Layoffs Propel Skilled Workers to Business Ownership
By: Michael Alston for Franchise Insights
October 28, 2025 — Headlines this week report layoffs at Amazon, UPS, and Paramount, while a government shutdown continues for almost a month. Tens or hundreds of thousands of skilled workers will be looking for better opportunities, with many taking advantage of this opportunity to take control of their destinies and “be their own boss.”
How will these candidates discover your franchise offering?
With the growth of chatbots and AI-enabled research, the pathways that lead to discovery of your franchise are certainly changing. Since Google’s launch of AI Overviews just in May 2024, search queries have grown by almost 50%, yet click-throughs have dropped by 30%.
Only about one in eleven aspiring franchise owners (9.1%) are already “very familiar” with the franchises they inquire about on franchise portals, and another 15.2% are “already somewhat familiar” with them, according to recent surveys of interested franchise seekers on the Franchise Ventures lead generation platform in September 2025.
Almost three quarters of prospects – 75.8% – chose to inquire about at least one brand with which they had very little or no familiarity prior to a franchise portal visit — the concept was introduced to the prospect during the visit.
When seeking information on an unfamiliar subject, consumers turn to the search functions on their phones or web browsers, and increasingly to chatbots or AI-enhanced search. Despite the introduction of numerous AI chat agents in the three years since Microsoft added ChatGPT to its Bing.com search experience, Google still retains over 90% of search traffic worldwide as of September 2025.
It is important to understand the user experience of franchise seekers as they enter the sales funnel. What happens when prospects don’t know exactly what they are looking for, or what criteria to use to compare the choices, or what options are available in a geography, category or price range? How can they be satisfied that they have reviewed the best options?
The primary role of franchise directory sites or “portals” is to organize and present high-level information about franchises to facilitate discovery and consideration, and make the connection between prospects and franchise development teams.
For over thirty years, franchise directory websites, or “portals” have played an important role in the franchise discovery and research process, and their usage is increasing in 2025, per the 2025 Franchise Lead Sources Survey. Aspiring business owners come to franchise directory sites to see all that is available, and for the convenience of comparisons in one place, and ease of connection to franchise representatives.
The September 2025 survey showed that 30.3% were “vaguely familiar” and 45.5% were “completely unfamiliar” with the franchise selections they ultimately inquired about. So the primary function of portal sites is to make an introduction – to generate awareness and consideration of options in a convenient “one stop shop.”
Online franchise opportunity directories and their associated mobile apps facilitate discovery, awareness and consideration during the franchise buyer research process. This is in addition to the vital role they play in information and comparison shopping. Online franchise portals provide:
- Exposure to the breadth of franchise categories
- Comparison and options within a franchise category of interest
- Reminders of familiar category franchise brand leaders, and
- Introduction and consideration of franchise concepts that may not be familiar.
This also helps explain why about two thirds of inquirers at franchise portals proceed to the franchisor’s website for further information, as we reported most recently in October 2024. More than 29% of those (19% of total submitters) also fill out the lead form on your franchise website right after having requested information via the franchise portal, providing valuable referral leads.
The “Mystery Shopping” survey is conducted monthly by FranchiseInsights.com from a sample of franchise inquirers across the Franchise Ventures lead generation platform. The data presented here is from September 2025.
Franchise Ventures is the leading franchise lead-generation platform for potential franchisees to thousands of growing franchise systems in the United States and Canada. Its franchise lead generation brands include Franchise.com, Franchise Solutions, Franchise Gator, Franchise Opportunities, Franchise For Sale, SmallBusinessStartup.com and BusinessBroker.net, and together they provide the largest aggregation of prospective franchise buyers in the U.S.
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Published on Wednesday, October 29th, 2025.