How to Run a Successful Salon Business

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Owning and running a successful hair salon is a dream of many. You can be the salon owner who makes this dream a reality. It is important to first understand what you are getting into while your salon is in the startup process before taking a plunge.

Going in with your eyes wide open, can help you reach your goal of running a profitable salon. You will want to stay motivated, hire motivated staff, set realistic goals, and look for extraordinary marketing skills. Whether you have already started or are interested in starting your own hair salon.

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1. Tips for Running a Successful Salon
2. Create an Attractive Company Website
3. Budgeting and Handling Cash Flow
4. Develop Long-Term Relationships With Your Customers
5. Conclusion

Tips for Running a Successful Salon

• Surround yourself with positive-minded people. These people will motivate you to keep on doing what you love no matter what happens. Keep all the negativity out.
• Always make sure that your personal appearance is great, as well as that of your salon premises.
• Stay organised.
• Compliment both your salon staff and clients sincerely.
• Run your business honestly and ethically.
• Treat every walk-in as your future client.
• Over deliver with your customers.
• Do not waste your time worrying about lack of money, but rather work on making money.
• Stay open-minded to new trends.
• Do not overwork yourself or your staff, take some time to relax and recharge. This will go a long way in helping you do your job better.
• Be motivated yourself, and the motivation will spread to your staff.
• Set realistic targets for your business. Make sure you are not setting yourself for failure from the beginning.
• Have great marketing strategies

Create an Attractive Company Website

In this digital age, you cannot afford to run a business without a website.

1. If you have the money, you can get a professional to make your company's website. Given that you have a tight budget, there are many DIY website platforms available on the internet. Your site needs to be catchy, and include useful information for your clients like hours, location, contact information, and pricing details.
2. Find Creative, Budget-Friendly Marketing Ideas: You can consider hosting a small event such as a ribbon-cutting or charity event to attract more clients to your salon. For instance, you can sponsor a play at a local school or have your employees volunteer at a local sporting event. The aim is to let more people know about your establishment and getting involved in your local community can go a long way in helping you achieve your goals.
3. Have A Social Media Presence: Social media is a key component in marketing. You can set up and utilize as many social media accounts as you like on different platforms. Ensure that you post on a regular basis and engage with your clients.
4. Offer Gift Cards: If your budget allows it, you can market your business successfully through gift cards. These are a salon's best marketing friends.

Not Sure About Marketing Your Salon?

If you are not sure about how to market your business, you can look outside the hairdressing industry for marketing ideas. It is easy for businesses within this sector to look the same to potential clients, but if you look outside the industry you can find multiple marketing tools that would work very well for your hairdressing business.

Looking from the outside in your salon setup, rather than from the inside out can make you stand out from the competition. Have a "marketing ideas collection". You can collect advertisements from newspapers, magazines, junk mail, brochures, and sample promotions that you like. If you purchase something because of an advertisement you saw or direct mail you received, you can try to see if that method works in marketing your salon too.

Learning from others is always a great way to help you understand how to run a successful hairdressing salon. Whenever you are unsure of an idea, you can turn to your collection of marketing ideas and find an advertisement that works for you.

Spotting Suitable Employees and Encouraging Your Staff

When you are first starting out on your business, you may be the only employee, but as your salon hopefully grows, you will need to employ extra help. Without a doubt, the success of your business is also dependent on the staff you hire.

When hiring, you should focus more on the personality rather than the skills. You want your customers to enjoy coming in to receive your services. Obviously, you need somebody who knows their way around styling hair, but you should not solely base your hiring decision on the skills alone. Personality is very important.

The following are some of the characteristics you should look for when hiring employees to work in your salon:

1. They smile and possess a sense of humour.
2. Polite and naturally friendly with others.
3. Take pride in their personal appearance.
4. Ask customers what they require and consider their budget requirements.
5. Offer a useful opinion and provide recommendations.
6. They are not afraid to ask for sales.
7. Once you have already selected your staff, you need to motivate them in their work by doing the following:

Be motivated yourself as a business owner. This will help your staff to stay motivated in their work too, thus attracting more clients.

Hire people who are highly motivated and optimistic. Having unmotivated staff will not do good to the health of your business.

Learn to set realistic and challenging goals for your business and motivate your staff to attain them. Award your employees fairly. Conducting your business fairly will motivate your staff to work better to achieve better results.

Provide praise and recognition as necessary. Everybody loves to get praises, so when any of your staff members do their work exceptionally give them recognition. This may encourage some healthy competition amongst your employees.

When a client spots a stylist they like, it is easy for them to become repeat clients. Just like any other business out there, repeat customers are very important in boosting sales for salon businesses. You want to ensure that you maintain your current clients and also attract new ones, by having skilled and friendly staff.

Budgeting and Handling Cash Flow

In the discussion of how to run a successful hairdressing salon, budget and cash flow management are key factors. Always take a realistic approach to how you budget for your salon business expenses. You should plan for the worst possible scenario, not the best. If things go better than you had initially expected, you will end up with more money in your bank account.

A common mistake made by many salon owners is poor planning and setting unrealistic expectations in terms of the cash flow. Underestimating the expenses, overestimating the potential income, and failing to recognize that money will come in slowly, are mistakes you should avoid if you want to run a successful hair salon.

You need to know the features and benefits of each service stated on your brochure and each product on your shelves. Features inform the client about the characteristics of products or services, and the benefits encourage the client to buy. Talk about the benefits, why should the client buy your product or service? Be confident in explaining the features and benefits to your customers. By so doing you will create interest and motivate them to purchase what you're selling.

High sales equal to great business success, while low sales equal to business failure. Sell your products and services confidently to make your business succeed.

Look for Ways to Save

When you first start your salon business, you might have splurged on some things you thought were important for your start-up, but really weren't. With your salon business established, go through your inventory to see if you can change some things or make cuts to save money. Review your monthly expenses too, is there anything you can trim back? Perhaps you can cut down on the number of beauty products you are purchasing every month.

Starting a salon business is a bold endeavor. Just like any other new venture, it is vital to plan well and be open to adapt as you discover what works best for you. Saving is important in running a successful salon, as you will have extra funds to find new ways to grow your business, motivate your staff, hire new staff, expand your business, etc.

Develop Long-Term Relationships With Your Customers

Nowadays, customers want to feel connected to the products and services they receive. Great companies such as Apple, and Coca-Cola have mastered how to do this and your salon business can too. Instead of providing your customers with a short service that improves their beauty till the next time they need a hairdo, you can choose to develop a care program that starts with the service, then maintenance and enhancement by using products, followed by repeat visits to your salon.

Do not sell them products, but rather recommend a path for your customers to achieve their beauty goals and provide professional, but personalized guidance throughout the process. Look into homeopathic and holistic ways of communicating with your clients. Today's salon client is yearning for expert advice and consultation, and giving them that invaluable service can help you develop meaningful relationships with them.

Concentrate on Growing Ethos Instead of Growing an Image

It has been said before that a salon business is all about image, however, this is not the case for modern salons. Nowadays, customers are loyal to a salon establishment because of what it represents rather than its physical outlook.

Developing a strong ethos such as salon values, goals, unique culture, and a mission, which your target clients are likely to share will help you build a relationship with them. Take time to evaluate what your target audience values and establish your salon's culture based on that to create long-lasting loyalty.

For an instant, if you are an organic salon business, your customers probably value their overall well-being, as well as the environment. When the values of your target customers are in line with your business culture, you will be able to grow your business successfully.

Be Savvy About the Prices You Set

It is often misconceived that when a salon increases its prices, it will scare away new customers. While this is typically the case for many industries, savvy salon business owners know that higher prices on the services they offer give them a chance to provide more attractive discounts when conducting promotional programs.

For instance, if you raise the prices of your salon services by 15 percent, but provide a 15 percent discount for family and friends of your current customers, you'll raise the perceived value of the services you offer, increase the loyalty of your current clients, and make way for increased prices from potential new customers whose perception of greater value in your services has been created by positive remarks from your loyal clientele.

However, you should ensure that you raise your prices reasonably. Do not increase the prices to an unreasonable amount, you need to consider the budget requirements of your clients.

Conclusion

Running a team, juggling business finances, and handling clients can be tasking. However, there are ways in which you can succeed in running a successful hair salon business, as discussed above. It is important to stay updated with the current trends in growing your business. Follow the tips mentioned above, and you might just enjoy being an owner of a successful salon.

Citations

The successful business plan: secrets & strategies
https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=hpFxjEsZLUwC&oi=f

What makes a new business start-up successful?
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1008168226739

Business process management: practical guidelines to successful implementations
https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/97802030