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Join Salon Mavens with Marnie Kallmeyer here.
Marnie sold her salon business for a big payout
Nearly 14 years ago, when WSM was in its infancy, I met a new Member whose salon happened to be only a few blocks away from our office.
Marnie Kallmeyer had bought my original Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit, much to the sneering objections of her husband Peter, who derided it as “just another scam”.
Marnie’s business was really struggling at the time, but she did nothing with the Toolkit for some months, until finally, driven by desperation, she picked it up and started using the tools and instructions contained within it.
Let’s cut to the chase – the business quickly took off, doubled then tripled sales, and Peter had to eat a healthy serving of humble pie. It got better though. Marnie fell over and badly injured her hand, so much so that she could no longer work on clients, and was forced to work ‘on’ the business instead of in it.
She immersed herself in education, schooling herself on all things marketing, subscribing to the work of great marketers like Dan Kennedy, and more importantly, implementing what she was learning.
Marnie became not merely a business owner, but an entrepreneur.
A couple of years after that, she put the business on the market, and sold it – for a solid six-figure sum.
Every year since, I’ve tried unsuccessfully to persuade Marnie to come out of ‘retirement’ (she’s far too young for that!) and make her enormous skills, her no-nonsense approach, her warmth and sense of empathy available to our salon & spa owners all over the world.
This month, I tried again. “Do you just want to fiddle around doing the odd eyelash extension, or do you want to use your knowledge and business experience to actually make a difference in the world?” I asked her.
Thankfully, that must have pushed a ‘hot button.’ So I’m absolutely delighted to let you know that Marnie has agreed to join WSM officially.
We don’t even have a title for Marnie yet. But safe to say, she’ll be intimately involved in guiding our Members, in group video training, in answering questions in our forum, and developing new ways of helping salon owners achieve their goals.
Marnie has been where many Members are right now, at the bottom and struggling to find clear air. She’s also been at the summit of success, and knows exactly what it takes to get there. But more to the point, Marnie is a wife and a mother, just like so many of our Members. She’s been through the School of Hard Knocks, graduated from the University of Having the Shit Kicked Out of You, and came out smiling, despite the scars and war-wounds.
She’s hard-nosed, but soft as butter inside. You couldn’t want for a better industry-specific mentor, guide and Marketing Maven.
Yes, a salon owner really CAN take holidays…
Like most salon owners, Jasmine Dwyer of Adore salon in Colac, Victoria, was ‘stressed out’. “When I was in the treatment room, I was missing so many phone calls, so much business,” she says.
Fed up, she made a crucial decision that’s changed her life completely. As Jasmine explains in this recent video interview, she’s now able to take long holidays without worrying about the business.
The Cafe Owner Who Sat on a Stool
Dear Diary,
The other day I called in on a cafe that I occasionally visit on the way to work. I’ve gotten to know the owner a little, over the years, and on this day, the cafe was empty and she was sitting on a stool, tooling around on her phone.
“Hi Cindy, how’s it going?” I asked breezily.
“Bloody awful,” she said, gesturing around the empty cafe. It was nearly lunchtime, it should have been busy. “I just don’t know what’s happened, business has just…dwindled off…”
I actually DID know what had happened. Another cafe had opened nearby – brighter, better food, happy staff, clever marketing (they were using Instagram to brilliant effect), and Cindy’s business was suffering.
“So, what are you doing about it?” I inquired.
“There’s not much I can do,” she moaned. “I sit here and wait for the customers to come, and they don’t…”
I could have taken her by the scruff of the neck and shaken her. There she was, doodling around on Facebook, for crying out loud, and whining about ‘how bad things are.’
Had she done any marketing to her list of regular clients, with an offer? Nope. Had she sent a staff member out into the street, handing out a ‘buy one, get one free’ gift voucher to passers-by? Ah, no. Instead of idly browsing inane cat videos on Facebook, had she actually done any paid advertising on Facebook to drive people to her website? Negative.
I ran off a string of other ‘actions’ she could be taking to generate business. She shook her head at all of them. Sadly, she was sitting on her stool, waiting for something to happen, rather than taking Massive Action.
To be frank, she’s no orphan in this. Many owners of small businesses are the same. In fat times, most are too busy taking easy orders to even think about the possible lean times ahead. Most pay little attention to threats to the business. And hardly anyone is prepared to take the massive action required to combat such threats, let alone thrive in the face of them.
Success in fat times is easy, even for the lazy. A rising tide lifts all boats.
Churchill said “Success is the ability to go from one failure to another without loss of enthusiasm.”
But he didn’t mean enthusiasm for failure. In nearly 15 years of consulting to and advising salon & spa owners on their marketing strategies, I’ve spoken to literally thousands. And the statistics never change.
Eighty percent do nothing, change nothing, take little or no action to change their circumstances. They fall at the first hurdle, whine that ‘it’ doesn’t work. And sulk. Ten percent get to the second, even the third hurdle, and give up.
Only the top ten percent keep going. Many of those ‘ten percenters’ have been members of our Worldwide Salon Marketing online and offline programs for years and years. They understand that not everything works, all the time. Success isn’t linear. It’s not about taking consecutive actions. It’s about doing lots of things, simultaneously. Such as…
· Regularly, frequently reaching out to your list of clients and prospective clients via email, text, social media with compelling offers to get them in the door.
· Being pro-active about ensuring your business is visible to prospective clients searching for your products or services online. That means either doing your own SEO (search engine optimizing) or paying a professional to do it for you.
· Being a Nazi about customer service – constantly training your staff, being ruthless about how you want things done.
· Planning your marketing months ahead, using a big wall calendar, or even the calendar on our Mobile App, My Salon Success.
· Accessing relevant tools and techniques – like the Client Attraction System website, which houses literally hundreds of done-for-you marketing for salons & spas that you can download and use, any time of the day or night.
· Planning and executing – well ahead of time – special events like Client Appreciation Nights, new product launches, membership programs, marketing ‘trigger’ events like Christmas, Mothers Day, major national holidays.
· Taking advantage of ‘news’ events – and rapidly tailoring promotions to ‘hook in’ on what people are already talking about.
· Monitoring and measuring the results of your marketing efforts, so you know from day to day what’s working, what isn’t working.
If you’re not doing at least some of the above, all the time, you’re sitting on your stool, like Cindy the Miserable Cafe Owner.
WANT TO TAKE ACTION?
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[VIDEO] How Angela doubled her salon profit in 4 years – and you can too, for just $1!
Angela Ord has just sold her salon business for TWICE what she paid for it. In this short video, Angela describes the THREE main strategies she used.
Now, for just ONE DOLLAR, you can TEST DRIVE the exact same system Angela used to double her profits AND her sale price.
Test Drive the Client Attraction System here for just $1 for 30 days!
No contracts, no ifs or buts, just hundreds of tested, proven, done-for-you salon & spa promotions, templates and how-to videos.
It’s client-grabbing, ‘push-button’ simple
[VIDEO] Use Your ‘Super Powers’ – with Julie Piantadosi
You’ve no doubt read many articles telling you what to do to become successful in your personal and business life. This is all very well and good, but I’m sure you have also figured out by now that there is no magic trick to win this race.
There is no quick fix or shortcut to the fame and glamour most of us dream of. So where does that leave us?
As part of my role at Timely salon software, I frequent many expos and networking events. Just recently I attended Beauty Expo Australia, and the highlight this year was talking with Julie Piantadosi. She is a no-nonsense type of gal, with a highly contagious and positive spirit. Her wealth of business experience makes her a powerful and effective speaker. As I chatted with her and listened to all the amazing things she does, I couldn’t help but wonder “How does Julie do it!?”
Check out Julie’s website here!
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332 pages, digital marketing, social media, done-for-you marketing & promotion templates – written by Rich Salon Owner author Greg Milner.
Used, tested & proven by more than 4,400 salons & spas worldwide.
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