One of the most underrated skills in the barbering game is arguably one of the greatest assets a barber or barber shop can have. What is that skill? Customer service. And what does this skill do for a barber? It increases their biggest money maker… Customer Retention.
Customer retention refers to the ability of a company or product to retain its customers over a specified period of time. In other words, your customer retention rate is your ability to keep your customers coming back after their initial visit. Why is this important you ask?
Well think of it like this, let’s say you’re doing around 100 cuts a month. This month you get 50 new customers, so now your total for the month is 150 customers. This is great for the moment, but if you really want to grow and expand your clientele, you will need to retain those new customers so next month you don’t drop back to 100. Bringing new customers back for their 2nd, 3rd, and 4th visit is key to growing any business, let alone a barbershop.
Doing this will help you create expectations for yourself and creating realistic goals for your business. So, you might be asking, “how exactly can I increase my customer retention?” Well, I’m glad you asked. I’ll explain 5 ways to keep your customers coming back to your barbershop.
- Create a unique Experience aka Provide Great Service
Now I know we touched on this earlier, but this is vital to bringing your customer back, especially if this is a brand new customer. When that customer sits in your chair, you need to make them feel valued. Believe it or not, the industry isn’t known for being professional or courteous to their customers. Don’t be that barber who takes smoke breaks in the middle of a cut. I know, crazy right? If you notice a lot of new customers you’re getting in your chair aren’t coming back, it might be time to reevaluate your process and how your servicing your customers. Even the most average barbers are able to bring customers back to their chair, it starts with service.
- Loyalty Programs
If you’re unfamiliar with this concept, a loyalty program is a program run by a company that offers benefits to frequent customers. Benefits include discounts, free merchandise, coupons, etc. Having a loyalty program does a few different things. It incentivizes your customers to come back as well as build brand loyalty. There’s a reason these big franchises offer loyalty programs, because it keeps bringing customers back.
- Ask customers to rebook
I’ve touched on this topic in a few of my other posts, but it’s crazy how so many overlook this one question. If you ask this the right way, this will increase your numbers tremendously. I recommend, at the point of check out – that’s when you ask the question. It can be something like this, “We usually get busy towards the end of the month, did you want to book your next appointment for the same time on the 26th or 27th?”. By stating, “We usually get busy towards the end of the month…” it shows the customer that you respect their time, and it doesn’t come off as salesy or pushy. It comes off genuine.
And by asking them an either/or question, you are now putting the customer in a position to answer with one of the selected options, “…the 26th or 27th”. If you were to just ask, “Would you like to rebook?”, they would be less likely to commit because the question ends with the answers yes or no, giving them the option to say no. However, by assuming their coming back, and asking them a question with answers that are in your favour, you put your customer in the right mindset to rebook. Eventually, they will get in the habit of doing this and it will seem normal to rebook after getting their haircut.
- Sending Email Blasts
An email blast is an email message that is sent out to a specific list of recipients – in this case your existing customer base. Email is a great way to get in front of your customer when they’re not physically in your chair. I recommend sending out an email campaign at least once a month. Another great thing you can do is send out an email blast to your clients who haven’t been to the shop in a while, with a promo or discount to incentivize them to come back.
- Advertise on Social Media
If you’re not running social media ads for your barber shop now, it’s definitely something you should be investing in. With social media advertising you can target cold audiences (people who have never heard of your brand) as well as target your existing customers! You can do this by creating custom audiences on Facebook and target your email list or anyone who follows your page. The likelihood for them to book their next appointment with you is 4x higher than someone who has never been to your shop.
Now that you understand the importance of customer retention and how you can bring customers back you are now in the right direction to taking your business to the next level. If you’re curious about the benefits of advertising online or would like to get an idea of what Facebook & Instagram can do for your business, take a look at some of the results we’ve been able to generate our clients here, http://bit.ly/VMResultsBarbershops and join our facebook group for barbers http://facebook.com/groups/barbershangout.
