by Greg Milner | Mar 28, 2013 | The Smell of Success, UK
Hannah McEnteggart of Oasis Health & Beauty Spa in Great Missenden, UK
When Hannah McEnteggart of Oasis Health & Beauty Spa in Great Missenden sat down to address envelopes to 50 of her ‘lost’ clients, she had no idea the contents of those letters would have such a dramatic effect.
A day later, her phone started ringing…and kept ringing, over and over again, in the coming weeks. No fewer than 48 of those 50 ‘missing in action’ clients called and booked appointments – a response rate of 94% – and of those, 92% re-booked!
If you haven’t already figured it out, good old-fashioned direct mail still works – if you do it the right way, as Hannah discovered when she joined WSM’s Lite marketing system, and began to download a series of proven hard-copy marketing letters instantly to her computer.
In this short video, Hannah told me how she was staggered at the response, not just to the ‘lost client’ letters she downloaded from the program – another promotion brought her 6,000 pounds, a massive increase on the year before.
[cf]Hannah McEnteggart[/cf]
Want the same kind of results? You can join the Lite program here for two weeks free, and test it for yourself! Get a video tutorial each week along with tested, proven marketing and advertising templates, instantly downloadable and editable to suit your own salon or spa.
Just $27 a week after 14 days free
NO CONTRACTS – you can leave whenever you like
by Greg Milner | Mar 25, 2013 | Advertising Tips
FREE: we have two complete copies of the Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit, valued at $4,995, to GIVE AWAY to the next two salons or spas to join WSM’s ‘My Social Salon’ marketing program – see below!
Back in the late seventies, there was a band called Woolley and the Camera Club. No, I don’t remember them either. I doubt anybody remembers them, ‘cept their mothers. But they recorded a one-hit-wonder that gained a cult-following, “Video Killed the Radio Star”.
Apart from a catchy tune, everything about the title and the chorus was wrong. Yet so-called ‘experts’ have since paraphrased the same message, that suddenly, the ‘new’ is killing off the ‘old’. Video didn’t kill radio. Radio is bigger than ever, and growing in reach and effect, specially as daily commutes to work and home again get longer. Particularly talk-back radio. People like to sit in their cars and be part of a conversation. You don’t get that listening to music on an iPod.
Neither did TV kill off movies, as so many doomsayers predicted in the fifties. Quite the reverse. TV made the movie business bigger. There are lessons here, for those who want to run their salon or spa business with a pulse, instead of by rote learning, or worse, on the basis of ill-informed opinions from Gen Y staff, the next graphic designer you talk to, or any one of legion of so-called ‘internet marketers’.
It always makes me chuckle when I see a salon or spa owner declaring, often in forums, that ‘I’ve tried newspaper advertising and “it” doesn’t work.’ Or ‘I’ve done radio advertising and “it” was a waste of money.’ Such comments betray a lack of understanding of what advertising actually is. But worse, they make it obvious that few owners of small businesses such as a hair or beauty salon realize they’re talking about the relative merits of various media, rather than advertising itself.
Let’s get at least one thing straight – newspapers, direct mail, Facebook, Twitter, mobile apps, websites, radio, TV, cinema, billboards, posters in the window, the elastic band of underpants worn above the jeans by cool dudes, and yes, word-of-mouth ALL have one thing in common:
They are just MEDIA.
In other words, they are no more and no less than delivery boys – merely a device by which a message can be delivered from Point A – usually you, the business owner – to Point B, the eyes and ears of your intended target market. To claim that any of them, either individually or collectively, ‘doesn’t work’ is akin to claiming the world is indeed flat, that the sky is really red, not blue.
It is true that some media that worked decades ago no longer has the same impact. But today’s online shopping sites are just the modern version of the mail-order catalogue of the 1930s. (And yet, real, hard-copy catalogs are still being mailed in their hundreds of millions every year by some of the biggest, smartest companies on the planet. Think Victoria’s Secret. Or IKEA.) When email caught on in the 1990s, the ‘experts’ predicted the end of direct mail. Could they have been any more wrong? Email is just about dead as a means of driving new business, yet direct mail has not only survived, it’s bigger than ever.
What has NOT changed – and this has never had anything to do with mere media – is the need for every business to find a way to differentiate itself from its competition, and to then translate that difference into words, images, sounds to be used in the various forms of media appropriate for that message, and the target market you want to reach.
Declaring that you’ve given up all forms of paid advertising in favour of Facebook ‘because it’s free’ is just plain dumb. Sure, you wouldn’t run an ad in Seniors Weekly if you want to appeal to working women in their thirties. But do you really expect Facebook to deliver you hordes of affluent, 60-year-old customers who drive to their golf club in Mercedes convertibles? (Nope. You’d advertise in their golf club newsletter!)
Yes, it’s complex. More so now than ever. So how DO you navigate your way to a sensible, well-planned and reasonably well-executed strategy, one that takes into account all forms of media, that helps you develop and deliver a compelling message to the right people, at the right time, using the right media for that target market?
It’s the primary reason we developed the salon & spa marketing program called My Social Salon.
Hundreds of salons & spas around the world have already signed up for MSS. Because for the first time, anywhere in the world, the busy, time-poor salon owner can access and use the power of ALL forms of media, online and offline, in a single, proven, affordable system.
And, also for the first time, we giving away one of the most famous, enduring and still absolutely relevant marketing & sales tools ever developed for the small salon or spa. The Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit®. The Toolkit, full of done-for-you templates, strategies, sales systems and CD/DVD tutorials, has been used by more than 4,000 salons & spas around the world to bring in more clients, more often, than any other such system on the planet. And it’s still being used heavily by smart salon owners today.
We’re giving away a complete Toolkit, valued at $4,995, to the next TWO salons who join the My Social Salon program. Watch the video below, and complete the form to get a free LIVE DEMO of the entire system….and you might qualify for WSM membership.
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by Greg Milner | Mar 20, 2013 | Featured, The Smell of Success
New Survey Reveals the Shocking Cost of ‘No-Shows’
Hair & Beauty salons are losing hundreds of millions of dollars a year because of no-shows, and the lack of deposit-taking policies for fear of upsetting clients.
In a new survey conducted by Worldwide Salon Marketing, the vast majority of 130 salon owners questioned revealed they had no policy of taking deposits to secure appointments, and even it they did have a cancellation policy in place, it lacked ‘teeth’.
Telling figures that show most salons are letting clients get away with murder
According to WSM founder & CEO Greg Milner, the results are a wake-up call to the industry. “If salons want to be taken seriously by their clients and stop hemorrhaging money, they have to take the lead from industries like travel, hospitality and entertainment, which simply refuse to take bookings without payment,” he says. “Customers accept those policies completely. Try booking a concert ticket and telling them you’ll pay when you get there. It just doesn’t happen.”
The survey of 125 salons reveals
- 88% do not take deposits.
- The average annual loss through no-shows is a whopping $10,000 per salon, with one salon reporting a staggering $52,000 – even though fully 80% of salons claimed they sent appointment reminders by text message.
- Extrapolated across Australia’s approx. 25,000 hair & beauty businesses, the losses represent $250 million annually.
- Of the 12% of salons who insist on deposits for appointments, the average annual losses dropped to less than $2,000
- Asked ‘How many times must a client ‘no-show’ before you no longer take bookings from them?’, 31.5% said three times, while another 32% said “I always let them book another appointment because I’m too scared to lose the potential business.”
It appears the industry is beset by fear. According to one respondent,
“We do have a cancellation policy, but rarely enforce payment, as so few other beauty clinics do so. Clients will not come back.”
And this from a salon in Melbourne:
“I would like to put a cancellation thing in place but I don’t have credit card facility nor any way of safely storing peoples numbers. And yip I am scared of scaring people away.”
But that fear appears largely unfounded. Said another salon owner,
“We started taking credit cards or a cash deposit on February 1st this year, for the first time. It works a charm, no more no shows, the clients now know we’re serious.”
The survey shows that among those salons which insist on deposits or pre-payments, the rate of no-shows drops dramatically across the board. “It also positions the salon as a business to be respected,” says Mr Milner. “It’s just plain rude to book a one or two-hour appointment and simply not turn up. You wouldn’t dare do that to your doctor or dentist because you respect them too much. It’s about time hair & beauty professionals swallowed a small teaspoon of cement, and hardened up,” he said.
Those who have ‘hardened up’ and imposed a strict cancellation policy backed up with deposits report dramatically-improved results.
“We’ve had a 100% Cancellation Policy in place for almost 6 years. It has virtually eliminated no-shows and forces clients to respect our business. EVERYONE in this industry should do the same – it will educate clients that they are visiting professionals whose time is valuable,”
says a Sydney salon owner. And a West Australian salon owner agrees, with impeccable logic:
“It should become common practice in all salons to take deposits, like the hotel and holiday industry, people will just accept it as common practice. Nothing is gained from those who are scared, and just end up hurting the industry with their fear. Even Spreets and other common daily deal sites do it, so why not the salon itself?”
Here’s how veteran WSM member Marnie Kallmeyer describes her deposit-taking and cancellation policy:
[cf]Marnie[/cf]
BONUS GIFT for salon owners who want to eliminate ‘no-shows’ forever!
Want to stop no-shows? Join the Lite marketing program and get this proven client letter FREE – a Bonus Gift valued at $297 – but PRICELESS!
This is the first page of a 2-page, proven client letter that stops no-shows dead. Carefully setting out what your client can expect of you, and importantly, what you expect of your client, this letter has been used successfully by hundreds of WSM member salons around the world – and you can easily edit it to suit your own salon.
Join the Lite program FREE for the first 14 days – and you’ll get to download this letter as a Bonus Gift worth $297 – but priceless when you consider how much no-shows are already costing your business every year!
by Greg Milner | Mar 17, 2013 | Beating the Competition, Blog, Email marketing, Featured, Packaging Salon Services, Salon Events
Ashleigh Mills of Ashleigh Renea Hair & Beauty in Katanning, WA; $3,000 in gift voucher sales in two hours
Most business owners simply leave everything too LATE to capitalize on marketing opportunities in the hair & beauty business. And you don’t have to be a genius to identify many of these opportunities, they’re scheduled in the calendar years in advance. For example, Mothers Day. (In most of the world, the second Sunday in May)
But great rewards come to those who plan well in advance. For example, long-time WSM member Ashleigh Mills of Ashleigh Renea Hair & Beauty in regional Western Australia.
With Mothers Day approaching, Ashleigh decided she needed military-style planning and precision to make the most of this major ‘salon marketing trigger’ event in any salon’s annual calendar.
From the WSM Members Only ‘sealed section’ resources website, Ashleigh downloaded a series of templates for email marketing, planned her campaign several weeks out, and drew up a schedule of out-bound marketing pieces to her database of clients.
On the appointed date, she pulled the trigger. On Saturday, the day before Mother’s Day, Ashleigh arrived at work early. Just as well. Before she’d even opened for business, the phone started ringing, and didn’t stop for two hours.
And that’s in a little country town of just a few thousand people. Here’s how Ashleigh describes that morning, and the lead-up to it.
[cf]Ashleigh2[/cf]
Ashleigh and hundreds of other smart salon owners around the world have 24/7 access to the huge library of resources in the Members Only ‘sealed section’ website, plus the world’s best online marketing tools, templates and systems in the ‘done-for-you’ My Social Salon marketing program, ONLY for salons & spas.
LIVE now on the Members Only website
All NEW Mothers Day advertising, posters, fliers – instant downloads for Members
We’re adding dozens of new salon advertising and marketing templates to the Members only ‘sealed section’ website site every month – in March, a completely new series of templates for one of the BIGGEST salon marketing events of the year.
Mothers Day is a big day for salons & spa marketing all over the world. It’s when thousands of salons make (or should make!) a large part of their annual revenue.
But so many face the thought of marketing with a shudder – all that work!
Not for Worldwide Salon Marketing members. As always, we provide our members with fresh direct response marketing templates – for all the major Marketing Trigger Events – throughout the year.
You’ll find them in various sizes and formats, both US and A4, postcards, posters etc.
Never stare at a blank computer screen again!
(STOP PRESS: new Mother’s Day Marketing & Advertising Templates here)
The new templates join literally hundreds of done-for-you advertising only for salons & spas, in the world’s biggest specialist library for salon & spa marketing.
All you do is simply download them from the website, edit them to suit your own salon’s offers and specialties, enter your own business name and address, and bingo – instant advertising! Never again stare at a blank computer screen, not knowing what to write or how to lay it out.
These templates are being continually produced by our copywriting and graphics team, adding to our vast library every month.
The Members website is a storehouse containing literally years of proven, done-for-you direct response marketing templates. They’ve been downloaded, tested and proven to grab salon clients fast, all over the world.
Online marketing, email, SMS, newspaper ads, radio ads, salon posters, client letters – you’ll find them all on the Members Only website.
Not yet a member?
Still sitting in front of a computer screen, tearing your hair out, not knowing what to put in your ads?
Go here to find out how you can get 24/7 access to the world’s largest Marketing Resources Library just for salons & spas
by Greg Milner | Mar 14, 2013 | Blog, Featured
The three ‘MUST HAVES’ to build a strong beauty business
Five years ago, Amy Mitchell was a struggling massage therapist with a new-born baby. Working 6 days a week just to pay the bills, she knew she’d run herself ragged if she didn’t take decisive action. Amy joined Worldwide Salon Marketing, and immediately began implementing changes. (Key word: implementing).
The biggest change was deciding which kind of customers she wanted. Today, Amy has a nationally-branded chain of day spas catering specifically to pregnant women, with plans for more locations in every capital city, and expansion overseas. All this while giving birth to her second child, and living more than two hours drive from her head office!
This is a brief cut from a detailed 45 minute video interview with Amy about exactly how she did it, while juggling a busy family life…
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ATTENTION WSM MEMBERS: Log into the Members Only ‘Sealed Section’ here for the full interview, including Amy’s Big Three tips for salon owners wanting the kind of business success she’s enjoying.
