Want more clients? The art – and science – of client attraction in the salon and spa

Want more clients? The art – and science – of client attraction in the salon and spa

For decades, college professors have taught students that “marketing” can be defined in terms of 4 Ps:

  • Product (what you sell)
  • Price (the cost to obtain what you sell)
  • Placement (where buyers can get what you sell) and
  • Promotion (how buyers find out about what you sell)

But over the years, and especially over the last two decades where

  • company-wide branding helped people understand that “marketing” encompasses more than “promoting”
  • human resources evolved from a paper-pushing personnel department to a deeper understanding of how the satisfaction of every employee, from top to bottom in a company, ultimately impacts customer satisfaction and the health of the business
  • and with the explosion of “new media” tools such as email, easy-to-create and use websites, social media, blogs and – let’s face it – thousands of options for you to sift through when it comes to internet marketing tactics,

it’s clear that limiting a discussion about marketing to the traditional “4 Ps of Marketing” simply won’t do any longer.

In 2012, I redefined marketing this way: 

mar-ke-ting  (v.)

anything you do to:

(1) attract people to interact in some way with your business

(2) engage attracted individuals to want to know more about your business and to identify themselves with the brand of your business in some way

(3) motivate the people you have attracted and engaged to take actions you want them to take, and/or

(4) retain people—clients, yes, but also employees you don’t want to lose, investors, key vendors and consultants.

Under this new definition, it’s easy to understand that you and your business are engaged in marketing activities all the time, whether you’re aware of it or not— and whether you’re doing so strategically or not.

Each and every one of your interactions, at any touch point or via any medium – from telephone to website to email to walk ins to training sessions to staff meetings to cocktail hour to the chance meeting at the grocery store – every interaction you have with any person builds or erodes the relationship you have with them, and thus, the way they perceive you and your business.

Attracting, engaging, motivating and retaining aren’t marketing activities, they’re marketing results.

And one or more of these results should be at the heart of each and every marketing activity or promotional campaign that you do.  Attracting, engaging, motivating and retention – these are the marketing results that you’re looking for and so should be the strategic goal that you attach to any and all of your marketing activities.

When it came time to write the salon and spa marketing calendar, I decided to focus on the first of those four desired results, client attraction.

Attraction isn’t about pushing someone to do what you want.  It can’t be forced.  Attraction is about pull.

Attraction occurs as the result of a quality or feature that evokes interest, liking or desire. Attractive qualities are described as magnetic, fascinating, alluring or enticing. Not only that, but attractive qualities are described as particularly appealing to the person, place, thing or event that they are intended to attract.

at-trac-tion (noun)   (merriam-webster.com)

A force (your marketing activities) acting mutually between particles of matter (individuals and your business), tending to draw them together, and to resisting their separation.

When you think about it like that, maybe we should be calling it the science of attraction, rather than art.  But if attraction were strictly a science, all you would need is the formula.

You could follow a formula and always get exactly the same results – just like how combining raw food, spices and sauces in specific proportions, procedures and processes always produces – for instance – lasagna or brownies or crème brulee.

But here’s where the art comes in. Attraction doesn’t occur simply as a result of process. It also comes down to the way that someone makes us feel.  How we feel as a result of interacting with them and how we envision them fitting into our lives.

And just as it’s true in interpersonal attraction, you can’t “make” someone feel this type of connection with your business through formulaic procedures.

So as you undertake to execute the marketing formulas – or recipes – that work to produce certain results, you also have to think about the sometimes illogical and hard-to-define characteristics that fall under the heading of “the art of attraction.”

These characteristics aren’t formulaic. They don’t live in your business practices, procedures or policies. They can’t be produced by simply following a magic marketing to do list.  But you know that they exist, because they are evidenced in how your clients feel about themselves and about your business as a result of doing business with you.

 

The 2013 Salon and Spa Marketing Calendar: The Art of Attraction, has both.  It has marketing formulas which work to produce marketing results (attracting, engaging, motivating and retaining) but it also has recipes which can help you to create the intangibles – the art part, if you will – to attract the clients you most want to attract to your business, to engage not only your clients but your team members to a deeper level of relationship with your business, and more.

Purchase the 2013 Salon and Spa Marketing Calendar on amazon.com and get your salon on the fast-track to marketing results – and the business health and success that comes along with it.  In each month you’ll get marketing ‘recipes’ which include both proven marketing tactics (science) along with guidance to help you when it comes to the way that you make your clients feel about your business and how being involved with you and your business makes their lives better!

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1 reply
  1. http://tinyurl.com/nolinevin17609
    http://tinyurl.com/nolinevin17609 says:

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