
Welcome to the Salon Ownerโs Podcast, Phorest FM Episode 6. Co-hosted by Killian Vigna and Zoรฉ Bรฉlisle-Springer, this show is a mix of interviews with industry thought-leaders, roundups of our most recent salon owners marketing tips & tricks, all the latest in and around Phorest and what upcoming webinars you can join. Phorest FM is produced every Monday morning for your enjoyment with a cup of coffee on your day off.
Phorest FM Episode 6
One of the best ways to engage clients through an email is by using call-to-action words. We discuss the different types of these, and how to use them to effectively to get the attention you want from your audience. Next topic covered is best send times for holiday email marketing campaigns. We then review of some of the most popular blog posts and topics from the month and give you a look at some of the things Phorest has been doing around the office to boost morale for this time of year.
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Transcript
Killian Vigna: Welcome to the Phorest FM podcast, episode six. Iโm your host Killian Vigna, and today Iโm joined Zoe Belisle-Springer. This week weโre gonna go through the top blogs so which call to action words will help grow your salon client list. And weโll give you the best holiday send times for salon email campaigns. To wrap up the podcast, weโll have a special guest talk about some really cool goings on here at Phorest. And how your salon might be able to benefit. Zoe will also give us a quick recap of some of the most popular blogs online in November. This podcast is produced every Monday morning for your enjoyment with a cup of coffee on your days off. Now, letโs get into the show. So Zoe, letโs kick it off with your two blogs. So, weโre only gonna go through two today because we want to do a monthly round up here to finish off November.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly. So the first blog that was published this week was about call-to-action words. Itโs kind of a subject that some people donโt really know what it really involves. So CTAโs, call to action, is basically just that little button at the end of an email or itโs even just an incentive on social media. Just click here, book a demo or book an appointment. Itโs those kind of like โhereโs what you should do nextโ.
Killian Vigna: Yeah.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Kind of thing for the client.
Killian Vigna: Itโs usually like your goal.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly.
Killian Vigna: Or kind of your stepping stone. So if someoneโs opened your email, itโs not just getting them to open or read that email. You actually want them to click your action to maybe go through to your website.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly.
Killian Vigna: Maybe even a booking link.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly. Yeah yeah yeah. And because salons send so many emails out to get appointments in or even sell products, at this time of the year itโs really important to get the most out of your emails because, and weโll get to that in the second blog, but this time of years email campaigns just clutter peopleโs inboxโs. And so these words can really help a client get into what youโre trying to get them to do.
Killian Vigna: Yeah.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: So youโve got many categories. Youโve got the power words. So letโs say just amazing, bonus, latest, save big, those kinds of things, right. Then youโve got the action words, download; so thatโs all the like click here or discover now.
Killian Vigna: Do.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, do.
Killian Vigna: Eventually.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, make an action now. Then you have the ones that kind of imply rarity. So limited offer, only five left. It usually puts a time frame on it a little bit.
Killian Vigna: Now with those, youโd want to be careful not to keep throwing out limit or limited or ending soon because people get used to that. So you want to make sure it is actually โฆ
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Limited.
Killian Vigna: Actually limited or has a time scale.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah.
Killian Vigna: Donโt just throw it out willy nilly.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Another category there is exhibiting. It kind of ties into the one just before but this one can actually be really useful for if youโre promoting events and such. So we have an exclusive offer for VIP clients or we have a VIP event, ask for an invitation, things like that. And then youโve got the urgency words as well. So itโs basically like today, hurry, now or never. Those kind of things where itโs just like-
Killian Vigna: Act now.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Act now, or youโre gonna miss out. And obviously these categories you can all mix the call-to-actions words together and make it more powerful. So it could be like download today. So you have an action, but youโre also saying do it now.
Killian Vigna: Now I know youโre saying you can mix the words together and make a real powerful sort of statement and stuff. Yes, you can. But you also kind of want to be careful that you donโt saturate.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah.
Killian Vigna: Like the example of and email or a landing page on a website. If you see like five different call-to-actions, what is your call to action. You canโt have five, six, seven different ones.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: So what you basically recommend, normally, would be on a landing page, social media, or email, or any place where youโre going to put those kind of buttons or incentives. You want to have one message and one call to action. Donโt try and put like three in the same place because then your client is going to be like what do you want me to do.
Killian Vigna: And even if they did go ahead and click one, for them to come back, itโs very rare. Usually, theyโre just going to keep moving forward. And thatโs what call to actions are; youโre creating a journey. You want to put your client or your customer on a journey. You donโt want them to go back, forward. You donโt want to go forward one step back to, do you?
Zoe Belisle-Springer: There you go. Yeah. So thatโs pretty much it for the call to action blog. Itโs basically a listing of the best ones that tend to work. Itโs based on some research marketing companies did, and so itโs really interesting. Itโs a bit like the salon hashtag blog that we had where we listed all the most performing hashtags. is is the same thing but for call to actions.
Killian Vigna: And then that moves us on to what everyone is dying to hear now coming up to Christmas. How to get out of the noise and the clutter. So go on, Zoe, what is it?
Zoe Belisle-Springer: So there was some research done on best holiday send times for email campaigns specifically. So if you havenโt yet sent out your email campaigns for Christmas and New Years, the research found that people were most active say December 22nd, 26th, and the 29th. Thereโs kind of a drop where the actual holidays happen, so Christmas day and then Christmas Eve and New Years, New Yearโs Eve. Thereโs a really low drop because obviously, people are in their family, theyโre not going to check their email. OR if they do, theyโre probably just going to put it into their spam or trash. Theyโre not actually going to click on it, and thatโs what you want to do.
Killian Vigna: I was literally just about to ask you why does it flatline at Christmas. It basically flat lines like Christmas Day but then it spikes on January the 5th.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, so January the 5th, if you think about it. Itโs the start of most businesses.
Killian Vigna: Yeah.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Itโs the week, the debut back from holiday week. So people get back at their desks or even just youโre in the salon, youโre automatically going to try to catch up what happened when you were away on holidays. So thereโs gonna be a spike there. So if you need to send a campaign around New Years, try to send it before the holidays, even maybe Christmas.
Killian Vigna: Yeah.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: But if you do need to send something else, later on, the best would be like the Thursday. The research found that the best would be the first Thursday coming back from holidays.
Killian Vigna: Yeah itโs kind of, when businesses start getting back in. I mean, so youโre all marketing to clients but, for people like us, where weโre marketing business to business, you are in that Monday to Friday window.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly, yeah.
Killian Vigna: But for you, you have the full seven days, essentially.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah.
Killian Vigna: Because theyโre personal emails.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly, yeah. Theyโre also saying that overall in the week, the best time to send an email would be around 11 am. Itโs like a window frame between 10 am and 12 with a peak at 11. So that would be from approximately Monday to Saturday-ish. But if you were to send an email on the weekend, then there is a huge difference between Saturday and Sunday. And it is better to send it off on โฆ Let me check to just make sure Iโm not saying something stupid here. But the weekend would be 9 pm and the Saturday would be 11 am. But the Sunday would actually get better engagement.
Killian Vigna: So is that because a lot of people are settling down, theyโre starting to relax on a Sunday evening. Theyโre getting the laptop open. Theyโre just bursting through that little bit of emails before work.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah. Well, to be honest, thatโs something I do, personally.
Killian Vigna: Yeah.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: So Iโm not really surprised by this. On your Saturday, you just finished your week, for most people who work like say 9 to 5. And thatโs probably many of your clients as a salon owner. So people arenโt really going to check their emails on a Saturday. But come the Sunday, they kind of want to check whatโs going on in the Monday morning so they kind of catch up a little bit.
Killian Vigna: Yeah and Iโm just looking here youโre saying peak times between 10 am and 12 am. Or 12 pm. I mean like when you just think about your own kind of daily routines and activities, that falls around your break time.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, pretty much.
Killian Vigna: So youโre essentially talking to yourself and go well when am I on my phone. When am I opening my emails, my social media. Again, we can give you this marketing advice and research and stuff like that. But you still have to go back and check your own analytics.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Oh, definitely. Yeah yeah yeah. And these are generic analytics obviously. Theyโre based on data from over thousand and thousands of emails and different people. So, of course, your clients arenโtโฆ From salon to salon, itโs not gonna be the same thing. And from person to person, even if the generic time, the peak time would be 11, that client of yours might just open their emails at 9 pm. Because thatโs what their day looks like.
Killian Vigna: Yeah, exactly.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Itโs just an overall thing you know.
Killian Vigna: Yeah.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: So itโs a good idea, itโs a good thing to have in mind when youโre creating your campaigns. But obviously, you need to look at your analytics as well.
Killian Vigna: Yeah, at the end of the day, itโs a good guideline, itโs a very good guideline looking at this, the images here. But itโs not a plan, donโt take it for gospel.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly. Yeah.
Killian Vigna: Take your guidelines Zoe has given you and then check your own analytics and kind of co-align them there.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah and you can always adjust every now and then and try things out. Donโt be scared to try things out. Sometimes we send emails, sometimes we donโt get as better as good a response as we would like to but you know.
Killian Vigna: And itโs really obvious in the office too when you get a good hit, and everyoneโs excited and when you get no hit, and the campaign gets forgotten about. No one mentions it.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: There you go. So itโs all about readjusting week on week and month on month. And eventually, youโll find a formula that works for your salon, basically.
Killian Vigna: Cool. So just that weโre talking about Christmas here. Weโve a special guest in here today. Weโve Siobhan McCaffrey, and the idea of this is, so youโre coming up to Christmas, your staff are very busy. Theyโre gonna start getting stressed. And we always talk on this podcast show about how we talk about the goings on in and around Phorest. And today is actually the first time we get to give you that inside peek of what is going on. So without saying any more, Siobhan, what has gone on here in the last few weeks.
Siobhan McCaffrey: In the last few weeks weโve been doing a few things to up moral. Itโs a stressful time in the lead up to Christmas. So without a doubt, everyone is feeling it. So weโve been doing a few little things to take the edge off and-
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Weโre drinking champagne right now.
Killian Vigna: Thatโs what all the noise is I signed.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Thatโs not always what we do, but sometimes it is. Because itโs a stressful time, personal life and in a work environment, particularly in the salon industry, and we are very much part of that. Itโs the busiest, without a doubt, time of the year. We have introduced a wellness week that we are currently towards the end of now.
Killian Vigna: Thatโs what the champagne is for.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Thatโs what the champagne is for. Very good for you. So we were doing yoga one of the evenings this week to do an unwind. We did a smoothie morning. We had to get fruit in because of course, itโs good for you. We did a nutritional talk as well. We had an expert come in from the leading gyms over here in Ireland, EducoGym. We had somebody in giving us nutritional information. All these things, theyโre not just important at work, theyโre important at home as well. So itโs nice to be able to bring it full circle.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: So how did the social team come about in the first place? Because the wellness week is right now, but the social team has actually been around for a little bit of time now.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Yeah, the company is growing enormously, which is excellent. But as it grows, people do quite literally grow apart. Weโre on different floors, and itโs really to bring us back together. If youโve happy staff, youโve productive staff. And that works regardless of what your industry is in. So itโs certainly something that can be taken on in a salon environment. Iโm ex-salon. I worked in a salon for nine years, and I know the importance of getting on with your colleagues. And itโs nice-
Killian Vigna: Especially when youโre in that close environment.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Absolutely, yeah.
Killian Vigna: Because like, weโre five floors here and nearly 200 people. But a salon, youโre dealing-
Siobhan McCaffrey: Seven people maybe on a day.
Killian Vigna: Yeah, exactly. So you want to make sure youโre getting on with them and someone you can actually talk to and stuff like that every day.
Siobhan McCaffrey: And your last memory of the day, you donโt want it to be God that was hectic. You want to be able to say oh, we had a-
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Had a wonderful day.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Yeah, we had a greatโฆ We went to Pilates all together or wasnโt it really nice one of the girls ran in and grabbed us all smoothies. And itโs little things like that that are really good for your head.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, because like most people will kind of think oh, team activities, letโs go out for a drink, letโs go out for dinner. But there are so many more options that you actually do and can place.
Killian Vigna: It did start off with the pizza and the beer, didnโt it for the first one.
Siobhan McCaffrey: It did.
Killian Vigna: And that just had to go very quickly. So it was a lot of expanding waistlines and a lot of giving out to Siobhan saying we need something healthier.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Well thereโs always a place for some pizza and beer. It was nice to be able to branch out a little bit. We have some people that are working outside of Ireland, so theyโre not in the office all the time. They were always missing out on Dominoโs. So we said that weโd make it kind of full circle and this week, as part of wellness week, everyone knows you get a bit stressed. We got some stress balls in for everybody-
Zoe Belisle-Springer: I really thank you for that by the way.
Killian Vigna: Which and, I canโt emphasize enough, how those stress balls arrived on the most perfect day. Everyone in the whole building was running around with a purple stress ball.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Yeah we here on the Phorest team, we all bleed purple in here. So we decided weโd go purple. Which is really nice but because we have a lot of people that arenโt in-house, we have people that are on the road. We have people all over the world working for us. And we wanted to make them feel part of the team too because they have a stressful day as well. So we did up little stress packs which we sent out to people, and they had some incense, some chamomile tea, we had little scented candles.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Thatโs really cute.
Siobhan McCaffrey: They are actually adorable. We should take a picture of them and pop them up actually.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah we can definitely do that. Pop them up on social media.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Yeah, theyโre adorable.
Killian Vigna: Keep an eye out.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Yeah. So we did that as well, just for people not to feel left out. And thatโs something as well. Because very often, in a salon, you have somebody off-site thatโs working in marketing. But no doubt theyโre going to be having as stressful a day as you. Itโs nice to be able to pull those in as well. And something like a smoothie voucher, so they donโt feel left out when all the girls go down to get their smoothies. Or they could meet you after work for Pilates. Something that you can include everybody in is always nice.
Killian Vigna: And it doesnโt even have to be expensive. Because for Halloween, what did we do? We just went upstairs and we all watched โฆ We ended upโฆ
Siobhan McCaffrey: We ended up downloading a movie. Legally downloading a movie.
Killian Vigna: It was Netflix.
Siobhan McCaffrey: It was Netflix. We watched a movie on Netflix for Halloween. We did a vote on it, and we picked the best one that was coming up.
Killian Vigna: That was done by an emoji quiz as well.
Siobhan McCaffrey: And emoji quiz which is actually fun as well. So like, little things like that, it just kind of pulled everybody in together. And it was free. The Netflix that I was already paying for, it was used. So it cost nothing to do it, and it makes such a difference. Like the moral was absolutely boosted that week. And even in the lead up it was good fun. With the lead up to Christmas as well weโre hoping to do just over lunchtimes because weโve got a really cool office here. Everyone tends to have their lunch in here, and weโve got a really big screen so weโre gonna pop some Christmas movies up. And it means nothing and it costs nothing. But itโs going to boost moral without a doubt and the stressful period at home and in work, any little helps, without a doubt.
Killian Vigna: Yeah, and itโs no big secret, if youโre staff is happy, youโre clients are gonna be happy. Like when was the last time you walked into a shop and you barely got a hello or goodbye from the shop assistant? And you left that shop feeling, I suppose bitter or vindictive or something. Itโs like Jesus, I want to go back and put some manners on him. But that is the case. If you went in and that shop keeper was real happy and jolly, youโd leave there feeling a million dollars like.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Oh and youโll go back.
Killian Vigna: Yeah. 100 percent. And youโll even get chatting with him next time. But we just canโt convey it enough; happy staff, happy client. And it doesnโt have to cost you anything. We did do paintballing and stuff the other day. But that was the staff volunteering to pay it up themselves.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Yeah. And it had a great turn out. Better than I expected.
Killian Vigna: And it was a freezing cold, wet day.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Yeah. But like all that out of it was a positive experience even though a few people had a few bruises and there were a few sniffly noses, it was definitely worth doing. Because it was more to talk about, it brought the team closer together. And like I said, the team has grown so much that weโre over five floors, as Killian was saying. And the fact that weโre like one big family, I think itโs down to the fact that we have these little extras.
Killian Vigna: I genuinely, I donโt know a single person that comes in and doesnโt look forward to going to work. And thatโs all down to it. Because everyone seems to get on, everyone helps each other. So it is like just bringing staff together, canโt emphasize it enough.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah. Well, thank you so much for joining us today.
Killian Vigna: Thank a million, Siobhan.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: It was great having you andโฆ
Killian Vigna: Canโt wait for next months activities.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah, exactly.
Killian Vigna: Christmas dinner on the balcony.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Iโll have Elf playing.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Amazing, have a great one.
Siobhan McCaffrey: Thanks a million.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Chat later, [crosstalk 00:17:44]
Killian Vigna: Cool. So, now just to kind of wrap up the show. Weโre coming to the end of the month here. Well, weโre actually going into December I suppose, yeah.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Pretty much.
Killian Vigna: So Zoeโs just going to do a nice end to show with a recap of all the top blogs that have been up on the Phorest blog now for November.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah. So every month, at the end of the month, we send out an email listing the four top, most popular blogs that have gone out in the month. And during November it was Attitude of Gratitude which we spoke about in episode three if you want to check that out.
Killian Vigna: We had Justin Fiddy, our loyalty man come in for that one
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Exactly. And then the second most popular one was The Simple Salon Marketing Mistakes. So that was with Connor in episode three.
Killian Vigna: Yep.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: And then we went also to the Christmas DIY Decor Ideas, and that was actually discussed in episode four. So there was loads of little, tiny thing you could do in your salon, just to bring the merry a little bit everywhere and not just your retail display. And the fourth most popular blog was the December Monthly Marketing Ideas. So we usually do those monthly marketing toolkits and their very popular every month. So they kind of always ends up in the top most popular ones. So thatโs all available on the blog. If you just look up the titles youโll find them immediately. So thatโs pretty much it for the most popular blogs.
Killian Vigna: Now before we go, if theyโre the most popular blogs, whatโs your favorite one?
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Thatโs hard to say.
Killian Vigna: You didnโt expect that question did you?
Zoe Belisle-Springer: No.
Killian Vigna: I know my favorite one there.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah the one you wrote.
Killian Vigna: No, itโs actually the simple salon marketing mistakes. The one we had Connor come in and talk about. I actually thought that was one of the best ones this month.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Yeah well itโs really important, and it was a veryโฆ Itโs a topic that always comes back because itโs just like what am I doing wrong.
Killian Vigna: Yeah.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Whyโs this not working. And he pretty much highlighted the most top five mistakes you can do. So that really helps out. So Iโd say favorite, hard to say but really helpful, that one. And then, also for your marketing kind of side, the December Monthly Marketing Tool Kit. Go download that for free, itโs up on the blog. It can really make a world of difference if you donโt have that much time for planning and such.
Killian Vigna: Cool. So that is essentially our show today. So, Zoe, once again, thanks a million for joining in.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: No worries.
Killian Vigna: Iโm Killian Vigna and enjoy December, guys.
Zoe Belisle-Springer: Enjoy. Catch you next week.
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