There is one particular question that we ask our salon experts time and time again, and that is ‘How do you use social media to attract new clients?’ As a salon owner, Facebook is a fantastic tool for promoting your salon. Not only can you reach a large client base, but you can also respond to questions and queries about your service offering, as well as showcase the fantastic work you do.

We recently spoke to the Not Another Salon team to find out how they utilise Instagram to promote their salon and have previously created a more general social media guide. In this week’s salon marketing instalment, we discuss leveraging the power of Facebook and how you can use it to attract new clients and market your salon successfully.

As of June 2017, Facebook has adopted 2 billion users, which suggests to us that it makes for a fantastic opportunity to communicate with more potential clients. It’s important that in the digital age, you position your salon at the forefront of the mediums your clients are using.

Related: 7 reasons why Facebook is good for your hair and beauty business

If you haven’t already, set up a Facebook business page…

Facebook has created a super handy step-by-step guide for when it comes to setting up your salon Facebook page. Ensure that you fill everything out correctly and double check for spelling and punctuation errors. Your Facebook page is an extension of your brand and business, and therefore ensuring it is properly set up enhances your professionalism.

Consistency is key…

Leverage the power of memory and association by posting consistent and regular content on your page. Facebook offers a handy tool for scheduling content, so you can ensure that anything you post, whether that be images of your hair or beauty work or details of the services you offer, are regular occurrences on people’s feeds.

Time is of the essence

One aspect that people often overlook is when exactly to post their content. It is important to think about when your client base will be active on Facebook and to coincide your scheduled content with these peak times. Early morning, lunchtime and evenings work best so think about scheduling updates around those times to keep people interested and engaged.

What kind of content do you want to share?

As well as showing off your staff’s excellent skillset and work, you can also share more interactive content such as polls and questions. These could be topics such as: ‘Which is your favourite autumn hair colour?’ or ‘Which nail art do you like best?’ These kinds of interactive posts encourage clients to become engaged with your brand.

You can also share special discount codes and promotional offers for clients (and even potential clients) that share the post or ‘like the picture.’ We also highly recommending running competitions to encourage your audience to interact with your salon page. Competitions offer a great way to have your brand name in front of hundreds of people, and they also incentivise audiences to engage with your page which, you never know, might lead to an appointment!

Utilise Facebook insights…

Facebook now has a super handy way to understand your page audience better with their ‘Insights Tool’ – Here you can:

  • See how many people your posts have reached, and how many people actually engaged with your posts by liking, commenting or sharing.
  • See the number of people who called your salon business from your page.
  • The number of times that you responded to clients and your average response time.
  • The number of check-ins people made to your business with their posts.
  • See reviews left by clients.

Quick wins…

We also recommend encouraging your staff to spread the word of your salon through their own personal Facebook pages, as well as personally recommending the dedicated page to clients in the salon.

Facebook pages also offer a great real-time opportunity to update clients of any changes to opening times, stylists who are off and other important notices. The more people you are connected with, the more of a community you will build around your salon brand.

All of the above attributes are perfect for getting to know your audience, how you communicate with them and also how they interact with your business. Building a successful Facebook page can take time, but once your audience is engaged it will continue to grow and attract new clients. We recommend experimenting with different types of content to see which is most well received. Most of all, have fun with it!