Growth Hacking Case Study: Full-Service Hair Salon & Day Spa
Our clients tend to be obsessed with growth. And so are we. Here’s the growth hacking story of how we found hidden revenue in a full-service hair salon and day spa.
The Business
A Moment’s Peace Salon & Day Spa was founded in the Nashville suburbs in 2002. As a mature brand, well-known among its core prospects, it has a long-standing expectation of double-digit YOY growth.
The business is unique in its area, mainly because it offers 10 core services all under one roof:
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- Hair Salon
- Nail Salon
- Massage
- Professional Skincare
- Med Spa
- Sunless Tanning
- Waxing
- Unique Gifts
- Gift Cards
- Spa Parties
Most competitors only offer 1 or, at most, just a few of these service options.
The Challenge
How do we grow a business such as this at an even more accelerated pace?
We learned over the years that growth was coming from 2 primary paths:
- Referrals — People had a great experience and recommended it to others
- Gifts — Men (mostly) gave their spouses/significant others (women, mostly) a gift card
So we focused our marketing on 2 primary goals. The first (internal) is to encourage more referrals. The second (our external growth hacking) is to double down on gift-giving.
The Answer
Once we figured out that it was much easier to sell men on the idea of a “gift she’ll love,” than women on “why A Moment’s Peace,” it became obvious that men were the path to creating new first-time customers (women, the end-users of the gift cards).
And when we analyzed the data and found that first-time women customers using a gift card became regular customers 57% of the time, the ROI of this strategy became even more obvious.
The Strategy
Target the men in the lives of the women we want to be regular customers and sell them gift cards for birthdays, anniversaries, Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, and anytime you’re in the “doghouse” remedies.
Using our basic digital marketing formula, we developed several plausible tactics:
- Search Engine Marketing
- Digital Display Ads
- Search Re-Targeting
- Geo-Fencing
- Demographic/Psychographic Targeting
- Contextual Targeting
- Outbound E-Mail
- Sports Talk Radio
Then, we applied our unique Bullseye Digital Marketing Method to test these tactics and refine them over a period of 90-120 days, which in our case coincided with the Christmas and Valentine’s Day holidays (2 times of year when gift card sales tend to spike).
The Results
As we executed and tracked each tactic, we used a performance dashboard we created using Google Data Studio to monitor the results and ROI by channel and even variations of creative and other variables.
After several iterations now, we’ve learned which variations work best at each time of year. And we’ve even been able to make the sports talk radio campaign more trackable through the use of creative ways to engage listeners digitally.
We now generate over $1 million annually just in gift card sales, and redemption of those gift cards is the primary driver of new, first-time customers. That 57% retention rate has held up, and has allowed us to utilize early-week and evening capacity. In fact, the facility is expanding to be able to keep pace with the growth.
Key findings:
- Different tactics and combinations produce the best results at different seasons
- The spikes at Christmas, Valentine’s Day, & Mother’s Day offer the best growth opportunities
- However, birthdays and anniversaries provide a year-round growth opportunity
How To Growth Hack Your Own Hair Salon & Day Spa
Our company was founded on core principles that include leading with education and investing in our clients long before they invest in us.
We work category-exclusive by city or designated marketing area (DMA). If you’d like to find out if we’re available in your market, just inquire here.
By gaining an understanding of your unique situation and applying the same principles, we can work together to growth hack your business and find new revenue that’s just hiding away right now.
Here’s more about our marketing strategy for hair salons and day spas.
