I actually feel a bit sorry for the banks. The fact that they’re in business to make a profit – just like every other business – appears lost on media and government, who relish in taking a shot at this soft target every time interest rates hi the news. Pity nobody in the banking industry has the balls to stand up and say ‘Hey, wait a minute, we’re a business not a charity, it’s our job to make money…!’

(Isn’t it funny how most bank customers moan bitterly every time their mortgage rate goes up, complain about the ‘greed’ of big business when the banks publish their billion-dollar profits – but don’t twig that their own retirement savings are heavily invested in bank shares.)

But that other public whipping boy – the airlines – deserve every dose of doggy doo thrown at them. Dumber than a bagful of hammers, for years they’ve competed with each other on little more than price, a strategy that – in any business – can only lead to death.

According to a recent article in the New York Times, US airlines collectively lost about $5billion in 2009. Now, they’re fighting back with an almost-universally despised trick of ‘un-bundling’ air fares so that passengers have to pay extra for things that have traditionally been included in the price of a ticket.

More and more airlines are charging an average of $25 to check in a bag. Several will slug you an extra $8 for a blanket. It’s now common for cut-price airlines to charge extra for exit-row seats which provide a bit more room for tall passengers.

Airlines are beginning to charge extra for what was previously part of the deal - like $8 for a blanket. Oh well, at least you get to keep the blanket....

After years of cutting their own throats by discounting, these big dumb companies have suddenly realized they need to make money. But the way they’re doing it smacks of desperation, and worse, complete ignorance about the concept of adding value, packaging, differentiation and giving themselves an ‘unfair advantage’ over the competition without discounting.

Salon owners who are Members of the Inner Circle Marketing & Mentoring Program could give the airlines a much-needed lesson in such market-making processes.

In Australia, I fly Qantas exclusively. Of all the competing airlines, Qantas is regularly the most expensive carrier. That’s why I fly with them. The food is free, and good quality – even in Economy Class – unlike the inedible trash on US domestic airlines. There are no extra charges for blankets, checked baggage, headsets, movies or anything else. On many flights, even beer and wine is free in Economy. It’s all included in the price.

Where even a profitable airline like Qantas falls down is in its failure to capitalize on this competitive advantage. They still attempt to compete on price alone, too timid to shout from the rooftops

“Hey, we’re the most expensive – but there are no hidden charges, sneaky extras or nasty surprises when you get to the airport. When you buy a Qantas ticket, everything is included in the price!”

Here’s what’s instructive for your salon business:

Take a lesson from bumbling mistakes of the airlines. Instead of constantly trying to compete with rivals on price (discounting), figure out a way to package your services. Don’t allow your customers to ‘cherry pick’ your treatment menu on price alone. By learning to package – as our Inner Circle member salons have done using the templates and tools in the Essential Salon Owner’s Marketing Toolkit® you’ll find yourself attracting customers who are more interested in value than mere price, want service above perceived (often phantom) savings, and are prepared to pay for it.

Read all about it! Hair salons up in arms about proposed changes to 'dumb down' the industry. Click on the image to open it up in a new window

In my part of the world, there’s a critical shortage of qualified stylists. So the state government, in its wisdom, has come up with a stunning solution, which, according to its detractors, will dumb things down so that anybody with a pulse can become a hairdresser!

Under the proposed new law, hair stylists will be exempt from registration and it will no longer be classified as a trade. Not surprisingly, hair salons are up in arms about the changes. In this story I clipped from my morning paper this week, they’re talking about a class action against the new bill, and, claims one, “You’re talking about professionals who have to mix chemicals and put it on people’s scalps.”

What do you think? Comment below if you feel you can add to the debate, and we’ll keep an eye on responses.

Tearing your hair out over staff who won't let you relax about not being in the salon?

It’s a Catch-22 that almost all salon owners face: ‘how can I get off the tools so I can work “on” the business more, when I’m too afraid of losing money/worried about what the staff will do/can’t work out what to tell clients…’ blah blah blah.

There’s no easy answer, as one of our Inner Circle Premium members is discovering. In a post in the Members Only forums this week, Amanda writes:

Hi all.
I decided to go off the tools in April this year, only working on the floor 3 days a week. The remaining days I work at home on marketing, paperwork etc & have a manager in the salon. The thing is that I don’t feel things are being done fully in the salon & I don’t think it is just a case of getting the jitters about handing the reins over….

Amanda goes on to detail how clients aren’t getting what’s advertised, how staff are using her personal tools and not cleaning them or putting them back, and how frustrated she feels when the staff wonder why she gets angry at them.

Our members are encouraged to log into the Members Only ‘sealed section’ here and give Amanda whatever help they can. But my own take on this? The tail is wagging the dog, because of a lack of systems. And it comes down to the little-recognized difference between managing people (you can’t, really) and managing systems.

When you have properly thought-out and effectively-implemented systems in a business (and the staff have signed off on and agreed to those systems) you don’t have to manage the staff, you just have to manage the systems.

In my business we have simple ‘tick sheets’ for all the important processes. For example, when a new Member is enrolled in the Inner Circle Premium program, there’s a single-page tick-sheet detailing a dozen or more tasks that must be completed before the enrollment can be ‘signed off’ as having been completed. Credit card billed for shipping, form faxed or emailed for signing by the Member and returned, data entry, Toolkit packaged and shipped, coaching call booked, and many more.

The point is, the system makes people accountable and responsible; if even one of those tasks isn’t completed, or is done incorrectly, the system allows us to track the breakdown and easily pinpoint where a breakdown has occurred.

(And there’s a similar checklist for every major process in the business. Any decently-run salon or spa’s Operations Manual should have a checklist for everything, down to and including the process of opening and closing the salon, turning on the computer, arming/disarming alarms…the works.)

For those who care about systems, I’ve posted an example of this checklist below.

For members who want to add their two cents worth, please log into the Members Only ‘sealed section’ here to read Amanda’s full forum post and see what helpful advice you might be able to offer.

“Most business owners think the purpose of getting a customer is to make a sale. But smart business owners know the purpose of making a sale is to get a customer.”
Dan S. Kennedy, marketing guru, millionaire-maker, and one of my mentors for more than a decade.

Greg Milner, co-founder and CEO, Worldwide Salon Marketing

In any business – and the salon business is no different – the way you think about your position in the market, and how you act on that thinking, is fundamental to your future success.

And the more carefully and deliberately you design your business so that prospects and customers are magnetically attracted to you with a pre-disposition to buy from you, rather than you chasing them, the more successful you’ll be.

My company is no different in that regard. I certainly didn’t dream up the concept. I just sought out the likes of Dan Kennedy and others, studied their teachings, and applied them – haphazardly at first, I’ll admit – to my business.

Many have looked at our success – certainly by now we are the largest and most extensively-studied salon marketing and sales training organisation in the world – and tried to steal our intellectual property, emulate our success. (All have so far failed. Yapping at our heels, they purport to offer much, but none is prepared to invest in the infrastructure and customer support necessary to sustain a real business.)

Among our Member salons – currently more than 600 in Lite and Premium levels – there has been much curiosity about our business model. So here is how we apply the principles of ‘magnetic’ marketing to our business; why we do it as deliberate strategy…and perhaps the smarter ones among you will be able to study this and ask yourself “How can I apply this thinking to my salon or spa?”

From its earliest days as a spare-room start-up little more than six years ago, Worldwide Salon Marketing has hired not a single sales rep, made not a solitary telemarketing call, knocked on no salon or spa doors soliciting business, nor cold-called a single salon owner pitching our wares.

And yet the company has recorded increased annual profit every year since inception, revenue growing by an average of 48% a year for the past four years, with thousands of salons and spas signing up for the Inner Circle marketing & mentoring program, and an average of 30 new Members joining each month, from all over the world. (Even had one join the other day from Finland. Finland!)

Clearly, the product works. The fact we’ve been wholly or partially responsible for making more money for more salon & spa owners than any other company in the world is testament to that. But a successful business isn’t about product (or service).

It’s about the method by which we attract our customers (IC members). We do it by NOT approaching them.

How can this be? Conventional business ‘wisdom’ has it that sales is about wearing out shoe leather, hordes of sweaty salesmen tramping from door to door, armies of telemarketers slaving over banks of phones and computer screens to get appointments, all aimed at securing a meeting in which the prospect finally and wearily signs on the dotted line if only to ease the pain of having their brains beaten in for three hours.

But we’ve never done any of that hard-labour. By deliberate strategy, we have instead forced prospective members to seek us out, jump through hoops to get to us, and pass careful but largely-invisible testing to qualify for membership.

Why make it difficult for our customers to get to us? Primarily, because it increases our value. Pure scarcity marketing, which is what we teach all our Members.

But there is another mainly selfish reason. It’s about the quality of people we attract as Members. Most businesses will take anybody as a customer. And indeed, in the early days I did the same, and quickly learned the folly of such a strategy (or lack of strategy).

If you look at our main marketing document here, you’ll notice that there’s a LOT of information, videos, testimonials, explanation – detail, detail, detail. And at the bottom of that, a carefully-planned Pre-Application Survey designed to force the salon owner to think.

The entire page is deliberate strategy to weed out those who will not apply themselves, who are not willing to study what it takes to be successful, who not only don’t want to learn how to fish, they want the fish handed to them on a plate, preferably filleted and fried, who are only interested in an instant-coffee solution to their problems, a magic bullet they can fire with no thought, application or self-imposed discipline and application.

It’s selfish on my part because I simply can’t be bothered dealing with people who won’t read, who must be dragged kicking and scraming to the trough, who – if they manage to slip through the net (and a few do) – will sit their copy of the Toolkit on their salon shelf and expect it to miraculously leap off and gang-tackle prospects as they walk by the shop, with no input or effort from themselves. Who argue with our coaches at every turn, insisting that ‘it’ (the system) doesn’t ‘work’, despite overwhelming proof that it does work for thousands of other salon owners all over the world.

Every salon or spa has ‘project’ clients, those requiring inordinate amounts of tact, diplomacy, cajoling and nurturing far out of proportion to their value to the business. (Definition of tact: making people feel at home when you really wish they were.)

So by deliberate strategy, we’ve structured our marketing and sales process to limit not only our availability, but to elevate the quality of those we choose to do business with.

Eg., when we interview prospective members after they’ve completed one of our surveys, either online or offline via our newsletters, we carefully question them on how much they have read and absorbed the (large amount of) information we’ve published about the Inner Circle program, membership fees, rules of membership etc. If the answer is ‘nothing, I just filled in the questionnaire’, they are politely but firmly turned away, with instruction to go back and educate themselves, and then come back and talk to us.

Interesting observation: Americans don’t read any more. Our US representative – and super-successful beauty business owner – Dr Tim Reilly reports the time and time again, he’ll call prospective Inner Circle members to interview them about an application survey they’d completed only hours before, only to be told “what application? I didn’t do any application!” It seems that not only do the large majority of American beauty business owners fail to bother reading the information, they have the short-term memory of a garden-variety grasshopper.

No doubt this strict policy of being careful about who we let in has cost us dearly in terms of revenue. But I have no doubt it has also saved us much annoyance and wasted resources attempting to teach the unteachable, and diverted resources from those who have not come to us merely expecting a silver bullet, fired with no effort on their part.

Those of you who are ‘our kind’ of customers will already be studying this model and asking ‘how can I apply this thinking to my business?’

And those visitors to this site who are clearly NOT our kind of customer…well, your eyes would have glazed over before getting this far anyway, and clicked through to somewhere else where the promise of easy success with no effort shines brighter.

If you ARE serious about becoming a business owner and entrepreneur in the beauty business, not merely a technician who’s bought herself a job, then I suggest you get our Salon Help Pack and free DVD here and start educating yourself about what works.

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'

Katina & Rafael Demetri-Meade of Venus Inspired in Woodford Green, Essex UK - Katina joined the Inner Circle Premium program and received her Toolkit at the Salon Profit Secrets seminar in Kingston-on-Thames

Every owner of every salon thinks that their business is somehow ‘different’, the problems and challenges they deal with every day are in some way unique.

And it always makes me laugh when a salon owner tells me ‘this wouldn’t work for my salon because my salon is different…’

Er, actually, it’s not. Yesterday in Kingston-on-Thames, UK, salon consultant Rebecca Page and I hosted a Salon Profit Secrets seminar, and in a question and answer session, the accents may have been different, but the problems and challenges were exactly the same as I’d heard at a hundred such sessions in Australia, New Zealand and the USA.

Here’s what’s instructive: there is not one single, solitary problem or challenge you have ever encountered in business -- or will ever encounter in your entire business life -- that has not been encountered, challenged, analysed and solved by another salon owner, in exactly the same position as you find yourself in, somewhere in the world.

Lisa Parsons (left) of Hair & Makeup Bar in Middlesex UK joined the Inner Circle Premium program at the seminar, encouraged by the success of other UK salon members like Debbie Osborne (five years membership, right) of Elysium Laser and Skincare Clinic in Crowthorne, Berkshire.

It is for this precise reason that so many salon owners are continuing to join the Inner Circle Premium marketing & mentoring program (the one that comes with the Toolkit) -- because they recognise the immense, undisputed value of being able to network with each other, to solve problems.

At the UK seminar, I was delighted to meet for the first time some UK salon owners who have been members of the program in some cases for 5 years, and wouldn’t dream of leaving it.

Debbie Osborne, Chantal Fallon and Clare Cockell have been evangelists for my kind of direct response marketing for salons & spas almost since the founding of the company in 2004…and as they all say in the videos below, their salons have survived and prospered through Britain’s recession while others around them have given up and closed their doors.

Here’s Clare Cockell, from The Reef, in Maidstone, Kent:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqhSx9t_QFY

Chantal Fallon, from Red Carpet Hair & Beauty in Worcester:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRRYMDAEVBQ

Deb Osborne of Elysium in Crowhtorne, Berkshire:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmpKXj-drTo

As I write this, the morning news services are reporting that UK airspace has at last been re-opened after a six-day shutdown due to the Icelandic volcano.

The air crisis again highlights the the most dangerous number in business…the number

1

European airlines alone are estimated to have lost a billion pounds in the six-day shut-down. But what about the thousands of other businesses whose very existence relies solely on the ability of airlines to quickly transport goods and people?

It’s a strong reminder that you must do everything in your power to structure your business so that it is NOT reliant on one of anything…one supplier, one source of leads and customers, one means of delivering service or product, one key staff member (you?)…

In my own business, I’m painfully aware of this fundamental truth, and have striven since day one to set up Worldwide Salon Marketing so that it is NOT dependent on any ONE thing. Our billing systems are diversified, our sources of leads and new Members are varied and as far as possible fail-safe, our systems designed so they are dependent on no single person.

It is, of course, simply impossible to predict a random event like a volcano. The ‘it’ll never happen’ mindset has once again proven to be hazardous. I would never have a business that’s totally reliant on, for example, the internet -- as so many do. Could the internet ever be completely shut down?

Nah. It’ll never happen.

I’m off to Colchester Castle, built in the 11th century by William the 1st on the foundations of the Roman Temple of Claudius, constructed a thousand years before. The Romans knew a thing or two, but even they were under the delusion their empire would last forever.

(Made a big travel breakthrough though. Changing planes at Dubai’s city-size airport, I boarded a gigantic Emirates A380 – these things should be too big to fly – and was immediately delighted to discover there are windows in the toilets. After decades, aircraft manufacturers have finally discovered that at 37,000ft, nobody’s going to be looking in!)

Premium member Tina Tran of Banyo Nails & Beauty was delighted to tell new members Mark Beekmans and Amanda Fullam of Supa Star Hair how her sales had more than doubled since she started using our Toolkit marketing templates just four months ago. (Mark & Amanda upgraded from Lite to Premium membership at the seminar)

Back in Brisbane, a terrific day at the Salon Profit Secrets seminar where almost a hundred salon owners … including many of our Inner Circle Lite and Premium members… put up with me, and were enchanted by guest speakers Pat Mesiti and million dollar salon owner – and now accomplished corporate speaker and trainer – Julie Piantadosi.

The event saw about a dozen salons join the Inner Circle Premium Program…two of them having decided to upgrade on the spot from the basic ‘starter level’ Lite program.

As always, a highlight of the day was the Panel of Experts session, with some of our most experienced Premium members answering salon business

Tim & Geraldine Sayre of Kepnock Hair drove all the way from Bundaberg to attend the one-day seminar, and joined the Premium program at the event.

and marketing questions from the audience. (My thanks to long-term member Brenda Patel of Nirvana Spa, and Susan Anderson of Lillian Mac Skin Clinic for their generosity – typical of so many of our hundreds of Member salons who are always so willing to share their success strategies with others in the group.)

(For our Premium members, these seminars are a great way to network and exchange ideas – we always set aside time for Premium members to gather around a table in a separate room for a closed-door session.)

The new Queenslanders we welcomed into the Premium program at the seminar were:

Anna Johns of Hairtalk was another salon owner who joined the Premium program at the seminar

Anna Johns of Hair T.A.L.K Beauty & Barbers

Emma MacDonald of Dockside Hair Culture

Dee-Ann Hunt of Expressions Of Beauty

Sheryl Barlow and Candida Bond of Hot Heads Hair Studio

Stephanie Fraser of The Beauty Asylum

Amanda Fullam, Supa Star Hair

Charmaine Mullaly of Chardooz Hair Design

Faye Reilly of Heaven Sent Beauty & Laser

Debra Holden of Kallangur Mod Hair Studio

Vikki Ratuere of Head Hunters Hair Workshop

Geraldine Sayre of Kepnock Hair

(They were among 27 salons who have joined the Premium program in the last month. We receive over 100 applications a month for Premium, but can take on no more than thirty.)

UK SEMINAR COMING UP: I’m here in the UK to speak at our first Salon Profit Secrets seminar next Monday, April 19, at Warren House in Kingston, Surrey. My UK colleague Rebecca Page says we have TWO seats remaining for this seminar, so if you’re in the UK and want to know what works in salon marketing, get in fast. You can book tickets (buy one, get one free and bring a spouse or business partner) from here:

Get last tickets for UK seminar here.

New York author Anna Bernasek, author of 'The Economics of Integrity' - how the entire economy is built on an assumption of trustworthiness.

It’s actually a very old concept, re-invented and clarified in a new book by New York writer Anna Bernasek, called The Economics of Integrity.

According to Bernasek, integrity is the ‘invisible infrastructure of the economy’, the glue that holds all business relationships together. And when that glue comes unstuck, as it did on a global scale when people got greedy and the pillars began falling 18 months ago, the entire economy is at risk.

But let’s shrink it to something everyone can relate to. Like you, in your salon or spa business.

Bernasek says integrity has two sides – the first is being trustworthy. Following the rules, telling the truth and being careful on the job. The second is having trust in others. For example, your customers, and your suppliers.

All economic transactions are built on trust. We trust that the people we buy from are selling us goods and services that are safe, reliable, and do what we’re told they will do. Which speaks to something I’ve been nagging salon and spa owners about for years; offering a strong, accountable guarantee to your customers.

When a business offers an unconditional money-back guarantee, it’s demonstrating its trustworthiness. If you aren’t prepared to offer a 100% money back guarantee on your product or service, then don’t sell that product or service.

But it’s also demonstrating a trust in your customers. Trust that few will take unfair advantage of it. And in my experience – and the experience of our Inner Circle members – that’s exactly the case.

Most business owners – and most customers – are trustworthy. That’s a fact. Think about this: if the general view of most people was that most people were NOT trustworthy, the entire economy would collapse.

Swindler Bernie Madoff stole as much as $65 billion from unsuspecting, trusting clients over decades. Last year he was jailed for the rest of his life, in a scandal that spawned a million bitter cartoons, like the one below.

Which is why cases of spectacular absence of integrity are few and far between, and cause such uproar when they do surface. I’ve just finished reading a book about just such a case: “Madoff – the Man Who Stole $65 billion.”, about ‘investment adviser’ Bernie Madoff, who for decades duped thousands of investors in his massive, illegal Ponzi scheme.

He was able to do so because people are generally trustworthy, and trusting. Madoff already had a successful stockbroking business. It had already made him wealthy. But he wanted more, and was prepared to sacrifice his integrity to get it.

According to author Bernasek, the cultivation and careful guarding of integrity is the basic cornerstone of wealth. In an interview with Time magazine, she says

“I don’t think (people) understand that if you act with integrity you actually can create wealth. We tend to think in a conventional way of integrity as — if you look it up in the dictionary — honor, honesty, moral rectitude. We think of it as a personal issue, a private morality, entirely up to you. But this way of thinking about integrity, the economic view, is a collective view. It’s all about us. It underpins everything we do in the economy. [For] any transaction [to] succeed — whether you’re buying or selling or borrowing or lending — you need to have this relationship of integrity and trust. And once you have that relationship you basically have an asset that produces economic value.”

Personally, I’ve done my best to live by that creed, and infuse Worldwide Salon Marketing with it.

And when you’ve always got your eye on integrity, it’s easy to spot the rare cases where it’s absent. I’ve written previously about the case of a former employee who left suddenly with our database tucked under one arm, and immediately began attempting to solicit business from our Members.

This lack of trustworthiness was quickly spotted and pounced on by our extremely loyal and trustworthy members, who loudly denounced this sneaky behaviour and turned him away.

As the world’s greatest investor, Warren Buffet is fond of saying, it takes 20 years to build a good reputation, and only 5 minutes of bad behaviour to destroy it.

So here’s what’s instructive: spend time, effort, and if necessary, money, investing in the integrity of you, your business and your products/services. Be proud of it, and don’t be afraid of shouting it from the rooftops.

As Bernasek writes, it’s a valuable asset. In the end, the relationship of trust between you and your customers – working both ways – is all you have.

How to make sure you go off the rails, right from the start....

Ever seen a train wreck about to happen, and felt powerless to stop it?

Or imagined everything happening in slow-motion as a child reaches for the breakfast cereal and knocks the milk over?

It happened to me last week. Channel-hopping on a pay network, I stumbled on a documentary about a young couple in the UK, determined to open their dream salon business.

As the film detailed their ever-deepening financial commitment, I felt like I was a voyeur, watching through a peephole at impending disaster, holding my hand to my mouth and wanting to shout

‘NO….don’t do it!”

By the time they opened their doors, they had spent… wait for it…. FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND POUNDS. Much of that was provided by investors who clearly had more money than sense.

That’s close enough to a cool one MILLION dollars. The salon looked fabulous. They’d gutted the premises and started from scratch. They’d travelled to trade shows in Europe, spending fortunes on expensive Italian fixtures and fittings.  They’d even hired a ‘celebrity’ hair stylist.

Finally, the thrill of opening day. A brief rush of customers in the first two weeks – almost all of them family and friends. And then reality struck, hard.

I could see it happening right from the beginning. These people actually believed that old nonsense about “Build it and they will come.”

Er, no, they won’t. Like a deer in the headlights, they’d  had been blinded by the ‘bright shiny objects’ of starting and running a business, oblivious to the harsh reality; that without customers, you don’t have a business. All you have is an expensive liability.

In all that half million pound spend, not a penny had been set aside for marketing – the only thing that gets customers in ANY business.

Within two weeks, they were facing bankruptcy. The investors had finally woken up. You could have fired a cannon through the salon, without a chance of hitting anybody.

I almost felt sorry for them. Almost. In the end though, they deserved to fail. A few years ago, you’d have had to attend seminars, got in your car and driven to the library, hired appropriate consultants.

Now, all the knowledge you need to avoid making such dumb mistakes is staring right back at you from your computer screen.

Sydney salon owners listen intently as Worldwide Salon Marketing CEO Greg Milner explains how to use hard-nosed Direct Response marketing tools to get customers faster....

All over the conference room at the Novotel Pacific hotel in Sydney this week, light bulbs were turning on above the heads of dozens of salon business owners who gathered for this week’s Salon Profit Secrets seminar. They were there to hear the brutal and unhappy truth about what passes for ‘marketing’ in the beauty industry -- a mish-mash of wasteful, expensive but oh-so-pretty advertising -- and find out what actually works.

In a special 'closed door' breakout session at the Sydney Salon Profit Secrets seminar, Inner Circle member salons gather to network and share their winning strategies with each other...

(And what more than 600 salons and spas are already using to increase their cash flow and profits, cheaply and quickly.)

As always, the most popular session at the seminar was the Panel of Experts, where some of our most experienced Inner Circle members took ‘how-to’ questions from the audience.

For new salon owner Karen Buckles of Karen’s Beauty & Body Care in Milperra, it was a ‘baptism of fire’. Karen won the ‘Hotseat’, joining the Panel on stage as we microscopically analyzed her business -- and put together a devastatingly-effective Unique Selling Proposition she can use ruthlessly to drive customers through her doors. (Our thanks to Inner Circle members Wendy Marron of Prima Hair on the Gold Coast, Peter Rickman of Making Waves in far north Queensland, and Rachael D’Aguiar of D’Aguiar Hair Skin Nails in Auckland, NZ, for generously offering their expertise for this week’s Panel)

Salon owner Karen Buckles (far right) won the 'Hot Seat' - and and the right to have our Panel of Experts analyse her business and send her away with a handful of easy-to-use marketing 'jewels'....

Among the salons to join the program at the seminar: Skin Expressions in Ramsgate, Cherye’s Beauty Q in Newport, LA Hair and Beauty in Tanilba Bay, Hair on Bridge Street in Waratah, Evolution Hairdressing in Oatley, Mosman Beauty Studio in Mosman, Hairitage Salon in Rodd Point, Devine Hair & Beauty in New Lynn and Bojangles Beauty Basix in Glossodia.

They were among over 30 salons & spas to have joined the Inner Circle Premium program in the past month, in Australia, the UK, New Zealand and the USA. (Each month, more than 100 salons & spas apply to join the program.)

Lesley Blake and owner Sarah Jeffree of Evolution Hairdressing in Oatley, New South Wales, among the new Inner Circle members at the Sydney Salon Profit Secrets seminar

We were delighted to welcome veteran sales and marketing man (and former National Marketing Manager for Schwarzkopf) John Lees back to the seminar stage…John had the audience in stitches with his unique and gently self-deprecating humor.

And our own Senior Coach, Annette Gomez, sent jaws dropping when she replayed ‘mystery calls’ she’d made to many of the salons prior to the seminar. For those owners who recognized the voices of their own staff on the recordings, it was a shock to hear just how well their ‘Sales Prevention Department was working!

Many of the salons who became Inner Circle members on the day were inspired by the success being enjoyed by the likes of long-term Members such as Michelle Weston (6 years membership) of Northmead Beauty Therapy, and Sean Hayes (two years membership) of Access to Beauty in Coogee…

www.youtube.com/watch?v=UL6jDmRHazs

www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wFjuX0WWnw

NEXT SEMINARS:

Brisbane, Hilton Hotel, Monday April 12. Go here to buy your tickets online, or call the office on 08 9381 6621. Early birds -- buy one ticket, get one free.

London, Warren House, Kingston-on-Thames, Monday April 19. Go here to buy your tickets online. Early birds -- buy one, get one free.