Signs Express UK Franchise
Company Facts
Signs Express franchise provides b2b signage. Signs Express is a white-collar managements based franchise business opportunity.
Signs Express is a full member of the British Franchise Appointments.
How much does a Signs Express franchise cost?
The minimum total cost of purchasing a Signs Express franchise is £87,500, of which you must provide a minimum of £32,500 of your own money.
Read about a day in the life of one of our franchisees
Mark Meadowcroft
Signs Express (Northampton)
A day in the life of a Signs Express franchisee
There's really no such thing as a typical working day in my role as a franchisee as it changes on a day-to-day basis. However, the main tasks remain the same and as a management franchise, the key to how I structure my day is based around managing my team and the business development as a whole. So in simple terms my expertise lies with managing my staff, meeting with new and prospective customers, carrying out site visits and quotations, and assessing the company accounts and marketing initiatives to continue to build the business.
The bonus as a sign franchise is that even though it’s up to me to grow my business I also have a team at Signs Express head office to help provide the tools and support to achieve my goals and help create business opportunities.
Managing the production team
Good management relies largely on communicating what’s required, expected and what should be prioritised daily. Each day kicks off with a team briefing to ensure everyone’s on target and a realistic schedule drawn up on the production board.
An experienced member of the team will need to take responsibility for the control of design and production of the signs and will therefore have the job to update the production schedule; a job which is vital to control the flow of work in and out of the centre. Current and upcoming jobs will need to be discussed including any particular special requirements such as materials, deadlines, site location etc.
Today, for example, we are applying vinyl to the first in a fleet of vehicles for a local builder; installing directional signage at a secondary school just round the corner from our production unit and also putting the finishing touches to a shop fascia and their promotional window graphics which need to be printed.
Marketing the business
It’s important to take a hand’s on approach with our marketing strategies. Our support team at head office helps us by providing resources to market the business and look for signage opportunities within the local area so everything is in place to help expand our customer base and increase our earning potential.
At some point throughout everyday I deal with both existing and prospective customers. This could involve customers visiting my centre or me going to their premises to discuss requirements.
Prospective customer visits would have originally been acquired through some form of previous marketing activity. My telemarketer takes control of the general marketing activity sending out eshots to company’s in the area and organising leaflet drops as well as follow up calls. Head office will send us data on different industry sectors to contact with direct mail and the support team will also handle online marketing such as our website, yell.com and local pay per click campaigns on google to enhance our search engine presence. The additional support really does help take the headache and additional stress out of the process. But there’s no better way to attract business than word of mouth; that’s why it’s important that we look after the customers we have and be the best we can be, as we never know who might be looking for a new signage provider.
As mentioned, my in-house telemarketer makes general calls to local businesses and handles the direct mail campaigns but I monitor the results and determine who needs to be followed up and what steps need to be taken to secure the business. I have a range of both tailor-made sales literature as well as generic corporate Signs Express material which all aids the sales process to show customers the wide range of options available.
Providing customer service
Working in the B2B sector requires both a quick turnaround and a high quality service. We want the customer to be so pleased with the service they have received that they automatically come back to us next time and recommend us to others. It’s these repeat and high volume orders that help make my franchise so profitable. After-sales care is also a vital element of business activities, so both myself, and my telemarketer follow up on completed work to gauge customer satisfaction levels. This all helps to ensure standards are maintained and any issues ironed out.
Quotes and accounts
Whilst the production team are out onsite or working in the production area, I continue with the day to day running and managing of the business, dealing with enquiries, putting together quotations and following up on previous quotes. I’ll also liaise with my accounts staff to keep track of money in and out to ensure everything is in line with monthly financial projections and that admin is up-to-date.
Business development
As the franchisee, business development is a main objective. I didn’t opt to take over a new territory area when I joined Signs Express but took on a franchise resale, an existing centre which was performing well but had lots of potential to grow even further.
This doesn’t happen over night, so spending time looking for new avenues to increase market share and flourish as a business does mean thinking out of the box and being on the constant look out for new opportunities. I often go to local networking events to pick up new contacts and learn about new government initiatives, and I also get involved with sponsoring events to get my name out there and to show support to loyal customers.
Each day I see fresh opportunities and new challenges which gives me a great sense of achievement and the enthusiasm to develop my franchise further by increasing market share and our financial results.
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