Spa Clientéle Marketing Tips

Members Only? How you can create your own country club

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Dear Heather,

Hello - thanks for your articles - they're always very helpful!  Just curious ... what are your thoughts on a "membership program" in terms of loyalty & helping to make those current clients more repeat??  Have you seen any membership programs that are really good or really bad??

-Mandi

Mandi,

Thanks for your comment and question!  The way I see it, there are two types of spa membership programs.

How to make the most of adding a new service on your menu

I love change.  Sometimes too much, really. But I just love the excitement of doing something NEW and different.  Yet, too much change -- or not fully receiving the benefit of that new and different thing can mean lost efficiency, even lost profits. 

The same is true for making changes to your service menu.  That fun new treatment you saw at the show, or were introduced to by a skincare sales rep is exciting!  Our natural creativity and curiosity blossoms when we learn something new.  Our brains are exercised and it is usually just plain fun!    But if you make too many menu changes, it is hard for your staff to keep up and hard for your clients to choose.  And sometimes we get so busy doing something new, we neglect to full marketing or sell that other service introduced last month.

Here's a list of tasks to do for every new service you add so that you can reap the most rewards (and profits!).

How to create a service menu that sells

You already know your service menu, brochure, list of services -- whatever you may call it -- is a critical marketing tool for your business.  But do you consider it a sales tool -- a printed version of yourself that motivates the reader to schedule an appointment?

For most spas and salons, having a descriptive brochure is a huge missed opportunity and could impact your business.  Your brochure needs to do more than passively describe your business, services or philosophies -- it needs to actively engage, sell and motivate prospective and existing clients.  This isn't easy to do, but it isn't impossible either.  Here are some Do's and Don't for creating a service menu (printed or on your website) that will attract new clients.

DO have a marketing strategy before you start.  Who is your target client and what do they want?  Sure, there is temptation to be welcoming to anyone willing to be your client.  However, being targeted in who you want to attract as a client increases the chances that they will become one.  So pick your target client, research what problems the want to solve (not services or techniques) they want at a spa and then create services (also known as solutions to their problems) that address those problems.

DO be brief. Too many options can be overwhelming or confusing for uncertain clients.  If you aren't right there to answer their questions, they probably won't call you to ask which one they should schedule.  Opt for more customizable services have the same price and length of time rather than listing every available service.  If you have more than five facials, you may want to reconsider why that is --- odds are that most of your clients are attracted to one or two.

DO include the time and price of each service.  This helps your clients plan their budget and day.   For the printed menu, consider a heavy stock price sheet to insert into a multi-color or glossy brochure that doesn't have prices listed.  This allows you the flexibility of changing your prices without having throw out your brochures.

DO get professional help. Consider your service menu as a sales representative -- one that you pay for up front and don't pay commissions for.  I am not trying to be dramatic -- but your service menu could be the reason why a prospective client schedules with you or doesn't. It is critical that it provides an accurate and inspiring impression.  Unless you were a graphic artist prior to opening your business, you should hire a graphic artist to help you with your printed brochure.  For your website, use someone who has designed websites for spas before.  For the words themselves, it is best to get help from spa marketing consultant to ensure your descriptions are worded in a way that speaks to your target clients and motivates action.  Proofreading and editing services are not over-rated either -- you do not want to have a mis-spelling on something that will live for a year or more.

DON'T assume they know your language.  Naming your services by their brand or technical names assumes that your clients know what they are.  This is especially true for the more recent technical services like IPL, Glycolic Peels, Mysotherapy or a skincare brand's recommended facial protocol.  Instead, use easy to understand descriptions that refer to the result or benefit of the service.   

DON'T constantly change your services.   You can introduce new products or techniques without creating a new service option.  Unless you are doing a major overhaul on your spa concept, you should be consistently providing the same solutions to your client's problems.  HOW you solve them is really not what the client is shopping for...they just want the results and trust you to figure out all that technical mumbo-jumbo.

DON'T forget to encourage interaction.  You should be inviting readers to call for an appointment, call to schedule a free 10 minute skin analysis, order a gift certificate, sign up for your newsletter --- to do SOMETHING that will avoid them from simply reading and moving on to something else.

I'm here to help! With a free 30-minute consultation I can help you plan the best way to insure your service menu is your best long-term sales representative.  Call me today at 888 278-3287 or email me to set up your call.

Fresh New Trend: More tea please

Tea has been getting a lot of good press these days.  Reuters just published a story about the positive effects of drinking tea and a connection with lower skin cancer risk.  In 2004, Oprah highlighted Dr. Perricone's Prescription that switching from coffee to green tea will cause you to lose 10 lbs in six weeks.  That show alone kicked off a major "green tea/weight loss" marketing frenzy in the diet pill industry.  [And was the cause of my one month ban on coffee where I didn't lose any weight -- and thus returned happily to coffee.] However, with this new scientific link between the antioxidants in tea and reduced skin cancer, it should be interesting to see what the media and skincare industry will do with it.

I hearby predict that tea-inspired skincare products and spa treatments will continue to increase in popularity and availability. 

To beat this trend, you may want to update your services to include "more tea please" -- in the products, the treatment itself or your spa experience.  Some ideas:

• Herbal tea bags as your signature hydrotherapy instead of salts or oil
• Foot or hand soaks in herbal tea blends for mani/pedi
• When you serve iced or hot tea after a treatment, be sure to explain the benefits to their skin; consider an educational flyer in your relaxation room
• Have a customer apprecitation afternoon tea party.  Serve 2 or 3 blends of tea (iced or hot or decaf), small scones and finger sandwiches .  Clients can enjoy the afternoon tea while they receive mini-services and buy products and gift certificates for an upcoming holiday. [Best before a gift-giving holiday, but could be a pick-me-up during slower months.]
• Considering adding new products with green, white and red (roobios) teas (Preston Private Label* has a full skincare line with all of these together.)  Or use green tea as a calming agent in serum intensives, such as Green Tea Calming Serum from Yüm Gourmet Skincare*
• Slightly modify the protocols in your current basic services (facial, massage, pedicure) to create an exclusive package that uses the powerful antioxidant power of tea in the soaks, the products and aromatherapy (green tea incense anyone?)
• Sell more teas in your retail area -- or simply take them out of hiding from behind other products.
• If you add a new service, write a press release about it and post it to www.pr.com (a free service).  Refer to studies like one highlighted in the Reuters story to establish credibility and explain your new super-antioxidant service.  You may even want to send it do your local newspaper as they like connections to larger consumer trends.  Give them the idea to write the story about how your fabulous new facial uses teas, which is linked to reducing the risk of skin cancer.

Whether you make a big or small or no change to leverage media coverage of popular spa ingredients, be aware of what that coverage is.  Your clients will be interested to hear your expert opinion on what some journeyman reporter said last night on the news.  And whether you agree or disagree with that reporter, the point is that your clients will listen to you because they trust you to take care of them and their skin.

*I am a sales rep for both Preston Private Label and Yüm Gourmet Skincare and would be happy to answer any questions you may have about products with green, white, roobios and black teas. Email me or call me: 800.766.0375 x116.

Fresh new trend: Baby Spa Day

Now here is a trend that I think has a fighting chance.   A step up from Mommy & Me classes,  Skin Spa Baby in Encino, CA has several classes on baby massage, baby yoga and even baby chakra chi. 

While you don't have to go all out, these types classes could be an excellent solution in your spa during those slow Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays.  Sure it would be great if you have a wellness center with a yoga studio for the space.  If you don't, then be creative!  Do you have an extra large treatment room that you can move equipment out of for mats on the floor?  What about your lobby?  Your mani/pedi room? If you schedule the class during a naturally slow time in the morning, noise from the class may not disturber many (or any) clients.  [While on maternity leave with my infant, I looooved getting out to do things together in the morning.]

If there really is no wiggle room in your spa, consider teaming up with a yoga studio or community center to offer classes there.  Other than the class tuition income, you'd have free reign to market your products (use them in the class) and your services (have brochures on hand). 

LESSON LEARNED: Explore other services you can offer your existing clientele.  Especially when those services solve other problems you have like slow weekdays.

Spring cleaning promotion ideas

Spring has definitely sprung in my neighborhood. While I don't see the dramatic season changes here in northern California, I do enjoy the birds singing and tulips sprouting!  And I also enjoy the energy that Spring brings with it to clear out clutter and freshen new routines.

Because March & April fall between two big gift certificate holidays (Vday and Mother's Day), finding something worthy to talk about in your marketing can be challenging.  This year, you might try a Spring Cleaning campaign to encourage your clients to clean out their bathroom cabinet clutter of old products and freshen their skin or hair care routines.  Here are a couple ideas for your Spring Cleaning promotion.

Personal product safety review. Offer a 15 minute personalized product safety review to anyone -- regardless  of  whether they  come in for a service at the same time.  In this review, have the client bring in every single product they have for skincare (for reviews with estheticians) or haircare (with stylists) or makeup (with cosmetologists) or nail care (with nail techs).   The applicable expert will review the products for obvious signs of "bad" product (discoloration, odor, etc), ask questions about the age of the product, how often the product is used or not used, and so on.  The first benefit you provide the client here is to weed out products that are clearly in need of being thrown out due to age or being rancid.  The second benefit is to determine whether that product is applicable to their skin/hair/makeup/nail needs.  Perhaps they have a product that made sense to use way back when, but today it may not be the optimal product to use.  This requires a little time to very briefly analyze a clients hair or skin so be sure to not spend too much time on that in a free session.  The final benefit to your client is a recommended plan that is tailored to them which includes types of services, time between services and products that would help address the client-stated concerns.   You could book these appointments anytime, or create a special event specific to this activity.

Product recycling or trade-in program.  Whether you do this as a one-time or ongoing program, offering a $5 or 10% discount for every product they replace with one of your products has several benefits.   First, you motivate clients to get rid of product that they probably don't use and feel guilty about "just throwing it out."  Secondly, you know that when they buy your products that they don't have a back-up product to use instead of repurchasing your product.  Thirdly, you know they aren't going to muck up your recommended home care regimen by inserting a product that contraindicates their condition.   I recommend setting an ongoing and somewhat generous policy -- if they bring in 3 products of the same time (shampoo or cleansers or nail polish) and buy one of yours give them the same benefit for each one. [Clearly stated limitations are also recommended.]  Remember the reason why you want to be generous here is to 1) clean-out bathroom cabinets and drawers so that your products are the only thing in there; and 2) have your client voluntarily discuss the products that haven't worked for them in the past.   It is an excellent relationship builder and competition squasher. 

Spring packages or seasonal services.  Create a package(s) for a limited time only that focuses on fresh and new things.   In a salon, offer a discount on non-chemical color with a full cost hair cut and blow-dry to encourage a stuck-in-rut client to try something new.  In a day spa, create specialty packages that focus on skin resurfacing or microderm, body scrubs, cellulite treatments or callus treatments in pedicures.  You aren't going for gift certificate sales here, but more about encouraging clients to return and prepare themselves for spring.  These packages can be designed for your Mother's Day promotion as well giving you an early start on that holiday.

Whatever you do for your March/April promotion, keep it fun and run it for as many weeks as you can.  When you keep the same marketing theme for more than four weeks, it provides a higher return on your marketing spending.   

What other springtime promotions have worked for you?  Please let us know in the comments section.

The perils of the Vichy shower

In my last post about the questionably popular snake massage service, the lesson to be learned is that just because you can offer a service doesn't mean you should.  For smaller day spas (less than 6 treatment rooms) I rarely recommend having a wet room, hydrotherapy or a Vichy shower because they rarely provide a profitable stream of income.  Let me explain.

[For my readers who are unfamiliar with what a Vichy shower is, it is a 5 to 7 head shower bar used in body treatments.] 

The decision to include a Vichy shower or wet room in a new day spa startup (or keep an existing one) is admittedly a tough one.   On one hand, you (a day spa owner) want to offer all the traditional spa services to your clients and not lose business to nearby hotel or larger chain spas.  On the other hand, the room is hecka expensive to build and there is usually not enough business to support the enormous investment.   

Let's take a look and see what the numbers tell us about having a Vichy shower.  A full wet room (tiled floor & walls, integrated plumbing and drain) will conservatively cost $15,000 and up.  One of those new integrated tub/color therapy/Vichy shower systems cost $7000 and up.  Just for fun, lets do a very rough estimate of how many services it will take to pay back the smaller $7000 investment.  Although service profits will vary by market and pricing and several other factors, a $10 net profit (Price - labor costs - prorated overhead costs) is achievable for most wet room treatments.  That means after doing just 700 full-priced services, that piece of equipment it is free and clear! (That is if you paid cash and don't have to also pay interest on that $7000). A two or three year return your investment is a reasonable guideline for equipment purchases and to do that you'd have to have 4 - 5 services per week every week to pay it back in three years.  Yet in smaller spas, where facials and massages are by far the norm, wet body treatments are done closer to 2 or maybe 3 times a week...which may double the time to payback that investment to 5 years or more.   

Although these are very rough and generic estimates, they clearly show that without clients that schedule a wet room treatment more than 4 times a week at a price that provides at least $10 in net profit and no maintenance costs and no interest expense...it may take 3 or more years to just break even on that purchase.  Are there other things you could spend that money on that would provide a higher return?  Perhaps retail inventory, a high-buzz marketing event, or higher quality signage out front? 

Even after knowing the bleak picture from the numbers side, you may still feel it is required to offer wet room services.  Or perhaps you really don't want to invest more money to convert the room to a facial or massage treatment room.  Douglas Preston wrote a great article a while back on A Profitable Approach to Hydrotherapy that you'll find helpful.

The bottom line is to find balance between what makes business/financial sense (using your facility space as wisely and fully as possible) and what fits the brand of your day spa (are these services your number one priority to provide?).  This balance is sometimes difficult to achieve, yet by looking at major purchase decisions from both of these perspectives you are setting the foundation for a more profitable business.

Don't let me be the last word here.  What has been your experience with having (or choosing not to have) a Vichy shower or hydrotherphy in your day spa?

 

Fresh new trend: Snake Massage

Now, I consider myself fairly progressive.  However, I'm not sure there is a large market for this service.  Although for US$70, the prices seems reasonable if you really like snakes slithering all over your half-naked body.

LESSON LEARNED:  Just because you can offer a service, doesn't mean you should.  More on that and Vichy shower rooms later.