Welcome to the Salon Owner’s Podcast, Phorest FM Episode 20. Co-hosted by Killian Vigna and Zoé Bélisle-Springer, this show is a mix of interviews with industry thought-leaders, roundups of our most recent salon owners marketing tips & tricks, all the latest in and around Phorest and what upcoming webinars you can join. Phorest FM is produced every Monday morning for your enjoyment with a cup of coffee on your day off.
Phorest FM Episode 20
An unfortunate situation salon owners can face is their employees stealing client details. They could use that information to harm your business, possibly by opening a competing salon. There are ways to prevent this from happening, and here we give you three major tips for that. We then continue on the topic of salon employees by discussing why it’s important to hold regular one-on-one meetings, and the best ways to go about that. Topics for this episode’s listener questions include how to promote bookings and retail sales, and different ways to get new clients in.
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Transcript
Killian Vigna: Welcome to the Phorest FM Podcast, episode 20. I’m your host Killian Vigna and today I’m joined by co-host:
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Zoe Belisle-Springer.
Killian Vigna: This week’s episode, Zoe’s gonna go through three surefire ways to prevent staff from stealing salon client details. We’ll talk about how to conduct amazing one-to-one staff meetings. We’ll also have a call in from the Phorest Salon Owner’s bootcamp over in Edinburgh. And as always, we top off the show with our upcoming Phorest Academy webinars. We’ve decided to add a little spin to it and start answering some subscriber mail.
This podcast is produced every Monday morning for your enjoyment with a cup of coffee on your day off. Now, let’s get into the show.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Welcome back.
Killian Vigna: Cheers. I just was listening to last week’s episode and you were mentioning about me in Brussels.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yes. Exactly.
Killian Vigna: That was a great trip. Highly recommended.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, it is good vibes in paradise, yeah. I was there about a year ago now so… it was nice.
Killian Vigna: It’s a nice small city as well. You kind of get around it quick enough to… I don’t like big cities. I’m scared of them. I’m going to London in two weeks and I’m gonna get lost.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Oh yeah. For sure.
So if we kick this off. Three surefire ways to prevent staff from stealing client details. So this was basically a blog written by Connor and we refreshed it a little this year. Basically, what he goes through is explaining that it’s something that happens and it happens more than you would expect.
Killian Vigna: So what are we talking about here?
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Basically, I’ll give you an example. If, for instance, you’re the salon owner. I’m a stylist. You’ve hired me. I’ve been working a while now for you and some day I decide to leave the salon and steal all your client database info. So I’m stealing your clients and I’m going elsewhere. That, unfortunately, is a situation that tends to happen more than we would expect. Or would like to.
Killian Vigna: That’s funny because I was actually just talking about this to my mom yesterday. It was Mother’s Day in Ireland so we had conversations.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly, yeah. So what he explains in this is that there’s obviously things that you can do to prevent it.
Killian Vigna: Can be overwhelming for some salons, because that’s why we were talking about it because my cousin is a salon owner. This was an issue.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah; exactly. So what he’d suggest is, you know, first of all, build relationships. And it’s not just building relationships with your staff but mainly with your clients. By this, he means after customers visit, send them an SMS saying something the lines of, “Hey, thanks for coming in today. I’m the salon owner. I just wanted to make sure that you had a good time. Is there anything we can improve on?” Basically setting the tone for this is your business and your name.
Killian Vigna: I suppose we talk about kinda if you follow up treatments with, or say I’m the stylist and I want to send you a message to say to my clients or whatever to say that oh, I have a spare booking. But this is you from the very start setting the tone that it’s your salon. And from there, then the staff can say hey, do you want a booking or anything like that.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, exactly. And he also suggests getting feedback from every appointment. This is something you could do with Phorest actually quite easily. By getting feedback, you know how well your staff is doing as well. So it’s easier to then have kind of like an overview of what’s going on in your salon, what’s going on with your staff, and how your relationship with your clients is going as well.
Killian Vigna: So I suppose in this sort of situation, because you can run reports to see, I suppose, what staff member is getting what bookings each week. So you could run a report and you see, all right well if I’ve got one stylist that’s doing 10 appointments, I’m being hypothetical here, 10 appointments in one day and another stylist that is doing two appointments? It’s up to you to balance that.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, exactly. If that superstar stylist or therapist has that many appointments a day…
Killian Vigna: It will fuel their ego.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, but then you can actually use that and turn it into a positive thing and maybe ask them to share their tips and tricks with the rest of your team, and try and build something together.
Killian Vigna: So you’re not building a group of people that work together, you’re actually building a team.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah. Exactly.
Killian Vigna: And it’s everyone upskilling each other. You might have information I don’t know, but you’re going to share with me. There’s actually the guys on the Grow team, they’re telling me they have a “barter hour” where, basically, they’ll take one hour a week where they share a skill they know with another team member.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Oh, really? I didn’t even know about that.
Killian Vigna: This only kicked off last week, yeah. Ops and SMS were telling me. So, again, it’s not people competing against each other. It’s people working together to help the overall business grow.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, because overall… like you said, overall, that’s your main thing. You want the business to grow. If you’re just trying to pull on your side of… If you’re trying to tug on your side of the rope, I mean, everybody’s just… your goal’s not gonna be reached.
Killian Vigna: Exactly. So if there is somebody stealing from this blog, steal the barter hour.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly. And the second tip he suggests to hire carefully and check references. I know for myself, I had six rounds of interviews or something like that. I am supposing you had probably about the same amount.
Killian Vigna: Oh, I had about 15.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: In Phorest, there is a strong recruitment process and, yes, it is important that you hire talented people but it also is important to check what other former employers have to say about these candidates. I’m from Canada and they still got my references from Canada to call into Ireland.
Killian Vigna: It is a really good way looking back on it now, but I remember at the time going, “What? You want me to get my references to call you?” But, looking back on it, the fact that my references… My references were willing to call into Phorest and recommend me, as opposed to “oh yeah, I’ll take a call”. Because anyone would say “oh yeah I’ll take the call”, but the fact you’ve gone out of your way to call their future employer, that shows, I suppose… backs you up.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Definitely. And like you said, if you have to just take a call you might just feel obliged to say yeah, that was a good employee, hire him. In the end, by getting people to call you in terms of references, you’ll get the real gist of what went on in their former jobs.
Killian Vigna: You can’t give a bad reference, but you can refuse to give a reference. If they’re gonna call in, it’s not going to be a bad reference. Unless you’ve really, like, pissed someone off and they’re just out to get you. Then in that case, maybe it’s your fault.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Then the third tip, he says lock down on salon client details. So, basically, your client details, they’re your salon’s property. They’re your property in the end. You’re the salon owner. That’s what it should be at least. If you’re using a book, not a software, they’re kind of everybody’s details ’cause everybody has to go into it. But, when you’re using a software, you can put different permissions of access and pin codes and stuff so people don’t have access to all of your database, basically.
Killian Vigna: Yeah. That’s not you being strict going “oh I don’t want them to see this or see that”. This happens in every company. There’s administer levels in every company. Like I was saying, if you’re using a book what’s stopping someone from pulling out their phone and taking a picture? ‘Cause you’ve got like these pdf scanners on your phone now, where you could take a quick picture that will come out crystal clear. Where, at least with the software, lock it down. It’s for the better good. It’s not-
Zoe Belisle-Springer: And, like, I mean you can still give them… if you’re worried of like oh, if I do this then they won’t have access to their appointments on their phone or anything, that’s not actually true. You can totally give access to them seeing their appointments, seeing their bookings and stuff, but they’re not getting access to what’s most valuable to you, basically.
Killian Vigna: So that’s, I suppose, called the read-only. They’re able to see it and they’re able to view it, but they can’t make those changes in the background. That’s up to you.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: And there’s a bonus tip. There’s always a bonus tip.
Killian Vigna: Surprise.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Build your personal brand. As much as you want to attract new clients or even just retain old ones, you’ll have to put yourself out there basically. You need to create something around your name.
Killian Vigna: And it can be uncomfortable, but it’s something that needs to be done. Like, over time habits. You’ll get used to it.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: It’s reputation, so if you’re quite shy to begin with, maybe try and build your online reputation. Word-of-mouth will just happen naturally because people are coming into your salon anyways.
Killian Vigna: So, something like Twitter maybe. Set up a Twitter account and get involved in salon expert industry groups. We have loads of them on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter. Just get involved. Start off small. You don’t have to be the big, massive person jumping in with your opinions. No. Listen, answer a few questions, and then over time when you get more confident on these topics, give your opinion. I suppose that will grow out, if you’re using Snapchat and things like those. Your followers, your clients will start following, and all of a sudden you become so knowledgeable.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: You become kind of an expert, but an expert online as well. Present on social media.
Killian Vigna: If you are nervous, become a keyboard warrior at first and then move onto [crosstalk 00:09:55]. Basically what I mean is, hide behind the screen and then start branching out to more visual [crosstalk 00:10:03]
Zoe Belisle-Springer: When you’re more comfortable with it, I suppose.
Killian Vigna: Which is why we start off on podcasts and not Facebook Live.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: There you go. So, listen. There’s no absolute 100% way to prevent people from taking and stealing details from you. But, if you do take all the measures possible before it happens, then you’re still ensuring it won’t happen to the best of your capacities.
Killian Vigna: This blog here is another one to add into your SOP manual, for your salon owner procedures. Again, it’s not harsh. It’s nothing like that. It’s just it is a procedure.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Now the second blog that we had on this week was… had to do with staff as well, actually. But it’s how to conduct one-to-one staff meetings. We’ve chatted a little bit with Valerie Delforg how meetings could be a really, really, powerful thing and empowering thing for your staff. When it comes to one-to-one meetings sometimes it’s just like okay well, what are we supposed to talk to you about, like what are we supposed to do now?
Killian Vigna: Just sitting there with a cup of tea in your hand, chatting about your weekend. Throw a business structure around it; make it productive.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: First of all, one-to-one meetings allow for you to give your employee their targets and you can talk about their journey within your business. Are they happy? How’s it going? Are they overwhelmed with work? Are they underwhelmed? Are they looking for more things to do? You can discuss training, possibly interests if they want to upscale their services and stuff. Maybe talking about a training that it can go onto and possibly give that service in your salon. It just helps you build a relationship, like a one-to-one relationship where you don’t have the pressure of having the entire team around you.
Killian Vigna: I actually like these ’cause I was in a job where I was the only marketer at the time and, I suppose that, surrounded by sales people and engineers, there was no one you could really go to. But I didn’t have these weekly meetings. Or, if I did have a meeting, it was more a case of what are you doing. So you did feel lost, and your staff will eventually feel lost if you’re not doing these meetings. Now we have meetings every week and you’re actually looking forward to going in, because if you are overwhelmed with work, or if you do feel lost on where you’re supposed to go, you have someone to kind of go to, say it to. Be honest in these meetings. The whole idea is not to criticize your work. It’s to support it. It’s okay, where can we help you?
Zoe Belisle-Springer: And how can we hold each other accountable for what we’re saying in here?
Killian Vigna: Exactly. Which also breaks down any frictions or barriers or stuff like that.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Before they even happen.
Killian Vigna: Yeah, so people will become more honest with each other because you’re having these meetings. Also don’t, as a salon owner, don’t just go and set out targets yourself. Encourage your staff to create their own. I don’t know if yours is the same but I have like five questions on mine every week. I’m actually looking to add stuff onto that myself every week.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah. I have a few as well.
Killian Vigna: But you feel more motivated of your work because of this.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: You have an idea of where you’re going at least.
Killian Vigna: Yes, exactly. Because everyone needs a bit of guideline. We don’t need direction or told where we’re going, but guidelines are nice.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: So the only thing though is that not everyone’s gonna react the same. See, me and Killian get along real well.
Killian Vigna: Yeah, yeah, we do. I just forgot to say anything there, I realize that probably sounded kind of awkward.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Sometimes, you know, I’ll get what he means when he has like a project, unless he’s struggling to put it into a short sentence. But sometimes what will happen is that you’ll say… okay, you come up with a great idea and you pitch it to your team and everybody’s on board initially, but then a week later you check in and then no one’s actually continued-
Killian Vigna: Or even remembered sometimes.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: And you’re like well, why did that happen? Wasn’t it a good idea? Everybody agreed to it last week.
Killian Vigna: Everyone was so excited leaving the room, and then it just slips their head.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: See, the thing is that not everybody interprets things the same. Not everyone will see the same thing as a priority. For instance, if I don’t understand why you’re thinking this is a priority, I might not consider it myself as a priority unless you set it to be it. That’s your role and your responsibility. If you want something to change, you have to put that effort into making people understand why it’s important that it changes. But that also comes back to behaviours, and how people understand different things, and how they react to different types of… help me out here.
Killian Vigna: Basically, what’s going on is if you have a project and you’ve got… I’m gonna break this down into really simple terms here. You’ve got four types of people in your salon. You’ve got the creative person. Now, everyone might come across as real creative because that’s the industry you’re in, but one person might be more creative than another. The second one could be more analytical, results driven. The third person could be an overall supportive team player. And then the fourth one is conscientious. Someone that’s… they’re afraid of being wrong and they will work until the tiny, tiny detail is figured out.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: They’re often gonna be called perfectionists.
Killian Vigna: Yeah, perfectionists. The whole point of this is it gives you a guideline of, instead of approaching everyone with the same question or idea it’s knowing who the better person to approach for the question you have. We’re gonna have to give an example here.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: For instance, if I pitch an idea, and I’m someone who’s been called a perfectionist many, many times, and I’m okay with that. If you pitch me an idea, then I am going to have to have the entire picture before I actually get onto it. I need to understand every single little bit of it to put it into motion. Whereas, I don’t know, for instance, you…
Killian Vigna: We’ve already done this test so we’ve a good idea who we are. Someone like me will take that little bit longer but make sure everyone’s on board and kind of everything’s going plain sailing. I’m not having to pick up the extra slack from someone else who’s coming in real enthusiastic, flying, “yeah let’s get this done, this is a great idea”, and then leaves the room and you’re kinda going “am I doing their work now? What?”
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Sometimes it’s just a way of phrasing things so that… you know, Killian would understand it, okay, this is a priority so I’m gonna try and get everyone on board. And on my side, I’m like okay I’m gonna try and see if there’s any roadblocks further down the line because that’s kind of my, I suppose, default reasoning.
Killian Vigna: There is a test you can do. We’ve all done it here in Phorest, for us, it was a day-long training.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, it was actually the professional one.
Killian Vigna: But there is an online version and I highly recommended it, because we’re going to go through the four profiles here. We’re just going to go over the overview. You will probably be able to identify your staff member, and even your clients, just by us calling this out. So what have we got here, Zoe? We’ve got four of them, isn’t it?
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah. Just before we get into that, I just want to mention that free online one, it won’t necessarily be as accurate as the professional one, obviously, but it will give you a good idea, at least, of where you could stand.
Killian Vigna: It’s an absolute top, skimming the surface. An overview.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: At least it gives you kind of an idea where you’re going and what kind of personalities you have on your team. DISC basically lists four profiles.
Dominant is a person who places emphasis on accomplishing results. You know, getting to the bottom line. Is very confident, usually.
Influence. A person who places emphasis on creating, influencing people, persuading others. They’re people persons usually.
Support. That’s your profile.
Killian Vigna: That’s me, yeah.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: And so someone who places-
Killian Vigna: It’s actually steadiness here. Sorry.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah… Steadiness, sorry. And then contentiousness. So, someone like me, who places emphasis on high standards, quality, perfectionism, and stuff like that.
Once you have an idea of what’s going on and how people work together in your salon, you can get a concrete action plan to conduct those one-to-one meetings. The first bit would definitely be to just catch up informally. Nothing like too long; five minutes is grand. You want your one-to-one meetings to last no longer than an hour. Then it just drags on and it’s too much.
Killian Vigna: Yeah, and then people zone out.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Most times, I don’t know for you, but my meetings are like 15-30 minutes and then it’s done.
Killian Vigna: Yeah, you cap it at that. Because, otherwise, anything said after 20 minutes is just going straight over their head. Like you just see glazed eyes everywhere.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Then you can allow… the thing you can do is to allow your staff to express how they feel, what are their concerns, how everything’s going in the workplace, so that should usually take between 10 and 15 minutes, I suppose. You can have a chat about that. Then you on your side, give constructive feedback on their work. So, again, 10, 15, minutes. Chat, discuss targets and stuff like that. You can find something, once you have those targets established, you can find something that you can both be held accountable for and then you can review on the next one-to-one. It doesn’t have to be every week. Like we have it every week but we have like specific targets to achieve. But if in your business it’s more suitable to have it every two weeks, then have it two weeks.
Killian Vigna: It’s just understanding you and your staff. What works best for you. Like, we can give you these tips and advice but you have to make it more bespoke to your salon.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: That’s pretty much all it is to the one-to-one. In that blog, however, there is a sheet that you can download and it’s basically for you to remember, okay I have to chat about this, I have to chat about that. Then you can keep those as a reference for the next meetings and take notes on that sheet. That’s a free download up on the blog.
Killian Vigna: Download it. Add it into your SOP manual.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Are we doing subscriber mail now?
Killian Vigna: Yeah. Subscriber mail. This is a new one here after throwing into the mix last week.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Our first subscriber mail comes in this week comes in from Jordan. Jordan says, “Hi. I’m the owner’s son and my main role is marketing and reception work. Our main issue is lack of retail sales. We created good material for Facebook advertising and Instagram posts, which received decent engagement. However, we don’t receive actual bookings from this, or make retail sales in the salon. We’re currently not using a salon software or SMS/email reminders. Your help and advice would be much appreciated. Thanks.”
Killian Vigna: So, Jordan. I saw this question come in this morning and basically, I haven’t worked in a salon… well, not yet. About to work in a salon in London in two weeks, thank you. I’ve worked in loads of shops through college and stuff like that. The main thing eas you always had these KPI’s and they’re always about upselling and stuff like that. We did, I suppose, the most basic one. At the booking, offer deluxe options. So basically this is like when you walk into a store and you see the shelves. You always have your middle range stuff bang-on eye-level. Then you have your expensive products where you have to look up to see the expensive ones and then the real cheap budget ones at the bottom.
So what we’re saying here is if you’ve got several different treatments for, we’ll say massage or something like that, always start off with the top one. Always start off with the top one and give choice. The paradox of choice it’s called. Basically, you’re limiting it down to three options. You’ve got your top, middle, bottom. People aren’t gonna always want to go for the top one unless it’s for a present or something like that, because it’s expensive. But, people are very rarely going to want to go for the very bottom one. That’s the cheap option. It’s seen as cheap and stuff like that.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: And if you promote it as being beneficial to you on the long run, they’re probably going to opt for the middle one.
Killian Vigna: Never start off with the most popular one. Start off with one that you want to sell and then move down.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: This works at checking as well. If a client comes into your salon on their appointment, try and rebook them. You were mentioning you were having a harder time booking people in. When your clients come in for their on-day treatment, offer them to be rebooked for the next time. Some won’t say yes. Some will prefer… busy schedules, sometimes it happens. But most people will actually be like “oh yeah, sure, yeah book me in for like a month, in four weeks, that’s fine”. When you get into the habit of doing that then you can also start talking about products within your entire treatment. It doesn’t have to be at the end.
Killian Vigna: To subconsciously upsell, in your waiting area people are sitting around. They could be waiting for a couple of minutes anyway. A popular thing that a lot of salons do is to tend to leave beauty mags, hair mags, stuff like those. If you’re selling products, why not leave the leaflets to those products on the table? People are gonna read anyway so why not read about it? Ooh, this is a really interesting product. Then they look up and they see it on your shelf.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Even like a try me-
Killian Vigna: Like a sample.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, like a sample thing or a little stand where you can actually try some products there and ask for advice with stylists, therapists, and then have a better idea of where you’re going with all this.
Killian Vigna: It’s just a nice way, without having to stock products absolutely everywhere. We could always say the point-of-sale is the best spot, the waiting area is the best spot, but then everywhere they go they’re seeing products. That is harsh, it’s too extreme. But information booklets, because like I said, people are gonna read. And gift cards. This is a great place for gift cards, especially if you’re selling your own salon branded ones. If someone buys it, they don’t have to redeem it. You’ve already got the cash. Just kinda… a handful of them here and there. Litter them around. Totally presentable, not too in-your-face.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: The best thing to sell retail… Well, I do actually run a webinar on this. In this webinar actually, there’s this one part where I talk about the act of listening and how that’s so, so, important. You can have a client walking in your salon and just chatting away to another client. If you catch on to, “Oh, they have holiday plans.” Or “They’re going for this kind of vibe.” Even at your consultation stage, basically. Make sure that whoever’s in that room with your client is very attentive to what that client is saying. If you understand their concerns and their problems, then it’s easy for you to… It’s not even about selling it, basically. It’s just providing them with an answer to their concerns. Once you do that, obviously, there’s not like… it doesn’t feel pushy.
Killian Vigna: It’s not ear-wiggin or nosing into the conversation. It’s just being aware of what your clients are talking about. Say myself and Zoe are two clients and we’re sitting in and Zoe tells me she’s going off to Spain, instantly you’re thinking dry, humid country. That hair. Yeah, SPF. Sun cream for me, definitely. I’m so pale.
But hair. If you know their hair’s gonna frizz up, you gotta jump in with “here’s a nice aftercare product” or something like that. Again, tailor to… Once you upskill your staff about the products you sell, they’ll know how to do it themselves. You guys are great at kinda getting the conversation going and making things seem seamless. It doesn’t feel like selling to your clients because they’ve gone to you for specialist service. They wanna make sure they’re getting the value long after. So think of your afters here. You’re not just doing their hair or beauty or their makeup or the massage there. You’re getting that after care as well.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: So hope that answers your question, Jordan.
Now our second subscriber mail comes in from Drago. And Drago says: “Hi Zoe. The number one salon marketing problem we’re trying to solve is that we’re trying to figure out where our future customers can come from.” Facebook, newspapers, TV, etcetera.
Killian Vigna: So we’re talking getting new clients here.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly. If people can’t find you on Google, that is a problem. If you’re trying to attract new people it means that, in their minds, they don’t know you. They’re gonna go and look up on Google salon and whichever city you’re in. If you don’t pop up then they-
Killian Vigna: You’re invisible. How are they gonna know about you?
Zoe Belisle-Springer: And the same for like, if they don’t know about you at all then they don’t follow you on Facebook, so how could they come into your salon? The first thing I’d say to check out is your online reputation. Make sure that you’re visible on Google and, ideally, on the first page. If you’re on the second page-
Killian Vigna: Goodbye.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: There’s barely no chance…
Killian Vigna: Even if you’re kinda like that last two, three near… you’re just…
Zoe Belisle-Springer: There’s a few things you can do for that. First of all, you can claim your business on Google.
Killian Vigna: Google My Business.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: If you’re a Phorest client, we can actually help you with that. We’ve got a team dedicated to online reputation. You can also try and get more reviews, because the more reviews you get, the more you’ll bump up into the Google rankings. So you’ll be higher on the page. That’s just something that Google does because you’re seen as being like an expert in your field, or in your area at least.
Killian Vigna: This is like your easiest way of bumping up your SEO. For anyone that’s aware of SEO, search engine optimization where you have to do… it’s a big long chore but basically it’s keywords, blogs, direct traffic. But what Zoe’s talking about here, this is your simplest form of getting your business found on Google.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Another thing you can do is possibly try and increase referrals. You have clients already. You’re trying to get new ones. If you reward your current clients for bringing in new people, then hopefully you can get them in and keep them as a loyal customer eventually. Word-of-mouth is still one of the most powerful things.
Killian Vigna: They say it costs like 10 times more to get a client than it is to retain it. I was just helping a client there with an email this morning about setting up a referral program. For anyone using TreatCards, or any sort of loyalty scheme, you just reward clients that have referred another client with a couple of points or maybe… we don’t say discounts, but like extra value to that client.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: I’ll feel like I should do it because, you know what, you’ve given me a great care. I love doing business with you. Why not just refer it to someone who’s looking for it, you know?
Killian Vigna: Think about it like this. At lunchtime, I turn around to Zoe, or anyone on the marketing team going, “I’m hungry. I wanna try something new.” Or “Where do you recommend?” I’m getting five people recommending. So I’m not gonna just go to one. I’m going to go to all five and see which one works for me. People talk.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Now with social media, for instance, I have over 1000 friends on Facebook. If I just post something on Facebook-
Killian Vigna: La-dee-dah.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: People have way more than that. It’s just… think about it. If you have me as a Facebook friend, but no one else in my network, and I talk about it, then you’ve got another 1000 potential customers right there. So multiply that by the amount of customers you have and you’ve got a massive database right there.
Killian Vigna: So already we have: ask your clients to refer a friend and, if they do, you can give them the TreatCard points. Secondly, ask your loyal clients for a nice review on Facebook. Or even Google. Or Yelp as well.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: They’ll all feed into Google anyways on the Google page. That all works and helps you increase your SEO.
Killian Vigna: It’s SEO without effort.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly, and without cost. Dive into those two options for sure. Then go from there.
Killian Vigna: That wraps up our subscriber mail. Just before finishing off the show, we have a guest caller all the way from Scotland. Just so people know, we’re based in Dublin here. Who do we have on the phone? We have Chris Brennan.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Hello. Good morning.
Chris Brennan: Hi there guys.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Good afternoon, I suppose.
Killian Vigna: Good afternoon. For anyone that doesn’t know who Chris is-
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Chris is a content manager here in Phorest on the marketing team. Basically, my boss.
Killian Vigna: Zoe’s boss and full of marketing knowledge, which is why he’s over the Phorest Salon Owners’ Boot Camp. So, Chris, how’d it go? You just finished up, aren’t ya? Just off the stage?
Chris Brennan: [inaudible]
Killian Vigna: Yeah, we’re just wrapping it up right now. It went pretty well. It’s a nice selection of topics and presenters to talk to Phorest clients all about how they get not only the most out of the system, but some inspirational talks from salon owners as well. Tips and tricks on how they can really maximize the use of, not just the system, but also their management and marketing skills as well. It went really nice. We’re in the Waldorf-Astoria, which I even felt fancy saying that. I was just thinking that, it does sound fancy.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: So, basically there was a few talks. You gave one. What was your talk about?
Chris Brennan: It started off with Declan from our training team, and he focused on reports. Then we moved on to Barbara of the training team and talked about marketing. I guess, umm, theories and practicalities of marketing but also to use with our system, so it shows you knowing why you should do this and also how you can do this in simple terms, using Phorest salon software. That moved into online reputation, presented by moi.
And then finally, we had a speaker from Zest Skin Spa, Louise Capwell, which she just finished and she’s remarkable. Really inspiring stuff, dedicated to how she’s managed to maintain the business model so kind of conduct her family goals and her personal goals and things like that. Even I think Phorest, I’ve been meaning to connect more of that on the concept we talked about, because it’s such an important factor when it comes to salon owners. We kind of manage to jump more to the business side of things. We’re doing this business to promote a healthy, happy, personal life so I loved what she said and I could actually listen to her talk for more. I think that this is definitely a person who, wink wink, could be interviewed on Phorest FM.
Killian Vigna: Why didn’t we think of that?
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Got the memo there.
Killian Vigna: Thanks for that tip there, Chris.
Chris Brennan: I think the next trajectory of the day is, well, umm… We started on reporting so it’s kind of like what’s the most important aspects of your business, but from where you should be at, where you’re currently at now. Then we moved it into marketing, primarily with your client list so that’s current clients, the whole client retention. Then to online reputation, which is about brand awareness creates new clients. Then bring them back to why salon owners do the things we do, that kind of thing. So quite well rounded day, full of treats, tea and coffee, things like that. I think it was fun. I could easily be up for more, anyway. I think the audience felt the same.
Killian Vigna: So this is the first of a few upcoming ones? Because I know when we sent out this email, it was originally intended for Edinburgh but we got so much feedback on when’s it coming in Manchester, when’s it coming to London. I guess this could be the start of a few of them.
Chris Brennan: Yeah. I think they just kept things run like basically how we would unveil features. Usually, we do a sample, we do a tester, to make sure what we’re actually putting together is useful and interesting to our clients, our audience. We decided to do Scotland, got a great response. Absolutely, we’ve been requested at other locations, which we will definitely be looking into. I don’t know where the next one is gonna be based but it’ll be coming soon enough and I’ll have to talk to Alex and Sinead of the PR event team and they’ll let me know, let you guys know, where the next location is. I think definitely, off the bat, there’s plans to do more and soon.
Killian Vigna: For anyone that does want to get involved… You’re used to talking to trainers on the phone. You’re used to talking to support. This is that more personal, hands-on approach, so if you do ever feel overwhelmed or anything like that, look out for these events. It’s more nurturing I suppose.
Chris Brennan: These events came off the back of requests like-
Killian Vigna: Off requests?
Chris Brennan: Definitely working in a people-based industry. We want to be as people-based as we can, so we set up the Salon Owners’ Summit. But why make that an annual event? So they’re looking into making more and more, because it’s so great to be in the same room with people. That’s what we get such great feedback and ideas based on what people talk about. It’s kind of a goal of ours this year, to get in the room with as many of our clients and get the conversation going on a different level as well.
Killian Vigna: That sounds great, Chris. We’re gonna leave it at that because I suppose that’s the best way to end it, isn’t it? Safe trip back to Ireland and all the best.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Cheers.
Chris Brennan: Thank you very much.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Thank you so much. All right, chat soon. Bye bye.
Chris Brennan: Bye bye.
Killian Vigna: So that’s the Phorest Salon Owners’ Boot Camp. He sounds tired. I think he just flew out this morning. A few of them went out last night. He should have followed through to them. Sounds good overall. Very hands-on and stuff like that.
Speaking of boot camps, we move on to webinars.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: This week’s webinars… there’s actually none. The next one is set for April 10, that’s Monday. It’s the salon retailing masterclass. That’s the one I was mentioning just earlier on. So, Monday, April 10, salon retailing master class from 10am-11am Eastern time in the US, so that’s like the New York coast region. That’s 3pm-4pm UK and Irish time.
Killian Vigna: Just following up on Jordan’s query earlier about how to upsell, that would be the webinar to jump on if you want to find out how to upsell your products, but also get your staff involved in selling the products.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: We have over 150 registrants at the moment.
Killian Vigna: 174 so far. Best of luck with that one, Zoe.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Definitely do jump in on it and I’ll be able to answer some of your questions as well on the day or at least within the next 24 hours. If you have any questions, prepare them. Write them down. Come on and tune in on April 10, the salon retailing masterclass.
Killian Vigna: That’s what we’re there for, to get your answers. Brilliant. Overall, great show. Hope you learned a lot.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Hope you enjoyed it.
Please let us know, you can leave us a little review on iTunes.
Killian Vigna: And we’re gonna do what we tell you to do. Refer a friend! Pass the link onto a friend. Get everyone listening to the show.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Have a beautiful Monday and we’ll catch you next week.
Killian Vigna: Cheers.
Thanks for reading!
#LetsGrow
