Are you finding that the salon is slow these days? Covid has impacted the regular flow of
clients and business is now more unpredictable than ever. As a salon owner or independent stylist, you need to find creative ways to stimulate your business. Our world is evolving and you need to make sure that your salon’s promotions strategies are evolving with it! As your salon digital marketing resource, we’re going to share with you some of the top retail and service promotion ideas that actually work.
We encourage you to read other related articles to help stimulate your salon business where we talk about salon growth strategies and the best ways to get new clients in your salon. Short term promotions that last 4 to 8 weeks are still important to keep our clients’ attention. Remember that they receive weekly specials from grocery stores and drugstores, so they expect to see sales and promotions – it’s often what triggers them to take action.
Retail Promotion Ideas:
Here are some fun retail promotion ideas that have had proven success in salons:
1. Deal yourself up to 20% savings on your favorite retail products! Use a regular
deck of playing cards. Let the client draw a card with every retail purchase. Cards
1 – 10 = 10% savings; Jack/Queen/King = 20% savings. Stylists keep the card that
their clients chose, and at the end of the week, the stylist with the best poker
hand wins a prize!
2. Trade Up! Give clients the opportunity to trade in their old drugstore product
for a rebate of 10 to 20% off the purchase of your professional product.
3. 2 is better than 1! Buy 1 product, get the 2 nd at 50% off (*discount is applied to
the lowest priced product). You can run a similar promotion called 3 is better
than 2 and offer a special price (maybe even free) for the 3 rd product purchased.
4. Spin it to Win it! Create a spinner wheel with different savings amounts (10% -
25%). You can add in ‘spin again’ and/or ‘free travel size’ for more fun options.
Give all clients that purchase 2 or more products the opportunity to spin for their
savings!
5. Shopping Bag Bonanza! This is especially good for Black Friday / Christmas
season because you are encouraging bulk purchases that people can give as gifts.
Give each client a bag (you determine the size) and the client gets 20% off as
much product as they can fit in the bag! You can exclude certain items or other
promotions, but be sure that most people will want to fill the bag as much as
they can!
6. The Great Giveback: Everyone loves companies that do good things for the
community. Find a local charitable organization that resonates with your clients
and run a special to give 10% of the sale of every product (during the campaign) to the organization. This can help you get positive media coverage, make people feel good about spending with you, increase your sales, and help benefit a local charity. A true win-win situation for everyone.
You can find additional tips for growing your salon retail sales in this article.
Service Promotion Ideas:
Here are some other service promotion ideas that have had
proven success in salons:
1. Gift with Service! Offer a special price on specific retail products when a client
tries a new service for the first time. Ex: Receive a free color-care shampoo when
get highlights for the first time. Or First-time color clients receive 20% off retail
purchases today. (the day of their first color).
2. Rebook Reward! Rebook your next appointment today and receive a
complimentary treatment service on your next visit (or you could offer 20% off
their retail purchase next visit). You can always make the reward contingent on
special timelines. For example: Rebook your next appointment within 5 weeks
and receive (enter the reward you choose here).
3. Give a Gift, Get a Gift! Gift card sales are important to focus on year-round, they
are not just for Mother’s Day and Christmas. Remember that people have
birthdays 365 days a year! Offer a bonus $20 gift card when clients spend $100
or more on a gift card. When people use gift cards, they are way more likely to
use them as a ‘treat’ and try services that they don’t normally get.
4. More Rebook Rewards! When you anticipate slower periods of the year coming
up, consider running a rebook promotion and offer a big prize. For example in
December: Rebook your next appointment in January or February and enter our
raffle for a year’s worth of conditioning treatments (value $xx). Offering
conditioning treatments as the prize is a great idea because the winner might
still be compelled to purchase shampoos and conditioners along the way.
Whichever salon promotions you try, there are 2 important elements to help you get clients to take action - scarcity and urgency. Scarcity is showing that you have limited supply of something. When consumers feel like there is a limited supply or limited opportunity to take advantage of an offer, they are much more likely to act quickly. Some examples of this include:
Only 2 appointments left this week!
The first 10 clients will receive...
While quantities last.
The 2nd element to include in your promotions is urgency. Urgency is creating some time pressure so that people realize that if they don’t act now, they might miss out on the special offer. If there’s no time pressure, consumers can wait to make their decision. You want them to make their decision to take advantage of the offer right now! Some examples of urgency include:
Today only!
Special offer expires at the end of this week.
Limited time offer (include deadline).
By understanding your objective, selecting the best promotion or tactic for your situation, and using scarcity and urgency in your offers, you will start creating the best salon promotions that work to drive more business for your salon!
For more salon business tips, check out our full resource library here!