Someone Asked Me If I Was Worried My Competitors Were Copying Me
Someone recently asked me whether I was concerned that a number of people in the franchising industry appeared to be plagiarising my content.
I had to think about that for a while.
Nobody particularly enjoys seeing something they've spent years developing suddenly appearing elsewhere dressed in slightly different clothes. When you've invested thousands of hours developing frameworks, writing books, creating courses, working with clients, testing ideas and occasionally getting things spectacularly wrong, including partnerships where others treated my IP like a cookie jar, before getting them right, there's a natural instinct to protect what you've created.
But after thinking about it, I found myself returning to the original vision for Franchising Made Easy®.
And that changed my perspective completely.
When I started Franchising Made Easy®, the vision wasn't simply to build another franchising consultancy, you know, the kind that steals your watch and tells you the time.
It certainly wasn't to create another business selling franchise agreements, operations manuals and templated documentation.
The vision was much bigger, although deliberately focussed:
To improve our little corner of the franchising industry.
If we're actually succeeding in doing that, perhaps I shouldn't be surprised when some of our thinking starts appearing elsewhere.
Imitation, Flattery and Mediocrity
Most of us know the expression:
"Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery."
The longer version is rather more entertaining:
"Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness."
It's frequently attributed to Oscar Wilde, one of my favourite writers, although apparently he didn't actually say it.
Perhaps there's some irony in that given the subject of this article.
But the sentiment raises an interesting question.
Where does learning from someone else's ideas finish and copying begin?
Because none of us operates in an intellectual vacuum.
Certainly not me.
I've spent decades working across franchising, corporate business, associations, start-ups and not-for-profits. I've learnt from extraordinary business leaders, lawyers, accountants, franchise executives, consultants, academics, franchisees and founders.
Some I've agreed with.
Some I've disagreed with.
And some have fundamentally changed the way I think.
That's how knowledge develops.
The danger comes when inspiration becomes imitation without acknowledgement.
I think there's a fairly simple distinction.
There is a difference between standing on someone's shoulders and standing in their shoes pretending they're yours.
I Stand on Plenty of Shoulders
I'll happily admit that much of my thinking has been influenced by other people.
That's not something to hide. It's something to celebrate.
One contemporary example is my former colleague, Joel Kleber.
A handful of us in franchising have believed for some time that traditional franchise recruitment marketing and sales are broken, or at least badly in need of renovation.
The old model was relatively straightforward.
Advertise a franchise opportunity.
Generate a lead
Call the prospect
Send the brochure
Get them into a meeting
Sell the opportunity
Repeat
That might have worked when information was scarce and franchisors largely controlled the buying journey.
That's not the world we live in anymore.
Today's prospective franchisee can investigate you before you've even discovered they exist.
They can Google your brand, investigate your directors, watch your videos, listen to podcasts, read your reviews, examine your social media, talk to existing franchisees and disappear down a Reddit rabbit hole at two o'clock in the morning.
The prospective franchisee increasingly controls the journey.
Several of us have been trying to encapsulate that change in our work.
But Joel has done an exceptional job of wrapping his arms around the problem, articulating it and, importantly, sharing what he has learnt.
I've clearly learnt from his succinct description of a well known problem.
We've incorporated elements of that thinking into our own work around something we may also have borrowed - although I cannot be sure who coined it first, called the Franchise Recruitment Trust Engine, combining those insights with our own experience, methodologies and practical work with emerging franchisors.
And I'm happy to tell you where the thinking came from.
That's the point.
Learning from other smart people doesn't diminish your expertise.
Pretending you invented everything does.
If You Want to Change Something, You Have to Share Something
This brings me back to the question I was asked.
Am I worried that people are copying Franchising Made Easy® content?
Sometimes.
There are obviously commercial boundaries.
Intellectual property matters. Proprietary methodologies matter. Copyright matters. There is a difference between being inspired by an idea and copying somebody else's work.
But there's also a bigger issue.
If Franchising Made Easy® genuinely wants to improve our little corner of franchising, we can't lock every useful idea in a cupboard.
We have to put ideas into the marketplace.
We have to publish.
We have to write books.
We have to make videos.
We have to develop courses.
We have to challenge conventional thinking.
We have to say things publicly that other people might disagree with.
And inevitably, some of those ideas will travel.
That's actually what ideas are supposed to do.
We're Trying to Change the Sequence
One of the biggest ideas we've consistently championed at Franchising Made Easy® is that aspiring franchisors often start their franchising journey in the wrong place.
They start with legal documentation.
I've written repeatedly that:
Legal documents record strategy. They don't create it.
That idea is increasingly appearing in conversations throughout the industry.
Good.
Because I believe it matters.
The traditional pathway too often begins with somebody deciding, "I want to franchise my business," followed almost immediately by, "I need a franchise agreement."
We believe the conversation needs to begin much earlier.
Is the business ready for franchising?
Does the business model actually work?
Are the unit economics sufficiently attractive?
Can the model be replicated?
Does the founder have the mindset required to become a franchisor?
Are the systems transferable?
Is the brand strong enough to attract franchisees and customers?
What is the growth strategy?
What are we actually trying to build?
Only then should we start translating those commercial decisions into legal documents.
If other advisers begin having those conversations with their clients because they've read our material, I'm hardly going to complain that the franchising industry has become slightly better.
That's what we wanted.
We're Trying to Change What "Ready for Franchising" Means
Another part of the Franchising Made Easy® vision has been challenging the idea that a business becomes ready for franchising simply because it's profitable and somebody has asked, "Do you franchise?"
That's not readiness.
That's an enquiry.
Our Six Franchising Success Criteria, our Foundation Programs, our Franchising Iceberg and the broader Franchising Made Easy® methodology have all been developed around a simple belief.
A franchise system can only be as strong as the business underneath it.
Franchising doesn't magically fix a business.
It replicates it.
If the economics are weak, you replicate weak economics.
If the systems are inconsistent, you replicate inconsistency.
If the customer experience depends entirely on the founder, you replicate dependency.
If the brand isn't clearly positioned, you replicate confusion.
This is why we spend so much time talking about foundations.
If that thinking influences other people in our sector to spend more time preparing businesses before they sell franchises, excellent.
Potential franchisees benefit.
Emerging franchisors benefit.
The lawyers ultimately receive better-prepared clients.
And the sector improves.
That's the vision.
The Same Applies to Franchise Recruitment
We're now applying exactly the same philosophy to franchise recruitment.
Recruitment isn't simply lead generation.
It isn't running an advertisement and waiting for someone to complete an enquiry form.
It isn't standing at an Expo handing brochures to everyone who walks past.
Franchise recruitment is fundamentally about building trust.
That trust may begin months before an enquiry.
The website matters.
Content matters.
Google matters.
Videos matter.
Founder visibility matters.
Existing franchisee stories matter.
Customer reviews matter.
The quality of the business itself matters.
The recruitment process should simply bring those elements together.
If our work encourages emerging franchisors to stop asking, "How do I get more leads?" and start asking, "Why should someone trust us with their life savings?," then we've moved the conversation forward.
And if somebody else adopts that thinking?
I'm comfortable with that too.
You Can't Advocate Change From Behind a Curtain
There's a price attached to putting ideas into the world.
People will disagree with you.
Some will criticise you.
Occasionally they'll ridicule you.
Some will take your ideas and improve them.
Others may take your ideas and forget to mention where they came from.
That's frustrating.
But the alternative is worse.
You can protect every thought you've ever had so carefully that nobody ever hears it.
Then you can be absolutely certain nobody copies you.
You can also be absolutely certain you change nothing.
I'd rather take the risk.
Because the value of Franchising Made Easy® isn't simply the collection of words we've already published.
It is our ability to keep learning.
To keep working with real businesses.
To keep testing ideas.
To discover what works and what doesn't.
To challenge our own assumptions.
And then to create what comes next.
Someone can copy yesterday's blog.
They can't copy tomorrow's thinking.
The Unreasonable Man
This brings me to another quotation I've always liked, this time from George Bernard Shaw.
He wrote that the reasonable man adapts himself to the world, while the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself.
His conclusion was:
"Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
There's something wonderfully uncomfortable about that idea.
Industries don't progress because everybody agrees to keep doing what they've always done.
They progress because somebody asks why.
Why do we start with legal documents?
Why do we recruit franchisees this way?
Why does the franchisor have to do that?
Why can't this process be simpler?
Why aren't we preparing founders better?
Why aren't we talking about financial modelling earlier?
Why aren't we treating franchising as an asset-building strategy rather than simply another way to open locations?
Some of those questions will lead nowhere.
Others may change the way we work.
But somebody has to ask them.
Back to the Original Vision
So, am I worried about people copying our content?
I'll protect our intellectual property where it needs protecting.
I'll acknowledge the people whose thinking influences mine.
And I'll continue expecting others to do the same.
But I'm not going to become so protective of our ideas that we stop sharing them.
Because that would contradict the very reason Franchising Made Easy® exists.
We want better-prepared franchisors.
We want stronger franchise systems.
We want more commercially sustainable franchisees.
We want founders thinking about strategy before documentation.
We want recruitment built around trust rather than pressure.
We want people to understand that franchising isn't simply about collecting royalties. It's about creating sustainable businesses, building enterprise value and giving other people the opportunity to build successful businesses within the system you've created.
And we want to keep challenging ourselves and the people around us to do it better.
So perhaps I've finally worked out my answer to the original question.
If people are borrowing our ideas, debating them, improving them and occasionally taking credit for them, perhaps we're doing exactly what we originally set out to do: changing our little corner of franchising.
Would I prefer they acknowledged where some of those ideas came from?
Of course.
I'm unreasonable.
Not stupid.
Speak With a Franchise System Architect
If you are exploring franchising and want to determine whether your business is ready for franchising, it helps to speak with someone who understands the structural side of franchise development.
At Franchising Made Easy®, we specialise in helping founders design franchise systems that are commercially viable, operationally disciplined, and built for long-term growth.
If you would like to explore your options, consider booking a consultation to discuss your business and expansion ambitions.
