by Greg Milner | Mar 4, 2013 | Blog, New Zealand
Its fair to say that many people, especially in the beauty industry, will have either heard of, or know, Margaret Walsh.
She’s the kind of salon owner with a very successful business that many of us aspire to and wish our salon could be ‘just like Marg’s.
She’ll probably kill me for saying this, but she’s been around a wee while and has helped many a budding young therapist and hair stylist to fulfill their dreams.
Last week I caught up with Marg and I saw first hand just how she supports her team, above and beyond what most people would see as ‘the call of duty’.
She had her staff gathered at her house for a team meeting and brought in a financial planning expert to help give advice to her team on how to manage their finances better. I made me think, if I were a therapist or stylist, I’d want Marg to be my boss!
And while Marg is busy concentrating on creating a 5 Star team and industry leaders of the future, as well as a highly successful hair and beauty salon in the Auckland suburb of Titirangi, she takes a lot of comfort in knowing that her salon marketing both online and offline is taken care off for her.
Margaret, who has been with Worldwide Salon Marketing for almost 3 years now, is a forward thinking salon owner who likes to stay a few steps ahead of her competitors. If something becomes available that Margaret sees as a good opportunity to market her business, she jumps at it!
Through Worldwide Salon Marketing, Margaret has access to some of the best marketing tools available to salons anywhere in the world, from done-for-you ads and templates (so she never has to stare at a blank computer screen wondering what to write), mentoring and support to help her plan her marketing in advance, websites and SEO so she completely dominates in Google searches in her area and an iPhone and Android app to keep those mobile savvy customers connected with her business.
Check out this video to hear what Margaret has to say about her experiences with Worldwide Salon Marketing, and some advice to salon owners looking to be the BEST in their town!
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If watching this video has made you think ‘I could do with some support like that’ give us a call (numbers at the top of this page) or click here to apply to join our My Social Salon program and we can help you become the best salon in your town…guaranteed! Just like Marg!
by Greg Milner | Oct 31, 2012 | Featured
Tamara O’Dowd of NRG Hairdressing in Leederville, Western Australia. “Business has grown by 40% in the 4 months since joining WSM and getting the My Social Salon online system…”
Every day, as Perth salon owner Tamara O’Dowd looks through her plate-glass front window to the inner-suburban street beyond, she knows that somewhere close by, at least seven prospective customers are typing ‘hair salon leederville’ or ‘hairdresser leederville’ into the search bar on their phones, iPads or laptops.
She knows this because Google’s keyword tool tells her so. And every day, one, two even three brand new clients walk through her door and hand over their cash for a hair service of some kind, having found Tamara’s brand new website at the very top of their Google search. Not just at the top of organic searches, but at the top of Google’s maps as well. (See picture below)
Every single day, day after day after day.
Think about that for a moment. I’ll do the sums for you. If a regular client is worth say, $1,000 to you in a year (roughly, $160 X 6 visits per year) then even ONE new client every single day, 5 days a week, 52 weeks a year is adding….wait for it…
$260,000 to Tamara’s annual revenue.
(click here to see videos that show exactly how Tamara did it – My Social Salon)
That’s how important it can be to be at the top of Google searches for your local area, in your industry sector. It’s now the end of October. Tamara’s website has only been live online since the end of July – 3 months. But as this image shows, it’s already dominating a very competitive geographical area, crowded with rival salons. 
Being able to be FOUND by prospective customers looking for your service, in their local area, has become not just ‘nice’ to have. It’s more important than that. It’s actually costing you money, lots of it, if they can’t find you.
Here’s another image of a Google search I did just today, ‘beauty salon ulverstone’ (a town in northern Tasmania).
Not surprisingly, at the very top of the search results was a website we built for another of our members, Silvia Bell of Bohemian Beauty. Silvia’s new website has been ‘live’ for about 12 weeks…
Now, at the risk of boring you witless, this matters because of studies which show that the difference in traffic you attract – and therefore, customers – is MASSIVELY dependent on your position in search rankings. Take a look at the graph below, showing the huge drop off in clicks from Number 1 position compared with Number 2 and beyond….
by Greg Milner | Jan 25, 2012 | Ads that Have Worked, Australia, New Zealand
STOP PRESS: We’ve just opened the NEW Salon Advertising Templates Webstore here!
If you are a Worldwide Salon Marketing Inner Circle member you will know what an amazing marketing tool and integral part of the program the members only website is. Many members tell me how they often spend hours browsing around all the different templates and marketing ideas and solutions.
And each and every year the website grows as more material is added and the archive gets bigger. In fact there is over 6 years worth of archived material on the website now. It’s easy for some of the older archives to be lost in depths of the website.
And it’s safe to say that if you were to employ a design firm or an ad agency to create the material on the members website and give you multiple options for designs, template sizes and concepts, you would be looking at spending into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. On the other side of the coin, if you were to try and design all this material yourself, well firstly you’d probably need a degree in copy writing, graphic design and a heck of a lot of time on your hands!!!
So, in this new feature I intend to delve deep into the archives, blow the dust and cob webs away and unearth some of the hidden gems that perhaps you have never come across before.
In this first feature I am going to look at a clever little flyer that was actually created by a Pizza Shop.
This was actually one of the very first promotions we use for our salon D’Aguiar: hair.skin.nails after joining the Inner Circle Program back in 2007 and it was a huge succuss. Our version was slightly different and at the top said ‘FREE $20 Voucher – No Strings Attached’ We then looped a piece of string through the flyer and hung it on peoples door knobs around our neighbourhood. We consistently got 10 bookings from every 100 door flyers delivered and we had so many people saying they LOVED the out of the box marketing!
We still have dozens of clients that come to our salon today who originally came from this flyer. So when you think for the cost of a $20 service, we have made upwards of $4 – 5K from EACH of those clients since then, it’s a pretty good return on investment!
Here’s a link to find this template in the members only sealed section.
http://www.worldwidesalonmarketing.com/members/salon-marketing-ideas/ideas-to-steal/a-different-kind-of-mailbox-flyer-try-this/
If you are a WSM Member and want to share a success story from another members only website ‘hidden gem’ then drop me an email chris@worldwidesalonmarketing.com and I’ll be sure to feature it in an up and coming article!
If you are NOT a WSM Member and are sick and tired of sitting in front of a computer screen trying to come up with designs and copy for flyers and ads, if technology bamboozles you, click here to watch the video and Request a FREE live demo of the My Social Salon program.
by Greg Milner | Aug 18, 2010 | New Zealand
NZ Salon Business Plan Template Superstars Nikki Smith & Phil Newman of NV Hair in Wanaka PROVE how even in a small town, there is big money to be made!
If I ever needed to provide evidence that the Inner Circle system works, regardless of the size of your town or the area your salon is in then Nikki Smith and Phil Newman of NV Hair in Wanaka, New Zealand are living and breathing proof!
Nikki Smith and Phil Newman of NV Hair, Wanaka, NZ
Nikki and Phil joined the program in July this year and have seen their takings sky rocket since then. For those of you unfamiliar with Wanaka, it’s in a fairly remote location in the South Island and has a population of around 7,000 (which grows a bit depending on the season).
Nikki and Phil actually took over an existing premises in Wanaka and it’s fair to say that prior to them taking over, the business was on a downward slide, with few customers and the clients that did come in, simply paid whatever they wanted to pay. It’s VERY hard to run a business like that!
But Nikki and Phil are a ‘no-nonsense’ team and knew what they had to do to turn things around…FAST. As soon as they joined the Inner Circle program and got their very own copy of the Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit® they took massive action.
“Hi Chris
We did the Hollywood promotion last month and here are our results…
We printed 2000 mailbox flyers at a cost of $110, and purchased 2000 envelopes at a cost of $230 (and we’ve now found them even cheaper).
We also ran 2 adverts in the local newspaper for $188 (we now do trade on service with advertiser so costs less, sometimes nothing depending on advert and time scale)
Our total number of bookings was 34 and out of the 34 only 3 paid the minimum $99. The average client spend was $130 (this was from up-grades and product sales).
The script for selling product and the method in the ‘Selling Like Crazy’ manual works a dream. I now have only 4 bottles of treatment on my shelf and my supplier loves me…..lol.
Thanks Chris this is definitely proof that the system works anywhere. The salon was on its knees when I took over and now, well I’m that busy I now need staff….lol.”
So let’s break these results down a bit more…
All up for the printing, envelopes and newspaper ads the cost was $528 (*You can get plain envelopes from the Warehouse Stationary for around $20 for 500…so this would have saved Nikki even more money).
3 packages were sold at $99 = $297
31 packages were sold with an average spend of $130 = $4030
So that’s a total income generated of $4327 for a cost of $528. A return of investment of $8 for every $1 spent…WOW!
If each of these clients were to spend on average $130 with Nikki and Phil every month for the next year, they would be worth over $1500 to the salon each. So potentially they have just increased the salons turnover over the next 12 months by $51,000….and that’s just from one promotion!
It’s pretty amazing considering that the salon was turning over a mere $2K a month before they took over.
Well done Nikki and Phil, keep up the good work!
Check out where Nikki and Phil’s salon is located…!
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by Greg Milner | May 28, 2010 | Australia, Marketing Superstars, The Smell of Success
Hair Salon Marketing Template Superstar: Message from a Doting Grandmother!
Now we’re being credited with creating babies!
At Worldwide Salon Marketing we’re dedicated to creating wealth and financial freedom for salon and spa owners. But we never thought we’d be thanked for making babies as well.
As Maureen Hardman writes, daughter and long-term Inner Circle member Cherie Underwood has been able to get married, start a family and work from home thanks to the success of direct response salon marketing she discovered in the WSM Inner Circle Marketing & Mentoring Program.
“When we purchased the salon nearly 3 years ago the old salon owner had implemented some of your strategies as she had hard copies of some of your marketing material, so at some stage she must have been a member.
“We know she had increased the business by about 25% in two years prior to her selling, due to an increase in her marketing strategies. Since joining WSM we have further increased our sales by at least another 25% by following your most recent ideas etc.
When we first purchased the business there were 2 additional full time staff (plus the owner) who had been there for a total of 9 years. They both left within 6 months, one opening up at home and taking about a quarter of the clients. (She left when Cherie returned from her honeymoon). Soon after this, with the help of the marketing templates in the Toolkit, birthday vouchers and fabulous offers, seen many of those clients return.
“We now also have someone on reception as inspired by WSM so we do not miss any calls, walk-ins etc (this is a must). The ex-employee is now working in a bar down the road (bitter sweet!). Because of this increase in sales we have put on an additional full time beauty therapist and Cherie has been able to start a family without any hesitation and will now predominantly work from home. Your stuff works and without it I may not have been blessed with a beautiful grandaughter!”
