by Greg Milner | Dec 8, 2009 | Getting Salon Clients Quickly
Susan Anderson’s gift voucher campaign paid off in a big way…
This Beauty Salon Business Plan Template Has Customers Queuing Up….
Susan Anderson of Lillian Mack Skin Clinic in Moranbah, Queensland has been pinching herself over how her salon business has been transformed.
Logging into the Members Only ‘sealed section’, Susan downloaded a special Gift Voucher offer many of our Inner Circle members had been running successfully in the lead-up to Christmas, and advertised it in the local newspaper last week.
She was almost knocked over in the rush…
“I had queues outside my door for the first two hours and then the rest of the day was solidly constant, I did not move from my front counter all day, even had one of the local coffee shop ladies bringing me coffee for free!! …and congratulating me on such a fantastic idea, we were the talk of the town!!
They have been on sale for 4 days and we’ve sold $24,980 worth of Gift Vouchers, and seen lots of new faces come into the salon so will have gained quite a few new clients…I am over the moon.”
by Greg Milner | Apr 20, 2009 | Getting Salon Clients Quickly
Tanning Salon Marketing: A Salon Owner’s Story – One Decision CAN Make All the Difference
Lisa Gray of Beauty Naturally in Sandgate, Qld, shares the strategies that saved her business from extinction – and put money in her purse for the first time in years.
(Play the interview recording below and listen in as Lisa describes how her business has taken off.)
By the beginning of 2008, Lisa Gray was at the end of her tether. Years of running herself ragged had left her with little energy, even less money, and the ‘ideas cupboard’ was bare.
Lisa says you ‘could have fired a cannon’ through her little beauty salon on the northern fringes of Brisbane. But as is so often the case, the teacher appears when the student is ready, and Lisa was ready.
In the next 12 months, her sales rose from $170,000 to $230,000, including a 25% increase in product sales. Her return bookings rate rose from a meagre 40% to 68%. She took on between 9 and 15 new clients every month. But the biggest change is her new attitude to her business.
“I get excited about actually having a business,” says Lisa. “I’m not so stressed, and when you’re not so stressed you’re more creative, you’re more at ease with yourself, you enjoy what you do. I actually look forward to staff trainings and staff meetings!”
“It’s exciting, it’s not a drain, and I don’t feel negative, I feel very very positive.”
Here’s just a partial list of the ACTION Lisa took to turn her business around:
1)Distributes a flyer offering a Toolkit-inspired $99 special offer to 500 local homes every month. “This has been brilliant, we get a regular flow of new clients from this.”
2)Sends out the series of New Client Letters in the Toolkit to each new client every week. “They work very well…largely responsible for our higher re-booking rate.”
3)Has implemented the Queen of Referrals program in the kit. “Our clients are loving this…”
4)Sends out a monthly newsletter. Not every quarter or every couple of months, every month, using the Newsletter Templates in the kit. “I get a fantastic response from these newsletters…”
5)Started running a regular, small, lead-generating ad in the local newspaper. “A great response…”
6) Hired a full-time receptionist. “Amazing what a difference that’s made to sales…”
And that’s just the start. As Lisa says, “All this and I haven’t even scratched the surface of the whole Inner Circle program and the Toolkit!”
by Greg Milner | Jan 28, 2009 | Ask the Experts, Beating the Competition, Getting Salon Clients Quickly, Increasing Retail Sales, Salon SMS Marketing
Salon And Spa Marketing: Dumb And Dumber-Why The Big Beauty Businesses Are Struggling, And How Small Independent Salons Can Laugh All The Way To The Bank
Despite what you read in the newspapers, it’s not ALL bad news.
From the Big End of town to the tiny end, there are plenty of reports indicating that the “recession” is patchy, uneven at best, certainly NOT a uniform slide into economic oblivion.
McDonald’s is reporting a massive 80% increase in net profit in 2008 over 2007. Spooked by the relentless reports of Armageddon on the TV news, it seems folks are hitting the fast food joints to save money on meals (and no doubt pile on some fat to carry them through the economic winter!)
Maccas made $4.3 billion in ’08, compared with $2.3 billion in ’07.
In our little world of entrepreneurial salon & spa owners, it’s a similar story, all over the world.
In Scottsdale, Arizona, Body Solutions Laser & Skin owners Dr Tim & Kanna Reilly report a staggering 500% increase in sales in 2008 over 2007, using a simple system of done-for-you direct response marketing tools and ‘sales thinking’ strategies they bought from Worldwide Salon Marketing in August 2007.
“It was a revelation,” says Dr Reilly, whose chiropractic clinic morphed into a skin care clinic over several years but had always bled them white. They were on the verge of giving up and closing their doors, until they ‘got it’ just in time and joined the WSM Inner Circle marketing & mentoring program.
IC member Rechelle Watt with her business award…a 40% increase in salon sales in 2008
Then there’s Inner Circle member Rechelle Watt, of Lamonde Hair Face & Body in New South Wales, Australia. While the majority of salon owners whine about how tough things are, Rechelle and hundreds of other Inner Circle members is going from strength to strength.
In ’08, a 40% increase in sales over ’07, according to an email from Rechelle this week.
“WOW!!!….. it’s AMAZING how my business has changed,” says Rechelle, echoing the sentiments of her fellow IC Members. Click here to read Rechelle’s full story.
(Members Only: want to copy what Rechelle’s done? Log into the Members Only section and navigate to ‘Getting New Clients – Hair’ and you’ll find the newspaper ads and the text messages Rechelle used to generate an extra $109,509 in sales in 2008)
And they do it using simple, hard-nosed, “ugly” copy-intensive emotional direct-response marketing, contained in the Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit and the coaching they get as Inner Circle members – not the unaccountable, ‘imagey’ expensive branding-style-lets-hope-some-of-it-sticks marketing typically rolled out by big dumb companies using other people’s (eg shareholders’) money.
Big companies in the beauty business are as guilty of pouring useless advertising dollars down the ‘branding’ toilet as anybody else at the top end of town.
Take the giant Regis Corporation, owner of such brands as Cost Cutters, Super Cuts and Hair Club for Men and Women, Regis spend gazillions last year in an up-market makeover of its newly-purchased 635-store Trade Secret chain of salons, attempting to ‘European-ize’ them as a means of selling more bottles of beauty glop.
It was clearly money down the drain. This week Regis folded its Trade Secrets tent, announcing it was ‘selling’ the brand to Premier Salons Beauty Inc.
The word ‘selling’ is a euphemism for actually giving it away. Regis will get precisely zero, nada, zilch for the ‘sale’, instead picking up some tax credits on all the money it’s flushed down the drain on its worthless branding exercise.
All of which just goes to show, dear salon owner, that the ‘geniuses’ running these billion dollar product suppliers and salon chain owners are certainly no brighter, and in many cases a lot dumber, than you the small independent salon owner.
So take heart. If hundreds of our small-time independent salon Inner Circle members can actually increase sales in this deep recession, so can you.
If, of course, you’re equipped with the same marketing & sales tools and coaching.
Which is why you need to apply right now, before you suffer any more hardship, for Inner Circle membership and get that Toolkit in your hands.
Note to US and Canadian salon owners: successful IC members Dr Tim & Kanna Reilly of Body Solutions in Scottsdale, AZ are Worldwide Salon Marketing’s first USA franchise, and are handling all coaching for new North American members as of January 2009.
by Greg Milner | Jan 14, 2009 | Getting Salon Clients Quickly, Increasing Retail Sales, Motivating Salon Staff, Salon Advertising Tips
Hair Salon Marketing Plan: How This Salon Got 165 New Clients in ONE Month-Special Group Coaching Call For Inner Circle Members
Motion Beats Meditation, Every Time – Hit ‘Play’ on audio below.
First, some interesting news that belies all the gloom and doom. International research and survey firm Synovate reports that a poll of 11,500 people in over a dozen countries found 41% of people plan to spend the same amount on beauty products and services as they did before the downturn, while only 27% said they would cut down. (source: www.synovate.com)
And there are other signs (hard to find in the mainstream press) that the outlook is not ALL thunder and lightning for 2009. China? The most recent figures I can find indicate China’s growth will ‘only’ be around 7% this year. ONLY 7%?? In any other country, 7% growth would produce dancing in the streets and joyful public fornication.
There are other indicators that the world hasn’t actually stopped turning. Principally from our own Inner Circle members. I love it when I hear from members who are truly kicking some serious butt… despite the ‘recession’, without regard to any and all obstacles put before them, regardless of nay-saying friends, family and/or staff, while ignoring the self-fulfilling talk of gloom and doom.
Like Chicken Little, for some people the sky is always falling in. For a few (certainly most of our Members) what falls out of the sky is money.
Nadia Valerio of Valerio Hair in Doncaster, Victoria. A real ‘action woman’.
Among them, Nadia Valerio of Valerio Hair in Doncaster, Victoria.
Most salons struggle to fill chairs/treatment rooms at this time of the year. Nadia and her staff of 11 are struggling to keep up with the sheer volume of clients, all brought in using simple ads, flyers and sales strategies from the Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit™
Get this: In November last year Nadia took an ad from the Toolkit and ran it in the local paper. The salon was run off its feet, in just five weeks they took in no fewer than
165 NEW clients.
(MEMBERS: Log into the Members Only ‘Sealed Section’ and you’ll find the ad that Nadia used under “Getting New Clients – Hair”)
That result was achieved despite what many would see as a massive handicap – located in a huge shopping mall with no fewer than EIGHT directly competing salons.
“Every client that came in the week after then received a $10 welcome letter/gift voucher to come back to the store and so far in 8 weeks of the first ad going to print 45 of those clients have come back, it has been the most amazing response, I could not have asked for anything more and this is just a start. We have put together a plan for the next 6 months and can’t wait to put it all in to play. Once again thank you WORLDWIDE SALON MARKETING you have taken my business to the next level,” writes Nadia.
by Greg Milner | Sep 17, 2008 | Beating the Competition, Getting Salon Clients Quickly, Increasing Retail Sales, Motivating Salon Staff
Worldwide Salon Marketing members: see below for the exact ad and marketing idea for a salon that brought one Member 87 new clients and $12,000 extra sales in a month.
You might be wondering ‘how can a little salon like mine ever be a successful business….when I know nothing about business!?’
Well, take heart. About the only thing you can hear on Wall Street this week is the sound of wrists being slashed and breasts being beaten, as yet more of America’s ‘institutions’ collapse in a very untidy heap, and the rest of the country shakes in fear of the economic ‘disaster’ ahead. Lehmann Brothers…dead and buried. Merrill Lynch sold for a pittance. Now the country’s biggest insurance company, AIG, bailed out by the taxpayer for $80-odd BILLION.
So you think YOU don’t know anything about business? The guys running these huge corporations are supposed to be Titans of Industry, the so-called Masters of the Universe. Yet it seems they’re not so smart after all.
How dumb was it to lend money to people who never had a hope of paying it back?
The emperors really don’t have any clothes.
If only these fools had half the smarts of some of our Inner Circle members, who clearly know more about how to make a profit than most of the Wall St wizards who’ve got America and much of the rest of the world into so much trouble.
Below are reports just in this week, from salons and spas in America and Australia…from salon owners who have thumbed their noses at the ‘recession’, are making more money than they’ve ever made in their lives, at a time when most salon & spa owners are shutting their eyes, slamming the door, hiding under the table and hoping that when they eventually do come out into the light again, things will have miraculously got better, all by themselves.
For here is the Great Recession Lesson: the more people do just that – bunker down, stop marketing…the greater is the opportunity for those few of us remaining to capture their market, make more money, not less, and come out the other side in better shape than we’ve ever been.
EXAMPLE #1: First to one of our more prominent Inner Circle members, Body Solutions Laser & Skin Care in Scottsdale, Arizona. From owners Dr Tim & Kanna Reilly, an email just in today, complete with the ad they used to achieve some spectacular results this past month:
Tim & Kanna Reilly
Hi Greg,
I know you like to share some ideas with other Inner Circle Members so I thought I’d open up this one. The attached ad (sse below) ran in our local paper (black and white, quarter page ad) from August 11to September 13. The results:
87 New Clients @ $99 per facial = $8613
53 bought products totaling approx $4000
60 already rebooked for another next month. Total from one monthly promotion was over $12,000, money spent on ad was $1040 for the month ( the ad ran 3x per week for 4 weeks)
Thanks as always for all your help, ideas and encouragement! If we keep this up well be looking for even more space. Take care, Kanna Reilly, Body Solutions LASER & SKIN, Scottsdale, AZ, USA.
WSM members: log into the Members only ‘sealed section’ www.worldwidesalonmarketing.com/members and navigate to the “Getting New Clients – Beauty” category to download the exact ad that Tim & Kanna used to get these results.
The In-Spa promotions that brought this Member retail sales of $25,000 a month.
EXAMPLE #2: Sydney salon owner Lesley Morgan-Wesson took two years to decide to join the Inner Circle program and get her marketing & sales Toolkit. By the sound of Lesley’s latest email to us, sounds like it’s been a worthwhile investment!
“We shall achieve our $1,000,000 goal by the end of this year…”
Lesley Morgan-Wesson Marketing Ideas For A Salon
I was working on reception in the salon yesterday… (because we’re 2 staff down at the moment: 1 on holiday and 1 I let go) and I was staggered at how busy we are!! I don’t work in the salon and rarely go in so I mean… it was really a surprise!
Let me explain…
Some of our staff are booked up til January of next year! We’re generally booked up until the end of September.
We’re doubling our turnover each month over the same period last year. We’re getting 15-20 enquiries from our website per day and most are converting… and they’re good quality clients as well.
Client feedback is very positive… one of our long term clients popped in yesterday because she saw me in the salon and we were generally updating each other. She praised the business, the staff, the marketing, the atmosphere, the decor, in fact the whole business… and me. This is a lady whose professional life revolves around the big end of town and has worked closely with all the big fashion houses in Paris. So you can imagine I was thrilled by her praise.
And perhaps the biggest coup for me was a few weeks ago I was approached by a local up-market shopping centre to open a spa there (on the basis of our website, our look and our reputation). I had a meeting last week with centre management and I’m working on a feasibility study and financial projection for them and for me… it’s looking very positive.
We shall achieve our $1,000,000 goal by the end of this year… no mean feat when you think a few months ago a Thai massage centre opened right next door to us and another massage centre opened across the road PLUS we already had 28 competitors in the area! Well, I’m happy to announce about 7 businesses have already closed and we rarely see anyone in the massage centre.
Why am I sharing this with you? Well, our salon has always done well… but this year it’s growing exponentially and really taking off!
I believe the reason is several-fold… I’m implementing all the Inner Circle theory (not just slavishly copying the templates) you speak and write about and yes, it requires tweaking at times… but when you get it right… BOOM!! I also have formulae, templates, notes, mentors and coaches to guide and support me and I feel so confident about the path I’m on… it’s great.
(Last year I was seriously considering giving up… too hard for the little return… I was so close to over it!)
So thank you very much… I enjoy being part of the Inner Circle because you and Jill have an impeccable work ethic and it is also evident in the staff you employ.
Kind regards (and raving fan),
Lesley Morgan-Wesson, Owner, LADY AT BAY, Sydney.
Marketing Ideas For A Salon Lesley
Recession? Nuts to that!
by Greg Milner | Jun 22, 2008 | Ask the Experts, Getting Salon Clients Quickly, Salon Advertising Tips
Salon Marketing Plan Strategy: Are They SERIOUS??
When I first read the following email from a spa owner last weekend, I thought she was having a lend of me, taking the mickey. I read it again, and again. Nope, she was actually serious. But it still took my breath away.
So I’m not going to embarrass the poor lady by revealing her name, or the city she writes from. It doesn’t matter anyway, because it could have come from any one of the many thousands of salon & spa owners who subscribe to this newsletter and market their beauty salons (except our Inner Circle members, of course. At least THEY are well educated enough not to make this most basic of foolish, delusional mistakes.)
“My husband and I are in the process of setting up a Spa & Beauty Salon, and working on a tight budget. Our first big hiccup is a dispute over our business card….”
Good grief. Of all of the challenges of setting up a new business – hiring staff, fitting out, getting product to sell, signage, marketing, admin, etc etc etc – a business card has provided the catalyst for their biggest dispute? My heart sank. Then. it got worse.
“We finally reached a decision on our logo, which I must say was very hard. I designed the business card with the logo on the left hand side. Our phone number on top right with a list of services underneath, followed by our address on the bottom, all on a matt white background so our logo will stand out in blue.”
By this point, my head is in my hands, throbbing. My eyes are glazing over.
Why do so many people new to business invest so much time, energy, money and angst over things that do not matter a damn remains an enduring mystery to me. So, for the benefit of this misguided soul, and every other salon & spa owner reading this, I’ll repeat something I’ve been banging on about for years:
In the entire history of the human race, a logo has never sold anything. Zero. Zip. Nada. Nyet. EVER.
Neither has a business card…that’s correct folks, even a business card emblazoned with a fancy logo.
The fatal mistake this and so many other business people make – and this applies equally to the ‘big’ end of town – is to assume that things like logos and pretty graphics and clever ‘slogans’ are enough in and of themselves to do the only thing that really matters in any business. And that is, to
get customers in the door and sell something to them.
(And do not for a moment believe that this most basic misunderstanding is limited to start-up businesses. A few years ago, the biggest bank in my part of the world, the Commonwealth, actually hired – at a cost of millions of dollars – an entire squadron of PR people, pony-tailed advertising so-called ‘experts’ and image consultants to agonize over, workshop, consult, focus-group and doodle till they were blue in the face so the brains-trust at this giant organization could unveil, with great fanfare, their new corporate logo!)
Do you really think, for a moment, that had McDonalds done nothing but erect a couple of golden arches, they would have sold so much as a single hamburger? Of course not, because McDonalds understands that ‘corporate branding’ and ‘image’ is only secondary, and matters more after they’ve acquired a customer, it doesn’t actually get the customer in the door in the first place.
No. What gets the customer through your door, above and beyond all else, is
THE OFFER.
Without a compelling OFFER – wrapped in a great sales message – plus a means of identifying your ideal target market (it’s called lead generation), and a method of delivering that message to that ideal market – all the fancy logos, business cards, corporate branding, staff training, back-office systems, salon fit-out etc etc – are a complete
waste of time, energy and money.
So my advice to this salon owner, and anybody else contemplating, agonizing over, arguing about their logo or business card… forget it, throw it out…and start again. Start with the only thing that gets customers in the door, and that is marketing, in its most basic form:
The OFFER, a great headline, testimonials, a strong guarantee, a call to action, multiple means of response, follow-up offers, list building, and above all, building a relationship with your customers.
In the end, ALL business is about relationships. And if you think a logo is going to do all of the above, by all means, go ahead and waste your time on the damn thing. Personally, I wouldn’t give it a nano-second’s thought.
And for those who don’t believe a practice what I preach: I don’t even have a business card.
