Your 6-Step Salon Success Roadmap for 2020

The Christmas/New Year madness is done and dusted.

As you gaze into the crystal ball for 2020, what do you see for your business?

A limp re-hash of 2019…or a newly-dynamic, expanding, organised enterprise with systems in place that bring a constant flow of new and returning clients?

Marketing success isn’t a happy accident – it takes planning, focus, ACTION, and a well-defined infrastructure in place to help you take advantage of opportunities as they appear. But what does this infrastructure look like? Here’s the Worldwide Salon Marketing Blueprint.

Think of these Ten Essentials like the internal structure of a small sailing ship – the keel, ribs, bulkheads, pumps and labyrinth of wiring and hydraulic plumbing – all hidden from public view – that all work together as a system to keep the vessel afloat and drive it through the waves.

1) Your DATABASE.

Your database is like the keel of a ship…unseen, but VITAL.

The keel of your ship. And like a ship’s keel, it’s THE very foundation of a successful salon.

Anyone these days who still believes you can efficiently and effectively run and market a hair or beauty business using names written on the pages of a school exercise book is either seriously deluded, or accustomed to fighting battles blindfolded and with one arm tied behind your back.

Your list of clients – their names, their (full!) contact details, what they’ve previously purchased, their date of birth, their average spend…all of this information is GOLD.

But most of this vital information is useless unless it’s collated in a properly-organised database.

If you wanted to create a special offer appealing particularly to women aged between 29 and 45 who have one or more children and a history of buying facials and/or brazilian waxes, and email/SMS them with a link to that offer on your website, you simply cannot do it effectively and efficiently without those details in a database.

The price of computer-based systems has plummeted.

There are now scores of purpose-built, off-the-shelf database systems designed specifically for the hair & beauty industry.

You can implement a complete Point of Sale and Client Management system in your salon, and have it up and running inside 24 hours, for as little as $29 a month. There’s absolutely no excuse any more.

2) Testimonials and Online REVIEWS.

Testimonials and word of mouth have always been a primary source of new clients. Online reviews are the new word-of-mouth. Nobody these days would dream of booking an overseas trip or a new restaurant without Googling first and reading reviews.

And online reviews are now THE crucial piece of information prospects seek when they’re searching for a salon or spa. Many of our Member salons report getting 10, 20, even 30 new clients every month because of the prominence and sheer volume of their online reviews.

There are literally dozens of review sites – Yelp, True Local, Womo, Tripadvisor and more – but for most local service businesses like salons & spas, there is one review site that stands head and shoulders above the others. And that’s 

GOOGLE!

Think about it. 

You’re looking for a restaurant, or a travel agent, or a hair salon in your local area. What do YOU do? You pick up your phone, open a browser and Google “hair salon near me” or “waxing Sydney…”

Most people do that. And what do they find at the top of their search? Something like this: 

See all those reviews? 

One of the (many) reasons these three salons appear at the top of the search results for “hair salon Melbourne CBD” is because of their many reviews. 

This is what Google shows first, because Google owns the platform. They’re not going to show Facebook reviews or Yelp reviews before their own!

How to get reviews on your Google listing: 

1) Log into your Google account and find your Google My Business listing.

2) Find the “Get More Reviews” box on the home page of your listing. Click ‘share profile’ and it will give you a link you can send to clients. 

3) TEXT or email your client: “Thanks for coming in today (name)-) I’d love it if you’d write a short review on our Google listing. Just click here (and copy the link.)

sms marketingWSM members: in the Client Attraction System here, you’ll find the How to Get Masses of Online Reviews pack you can download, complete with done-for-you templates you can use to both collect reviews (the easy way) at your reception desk, and to send to clients by email.

Not a Member? In WSM’s flagship Client Attraction System marketing & mentoring program, you get unlimited access to the world’s largest and most comprehensive library of business & marketing resources designed and continually updated ONLY for salons and spas, as well as technical support, wesbsite and mobile app support, search engine optimization, and one-on-one coaching and guidance. Strictly limited to those salon owners who want to be business owners and entrepreneurs, not merely technicians. Go here to find out more.

 

3) VIDEO – simple, quick, easily uploaded – and devastatingly effective.

Your smart-phone is your friend. It’s also the friend of every single one of your clients, because everyone has one! They do almost everything on their smart phone – they browse the web, post to social media, send messages to their friends, shop, and…they watch videos. Smart salon owners – particularly those members of our My Social Salon program – are beginning to use videos as a stunningly effective tool to both reach out to their clients with interesting content, as well as generating instant business.

Here’s what to do:

1) Shoot a short video using your iPhone or Android. It can be just about anything – a quick ‘selfie’ interview with a happy client, a one-minute ‘how-to’ video featuring a new treatment or service in your salon, an introduction from a new staff member, a special promotion you’re running.

Here’s an example from one of our Members, Anita Bowe of Twisted Desire in Queensland:

Here’s another example from Carolyn Evans of Absolique Hair Health in Brisbane:

 

Any salon owner can do this! If you can touch the ‘record’ button on your smart-phone, or get one of your staff to do it, you CAN do this. But it’s what happens next that makes the magic.

2) Upload your video – straight from your smart-phone – to YouTube. For this you’ll need a free Google account (if you already use gmail, you’ll already have a Google account.) The whole process takes just a few minutes. YouTube will ask you for a Title, and a Description. In the ‘Title’ field, type a few words of what the video is about, and don’t forget to include your phone number, and your location. Why? Because Google uses this information as part of its Search Engine Optimisation process – if people see your video by going to the YouTube website, you want them to be able to see where you are and how to contact you.

You can simply leave your video there on YouTube. However, it’s smarter, if you know how, to then embed your video directly into your website.

Here’s an example on our Member, Escape Skin & Body’s website (just go to the home page and scroll down a little.) 

3) SMS and email your clients with links to the videos.

Here’s where you get the impact, and the results.

There’s no point in recording videos, uploading them, embedding them in your website if you don’t tell anybody about it.

Even if you don’t have everybody’s email address, you no doubt have every client’s mobile phone number. Send out a group text message, eg “Hi Jane, it’s Mary from (your salon name), I’ve just uploaded a quick video on a brilliant new hair style we’re doing, would love your feedback, check it out here:  and give me a call on 000 000 000″

(Hint: web addresses can be loooong – and soak up a lot of characters in an SMS. To shorten the link, copy the web address where the video is and go to www.bitly.com, paste the address of your video into the field in bitly, and it’ll instantly give you a much shorter link you can use in your text message and email. If you have email addresses of your clients, send them an email as well as a text message.)

You can do a video like these examples every week. Your clients will love them.

 

4) Your Website – but that’s just the start. 

If your current website – and all the other infrastructure around it, like Google Maps, reviews, videos etc – is bringing you a steady, measurable, identifiable stream of customers and clients every month, then you probably don’t need to do too much with it. If it’s already on the first page of Google for relevant searches, like ‘hair salon (your suburb)’ well and good.

But if you’re NOT getting a steady stream of clients who find you online, it’s time to ramp it up – or be left behind.

Here’s what to check:

1) Test your website’s Google ranking like this; open the Google Chrome web browser and ‘go incognito’ by pressing ‘control’ + ‘shift+ ‘n’ so Google doesn’t know who you are and gives you totally fresh results.

In the search bar, type what you think people in your area are searching for, e.g., ‘waxing’ and then your location or major geographical area, like ‘waxing northern beaches’.

If your website isn’t listed on the first page, it’s nowhere, and needs work.

Nobody searches Page Two.

2) Is your business appearing in the Google Business Listings? If not, you need to ‘claim’ your listing, and that involves generating an old-fashioned hard copy postcard from Google with a PIN number in it. They’ll mail it to you.

3) Look up your website on your smart-phone’s web browser. If all you get is a tiny version of the whole main website, it’s not mobile resp0nsive. That’s a problem, because more than half of web searches these days are done on mobile phones, and if all prospects get to see is a tiny version of your main website, not only will Google eventually downgrade your site in the rankings, but prospective customers will find it too hard to read, and go elsewhere.

4) Is your phone number prominent at the top of your website? It needs to be. On your smart phone, is your phone number appearing as a ‘hot’ or ‘click to call’ link? If not, it needs to be. Don’t make people jump through hoops just to call you.

5) Is your website being updated frequently and regularly with fresh content – text and images? If not, it needs to be. Google ranks websites it sees as being ‘loved’ and updated regularly. There’s no such thing as a ‘finished’ website.

5) Social Media – it’s for building relationships, not immediate sales. 

Facebook, and to a lesser extent Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram, can be useful to help build rapport and interaction with your ‘fans’. But they’re a LONG way from being the be-all and end-all.

In fact, Facebook particularly is becoming less so, as the company is constantly making it harder to reach your audience unless you’re prepared to pay.

It’s not ‘Free’ marketing by a long shot. Relying on Facebook and other social media platforms entirely to drive customers into your business is just plain dumb. If you do that, you WILL fail.

But there are ways of using Facebook much smarter than most people realise.

1) Never, ever ‘boost’ a post in an effort to reach more people. It’s expensive, and generally unproductive. A better way is to use Facebook ads. But it can be tricky, with major traps for the unwary.

2) People use Facebook and other social media to be social. They don’t go to Facebook to buy stuff. So post stuff on your business page that is engaging, that has been shown to get likes, shares and comments. Pictures, videos, funny stuff. Occasionally, a pitch or special offer.

But Facebook is not a selling platform, it’s an engagement platform. (Hint: if you’ve uploaded on of your videos to YouTube, do NOT merely post a link to that video into your FB page. Instead, upload your video directly into Facebook. It plays better that way, and doesn’t take people away from your page like a YouTube video does.)

6) Paid Online Advertising

If you’re serious about marketing your business, then you must use paid advertising – on the two biggest online platforms, Facebook (and to a lesser extent, Instagram) and Google.

As example, our digital marketing team set up the campaign above (and a similar ad on Google) for one of our members, Lorina Cassidy-Reid of Original Skin Tattoo Removal in Canberra.

Those ads – and variations of them – continue to bring in a steady stream of two, three or four appointments every day.

You can post nice updates on your Facebook business page till you’re blue in the face, but if you really want your stuff to be seen by the most people, and acted on, paid ads are the way to go.

But there are smart ways, and dumb ways, to advertising online, as I explain in this short video here: 

 

If you need any clarification of the above, or just want to discuss your hopes, goals and plans, feel free to call me or one of my specialist team on +61-8-94439327. 

We’re old fashioned. We like phone calls. 

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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!”

 

 

NZ Salon Success: SMS Gets Maree Hoare of Red Hair 12 bookings in just 30 minutes!

Maree HoareIt’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.

For WSM members, you can see the SMS that Maree sent on our members only Facebook forum. Click her now to check it out.

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.

New Zealand 09 476 1592

Australia 08 9443 9327

USA & Canada 250 590 0449

 

Worldwide Salon Marketing Success Story at the NZ Beauty Awards 2013

Over the last 5 years since starting Worldwide Salon Marketing in New Zealand we have seen and heard many success stories from salons owners, some of whom prior to joining WSM have been close to closing their doors, and others that already have successful and established salons but just want to know how to improve their businesses even further and make more money.

It’s fantastic to be part of helping salons achieve great success and reach goals, so when that success is recognized by a third party its even more satisfying.

Which is exactly what happened to Margaret Walsh of Face & Body in Titirangi.

At the recent New Zealand Beauty Gala Awards at the Pullman Hotel in Auckland Margaret and her team at Face and Body in Titirangi, picked up the ‘Runner-up’ prize in the category for Marketing Excellence, an Award sponsored by Worldwide Salon Marketing NZ.

Face & Body_Mkting Excellence_RunnerUp

Worldwide Salon Marketing wants to congratulate Margaret for her achievement.  Marketing is always evolving and Margaret has shown that her salon has used a great blend of traditional media, whilst embracing new media like apps and social media.

WELL DONE MARGARET WALSH & THE TEAM AT FACE & BODY TITIRANGI!!!

CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF MARGARET WALSH

And I also want to extend a MASSIVE congratulations to the winner of Marketing Excellence, Nicola Quinn from Nicola Quinn Day Spa in Christchurch.

There’s a funny story behind this also.  Nicola is not a member of WSM, however I have always been an admirer of Nicola’s salon, even more so since the terrible things that have happened with the earthquakes in Christchurch over the last couple of years.

Whilst in Christchurch visiting some of our WSM members I popped in to say hello to Nicola who was unavailable.  So I left her a hand written note encouraging her to enter the Marketing Excellence award, which she obviously did.  When presenting her award on the night Nicola told me she still has my note, which I thought was great.

Nicola Quinn_Marketing_Winner

So a BIG CONGRATS to Nicola Quinn and her team at Nicola Quinn Day Spa.

Finally, Worldwide Salon Marketing NZ also co-sponsored the ‘Best New Business’ category to which we would like to congratulate Louise Dickinson of ‘Chrysalis’ in Browns Bay, Auckland.

Well done to ALL the finalists from the Team at Worldwide Salon Marketing!

Christopher and the Team at Worldwide Salon Marketing New Zealand help salon owners chase the dream of becoming more successful and profitable.  If you like the sound of that then click here to find out more – obligation FREE.  We have packages that can fit ALL salon types and sizes!

Want a THRIVING beauty business? Amy Mitchell tells how she started as a one-man band – and grew a nationally-branded day spa business

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.

Not yet a Member? Check out the My Social Salon program here!