october 2009 - Stylist and Salon Newspapers

Put Technology to Work for You
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10 | OCTOBER 2009 | TEXAS STYLIST & SALON
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Three Months
of Marketing
Elizabeth Brown
One of the toughest aspects of running
any business that employs people is the
“employing people” part.
As salon owners you have no choice
but to become an instant staff development
director, human resource manager, conflict
resolution expert and consummate motivator
to the best of your abilities.
Even then, people don’t always follow
the rules. What may work to incentivize
some staff doesn’t interest others. Sometimes,
no matter how far you go to empathize,
sympathize, motivate and interest your
employees, they choose not to come along
for the ride.
Some demonstrate a lack of concern
for your business, coming in late, skipping
employee meetings, refusing to participate in
sales initiatives, refusing even to help grow
their own clientele. Worse, no matter how
hard you try to develop a mutually respectful,
positive climate, some employees undermine
your efforts – sometimes subtly and sometimes
in outright subversion to the goal.
Do you wonder what this has to do with
technology?
As someone who has been preaching
technology to businesses in the professional
beauty industry for five years, I still see it
when your eyes glaze over. I feel the subtle
(and sometimes not so subtle) resistance to
the reality that your business does, in fact,
need a website. I still hear from individuals
within the industry that they are “afraid”
that they will make their customers “mad” if
they email them.
Since marketing and business arguments
have still not overcome your objections to
putting technology to work for you, I wanted
to give you a more self-centered reason to put
the internet and email to work for you.
The internet and email will not talk back,
undermine efforts to grow business or create
a negative undertone. They will work for
you, showing up day in and day out, at any
time day or night, 24 hours a day, 365 days
a year. They will support your sales initiatives,
help generate new business and play
an active role in attracting new residents and
clients looking to make a change from the
competition.
The beautiful reality of email and the
web is that you can create the best version of
your business for display. You can tell clients
about products that stylists ‘forget’ to mention.
You can promote new stylists, celebrate
personal events of staff and clients, you can
congratulate and give kudos, and espouse
worthy causes.
You can tailor your communications
to client’s desired frequency and to what
interests them most. You can create leverage
needed to attract other businesses for cross
marketing or conducting cooperative events
and marketing campaigns.
A lot of good reasons to put the internet
and email to work for you.
Half of all Americans spend more than
an hour online every day, and that statistic
goes up in your prime demographics: working
professional men and women, moms,
boomers, and prospective clients 35 and
under.
Your clients and prospective clients
will be looking for you online - you’ll be
googled, yahoo’ed and otherwise searched
for. A website is a 24 x 7 x 365 billboard to
the world. You can start with a landing page
for just a couple hundred dollars a year or
build a complete online community.
A website can be as simple as a one page
“landing” site costing as little as a couple
hundred a year (compare the cost of that
with your yellow page listing) or a multipage
site with home page plus contact/location,
menu, and a special web offer for
current or new clients. Simply put, you have
to have it, because your clients use it.
Here are a few ways to put e-mail to
work for you in the course of business:
appointment reminders, sending directions
and contact information; thank you notes;
newsletter; promotional service or retail
offers for clients; event announcements, collecting
RSVP’s and taking reservations.
To avoid alienating readers, follow
simple rules of email etiquette - be personal,
be brief and compelling, and only send
email to those clients or prospects who have
subscribed or otherwise given you permission.
Collect email online and offline in the
salon at appointments, point of purchase and
events.
Even if you’ve never used a computer,
you can still use e-mail as a communications
tool for your business. How? Simple. If you
really don’t want to learn to use it, hire a local
high school or college student. Just a few
hours a week will be enough to give you a
start on an effective e-mail communications
program.
If simplicity isn’t compelling, price may
be. Note cards and postcards are inexpensive
and fairly quick in reaching people, but
e-mail is immediate, trackable and FREE
- and e-mail also has a significantly higher
response rate than other forms of marketing.
Elizabeth Brown is the founder of Be InPulse Marketing and Design in
Auburn, Washington and the author of 12 Months of Marketing for Salon
and Spa. Email the author at elizabeth@12monthsofmarketing.net.
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