Mark & Shelly Gibbs owned a struggling hair salon in Melbourne, Victoria....Inner Circle membership and the Toolkit not only gave them the tools to get their salon pumping, it gave them the confidence to look 'outside the box' and branch out into other money-making ventures - like motorbikes for junior clients to sit on!

Not so for Mark and Shelly Gibbs, Inner Circle Premium members of Shellmark Hair Shack in Kilsyth South, Victoria (Australia).

As Mark says,

“When we joined WSM 12 months ago, we were in deep s**t, I couldn’t pay the bills or the rent, and the computer was in ‘sleep’ mode most of the time.”

How things can so quickly change. A year on, Mark and Shelly have not just one, but THREE successful businesses – the salon itself, an associated business selling kids’ cutting chairs in the shape of mini-motorcycles (see downloadable pdf) and a car washing business!

“You saved our salon,” says Mark.

To merely accept Mark’s plaudits with gratitude would be telling only part of the story. What Mark fails to acknowledge is the fact that all we at WSM did was give him and Shelley the tools; they provided the motivation, drive, enthusiasm and persistence.

It’s worked, brilliantly; for example, when they put the motorbike ‘chair’ in the front of the shop, their takings for kids’ haircuts soared by 84%.

As Mark details in this short interview recorded this morning, total salon figures have increased by well over 100% in 2010 over 2009.

Mark & Shelly did a JV deal with their software supplier, in an editorial-style iinsert in a big trade magazine, promoting both the software AND their new kids' chair business. Right click on the picture and 'save as...' to download the complete story in pdf format.

And check this out: Mark and Shelly bought some software to help run their salon more efficiently – and then did a Joint Venture deal with the software manufacturer to promote the software – and the kids’ hair chairs – via a special double-page spread in a major trade magazine.

That’s doing some serious ‘outside-the-square’ thinking. (Right-click on the pic and download the full magazine feature story.)

Resource: for Members interested in contacting Mark about leasing one of those cute-as-pie kid’s motorcycle chairs, visit their website,

www.chaircoconcepts.com.au

Mark & Shelly's 4-year-old son demonstrates one of the kids's two-wheeled cutting 'chairs'

It failed my report card.

I won’t name the salon, but if its owner is reading this, she’ll recognize herself. This salon is one of three owned by a young entrepreneur who’s done a lot of things right, but still lets money fall through the cracks through lack of attention to detail. And there is magic in the detail.

I wandered in late yesterday afternoon, a Monday, to get a haircut. The layout is impressive – 20 chairs line the walls, with a massive raised catwalk down the middle for the fashion shows the salon has become known for.

That’s a tick for laterally thinking about how to create a ‘buzz’ that spills over into attracting new clients, an ‘involvement device’ to acknowledge that as the majority of customers are women, they’re interested in all things fashion and style, not just getting their hair done.

I was greeted at reception by a pleasant young lady (one of five staff on duty, only one of whom was actually cutting hair, being a Monday) who informed me that my haircut would cost an eye-watering $71. This for the privilege of having the services of the company’s ‘art director’, an innovative way of describing their most talented stylist.

When I visibly gulped at this – in a town where an average male haircut might stretch to $35 – she offered me instead, one of their ‘artists’ – another inventive term for what ordinary salons would call a ‘senior’ – for only $62. And if this was too much, I could have one of their ‘designers’ – their version of a mere apprentice, for a few dollars less.

Another massive tick from me for innovation. This salon owner is doing what I’m constantly nagging our Members to do – to re-think what it is they’re selling, to re-invent the business in such a way that it differentiates itself from the competition, simply by re-branding the common and thus making it un-common. Out of thin air, creating more perceived value. “Ordinary salons have seniors and apprentices. We have ‘artists’ and ‘designers’.”

Here’s what’s instructive: using differential pricing, you can elevate the perceived value of your own services. Example – clients insisting they only want the owner pay more for that privilege.

Next, I was asked to complete a client details form – name, all my phone numbers, email address – and crucially, tick-boxes for how I found out about the salon. A database-building system most salons are too lazy to implement, too ignorant to recognize its value.

I was introduced to my ‘artist’ who led me to her chair.

Unfortunately, that’s about when the shine started to come off an impressive start.

I was handed a selection of magazines. They were dog-eared, months old. As she washed my hair, my ‘artist’ cheerfully asked me the standard questions – ‘had a busy day so far?’ Yes, thanks. … ‘Got a big weekend planned?’ Mmmm…couple of social functions, that’s all. ‘What line of work are you in?’

I knew she was going to ask this, so I threw in a truthful answer, specifically to check her pulse.

‘Er, I show salons how to market themselves more effectively, more efficiently, how to increase the per-visit ticket price, and get customers coming back more often…’

“Really….and do you live locally?”

She might have been thinking, but it wasn’t about what I was saying. Nice enough girl, no pulse.

But the wheels really fell off back at the reception desk. Here I was, a brand new customer just walked in off the street, happily paying my $62 buzz-cut bill. I stood there idly chatting with the receptionist, my ‘artist’ attentively nearby.

Sigh. No attempt to sell me product, despite earlier telling my ‘artist’ I always use gel in my hair.

No request for feedback (i.e. testimonial) about my experience in their business.

Not even the slightest effort to re-book me next month.

I walked out the door, the sound of staff chattering to each other about their Christmas plans fading in my ears.

What a crying shame that it’s like this in almost ALL businesses. Attention to detail is its own economic stimulus package.

]]> http://www.worldwidesalonmarketing.com/advertising-tips/increasing-retail-sales/does-this-happen-in-your-salon/feed 2 http://www.worldwidesalonmarketing.com/advertising-tips/increasing-retail-sales/salon-marketing-superstars-inner-circle-member-of-the-week-maria-mazis http://www.worldwidesalonmarketing.com/advertising-tips/increasing-retail-sales/salon-marketing-superstars-inner-circle-member-of-the-week-maria-mazis#comments Wed, 11 Nov 2009 02:28:26 +0000 Greg Milner http://www.worldwidesalonmarketing.com/?p=1634 There must be something in the water in Adelaide. For the second consecutive week our Inner Circle salon superstar comes from the City of Churches in South Australia.
Maria Mazis of Skintelligence, just a few blocks away from last week’s superstar Inner Circle member, Dina Matters of Contours Clinic, has discovered the incredible power of a monthly newsletter to deliver sales and profits.

Maria started sending a hard copy newsletter to her clients soon after joining the Inner Circle program in March and tweaking the easy-to-use newsletter templates she found in the Members Only ‘sealed section’.

Last month, her simple, two-page newsletter brought in no less than $10,000 in extra sales, thanks to a cleverly-designed Mini-Membership program she promoted to her database.

(NOTE TO IC MEMBERS: Log into the ‘sealed section’ here and navigate to ‘Newsletters’ where you’ll be able to download Maria’s newsletter in Word format and tweak it to suit your salon.)

In addition to the $10,000 in Mini-Membership sales generated by the newsletter, Maria also promoted a clever ‘free facial’ campaign to the teenage daughters of her clients – an idea that generated another $400 in product sales; but more importantly these teenage girls are ‘prime’ candidates to become long-term clients. Smart.

I cannot stress enough the importance of a regular newsletter. Most business owners put it in the ‘too hard’ basket, unwilling to commit the resources and time necessary to implement and maintain it – and thus miss out on easy dollars from an eager client base just waiting to be asked to hand over their money.

Here’s how Maria describes the effects of her monthly newsletter campaign.

If YOU want the kind of tools that Maria is using to generate serious CASH despite ‘the economy’, you should immediately apply to become a Member of the Worldwide Salon marketing Inner Circle program, including the world-famous Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit®

GO HERE to complete a no-obligation Pre-Application Questionnaire and you might qualify to be one of just 30 salons each month who join the program all over the world – and double their sales inside 12 months!

All the way up north from gorgeous and sunny Brisbane, QLD (yes, we’re jealous!), Rachel is a young sole operator who has had some amazing results since joining us a mere 6 weeks ago. Implementing just a handful of powerful strategies contained in the Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit®, her sales has jumped from around $8,000 –$ 9,000 per month to $12,400 – a massive 25% increase! Product sales have been even more impressive, almost doubling from $2,500 to $4,600.

But Rachel proves that not only is it possible to grow your business substantially using the Toolkit®, she also tells us how easy it was, and spills the secret on her phenomenal retail sales:

However, the most amazing part is that she managed to do all of this simply by mailing 200 existing clients on her database a seasonal offer, directly from the Toolkit®, booking in 19 clients. These sales added up to over $2,000, proving that you don’t always need to go trawling the streets for new business when you’ve got a gold mine filed away in your salon computer hard drive. And even better than that – there’s no need to re-invent the wheel. If a template directly from the Toolkit™ can help Rachel achieve these results, they can do the same for you and your salon.

Being a sole operator, the road to success can seem especially daunting – no moral support from a co-owner, no staff in the salon to help out when things get hectic. Being a member of the Worldwide Salon Marketing Inner Circle not only offers you support through coaching and meeting up with other salon owners, but also takes the stress of marketing your business off your shoulders. Everything is literally done for you – just add your salon details, and watch the money roll in!

If you want to join the Inner Circle Marketing & Mentoring program, and experience the same level of success as Rachel, fill out an online survey today. We’re so confident that it will work for you too that you might even qualify to trial the entire system for 30 days, completely free of risk. So click on the link below now, and say yes to success!

Click HERE to see if you qualify for a 30-day Test Drive of the entire Toolkit & Inner Circle system.

Bruce Fisher and his wife Beth have owned a hair salon & spa, Fisher Experience in Braintree, Massachusetts, just south of Boston, for 25 years. I was talking with Bruce this week, and he was understandably excited.

In the worst recession America has encountered in decades, Bruce’s sales have leapt by over $10,000 a month in the four months since he joined the Inner Circle program. Part of the reason for that is Bruce’s discovery of the

‘hidden’ goldmine

that most salon & spa owners ignore – his ‘lost’ clients.

It’s a mystery to me why so many business owners don’t see the forest for the trees, while they frantically spend huge amounts of time and energy (and money) trying to pour brand new clients constantly into the top of their leaky customer funnels.

The ‘funnel’ leaks because almost zero energy is put into keeping existing clients, and getting them spending more money.

Here’s the hard lesson: it’s at least six times more expensive to get a new client than it is to get existing or past clients coming back for more. Simple reason: with past clients, you know – or should know – their names and addresses…and no media is more cost effective than a letter, an envelope and a stamp.

Bruce has learned a hard lesson (as you can hear in the accompanying brief audio track): recently he sent 400 lost clients the series of tried and proven ‘Raise the Dead’ letters from the Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit.

In two weeks, those letters brought no fewer than 82 of those ‘lost’ and forgotten clients back into the salon – a marketing campaign that cost a few hundred dollars, for a return of around $10,000, and dozens of re-activated clients who will continue to spend, in many cases for years to come.

Here’s how Bruce describes the ‘revolution’ in his business – from typical beauty industry ‘image’ style marketing to our kind of accountable, measurable direct response marketing…

Jenny Coleman, Inner Circle member of Snipz Hair in Edge Hill, Queensland

Staff deliberately promoting other people's products are the ticking time bomb in your salon....

How ruthless would you be if you caught one of your staff members deliberately sabotaging your sales?

Some do it simply out of ignorance. Others do it because they just don’t care. Either way, it costs YOU money when your staff don’t sell your products, or worse, promote other people’s products…

But there can be few cases worse than this one, just posted on the SalonCentral.com forums this week, from one of our Inner Circle members in Ireland.

“Hi everyone I am very new to the (Inner Circle)!! Just on the thirty day trial but I am amazed at the response I have gotten to an ad I ran last week so I think I am going to be joining for the long haul …

“I do have one dilemma that I would love some advise for…I over heard one of my staff members recommending a Clarins hand cream to a customer during her manicure and for the bad bit , we dont sell Clarins in our salon. Now to make a situation worse this staff member went to her handbag and got her Clarins handcream and used it on the client ….can you believe it ?

“I am so cross and upset and don’t know which is the best way to deal with this as she is very popular with clients. Any advice?”

Go here if you have some advice for Maria, but if it was my money this employee was flushing down the toilet, she’d get an instant warning, and if she dared do it again she’d be out the door, with a swift boot up the backside for her trouble.

But the business owner must bear some responsibility for this. In most such cases, it comes back to a failure of the business owner to set the rules in the first place. It starts with a written Policies and Procedures manual which ALL employees must read, agree to and sign as part of a formal induction process.

And backed up firmly with a cover letter which in effect says “Here is how things are done here. If you agree to abide by these rules, please sign below. If not, go find another business to sabotage…”

If you’ve had similar situations arise, or can offer Maria some advice, log into the Forums and fire away.

But salesmanship is dead. Which is curious, because we love to buy things. My brother’s wife had her credit card stolen once. He didn’t report it for a month, because the thief was spending less than she was.

Yes, it’s a joke. But the lack of salesmanship is not. And the following appalling example should be enough to curdle the blood of any business owner who employs staff, e.g. presumably YOU if you’re the owner of a salon or spa.

On Saturday Michelle and I went to a nearby outdoor warehouse to buy one of those big market umbrellas for our rear deck. Chose the style and colour we wanted, handed over my credit card.

Did the ‘sales’ guy attempt to up-sell me to a nearby matching deckchair? Nope. Did he even so much as hint that I might like to take advantage of a special offer they had on barbecues that day? You’ve gotta be kidding. Nope, all the way out to my car, this poor dope blathered on about how hot it was, how bad sales had been because of the recession (!)

As he shoved the umbrella into my car, I gave him one last chance to do his job.

“Oh, does this thing come with a heavy base so it doesn’t take off in the wind?” I asked hopefully.

“Ah,” he said, “no it doesn’t, we do have them in stock though.” And then this idiot said the fatal words:

“But to be honest, you can get them cheaper at Bunnings”.

I nearly choked. Had I been his boss, he would have been fired on the spot. For criminal negligence, effectively stealing from his employer, for being an advocate for the competition.

There’s a Sales Prevention Department in every business. And the bigger the business, the more finely-tuned is their SPD.

Last month we tried to give an American magazine publisher nearly $10,000 for a full-page ad in a new beauty industry magazine. They declined to take our money because the ad we wanted to run wasn’t ‘the right type of ad to place in our new magazine given we are creating a highly aesthetic publication for our readers’. The italics are mine.

Never mind the fact that the ads we produce, both for ourselves and our Inner Circle salon members, actually work. Pardon the sarcasm, but it’s obviously of little consequence how effective an ad is, much more important how it looks.
So they miss out on our money. The Sales Prevention Department triumphs again.

The world doesn’t need government handouts, bailouts or rescue packages. The world just needs sales people to do their job, and sell stuff. The world economic crisis would self-correct, if the Sales Prevention Department would just get out of the way.

There is a lesson in this for all salon owners. Be paranoid. Be wary, suspicious, nervous about what your staff are telling your customers. Listen in. Make mystery calls. Take care that your employees are selling your stuff, not somebody else’s.

And if you were equipped with the Selling Like Crazy sales training module from the Inner Circle Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit you’d find that task a whole lot easier.

From the Big End of town to the tiny end, there are plenty of reports indicating that the “recession” is patchy, uneven at best, certainly NOT a uniform slide into economic oblivion.

McDonald’s is reporting a massive 80% increase in net profit in 2008 over 2007. Spooked by the relentless reports of Armageddon on the TV news, it seems folks are hitting the fast food joints to save money on meals (and no doubt pile on some fat to carry them through the economic winter!)

Maccas made $4.3 billion in ’08, compared with $2.3 billion in ’07.

In our little world of entrepreneurial salon & spa owners, it’s a similar story, all over the world.

In Scottsdale, Arizona, Body Solutions Laser & Skin owners Dr Tim & Kanna Reilly report a staggering 500% increase in sales in 2008 over 2007, using a simple system of done-for-you direct response marketing tools and ‘sales thinking’ strategies they bought from Worldwide Salon Marketing in August 2007.

“It was a revelation,” says Dr Reilly, whose chiropractic clinic morphed into a skin care clinic over several years but had always bled them white. They were on the verge of giving up and closing their doors, until they ‘got it’ just in time and joined the WSM Inner Circle marketing & mentoring program.Â

IC member Rechelle Watt with her business award...a 40% increase in salon sales in 2008

Then there’s Inner Circle member Rechelle Watt, of Lamonde Hair Face & Body in New South Wales, Australia. While the majority of salon owners whine about how tough things are, Rechelle and hundreds of other Inner Circle members is going from strength to strength.

In ’08, a 40% increase in sales over ’07, according to an email from Rechelle this week.

“WOW!!!….. it’s AMAZING how my business has changed,” says Rechelle, echoing the sentiments of her fellow IC Members. Click here to read Rechelle’s full story.

(Members Only: want to copy what Rechelle’s done? Log into the Members Only section and navigate to ‘Getting New Clients – Hair’ and you’ll find the newspaper ads and the text messages Rechelle used to generate an extra $109,509 in sales in 2008)

And they do it using simple, hard-nosed, “ugly” copy-intensive emotional direct-response marketing, contained in the Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit and the coaching they get as Inner Circle members – not the unaccountable, ‘imagey’ expensive branding-style-lets-hope-some-of-it-sticks marketing typically rolled out by big dumb companies using other people’s (eg shareholders’) money.

Big companies in the beauty business are as guilty of pouring useless advertising dollars down the ‘branding’ toilet as anybody else at the top end of town.

Take the giant Regis Corporation, owner of such brands as Cost Cutters, Super Cuts and Hair Club for Men and Women, Regis spend gazillions last year in an up-market makeover of its newly-purchased 635-store Trade Secret chain of salons, attempting to ‘European-ize’ them as a means of selling more bottles of beauty glop.

It was clearly money down the drain. This week Regis folded its Trade Secrets tent, announcing it was ‘selling’ the brand to Premier Salons Beauty Inc.

The word ‘selling’ is a euphemism for actually giving it away. Regis will get precisely zero, nada, zilch for the ‘sale’, instead picking up some tax credits on all the money it’s flushed down the drain on its worthless branding exercise.

All of which just goes to show, dear salon owner, that the ‘geniuses’ running these billion dollar product suppliers and salon chain owners are certainly no brighter, and in many cases a lot dumber, than you the small independent salon owner.

So take heart. If hundreds of our small-time independent salon Inner Circle members can actually increase sales in this deep recession, so can you.

If, of course, you’re equipped with the same marketing & sales tools and coaching.

Which is why you need to apply right now, before you suffer any more hardship, for Inner Circle membership and get that Toolkit in your hands.

Note to US and Canadian salon owners: successful IC members Dr Tim & Kanna Reilly of Body Solutions in Scottsdale, AZ are Worldwide Salon Marketing’s first USA franchise, and are handling all coaching for new North American members as of January 2009.

(IC Members: Log into the Members Only section, navigate to Getting New Clients – Hair, and you’ll be able to download the exact ads and text messages Rechelle describes here)

“I have been in business for 11 years and never had the success that I am having now….I have been a Worldwide Salon Marketing member for about 5 years, but didn’t change much about how I marketed my business so obviously I didn’t get the results.

“The salon was not doing so well in 2007, things were really bad, I then made a decision to do something about the business. So I took action, I went off the tools working only three days in the salon and two full days on the business at home in my office.

“The first thing I knew I needed to get sorted was the marketing and be consistent with it.

Every month we did two big promotions via text message. Each SMS was to 2000 clients. We had a massive response from this particular SMS.  

(Members: Log into the Members Only section and navigate to “Getting New Clients – Hair” to copy the exact text Rechelle used)

“This SMS I started to send out in June 2008 and we are still sending it every fortnight.

“Sales increased in 2008 by 40% compared to 2007! That’s $109,509 extra (Real Big Green Ones) in 2008 sales.

“I also did this exact promotion in a newspaper advertisement which also was a huge success.

It was a half page ad costing around $350 each time and was placed each month from July 2008. We are still placing the ad every month and it’s still working.(Members: Log into the Members Only section and navigate to “Getting New Clients – Hair” to copy the exact ads Rechelle used)

“We also did all the normal marketing such as newsletters, new clients letters, birthdays and referrals all from the Toolkit, we are getting an average per month 90 new clients. Retail sales have gone through the roof – up $6000 per month.

The Toolkit gave me the tools, the ideas, the ingredients to make my marketing fantastic and I was persistent with it and it gave me real results. I have attached a copy of the newspaper ad and a picture of myself receiving the best customer service business award for 2008.

All the best, Rechelle Watt, Lamonde Hair Face Body, Toukley, NSW.”

First, some interesting news that belies all the gloom and doom. International research and survey firm Synovate reports that a poll of 11,500 people in over a dozen countries found 41% of people plan to spend the same amount on beauty products and services as they did before the downturn, while only 27% said they would cut down. (source: www.synovate.com)

And there are other signs (hard to find in the mainstream press) that the outlook is not ALL thunder and lightning for 2009. China? The most recent figures I can find indicate China’s growth will ‘only’ be around 7% this year. ONLY 7%?? In any other country, 7% growth would produce dancing in the streets and joyful public fornication.

There are other indicators that the world hasn’t actually stopped turning. Principally from our own Inner Circle members. I love it when I hear from members who are truly kicking some serious butt… despite the ‘recession’, without regard to any and all obstacles put before them, regardless of nay-saying friends, family and/or staff, while ignoring the self-fulfilling talk of gloom and doom.

Like Chicken Little, for some people the sky is always falling in. For a few (certainly most of our Members) what falls out of the sky is money.

Nadia Valerio of Valerio Hair in Doncaster, Victoria. A real 'action woman'.

Among them, Nadia Valerio of Valerio Hair in Doncaster, Victoria.

Most salons struggle to fill chairs/treatment rooms at this time of the year. Nadia and her staff of 11 are struggling to keep up with the sheer volume of clients, all brought in using simple ads, flyers and sales strategies from the Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit™

Get this: In November last year Nadia took an ad from the Toolkit and ran it in the local paper. The salon was run off its feet, in just five weeks they took in no fewer than

165 NEW clients.

(INNER CIRCLE MEMBERS: Log into the Members Only ‘Sealed Section’ and you’ll find the ad that Nadia used under “Getting New Clients – Hair”)

That result was achieved despite what many would see as a massive handicap – located in a huge shopping mall with no fewer than EIGHT directly competing salons.

“Every client that came in the week after then received a $10 welcome letter/gift voucher to come back to the store and so far in 8 weeks of the first ad going to print 45 of those clients have come back, it has been the most amazing response, I could not have asked for anything more and this is just a start. We have put together a plan for the next 6 months and can’t wait to put it all in to play. Once again thank you WORLDWIDE SALON MARKETING you have taken my buisness to the next level,” writes Nadia.

And that was just the beginning. As Nadia describes in this short interview extract, revenue, client numbers and profits have been nothing short of amazing since she a) began to educate herself about what works, and b) put the tools, strategies and advice as an Inner Circle member into action.

Special Group Coaching Call for Inner Circle Members – Monday, February 2

Nadia has agreed to be my special guest interview for our next Inner Circle Members Only Group Coaching Call. In this call she’ll detail exactly what she did to not only generate massive new business before Christmas, but avoid the post-Christmas lull that most salon owners suffer from.

Members will receive direct email notification of the dial-in number and PIN code for this call, but here are the date and times:

Date of Group Coaching Call: MONDAY, February 2.

(For North American Members, this will be SUNDAY afternoon/evening, February 1. If you miss the call, don’t say you got ‘confused’ by the time difference.)

Time of Group Coaching Call

In Australia:

Perth: 10am
Adelaide: 11.30am
Melbourne/Sydney: Noon
Brisbane: 11am

In New Zealand: 2pm

In NORTH AMERICA:

Sunday, February 1

Pacific: 5pm
Mountain: 6pm
Eastern: 8pm