When you think of marketing for your salon, sometimes what comes to mind is an overwhelming cloud of stress, working out how to reach new clients, creating expensive and time-consuming flyers or complicated email and social media campaigns.
But campaign marketing doesn’t have to be hard work. In fact, the best campaigns will work hard FOR you, bringing in new clients you would never have found before, and keeping the relationships with your current clients on track so you get them back through the door regularly.
If you plan ahead, and know what you want to achieve with your marketing, it can be as simple as creating a few new email templates in your Shortcuts Marketing suite and scheduling them in when it suits you.
We’ve mapped out some campaign ideas for the everyday situations every salon owner can relate to. Get ready to nail your campaign marketing!
For when you’re busy…
Ahh Christmas. It’s the most wonderful time of the year, isn’t it? Along with New Years Eve, Easter, Mothers’ Day, Fathers’ Day and the rest – there’s nothing like a holiday to flood the salon will clients. But while your appointment books might be filling up, your clients’ email inboxes are too. So how do you make your seasonal or holiday campaign stand out from the rest?
We’ve got a few tips we like to use:
- Subject lines are like the doorway to your email. Use something snappy and enticing to bring people in! We love subject lines that keep us guessing, with a bit of a hint about what we’ll find inside.
- Personalisation. Where possible, use a client’s name in both the subject line and email – how much more likely are you to open an email when it’s got your name in it?
- Get creative. Why not try a seasonal colour theme? Change up your heading and button text to red and green for Christmas, or include a relevant image in your header – anything to stand out from the sea of emails in all our inboxes.
- Show some personality. Your clients love speaking to you and your team when they’re in the salon – don’t let your emails sound formal and boring! The best emails are the ones that speak to you directly, and sound like a person (no one wants to hear from robots….🤖)
- Keep it snappy. The other thing no one wants to do it scroll, scroll, scroll through endless text. Keep emails to 3-5 sentences, and then direct them to a page on your website with a nice big button. If you’re having trouble cutting it down, we like to follow the 5Ws – cover off:
- Who you’re talking to;
- What you want to tell them;
- Why they should be interested;
- When they can action; and
- Where they need to go.
And when you’re NOT busy.
In 2020, more than any year we can remember, we have had periods of immense and imposed downtime. From forced closures to nationwide lockdowns, we have struggled to keep business afloat and keep the conversations with clients happening – even when it feels like all we have to say is bad news.
But in these quiet times, it is just as important to be communicating with your client base as when you’re busy.
For many salons and clinics, the COVID lockdowns brought about a sudden twist from in-person treatment to online-only offerings, and forced business owners to think differently about how to keep the connection with clients alive.
Some of the amazing ways we have seen businesses engaging with their clients while they’re closed or quiet include:
- Promoting an online consultation service (like James Vivian)
- Creating a strong and strategic social media plan to communicate updates and keep spirits high
- Sell retail products and at-home DIY kits through online stores or even your social media channels
- Create challenges – through social media or email, set a skin challenge each day or week for clients to take a #selfcare moment, guided by your expert team
- Create enticing after-lockdown packages – think of all those unkempt brows and lashes just waiting for your magic touch – why not add a mini-facial to round out the pampering? And who doesn’t have a handful of split ends after everything 2020 has thrown our way?!
To bring new clients in….
These babies are everyone’s favourite email to receive. We love seeing how creative you guys get! Surprise and delight campaigns are emails that are sent based off a trigger that you guys decide on. It could be around the number of total appointments ever, a target number of appointments for a client, or even appointment “streaks” or just a specific date that is special to your salon or clinic – anything fun and delighting you can think of.
Some of our favourite campaigns include:
- You’re our 10,000th appointment!
- Happy 100 visits
- Brow-master – you’ve kept those brows in shape every month this year!
- International Good Hair Day offer (it’s the 26 March each year, FYI)
- Special anniversaries – you’ve been a client for 5/10/15 years
And to keep them coming back.
A great way to build loyalty among your clients is with specific campaigns designed to make them feel noticed, and special.
With Shortcuts, you can automate these campaigns to send based on specific triggers – like 4 weeks after a colour appointment, or 3 months since their last booking. Clever, right?
You can even include a deal or package combo to entice them to make a booking – but remember, the beauty of having these campaigns automated is you don’t need to think about it! So make sure it’s something you have always running, like a referral campaign or a cut/colour/blow dry combo.
Our favourite loyalty campaigns to run include:
- It’s time to see you again! You can schedule these to send when a client hasn’t had an appointment for a while and maybe needs a little reminder to book that root touch-up or brow tint.
- We miss you – this campaign is great to send when a client has left it a little bit longer, and there’s no future appointment booked in. Your Shortcuts system can check this automatically!
- Referral thank you messages –this is a great way to automatically reach out to client referrers and thank them for spreading the word. If you’ve got a referral program in place, this is your opportunity to include the reward or discount to say thanks! And if you don’t – have you considered the benefits? Word of mouth is one of our most powerful marketing tools – use your happy clients to bring in more happy clients! It’s a no-brainer in our books.
- Birthday campaigns – while not strictly a loyalty campaign, what better way to remind your clients how much they love and miss you than sending them a lovely birthday message? You can even include a promo or birthday deal for them to use, to encourage them to book in – did anyone say birthday blow-dry?! 🎁
Setting up campaigns in Shortcuts Marketing Suite:
Now that you’ve planned some campaigns to bring in new clients, keep connecting with your old ones, and keep your salon busy all year long, it’s time to get them set up!
For all the setup guides to get you from marketing zero to communication HERO, check out our Marketing Resource Hub here.
