Ask Me Anything - March Q and A with coach Phil Jackson

Hello, hello, hello, my salon friends. How has March been treating you? How's business? How's Q1 been? What's going on with you? Let's find out in my monthly Q&A. Hello, hello, hello, my salon friends. Phil Jackson here, your queen of salons, coming in your eyes and ears with a dose of wise old owl wisdom. How have things been for you? Can you believe that we're storming towards the end of March? My goodness, I was awake in January, blinked twice, and here we are in March. February just went past in a blur. How's business been? How are things going with you? The vibe, generally, feels pretty positive, as per what I'm seeing out there and the conversations that I'm having with my coaching clients and with people that I'm chatting with in the industry. Seems like January was not great. February could have gone either way. People either had a much better February than normal or a much worse one. And March feels like things are starting to move in the right direction, starting to get some big spenders back in the salons. How are things with you? Reach out. Let me know. Phil at buildyoursalon.com. You know I love hearing about how well you're doing. And you also know I love receiving your questions. Now, I had to do some bullying this time. I had to nag some people into sending me some questions and put it out on my social media. So please reach out. These episodes are so important to me because I adore knowing what's going on in the industry. And I want to help. You know, I want to help with the stuff that's relevant to you. And the best way to do that is for you to send your questions in. Phil at buildyoursalon.com. So what have we got in the mailbag today? Well, we've got four questions, but one of them is going to get a whole episode. So, Chantel, if you're listening, I've got your question about productivity, getting stuff done. I'm going to give you a whole episode in two weeks' time. So look out for that episode, Chantel, and I hope you find it useful. Also, if you're watching on YouTube, apologies that I don't have my normal backdrop and I haven't closed the blinds. Such a beautiful morning here and the sun is out and the sky is completely cloudless and I just couldn't block it away. So you've got the view of my office and my poor dying office plants in the background if you're watching over on YouTube. Also, I've left the window open because there's a couple of birds out there tweeting their heads off. And I hope you get a little bit of that spring energy from me as well. So first question comes from Emily in Dorset. And Emily says, I really like the idea of salon memberships.

Good. So you should. And I'm struggling with what to include and also pricing. So that's the two big ones. Well done. I'm thinking of offering a subscription where customers can get a massage every month. But I know you recommend including bonuses. I do. And there's a very good reason for that, Emily. Do you think offering a discount on other services is enough? Also, how do you go about pricing memberships? I'm worried I'm going to lose money. OK, first things first. Shameless plug. A few times a year I run my Salon Memberships Made Easy training or I have Salon Memberships Master Plan on offer. Emily, if you head over to queenofmemberships.com, you'll always see the latest training offering on that website there. So that's my shameless plug out of the way. Let's give you some free help now, shall we? So I'm thinking of offering a subscription where customers can get a massage every month. Great. I love that's what we call a predefined outcome or a defined benefit subscription. So they pay so much and they know exactly what they're going to get every single month. Sweet and simple. Do you think offering a discount on other services is enough? Well, it depends. And you're going into discount territory, Emily. And that's not a comfortable place for your Uncle Phil to be. I don't like building discount clubs. It's got to make financial sense. Absolutely. But we're not here trying to build memberships for your cheaper customers, the ones that are price sensitive. Not necessarily anyway. And that's because I don't think we should be tailoring an offering to someone who maybe is not particularly loyal to the salon or they're very price sensitive, likely to leave if you have a price increase. I think we should be tailoring to people who are good customers and trying to turn them into great customers. Do I think offering a discount on other services is enough? I would think, again, if I was you, Emily, and the reason for that is that our membership customers tend to be the first to take extra services and upsold products anyway. So I think offering a discount on other services is a bit wasted because I think that we'll probably start taking some of those other services anyway. And generally, the rule of thumb for me is that we give people more of what they love. So if you're building a massage membership, let's say somebody comes in and they can get a back and shoulder massage once a month, then why not give them a bonus of a bit more massage? So why not maybe once or twice a year upgrade them to a full body massage?

So we're giving people something that they're interested in. And where I see lots of people go wrong is they build in bonuses on other services. Then the problem is, let's say, I don't know what other services you offer, by the way, Emily, but let's say that you offer a massage membership and then once or twice a year, they get a bonus of a facial. Problem is, you've got some people who are interested in facials, some who are interested in massage, but the overlap between the two is smaller. So each time we bring in different services, your membership actually becomes less attractive. So keep it really simple, built around one service or one small group of services. I feel like a parrot. I've been nagging people about memberships for the last three weeks. Also, how do you go about pricing memberships? I'm worried about losing money. If you're worried about losing money, then you've probably priced your membership too low. A couple of things you can do. Firstly, make sure that the prices on your regular services are where they should be. Because if you build a membership on shaky pricing, it's going to magnify that problem. So make sure you've got your own services sorted first. The whole point of the bonuses is so we're not offering big discounts. So it should be a profitable membership. But if you're not sure, and actually I like doing this for my memberships anyway, why not put a limit on the number of memberships available? Why not say you've only got five available on this launch offer? Fill that. Make sure it's profitable. Make sure you've got the pricing right. Make sure everything's working for you. And then we can build and scale from there. Very best of luck with it, Emily. I love memberships. Queen of memberships, absolutely. And please reach out. Let me know how you're getting on. Next one is an anonymous question. So we'll call her Jane. Please help. I am so close to throwing in the towel. My lease is up for renewal at the end of this year. And I feel like I've tried everything to get my salon busy. I can't seem to keep staff and the couple I have, the couple I have aren't very busy. My column is full, but I don't want to do services anymore as I want to work on my business, as I want to work on my business, not in my business. Apologies. We're not losing money, but at the end of every month there is nothing left and I thought I would be earning more by now. It's been a very long five years and I can't see a way forward. Janey, Janey, Jane, Jane, Jane. OK.

There are more salons opening every day, at least every year. In fact, in the UK, we're adding thousands of new salon businesses to our economy every year. And that's not just new salons opening and some closing. That's net number of salons is increasing year on year. So it is getting a more and more crowded marketplace. That means it's tougher to find clients to fill your column. It means it's also tougher to find team members to make your salon that busy, buzzy place that it sounds like you want. I think there's a bit of tough love coming your way, my darling. And apologies if you find that offensive. But firstly, when people say they've tried everything to get their salons busy, they very rarely have. And I want you to think about the energy that went into your business when it very first opened. We were sponsoring the local football team, handing out balloons going down the high street, stuffing flyers underneath the windscreen wipers of cars and annoying people that are parked outside the salon. We had a bubble machine outside our salon to try and just get people to notice us on the high street. We were in the newspaper. We were entering competitions. And that was all before we'd even thought about social media because, of course, I opened my salon in the 1800s because I'm ancient. That new salon energy is when we're trying everything. And there aren't many people that have been in business for five years and they're still trying everything. The problem is all of those thousands of competitors that are coming into the marketplace every year are trying everything. So if you've got some really hard building to do, this is the level of energy. This is the level of input that needs to happen as far as your marketing activity is concerned. As far as recruitment is concerned, well, I wouldn't be recruiting anymore if you've got team members that aren't busy. In fact, I would be increasing your availability, first of all. If you're really up against it and you need more money and your column is full, then make yourself available for more hours. I know you want to work on your business, not in your business. I get that. I suspect what you've got is, well, I think there's two things going on. Firstly, if you've been open five years and your team isn't busy, you've got a retention problem. So you need to find out why people aren't coming back into your business. Sort that first because pouring lots and lots of marketing effort into a business that's losing clients is wasted marketing effort.

And you will burn through the number of people that are actually willing to give your salon a go really quite quickly. So sort out why people aren't coming back, first of all. It might be if you've had recruitment problems, they're just sick of seeing new faces all the time and they don't trust you anymore. In which case, you're definitely going to have to make yourself the stable presence in your salon. The second thing I think has happened is you've got what I call the altitude problem. And the altitude problem is when people try to pull back from carrying out service too quickly. And I know that's not what you want to be doing. And I know you want to work on your business. But you need a certain level of financial stability and a certain amount of success before you're allowed to pull back and keep that as a sustainable business. And yes, that might go against everything that everyone else is telling you. But I actually want you working more in your business until you get to a certain level. Start hitting your financial goals. Then we can start systemizing. Then we can build processes. Then you can start taking that step back. That said, to be honest with you, Jane, if you don't love your salon anymore, and your salon, all of you, your salon should be your second favorite place to be in the whole wide world outside your bed. After bed, that should be the one place that you really want to be all the time. And if you don't feel that way anymore, then maybe it is time to throw in the towel. And what would that look like for you? When you start thinking about perhaps, I don't know whether you're, does it say whether you're a stylist or a beauty therapist? I can't see it anywhere. But does the idea of renting a chair or renting a room somewhere fill you with joy? Does it feel easier to you? Or does that loss of scale, does that loss of potential scale to your business fill you with dread? I'm guessing if you don't want to carry out services anymore, that either means getting a job somewhere else as a manager for someone else, or you're going to have to make this business work. But go back to your goals. Go back to what it is that you want out of this business and see if you can fall back in love with it again. Final note, it says you're not losing money, but at the end of the month there's nothing left. I wonder what your financial control is like. I wonder whether there's a bit of work to do on profitability. If you haven't read, and this is actually a recommendation for all of you, if you haven't read a book called Profit First, you need to read it. It's on Kindle, you can get a hard copy, and it's on Audible as well, so no excuses.

Seriously, a game changer as far as cost control, cash flow control, and actually starting to retain some profit is concerned. So I hope that's been useful to you, Jane, and I'm sorry if it's not the answer that you wanted, but I feel like it might just be the answer that you needed. And finally, another, yes, it is finally, because we're going to do Chantel's question in a couple of weeks' time. Finally, short and sweet, another anonymous question from, we'll call her Jane number two. Jane number two says, what is the best structure for my business? I'm opening a new clinic in the autumn. Hurrah, exciting times. And I'm not sure whether to employ or offer room rental or a mix of both. This needs to come back to your goal setting as well, Jane number two. It depends whether you're trying to build a business that can manage without you. It depends whether your goal is to open more clinics. It depends on what the end game is for you. Are you looking to sell this as a going concern? Is it something you want to work in until the day you die? Are you going to pass it on to family members? All of these things will make a difference around the way that a business is structured. Generally, if you want to make more money, you're going to want to employ. But of course, that brings with it a number of struggles that Jane number one is having in terms of recruitment, retention and motivation and performance management. So it's harder work to employ, but the potential benefit is that you can make a lot more money. As far as a mix of both is concerned, I have not run a beauty salon this way. I've only run a hair salon this way, and I really struggled to have a mix. I think that your employed team members start to get a bit resentful when they see the self-employed people clocking off at the end of the day and going home when they have to stay until the end of their shift. I think they very quickly forget that they get to call in sick every now and again or they get to go on holiday and still get paid. All of those benefits go by the wayside, and I've never managed to get a successful mix of both. That said, maybe some people have. And if you have a successful mix of employed and self-employed in your business, please reach out. Let me know. Perhaps we could even get you on the podcast for a quick interview about it. So I would choose one or the other myself, and I think it has to depend on what it is that you want out of the business ultimately, Jane number two. Very, very best of luck with it, though. Great to hear about a new business opening, and I wish you all the very best of luck. So there we have it. That's what's going on in the business that I've heard of in my mailbox. If you could do with some help, please reach out, phil at buildyoursalon.com.

I would love to be answering your question next month on the Build Your Salon podcast. Also reach out if you would like to be a guest on the podcast. You know that every other episode is a special guest episode, and I would love to hear your angle on this amazing, amazing industry. That said, please, if you're reaching out as a potential guest, make sure you do have an angle on this amazing industry. I've had a few people reaching out now where it's blatantly just to sell something which actually isn't going to add value to my audience at all. So that said, I would love to be speaking to more of you in the very near future. Just seven short days until I'm coming in your eyes and ears again. And until then, take care. Sit down and see what's going on with the queen of salons. Hair, beauty and more successful tips for business owners. All on Build Your Salon.