Imagine what your salon business will look like when the demand is increased and the supply is decreased.

In our latest blog discover the 4 things high street salon owners are doing to create a flagship salon which customers and top industry talent look for.

With department stores and banks closing daily, it’s no wonder salon owners are feeling vulnerable. Then throw into the mix the ‘great resignation’ post covid
and the rise of self employed people in the hair and beauty industry.

The latest report from the British Beauty Council shows that 57% of hairdressers are now self employed.

With 30% of self-employed workers have opted to convert garages and rooms in their homes or have gone mobile.

That equates to a lot of people exiting the traditional high street salon businesses.

Now add in an economic crisis with inflation levels soaring and we get a scary looking future for the high street salon for sure!

So where does this leave the high street salon?

Will high street salons even exist in 10 years?

Imagine this…

Its 2033.

💭The high street is the go to place for premium services and experiences.

💭There hasn't been any advances in technology which replace the salon experience or bespoke hair and beauty solutions.

💭Boutique and niche bars, restaurants, experiences and services are thriving.

💭More high street salons are VAT registered.

💭These salon businesses are providing job security, financial security and wealth.

💭The entire industry is growing, with more and more apprentices opting for an exciting career and learning specialist skills and in demand skills.

How did this happen?

At times of challenge and change the Salon Owners who found opportunity to adapt and grow were able to thrive.

Whilst "supply" reduced

(more and more high street salons closed down or relocated to a home salon)

Demand didn’t!

In fact by 2023 consumer spend in hair and beauty returned to 2019 levels. (pre pandemic) As predicted by globaldata.com

The supply went down whilst demand went up.

Driving the top, high street salons into a prime, premium, flag ship position.

Those who survived started to thrive and experience:

✔️stabilised cashflows,

✔️ increased confidence

✔️increased profit

✔️increased opportunities

Employed positions in a flag ship salon became a dream destination for creative and professional individuals.

So if this is a case of survival of the fittest, how do we secure a top spot?

It’s a race to the top! (Not a race to the bottom!)

Below are the 4 things high street salon owners can do, with immediate effect, to start their journey to the top.

Discoverable, Searchable and visible
Which word describes the digital presence of your business?
Being visible is great
as you build trust with your audience on social media platforms. It’s a great way to share your knowledge, passion and transformations.
Being searchable is awesome!
This is ensuring your high value content gets seen again and again. By those who are looking for your solutions to their problems via a search engine. This audience can also build trust and move closer to a buying decision.
Being discoverable is incredible!
This is driving the audience with intent directly to your business.
What's an audience with intent?
The audience who understands their problem and solution. Ready to make a commitment and actively looking for a business to serve them.

If your not tapped into all 3 digital presences then you might find you get left behind.

So get visible, on the platforms which your customers are using!

Top tip: don’t measure your traffic likes, views etc. Analyse which platform is converting from audience into physical presence in your business.

Once you know that, increase your visibility on that platform!

Become searchable with evergreen marketing and systems.

(the stuff that is discoverable with SEO and doesn’t get lost in a sea of algorithms) for examples blogs, YouTube videos, landing pages, websites and funnels.

Increase your discoverability

with a strong presence on an optimised Google profile and other relevant online directories.

2. Optimised Customer Journey

Believe it or not..

Your current customer journey is likely to be filled with missed opportunities!

When is the last time you assessed and mapped out your end to end customer journey?

We are in a digital era and have an abundance of technology at our finger tips.

Yet we often speak to salon owners who don’t use their salon software to its full potential.

Automations are huge!

when set up correctly, automations can:

💯put money in your till,

💯add delight moments to your customers,

💯and make you stand out from the crowd.

Most salon owners use appointment reminders, but what about upgrades and post service advice?

Tapping into this can serve your customer on a very high and consistent level

as well as generate more revenue in your salon.

Once we analysed and changed the customer journey in our own salon business:

We actually tripled the retail in a single month! By mapping out and fine tuning our automations. We also saw a rise in treatment spend and re-booking!

What are you waiting for?

Map out your journey, look at potential delight moments and implement them into your customer journey for an immediate boost to the premium salon space.

3. Accessible

We have said this a thousand times over and we will continue to tell anyone who wants to make a difference.

Being accessible does not mean answering DMs or what’s app messages.

Being accessible does not mean encroaching on your personal time to deal with enquiries.

Being accessible does not mean being available 24/7

So how do you have an accessible, premium and consistent salon business?

Step 1: Online bookings

Of course, the majority of people use online bookings (great!) but the problems arise when salons do not make their online booking easily available and accessible online.

From a Google Search, how many clicks (or scrolls) does it take for a potential customer to find their way into your online booking system? If it's more than 1 or 2 then rethink this and change this quickly!

People get bored and easily distracted. Don’t make it too hard for customers to find their way into your amazing business.

Step 2. Online consultations

These are complete game changers!When implemented correctly, they can bring consistent enquiries into your business on demand (without entering your DMs)

Take a look at other businesses. How easy is it to make a commitment, book an appointment or spend money in some way. You will notice that those who are accessible are the businesses which are thriving!

4. Dream destination

Question…. When booking a holiday would you buy…

A) A 2 week all inclusive,

relaxing break in an incredible hotel,

situated on a white sandy beach front with clear blue sea…..

OR

B) a 10 hour plane flight,

with terrible food,

cramped legs,

poor entertainment

followed by huge queues for the baggage?

Forgive me for being so obvious here! Of course we all know that the plane flight is a must to get to the dream destination, but we don’t buy the plane flight! We buy the dream destination.

Yet in the hair and beauty industry we so often “sell” the plane flight in content marketing.

It’s time to show your audience that your services is the plane flight to their dream destination.

What does that look like?

Maybe more confidence?
Perhaps maintaining a professional image?
More time?

When people look good, they feel good! Try tapping into this in your content marketing instead of selling the process.

Avoid marketing like (this is a real example)

“Half price gloss service with every colour in November”

Try

“we have limited availability in November

for the trending hair treatment which saves women hours of time every week on styling their hair!

Book now to avoid disappointment ”

Take a minute to understand your client and understand their dream outcome.

This will make it is so much easier for you when creating content and selling the destination, not the plane flight!

You may now be wondering….
So what is the next step and how can I start to implement positive change in my salon business?

Take the Salon Marketing Impact Quiz and discover how you can positively affect your bottom line and ultimately become the flagship salon destination by identifying key areas of improvement.

Developed BY Salon Owners for Salon Owners, the Salon Marketing Impact Quiz will benchmark your current marketing performance and identify opportunities to attract new clients, more consistently, without spending hours on social media! Take the quiz now, its free and takes approx 2 minutes!

Natasha and Natalie

HEIR Education

Do high street salons have a future?