Managing a salon is often like walking on a tight rope. Take a quick look around and chat up with any of the salon managers, and you’ll hear the very familiar refrain.” I’m hard pressed for time” or “There’s still so much to do”. In the cut throat world of beauty salon business, even a single slip can cause irreparable damage. The multitude of administrative processes such as booking appointments, allocating the work, attracting new clients, retaining the existing clients, managing inventory, handling the team, and managing the finances can leave even the best of the salon managers exhausted. On the other hand, implementing a well-crafted salon business management plan can do wonders and take your business to the next level. So, read along our ultimate checklist of salon management tips.
Exceed Client Expectations
Your clients are the pulse of your business, and the key to retaining your clients is to always exceed their expectations. Did you know that one of the easiest ways to exceed client’s expectation is by engaging in effective communication? Proper communication is the first step towards success technology in the form of a salon management software can greatly help you in the process. From offering a simplified appointment booking process, and delivering personalized experience to collecting client feedback and running a loyalty program, a salon management software can help you deliver an excellent customer experience. A well-executed loyalty program can not only easily help you retain clients but also help you gather new clients.
Get Close to Your Team
It takes a great team to deliver great results. Therefore, as a salon owner or manager it is imperative that you build a great working relation with your team and one of the ways to do accomplish it is by having a clear and open communication channel. From setting rules to defining roles and responsibilities to keeping your team motivated and rewarding good work, as a salon manager you got to do it all. Employees who feel engaged are more likely to contribute to the growth of the business and will go above their role and responsibilities. Here also, you can leverage technology to help drive your interaction with your team. A salon management software allows you to easily set up a KPIs to have a transparent and fair individual and team performance monitoring system. When an individual or a team exceeds the expectation, always motivate them and highlight their achievements through rewards and on social media. The rewards can be either in the form of gift voucher to dine at the employee’s favourite restaurant or pitching in for the upskilling course they’re eyeing for.
Budgeting & Expenses
Amongst the key skills required to successfully manage a salon is having a grasp on your numbers. Thus, it is important to have a clear budget of both statutory and revenue generating expenditures. A budget helps you ensure that you not going overboard with your expenses and also ensures that your business remains profitable. Since the budget accounts for each and every type of expense, it automatically helps you keep a reign on the account payables. Here also a salon management software can help you automate the process, thus making your life easier. By allowing you create budgets for expenses under every head and tracking the expenses incurred, the software will ensure that you stay well within the budget. Further with advanced features such as data analytics, the software can also help you ascertain the changes the expenditure pattern and how it can be further optimized.
Create & Run Effective Marketing Campaigns
Perhaps the primary aspect of managing a beauty salon means is to ensure that you have a fool proof way of both retaining clients and also attracting new ones such that the revenue doesn’t see a fall. Perhaps the best way to ensure that you have a steady stream of visitors is to create highly effective marketing campaigns. While membership programs and loyalty programs do rake in sales, beauty salons need to think beyond them and engage with clients in newer ways such as personalized marketing campaigns. By analysing the client’s profile and past purchase history, a salon management software can suggest products and services that are likely to find higher acceptance. Further by automating email and messaging campaigns combined with special offers for their special days such birthdays and anniversaries, you can easily make the clients feel that you care for them and in turn enhance loyalty.
Delve in your Numbers
We cannot stress enough on this one. As a salon manager or owner, it is extremely important you know your business numbers. From daily sales, and revenue to P&L and deployed capital, the numbers should be not only be available for your study but also known to you such that, at all times, you are aware about the health of your business and can take data driven informed decisions on the way forward. Here again, instead of relying upon manual ways it is best to leverage technology. In today’s times many salon management software have on demand reporting and analytics features, we personally recommend the one from Zenoti. With its cloud based infrastructure and over 100 pre-set reporting templates, which come with graphical representations, Zenoti makes the process of comprehending the numbers both instantaneous and hassle free.
You may have noticed that a common theme in the blog post is about harnessing the power of technology. While technology is no substitute to business acumen and understanding the reality, technology is definitely the big enabling tool which can transform the way you manage your salon and help your business reach new heights.