Today, almost every neighborhood has a women’s salon, whether in big cities or small villages. Salons have become a pressing need, a big market for new businesses and a highly competitive field, and they come in many types — from full-service women’s salons to salons specializing in nails, lashes and brows, to barbershops. If you’re thinking of opening a salon to welcome clients, we’ve summarized 7 essential tips or steps to help you develop an effective, successful business plan.
We need to start with a feasibility study for setting up a salon business:
1. Business model
One of the first and most important steps in setting up a salon is creating a business model, which helps you define your idea, the value you’ll add through the business, the fundamentals it’s built on, and your plan of work.
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2. Market and target client study
Once your business model is ready, start studying the market to make sure you understand the current salon market in your area and the neighborhoods near the salon. You’ll find out whether there are enough salons and whether their number is growing. This helps you plan how to stand out from other women’s salons: by getting to know your competitors, you can learn their strengths and weaknesses, as well as the level of supply and demand for each of their services and products.
3. Brand identity
Identity plays a big part in making your salon stand out. It covers the business’s complete visual identity, such as the name and logo, as well as details like typography and colors. Choose a distinctive name that fits your salon’s identity so it stays in clients’ minds.
4. Choosing services and products
Offer distinctive, professional services and high-quality products. Think about how to make your salon unique, and identify your most in-demand services — the ones you deliver with the highest professionalism and that clients love most. Focus on the quality of your products: choosing outstanding services and high-quality products keeps you in clients’ minds and links the value of your work to them.
5. The business’s financial plan
This is based on the size of the salon and the basic requirements for its services — equipment and machines, human resources, staff and their wages.
Here’s a summary of the main known costs of setting up a women’s beauty salon:
Licenses and permits: there are municipal requirements, which you can read about on our blog if you’re in Saudi Arabia. You’ll also need a commercial registration, and other permits if you plan to sell the salon’s own products.
Premises: set aside a sum for rent if the salon is rented. If you buy the premises, you won’t need to pay annual or monthly rent.
Payroll: this includes the salaries of the staff you hire, along with any related benefits or bonuses you want to offer.
Salon equipment: a women’s beauty salon needs a lot of equipment for each section. For example, the hair section needs chairs, basins, hair dryers, hair care products, hair color products and more, while the skin section needs beauty and makeup tools, skin cleansing and exfoliation devices, and many other salon tools. If the salon offers other services, such as nail care and nail art or a dedicated spa area, these have their own equipment. The salon also needs an accounting system that manages bookings and monitors the salon effectively, a computer and more.
Inventory: if you plan to sell skin or hair products to clients, you’ll need a dedicated place to store products before opening.
Reserve: to avoid financial crises and run the salon well, set aside a reserve fund for the salon.
6. Invest in your staff
A women’s salon is always focused on serving women with a high level of professionalism, so it’s essential to have a skilled, knowledgeable team that’s friendly with clients.
Train and motivate your staff, and create an annual training plan with the best trainers — hairstylists and makeup artists — keeping them up to date with the latest fashion and modern techniques.
Train your reception and management team too, enrolling them in courses to help them sharpen their skills and serve clients with great professionalism — which may encourage clients to visit the salon again and again.
7. Marketing the salon
Marketing is the client’s entire experience — much more than “promotion” or running an ad with an influencer or on any marketing platform. Marketing is the client’s experience from how they book an appointment, to how they’re welcomed, to how services and prices are presented, through to the end of the service. Build a marketing plan first; promoting the salon comes after that.
Here are some important tips for promoting your salon:
- Create a Google Business Profile for the salon so it appears on Google Maps.
- When advertising on social media such as Snapchat, focus on the geographic area near the salon.
- Manage online reviews. Clients tend to trust online ratings and opinions when judging salons, so try to respond to every review you receive — especially negative ones — in the right way.
- Keep a database of all your clients from day one, and start contacting them on occasions and at other times by phone or on social media.
- Set up a points-based loyalty program for your clients.
Tip:
When launching an ad campaign, define your target group precisely by age and location, and make sure it fits local culture and interests and doesn’t conflict with them.
A booking system for your salon: without doubt, one of the most important reasons your business will succeed is your ability to run it smoothly. Naeem provides everything a salon needs: an internal booking system, client ratings, staff management, client management, WhatsApp communication with clients, online booking, online payment, coupons and gift cards, inventory management, leave management, package management, integration with other systems, notifications by text message or email, staff commission calculation, sharing invoices on WhatsApp, and pricing for services and service providers.
It also offers reports and statistics to support your decisions, cashier management, branch management, service provider performance reports, cashier staff performance reports, notification management, and installment payments for clients through Tamara or Tabby —
more than 50 features to help you raise the quality of your services.
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Finally, we wish you a successful journey full of achievements.
And don’t forget: the market has room for everyone. Don’t get caught up in watching your competitors — keep developing your services, because the best always last.
