I know it's only the second week of July, but we need to talk about your spa fall marketing plan now.

Most spa business owners leave this crucial planning to the last minute (when they’re in panic mode) and making decisions from their reactive brain. As I mentioned in past posts, a plan that comes from a reactive brain is not going to be nearly as effective as it would be if you started now.

So, what I am trying to say here is, make sure you prioritize your fall marketing plan at least a month in advance.

The Planning Phase of Fall Spa Marketing

Before you start implementing any ideas for your spa fall marketing plan, there are a few essential steps that you need to take first. Trust me; if you don't take these steps first, your marketing plan will feel very disorganized.

1. Determine your seasonality. What products or services do your clients typically choose that time of year? If you don't know what clients want because your past fall marketing attempts didn't work well, you can rephrase this question - what are your consumer's pain points at that time of year?

2. Choose a monthly or seasonal feature based on those pain points.

   Now that you know what their struggling with, match up the service and marketing approach with their concerns. This method allows consumers to quickly identify if you have a solution for them. Here are a few examples of what I mean…

   Skin Therapy - Your client's skin will have different needs with the changing season. Plus summer aggravates certain conditions like hyperpigmentation and acne. Many advanced treatments aren’t advised during summer months, so fall is a perfect time to suggest clients book facials that speak to helping clients transition their skin

   Lashes – Summer is over and clients want low maintenance for getting back to school or work. Although the low maintenance message can be used during the summer to enjoy hassle-free vacations, shifting it to a fall message (working moms everywhere are thrilled to show up at work looking well groomed with minimal effort!) consumers can relate to can be just as effective for bringing in new business in September.

   Waxing – If your niche is waxing, we know that you’ll always have those "summer only waxers" that ballon your biz in the spring. But perhaps you could be sharing information about the benefits of continually waxing year-round to educate those clients/consumers what’s in it for them if they come regularly during the winter.

   Massage – Hopefully your clients have had a great the summer being more active and seeking outdoor adventures and sports. Why not suggest they consider creating an ongoing self-care plan to maintain their summer vibe? This could be positioned as a massage series or a special “tech neck” treatment to buffer the blow of back to work.

   Please know, you don't have to discount any of your services or products. It can just be “featured”. But if you do discount, it needs to be done strategically, that you aren't doing it all the time and your pricing strategy can bear the reduced cash flow. You do not want your clients getting used to you discounting all the time.

3. Decide on the goal of that feature.

   By the time you’ve come up with your feature idea, most spa owners want to dive into making posts and writing emails. Wait!! What’s the actual goal of this offer? Is it to promote a service that needs some love or one that you’re launching? How many do you want to sell? What would you consider successful? How many do you normally sell each month?
   
   Or maybe the goal is to sell more retail? Or create brand visibility? Make sure you’re always keeping that primary goal in mind as you are creating your feature so you can support your team (with offer details & sales scripts) when it’s launched.

4. Create the monthly/seasonal implementation
   Ok! Now you can start curating images and copy for your email , social media, in spa conversations/posters, and website marketing. Yes…you need to spread the marketing message across ALL platforms for it to be seen & heard effectively. Sorry folks, a few social media posts aren’t going to help you hit your goals.

Ideas for Fall Marketing

Check with your vendors to see what they'll be offering: Do they have any gift with purchases or discounts you can pass on? Some vendors are pretty good about getting their features to their clients in a timely fashion. But if they are slow in getting information to you, talk to your rep and let them know that you need more lead time so that you can create a thorough marketing plan.

Create or offer express treatments: Fall is a busy time getting back to school/work for parents, especially in September as they get their families back into a routine with after-school and weekend commitments. Shorter treatments might be an easy solution for this demographic.

Offer free skin analysis/consultations with their service: If bookings are sketchy in September, this idea allows you to make up lost revenue from services by selling retail. If an Esthetician has time, offer to give scheduled clients a free skin analysis & home care routine. Don't forget to include a skincare prescription - the key sales tool for selling retail! Who knows, you may convert a waxing/lash/massage client to facials!

Spotlight your team: If you’re struggling to come up with a service or retail offer this fall, why not feature your team? It improves team culture (who doesn't love being singled out and appreciated) and builds trust with new consumers by giving them more information about your team.

Plan an event: October and November are great months for offering events. But here’s the thing, planning an event takes more time than you think it will, so make sure you give yourself plenty of time to plan it out well. You should be sending out an email announcement to your list three weeks before the event, and strategic email sequences right up to up to the event (no, that’s not too many emails). Plus, you want to have all your social media marketing for the event planned out to dovetail it with your monthly marketing strategy.

Never underestimate the power of layering up your marketing actions. For one of our social media accounts, we ran consistent messaging for a June event via social media & email marketing. Despite June being a notoriously terrible month for hosting spa events, this solo spa client made $8500 in series sales one night. Compare this to her colleague (who she was sharing the event with) who only generated $1500 in series sales!

And on the topic of events, I don't recommend open houses because they tend to have low show-up rates. Instead, sell tickets that guests can redeem at the event and put toward product or service purchases.

Those who pay, pay attention - and the more they pay, the closer attention they pay

-Russell Brunson

Give a September bounce-back coupon to August clients: Bounce-backs work really well for many industries, ours included! Give a September bounce-back coupon to your August clients to boost next months bookings. Be sure to add the Sept 30th expiry and use them sparingly in your business to avoid the discount slide.

Run a social media contest: It's getting harder and harder to achieve high organic reach or engagement on social media anymore. It’s pretty much pay-to-play now, even on Instagram. Social media contests are a great way to boost engagement and increase brand visibility but there are very specific rules for holding contests on Social Media so you will need to do your research before you jump in so you don’t get your account closed. Yikes!

If you need any help getting yourself organized and preparing for your fall spa marketing plan or you just don't have time to do it yourself, contact me. My team and I can help get you started or create and implement and manage your marketing system for you.