Word of mouth referrals and reviews are the best forms of marketing, with 92% of people relying on the opinions of their friends and family to help make purchasing decisions.
If you’re a salon or spa owner, getting referrals and reviews is obviously great for business so let’s find out how you can get more of them.
1. Create a referral program
Creating a referral program is the obvious first step to getting more referrals. It opens up the opportunity to ask your clients to refer your business to their friends and family, and puts clear processes in place for your clients and staff to follow.
To get started with a referral program for your salon, spa or clinic, ask yourself:
- How can your clients make referrals?
- How will you capture information about the referrer?
- Will you offer the referrer and new client a reward?
- How will you market your referral program?
2. Promote your referral program
Whatever program or process you have in place to get referrals, it’s essential to ensure everyone knows about it, including your staff members so they can be confident when talking about it to customers.
Here are some ideas for promoting your referral program:
- Include information about your referral program on your website.
- Send an email using MailChimp, or text message using your salon or spa software, to all your clients asking them to refer someone or just letting them know about how your referral program works.
- Use your social media accounts to promote referrals.
- Tell your clients about it in person. If you have a client who’s ecstatic about their experience with you – ask them to tell their friends and family about it.
- If you have any referral cards or posters, display these at your stations, in treatment rooms or at the counter where clients pay. It could spark a conversation, giving you the opportunity to promote your referral program..
3. Reward the referrer and new client
If you want clients to refer and new clients to come to your salon or spa you may need to reward them. While you will likely get referrals from your loyal regulars regardless of whether you offer a reward or not, having a referral program] with some kind of reward will encourage more people to make the effort, driving more referrals for your business.
For the referrer, it will incentivise them to promote your business. For the new client it may be the push they need to come and visit you for the first time. It’s also a nice way to make them feel special and valued, and get their first visit to your salon or spa off to the right start.
4. Track where your referrals come from
Tracking your referrals is an important part of the process and is essential to getting more. By learning where they’re coming from you can start to understand what’s working and what isn’t.
For example, if you’re getting more referrals from your current clients than from the social media advertising of your promotion, perhaps you should focus your budget and time on rewarding your current clients more than spending a lot on other areas of marketing.
Being able to analyse the results of your referral program will enable you to focus your limited time and budget towards the avenues that work best for your business, which can result in more referrals!
To effectively track and report on referrals, you can use Kitomba Salon and Spa Software. Use the ‘Referred by’ field in the Kitomba and Kitomba 1 Client Card to capture this information, and report on it.
5. Partner with local businesses
Partnering with a complementary business is an easy way to get more referrals. It gives you access to a group of clients in your target market, which you may otherwise be unable to reach.
Start by deciding which businesses in your area are targeting the same clients, but provide different products or services than you do, and have the same service quality and expectations as you (this is key to a successful partnership).
Next, you’ll need to decide on your referral offer and how you think it’ll work. Once you know what your offer will be and how you can create a win-win partnership, it’s time to approach the potential partners with your concept and explain how it’ll be mutually beneficial for you both. Be sure to think about promoting this partnership, too.
6. Exceed client expectations
Word of mouth is one of the most powerful ways to get referrals. However, it often comes from loyalty and that’s something you have to earn. If you want to get your clients raving about you, you’re really going to have to wow them.
Sit down with your team and brainstorm some ways you can do this. By implementing some improvements that exceed your clients expectations, you can increase your client loyalty which can lead to an increase in client referrals. Often the little things can make a big difference.
7. Make it easy
This is a simple one, but it’s easy to overlook. Too often we can miss out on referrals because we’ve just made it too hard for people to do it.
Here’s how to make your referral program as easy and simple for clients as possible:
- Ensure the referral process is easy to understand.
- Make the details easily accessible and concise.
- Make it simple for your clients to refer (one or two steps should be the maximum).
8. Ask for feedback
Asking for feedback on your services or products may not get you instant referrals, but it’ll work towards getting you more over time. By talking to your current clients about what they like and don’t like about your service, you can get a good sense of how you could improve.
This can take your service from satisfying customers to dazzling them, turning them into fans that refer new clients to you!
Use artificial intelligence to save you time
Improve your online reputation and get more 5-star Google reviews for your business automatically with Reputation AI – a new feature available through our exclusive REACH.ai integration for Kitomba customers in Australia and New Zealand.
Reputation AI sends automated emails to your regular clients immediately after their appointment asking them to rate their experience out of five stars and provide feedback.
The feedback is sent to your team by email to respond to, and if their review is positive (4-5 stars), they will be invited to publish their review on Google.
If their review is three stars or less, they will be prompted to contact you privately to address their concerns or leave a review on Google, giving you the opportunity to address negative feedback quickly.
Find out more about this time saving feature here.
If you want more tips for increasing bookings and client loyalty, check out these articles:
Editor’s note: This article was originally published on 18 April 2018 and has been updated for comprehensiveness and accuracy.
