Beauty Biz

Spend 30 minutes developing a self-assessment
sheet in which you can hand out to your team,
with hopes of gathering feedback and critique
on your leadership skills. If you find areas of the
assessment which are sticky for, focus more time
implementing them into your strategy moving
forward.
STEP 2. FIGURES & FINANCIALS
Getting your head around your business’
financials can often seem daunting and perhaps
even a little overwhelming! Being comfortable
with your business financials and types of figures
you should be tracking throughout the day, week,
month or year will actually have you feeling more
empowered than ever!
Understanding the numbers through the use of
helpful and easy to navigate tools that clearly
show the financial health of your business will
help you better plan, prepare and can even assist
in creating more profit!
We suggest taking a look at the following
financials:
- knowing your break even figure hourly, daily,
weekly and monthly
- knowing how to read a profit and loss
statement
- knowing the difference between your product
margin and mark-up
- understanding a balance sheet
- tracking key performance indicators
- knowing your net cash position
- knowing how to manage your cash flow
When it comes to your figures on the other
hand, keeping an eye on metrics like:
- your average client spend
- your retail vs service percentage
- your labour percentage
- rebooking rate
If numbers aren’t your thing, book 90 minutes
into your strategy session dedicated to your
book keeper or accountant and let them guide
you through this process. Stock up on coffee and
be ready to feel empowered by your numbers,
proving they’re no more than a detailed story
about what is happening in your business.
Remember: this story is yours – you can change
the ending at any time!
STEP 3. POLICIES & PROCEDURES
With the increased number of services we are
providing, complete with add-ons and upgrades,
combined with the fast employee turnover rates
consistency in the beauty industry is something
that’s hard to come by. A policy is a deliberate
system of principles to guide decisions and
achieve rational outcomes. A policy is a statement
of intent, and is implemented as a procedure or
protocol. Policies should be learnt adopted by the
entire team within an organisation.
Policies business owners should have
available and within close reach include:
- Leave forms
- Incident reports
- Opening/Closing checklists
- Uniform and presentation standards
- Employee code of conduct
- Consultation records
- Service menu
- Treatment protocols
As well as other miscellaneous documentation
on machinery and software.
“YOUR CURRENT
CLIENTS ALREADY
KNOW, LIKE AND
TRUST YOU, THEY’RE
MORE LIKELY TO
TELL THEIR INNER
CIRCLE ABOUT
YOUR BUSINESS
AND SERVICES.”
Procedures on the other hand are detailed
documents which walk through tasks and
treatments step-by-step.
Between induction, onboarding, skills and
professional development training that therapists
have to undertake, directions and details can get
a little hazy - it’s for this reason your procedures
are an essential asset to every business. While it
may seem trivial to have detailed procedures for
every task someone has to repeat again, it allows
business owners freedom away from the business,
and allows therapists autonomy to find out answers
for themselves and allows for consistency.
Procedures may detail:
- Treatments
- Machinery operations
- Troubleshooting
- EFT and cash transactions
- Gift voucher and product sales
- Laundry and Washing methods
- Cleaning and close of business
Use 30 minutes of your allocated Strategy Session
to run through the aforementioned checklist of
documents. Tick off those that you do have and
those that you don’t, set aside or delegate time to
others to help create them. These will free you from
being shackled to your business and will empower
your teams to make decisions on their own.
STEP 4. BRANDING
Beyond just a memorable logo, good branding
increases the value of a company, provides the
team with direction and motivation, and makes
attracting new clients easier. So what exactly is a
brand? The short answer is: everything.
A brand represents the sum of people’s perception
of a business’s customer service, reputation,
advertising and logo. When all of these parts of
the business are working well together, the overall
brand is healthy, recognisable and naturally
clients want to be experience it. One of the major
components of a brand is a logo because, as the
“face” of a business - it’s what people instantly
recognise. A professional logo design is simple
enough to be memorable, but a brand is much
more than just a logo.
Just as people are more likely to purchase from
a business that appears polished and legitimate,
clients need to feel comfortable before committing
to a package of services or routine of products.
To ensure strength in your brand consistency is
key across your website, service menu, interior,
uniforms and social media.
Allocate 60 minutes into your Strategy Session
dedicated to the purpose of reviewing your brand.
Ask yourself questions around the consistency it
shows, the time in which it speaks to your current
clients and the messaging it says to potential
clients. If you find the consistency, tone and
messaging is not quite aligned to your ultimate
branding vision, time to call in the branding gurus
and seek some further help.
STEP 5. MARKETING & ADVERTISING
Marketing is the study and management of
relationships that take place between client and
business. It is the human process of identifying,
anticipating and satisfying client needs and wants
through carefully considered offers, promotions
and sales.
Contradictory to what many business owners in
the beauty industry think, a successful marketing
campaign does not always require thousands
of dollars of investment. Traditional advertising
methods can be costly and hard to measure and
with the accessibility of social and digital media,
beauty businesses have never had greater access
to cost-effective and trackable marketing tools to
ensure you’re getting the return you’re investing.
Simple ways you may like to market include:
- Contributing and interacting with your local
community
- Networking and attending events
- Asking for client referrals
Beauty business owners are often trying to seek
new clients, we call these cold clients. Hot clients
on the other hand are clients who already visit your
space which is why we want to aim our marketing
campaigns at our warm clients. Warm clients may
be friends, family or colleagues of your current
clients. Because your current clients already know,
like and trust you, they’re more likely to tell their
inner circle about your business and services.
Warm marketing could include:
- Bring a friend incentives
- Loyalty cards
- Buy one, Gift one vouchers
and the list goes on!
When used correctly, marketing can generate
the following traction for a business:
- New client generation
- Brand awareness
- Public relations exposure
- Reward and recognition
- Strong team culture
- Attraction of your perfect client
Organise a 12-month calendar for your Strategy
Session and start to map out the hallmark dates,
add in your product brand activations and then see
where the gaps are and create activations around
these gaps. Aim to have approximate either to 10
campaigns per year and ensure your campaigns
match your marketing collateral and further
communicate these campaigns with your team so
that they can communicate them with your clients.
Dedicating an entire day to your Strategy Session
will help give you the time and space to plan,
implement and action your new strategy. For
ultimate success, check in with yourself every
quarter and revisit the strategy to see how you are
tracking along for the year.
For more information on Tamara and Beauté
Industry visit www.beauteindustrie.com
Beauty Biz Year 14 Issue 1 73