Franchise Friday – Episode 212 – with April Porter of Ask April Porter

In this episode with Melissa Pang and April Porter: Business Growth Strategist, Founder and CEO of Ask April Porter

Read more: https://futureoffranchising.com/podcast/franchise-friday-episode-212-with-april-porter-of-ask-april-porter/

As an award-winning entrepreneur with a proven record of success in growth strategy through lead generation, sales training, and employee performance, I have experienced first-hand the joy of building a business that creates a dream life. 

I am fulfilling my mission of teaching franchisees how to fill the gap between the franchise model and the executive-level know-how needed to increase revenues, build a reliable team, and scale to multiple locations. 

When I started as a first-time business owner, I was overwhelmed with the magnitude of responsibilities in areas that I was unfamiliar with (marketing, sales, employee development and financial management), so I fully immersed myself in learning how executives think, strategize, and execute. 

My approach to franchise ownership created explosive growth. We expanded to four locations in record time by cultivating a team of employees personally invested in exceeding expectations and maximizing performance. We used a strategic plan to motivate and empower everyone to drive toward the mission of reaching our BHAG, allowing me to delegate the daily operational tasks and become an absentee owner. 

With a passion for mentoring Franchisees, Entrepreneurs, and Small Business Owners, I began teaching the formula to multi-unit success – an evolution from an employee role inside the business into an Entrepreneur overseeing growth and expansion.

I am dedicated to mentoring franchisees that want to enjoy life, enhance their impact on the world and crush the competition. 

Franchisees come to us when they are ready to scale into higher profits, a larger team, multiple locations, or additional industries. We understand the opportunities and limitations of being in a franchise agreement, so we teach the executive tactics and strategies for massive growth that complement the franchise model. With a CEO who is an experienced attorney and award-winning (former) multi-unit franchisee, we offer a holistic approach to business ownership development.

April Porter has always BEEN A CHAMPION FOR THE UNDERDOG

She sold her franchise locations during the pandemic and founded "Ask April Porter" to dedicate her attention to creating more opportunities for franchisees and franchisors through advanced business education. Applying the same growth strategies used to expand her franchise locations that grew her new company from zero to six-figures in just four months.  April Porter has a team of franchising experts who have experience as franchisor corporate team members, franchisees, franchise sales brokers and franchise marketing specialists.

April hosts the #1 franchisee podcast, Infinite Franchisee and the only Facebook community dedicated to franchisees. She also moderates the Clubhouse Infinite Franchisee Club.  

Finally, I'm a #1 Amazon International Best-Selling Author through my involvement in the anthology "Fearless and Fabulous: Finding Your Way Through Change and Beyond" and an inductee of the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame.

Franchise Friday, where you can watch or listen as we explore franchising, entrepreneurship, and small business ownership, speaking with the franchise industry thought leaders and subject matter experts that shape the Future Of Franchising. #FranchiseFriday – For more about our podcast, visit our website: https://futureoffranchising.com/ Produced by Franchise Source Brands International and The Entrepreneur’s Source.

Transcript

Unknown: 0:14

Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of franchise Friday. I am Melissa Pang with the entrepreneur source and I am joined by the lovely fabulous Rockstar April Porter of ask April Porter and April, started as a lawyer, I then became a top performing franchisee at a very well known franchise brand, and now is the owner of her own company. That's really helping franchisors and franchisees just create better success and actually understand how to create that success. She's filling in the blanks, where we don't see a lot of conversation happening. So, April, welcome. So happy to have you. Oh, I'm so excited to be here. This like a party. I know. What did I do make a cocktail? No, but I will for next time. Um, so if you want to fill in a little bit more about your background? I'd love to hear a little bit about that before we jump in. Yeah, absolutely. So I started my career, as you said, as an attorney, I was actually a trial attorney, a prosecutor I prosecuted homicides, domestic violence. And am I frozen? There we go. Hello. We're working homicides, domestic violence and sexual assault. It is now you're gonna be good. Okay, great. So either We'll edit that out, or it'll be to some nice color in the in the overall video. This isn't the joys of the podcasting video world. Which is fine either way to be. Um, so yeah, so that was my I did that for 10 years, and it was high intensity, it was kind of dark at times. But most of all, it was extraordinarily strategic, because you got to be really strategic to get juries 12 strangers to agree to send someone to prison for the rest of their life. You know, you can't get your family to agree on what to have for dinner. So it's not an easy thing to do. But I did that for 10 years, and then decided I wanted to try something maybe lighter and fun. And so I ended up investing in a franchise. And it was a kickboxing franchise, I grew to four locations in less than three years, and got it to where I was only working five hours a week on the business meeting with my team members, they were growing the revenues, they doubled the revenues in six months, without me being in the in the business. And then of course, everybody wanted to know, what are you doing? So I was getting phone calls from around the country, people asking me to help them and I began consulting one on one, which I kept doing until I sold all of my locations in 2020. And had had really great success with the consulting and helping other franchisees and could see that there's this gap in the industry that really, there's nobody filling it and said, You know what, I'm going to rebrand, I'm going to make it so I can help groups of franchisees instead of one on one so I can help more people. And that's how we came up with ask a reporter. And even after this, I'm sure you're gonna get calls from people going, Okay, well, I too, would love to be working five hours in my business and seeing, you know, year over year extreme growth. So and I think to what's really interesting is just Yes, you've had that varied career, you know, from attorney to franchisee, and then into entrepreneur, startup business owner. But the word strategy for you is what ties it all together. When it comes to strategy around around those things. Where do you focus on with your clients, like, Who do you focus on could be multiple audiences, and what do you focus on with them? Right, our actual clients, the people that we're working with on a daily basis are franchisees, and what we're helping franchisees with, we refer to it as the franchise gap. So the franchisor is responsible for bringing for teaching the franchisee everything they need to know about the model. And that includes the product and service what makes it special How do you communicate to the to the potential customers about the product and service? And then how do you get it in their hands? Whether it's like a POS system? How do you bring it up? How do you track things those days those operations as they relate to the model. But what the franchisee needs to scale is they need to bring a certain level of business acumen, emotional intelligence, leadership skills, mindset for growth, and they need to understand how the different areas of business relate together, right? So many franchisees come in, and they are so psyched about the product or service. And they're super passionate about it, right? They're passionate about animals, they buy a dog grooming business, but they don't really know a lot about financials, they don't know a lot about legal liabilities, or what they should be thinking about as they make different moves in their business. When it comes to the legal side of things. They don't necessarily know about marketing strategy and how to move someone through a pipeline. They just kind of throw spaghetti at the wall and hope that it sticks. So we fill them in on all of those things, the strategy, the mindset, leadership skills, and really understanding how they have to look at their business holistically. And take all of that and apply it to the model. Absolutely. And you know, what I think is so interesting about what you do is I talk to franchisors all day long, and we really focus on Okay, when you're bringing in franchisees looking for those, you want to find the right people, you're, you want to create an experience for them upfront so that they can see themselves in your brand. And it's all about the dream and the vision. And let's let's get them on board because you want great franchisees for your system. But what you're talking about, and again, I like to call the franchise gap because there is something missing there is you're then talking about you're a franchisee you have the product, you have the service you kind of have you have the ops manual, you know, you have all these things, but then how are you putting that as a franchisee? How are you putting that into play into practice in a way that's getting you to your goals, that the goals that you want to get to that was the reason you joined the franchise so you can achieve these goals. But now that you're actually in it, like how you know, and it's that part of it that I think you bring phenomenal, that's where you're bringing the value to these franchisees 100%. And that that vision that you're talking about, you know, everybody, a lot of these first time business owners, they're coming from employment that they're unsatisfied with, right, so they're coming from being an employee for someone else, into owning their own business. And they're doing it because they have this like dream, this vision in their mind of how their life could be different if they are in control of their own destiny as a business owner, instead of stuck working for somebody else's vision or dream. And so we like to refer to that vision as swag, sanity, wealth and gratitude. Because it always involves, from the business owner perspective, some form of sanity they don't have now. So that usually means working fewer hours, having more freedom of time, being able to take vacations, you know more often longer do other experiences with their families, and involves a level of wealth that they don't think they can, they can attain with just weekly or bi weekly, paycheck. And then it usually involves gratitude, which really means living in peace of mind, being able to give back, maybe being able to be more charitable, because of that wealth, right? Being able to spend their time doing the things that bring them joy, like spending time with their family instead of just, you know, working and grinding away so that no matter what the specifics are, that vision really is about attaining swag, that's how we talk about it. So to attain swag, you have to be able to transition out of the habits and the programming, the subconscious programming that we've all had since honestly, since we started school, to show up at a certain time, get a certain amount of work done and then clock out. That's being an employee and it takes a completely different skill set a completely different mindset and a completely different way of communicating and leading the next generation which are going to be your employees in order to be able to attain that vision that you have. Right it's so much more and it's so interesting you guys call it swag and when we're kind of again in those beginning stages before someone becomes a franchisee we're talking to them about what we call it Are we is that how cool but income, lifestyle, wealth and equity, which covers all of those pieces. And so what I do think is interesting as well, and this is so important is we're talking about the why before they become the franchise, because that's what's fueling them to take that leap of faith and become a franchisee, and then you're talking about it on once they're on the other side. But, again, that why that's going to drive them to find those strategies. And, and you can probably talk about it a little bit better than I can but, you know, drive them to want to get to those, that they're not stuck in the in the, it's still in the employee mindset, you know, taking it to the next level, they do have to change some things to get there. Well, and the reality is, let's take it from the franchisor perspective for a second, franchisors are looking at this and saying, I'm given the same thing to all of my franchisees, all of them got the same training manual, they all got the same operations manual, they all got the same model, we're offering the same support to all of these franchisees. And still, I have people at the very top that are killing it. I've got people that at the bottom that are like, struggling, and they're getting dissatisfied and becoming disgruntled. And then I've got all these people that are hanging out in the middle that are doing, they're doing just fine. So as a franchisor, you need to ask yourself, if if it's apples to apples, why are they all having a different experience, and it's because of what they're bringing to the table to complement the model with. And they have various degrees of these have the strategy, the mindset, all the things we've talked about. And and the difference between the top and the middle. And the bottom, honestly, probably is not what they bring to your system. But it's how fast they realize that they have to supplement what you're giving them with some kind of outside learning. And they realized quicker than the rest of your system that they have to personally evolve. If they want to be able to take the brand to where to where it could possibly go. That was me, right? Like I got in, I learned everything the franchisor had to teach me by three months in, we were profitable. And we were running like clockwork, according to the model. And I'm sitting there like, Well, alright, things are good. But this isn't my vision, I don't want to be working in the gym, and I can't be in four places at once. So what do I need to do. And so I realized I need to go out and figure it out and supplement the model with my, my own potential, I need to reach my own potential and then supplement the model, not expect the model to just take me to my potential. I saw a lot of different things here, where, again, you're talking about experience, which is amazing, because you were talking about that before, it's all about experience the whole way through. But then also, you can't cookie cutter candidates before they become franchisees, you can't just like push them through a process because they're all at different spots of life. Some have jobs, some don't, some are retiring, some have young kids, you know, are traveling to a 24/7 they're all at different places, they're all in different mindsets. Why would that change once someone becomes a franchisee they don't all of a sudden just fit the mold and you can give all of these things? I don't think it's necessarily obviously as a franchise, you have to the guidelines, you have the set structures, but what do you see as especially just going into this year, the next 12 months, what do you see is really important for and you can speak to it from the franchisor side or and or the franchisee side as something to focus on, be aware of and kind and then be able to do what you're saying which is create customize that experience? How can you get more of your franchisees aware that they need to evolve personally, to get to the next level and actually achieve the goal that they they started with? Right? Well the number one recommendation I would make to every franchise system and ultimately this is one of our true missions of our company is to change the conversation that's happening when people are going through the the validation process before they sign their franchise agreements. And that conversation really needs to include well first of all, it needs to stop people need to stop saying we give you everything you need to be successful. Because franchise franchisees hear that And they like they get really literal about it right, because they believe I'm buying the franchise so that you will show me how to become a business owner. And that's not really what you're what you're promising to show them, you're promising to show them how to operate this particular model. And, but when they hear everything, that's what they believe. And so they, you'll have franchisees who get upset when they're not successful, because they took it to mean that they would be it was a guarantee of success. Or you'll get franchisees, like those middle ones who are doing fine. But they're not going to take initiative to do better, they're sitting there and waiting for you to give them the next step in their evolution, because you're supposed to be giving them everything to be successful. So let's stop saying things like that. And instead, let's be really clear from the beginning, we are providing you the model. And we know that when you use the model, it works, but you have obligations as a franchisee. And what you need to be bringing to the table is an entrepreneur mindset. You need to bring strategies, both in marketing strategies, growth strategies, and reach recruitment and retention strategies for your employees. You need to also bring leadership skills to develop those employees and delegate to them so that they can help you build the business. And that's how you're going to scale. But that's your obligation to bring those things. And if you don't know how to do those things, because you've been an employee somewhere, then you need to be prepared to invest in professional development alongside the other investments you're making to grow this business. So put a line item in your budget right now you've got How much are you spending each month on marketing? How much are you spending each month on professional development, it needs to be an expectation. And that's how you're going to get your brand to grow faster, because your franchisees are going to be growing. And then franchisees that can change that mindset, they're your hottest leads for your next locations, right, so you want every franchisee capable of opening 234 locations, that's a much better growth plan than finding another person that's just totally green on the streets to open one. And you're also going to have on the validation side, I mean, they're just so tied both sides to the growth of the franchise, you have the internal growth from franchisees year over year, and then also the growth of bringing in new but then your validation is going to be so much better, as well. And, and at the end of the day, it's all about the long term growth, like you don't want to do this flash in the pan. If you are serious about franchising, you don't want to do the flash in the pan, you want to franchisees who are going to renew their 10 years, you know, after 10 years, they're going to renew, they're going to go into more locations. And it's not just the status quo. They're aiming to get, you know, higher and higher. But I think it's really interesting that you bring in the professional development piece of it, because again, yeah, we don't really don't really talk about that at all on the franchisee side. Right? And that's, that's what you really see it a lot. A lot of times you see franchisees they're like overconfident that they're going to be successful, right? Because because they generally pick a brand they're passionate about. And because they're high achievers, they're like, I've got this right, I've worked, you know, with dogs my whole life. So yeah, they're gonna teach me how to do a dog hair cut. But I'm great with dogs, I love dogs. And I'm also a people person. And so I'm going to be successful. And it's like, you're going to be a successful dog groomer. But you need to be a successful business owner. And you need to be if you want to be you know, if you're if your vision if your vision of swag includes spending weekends on your boat, then you need to probably own more than one location. And you can't be great with the dogs cutting hair and own multiple locations because you can't be in two places at once. Exactly the whole mindset thing and it's funny like here at the entrepreneur stores we have like you have your coaching hat and then you have your business owner hat you know, you're wearing these different hats and that's when as you're like you're going in with the employee mindset or that you know, the almost like the man in the van type type of mindset. And then how do you put on your board of directors hat or your owner hat, you know, like and switch from one to the other. So, on the franchisor side, how was that? How can they start fostering that? Okay, we talked about invalidation. Starting to have those conversations with their potential franchisees what happens on the other side Then to get franchisees into that place? Well, I mean, the reality is, is that this type filling the franchise gap I've had franchisors asked me before, well, why don't we just add it to our it's the support we're giving to franchisees. And the reality is, is you can't, and that's not a dig, stay with me here. You don't have the bandwidth or the budget, to do what is necessary to teach these individuals at these different levels. Like, you know, like you said, it's, you have some people coming in with small kids, some people who are retired, like all these different life experiences, well, that feeds into their own limiting beliefs, their own limiting beliefs, are affecting the way that they lead their team, the way that they interact with customers, the decisions that they make regarding investments in marketing, or other tools that can make them more efficient. And so you have to be able to give them a significant amount of personal attention, to identify what those subconscious patterns are, and to help them overcome them. And if you as a franchisor, start spending your time and energy doing that one, you're going to have to hire a lot more personnel, just because there aren't enough hours in the day to get everybody as often as you need to. And to you're going to have to hire very skilled franchise business coaches that can get into all of this emotional intelligence and psychology and do a lot more training. But three, you've need to be focusing on the brand and growing the brand you should be focusing on how are you going to sell more locations? How are you going? How are you keeping your eye on the competition so that you can evolve your product and services to always stay ahead of the game? What new technologies are coming out that can make your brand more efficient, and that could do a cost savings for your franchisees? Those are the things you should be focusing your time energy and your money on not helping, you know, Billy Joe get over his childhood trauma that has made him not want to spend a dime, more, you know, like only I'm only paying employees $12 An hour no more no matter what. Okay, well, you're not gonna find employees, right. So we got to get over that thought process. And there's a huge process to doing it. So for us, like when we work with franchisees, they have eight opportunities every month to meet with us in a face to face coaching group setting. They're doing assignments where we can review what they've done, and we can identify where they're where, where their beliefs are, where the the road bumps are, that are holding them back. The things that are coming up that that show us, okay, I see where I see where your line of thinking is. Now let's introduce some other perspectives. And let's talk that through and we can help them make those switches. But it's because we that's all we do. So we put all of our bandwidth and all of our time and money into that type of support. So So yeah, so I would say franchisors don't try to do it yourselves, find someone to support your franchisees like us or, you know, there's other business coaches out there for the past, but no, no, but, but just you acknowledge that they need, they need that additional support. And to be quite honest, you encourage them, franchisees don't have to use us, they could even just have, honestly a therapist, somebody helping them work on becoming the person that can run a franchise empire, instead of becoming the person that can operate a single location. Not just their business, and the the numbers and all of those strategies that go along with that. But there's this whole other side to things. And having both you're going to see that growth that you saw in your business. And then I'm sure you see with client to kind of get those things clicked in together. Yeah. And you asked me for an example and one of our clients said, I think you saved my marriage. I mean, yeah, he'd been he's been a friend. He's been a franchisee for 30 years. He started out as an employee in his franchise and he was an employee for five years and the franchisor sold him a location. And this is his 30th anniversary as a franchisee. He's got two locations. And he started working with us officially like a year and a half ago. And he was still he was still working so many hours that at times he would sleep in his store. Because he was working so many hours when he came to us, and I was like, No, we're not doing this. This is not a way to live. You literally been doing this for 30 years like, this is not the dream that you had, that you would be sleeping in your store after 30 years of business ownership. And so we put him through, like the structured, the program that we put people through originally is extremely structured, you have to go in order, because it layers, the lessons layer on top of each other as we make these shifts. And he's completely out of working in his business. He's not on the schedule at all. He, his focus is on developing his team, and they're the ones growing the locations. He in 2022, they had their biggest revenue years ever. And he is now looking to acquire his third location and in talks to acquire the third location with no plans of working in it, but to be the one developing it. So I mean, like, it's amazing, you know, it's truly life changing. I love that so much like someone for 30 years, just plugging away and thinking, Okay, this is it. And then in a year and a half sees that switch that transition. So tell us the magic secrets. Because all of them here a fall. But I think too, it does come down to again, the I really like you're you had mentioned this before the example of you know, you have a kindergartener and you're not going to move them up to seventh grade, you're not going to have your middle schooler and put them in preschool, you know, like there's that customized, tailored experience doesn't just exist for your candidates, your franchise candidates, potentials, it's 100%, just as much true on the other side, and I think maybe as a franchisor, we can think, well, I don't think my friendship my franchisees are working, you know, they're not sleeping in their store. They're not doing all those things, but how well do we as franchisors actually know what's going on in the lives of our franchisees to the level to that level, you know, where you, you actually can, if you get in on that more granular level, you can see massive changes, and imagine that, and you, whatever, 10, exit 100 You know, 100, exit across all your franchisees, oh my gosh, now your system is on a whole nother level. And it affects everything. Well, and I have franchisors who will sometimes say to me, like, Oh, my franchisees won't invest in that. They're not going to invest in that they're not going to pay any money, you know, for coaching or whatever it is. And it's so interesting to me, because it does really show exactly what you're talking about is like how well do we really know what's going on in their in their heads. And the reality is, is the example I gave about a franchisee telling their, their franchise business coach, like I need more employees, so my wife doesn't divorce me, they're never going to tell you that because it's shameful. It's hurtful to say out loud, like I've put myself in a position now where I could lose my family, you know, so most of the time, franchisees are not going to actually tell you their biggest pain points as the franchisor because it's shameful, and because they don't want you to be disappointed in them. You believed in them to offer them a franchise and they don't want to admit that they feel like they're failing, even if the numbers say that they're not. So they're gonna play the game of like, yeah, it's good. Everything's good, you know, and meanwhile, they're dying on the inside. A lot of them a lot of them really are. And that's kind of the beauty of the fact that I've been a franchisee I've seen it. I know it. I've there's times in my franchise journey where I felt that way. And so when I can talk to those things about people, they're like, Oh, my God, I didn't have to say it out loud. And yet, you knew what I was thinking. And it and you were able to get out of that life. That's not That's not who you are. That's not your life. You've been successful. And then instantly, it changes from this despair to hope like, oh my gosh, well, then how is it possible? So even though franchisors are like my people won't even invest in the marketing that's going to grow their business? Well, why marketing isn't gonna save their marriage, right? They Well, once they get there once the marriage is, yes, the cure? Oh, yeah, I'll invest in the marketing. And they have a totally different mindset, then then they're like, I see why I need to make this investment because I'm thinking like an entrepreneur and I, and I see where I was wrong before and I was in scarcity mode, and I was in protection mode. And really, I have to be open to see seizing opportunities and that requires investments. And it's just a complete switch. And what I love about all of this is the word like just humanizing franchising, and this is about people, it like on so many different levels. And I'm not seeing anything earth shattering here. But I think it's a really good reminder that as you get into this, the race or you get into the that kind of journey of bringing in franchisees getting the numbers, we're looking at KPIs, I want year over year growth, I want X dollars in revenue, and, you know, customers and marketing spend, and we can sometimes lose sight of the fact that these are people, and we brought people into our business, and how do we connect with them, make them successful, and allow them to actually achieve like, you're talking about empowering people. That's what we talk about as well. But I think science, we can lose sight of that in all the stuff, which is awesome. Yeah. And I know you guys go through the ill we but I would challenge the franchisors that are watching how many of you actually know what each franchisees definition of success is in your system? Like, have you asked them to fill out a vision board? Have you asked them when you reach the level of success you hope to reach using this model? What will your life look like? Because the reality is, if you did that, just in my brain, I just had this flash of like, you know, kids projects on a string and a teacher's class. But if you put them side by side, they're all going to look different. They all have a very different definition of what that swag is for them. And so the model is designed to get everybody to, like you said the same spot, which is really the franchisors definition of success, which is let's get you profitable, we'll have some people who kind of hang out there, we'll have some people who who exceed it. And we'll have some people who unfortunately come in underneath it. But if we put if we give everybody the tools to get to profitability, then we've delivered on our promise, right. And that's your vision of success, and it works for your business model, because your business is selling franchises. And there's nothing wrong with that I don't want anyone to think I'm criticizing that. That's not what I'm saying. But those individual franchisees, their their vision of success is different. And for some of them, it does it is profitability and grooming the dogs, that is what I want out of life, I just want to every day I want to spend around dogs, and I want to buy myself a job. And if I'm making money at it, and I'm happy, it's better than whatever I was doing before. And that that's my vision of success. And that's beautiful. But for other people, they're dreaming of taking three vacations a year with their family, and they find themselves sleeping on the floor of the store, never taking a vacation and not even making a home for dinner. And that's where that's where you're going to start to really see some breakdowns, not just in the numbers and the overall health of the system. But that's where that relationship between franchisee and franchisor starts to break down. Because people feel like, this doesn't matching my expectations. This isn't what I was sold. Yeah. 10 I just love that we're talking about this. You know, we could talk about this for like hours. Because it's so it's so interesting to me because it's so crucial to the health of the business. But it's again, that gap that that's missing. So, okay, as we get we asked, we could talk for, you know, 10 more hours here. As we wrap up to two things. One is in 2023, what should people focus on? In and then number two, where can people find you? Okay, 100%. So 2023 This is not what I'm about to say, if you've been listening so far, it's not going to come as any surprise to you. But 2023 We all know that there we're bracing for a recession, right? And franchisees, this for your franchisees this is going to bring a lot of fear up, they're going to be fearful that due to a recession, less money will be coming in. Now one you don't want them to have that mindset because we all know that thoughts become actions and actions become results. So if they believe that less money is coming in their actions are going to fall right in line with that belief, which for most of them means they're going to stop investing in things. They're going to start trying to save money by. Okay, I'm going to cut my marketing I I'm gonna, you know, maybe I'm gonna get rid of a couple of the software systems that make me more efficient, but it's costing me money. So now we're spending more hours we're less efficient, we're less productive, we're doing less marketing, guess what less people are coming through the door. That means less money is coming through the door, we've obviously created our own reality. So franchisors, you need to be prepared to support your franchisees at a higher level, you need to be prepared for these beliefs and thoughts starting to interfere with their ability to thrive. And you need to be out in front of it and having these conversations with them about about this. Also, I would say focus on as a franchisor is going to bring your freedom franchisees more competence if you're focused on something that is directly related to increasing their revenue, but they have to believe it. So if you come out of the gate and you say something like, Okay, guys, we're going to raise prices. franchisees are going to say raise prices, were coming out of recession, people are going to be spending less money on things if we raise prices, that's going to drive even more customers away. So you really need to be cognizant about that that franchisee perspective and the conclusions that they're going to draw from the initiatives that you put out there that maybe you didn't intend, and and just be ready to, to invest in higher level of support to help them get through and help them overcome what's happening in the rest in the recession. I mean, I believe, I know Warren Buffett said it and I saw a TED talk on it as well. But there was some type of case study done in 2000, after the 2008 recession, that showed what did the businesses that made it through the recession without closing? What did they do differently from the ones that closed, and across the board, it was that they invested, they actually made an vestments, and we're focused on spending and growing instead of trying to save and survive. And I think we saw that too, coming out of 2020 where I know they're the ones that just shut down stopped and stopped all momentum. Let's just hold on to our reserves. And coming out of it. They had to build up again, so much more than those who said you know what, we're going to keep on we're going to power through this, here's the strategy that we're going to take, we can get through this, here's how and then they came out on top and they actually came through better than expected better than the year previous and just had a lot of momentum. So 100% get ahead of get ahead of the fear and support your franchisees where can people find you April? Well, I'm you can connect with me on LinkedIn, just let's connect but um, check out our website, ask April porter.com. And you can find out all of the details about how we help franchisees on a daily basis and how we work with franchisors to do so. In addition, we have a big conference, we are holding the only franchisee business and development conference Business Education and Development Conference that is mixed industry in the franchising industry. And it's an April here in St. Louis, and we're super excited about that. So we'd love to see franchisees coming and learning about some of these advanced marketing strategies, exit strategies, how to value a business and wealth, wealth strategies, growth all the all the things so amazing. You can see APR and APR, if you would so if you so desire, so, and we'll put that information too in the Kimberley the same as we're gonna put it in the show notes. Okay. Who am I? Someone stopped anyways, April, thank you so much. I covered so many different topics and I love that we are aligned in our approach even though we do different things. Again, it's that that person, the individual is is at the center of it all. So thank you so much for joining me today and I look forward to chatting more at a later date. Me too.