FranConnect, a provider of franchise management solutions has announced the appointment of Ian Walsh as the newly created chief operations officer (COO).
Walsh joined the company in 2020 as the senior vice president of marketing and has successfully built the function out over two years. Earlier this year he also assumed responsibility for the customer success team, integrating marketing best practices and scale into customer engagement.
As COO, he will oversee professional services, customer success, strategy and commercialization and a newly developed function dedicated to partnering with other services and technology companies to jointly serve customers and the franchising market.
“2021 has been a year of tremendous growth for FranConnect, and the time is right to expand our leadership team as we prepare for 2022,” said Gabby Wong, CEO of FranConnect.
“In order to drive even greater impact and value for our customers throughout their journey with us, we must operate with cohesion and consistency across all areas. Ian has shown an impressive ability to work with the talented leaders throughout our organization, putting strategy into action and delivering results.”
FranConnect has had a strong year; building relationships with over 100 franchise brands and multi-unit businesses and integrating the newly acquired FranchiseBlast’s field operation and artificial intelligence capabilities.
“The incredible momentum we have experienced over this past year has created a perfect opportunity to evolve our structure as we look to 2022 and beyond,” said Walsh.
“Our teams are going to be working together like never before as we refine how we bring new products to market and support our clients in every step of their own growth plans.”
