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While it’s a constant struggle to turn a profit in this economy, a franchise must remember that its social responsibility still matters hugely to customers.

‘Corporate character’ has not gone out of vogue. If anything, there is a greater demand for franchises - especially in the food sector -to put an emphasis on transparency and ethics in their business arrangements. It might not always suit a business’s bottom line, but when the biggest franchises in the world start to introduce socially-responsible marketing, you know that their motivations aren’t purely idealistic. It pays to be socially-responsible as well.

The latest franchise to place a bigger emphasis on social responsibility is Dunkin’ Donuts. Not only have they released their first-ever corporate responsibility report called ”Serving Responsibly”, but they’ve issued new guidelines to back up these new guidelines. According to the report, their hope is to introduce new environmentally-friendly packaging, fair trade coffee, cage-free eggs, green stores, while upscaling their charity work and youth leadership programs.

That this comes against the backdrop of general economic uncertainty should be taken on board. Corporate responsibility was not simply some fad of the good times. Many consumers demand ethical practices from the businesses they support and they’ll vote with their wallet every time.

The Happy Meal is one of the most contested menu items that food franchises provide. In the eyes of many consumer advocates, kid’s meals promotions like Happy Meals provide children with an incentive – ie, a toy – for eating ‘unhealthy’ meals. There have been calls for franchises to discontinue their kids meal’s programs. They’re beginning to be heard.

Jack In The Box recently announced that it will discontinue including toys with kids meals. Interestingly, Jack In The Box told Ad Age that they’re doing this not to look after children’s diets, but to enhance their focus on their target market – 18 – 34 year old’s. That doesn’t mean that consumer advocates aren’t considering this is a victory for children’s nutrition. In a statement, they said:

“We hope that McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, and Taco Bell are paying attention to Jack in the Box, which has decided to stop using toys to market fast-food meals to children. It’s too bad that McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, and Taco Bell think they can’t compete on the basis of quality, value, taste, or nutrition, but instead must resort to such a discredited marketing tactic to lure families to their businesses.”

The question - as Ad Age rightly ask, is this – can a franchise like Jack In The Box, which can’t really compete with the likes of McDonald’s and Burger King, make a difference by cutting toys from its kids meals? A Jack In The Box spokesperson says that they generate a ‘very small percentage’ of profits from children’s meals. On the other hand, kids meals make up a pretty healthy chunk of profit for bigger franchises who often team up with large corporations in these marketing projects, so it’s unlikely that Jack In The Box’s move will create a domino effect. That said, it’s interesting that Jack In The Box are substituting toys for Chiquita Apple Bites. It’s a healthy switch.

We’ll see if other QSR franchises follow their lead.

Franchise Direct has just published another in-depth, fascinating report on franchising. We’ve examined the cleaning franchise industry this time. With over $80 billion in revenues and legitimate green credentials, it’s no wonder why many so entrepreneurs are investing in cleaning franchises.

The Franchise Direct cleaning franchise report provides an excellent overview of the industry as a whole. The first thing to understand with the cleaning industry is that it’s hugely diverse. Businesses that provide everything from maid to janitorial services to carpet and dry-cleaning work and even junk removal and disaster restoration have been branded as cleaning franchises. There’s an even greater diversity of business sectors from which cleaning franchises thrive. Among other things, they do commercial, educational, governmental, hospitality and medical work.

As our report explains, what links this boom in cleaning franchises is a trend towards outsourcing. Essentially, it no longer makes fiscal sense for businesses, governments and other large organizations to employ cleaning staff. Cleaning franchises have stepped into this void to provide outstanding, cost-efficient solutions for businesses that require clean premises. And let’s be honest – every business needs a cleaner. There is no sign of this trend abating, and we’ve seen that businesses turn firstly to cleaning franchises because they provide a proven service.

Many industry experts put a lot of emphasis on the value of sustainable practice for today’s franchises. It must be said that the cleaning franchise industry is one of the most progressive sectors for instituting ‘green’ improvements to their business practice. After being criticized for using dangerous cleaning products in the past, many cleaning franchises now use organic products that are known to be better for the earth. This green trend exists across the cleaning franchise spectrum.

As for the state of the cleaning franchise industry, it is clearly growing. Like every business sector, it suffered during the recession, but it’s flourishing again as the economy returns to something like normality. In fact, for franchises that endured the worst of the recession, there are even more noticeable gains. “Companies that weathered the severe recession will have a decided advantage going forward,” said David Thompson of Jan-Pro.

On top of all of this information on how cleaning franchises work, you’ll also find essential financial information on a number of cleaning franchises. By and large, these are affordable franchises that provide an opportunity for great success. The Franchise Direct report on cleaning franchises is a truly valuable resource for anyone looking to ‘clean up’ in business.

We know how much the internet has changed the way businesses are perceived in the public domain. People can publish all kinds of constantly on Youtube, Facebook and Twitter, in no time at all, often with embarrassing consequences for businesses.

Rather than ignore this reality or try to wish it away, many business leaders, including those from the franchise world, are urging companies to embrace transparency. Franchises, in fact, have been on the receiving end of some really bad social media publicity, but their varying responses prove that transparency can really affect the way a business rebounds from bad PR.

Take Domino’s. They were on the receiving end of really bad publicity after some unseemly videos surfaced online. But they used one unfortunate moment in one franchise to relaunch their franchise vision. They changed their food recipe and utilized the web as a tool to better communicate and improve its product and services. Sales spiked accordingly.

Writing on the Boston College Corporate Citizenship website recently, Bob Langert, VP of Social Responsibility at McDonald’s, drove the point home even further during a 10-point discussion of lessons learned from a lifetime in business:

With the power of the Internet, there is now a very radical transparency. People can get information and use this publicly in a matter of seconds. Take this seriously and dedicate resources to providing good and accurate information to as many stakeholders as you can.

McDonald’s has great experience in dealing with various lobbies that against its food and ethos, so this advice should be taken very seriously. When bad PR comes your way via the web, don’t hide from it. Just be prepared.

Social media is an issue that won’t go away for the franchising community. If anything, its become more important than ever for franchises. Developing a clear, focused and rewarding social media policy is difficult and nebulous work, so it’s always helpful to get the opinions of people who are succeeding.

I came across a really interesting interview on eMarketer with Ronalee Zarate-Bayani, the woman responsible for developing Taco Bell’s social media strategy. She’s an interesting woman with some exciting ideas about how to promote her franchise via the internet. Her importance to the company was noted recently when a class action case was brought against Taco Bell over claims that “it was misleading customers about the ingredients in its tacos”. While the case has been subsequently dropped, Zarate-Bayani response to it - the creation of “Super Delicious Ingredient Force” videos - has highlighted how essential a strong social media presence can be.

Since Taco Bell’s target audience is 18-34 year-old males, they figured that comic-hero themed video content would speak directly to their eaters. A few months later, they’ve received nearly one millions views across a variety of media platforms. For a franchise that targets men, especially young men, Zarate-Bayani feels that video is a vital domain.

“We’ve found that the digital space is a young man’s virtual world. They access this world in so many different ways within the digital medium. They access our content through their mobile phones, so it was really important for us to make sure that they could see the videos on their mobile devices. They access YouTube on mobile, so that’s key. It’s important for us to go where they go and not to try to bring them to us. We have to be where they naturally already are,” she said.

This is must-read material for anyone in franchising trying to create a digital media strategy. Zarate-Bayani touches on many points- Twitter vs Facebook, social media ROI - that are essential for understanding how to best promote your brand in the digital sphere.