The salon industry is a competitive one, and standing out can be a challenge. Fortunately, email marketing provides an opportunity to connect with your clients and promote your business in a way that is relatively easy and affordable. Here are 9 simple ideas for using salon email marketing and newsletters to engage your clients and grow your business.
One of the most powerful marketing weapons a salon has is email marketing. And if you aren’t careful about your salon’s email marketing strategy, you’re missing out on some major money.
What is a Salon Email List and Why do you Need One?
Did you know that when you post something on your salon’s social media account, the majority of your fans see it? That’s correct. We tend to believe that if we have 1000 people following us on Facebook and Instagram, they all will see our postings. However, this isn’t true.
For a business, like yours, only a few percent of those who see your content truly get to see it. And if you’ve been fortunate enough to build up a strong following on social media, you’re not really in control of that list of followers.
The platform, not the social network. And the platform controls how many of your followers should see what you’re posting and share it. Business owners have gone through this pain in the past few years. Facebook updated its algorithm to allow for a more personalized news feed. Businesses had to start paying for advertising to be visible on Facebook overnight.
Examine every salon owner who had worked so hard to build their clientele. They lost all of the time and effort that they spent building up their business. This is not the case with a salon email newsletter. You have complete control over your customer list. No one else has the power to alter whether or not your emails should be read. Emails are viewable and opened by a significantly larger number of people than social media posts do. As a result, whenever you share, a substantial portion of your audience will see it.
You may also customize the content of your email messages. You can use links, pictures, and other elements that most social media platforms prohibit. As a result, salons and other organizations are focusing more attention to email.
In this article, you’ll learn how.
What Tools are Best for Salon Email Marketing & Salon Newsletters?
Some salon owners employ some form of salon software to assist manage their company. Salon software that is effective may be a tremendous help for a hair salon since it manages all elements of the business, including appointment scheduling, inventory management, business reporting, and marketing.
Some of them, on the other hand, come with built-in email marketing support. However, it is worth noting that salon software solutions aren’t necessarily designed for email marketing.
in email service vs. a dedicated email marketing solution, you’ll always be somewhat restricted in terms of email marketing.
I understand why some salon owners continue to use that approach because I can see how it would be easier. What I advocate, though, is that you work with a dedicated email marketing service provider. And ideally one that links to your salon software or appointment scheduler so you can keep track of all of your contacts in one location.
1) Using Acuity Scheduling Together with Constant Contact Email Marketing
When you combine these two tools, your email marketing is limitless. And best of all, when compared to using add-on email marketing capabilities in your salon software, you’ll save money.
The first thing you need to do is get your Constant Contact account linked to your Acuity Scheduling account. You can learn how to do that by clicking here.
Assuming you have both of those accounts and they are now linked, the process for sending salon newsletters and email marketing messages is simple.
It’s simple to connect the two accounts so that every time a client books with you at Acuity, they’ll be added to your email list in Constant Contact.
2) Use Your Salon Software with Built-in E-Mail Marketing Support
If you’re satisfied with the salon software you already use, you may look into whether it includes built-in support for salon email marketing and whether that’s enough for you. You’ll probably discover limitations, and you won’t be able to complete all of the salon email marketing ideas I’ll show you today. But if that’s fine with you, stick with your current solution.
9 Simple Salon Email Marketing Ideas
Let’s move on to the more complicated aspects of the finest salon email marketing software now that we’ve covered the technical side. Let’s take your company to the next level with these simple salon email marketing ideas.
Building Your Salon Email List
Let’s start with the end in mind. To send your salon newsletter and run marketing, you’ll need a list of subscribers. Your hair salon email list is priceless, therefore it is critical that you collect email addresses and grow it as soon as possible.
1. Always Collect Email Addresses When Your Clients Book their Appointment
This is the simplest way for you to get your current customers’ email addresses. If you’re using Acuity to arrange your appointments, this will all happen automatically, and every client who books online with you will be added to your salon email list. GDPR compliance is also handled by Acuity.
Appointments aren’t only made online, of course. They might be conducted over the phone or in person at the salon. When a new client books an appointment, request their email address from your salon workers as a priority.
2. Capture Email Addresses of Non-Clients by Giving them a Good Reason
Your first objective should be to expand your email list with existing customers. Getting email addresses for potential new clients, on the other hand, is simple. They don’t know you yet, so why would they give you their email?
You need to provide an answer for this. You must offer them a reason. There must be something of value for them to exchange their email address for it. This might be a limited time offer in which they have to submit their email address in order to receive a voucher. It could also be a brief instruction that they will get by giving you their email address. For example, consider a tutorial on how to hide regrowth between color appointments. You should give them something in return for sharing their email with you.
You may begin to build their trust by sending them a salon newsletter, which will help you convert them into customers over time. But where do you ask for their email, in case you’re wondering? There are several options.
- You may advertise your free guide or offer on your salon’s Instagram feed, as well as include a link in your bio.
- You can pay for a Facebook ad campaign with your offering and ask people to fill out a form with their email address.
- You might add an email opt-in on your website so that every person who visits it has a purpose in giving you their email address.
Constant Contact allows you to create opt-in forms on your website or connect it straight to your Facebook marketing. By putting these strategies in place, your email list will gradually expand. Every time you get an email from that list, you have the opportunity of getting a new client and expanding your business.
Finally, but importantly, whatever reason you offer for people to provide their email address with you, be sure it’s compatible with what you’ll want to give later on. This is to ensure that the individuals on your list are more likely to become a customer in the future and that it isn’t simply a list of persons who live far away from your salon and will never become one.
You may have noticed the emails on this website where I provide free salon business education. As you can guess, I’m a huge lover of beauty, business, and entrepreneurship, so I want to connect with other salon owners who share my interests.
Get Emails from you Salon Opened and Read
You’re doing well. You now have the resources you need, and you’ve begun building your salon email list. But first, let’s talk about a few methods for increasing the number of your emails that are opened and read.
3. Salon Email Subject Lines that Spark Curiosity
The subject of your email is the most significant aspect for ensuring that it is opened. People see this before deciding whether to read your message or save it in their inbox.
The subject line of your email is one of the most important elements. You don’t want to give everything away in the email’s subject line, so you should make it as short as possible while also not revealing too much. Instead, you want them to pique your reader’s interest so that they just want to open and see what’s inside. Funny fact: “name” has an excellent opening rate, for example “Lisa?” e.g. “As title?” Now, if you start utilizing these methods, be careful not to spam people or get reported by SpamCop.
4. Deliver Value in Every Email
Your email list will be abandoned. We receive a lot of emails these days, and people just want to get inboxes that truly provide value to them. It’s fine to run sales. In fact, it may be seen as a mark of respect by your readers. But not all the time. There must be a balance between offers and emails in which you simply offer value to your subscribers.
5. Keep Your Salon Email Newsletter Design Simple
It may be tempting to use gorgeous banner pictures in your emails to make them truly branded to your salon. This is not always the case, though. Simple emails with the appearance of having been sent by a friend to another friend typically have better engagement. When you receive my emails, you’ll notice that they are really basic. The problem is that people are used to spammy promotional mailings today, which are often richly branded with pictures. Subscribers might perceive your emails as advertising and become dissatisfied if you use many images.
However, there are times when using compelling templates makes perfect sense. I simply recommend being careful to send a totally new subscriber something that appears like a promotional email. Let’s suppose you own a barbershop and want to run a Valentine offer for it. Isn’t this salon email template fantastic?
Automate and Personalize your Emails
You should personalize your emails for your customers, not only send a generic salon newsletter broadcast, to establish a positive connection with your audience. Let’s look at how you can accomplish it.
6. Use Salon Client Data when Sending Emails
Using small things like including your client’s name in the email makes it seem more personal. Set up particular emails for your clients’ birthdays or any other significant occasion. You may also send out distinct sales offers to different people depending on their previous interests. Having a personalized touch with your clients develops trust between you and them, making your communications relevant and practical.
7. Send Appointment Reminder ahead of Appointment
This is a great way to make use of automation. By setting up an automatic email that’s sent out a few days before the appointment, you can gently remind your clients that they have an upcoming booking. This is especially useful if your client has to cancel their appointment for any reason.
Sending an email or SMS to the customer ahead of time to confirm their appointment is one of the most effective strategies for avoiding no-shows. Your clients will appreciate a welcome message from the salon before they arrive.
8. Send an Email when it’s Time to Book Again
Your clients have a lot on their plates, so it’s easy to overlook to book the next appointment. You don’t want your client to discover this too late, when you’re completely booked, because then they’ll go somewhere else and you risk losing them.
9. Send a Follow-up Email after Appointment and Ask for Feedback
It’s crucial to remain close to how your client’s appointment goes in order to make educated judgments when planning your business for the long run. This is why getting their feedback straight after their visit is so valuable to you. However, there are a few more reasons why you should collect comments. You should also inquire whether the comments can be made public. Having salon evaluations on the internet distinguish your business from the competition in your region.
Your Google My Business profile improves your search engine visibility. Adding reviews to Yelp and Facebook increases the trustworthiness of potential new consumers in your eyes. If you’re using Constant Contact, you may enable this feature so that visitors are immediately prompted to leave a review. They also provide add-ons that let you filter bad remarks into a separate folder and good comments out to public platforms.
Creating your Salon Newsletter
Now that you know the basic salon email marketing regulations, you can use them to grow your list and have your emails opened in an automated and personalized manner. It’s time to get started on creating your salon newsletter. The primary reason for wanting to establish a salon newsletter is, of course, to stay top of mind with existing and new clients. Even if you only need to promote your services or items after establishing trust with your subscribers, it’s critical that you do so.
What to Include in a Salon Newsletter?
The purpose of your salon newsletter is to offer value to the reader while also advertising your goods and services in a natural manner. The following are some examples of topics that may be included:
- Seasonal changes: Celebratory seasons like wedding season, graduation, and Christmas are good times to try different hairstyles. Seasonal demands: If you’re a hairdresser, discuss topics such as how to deal with sun damaged hair in the summer or frozen scalps in the winter.
- Seasonal promotions: Seasonal events are excellent methods to market your services, goods, and gift cards.
- Staff news: Do you have a new member on board? Perhaps a member of your staff has gone through a significant life event? This is an excellent opportunity to get personal with your customer, which will strengthen the connection between the salon and your team. It’s also a great method to inspire your employees.
It’s usually a good idea to concentrate on seasons since they’re easier to prepare for (we all know when Christmas is approaching, right?):) It also makes your email seem more relevant in the eyes of the reader.
Free Salon Newsletter Ideas Calendar
To assist you in planning for the year ahead, we’ve produced a free calendar with important dates that may be included in your salon newsletter. This will offer further inspiration for salon newsletter ideas so that you don’t run out of things to write about.
How Often Should I Send my Salon Newsletter?
The frequency of my salon newsletter recommendation is between every two and four weeks. You might wish to increase the frequency during peak season periods and keep it at monthly throughout the rest of the year. It takes time to compose each email, so you must also consider your schedule when determining how frequently you should send emails.
If you use Constant Contact to manage your emails, you may create them ahead of time and set them up so that they go out at the optimum moment when most of your recipients will read them. This way, you can improve the amount of time you spend on your salon email newsletter. Take a day and write out all of your year’s worth of emails; then sit back and relax while Constant Contact takes care of it all for you.
How to Design my Salon Email Template?
When you’re happy with the content of your salon newsletter, it’s time to start thinking about design. The first step is choosing an email template that’s appropriate for your business. You want something that will represent your brand well and make a good impression on your subscribers.
There are many sites that offer free email templates, such as Canva, so finding one should be easy. If you prefer, you can also hire a designer to create a custom template for you. Once you have your template, it’s time to start adding content.
Your salon email newsletter doesn’t need to be long; in fact, shorter is often better since people are more likely to read it all the way through. A good rule of thumb is to keep it to about 500 words or less.
In terms of design, you’ll want to include some images since they tend to make email newsletters more visually appealing. Just make sure that the images you use are high-quality and relevant to the content.
Once you’re happy with your salon newsletter template, it’s time to start adding content. As we mentioned before, shorter is often better so try to keep it to about 500 words or less. You’ll also want to include some images since they tend to make email newsletters more visually appealing. Just make sure that the images you use are high-quality and relevant to the content.
Hair Salon Newsletter Example
You’ll soon get a hang on how you can design and write salon newsletters that work. Below is a hairdresser newsletter example.
Make sure to include your contact details and links to your salon’s social media in the salon email signature so that your clients have an easy way to engage further with you.
Helpful Salon Email Marketing Tools
- Adobe Consistent Contact: Email marketing software for local businesses and salons.
- Acuity Scheduling: Online appointment booking tool with advanced appointment reminder capabilities.
- Canva: A simple design tool that helps you create beautiful email graphics (free to use).
Conclusion
Email newsletters are a great way to keep your customers and clients up-to-date on what’s new at your salon. They also give you an opportunity to promote special offers and events.
When writing your newsletter, be sure to keep it short and sweet. Include some images to make it more visually appealing, and be sure to include your contact information and links to your social media pages.
Finally, take advantage of helpful email marketing tools like Adobe Consistent Contact and Canva to make the process easier.
With these tips in mind, you’ll be well on your way to creating successful salon newsletters that will engage and delight your readers.