Salon Marketing Tips and Ideas

Starting on a new business venture is always an exciting mission, so as long as you are starting out on the right foot! Any industry that encourages your customers to look and feel fabulous is a good idea.

If you are finding your place in the salon industry, whether it be hair, nails, a spa, or for tanning, you’ve already made a good choice! These types of services, although common, are always utilized by the locals as long as the service is good.

Finding a good location is key in being successful! Ideally, you want to center yourself in an area that gets a lot of traffic whether that traffic be on foot or by car. It’s also a good idea to be near like businesses.

If you’re a nail salon owner-to-be, look for a hair salon because many people love getting their hair and nails done at the same time, and what’s more convenient than right next door? Once you establish a good location, you should really put a lot of time and thought into marketing to get your name out there!

When a new business opens, people don’t just know that you are there, with the exception of people who might have seen “coming soon” signs out front. This means you need to be going the extra mile (literally!) to spread the word! For salon businesses, you need some good salon marketing ideas. Here’s some ideas that you should definitely consider:

• Flyers: Print up the biggest pile of flyers that you can and use them all! Telephone poles, car windshields, other local businesses (with permission), all up and down your street and everywhere in a one mile radius! Don’t forget to offer a modest discount for bringing in a flyer!

• Business Cards: Similar to using flyers, but more dropping them on cars, and offering other types of salons a business card exchange for each business to have out on the counters. “10% off with this card.”

• Coupons: Coupons can be anywhere from on the flyers you should put out to in local newspapers and circulars. Coupons are a great way to draw in new clients in order to get them hooked on your services!

• Newspaper Ads: Newspaper advertising isn’t too expensive and there are people who still read the paper, believe it or not!

• Sign Spinner: There’s a reason why these guys are everywhere, and it’s because they work! The sight of a spinning sign is sure to catch a few passing eyes and spread your name a little more.

• Inflatables: Flailing inflatables are another way to catch the eyes of nearby potential! Hit up your local rental store and see what they have to offer, and see if they could use your services as well!

• TV/Radio Commercial: Many people watch TV and listen to the radio, so these are two more avenues in which you can advertise! Make a short commercial and include a “be sure to mention this ad to receive a discount on your first service!”

• Grand Opening: I saved the best for last on this list because I figure it’s a given, but it’s still the best way to get traffic in your doors! Having a grand opening event is the perfect way to attract people since they often include free food, raffles, prizes, discounts, and so on. Make it big and grand!

Sitting in your salon waiting for business, or even out front trying to promote it, you may notice a large percentage of people who are passing on by just staring like a zombie into their phones, welcome to the apocalypse! What are they doing? They are surfing the internet while you are trying to put a bug in their ear about your business, how rude!

For this group of people, the kind of marketing that works best is not what is waved in front of their faces (because they would miss it anyway), but you need some online salon marketing, too! This will allow you to reach the seemingly unreachable. Just what can you do about salon marketing online?

• Social Networking: When it comes to social networking, you would think that every business would use this handy tool since it’s free! Create a business page and start by targeting locals by way of posts on local buy/sell/trade pages and with other local business pages!

• “Like and Share” Facebook promos: Once you have a few followers, design an advertisement to be “liked” and shared in order to enter a contest is a great way to get the word out about your new business! It doesn’t have to be anything fancy, but it should be catchy enough to capture people scrolling by!

• Mailing list signup promos: Offer discounts or the chance to win a raffle by having people sign up for a mailing/emailing list which will make it so that you can keep them in the know about any upcoming deals!

• Sponsored Ads: On websites like Facebook, you have an option of paid advertising which will show up in the newsfeed of many potential customers! Use this to your advantage and you might just score a few regular clients out of it!

• Website Coupons: Have a website! Great, you should! Use it to post promos and coupons on the website, whether it be on the main page or on a designated webpage.

• Google AdWords: Like the idea of being at the top of search engines? Well now you can be with Google AdWords! The best part is that you only pay when someone clicks on your website or calls. Just visit www.Google.com/AdWords for full details.

Anytime you open a new business, marketing is one of the most important things for you to do in order to be successful in this day and time.

Since we are in a time where the older generations are not online and the younger ones cannot step away from technology, it’s important to bridge that gap by marketing to both audiences both in the physical world and virtual world.

Using these clever ways to market your salon should have your doors bursting with business in no time!