Marketing plan

[Chloe D]

Hello all

I am now putting together my marketing plan for my nail bar and would like to run some ideas past you all. I have several ideas to market my business (in an area with quite a bit of competition) but do not want to slash my prices to get customers as it would be virtually impossible to then raise the at a later date. Therefore, the marketing ideas I have are monthly offers, deals & parties. I would be so grateful if some of you could give me your opinion on my plan:

1. Loyalty cards. After 10 treatments clients may benefit from one free treatment (luxury mani/pedi/nail enhancements) or retail items up to the value of £15. (NB: my nail bar will be 60% treatment space and 40% retail)

2. Pamper parties for children and teens (goodie bags given out) and ladies (champagne, wine, nibbles)

3. Retail evenings. Customers and potential clients may come to the nail bar and browse and test products and have wine and nibbles. Discount of 10% to any customer booking a treatment that evening.

4. Opening offer could be book any treatment and receive a free gift (E.g:mini nail polish/file etc)

5. I will also be pounding the streets with leaflets with offers on presentation of the leaflet so I can monitor how effective this marketing technique has been.

6. Business card raffle - clients place their business cards in a bowl and one is selected at random bi-monthly for a free file and polish.

Can any geeks see any glaring problems or potential issues with these ideas? I will be stocking Burt's Bees, Nails Inc, L'occitane & Barry M cosmetics.

Thanks

Chloe x

 

[Fairchild]

These are all nice promotional ideas but are not an actualy marketing plan. Promotions obviously can form part of a plan and will achieve you some awareness and will drive customers to your business. All wothy stuff. You just need to think about what incremental business you are going to achieve ie. who would ahve come to you anyway versus those that have only come to you because of the offers.
Do think about what your objectives are for this activity and ensure that you keep this in mind when you put any promotions in place. Do pm me if I can help with your plan - have just come out of marketing to go back to beauty!

 

[Chloe D]

Thanks Fairchild - good advice! I was a teacher in my previous life so this is all new to me. I want to run my nail bar as a successful business and am trying to keep a business head on rather than getting distracted by the hundreds of nail varnishes/creams/chairs I can buy.

I think that people may come to me initially because my nail bar looks good and clean. It is to be designed with all white fixtures and fittings and a grey slate-look floor (not real slate as I will need to clean it properly!). The other salons in my area are quite pokey and cluttered. They charge between £48 and £70 (!!!!) for a full set of acryllics/gel enhancements but don't want to undercut them or devalue myself by going in at say £30. This would make me suspcisious that the salon was no good or staff untrained which is not the reputation I want to create.

I think that the offers may get those women in who may not have had their nails done before as they feel they are getting a benefit for trying my nail bar out. I may be wrong though....

 

[Fairchild]

The only way of really knowing if the offers have worked is to test your promotions - you would need to ensure only a representative sample of people received your promotion and see how many of them booked an appointment versus how many people came to you anway. Otherwise it could be all sorts of other factors that determine whether a promotion has worked or not ie. the time of year, the weather, other promotions in other salons, etc. etc. I could go on but I don't want to bore you or confuse you. All your ideas are nice ideas, just think about which ones you run and when you run them so you get a feel (at least) for which your audience prefers. Good luck.

 

[Chloe D]

Would you recommend planning a monthly promotion to avoid over saturating the offers available?