This research uncovered three key problems concerning the internet marketing situation for the International Franchise Association, the world's oldest and largest trade association for franchisors and suppliers and, to a lesser extent, franchisees. The three problems are:
The IFA does not have a concise and consistent methodology for making IT decisions.
A rival and aggressive organization, the American Franchisee Association, is challenging the IFA and is much better coordinated in terms of Internet marketing.
The lack of a clear direction has led the IFA into a collaboration with Vicinity, an internet connectivity specialist, which has led to a very confusing web presence.
These three problems gave rise to a marketing strategy suggestion that involves clarifying the MIS roles in the IFA and redesigning and greatly simplifying the IFA web site.
For 33 years (from 1960 to 1993) the International Franchise Association (IFA) was considered to be the "Voice of Franchising." In 1993, a new organization, the American Franchisee Association (AFA) officially organized saying that the IFA did not represent its concerns. In less than two years, it had a roster of 30,000 member outlets and stated its belief that the IFA did not fully represent the interests of franchise owners -- particularly American franchise owners. The AFA used an aggressive marketing strategy that made use of the Internet to spread its marketing message.
The IFA had not used the Internet as a main part of its marketing strategy, but felt compelled to do so when a large majority of Internet users began getting all of their franchise information and understanding from the AFA website. In 1998, the IFA budgeted a fund for Internet marketing, creating a "war chest" to put its story online. This was the beginning of the Internet Franchise War that is being conducted on a regular basis. In 1999, the IFA formed an Internet Alliance with a company calle...