How can you utilise this time at the salon to increase footfall for before the kids go back? First off, you need to start your marketing now, as lots of parents like to sort their back-to-school shopping out early on, and so you want to make sure you’re ahead of your competition when reminding your followers to get their child in for a back to school haircut!
So how do you catch the attention of this opportunity market?
You’ve got 2 types of generation within this segment. You have parents of children at say Primary school up to their mid-teens, and then you also have the college & uni students too. You ideally need to attract each group separately, as the message will be slightly different for each of those customer types.
For those parents of younger children, they are looking for a back-to-school deal where they can come and get their kids new dos sorted, and most likely on a bit of a budget if there are new uniforms, school shoes and lunch bags to buy too. But, while price may not be necessarily a big deal for everyone, we can’t deny that most people love a bit of a bargain (we know we’re all guilty of checking the 241 apps and voucher code deals for mid-week teas). But who says the offer needs to be mega cheap? Think of alternative ways that you can come up with an attractive offer that will catch the eye of back-to-school parents.
How about a family treatment deal? So, say for those parents who have multiple children, why not do a family booking for ‘Mums and Minis’ or ‘Dad’s & Daughters’ or ‘Dad’s and their Lads’ (few little silly ideas – but you get the drift). It could be something as simple as;
‘Get £3 each child’s cut and 10% off your next treatment, if you book your Daughter/Son’s back-2-school trim throughout August!’
‘Youngest child goes ½ price if you make a group Back-2-School booking for your kids, plus receive a mini treat for yourself too if you book in for an appointment before 31st August!’
You get the idea, but they are just a couple of things to get you started – where you could publish these ideas either through an SMS marketing campaign, post on your social media pages or even traditionally advertise using decals in your shop window! You could even post flyers through the doors of local estates to get your brand name out there.
Students, they similarly are looking for a discount! However, this time the initial cost of their treatment is going to be much higher due to the age difference. Where a child under 16 isn’t likely going to be having highlights, college and uni students will definitely be on this bandwagon so you can most likely afford to run some student discount events throughout the ‘back-2-college/back-2-uni’ season!
For any teen/young adult that has a valid NUS card, you could offer say 10% off all treatments, or even categorise this to be only off treatments over say £50? Just to make this a more profitable campaign for yourselves. If your salon is within a location where you have a college or Uni close by, then it could even be an idea to keep this campaign running indefinitely, as once you have the attraction of a new student client, hopefully you can retain them by including some form of student/college loyalty incentive. A little something to think about.
Then you have your retail products that you can use to generate ‘Back-2-uni’ pamper nights, to also upsell your salon products during this time (especially if you’re going to be offering a few discounted packages throughout August, this then helps you to still remain profitable). Or with events such as these, you could even tie it in with when student loans come in and do it as a ‘freshers’ night’? As this is when the students will have most disposable income and will be looking for the best freshers-week deals.
For the younger kids, you could perhaps do a family event night, where there’s complimentary refreshments; like cupcakes etc, just to bring an element of fun to the salon and to keep the children entertained while they’re waiting for their trim. Or, if you’re a beauty salon, how about running a ‘pamper party’ for children in their early teens – where you could give mini manicures and facials? Call it ‘Schools-out’ or something like that?! A few mini marketing ideas for you to bear in mind anyway! But have a think what will best suit your salon, dependent on the services you offer and also age-range suitability.
So, hopefully this has given you a little something to think about in Prep for September! Where for anyone who makes an appointment with you throughout August for ‘back-2-uni/back-2 School’, you could then run a mini discount incentive for anyone who then makes a re-booking with you for later in the year. As after all, once Back to School is over, it’s the countdown to Christmas so you want to get as many bookings in as you can early on so people don’t miss out on their Xmas treatments! Hope we’ve helped to set you up for September and remember if you want to trial our software just head to https://www.salontracker.co.uk/FreeTrial.aspx and fill your details out – then a member of our team will get in touch!
Salon Tracker x
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