Don’t fail because you can’t advertise and promote your salon or beauty business successfully

Being in business requires you to understand how to sell your products and services. You have to learn how to advertise and promote your thing as well as you do your thing!

It’s easy, right? Posting promotions on social media, creating offers and writing ad copy well

but, if it does not sell your products and services or advertise your salon well, it’s a complete waste of time.

Social media has made it much easier for us to advertise and promote our salons and beauty businesses, but just throwing up an offer and hoping to get new customers is not a strategy that works. This framework below will help you get your social posts seen, read and acted upon, and bring all your messaging, branding and customer service across all advertising up to standard while bringing in new customers.

Why Bother?

Because time is your most valuable asset and you need to make your efforts count for something.

Just because you wanted to own your own business and do your craft or service, you are expected to know how to advertise and write great ad copy as well… but it is a skill people study and hone for years just like you did with your skills.

Learning how to get your offers just right for your customers and wrangling social media so it’s not a time-waster is important. It is a discipline and needs a strategy.

It can be complicated, time-consuming and expertise not all of us want to do.

But… Advertising and promoting your salon and beauty business successfully is essential and requires a few skills you can learn here.

5 Steps to Advertise and Promote your Salon Successfully

We’ve outlined 5 steps you can use to improve your promotions… an ad framework to work through step by step.2.

This is so you can get a better response from your salon marketing and create ads that get the reader to do the action you want.

Make the effort worth the time and bring in ideal customers and more profits!

Use this 5 step framework to assess a current ad or as a guide to map out what you are going to say and how it in your next promotion.

1. The Offer

Create a killer offer that your customers want.

2. The target audience

Target the audiences that you want to see your offer and advertise to them with the right messaging.

3. The messaging

Use appropriate ad copy to draw people to your products and services.

4. The design

Design and advertise your salon brand to sell your values and culture to ideal customers.

5. The Follow-through

Have a call to action and follow-through that seamlessly takes the customer on the journey to a sale.

Now, most salon owners are on board with social media and getting creative content out there. Thinking about a strategy can be missed.

The targeting, copy, offer, follow up…  can just be an afterthought.

Not another job to try and learn!

Well yes, I get it BUT

What I know is…  advertise your salon in a way that ticks all the boxes and you will attract new customers and encourage regulars to spend more. When done correctly great promotions build relationships and community around the services and products you provide.

It creates leads and turns them into real customers and works as a crucial tool in your customer journey from follower or fan to bums on seats.

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Business owners need to be just as good at marketing their thing, as they are at making or doing their thing … or hire it out.

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And not just that…

Great salon ads

• stimulate more frequent visits
• encourage customers to have extra services
• motivates more product sales
• inspires extra recommendations of your salon to their friends. WIN-WIN! 

But… how do you find the time and get this on the schedule and make it work?

It’s all about frameworks and structure.

Once you follow along with what is outlined below, it will just get easier and become a more efficient process.

We have listed a framework of considerations that will really help you minimise the time you spend thinking about how and what to do when creating an ad.

When writing an ad or creating an offer and promotion run this checklist over your efforts.

Use the frameworks as a guide to map out your offer, targeting, ad copy and design.

Firstly you need to know this…

Brain triggers.

They are things that happen and social scenarios that “automatically trigger” the brain to respond. When you know these triggers you can use them in your sales copy, advertising and in your presentations to get people to say yes to you.

And… it’s all brain-based and subconscious, so most people won’t even recognise these triggers in your sales, marketing and advertising. Makes getting a yes to your offers, retail and upsells so much easier.

Attention

All ads and promotions must capture your readers or listeners attention. Stop the scrolling, get them to stop and listen otherwise, your messaging is just more white noise.

We talk more about this in the offer framework and how to be new, different and exciting.

Images

Use imagery because the brain thinks in imagery and our industry is perfect for this. We read imagery so much faster than words and you can tell a whole story in seconds. We talk more about this in the design framework.

High Contrast

Our brain is triggered by high contrast. It compares and judges. Stand out, stand above and be seen. Gets people to make a decision.

Make it simple

Don’t over complicate any of the parts to the steps. Our brains will always take the easiest path. make it easy for them to say yes.

Make it about the customer

Human brains function on a ‘what’s in it for me’ structure. Be clear with this across all the frameworks.

Use emotion.

The brain is hardwired to emotion. Go for the feelings over facts every time.

Think about how these things operate in your own buying decisions across all your life. These are human drivers and play a big part in how we make decisions.

Now let’s dive into the frameworks and set you up for advertising success!

The Offer Framework.

Uncertain how to put together a killer offer for your salon?

Read this step by step guide HERE on How to Create an Offer your Customers Want.

This post breaks it all down and answers these questions about Offer Strategies.

Think about how you currently offer your salon services and what you do to increase salon sales and profits. 

• Who do you direct offers to?
• How do you structure offers to reach your ideal new customers?
• Do you offer bonuses or discounts?
• What methods do you use to convey salon offers to new and existing customers?
• Do you bundle services and products?
• How do you encourage your team to utilise offers for their sales?

The Ad Targeting Framework.

Who is your ad targeted to?

When you are crafting an offer, one of the steps is to decide who is best suited to the offer. An offer can suit different audiences but they do need to be spoken to differently.

Describe the different benefits each audience will value and weave these into your marketing message using the copy and design frameworks below.

Here we just want to give you a simple break down of what types of audiences you can target. It’s easy to start with people that know you and ones that don’t. People who don’t know you at all are cold. This goes right through to the sizzling hot audience who are ready to buy or who are already customers and you want them to buy more or visit again.

Cold audiences – you can use location settings on FB, age, demographics and interests. Our favourite cold audiences to target are ‘Look a Likes’ of existing warm or hot audiences you have already loaded up and collected in your FB audience dashboard.

Warm audiences are people who like, engage, watch videos and comment on your posts. They might have been on your website a few times and even downloaded a report or joined your newsletter list. In some way, they have shown an interest.

Within this warm audience, you will have a variety of demographics that will respond to various marketing messages. Use different copy and images to specifically speak to them.

Hot audiences are the customers that have visited you already… so your uploaded customer list. Advertise offers to them that they might have seen in the salon, events and promotions of new products and services. Use loyalty schemes or refer-a-friend incentives. You can overlook this audience when marketing but they are your fans already and will be keen to see what you have on offer.

Getting clear on where your customer is in your selling journey, what type of offer they respond to and how to speak to them so they engage and take notice is worth a bit of extra effort.

The Ad Offer and Copy Framework.

Run these questions over your offer and see if it makes the cut.

Is our offer novel, unique and distinctive?

Now, this is really, really easy if the offer, product or service happens to be novel, unique or distinctive. This is if you have something brand new or if you’re releasing something that your customers or potential customers have never seen.

But what do you do if they have seen it before, or what do you do if you’re selling a service that every salon does?

Ask yourself what’s a way that you can make it feel new. What’s an angle that you can take, or a way to package something together that you haven’t tried before?

A new stylist or product range is easy to promote as new or unique but you will need to put your thinking hat on for ways to package up what you always do and get it out there. You want to be the choice in your area for the service you are promoting. What is your unique style, presentation, add-ons or approach that you can talk about and will get the readers attention?

Have we made the offer seem simple and easy?

Make whatever it is that you have to offer seem simple and easy to consume and understand.

When we grasp something quickly and effortlessly, we not only like it more but we care and value it more too. You don’t want a complicated system of getting vouchers to use towards a service that takes 10 minutes to fill out or a comment post that requires them to be in front of messenger for 15 mins to get to the offer.

Make it simple and before they know it they will have committed to the offer and be in your salon in no time. It’s then that you get to show off all the good stuff that your salon has to offer.

What’s an opening question in your ad copy that when answered, will trigger a desire and connection? 

Opening your ad copy with questions is compelling and will catch your customers’ attention. How do you like your hair today? Is your hair colour making you feel good?

A general question like this engages the mind. It doesn’t necessarily engage heart or identity.

We also want questions to create a mini-commitment? Answering ‘yes’ to small things makes it easier for the reader to say YES to the bigger commitment you really want.

Ask someone, “Are you brave enough to try…? Do you value your hair enough to want …?”, or “Is your time important enough for you to …?”

Now that’s the next level, and we’re not simply asking a question for the sake of a question that engages the mind. We’re asking a question that when answered, even if they’re just answering in their head, is saying something about themselves.

For example…

Asking – Do you consider yourself to be brave enough for a new style? They think… ‘Yeah, I do’.

Next – Well, we have the perfect new colour style you would love… They think ‘Yes I would’.

We often are told to drive home the pain points with questions like ‘Are you managing your waves and frizz? Is your dry skin getting you down?

If you use this approach you want to follow with questions to which they can answer YES. Ones that can make them identify with a positive, helpful and caring person inside of themselves.

‘You are Worth it, You deserve it’ campaigns are everywhere. Human nature dictates that we want to believe and identify with treating ourselves well, being brave, loyal and good.

Ask questions that allow your reader to be that person they want to identify with and next, place your service as the vehicle that gets them there.

Is your copy pre-exposing your reader to the desired emotions you want them to feel when they use the product or service you are promoting?

How can you show the feeling of a new colour or the ease of having silky straight hair? The sensation of beauty when they see their long lashes and blemish-free skin. The admiration of a friend or family with the flattering new cut.

Use images and copy together here to paint a picture and evoke emotions that you want your reader to feel after they have had your service or bought the product.

Transformation images and words work well here. Ask the reader how they feel with what they currently have and then talk about the emotions they will feel after they have used your product or service.

For example, this is a perfect chance to say. ‘How would you feel if your day started with hair like this?’

Have we held our readers’ attention right until the end of the offer with the copy and design?

Give them a reason to keep engaged until the end of the copy. Use layering to reveal what it is you want them to do, what the price includes or how they go about getting in on the offer.

Make it desirable, exclusive and feel that it was written especially for them.

The Ad Design Framework

Great copy won’t save a bad image and a great image won’t hide a poor offer no one wants.

Read the blog we have about how to craft an offer that sells before you dig into this framework too much. It really is the most important thing to get right.

Research

Here’s how you can begin your research:

• Search Google for similar products to yours.
• How are they being marketed?
• Why are you offering this particular product/service?
• What are the benefits of the offer? Who do you want to target?
• Who is your audience?
• What’s the end result they can achieve?
• What is the emotion/feeling you want to convey?

Communicate the answers to these questions in your image and copy wherever you can. An effective Facebook ad is much more than just a pretty picture with words. A good image and great copy will weave in the marketing message as much as possible.

Design

When design is used strategically and planned out, it will ultimately benefit the results of the advert.

Plan what you are going to do and where you want things to be.

In this step, start planning your…

• Graphic aesthetic. Photo-based vs. illustration
• What program you’ll use to create the image?
• Layout/placement of your design elements.

Colours

Facebook ads have to POP! Use only a few complementary colours. Avoid colours that are harsh on the eye and stick to your brand. Hopefully, you will have a style sheet to keep you on brand and on track.

You want the colours to…

• Get people to stop on YOUR ad.
• Set your ad apart.
• Create a pattern interrupt.

Fonts

Only use 1 or 2 different font families for your image.

Too many font choices will be distracting from your overall message. Pick legible, clear fonts especially if it’s going to be a small Facebook ad.

Image

Make sure the image/graphic not only makes sense with the ad messaging but that it makes sense with your overall brand.

Be consistent with styles throughout your ads and your website. You want to keep people hooked and to maintain congruency.

Pay attention to your creative and make sure it conveys whatever marketing message you have set for this campaign.

Images can and should tell a story, especially video ads. It allows the viewer to see themselves inside of the story you’re telling. You can tell a pretty long story in a simple image, it’s very effective

Display your service or product and the results the customer will achieve, especially if you’re selling a physical product and you can show it in action…

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Start with the end in mind

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Follow through.

What do you want to happen next?

What do you want the reader to do?

Start with the end in mind. A very important point from the great Steve Covey.

All this great work will be useless unless you have a plan to cope with the increased demand on your team if they need to do callbacks, FB message replies, or distribution. If the post ad experience does not live up to the introduction, you can do more harm than good.

Decide how you want the next steps to go and plan this out. Simple and automated is best and there are so many options for this now. FB messenger bots, landing pages and email autoresponders. There is nothing more helpful than a real person follow-up though, so think carefully about how you want this stage to work.

Are you creating a webpage for the offer to be redeemed?

How will you follow up after people give you an email, comment on your post, call your business?

Do you have or want a salon sales page for direct purchase and a supply system?

Have you thought about a bot for FB messenger for engaging immediately?

An offer crafted well and presented to the right people at the right time and then handled with the appropriate follow up is the way to make your salon marketing a success.