CONCLUSION

IT can be very valuable for a franchise business to increase its efficiency and productivity.  In this paper we discuss how to manage working franchise knowledge using IT to build up the “family” relationship between franchisor and franchisees.  Leading franchising companies have been adopting the following emerging information technologies to progress the “family” relationship further: (1) Internet as an advertising and marketing tool to reach consumers; (2) Extranet as a tool for increasing back-office efficiency;  and (3) Intranet as a cost-effective web-based training and interactive communicating tool for linking the franchisor office and franchisees.

The concept of subscribing information technologies through ASPs sounds interesting and attractive.  In the franchising industry, the ASP concept looks even more appealing.  Due to the nature of franchising, an ASP providing excellent services to its client can duplicate the successes to other similar franchises quickly and inexpensively.  There are three types of applications: data, information, and knowledge.  We explained why it is better off to outsource the data and information applications to an ASP and keep the knowledge applications in house.  We also recommended building an Intranet-based knowledge repository to leverage the hard-earned working knowledge within the franchise system.