Hair Salon Marketing Ideas: A Salon Owner’s Story – and How You Can Copy It…
In 1937, Napoleon Hill wrote one of the earliest ‘success formula’ best-sellers, Think and Grow Rich. I would have titled it ‘Think, ACT and Grow Rich’.
Thinking doesn’t achieve anything by itself. The world is full of educated derelicts. Only action makes a difference. Ghandi, Mandela, Martin Luther King didn’t achieve anything by thinking, they took action and got things done.
Which is why you should read on, because here is a story of action from one of our own Members.
Lisa has been featured here before. She attended one of our Road to Riches marketing and business education seminars, and her life and business was revolutionized overnight.
Here is Lisa’s story, as emailed to me this week.
“Thank you for the wonderful support that you and the team so generously give to me.
When I look back at the way I used to let my business set my mood and how, if the staff were bickering, I would lie awake worrying that some one might leave”.
“I can’t believe the personal growth I have had in just six months alone. I would never have believed you if you told me that the way I am feeling now would happen back in July when I signed that credit card slip, joined the Inner Circle program and drove home with the Toolkit.
“Truth is I felt trapped by my own career, knowing full well that I certainly did not want to go back to working for a boss who was drowning like I was.
Thinking what I could do instead, when I love this industry (give or take a few peacocks), hair dressers are my kind of people. This industry needs help in so many ways.
“For my part I wanted to grow my business so that I stopped feeling physically sick when things went wrong at work. In just six months I have become a great boss. I have the Christmas cards from my team to prove it.
“I am learning about what my staff want and need in order to thrive in a working environment and thus return me good money on my investment. (Those I employ)
Since I attended that conference and joined your program 3 staff members in a team of 5 no longer work here, they have been replaced by passionate people and everything has improved for the better.
“Together my sales have improved consistently, over $60,000 in the same 6 month time frame and I now know where it is I want to be and what is I need to be working on. I have the best team of hairstylists (4 of them a mere 18 years of age) and now I have the knowledge and direction that will see me continue on this successful journey.
“I have things on the go now that keep me awake with excitement. That is how I felt 8 years ago when I opened my own business, however I lost my way somewhere along the way.
“I am on the floor cutting only for two 4 hour sessions a week, to keep the loyal clients happy and I love it. And that sick feeling that comes along when something hits that’s GONE!”
Last year Microsoft shelled out $26 billion – yes, that’s twenty six billion dollars – to take over LinkedIn. Just think about that for a minute – $26 billion is greater the entire Gross Domestic Product of more than half the countries in the whole world.
And why would Microsoft do that? LinkedIn’s total revenue in 2015 was a paltry $670-odd million. So Microsoft is hardly interested in LinkedIn for its profits.
Nope. Microsoft is prepared to make the biggest purchase in its 40 year history to get hold of LinkedIn’s 350 million members. And most of that 350 million are high-value professionals of some kind.
Microsoft recognises that the real money is in the list of customers.
So how does this relate to your small salon or spa in Downtown Anywhere? For exactly the same reason – the real money is in your list of customers, clients and prospects.
Last week, veteran WSM member Nicole Panayiotou, owner of a successful salon in the Victorian country town of Sale decided she wanted to boost sales for June, and at the same time clean up her large database of several thousand clients and former clients.
Here’s what she did:
1) At my suggestion, she shot a short video on her mobile phone, sent it to one of my team at Worldwide Salon Marketing, and we loaded it up onto her salon’s website. You can see that video here.
3) At the same time, she used her database – her list – to find another 400 such ‘missing in action’ clients with mobile phone numbers, and sent them a text message that read as follows:
“Want a FREE $50 voucher? Click the link to redeem it! We miss you at Blush x. http://www.beauty-salon-sale.com/we-miss-you – Reply stop to opt out.”
The link in the SMS took recipients to the new video on her website here, and under the video, a simple form to fill in and get the gift voucher.
Results?
“I sent 150 letters, got 3 clients back off the first letter. Sent 400 texts, got 11 opt outs and 7 clients back in! Still got more to send so extending it (the offer) thru till end July. Great chance to clean up data base so I’m happy.”
Now, before you dismiss that as a poor result, think about it; with a simple, easily-implemented promotion using just a tiny section of her existing list of clients, she resurrected ten ‘missing in action’ clients, with the chance to turn them once again into regular buyers. At say, $1,000 a year per client, it’s a cheap way to regenerate $10,000 a year revenue.
That’s the value, and the money, in a well maintained list. And that’s why Microsoft is spending $26 billion to get hold of one.
Now, I did promise I’d show you exactly how you can write an ad that turns your silent phone into a never-ending ringing-machine. This includes the 7 CRUCIAL elements to any successful salon marketing campaign.
Let’s dive in.
There are two types of popular marketing: branding, and direct response. This type of marketing I’ll be talking about is will be direct response.
Branding marketing works wonders for Apple and your local bank – but it’s a money guzzler for salons and spas.
As a salon owner, marketing can be VERY overwhelming, and it’s very easily a huge waste of money. That is, if you don’t do your marketing right. Time and time again, salon owners (and specifically, our members before they join any of our programs) will run branding ads, or ads promoting HUGEEEE discounts.
The thing is, “50% off an eyebrow wax,” or “50% a cut and color!” just doesn’t work. I’ve never been compelled to book in for a “discounted” service – have you?
Direct response marketing, put simply, creating adverts and offers that benefit the customer, NOT the salon or spa. Discounts work on the salon’s behalf – they get you in customers.
Direct response, however, ALWAYS will solve a client’s problem: whether it may be frizzy hair, long hair, hairy legs, cellulite, acne – whatever your service is, you solve a problem.
You already know the 3 elements you must figure out before you write any ad – and if you don’t, read them now, otherwise the following won’t make much sense.
Those 3 elements (you’ve gotta know what you’re selling, to whom, and why they should buy from you) are crucial for you to figure out these 7 must-have elements in ANY marketing campaign, especially for your salon.
They are –
A headline: your salon name is a SHITTY HEADLINE.
An offer: no, this isn’t discounting. DISCOUNTING IS EVIL!
List benefits: what specific problems do you solve? Bumpy legs from shaving, frizzy hair?
A guarantee: This is the most powerful, yet rarely, and so poorly used.
Some proof: How can you prove what you say is true? How can you make your potential clients TRUST you?
Scarcity: why should they call now to book?
Call to action (CTA): what do they do next?
Phew. That’s a lot to take in.
See, 99% of salon marketing falls into the fatal, profit-grabbing trap of talking about their own business:
“Our clients have come to trust OUR experts… for OUR expertise…. our cutting-edge machines…..”
STOP. Just, stop. I was bored writing that sentence, and I’M A MARKETER!
Marketing that fails is bragging about your business. Marketing that makes money, always puts the client first. Always.
See, advertising is SALESMANSHIP IN PRINT.
Here’s an INCREDIBLE direct response ad – written from a manufacturer. It’s clearly been written by a copywriter – someone who’s job is to write marketing for a living – someone like me.
It has a headline that’s direct, and to the point. It’s job is to appeal one to those are interested, and to compel the intrigued readers into reading the ad.
Let’s dive in:
1. Headline
The headline here is straightforward, and bluntly put: it’s about making more money. They’re clearly targeting people who use Seal-It, either in their current business or as part of their hobby. By giving them this elusive idea that they can MAKE money from the products they use instantly intrigues them.
Read on.
2. Offer
They’re not selling a product itself through this ad, instead they’re creating a relationship with the interested reader. This is called lead generation advertising.
The offer here is to become a distributor of Seal-It, and to make money: they’ve made it clear: “Become a Seal-It Distributor and make money now!”
3. Benefits
Seal-It did it beautifully: a simple list, clearly stating the benefits… “unlimited earning potential,” “no franchise fees…” – they’ve already stated the solutions to a reader’s potential questions.
4. A guarantee: This is the most powerful, yet rarely, and so poorly used.
Although they don’t state a specific guarantee, the little yellow box stating who they can potentially sell Seal-It too, and the testimonial below the box replaces the guarantee.
5. Proof
They’ve added a clear testimonial – AND an image of the couple. Any form of testimonial will increase trust, and increase sales, but photos of the person whom the testimonial is from will increase sales even MORE.
After all, humans connect better with other humans.
6. Scarcity
Usually, in direct response marketing, you’ll have a limit on what you’re selling. That limit is in either time the offer is available, amount of appointments/quantity available, or anything that makes people **act now**.
After all, that’s what scarcity is designed to do: scarcity triggers the fear button that every human has.
7. Call to action (CTA)
They’ve made it clear: “Call now for your free information packet!”
Can’t get any clearer than that.
I’ll bet your first reaction of this ad was “there’s too much text in it! Nobody will read it!”
To the contrary, actually. The people who WILL read this ad are PRECISELY the only people the advertiser wants. That’s true for you, that’s true for ANY form or direct response advertising:
This is a real advert written by Ogilvy & Mather, one of the largest marketing firms in the world. Click the ad to read the entire thing.
This is a real advert written by Ogilvy & Mather, one of the largest marketing firms in the world. It’s long, about ten-times longer than the Seal-It ad above, yet, it’s one of their best converting ads of all time. Click the ad to read the entire thing.
This ad is not only written for their perfect client, but it covers ALL 7 elements. They’ve written the ad so well, that even I want to call Ogilvy – and I’m not even in the financial industry!
Here’s the thing: if people aren’t interested in what you have to sell, they won’t read a THING.
But if people ARE interested – they’ll read everything. They’ll soak EVERYTHING UP with a sponge.
And that’s the difference between brand advertising, and direct response advertising. You want to tap into your perfect client’s mind, and push their pain points. This is why you must figure out your perfect client before you write anything for your salon marketing.
Because if you don’t know what your perfect client wants, how can you sell anything to them?
Here’s an example of a direct response ad for the salon industry:
If you have wrinkles, dark-eyes or anything else that dermatitis cream solves – you bet you’d be reading that ad. Chances are, you’d be picking up that phone, too. And that’s what direct response marketing is designed to do:
Get people to pick up the phone and call you.
And to do that, you need to have an irresistible offer. Figure out what you’re going to sell, to whom, and why they should buy from you, and start writing your ad following the 7 elements above.
When your salon marketing is done right, the ad will be ringing: off the hook.
I speak with many salon owners who tell me, “I post on Facebook from time to time, but I don’t really know what to post and when.” Other times they say, ”I know I should be on social media more, and I need a plan of attack.” Well thankfully I know a thing or two about salons and social media.
When I started using social Media in my salon it was still relatively new and I didn’t really know what or how to use it as a business tool. After I sold my salon, and before I joined Timely Salon Software, I ran a small social media consultancy business I was able to see first hand how much of an impact social media could have on a business. I was able to grow salon businesses, increase profits, and strengthen relationships between the salon and their clientele. Here are some of the tips I’ve learned on how to get a business started with social media.
The secret to doing well on social media is to know your audience intimately. What type of client do you want to attract? Who are the clients you have in your salon now, and do you love to look after them when they’re in your chair? We all have clients who complain, moan and are never happy with what we do, but they still keep coming back and causing you grief. Lets not focus on attracting more like them. You can be picky about who you you choose to promote your business to.
Build a clear picture of who your perfect client is and give her a name. Build a virtual profile based on what she does, where she goes, and what personal values she has. Let’s start by giving her a name – we’ll call her Jessica. What social media platform does Jessica use? Is she in her 50’s and and in need of a regular colour touch up, or is she in her early 20’s and wanting to look like the latest celebrity? You’ll speak differently to Jessica depending on who she is as a person.
Once you know who Jessica is, you can speak directly to her in all of your business marketing. This starts with picking the right social media platform. If Jessica is 45-55 year old career woman, she is more likely to be on LinkedIn and Twitter than on Instagram and Snapchat, so take that into consideration when choosing your social platform. The 25 year old Jessica who loves to follow celebrity fashion might hang out in Instagram to keep up with the Jenners and Amy Pham, so making sure you have a presence on the right platform for your business is the first step.
My advice would be to nail Facebook before you venture out onto other social platforms, since everyone is on Facebook.
Now you know where Jessica hangs out online, it’s time to start sharing with her.
Show Jessica who you are as a brand and salon team. Post pictures of the hair you do or real things your team get up to outside of work, like courses they attend and team building activities. Continue the real conversations you have inside your salon on your social media pages.
It’s important to be relevant with what you post. There are so many pages posting so many things but you need to be known for something on social media. You’re a hair salon, so post things that are about salons or come from a hair salon’s perspective. For example, a picture of a cute dog is not relevant to your salon, but if the dog has a very cute hairstyle or has come in with a client, it might be.
Also remember that everything you post should be directed at Jessica. Keep in mind that you’re speaking to her. Before you push send, ask yourself if what you’re posting is relevant to your business and interesting to Jessica.
The final thing to keep in mind is that social media is about a conversation. It starts inside your salon business and should be continued through your social pages between salon visits. Hair salons are not only about doing hair; they are a place where we build strong client-stylist relationships, which adds significant value to the salon experience. Social media allows you to build and strengthen those relationships by maintaining your rapport outside your place of business.
Social media doesn’t need to be a challenge if you see it as a way to continue your customer conversations and build relationships while they’re away. Of course to do this you need to know who you’re speaking to. Creating a profile of your perfect client will allow you to speak directly to them and keep them interested in who you are and what you do. Use this as a guideline when deciding what to post and when, and you will do just fine on your salon’s social media. Good luck out there!
Marketing & Business Development Manager at Timely Software. After 20 years of owning an award-winning salon and 3 years running online marketing businesses,Larissa knows first-hand how hard it is to keep up with the evolving digital landscape, while keeping clients happy and looking after the day-to-day pressures of running a business. larissa@gettimely.com
It’s less than 2 weeks in to 2014 and our Worldwide Salon Marketing members are already out of the blocks with a roar with emails and phone calls coming in to our office from excited salon owners telling us about their successful campaigns.
This morning I spoke on the phone with Maree Hoare, of Red Hair in Palmerston North. Maree joined us just one month ago and has shown immediately what it takes to be a successful marketer of her business.
She hasn’t sat around waiting for the phone to ring, instead she’s got straight down to business, is creating her own success and taking complete control of her business.
When Maree opened her salon this morning she noticed some gaps in the booking system later in the week. So armed with the tools she needed to fix that problem, she opened up her computer, visited the members only template website and found an SMS example that she could adapt for her own salon.
She sent the message out to just 400 people of her SMS list and within 30 minutes had no fewer than 12 bookings.
“With schools being on holiday it gets a bit quiet around this time of year in Palmerston North, I need to keep my team busy and so at this late stage it seemed a text message to my clients would be the quickest option to fill the gaps later in the week. It took me a few minutes to put the message together from the examples on the website and then I sent it out and within minutes the phone was ringing hot! The system says the SMS’s are still being sent out so I am sure I will get even more calls than the dozen we have already had in the last half an hour. But I am really happy with the result.”
The hair offer Maree sent out by text was for $79. Given that a text will cost about 10c per message that’s a $40 cost for a return so far of $948. I would call that a great return on investment.
And the message also saw at least 2 long lost clients make a booking in the salon.
Since joining WSM in December, Maree has already put in to action steps to help her work more as a marketer on her business. Could you imagine earning $948 in 30 minutes if you were cutting someones hair or doing a facial? Not likely unless you are the hairdresser to David Beckham. So Maree is already seeing the value of her time spent marketing rather than being a technician cutting hair.
And in addition to Maree’s amazing SMS campaign she also launched her mini memberships last week which she has already sold 7 bringing in and extra $1400 in income.
A massive congrats to Maree for her great start to 2014 and we can’t wait to hear more from her as the year progresses.
If you are not a member of one of our WSM programs but want to kick start 2014 the way Maree has done then click here now to apply and one of our team will be on the phone to you immediately. Or call one of our worldwide offices to speak with someone now.
Last year Microsoft shelled out $26 billion – yes, that’s twenty six billion dollars – to take over LinkedIn. Just think about that for a minute – $26 billion is greater the entire Gross Domestic Product of more than half the countries in the whole world.
Last week, veteran WSM member Nicole Panayiotou, owner of a successful salon in the Victorian country town of Sale decided she wanted to boost sales for June, and at the same time clean up her large database of several thousand clients and former clients.
3) At the same time, she used her database – her list – to find another 400 such ‘missing in action’ clients with mobile phone numbers, and sent them a text message that read as follows:
It’s less than 2 weeks in to 2014 and our Worldwide Salon Marketing members are already out of the blocks with a roar with emails and phone calls coming in to our office from excited salon owners telling us about their successful campaigns.
