More ways to promote your business

[Jodie-May]

Marking for later

 

[Elegant]

I started up in January - mobile beauty for hands & feet and having spent hours reading through all the ideas and feel ready to go full steam ahead promoting my business to move up to the next level. I have been in contact with a couple of local hairdressers who are happy to take some of my leaflets which is fab.

But I am now wondering should I only be building a relationship with one busy salon in my village so that if they can recommend me I will take some of their leaflets to rec them and try to build a partnership with them or should I just give leaflets to any salons which are happy to take them and get my name out there but not recommend them in return as i have leaflets with a few?????

Also should I offer some incentive to the staff to hopefully encourage them to push my treatments and hopefully pass me new clients and if so what? Maybe a discount card for staff to use or % off a treatment???

Does anybody have any thoughts or ideas which might help me,
Thanks in advance. xx

 

[lady*b]

Hi everyone
just wanted to share what i've done this week I'm super excited!

I saw flyers for a fashion show at the local school so i rang and offered help with make up etc but they already had people so i offered them a voucher for their raffle and asked if they would mind putting some leaflets out and they said "if you could get 300 i'll put one on every seat"! so i gave them a voucher for a shellac manicure as you know what they say "shellac brings them back". I also had 400 flyers made just that i printed off the computer which cost £12 and on the back i put a "prom special" as its leading up to that time of year and its in a school. hopefully i'll have some bookings its in 2 weeks so i'll let u no.

Also they had a table top sale at the leisure centre on sunday so i booked a table and went up. I put the rest of the leaflets out and pictures of my work and marketing stuff. i offered nail painting up there for girls and file and paint for adults. it was really quiet but one lady had a file and polish which was £6 i paid £10 for the table so lost £4. however a few people did take leaflets and now today someone has called to book in for gels so it paid off!

they have the sales every month so i think im going to go again and the lady that booked has also said her friend might be interested after a bad experience at the local chinese nail bar!

hope that helps any one sorry about my typing! xxx

 

[Lynne Baker]

Last night I had a massage. I have these regularly because I'm old and knackered, and a patient fell on me years ago when I was nursing, and I fractured the first lumbar vertebra. I don't offer massage in my salon, again because I'm old and decrepit!

I have a client list with 487 email addresses, to whom I send marketing emails every 4 - 6 weeks.

When I got back from the massage I sent my clients the following email. (I use constant contact for email marketing, by the way)

Hi xxxx

As you know here at xxxx salon we are totally committed to providing you with the very best treatments, products and service. We'd like to tell you about a local business which we know you're going to love just as much as we do!
We have a comprehensive service menu here at xxxx salon but we don't offer xxxx, and this amazing therapist/business does just that. She is an expert in her field, having many years' experience and reputation second to none. We have used her services on many occasions and we are delighted to recommend her!

Just click here to see her website, or give her a call on xxxx xxxxxx to book an appointment with her. She also has a Facebook page; why not join the growing number of fans by liking her page! It's easy - just click here.

Best wishes

Lynne



Now, I wasn't asked to do this, neither did I ask for a commission for any clients that use her; it's all about building relationships with local businesses.
Obviously you need to be 100% happy to recommend the chosen business because it will reflect badly on you if your clients have a bad experience.

Feel free to copy the above text and amend where appropriate.

Enjoy!

 

[jennielawson106]

Marking for later

 

[Lynne Baker]

No need to post on the thread to mark it, just go to the top of the thread, click on thread tools and hit subscribe.

 

[Cindy1005]

Dear Lynne
thank you so much for generously sharing all your ideas! I'm just starting my training and it seems daunting, but I feel alot more confident after reading your post and those who contributed. It seems more feasible now!

Cindy

 

[beautybyselina]

Hi everyone...

Right I was almost reluctant to even share this as I've had such a good response rate...but I've sort of mentioned it before so here goes...

Facebook. What? erm...nooo I hear you say?

Well I found out the day before yesterday that it seems FB has changed the 'rules' slightly. LAst year myself and my other half spent a few days going through some 'posh' nightclubs facebook groups in our area and looked at their photos. We then sent direct messages to the people 'tagged' in them who looked like they fitted our criteria i.e. female, 30-50, well groomed/fashionable etc.

The problem was, at that time FB seemed to send us a warning message after about 20 messages saying 'it looks like you're spamming - please stop or your account will be suspended'.

However, we decided to give it another go recently as we got quite a few clients from the last one who ended up having four or five repeat treatments with us.

This time we seemed to be able to send out an unlimited amount without getting a warning message! I think FB has changed their stance on this unless users opt out by selecting the privacy option that says people cannot direct message them.

Now obviously, direct messages from companies can be annoying but our messages are really kinda friendly... We say stuff like 'really sorry if this isn't for you but we'd just like to let you know about....finishing with sorry again if you're not interested, have a good weekend...etc'

We've had some great responses from people saying they are really interested and want to bring friends!

Give it a go!

i can see why you was reluctant this is a brilliant idea thankyou for sharing i got 2 customers messaging me after about 5mins of messaging people so thank you thank you thank you x

 

[Lynseypinsy]

i can see why you was reluctant this is a brilliant idea thankyou for sharing i got 2 customers messaging me after about 5mins of messaging people so thank you thank you thank you x

This is a great idea, but does it only work if your business has a personal fb page? I set mine up as a business where people 'like' my page and to be honest I find it harder to contact people but was told not to set up as a personal page as eventually fb would close it down

Has anyone else found this?

Lyns x

Sent from my HTC Wildfire S A510e using SalonGeek

 

[beautybyselina]

This is a great idea, but does it only work if your business has a personal fb page? I set mine up as a business where people 'like' my page and to be honest I find it harder to contact people but was told not to set up as a personal page as eventually fb would close it down

Has anyone else found this?

Lyns x

Sent from my HTC Wildfire S A510e using SalonGeek[/

i have a "like" page and for the past few days i have messaged hundreds of people so its working for me i just copy and paste my link and type a message and post it x

 

[oatridge2006]

Brilliant advice I plan to do some of these thank you! X

 

[Charlietans]

Charlietans - how do you get business through twitter? I've managed to set an account up and follow the local gyms, clubs etc but so far no-one follows me and no-one has every tried to contact me back LOL

Hi Tinxy

Sorry, I'm new to Salon Geek and have only just found out how to follow a thread and then found this question.

I follow other local business twitter accounts, look through their list of followers and going off the picture and their location I then followed them in the hope of a follow back. Some have, some haven't. Best bit is tweeters will tweet about your service to their followers and then you can retweet to all yours :lol:

When I got my 100th follower I tweeted her to say 'thanks for being my 100th follower' she replied asking if she got anything so I said I could do her a discount and she took me up on a spray tan and has said she'll book again in the future and her sister wants one too. She tweeted some lovely things about me as she'd been quite nervous after being tangoed previously.

One of the ladies I tanned makes cards so we started retweeting each other's posts, she suggested setting up a business network in our area. I invited a lady who does body shop parties and she wants to hold a ladies night so we did some brainstorming on that and now have our first one booked! We only have five members in our business network (only one month in though!) but we each have different ideas and skills to pull together and we're all getting involved in the ladies night and at the same time retweeting each other's tweets. Plus they are all having a free spray tan from yours truly in return for before and after tan party pics (which try as I might people really don't seem to want to have done) and one of them has booked herself and her two friends in for spray tan a week later.

It may be slow going but I feel as if I'm working in a team now and not on my own!

Hope that helps, sorry to waffle on!

Charlie

 

[Bluerinse]

I'd just like to share my new marketing idea I've just started, I've had key fobs made up with salon name, address and phone number on the front and just my main prices, so I've got Cut and finish £22
Colours from £25 and gents cut £9
Then stated I offer civil service discount,

What I am doing when I hand them
Out is tellin them that at certain points in the year I'll run KEY discounts, do you only get a discount if you produce your fob etc yes every client gets one but they feel special if they have to show something to get a discount!

 

[Pinkbunny28]

Blue that is such a fab idea!! I may do something similar x

 

[Bluerinse]

Blue that is such a fab idea!! I may do something similar x

They weren't that expensive either! Www.ProActivCards.co.uk

They come I'm strips of 3 key fobs which you just bend to separate and slide on a key ring if you have used all the key rings they send you as well! And I had a box of 435 strips! X

 

[MrsHBeauty]

Ooooh I like that idea

 

[Bluerinse]

Ooooh I like that idea

It's fab!! I hate writing business cards because my hand writing is awful! And it's not invasive either! X

 

[Lynne Baker]

bugger, the website is down!

 

[Severnrose]

Looks like they are building a new website shame I wanted to see these key fobs! Have you got a pic of yours?

 

[Bluerinse]

Looks like they are building a new website shame I wanted to see these key fobs! Have you got a pic of yours?

Yes of course