With everything that is happening this year, the digital world and beauty industry is still evolving, generating new and excellent business opportunities, and having an online presence today, is fundamental for the growth and development of your business.
We know that the Beauty segment has changed radically in the last 5 years, and these changes have transformed this market, becoming more and more competitive and sowing fiercer competition for clients.
But with so much competition, how can you attract clients specifically to your Beauty salon?
If you are looking to increase the number of your clients and your profit, you need to invest in Digital Marketing Strategy for hair salons. This is one of the best ways to reach your customers today.
Digital Marketing is an excellent strategy for several segments and the beauty market is certainly one of them. Investing in quality content that really offers value to your customers is a renowned strategy known as Inbound Marketing, which can bring excellent results for beauty salons.
Social networks and the website represent the greatest means of access that a beauty salon can have, given the advancement of mobile technology and the ease of companies to connect with their audience quickly and simply. Beauty salons are social environments for people who have the same goal, always looking to be more beautiful.
Communication channels such as Google My Business, among other social networks, are indispensable tools to attract and retain customers. On this picture you see Top 3 search results for Beauty Salon on Google Maps.
Through them, you publicize your salon to the closest people within your location, (in this example it is Brooklyn, NY) create an audience around the brand, strengthen the relationship with the public, make consumers themselves publicize the salon in their profiles - thus, gaining new promoters for your beauty salon.
But where to start? Where to invest your time, money, and effort to implement assertive marketing strategies for hair and beauty salons? Check out the answers to these and other questions in this post.
1. Start with a Beauty salon digital marketing plan
Planning is the beginning of everything. Any marketing strategy needs to start with studies and analyzes that point out what the company wants to achieve and how it intends to get there. This is what guides marketing actions towards success and reduces the chances of getting lost on the way and ending up wasting resources.
Do market research
Market research involves studying consumers, competitors, threats, and opportunities that are out there. It helps you decide — based on data, not guesswork — how your company will position itself in the digital world to stand out in the marketplace.
If you have a beauty salon in Texas, for example, when searching for the relevance of terms on Google Trends, you can see that the term “Beauty Salon” has more searches on Google than the term “ Hairdresser”, with this initial targeting you can start strategizing for the most searched term on Google, but that's just the beginning of many more analyses.
When we analyze the queries related to the two terms, we can see that both have similar search intentions, such as the search for “beauty salon near me” or “hairdresser near me” .
Another useful tool to use is Google keyword planner.
Define your niche
To give direction to Digital Marketing strategies for beauty salons, your business needs to have a niche or a target. All Digital Marketing actions directly require a qualified market segmentation, making their actions directed towards a certain group of people. This will considerably facilitate the conversions of your blog, social networks, etc.
Many Beauty Professionals and Hairdressers invest heavily in their social networks, which is also a very important factor that enables them to stand out on the Internet. However, they end up leaving aside greater attention to the website of their business.
2. Create a Website for Beauty Salon
The first step to being able to apply SEO techniques for beauty salons and barbershops is to have a website. It should contain important information about your business; such as opening hours, location, services provided, photos, videos, testimonials, and prices.
In addition, when we think of a beauty salon, hair salon, or barbershop, it must be taken into account that a chat for customers to schedule appointments can be extremely useful. Or, even better, you can have an option to book online appointments for your beauty business on a platform like City Pros.
To get more credibility for your website, it is always a good idea to post lots of photos of hairstyles and other services offered at your Beauty Salon.
To ensure greater professionalism, we recommend that you turn to experts in website creation and maintenance. They are extremely skilled and can ensure that your beauty salon’s digital presence is very solid.
But now that you have your own website for your beauty salon, you must be thinking about how to make it stand out and attract more customers? And to answer that question, we separate some important tips for you to follow.
Once you and your team have developed the scope of a segment to target, it is essential that your salon has a responsive website (responsive websites are websites that have technologies that fit on any screen).
In addition to the website being responsive, it needs important information such as:
- Identity of colors or palettes according to the beauty salon brand;
- The website needs to have CTAs (Call To Action);
- Development of landing pages for each service that your salon will offer. The creation of these landing pages makes Adwords and SEO actions easier for the future.
Content marketing strategy for beauty salons can be a very efficient alternative for those who want to remain relevant within a highly competitive industry. Want to know more? Read on and learn how to apply content marketing in a beauty salon!
3. Content Marketing Tips and Ideas for a Beauty Salon
There are a few tips on how to use content marketing to attract and retain beauty customers.
Create a blog
An interesting tip, used by many barbershops and beauty salons, is to create a blog on your beauty salon website. This is a strategy known as Inbound Marketing (or attraction marketing), where you can speak directly to your audience.
Your blog is a channel to gather all your most interesting publications for your audience. An area where the visitor can find all published materials that reinforce the authority of your brand. The idea is that space becomes the reference for those who have a question or problem when it comes to beauty.
When it comes to blogging, it’s common to think of text articles right away, right? Nothing unusual, after all, most content can even be in this format, but the idea is to explore different ways to impact your audience. It can be the use of an infographic to illustrate a step by step or even the publication of a video with simple and practical beauty tips. Thus, you can develop a series of articles and videos about your beauty salon, barbershop, and related topics, separating them by categories. In this way, you will be able to bring greater content to your customers and howcase your work, so that they are informed and know more about your services.
Inbound Marketing can interest many people who will visit the beauty salon, intrigued by the content viewed and read on your blog.
Make a presence on social networks
In addition to the blog, it is essential to be present on the channels where most of your audience (and any business) is: social networks. If a potential customer is using Instagram, Facebook, YouTube or Pinterest why won't your brand communicate with them there? Create profiles on platforms that make sense for your business, making the most of these channels.
On social networks, you can, for example, publish some content that came out on your blog, creating a connection with both platforms. In addition, it is ideal for generating engagement with the public, always interacting and responding to comments, whether to ask questions or to thank you for a compliment. It's the most natural and organic way to keep in touch with potential customers.
Create a publishing strategy and calendar
No salon content marketing strategy will work without planning. Therefore, it is necessary to create an editorial calendar with content that may be interesting to your audience in the coming months, for example. Take a day to organize and define which topics will be worked on over a given period.
The goal is to prevent content creation from becoming a headache for you and/or your team. A tip for this task is to use Google Trends to look for references about what is trending when it comes to care, beauty, and aesthetics. This can help you create content that is more relevant to your audience, ensuring your digital marketing strategy delivers significant results.
Incorporate Beauty salon content ideas
But, after all, what are the types of content that can be interesting to the audience of a beauty salon? To help you with this task, we have separated some tips that can be very useful as you start. Check out!
- Step-by-step posts and videos
Video content is very interesting, and a good option to attract the eyes of your audience is the step-by-step creation of hairstyles or even makeup. The idea is really to offer support to your audience, showing simple tips on how a process that may seem more elaborate is actually quite simple.
- News from the salon
Promoting your business and announcing beauty salon news is always interesting, but to get away from the routine, don't just make a traditional ad. Go into more detail about that new product or service in your portfolio. Most importantly, show whoever is reading the reasons to go to the salon and learn about this novelty.
- Hairstyle ideas for different occasions
Some special occasions call for different hairstyles, right? The style for a wedding is completely different from that used on a day at the beach.
But wouldn't it be interesting to gather several options for different moments in someone's routine? Create options to go to work, to a party, to do physical activity, and even to stay at home. Simple and practical tips are always welcome. And, of course, the more pictures and videos, the better.
- Behind the scenes of the salon
One way is to present more details about the day-to-day of your business. Showing the backstage of the salon can bring your audience even closer, creating connections from the challenges and joys in the work routine. In addition, it is a way of showing all the care and affection behind the scenes to provide a positive experience for each customer.
- Color combination
The use of colors is fundamental in a beauty salon, but you have to be careful with the combinations, right? How about giving some tips so that customers can be inspired and create combinations that stand out even more? Make more technical content, explaining the meanings behind each color, and show inspiring examples.
- Myths and Truths
Myths and truths can also be very helpful in attracting the public's attention. Especially, when talking about beauty care, there are some claims and theories that are not always true. How about using all your technical and practical knowledge to clarify some of these doubts and further strengthen your authority?
There are countless possibilities to put content marketing for beauty salons into practice that will significantly improve your SEO results, increase reach, and will bring more clients to your beauty salon.
Do you know the meaning of the term “SEO”? No? We will introduce you to this vast world of websites and search engines.
4. What is SEO?
SEO is the acronym for "Search Engine Optimization". This optimization is the set of strategies with the objective of enhancing and improving the positioning of a site in the pages of natural (organic) results in search engines. In short, SEO is a ranking strategy for websites in search engines such as Google.
You might be wondering what these strategies are. Basically, they are based on several factors that make the website content more functional and objective. They are tags (keywords), well-written articles, catchy titles for articles, properly structured URLs, among other things.
5. What are the benefits of SEO for hair salons?
Now that we know the meaning of the term, we will see the uses of this mechanism on a practical level.
The internet has reached unimaginable proportions in recent years, and the amount of information that travels through it grows proportionally. With this, in order to better serve users, search engines have created filtering methods so that the most relevant content is the first on the pages.
Imagine that someone does a Google search with a specific request like "Best hair salon near me". In most cases, the first content on the page is the most valuable and the most viewed by users. That's where SEO comes in. To be in the first position and, consequently, to attract a larger audience, is not easy. For this reason, companies around the world are turning their eyes to this strategy, which can make a difference in the success of the business. Here are the main advantages of SEO:
- It is free or almost free! You don't necessarily have to pay Google to rank well. We'll talk about sponsored links later and why it's not a good idea to pay for top positions.
- Increase in traffic – optimizing content for search engines allows the hair salon website to be naturally well-positioned, attract more visitors and stimulate business. This generates many benefits, as well as more clients.
- Brand strengthening – being well-ranked means that, in addition to more people having access to the content, they will acquire greater confidence in the work offered. The hair salon's identity will be strengthened and it will become a reference among users and other salons.
Credibility – Who would you trust the most? In the hair salon’s information that is on the first page of Google or one that is on the tenth?
6. SEO vs sponsored links or paid ads?
Using this optimization method requires knowledge and specific tools within the website that, together, will work on SEO. As we mentioned before, it is super important to have an SEO-optimized beauty salon website. This will bring more interesting results than the use of sponsored links. We will explain.
Sponsored links and their disadvantages
Have you ever seen, among the first search results, websites that have the word “Ad” before the link? This is a sponsored link.
Sponsored links are paid, meaning the company pays a fee to appear on the first page. The main problems with this method are:
- Non-Fixed Fee: Sponsored links are a kind of auction. Whoever pays the most to Google will appear first on the page. This implies the following problem.
- Temporary link: If the company does not keep up with the increase in rates, it runs the risk of not being ranked well and even not being part of the sponsored links. Most likely it won't appear on the first page, and if you haven't adopted SEO, it won't appear on the second or third.
Research shows that most users do not see sponsored links well. There is a certain fear in clicking on these links.
Also, there are fees for the business for each click on the site. It works like a “commission” for Google, for putting the company up there. Because they are paid, sponsored links do not always directly serve what the user is looking for. They are more generic and can be out of context.
Therefore, SEO is a guarantee that the website is positioned in a healthy way without having to be paid.
7. SEO tips for Beauty salon websites
Structure of the website
The website or blog must have a clear and clean structure that facilitates your navigation.
A blog must be hierarchically organized into pages and entries. Both to reach a good position in the search results and to give a good user experience.
On the main page, there must be links to the main contents, in this way Google, any other search engine, will be able to identify them.
Another good recommendation is to indicate to searchers which are the most important contents through the links. Even though there are more internal links for these contents, they will be considered more relevant.
Indexing
This is another important factor for technical SEO and to facilitate the indexing of a website or blog by Internet search engines if you have a sitemap.
For a WordPress blog, for example, you can use a plugin that will generate your sitemap. The blogs have a simple structure and a plugin can do a good job at the time of creating your sitemap.
However, with a more complex website, such as an e-commerce for example, in these cases, the creation of a sitemap may require the knowledge of a web developer.
Responsive design
Having a website or a blog with responsive design is another important factor in achieving a good position in the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). Ensuring a mobile responsive website can also help you with Google ranking.
The search engine's algorithm analyzes more than 200 factors, including responsiveness, to rank the websites in Google search results. In addition, it contributes by giving it a good user experience.
As you know that almost everyone owns a smartphone these days. Therefore, it is very important that your website is mobile responsive and works on smartphones and any other mobile device. That's because, in this way, potential customers will be able to access it anytime and anywhere as the number of accesses from mobile devices is much higher when compared to those from desktops.
Your website must be viewed from any type of device. One of the important things at the time of setting up a website is to analyze the size of the letters and the buttons on the smallest devices, such as cell phones, for example. What you should consider is that both the content and all the functionalities of the website are fully available on any device.
Now let's talk about what you should avoid with technical SEO.
8. What are the most common errors in technical SEO?
There are several types of errors in technical SEO, but we can consider them as the most common ones:
Issues with page speed
Too many js scripts
Excess of labels
An error that may seem harmless, but it affects technical SEO and the use of tags without discrimination.
The problem with the excess of tags is that it can create duplicate pages. An example of these is that when using synonyms for the same word, equal pages will be created for each of these contents, which will harm the positioning.
The labels can be extremely useful, always and when they are used wisely.
Leave untreated images
This is one of the most common errors that can notably affect the page load speed.
Compressing the images on your website can be of great help to reduce your load speed. Therefore, consider it!
9. What is the best tool to monitor technical SEO?
There are many good tools that can help you monitor the technical errors that you may have on your website like SEMRush.
SEMRush is a tool that can give you a good view of the technical situation of your page. Its free version is limited, but it can also help to identify possible technical SEO errors.
10. Google My Business. The fastest way to get clients for beauty salons and hair salons
Nowadays, Google places more and more importance on local searches. Indeed, when an Internet user searches for a "New York hairdressing salon" on Google Maps, they will never find it if the salon never registered in Google My Business.
In the USA, 93% of Internet users use Google when searching for something on the web and 75% before going to a beauty salon or hairdresser. Being referenced in Google My Business allows you to increase your visibility on Google search.
Let's assume your salon is located in New York. By signing up for Google My Business, you confirm your location and after verification, you will notice that your website will be available on Google Maps, making customers find your beauty salon faster it will be possible to reach a greater number of people.
Below is an example of how Google My Business results dominate on SERP (Search Engine Results Page). As you can see, the first 3 results are businesses registered with Google My Business, the rest and organic SEO results.
There are many nuances on how to be in TOP 3 results on Google My Business. It involves daily activities like:
- Daily/ regular posts on GMB page
- Respond to quotations and reviews
- Adding videos and new images
- Tracking statistics, etc.
There are hundreds of beauty salons and hair salons in Austin, Texas, however, Google shows only the Top 3 results on the first page on Google maps. To be in the Top 3 you need to do some technical work. This work involves target keyword research, page optimization, citations, local press mentions, etc.
Using Google My Business can provide fast and amazing results for you as a business owner. It is a local search tool, that can be used to your advantage with the aim of giving greater visibility to your services, attracting customers, improving the relationship with them, and expanding the image of your business.
At City Pros, we offer comprehensive SEO services which help beauty and hair salons dominate local markets generating sales leads. We have years of experience helping local businesses get to the Top 3 results on Google Maps.
This and the other tips mentioned in this post are very effective. Therefore, it is worth implementing them for your business to ensure greater success and visibility.
And if you're looking for help with marketing for your hair salon or beauty business, City Pros is your place to start. Register for Free and find out what City Pros can do for your business's success.
