Your Franchise is Waiting President Jane Stein Joins Us On Join Up Dots
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Introducing Jane Stein
Jane Stein is a certified franchise consultant and the Founder and President of Your Franchise is Waiting, where she and her team assist people in growing and diversifying their wealth through business ownership.
Previously employed with a large Wall Street firm, Jane was a Certified Financial Planner for more than two decades, providing comprehensive wealth management solutions for individuals representing over 250 million in assets.
Jane now guides others through a due diligence process to identify and evaluate their options in the franchise space, using her extensive financial background as a guiding principle.
She previously wrote an investment column for a major metropolitan newspaper, as well as conducted public seminars branded as “Money Matters for Women.”
How The Dots Joined Up For Jane
With a special interest in helping women take charge of their financial futures, Jane’s goal is to help future franchisees identify opportunities that meet their interests, lean into their skill sets, and fall within their budget.
She not only listens closely to her clients but also reads between the lines to help them find a business that will provide them with much-needed control over their careers and lifestyles.
Jane is incredibly proud to say that not one of her clients has failed.
So what is and what isnt a franchise and can we all be franchisees reasonably easily?
And how expensive is it to start right at the beginning when you are trying to build your wealth?
Well let’s find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots with the one and only Jane Stein
Show Highlights
During the show we discussed such weighty subjects with Jane Stein such as:
We discussed how McDonalds has built their business, and what steps you need to take to jump into the fast food network.
Jane, shares her route to burnout in her consulting business and why her route to retiring early didn’t end as planned.
We discuss how we all will need to overcome the fear of not niching down deep enough for fear of missing out.
And lastly….
Jane shares how she has created a business that she can take with her around the world – the dream of many.
How To Connect With Jane Stein
Return To The Top Of Jane Stein: Your Franchise is Waiting
Full Transcription of Jane Stein Interview
Intro [0:00]
Life shouldn’t be hard life should be a fun filled adventure every day. So now start joining up dots tap into your talents, your skills, your God given gifts and tell your boss, you don’t deserve me. I’m out of here. It’s time for you to smash that alarm clock and start getting the dream business and life you will, of course, are dreaming of. Let’s join your host, David Ralph from the back of his garden in the UK, or wherever he might be today with another JAM PACKED episode of the number one hit podcast. Join Up Dots.
David Ralph [0:40]
Good morning to you all. Good morning, and welcome to another episode of Join Up Dots. It’s an interview show today we’ve done a lot of solo shows recently. So we’re back on the interviews and today we’re going to be talking to a certified franchisees our franchise not branches. That’s I don’t know what franchise is consultant and the founder of President of your franchise is waiting, where she and her team assists people in growing and diversifying their wealth group business ownership. previously employed with a large Wall Street firm, she was a certified financial planner for more than two decades, provide comprehensive wealth management solutions that individuals representing over 250 million in assets. Now she guides others through a due diligence process to identify and evaluate their options in the franchise space using her extensive financial background as a guiding principle. Now with a special interest in helping women take charge of their financial futures. Her goal is to help future franchisees identify opportunities that meet their interests, lean into their skill sets and fall within their budget. And she’s incredibly proud to say that not one of our clients is fouled. Wow. So what is it? And what isn’t a franchise? And can we all be franchisees reasonably easily? And how expensive is it to start right at the beginning, when you’re actually trying to build your wealth? Well, let’s find out as we bring them to the show to start joining up dots with the one and only Jane Stein. Good morning, Jane, how are you?
Jane Stein [2:14]
Good morning, David. Thank you. Thank you for having me.
David Ralph [2:17]
It’s lovely to have you here. lovely to have you here. So I struggled to be frank cheese and franchise. So it’s, so it’s not something that you put on your toast. It’s our your pizza, it’s something when you build businesses and buy businesses, yeah.
Jane Stein [2:32]
Yeah. And it made me want to think about Who Moved My Cheese, which is one of my favourite books. But anyway, yeah, franchise is a, you know, regulated kind of business. You know, if you’re an owner of a mom and pop, H fac business and 10 years down the road, you want to grow your business, you have two options, as of as a, you know, franchisor, potential franchisor. And that’s to, you know, use your own money and expand nationwide, or partner with other invested partners, and use the franchise model to distribute your business nationwide. So a franchise is a just a business structure where there’s specific fees involved, certain things you’re always going to pay, you’re always going to pay a franchise fee, upfront, that’s a flat fee up front, which gives you the right to do business with that entity in your particular territory. If it’s a territory based franchise, you’re also going to give them a percentage of your gross revenues, that’s called royalties, often you’re going to contribute to a marketing fund of some sort. So first of all fees are what make it a franchise, believe it or not, you will be regulated by the Federal Trade Commission. And that’s a good thing. Because if you as the consumer are looking to invest in a franchise, you are going to have a tremendous amount of data points at your disposal as is required under these federal trade commission guidelines. So I’ll stop talking but yes, that is simply a type of business where you are in partnership more or less with the corporate entity, you’re given certain things in return for your fees.
David Ralph [4:35]
Right. Okay. I’m glad you said you were gonna slow down because I was ready to jump in because I had so many questions were so so in layman’s terms. I’ve got a brick and mortar business I have actually but let’s call it join up. dots.com Okay. And I decided that I want another business in another town. I could either start my own or I could find somebody doing something exactly the same. Um, buy in to their business, and then call it Join Up Dots as well. And then buy another one in another town. So I’m just looking at established businesses with as established client bases, but I can just basically rebrand under my own name. Would that be right?
Jane Stein [5:17]
You could do that. But that’s wouldn’t be a franchise.
David Ralph [5:21]
Oh, I thought you were gonna say I was so clever, Jane, I thought you are. I thought now.
Jane Stein [5:26]
You 100% are? Yeah. So that’s one way of expanding that’s using your own money. Right? Yep. But let’s say you wanted to expand and you had a big vision, and you want to Join Up Dots all over the UK, chances are you don’t have the $5 million required to do so
David Ralph [5:47]
I’m very successful. My podcast is very successful.
Jane Stein [5:51]
Nor would you want the brain damage. But anyway, the other option would be to franchise and there’s a third option, which is to sell licences. And I’m not in that world. But that is your third opportunity. And that is to sell people the right to open a Join Up Dots in their town. They’re in charge of it. It’s their money, they own the business. And they pay you a licencing fee for your operations manual, and your instructions and your support,
David Ralph [6:19]
which is the classic sort of McDonald’s sort of model, I imagine.
Jane Stein [6:23]
Yeah, McDonald’s is a classic franchise, though, that’s different from licencing. I swim in the pool of the franchise world, where it is like McDonald’s, I represent probably 800 brands that are not McDonald’s, that are younger in their growth cycle, where they don’t yet have one on every corner. And yep, so
David Ralph [6:50]
let’s use McDonald’s as our sort of like, because we all understand McDonald’s, we’ve got one on every corner, as we say. And so a mom and dad, they start a business, and they basically buy into the rights of using McDonald’s stuff. And now you run the shop, but McDonald’s own the land and the shop. That would be right. Yeah. Is is that that’s sort of where we’re heading with this conversation, using McDonald’s as the sort of benchmark or what we understand.
Jane Stein [7:20]
Well, I hate to be the one to correct you on your very own show. But the
David Ralph [7:26]
woman your woman, I’m used to it, Jane. That’s what we do. That’s what we do very well. Yes. You’ve already locked your husband out the room before you recorded Yes. I know who’s in charge.
Jane Stein [7:40]
By once having walk in in his underwear what literally when I was on a call with a gentleman from Asia, so that was pretty funny. The, in the in a true franchise world what people maybe don’t realise. So this is good that we’re uncovering this now. McDonald’s, does not own your land. McDonald’s does not own your building. McDonald’s does not own anything, but the rights to the trademark. And they have the right to enforce that you run that McDonald’s, which is your own business. You either lease or buy the land, you did the $2 million. build out. What you get from McDonald’s is the operations manual, the trademark, you’re gonna get the marketing support, but it is your business. You 100% Own it, you can sell it. You can buy the land. I don’t know what percentage of McDonald’s people do that, actually. But yeah, it is your own business, not McDonald’s.
David Ralph [8:43]
Now, okay. So I watched the film The founder, just before we started, so I thought why this is my research. I’m gonna watch the founder, love the film, see it two or three times? And now I’m totally on the wrong track. That’s where we are. Yeah.
Jane Stein [9:01]
No, you’re not on the wrong track at all. David,
David Ralph [9:04]
let’s jump back into you. And then I’m gonna get me Brian into gear for the conversation here. So you worked in a corporate land for 20 years? What made you suddenly don’t dive into this? Or maybe it wasn’t suddenly maybe it was around you all the time. And you just saw a different way of doing it. Because you was you were settled? Weren’t you? You as a certified financial planner. You could have grown old gracefully in that business.
Jane Stein [9:32]
I could have. Yeah, what happened was, and I’m curious how often this happens. I had a super successful practice I had I had brought in partners I brought in a team built a team was you know, one of the top producers nationwide. i After about 15 years. I was one Hi 100% burned out. I wasn’t learning anything. I, you know, I felt like I was having the same conversations day in day out, you know the nature of a long term consulting business of any kind, I consider that, you know, I was helping people manage their money. The goal is you keep your clients for 20 years, which I did, I rarely lost a client. But the nature of that is it’s the same people, it’s the same conversations every time the market as a hiccup, you’re reminding them. I was stagnant. And for some people, I think personality is is important to for self awareness. Lots of people like that they liked the stability, the knowing it was a recurring revenue model, I made a lot of money that afforded us an incredible lifestyle. But I woke up every morning with a stomach ache when I realised it was a weak day. And I just am one of those people who need is a need to change, I need a change of venue, I needed a change of, you know, I need to feel like I’m learning something new. So at the time, I didn’t realise, you know, what was happening, I just 911 had happened right around then. And I just turned to my husband one day and said, Look, I think we have enough money to retire. I don’t think I want to do this anymore. And I don’t think I want to live in Houston, Texas anymore. So we went on a two year quest to see where we wanted to live. We literally picked up our young children, moved them away from my mother, which was probably in retrospect, not a great idea, picked a place out, you know, literally threw a Dart on the map of a place that we thought would be cool to live where outdoor people we wanted to live in Colorado, and be near ski slopes. And basically, we retired at a very young age, I was 47. My husband was 55. We had young children, and one of my children has pretty profound learning differences. And I needed and wanted to be more involved in the classroom and in in the upbringing of my children. I had nannies up until them that more or less were with my kids during the days. And so that’s what we did. And after about eight years, nine years, I realised I was bored out of my mind. My kids were older, they didn’t need me, I was tired of not talking about business and not being around really smart people every day, and having those conversations that were stimulating and intellectually challenging. So I thought I would buy a franchise because we had capital. And at the time what I thought that meant was that you invested your money. And going back to McDonald’s. McDonald’s ran it for you. You owned it. Yeah, you threw money at it, but they just do everything. That’s exactly
David Ralph [13:14]
what I bought Jane when I own I own a business myself, which is very offhand I don’t do a lot bit. But I’m amazed how much time my little bit of time takes to just keep this thing ticking over.
Jane Stein [13:31]
Right? I mean, honestly, if that’s the way franchising works, we would all just jump all over it but so that’s what happened. I started clicking on things on the internet on Frant best franchises for women best franchises for Boulder, you know, I was just like randomly doing these. So just
David Ralph [13:47]
clarifying this for the listener. At this point. You didn’t have any background knowledge other than you as a financial lady. You were sort of fed up with your life a new just felt a need to do something else. You weren’t an expert. You didn’t just land in this, you had to start from scratch.
Jane Stein [14:07]
100% not only was I not an expert, I was a complete ignoramus. I mean, literally, I knew nothing. I had never read a book about franchises. I just had this vague idea of what it was
David Ralph [14:19]
about you read 50 Shades of Grey though.
Jane Stein [14:21]
Oh, well, I’m not telling ya. Any date
David Ralph [14:25]
is the only book that my wife has ever read.
Jane Stein [14:29]
She would kill you if she thought you said that. Any way I Yeah, that’s what happened. So I start clicking around on the internet not realising that. When you do that, in the US, I’m sure it’s the same in the UK. Basically, what you’re clicking on are lead portals for franchise brokers like myself, like a person whose job it is to, you know, scoop you up, talk to you about what it is Looking for show you different franchises, we’ll talk more about what I do in a minute. So anyway, the long and short of it is, I was getting inundated with cold calls from as I lovingly refer to them old white guys in their shorts working out of their basements. So that’s me, that’s me at the moment. But I know you’re in your garden.
David Ralph [15:23]
I haven’t even I haven’t even got my shorts on. That’s that sounds that’s bad. I am
Jane Stein [15:29]
visualising that now. But anyway. So they all of a sudden, the light bulb went off these people weren’t super well trained. I, you know, I just felt like, wow, this is an industry that is ripe for transformation, bringing in a little professionalism and a little smart,
David Ralph [15:48]
you have a little bit of that kind of because we’ve seen this time and time again, you realise it’s a good idea. And then you go to bed the next morning, you wake up and you kind of think, who am I? Who am I to do this? You know, somebody else must be out there already. Did you not have this? Or was it just a gradual move in the right direction as that light bulb went off?
Jane Stein [16:10]
It’s funny, I listened to your thing about fear. And I laugh about it. I am one of those people with ridiculous amount of overconfidence in certain things. And sometimes it serves and sometimes it doesn’t. But the bottom line is I never doubted that I could do this and be better than 80% of the people that were out there doing it because I had had these conversations with them. And I felt like a lot of them were doofuses.
David Ralph [16:34]
I love that word. We don’t have that over here where you’re better than that. But that says so much. Now, the thing about doofus is is that they can still make a lovely living, and which is which is amazing to me. Now, I always say through the show when when you see competition. It’s not something to be scared of. It’s just how can I do it better than them? Simple as that? What can I bring? What’s my unique selling point? So I know you’re very focused in on helping ladies was that the the focus was that your USP at the beginning that you was going to be niching down on to the sort of the female side of things.
Jane Stein [17:15]
It was I how that came about is I started going to networking events, kind of feeling out the process of what this would look like. And I would meet occasionally other franchise brokers and I and I would say hey, I’m getting into the business. And I just I’m going to try and work mostly with women. And they all said, Oh, why would you want to do that? So I again, really felt like I was on to something. It was a niche. It’s what I did when I was a financial planner. I’m comfortable with women, I think women are super smart. And it turns out women make great business owners. So yeah, that’s where I started. It’s morphed a little, by the way. Because I’m not sure you can make a living just focusing that small of a niche, not that it’s that small. And frankly, in my business, as I’m sure yours when you get a lead, it’s happens to be a man great. You know what I mean? At work, Whoever comes to me,
David Ralph [18:13]
though, I’m interested, more than interested, because we talk about niching, down niching down niching down, and you’ve kind of niched 50% of the world’s population. And I know there’s there’s different genders and stuff out there. But just, I’m an old guy, 50% men, 50% women, and you still think that you couldn’t make a living based on that niche?
Jane Stein [18:36]
Well, I certainly think I could have, but I’m not that smart to know how to target my marketing, specifically in such a way I have tried, and I did try in the beginning. You know, I did Facebook ads, and I put ads on Architectural Digest in places where I thought women would be. But the truth is, let’s let’s put it this way. Not every person is a potential client of mine, right? My clients are people who are thinking of investing in a franchise, that already is a niche. Right. So to only be drilling down on half of those people, I just feel like in my business, you know, it’s a unique consulting practice, I mainly will work with at any given time three to four people at a time. And if I have 10 closings a year, that’s a very, very good year for me. So I don’t need a lot of clients. And if I were to turn down somebody who was referred to me and you know, I just don’t think that would be a smart strategy. In my case. I think you could really drill down on the women who are interested in investing in a franchise but you would have to really focus all your marketing dollars there. And I really was never successful at doing that.
David Ralph [20:05]
Did you? Did you do it yourself? Or did you hire somebody to do the Edison stuff?
Jane Stein [20:10]
Both I’ve hired people. I’ve hired expensive people, I’ve hired inexpensive people. And for whatever reason, and I’ve talked to other franchise brokers, it doesn’t really work in our business. Our business is referrals, knowing somebody who knows somebody who’s an CPAs, career coaches, Business Brokers, that’s where mostly we get our business from.
David Ralph [20:38]
Yeah, it’s interesting, because for years, I used to do Facebook ads, and myself. And I was right, you know, quite successful. And then I just had an epiphany one day, but I was bored with it. And I thought, I can’t bear this anymore. I don’t know why. Because I like numbers. And I like crunching spreadsheets and stuff. And I hired a guy called Stephan in Serbia. And I’ve been working with him now for about two years. And he’s brilliant. And it he’s to the point where he actually says, David, I have been looking at it and the amount of traffic that is going through the checkout, and I kind of think I don’t really care, I don’t care to that much detail. You know, just tell me how much is it costing? And what am I gaining out of it? You know, and he’s obsessed by it. And it really showed me that there’s always somebody out there better than us to do stuff. We’ve just got to sift through the gold. And that’s one of the problems that entrepreneurs have, they kind of think that they have to do everything at the beginning don’t know, but they really should look for people to do the stuff that they can’t do.
Jane Stein [21:39]
100% And I’m just like you, by the way. So when I am in a presentation, and somebody let’s let’s just say it’s a franchisor going into their details of presentation. I mean, I’m listening, but when when it gets super granular. Tell me why I need to know. Yeah, I want to take action. I want to understand what I need to know. And that one thing more my husband is endlessly trying to teach me something about why a particular who knows something on an Excel spreadsheet, I’m like, I don’t want to be the one. That’s why you that’s why we delegate in this marriage, you are the spreadsheet guy. I am the big picture visionary.
David Ralph [22:23]
Ya know, I spend my life looking at cutting corners, because I think cutting corners is the way forward, I just don’t understand why everybody you know, goes such a long route, just look at the quick route. That’s what water does. Water just finds the quick route and just just do that. So right. Okay, so we’re at a point now that you’ve come up with this decision, and you’ve decided that you’re going to do it, you’ve started to niche down and you’ve started your business. Was it classic laptop on the kitchen? Or did you buy an office space? Tell us about it?
Jane Stein [22:56]
Yeah, that’s interesting. I did initially invest in an office space. Because in my mind, I wanted to be professional. I wanted a plaque on the door. And then after about a year or two, I realised I never went there. I still work from home. In my business.
David Ralph [23:19]
It’s like every gym membership on the planet. You have it, but you’d never go.
Jane Stein [23:24]
Yeah. And we there’s no reason to have an office in my business. I work all over the country, all over the states. And it’s all telephone and zoom. It’s consulting. So we’re just on Zoom. There’s no reason for me to get out of my house if I had little kids, and I needed to have quiet. But I’m at the other end of that my kids are grown and out and I have a home office. That’s great. And yeah, like like most consultants I work, you know, when I want to work from home or from a where, by the way, one of the reasons I got into this is we like to travel. So I you know, I was in California all winter. I don’t love snow. I stayed in California all winter, my husband went back and forth to ski. People don’t know where I’m at. I’m on my zoom, I look the same. It’s the same. So yeah, it’s one of those businesses, you can do it from anywhere, which was very attractive to me. And that’s one of the reasons I jumped in it.
David Ralph [24:20]
And you know, you can ski in California. I’ve been up to the neck in snow in California.
Jane Stein [24:27]
I guess. Oh, they had a real problem this winter. But Yep,
David Ralph [24:30]
yeah. Oh, you don’t have to zip all around. So do you have to know why? This is where my mind is going. I’m thinking okay, this is brilliant. You don’t need a lot of customers. You can have your laptop you can travel around. But do you have to know your area? Do you have to know the demographics or could you be based in Denver, Colorado and do this or Galveston, Texas for example?
Jane Stein [24:54]
Yes, you were talking before about studying the competition. and seeing what they do figuring out how you can do it better. Early on I realised very few franchise brokers spend money to differentiate and have tools and resources at their disposal. So very early on I subscribed to Ibis reports as an example, if you know what that is, it’s a kind of like a Dun and Bradstreet, but they are cutting edge in terms of industry growth, shrinkage, SWOT analysis, I subscribe to am an Analytics site where I can push in zip codes anywhere in the country, and draw circles of radius around that zip code and push a button and I have access to more demographics and detail than my brain can take in. But I get the picture right away. It’s affluent, it’s not affluent, it’s this percentage, white, it’s this percentage Latinx, whatever it is, so then I get my thinking cap on on what would be a good business that would work there. Anyway, we’ll talk more at what I do. But that’s the answer is you need tools to do it. Right. And a good broker will have tools. And I’ll end it at that.
David Ralph [26:14]
Okay, we’re talking to Jane and we’ll be back with her after these words. Would you love three coaching expert business lessons and the ability to be surrounded by like minded go getters or building six figure incomes online for free? What Join Up Dots six, bigger Online Business School is now open and showing you how to create a 10k income online per month. So if you’re serious and changing your life forever, head over to join up dots.com forward slash Bisco and register today. And dip you say it’s free? Yeah, I’m sure we did. That is join up dots.com forward slash b school. Right. Okay. So Jane, let’s get into the nitty gritty because I must admit, at the beginning, I was a bit confused, I moved the conversation to Well, I was in control of it. But at the beginning, I didn’t 100% understand the differences. So make it as simple as possible somebody comes to you by knock on your window, you open the window and they say, Jane, I’d like some more advice on getting a franchise. What we can say to them.
Jane Stein [27:21]
Yeah, now you now you’re in it. So what I do is I take my client candidate through a series of assessments, questionnaires and conversations, which allow me to build a profile on that person. Much like think of the model of a residential realtor, a residential Realtor will say, what neighbourhoods Do you like, how many bedrooms do you need? What kind of a lifestyle Do you have? Whatever, whatever. And they begin to research housing that meets those parameters. It’s very, very similar. I have some proprietary tools and resources that I use to build a profile on you. That tells me a what your transferable skill sets might be be, what your budget might be, because of my background, I can quickly see when you’ve disclosed to me or financials, what sort of risk in terms of investment level that would be okay for you. We have talked through all kinds of business attributes, I’ve made a list of business attributes that I think would be important to you, whether it’s recurring revenue, whether it’s brick and mortar, whether it’s home based, whether it’s consulting, whether it’s, you know, high ticket, quick, ramping, or slow to build but builds over time to a nice multimillion dollar revenue stream, whatever it is, we’ve got all that drilled down. Now I go back to my drawing board and this is the fun part. This is where all of my energy is spent at the front end, doing the research. I will do this market study, I will reach out to probably 50 to 60 franchisors to tack on territory availability, to research through those disclosure documents of the ones that I’ve decided, you know, I then narrowed that down to maybe 10. I then dive into the disclosure documents to look for lawsuits, potential revenue, potential pitfalls, fees, etc. Kind of pre screening on behalf of my client. I then reach out to the franchisors and have conversations about my client. This is who they are this is what I think they would like to do and this is what I think they wouldn’t be willing to do a you know the guy’s an introvert or be IE, they are, you know, going to be thrilled to go to network and whatever it is. And they tell me whether they think, again, they would be successful in that particular franchise model. At the end of that two weeks that I’ve spent all of this time now I present to you, my candidate, six, or four or three business options that are available in your market, that are in your budget, that are in your wheelhouse, that I think will give you the lifestyle to which you have expressed an interest in whether it’s flexibility Monday through Friday, whatever, whatever. And at that point, you decide which ones you want to begin diving in on and doing the due diligence. My role, David is not to sell the franchise, my role is to do all of that pre screening to try and put franchises in front of you that I have reason to believe you will be successful in in your market, and that you have the financial runway, till it gets to break even. At that point, I introduce you to the two franchises or three at the most that you want to start doing due diligence on and now you’re in the throes of the development team, aka sales team of that franchise.
David Ralph [31:26]
So this is endeavour franchise, you, you you narrow it down to the ideal ones, and then say to them, it’s over to you. Which one’s your fancy?
Jane Stein [31:36]
Yeah, I’m a matchmaker. And it’s a very good value add proposition because you don’t pay me for my time. The franchisor pays me a referral fee. If and when my introduced candidate moves forward and signs a contract.
David Ralph [31:55]
So how do you find the ones who want to sell up on their business? Are you sort of going around building a database? Or does it all come up with the information that you’re mining?
Jane Stein [32:07]
at you, actually, in my business, and I meant to clarify this before, one can’t just suddenly decide to be a franchise broker, like me, who knew nothing, and then just self educate and go out and hang a shingle in my world there are, I guess, I would say, broker associations, who you pay a fee to who train you educate you. And in return for that fee, you have access to all of the franchisors who are in their contractual listing sites. So I have am a member of two such organisations. And by nature of being a part of those associations, I automatically have referral agreements with the 300 franchises that are in each of those two sites. And then in addition to that, over the years that I’ve been doing this, I have developed my own 200 or so referral agreements with franchisors who are not, don’t happen to be in those two associations that I hear about and reach out to and basically try and get a referral agreement with. So that’s how it works.
David Ralph [33:31]
So 10 customers out of a database of your own up to 100, and whatever’s any other good in it. That’s perfect. Well, I
Jane Stein [33:39]
think I think we’re misunderstanding the language. The, the database is the franchise companies, right? So I have around 600 ish, that I have availability to research to pull up their disclosure documents to get a referral fee if if somebody ends up investing with them. My customers however, the numbers are I need about 100 customers to close one or two deals. Right. So I want it Yeah, so so just like probably any large ticket. I don’t know, franchise, you know, business. I need 100 interested, you know, when I say 100, I made 100 leads. So maybe they expressed interest, you know, once
David Ralph [34:25]
and that’s only knowing that that’s that’s still not a lot. Is it nine a month?
Jane Stein [34:29]
Yeah. So at any given point, my goal, if you want to get into the metrics is to have 20 active people in my pipeline. That means 20 people that I’m having conversations with, they may not be ready now, but they might be in the future. Or we haven’t found anything yet that they can get excited about. But I’m still kind of noodling ideas for them. Because out of those 20 people, maybe two will ultimately close if they’re having conversations with me on a regular basis. they’re interested, they buy into my value, where they’re thinking they will invest in a franchise at some point, you know, in the next two years. And so it tends to be that if 20 people are actively in that phase of the pipeline, I will close to at some point, or they will, two people will invest.
David Ralph [35:19]
Now, what I like about this is this is a real person sales funnel, basically, all businesses have a funnel, but it’s not automated, you’re in there, you’re building up relationships, you’re not expecting this thing to just automatically trigger from your website and bounce off to where you’re actually getting down. And you’re building a relationship. And that seems to me to be lacking in so many of the businesses nowadays, who people just literally want to sit with their laptop on the mountain, and not ever be engaged with the customer. And I always think, ultimately, whatever we’re in is about building relationships, isn’t it?
Jane Stein [35:57]
Well, this business for sure, people are investing their life savings or a large investment. And I’m a trusted advisor. And that’s what I like about it. I was a trusted advisor in my previous career. I’m a trusted advisor. Now, if there’s no trust, then there’s no, they’re not going to do business with me, right. So I am building trust over time, through a lot of things, I have 4000 people in my, in my database that are potential buyers, right, and I put out educational material every month. And my goal is to educate first and be seen as a trusted adviser. So everything I put out on social media or through my drip campaigns is 100%. About a showing me to be an expert in the field, and be showing me to be a trusted confidant who’s gonna tell you the way it is.
David Ralph [36:50]
And that’s the key thing that’s trust, isn’t it? You know, I spend more time talking to people totally free of charge, who I know are never going to work with me whenever you can just sense it. But I’d rather them not work with anyone, you know, I’d rather tell them exactly how life is in business. Because there’s a lot of people but it’s not suited for. So imagine how you get the same, you get a lot of people that come along and you actually go to them. Look, I think this isn’t your thing, you’re better off to stick your money in a bank and just get interest.
Jane Stein [37:20]
100%. And that’s the difference between, you know, a good adviser and just, you know, obviously somebody who just is in it for the money. Yep.
David Ralph [37:30]
Do as you see, yes, I’m learning, I’m gonna be part of American, yeah, I’m gonna be half American, I’m gonna have my mic Trump great again, or whatever, he’s got a nice, he’s gonna wear it in prison, he’s going to wear it in prison, and he’s going to be proud. Let’s hear from the words of Steve Jobs.
Speaker 4 [37:49]
Of course, it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards. 10 years later. Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something, your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. Because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well worn path. And that will make all the difference.
David Ralph [38:24]
So you was in corporate land, you got jaded, you got burnt out, you lost your mojo. Would those words have applied then? Or did they only apply now because you took the leap and you’ve created something yourself?
Jane Stein [38:38]
Now I love that quote, I think absolutely. When I started thinking about doing this, my dots were, I had an interesting conversation with a friend of mine who I didn’t realise at the time knew me so well. And I told her I was going to be investing in a business. That was a recurring revenue model, blah, blah, blah. And she said, Really, she said, I was thinking that you told me, one of the reasons you stopped that you retired is that you were burnout on those same customers for 20 years and the same conversations and it really was an aha moment. So I decided to make a list of the things that are the things that I really love to do. And with regards to business, one I love to research to I love to connect the dots. Honestly, it’s putting together pieces of the puzzle. I got a guy or a woman. These are their strengths. These are their weaknesses, which I never use that word with them. This is how much capital they have. Which of these out of the hundreds of opportunities out there might be hitting on as many of those would put Most of those puzzle pieces together, that is the most fun I ever have in my life is when I can make that happen. So it’s research, it’s putting together the pieces of the puzzle. And the third component what drives me and probably you, because people that are passionate are good at what they do. I like helping people. And the notion that I could potentially help someone achieve their lifelong dream of being an entrepreneur, or building an asset that would allow them to leave a legacy, the fact that I can play some tiny part in that is so exciting to me. So those are the three dots that came together for me, in me realising this was the perfect business for me.
David Ralph [40:49]
He’s fascinating how but dots do join up magically, when you allow yourself to take action. It all comes with taking action for many years, I was in corporate land, I worked 10 years in a bank of Ghana, where 10 years in insurance, and I never stopped to actually think about my strengths. I just kind of did what the jobs were given. They say would you like that job? Would you like this promotion? Would you like that? I never once queried whether it was the right promotion, it was just, oh, it’s something different have the money. But now when you’re actually creating your own future, you realise that actually, it all does come down to your skills and talents. Everything starts from that and what you used to be brilliant at doing, you know, I can guarantee, well, I can’t guarantee you, that’d be amazing. But I’m going to assume that when you was at school, you was one of those people that would sort of connect people at school, you would bring classes together, if the new kid came in, you would reach out and say I look after him for the day. Would that be about right? 100% Of a connector? Yeah, you say and we have that while a very beginning we have the skills, but because So sort of naturally in us. We don’t reference them until the right time that you look back and you Join Up Dots and you go alladia, I should have seen this years ago, if this this was always here. It just blows me away time and time again.
Jane Stein [42:13]
Yeah, I think you have to be a certain age, don’t you? Like you don’t there’s no time for self awareness. When you have little kids? I mean, this whole notion of what do I want to do with the rest of my life, feeling dissatisfaction that times are wasting, you know, those happen at those key milestones. So those are my clients, they’re turning 40, or they’re turning 50 period. Sometimes they’re turning 60. And it’s those key milestones that I think cause one to look inward, to really do the self awareness piece. Am I really happy? What do I want to spend the rest of my life doing? And I’m sure you find that as well.
David Ralph [42:51]
Yeah, I only hear from my kids. Now, when they come in from the pub at night. Basically. I’m already in bed asleep, and they’re having their social life and that and so yeah, you do you do move on. As we have moved on this conversations, we’ve shared a real blueprint of finding a business idea and drilling down and becoming an expert by being trained in that. And then looking at how many customers you need to make a living. But of course, we’ve got some more information for you to share on the Sermon on the mic. And this is part of the show when we send you back in time to have a one on one with your younger self, to share the dots of your success with them. And if you could go back in time and speak to the young Jane, what advice would you love to give her where we’re going to find out because I’m gonna play the theme as always, Ben, it’s your time to share this is the Sermon on the mic.
Speaker 5 [43:50]
With the spirit of the show, the Sermon on the mind the Sermon on the Mount
Jane Stein [44:06]
I love that so much. I guess I would say to Jane and college. Look, you want to be in control of every aspect of your life. And what you will find is that things can’t always be controlled, especially the ultimate outcome. The ultimate outcome is not in your control that’s in the hands of the universe or God or whatever your spiritual belief may be. Mine is the universe pushes us toward spiritual evolution. But you cannot control that what ultimately is going to happen you can only control your day to day actions. I would say that it’s okay to change course. Don’t get so dug in on something that you’re not afraid to be flexible and pivot, your life isn’t going to look the way you thought it would at all. But it’s going to be amazing. And it’s going to be messy. And it’s going to be outrageously fulfilling. And the final thing I would say, I guess, is while working hard, is your strength, it will continue to serve you well. But now would be a good time to learn to have more fun. It’s okay to have fun, and have hobbies. And it will make you a more well rounded individual.
David Ralph [45:41]
Yeah, great advice for everybody out there as well. So Jane, for the people that have been listening, ie the listeners, what’s the number one best way that they can connect with you.
Jane Stein [45:51]
They should simply Google my name franchise broker chain Stein franchise broker, they can find me on LinkedIn, they could find my website, which is called your franchise is waiting. But I suspect if they just put my name in a search box and say franchise broker, I will be on the first page.
David Ralph [46:15]
And we will of course, have all the links on the show notes to make it as easy as possible for you. So, Jane, thank you so much for spending time with us today, joining up those dots of your life and your business. And please come back again, when you’ve got more dots to join up. Because I do believe that by joining up the dots and connecting our paths is always the best way to build our futures. Jane, thank you so much.
Jane Stein [46:37]
David, thank you so much. I appreciate you.
David Ralph [46:41]
So interesting business, so people are looking for businesses as a database. And then Jane consults with them to find out what they’re actually look for the lifestyle, the income, the flexibility, and Ben does the number crunching down. A lot of it’s building up relationships, a lot of it is building up trust, but it’s something that somebody out there could do. It’s one of those jobs that you can take overly, and just build up the relationships on Zoom or an email, whatever. I like that I like that business not until next time, my friend. As you would have heard in the show, we’re opening the biz school again, looking at teaching you the background mechanisms are building a 10k per month business. So if you’re interested in that, come across and register, and we’ll see if we can take it further. But if not just listen to another Join Up Dots because we will be sharing more soon. Until next time. I’ll see you again. Cheers. See ya. Bye bye.
Outro [47:43]
That’s the end of Join Up Dots. You’ve heard the conversation. Now it’s time for you to start taking massive action.
Speaker 7 [47:56]
Create your future create your life is the only life you got.
Outro [48:03]
We’ll be back again real soon. Join Up Dots during the gods Join Up Dots. Gods
Unknown Speaker [48:10]
Joe
Outro [48:12]
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