Business Memberships are considered the holy grail of scaling a business towards unimaginable growth. They not only help you in scaling your business to greater heights but also provide a way to build a bond and long-lasting connection with your clients.
Coming from personal experience, running a Salon Membership in our Salon, helped us almost triple our revenue and staff in less than a year. It was one of the best decisions we ever made and we are still seeing remarkable benefits from it.
THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF MEMBERSHIP PROGRAM
So before diving into how Salon Memberships can turbo boost your Salon’s growth, let’s have a look at what a Salon Membership is and what are the different type of membership programs and schemes you can offer within your Salon.
FIRST; WHAT IS A SALON MEMBERSHIP?
Simply, Salon Memberships are either monthly or annually paid subscriptions, where the members receive a benefit for that charge. This is normally done through the exchange of products or services which make the long term subscription good “value” for the client and the upfront or guaranteed income lucrative for the Salon.
Typically there are three types of membership schemes which a salon could offer:
What is it? This membership scheme generally involves the client paying a pre-set monthly or yearly fee and receiving a discount on different salon services and products.
How does it work? With this membership plan, a client joins the salon for a month or year, pays a monthly/annual price and receives a percentage (%) discount on all or maybe selected products and services.
For example, pay £75 / month and receive a flat 30% off of all Hair Styling Products and Services every month.
This type of membership plan is particularly attractive to salon owners because the upfront payment helps with cashflow, the perceived financial commitment to the salon owner is very small, and it encourages client loyalty for the duration of the membership cycle.
Be aware though; the perceived low financial commitment may be more than salons think, if they haven’t got their pricing structure right. Plus, although this membership may entice your current clientele it may dilute already big spenders in the salon and is unlikely to attract to new clients.
What is it? In this membership system, a client will pay a monthly or annual payment and get a certain or predefined set of services free (covered within the membership fee)
How does it work? A client joins the monthly membership and gets packaged services every month. For example, the monthly package services can include 5 blowdry appointments, 2 hair cutting/styling appointments and 1 eye brow tint appointment per month.
This type of membership plan can generally increase the workload on your staff to fulfil the commitment, without significant increase in income, so be prepared to handle that. However, increased foot traffic and customer engagement, opens up substantial opportunities for upselling and converting to other services.
What is it? This membership charges a client a flat monthly fee for a specific unlimited service.
How does it work? A client joins the monthly membership plan and gets unlimited access to a specific service. For example, unlimited blowdries for £50 / month.
Similar to packaged services membership, unlimited monthly memberships keep your seats filled and provides a tremendous amount of opportunities for getting close to your customers and upselling them more.
This membership plan is generally the most popular type of membership plan out there among both clients and salon owners. It is usually the cheapest membership option so clients usually don’t have to spend a huge amount and with only one focused service, salon owners find it easier to manage than providing multiple services as part of other membership types.
So now you understand what a salon membership is and what are the possible different membership models, let’s see why your salon should be offering them.
A – IMPROVED, CONSISTENT AND RELIABLE CASH FLOW
Let’s agree on this. Regardless of how small or large, your salon is, above all else having a consistent and predictable cash flow is the dream. It makes the otherwise stressful life of a Salon Owner so much easier.
With automatic monthly membership payments, salon owners know that a certain and guaranteed amount of revenue is coming into the salon every month, which helps them plan their finances with greater precision.
Moreover, each client might not utilize the membership to it’s full potential, but they still will be charged for the monthly membership.
B – RETAINING EXISTING CLIENTS AND CONVERTING THEM TO SUPER FANS
A monthly membership will force your existing clientele to stick with you and use more of your services and seat time. If you play that increased engagement right, you can convert those clients into ambassadors that drive in more referral friends.
However, to ensure that they become your true fans, you need to deliver high value and quality in return for their subscription fees.
C – ATTRACTING AND ACQUIRING NEW CLIENTS
Following from the benefits of creating super fans and gaining referral interest; a salon membership plan can easily open doors for new clients. In B2C businesses like salons, word of mouth referral or personal recommendations are gold dust.
Salon Experts believe that selling a membership is much easier than selling a service, as it offers more privileges and benefits than the standard set services.
And don’t forget about your super fans for bringing you more customers. Give your existing clients or their referred friends an added benefit, something free or anything that adds value to their recommendation.
For example, refer 3 friends and get 1-month subscription free or bring in a friend every month free of charge.
Your members will love it as it gives them either the opportunity to get something for free or help their friends and turns them into your Super Fans.
D – INCREASE BOOKINGS
When you open your salon to a membership, naturally you will get more bookings and busier schedules for your team. A salon membership system can dramatically increase the amount of foot traffic and appointments within your salon.
Imagine 100 members coming in at least once per week. This will result in over 400 more appointments/month, the significant upselling capabilities they bring along will result in more regular appointment for your salon.
Be prepared for it though, you still need to offer value for money and that means the level of service and number that your clients perceive to be value for the money they are paying.
E – MORE PREBOOKINGS
Another significant angle to a salon membership is that it becomes part of the weekly / monthly routine like other lifestyle memberships. For example, if your customer is paying monthly for a yoga club, they usually add it as part of their routine as not only does it help them stay healthy but they are also paying for it.
Similarly, salon memberships become part of their routine, they more frequently attend the salon and become accustomed to upholding a certain level of appearance. This provides an opportunity when the client visits for regular services as they will have become used to regular and frequent visits to the salon; prebooking their next colour, or cut becomes part of the routine too.
F – REDUCES LOAD AND RELIABILITY ON YOUR TOP STYLISTS
From my own experience, I found this to be a very big issue specifically in our industry and salons face significant stress due to this.
In most Salons there is a traditional hierarchy, set mostly by experience. Generally because of seniority the higher up the ladder the larger the clientele and busier the team member. Disregarding specific qualifications and price most of your clients would want to be looked after by your top stylists.
But if that stylist goes on a holiday or worse leaves the salon, you will see a significant drop in your customers.
The good news is that a membership plan can easily take care of this issue.
With a membership system in place, your clients will have the opportunity to be serviced by different stylists possibly on every visit to the salon. This creates a loyalty shift, from team member to Salon, if now a stylist goes on holiday or leaves, the client will already have built familiarisation with other stylists.
G – ATTRACT THE BEST PAIR OF HANDS FOR YOUR SALON
