Groupon packages, positive comments please

[lissy00]

I have my Groupon rep coming to see me on Thursday and she is lovely. Dealt with her this time last year when I was running some leisure courses for my teaching degree. Desperately needed bums on seats and it was fantastic. My rep made sure I was covering all my costs. She took into consideration everything and then she decided it would be better for me if the clients had to pay extra for the material costs on the first night, which is what happened. So I think it can vary for people depending on their area and the rep, but I only have positive things to say about my rep.

So, at the moment I work from home and also do pamper parties mobile. Working from home can be difficult to get new customers as people only find out about me through word of mouth and some advertising I have done, and my web. But I want my advertising to be more targetted- hence groupon. Since Groupon don't like you to run deals without a premises, I have decided to do a mobile one for pamper parties so that I get multiple clients in one location and will limit the radius I will travel in the deal.

I am aware that Groupon can devalue businesses, but I am being careful about how I approach this and want to make it more taster treatments for people so that I am not doing full, labour intensive treatments for peanuts! I am also aware that people can get inundated with Groupon customers and can't fit regulars in. Well I am limiting how many I will do per week so this will not happen. I am also capping the number sold so that I can cope with the workload. I have plans for upselling and add ons, as well as getting their emails and details for my mailing list and want to go about this properly, so please don't post negative comments. But I welcome constructive ones.

Has anyone done something similar? And would you mind telling me the response and if you thought it was worth it? I will only run the deal if I believe the cost is worth it to me and am planning on offering treatments which do not require much in the way of materials.

Look forward to hearing from you.

:lol:

 

[Geminikelli]

im limited on time so will try to be quick and hopefully not ramble..

i have done groupons and have made them work for my business.

you need to look at them as purely an advertising route rather than instant income, you wont make money on them unless you upsell and provide such a good service they return.

you will always get the bargain hunters but this can happen if you put a special on facebook or a sign in the window etc its not just groupon deals that attract unloyal customers.

the first one i did was unsuccessful i sold about 150 but i stupidly did all treatments that cost hardly anything but were luxury treatments not regular treatments people have so as much as people enjoyed it it was not something they were gonna keep rebooking for unless a special occasion.

now i know people will shoot me down for devaluing the product but i did a shellac groupon and my salon is now 90% shellac day in day out and a good 80% was groupon and i have kept these clients returning every 2 weeks, the big test was when a salon very close by ran the same deal but bit cheaper and i didnt lose a single client.

the deal attracts the clients in thats the easy bit, the hard bit is making sure they stay with you.. so how do you do this??

make sure you treat the groupons as if they were full priced paying clients, i think we probably went above and beyond even more than normal clients to win them over because all i ever heard was negative things about groupon salons.. oh they must be desperate for business.. oh when i see a salon running a groupon i sit back and laugh blah blah blah...

maybe for some salons but not all.. you need to put your business head on .. add features.. we had upgrades, discounts for other treatments on the day one being microdermabrasion at 25% off this was a treatment i wanted to push and now were busy busy with courses of these from groupon customers.

we as a salon were doing ok before we ran our first one just under a year ago and now were moving premises as we have outgrown our one taken on more staff and constantly turning bookings down.

we had teething problems and the occasional pain in the back side client who expected the earth and then moaned about what they were getting but then you get this anyway groupon or not.

we encouraged clients back with vouchers and gave them all goody bags, from just one groupon client i then got her sister, mum, nan, cousin, 2 x step daughters, aunty and have lost count how many friends they all religiously come every 2 weeks. so ok i made no profit on her first treatment but now i do.

decide what you want to promote, how many you can get done in a day and set your cap. then when it runs make sure your website has full details about how to book etc etc and set times and dates you are going to do them obv allowing time for your regulars, never let these get missed because of groupons.

dont let groupon push you into a commission tell them what you need to make per deal sold then work it from there, Groupon want your business they need you so you tell them dont let them talk you into a price if your not happy with it.

if you want any more help pm me and ill reply when i have bit more time.

yes there is negatives but if you do it right it will work for you! remember its not a money making scheme its an advertising scheme to get your name out there x

 

[lissy00]

Thanks so much for that. That's really useful, and you make a good point about the luxury treatments which are more likely one offs. Nails is a good idea as if they are happy you get regulars.

I may well PM you when I have mulled over what you wrote. Thanks for taking the time. x

 

[MrsHBeauty]

I ran a groupon deal and it was a success for my salon.

I made barely any money, but I didnt loose money even paying staff to do the treatments.

I ran a pamper deal choose 3 from a choice of 6 treatments. I sold 89 and had a 5 month expiry date. we are quite far outside of our nearest groupon city which is why we didnt sell that many, but this was a perfect amount for us.

We limited how many we did in a day, we gave it our best, we upsold on treatmetns making them luxury instead of standard, giving 25% off any other treatments taken on the day. Loads upgraded, some added more treatments, a couple hae become reglar clients. Most of all more people now about us.

I would happily run one again.

Its nice to hear someone else has had a good experience with groupon.

Do you think its best to run a manicure deal then offer an upgrade to shellac? If anyone anted Shellac as an upgrade to a manicure we added £8 on. We only charge £20 for shellac so id only get £4 where as if i did and express mani id get £3.60 plus an extra £8 for shellac then another £3 if the wanted a luxur shellac.

I might htink about this in the new year.

x

 

[jazmine]

Hi, I'm in salon and they run a living social deal. We would be considered upmarket and it doesn't de value the service, it's only available on haircuts and was used to promote the newly qualified stylist to help them build up a clientele. As many have said you will get bargain hunters. My best friend is an avid groupon lover! She has used it for beauty treatments mainly and often is given an incentive to rebook or has just been made aware that somewhere offers the services she wants. On a couple of occasions I've gone with her and had a treatment done at the same time (at full price). If you've got a good rep that's fantastic
Gives you an opportunity to meet new clients and if you can get a client record card with email addresses in time you can fwrd on your own deals good luck!

 

[Geminikelli]

The first one I did which was choose 3 from 6 two of treatments were mani and pedi and I had upgrade to gel (wasn't doing shellac at time) and lots if ppl went for this but had to upsell on the phone and sold it as its dry instantly we had lots of ppl on the day go oh wish I had upgraded now but most of time we didn't have enough time to do gel so really upsell and point out benefits of upgrading.

 

[Geminikelli]

Also just to say I'm running one again in January to cover the dead month after Xmas I'd rather break even at end of jan rather than dip into profits to cover wages and have girls sitting around.

Not sure what I'm gonna run yet but have my feature date secured ages ago.

I have two juniors that are past the junior stage now but were lacking clients of there own so used group on as a way to build there experience and build client base and its really worked for them x

 

[lissy00]

I ran a groupon deal and it was a success for my salon.

I made barely any money, but I didnt loose money even paying staff to do the treatments.

I ran a pamper deal choose 3 from a choice of 6 treatments. I sold 89 and had a 5 month expiry date. we are quite far outside of our nearest groupon city which is why we didnt sell that many, but this was a perfect amount for us.

We limited how many we did in a day, we gave it our best, we upsold on treatmetns making them luxury instead of standard, giving 25% off any other treatments taken on the day. Loads upgraded, some added more treatments, a couple hae become reglar clients. Most of all more people now about us.

I would happily run one again.

Its nice to hear someone else has had a good experience with groupon.

Do you think its best to run a manicure deal then offer an upgrade to shellac? If anyone anted Shellac as an upgrade to a manicure we added £8 on. We only charge £20 for shellac so id only get £4 where as if i did and express mani id get £3.60 plus an extra £8 for shellac then another £3 if the wanted a luxur shellac.

I might htink about this in the new year.

x

Thank you for your comments. When I initially read Geminikelli's post, upgrading to shellac (or gel polish) in my case was what went through my mind and then hopefully get some regulars as a result.

Loving these ideas. So I'm thinking I could suggest to my Groupon rep it might be good to do a nail party deal for x amount of people and £x per additional person, with just file and polish for everyone but then add on £x amount for French or £x amount for gel polish and £x amount for luxury treatment. Although not actually sure what a luxury treatment would involve with gel polish as you wouldn't want all the grease on the hands. Is shellac different, or do you do all the pampering bit after the polish is dry?

Out of interest, what were your 6 treatment options? xx

 

[lissy00]

The first one I did which was choose 3 from 6 two of treatments were mani and pedi and I had upgrade to gel (wasn't doing shellac at time) and lots if ppl went for this but had to upsell on the phone and sold it as its dry instantly we had lots of ppl on the day go oh wish I had upgraded now but most of time we didn't have enough time to do gel so really upsell and point out benefits of upgrading.

This is really good advice thank you. I will definitely bear this in mind. Although I do do gel polish so actually timewise, it wouldn't be a problem to switch (pretty much same time), I would just have to know to take products with me. Or I suppose it would probably be worth taking them anyway, just in case!

Also just to say I'm running one again in January to cover the dead month after Xmas I'd rather break even at end of jan rather than dip into profits to cover wages and have girls sitting around.

Not sure what I'm gonna run yet but have my feature date secured ages ago.

I have two juniors that are past the junior stage now but were lacking clients of there own so used group on as a way to build there experience and build client base and its really worked for them x

I had been hoping to take on a premises earlier this month, but it fell through. Hence why I had the initial contact with my groupon rep. What I had thought was to sell eyebrow shapes on groupon for 99p. Because it doesn't take long and I figured they would sell like hot cakes and not too hard to squeeze in appointments and I have known newly opened salons give eyebrow shapes away for free. It would have got my salon lots of exposure and then my plan was to upsell, do a more than fabulous job and leave them wanting to return. Sadly I can't do that now as I work from home and certainly isn't cost effective to do mobile. But if anyone thinks it might work for them, feel free to copy my idea (if you think it's a good one that is)

 

[MrsHBeauty]

with a luxury shellac I do file cuticle, apply shellac, then exfoliate, masque and massage then add solar oil.

A standard shellac cuticle, apply shellac, moisturise and solar oil.

x

 

[lissy00]

I want to thank you so much for your really helpful comments. Much appreciated.

My rep came today and my deal is all set to run in a fortnight's time. They did me a better deal than the normal 50% so I was pleased with that, and she costed out my time for 2 hours because of travelling to clients and setting up, but the treatment time where I am doing clients is just 1 hour split between 2, 3 or 4 people (so basically just 15, 20 or 30 min treatments). I am really happy with the outcome and hopefully some people will go for it.

She has capped my deal at 65 so that I can cope with demand, and she has put restrictions as to distance I can travel. She has also put that they can upgrade too.

So I will let you know the outcome.

Thanks again.

 

[plumpapple]

I want to thank you so much for your really helpful comments. Much appreciated.

My rep came today and my deal is all set to run in a fortnight's time. They did me a better deal than the normal 50% so I was pleased with that, and she costed out my time for 2 hours because of travelling to clients and setting up, but the treatment time where I am doing clients is just 1 hour split between 2, 3 or 4 people (so basically just 15, 20 or 30 min treatments). I am really happy with the outcome and hopefully some people will go for it.

She has capped my deal at 65 so that I can cope with demand, and she has put restrictions as to distance I can travel. She has also put that they can upgrade too.

So I will let you know the outcome.

Thanks again.

I look forward to hearing the outcome

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