Brain storm....Client retention

Hi all, this is a good idea Carl.


We all know what it's like to have a loyal clientel that have been coming on a regular basis, to all of a sudden dissapear off the face of the earth.It comes down to the fact that we're all replaceable, it might be because that the client is use to a standard of service in your salon and all of a sudden one of your staff (for some reason) makes it an unpleasent experience them: result they go else where, to once again regain that fealing of being loved & pampered, we arre about to put out a survey (with stamped return envelope) to the clients we havn't seen for a while..............share your feeling on this matter and how you retain clients & win them back.

Regards
Murray.

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There's no such thing as alittle off the top,we're talking full make over here!

Good topic Murray...

definitely it's hard to lose clients but we all will.
I think it's about 15% loss per annum due to reasons other than dissatisfaction etc (eg, moved, died ...)
Sending out a survey is a great idea. But you'll need thick skin to do it so well done on that front.

We find that a really efficient rebooking reward system helps minimize our losses. We print a $5 reward voucher for clients that rebook upon leaving. I know some salons do a 10% discount reward on the next service which in my opinion is business suicide. Doing a set $ number is real to the client whereas a % is fictional until applied at a latter date.
So my first tip is to rebook so that you don't lose them to start with.

This is a brainstorm some lets all toss an idea into the ring everyday if possible until we exhaust the topic

__________________
"If you beleve you can, or if you believe you can't. You're absolutely right."

Chumba Concept Salon
Pro Hairstylist (main website)

My business coach suggested that we need to rebook more. I held a staff meeting about this from stylist to front desk to get everyone onto the rebooking cycle. Rebookings did go up, but so did no shows. We also tried a rebook and win, where every client that rebooked went into the draw to win their next service free.... That didn't change rebooking numbers at all.

I was toying around today with the idea of a discount for rebooking, which I really hated the idea of, but if it made them keep the appointment then I thought it might be worth a try. Well I am glad I waited!!!

I came home and read your reply Carl, and I think it is a splended idea, I can handle $5 off, more than I can 10% or even the free service.

Now a question! Is the $5 off time sensitive? By that I mean you give them a $5 off slip and do you date it to expire on the date of the next rebook? I can see how this would make them keep the appointment, lets face it $5 is 2 litres of petrol!!! LOL

As for lapsed clients, what we do to try to close the gap at this end of the business is go through our client lists and anyone that hasn't been in for 6 months we send them a letter/postcard saying we miss them and would love to see them again. Along with this we offer them 25% to come back in.

If after a further 3 months, that's 9 months in total since their last visit we send another letter/postcard saying that we were about to throw out their client card (people don't like to be thrown away, that is the reason we use this type of verbage) but thought we would send them one more letter because we really liked them and would love to see them again (lay it on you have nothing to lose here) along with that we offer them 50% off services with their next appointment. Yes 50% is a lot but this is your last chance to secure that client back to you.

After 9-12 months and 2 attempts at getting them back, we accept the fact that we probably are not going to see them again.

How effective this is well in the last 2 years I have had maybe 3 clients come back after 6 months and none after the second letter at 9 months. But for the grand total of $1 postage, I guess it is worth the try.

Also make sure your files are up todate...... We have send a couple out to clients that were no longer having colour, just cuts our file system at the time didn't include cuts (index cards) clients get a little annoyed if you send them something like this and they were in 4 weeks ago...... This has now been averted since we have a computerised system which records every visit no matter what the service.

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We have toyed with the idea of $5 vouchers for rebook before, and found it was a positive and negative, people would re-book then on the day phone and cancle only to ask canI use the voucher if I make another booking, we'ed say if it's with in a weeks time frame, they'd say no in about 3-4 weeks naturaly we'ed explain the point of a rebook voucher, and the difference say:between regrowth of 4-5 weeks compaired to 7-8 weeks, theyd get catty and end up not coming anyway, this would happen all the time. Or a stylist would be like I'm not doing a & $17 haircut !!!
Our business coach had us rebook every one and it worked well with a follow up phone call the day before, we'ed get 80+% returning but as we got bussier & bussier and staff changed it all fell apart.
We are about to put together a business plan to retrain all the staff over the next few weeks now that we have sold one of our salons (well on june 30 anyhow) and we can go hell for leather, it has to be all about the client' we were putting through big number of clients and it started to overwelm everyone and we couldnt find staff, clients started to not get that wow factor and I think it is one of our problems "consistancey" even though our numbers have dropped off slightly we are still increasing our taking's on last years figures...........But I want more and I wont stop till I work out the right formular.


On another note Friends of ours who own Cordony hairdressing (where my wife did her apprenticeship) and who are also one of our business mentors are celerbrating "80" years in hairdressing in August the big COKE sign at Kings Cross (Sydney) use to be the Cordony hair dressing sign...Now hows that for advertising.

Take it easy all
Murray.

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There's no such thing as alittle off the top,we're talking full make over here!

Great stuff guys

Who's using sms confirmations via Shortcuts? We do and we have a very very low no-show rate. In fact when it happens we are surprised! If it does happen then we call immediately for a few reasons.
1. It's to teach positive behaviours in the clients. eg, we're bound by our word and so are they if we're to have a positive relationship together.
2. You'll never find a 'fakie booking' as the staff know we'll definitely call.
3. If they have forgotten we still want their $$'s so we'll get them in asap.

FYI, Chumba Warragul is upstairs so we live and die on marketing and rebookings. Without those two drivers there's no hope of clients walking in just because.

I like the lost client ideas. We have a flyer/letter that we send. I'll describe shortly.

__________________
"If you beleve you can, or if you believe you can't. You're absolutely right."

Chumba Concept Salon
Pro Hairstylist (main website)

Well this has sparked some debate in my household. My wife is coming to work as our receptionist full time. I told her about the rebooking thing she thought it was a good idea. Now she is reluctant to ring and confirm appointments. Which is I what I want her to do. Not using shortcuts I don't know if my salon software has a sms confirmation I am sure it does..... back to reading the manuals.

I am glad to see the positive results you guys have gotten with calling to confirm, This might be the answer to my little no show problem.

Another thing my wife suggested was to email clients with confirmation, but I do think I like the SMS idea better.

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I went to a marketing meeting last week where they were talking about a multi mailout e-mail softwear program that is available through most large computer stores that once it is installed it does daily, weekly, monthly, yearly auto mail outs. apparently it's a bit of a job to set it all up, but I hear it gets results.......unfortunatley we don't have internet connected at the salon so it no good to us....we also use salon Iris which I dont think has SMS feature anyhow.

But I strongly suggest conformation phone calls before appointments!!

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There's no such thing as alittle off the top,we're talking full make over here!

Hey guys..

Im not an owner but i would very much like to join in on this thread...

I've been pushing for computer system eg. Shortcuts. for about 18 months.. we still do everything manually with a paper book & client files. I Find it so un organised & un professional.

We just find that a lot of appointments get stuffed up, like written in on wrong days.

I have a lady from Hair ware coming out to the salon next weekend to demonstrate to my boss how much of a benefit the systems really are..

I made an Email address for the salon & had plans to start taking email addresses from clients to send them updates. Tried it on myspace to but we don't have enough clients on there or the right ones to make the most of it.

I recently made flyers up on my own computer at home offering 20% off services over $30 on weekdays.. Quite successful to fill up quiet times.. the local post offices have forms that you can fill out to have unregistered mail distributed in your local suburbs, i found this was a very in expensive way to advertise to new clients, entice old ones back & fill up quiet times.

with all of the extra work i put into this salon it makes me sad i don't have my own yet.

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Sugar & Spice & all things nice

Well that saved me reading the manual. I am running Salon Iris too. What was the name of this email software? Sounds like something interesting. I have just connected to the internet at the salon with plans to do email marketing etc (surf and check emails and forums?)

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Really happy with this thread guys

We use Shortcuts but the SMS provider is called Message4U. Call them and ask how you can use sms as they will have a solution outside of Shortcuts. It costs us about 22c per sms and that is cheap when you consider what a no show costs you. Monthly depending on the salon we spend $40 - 75. So less than one no show. And as i said we have very few misses.
Actually our service broke down a few weeks back and we only knew that because our no-shows went sky high and our clients complained. They see it as part of our professional service to sms them. And that’s part of the point, the clients perceive this as value added & professional. The other huge advantage is that it means we keep in touch & thus increase our chances of retention longterm.
If you can't sms then definitely phone. It builds relationships and loyalty.

Email is a different beast. We don't confirm via email but i guess if your clients are computer bound it could work.
We're currently looking at an email service called Campaign Monitor to use as a marketing tool. I want to do a monthly newsletter so i'll let you all know what happens with that.

__________________
"If you beleve you can, or if you believe you can't. You're absolutely right."

Chumba Concept Salon
Pro Hairstylist (main website)