It’s no secret that after the holiday rush we usually hit a bit of a slow period but this year’s service and retail totals had a 58% growth in my Salon Studio. Trust me you don’t want to miss what i’m talking about in this one!
Every year for the past 3 years I have had a 20% growth in salon services and retail sales. This is for the entire 12 month year combined. I love numbers so I tend to be a bit of a nerd when it comes to looking at the numbers in my salon studio. This is without a doubt ONE of the contributing factors in the growth of my salon studio this year.
When you are working in a big salon under someone else, usually making a commission, your managers have this job. This number tracking thing. As salon studio owners this is now up to us!
When you are working in a salon studio you MUST have an KNOW what your salon is bringing in. Not only that you have to compare them to numbers from your past to know if you are doing your job up to the standards that you want to be and seeing growth or loss in income!
Looking at the trend of your numbers will help you decide things like, what your next goals should be and when it is smart for you to invest in new projects and ideas for the salon without going broke and regretting any decisions.
My point is, know your numbers because without knowing where you are and where you have been, setting a goal for where you want to be is just pulling a number out of the sky!
Once you have goals set for your salon studio it’s time to get to work!
If I had to say the one thing that I did this year that I did differently every other year is I took extreme ACTION!
I added new ways for my salon to make money first by doing a few things at a time and tweaking as I go. Here are a few actions I took:
- Expanded my menu
- Changed my schedule
- Revamped my website and added an online shop and blog
- Started a monthly newsletter
- Created a clear vision for what I wanted out of my clientele and salon
- Was flexible in my methods and open to change
Most of this list is pretty self-explanatory but we are going to talk through a few of them to give you a better idea of what I mean!
I expanded my menu, literally! When I first opened my salon studio I was a little bitter from being forced to do certain services in my previous salon so I limited my menu to just what I really wanted to do. Although I do stand behind only doing the things you want to do I had to take a step back after a while and ask myself if I really didn’t want to do those services.
I do realize that I am so much more confident in my craft and maybe the reason I was not wanting to do certain services was my fear of them. Maybe I actually do LOVE them but there was so no other way to find out than to try them again!
Turns out I LOVE doing event styling but I HATE travelling to do it. I do not like being in a space I can’t control. I don’t like carrying my things to and from locations so I don’t do off sights.
I would have never had that additional income if I wasn’t open to changing and trying things for a second time!
Maybe next year I will try off-site event styling again but that’s gonna be a no from me, for now!
Changing my schedule was actually the easiest way I made more money this January compared to last. You see, I always had the regular hairdresser schedule where I was open on Saturdays. Actually, this requires some backstory so give me a second to explain…
When I moved my business into a salon studio, I moved from downtown San Francisco to 2 blocks closer to the financial district. If you know San Francisco, you know this neighborhood is the busiest in the city Monday thru Friday but DEAD on the weekends! Along with this I noticed more of my Saturday only clients coming in more during the week and my Saturday’s became more and more open.
I decided to start playing around with my work schedule and switched my Saturday for Tuesday’s every other week. I started noticing every week I was in Tuesday-Friday I made more money and my Tuesday’s became my busiest day and thus my experiment worked and this schedule became my regular schedule!
Woohoo to having Saturday’s off for my first time since I turned 18…we won’t talk about how long ago that was! 
This next one is a big one in my opinion and if you are going to take anything away from this post today, let this one be it!
When I looked at my business the #1 thing I hated talking about the most was my website. As I mentioned earlier, my salon studio is in San Francisco which is sort of known for being a little techy! Having a website you are embarrassed about is NOT OK!!
I thought revamping my website was too big of a task. It sounded scary and intimidated me so I pretended like it didn’t matter!
Boy was I wrong! Updating my website was the best thing I could do this past year for my business. I decided after talking with a few of my peers about how they did their website that hiring someone wasn’t the way for me!
I had a friend pay thousands of dollars to get her website redone and on the day she relaunched it, which should be when you are most proud of it, she said to me she wasn’t happy! She said she loved her designer and everything was going great but after only one revision she was past her budget and couldn’t afford any more changes.
Now, I am a creative person with A LOT of ideas and at the time I was on a budget so the thought of this happening to me was my worst nightmare!
I knew I would be wanting to make changes all the time (and I do) so the quest to learning how to be a website designer began!
I stumbled on a post on Pinterest called, I don’t even know anymore, how to start a blog?! It was the most straightforward explanation of how to start a blog I had ever heard. I was offered a free 7 day workshop that expanded on the topic and by the end of the week, I decided to purchase their eCourse, Build and Launch your Blog. Like I said, Lauren and Alex are pretty straightforward so no cutesy names for them.
In their course, they walked me through setting up a website and showed me how to use WordPress, which I now know as the BEST possible platform for websites! I also started a blog for my salon because they made it sound the best thing ever which clearly now that you’re reading this you are probably realizing they helped me find my newest passion!!
Because I know their course is the best of its kind I have now purchased 3 of their courses and have become an affiliate for them…this means, I do get a small commission if someone purchases their course with my recommendation, which I obviously recommend you do! This is one of the ways I monetize THIS blog and pay for the expenses it costs to run and keep these awesome article available to you! Here’s the Link again: Build and Launch your Blog
Along with how to build a website, Lauren and Alex also show you how to start a blog for your business although they don’t focus on this industry they focus on general topics so it can easily be used for several topics.
Even more importantly they talk about the importance of email marketing. Again, Lauren and Alex talk in the context of blogging and making money off of digital products which is how they have created their success and I think is without a doubt something everyone should do but I adapted the lessons to fit my niche and I do believe a lot of my success from last year to this year is partially due to a HUGE overhaul of my online presence!
Last but not least, one of the things I have changed about the way I run my business is that I decided to really follow my gut with what was feeling good in my business and what wasn’t. If you have read some of my other posts you probably have picked up on how I am all about being aligned with your clientele and feeling positive energy around what you are doing.
Nobody wants a hairdresser that seems unhappy to be at work or like they don’t really like YOU! When you create a super clear vision of what you want your salon to be like, the type of clientele you want to work with and the type of work you want to be doing…some kind of magical thing happens where all of a sudden your pain in the ass clients that always want discounts suddenly move out of the country and you have a burst of new customers that you instantly know are your soul clients.
It may seem kind of strange if you have never tried this but if your business is feeling heavy, try journaling. Writing out the things that are bothering you in a free writing style, so no editing or stopping to gather thoughts, really brings clarity to things.
I also recommend doing this when you are figuring out who your ideal clients are, and what kind of salon you want to have. Letting your mind wander freely into places you wouldn’t consciously go!
I hope you have gotten some inspiration from the things I have changed about how I run my salon studio that resulted in my income going up 58% in January 2018 compared to January 2017!
The ultimate take away: I never stopped fine tuning my daily habits!
If you are needing help when it comes to learning how to speak to your ideal client or even if you aren’t sure who your ideal client is and creating goals for your business and actively working towards them, you should definitely check out my 5 Day Workshop, Attracting your Ideal Salon Clients and Mastering Momentum! I know this 5-day workshop will not only be used once but over and over as you and your business continue to evolve and uplevel!
Remember, not stopping is how you win!!