There’s more to adding hair
Your reputation and brand are linked.
Article extracted from ‘Getting started in the hair extensions business by Diane Shawe
Guarding your brand encompasses your personal reputation, business name and appearance of your salon or even your mobile business.
Your staff and their performance, how they treat and look after clients, the quality of products you use and the level of service you deliver are also linked to your brand.
All of these are your Unique Selling Proposition (USP) and your USP is your promise to deliver a benefit to your clients who expect you to live up to your promise.
Six ways to help yourself protect your brand
1. Avoid using profanity. You may think that swearing is cool, but you would be surprised at the number of people it offends. Express yourself simply and clearly.
2. Always give your clients your undivided attention. Try not to spend time texting or speaking on your phone whilst doing a clients hair.
3. Be dependable, keep commitments, practice honesty and show no form of disloyalty. Do not gossip or slander.
4. Do not ever take ethical shortcuts; always do the right thing. Maintain a high standards and keep the clients happy. Once a reputation has been shattered, it is very hard to fix the damage. Bad word of mouth spreads like wildfire. So make sure to protect your reputation.
5. Keep your prices and terms and conditions up to date. Make them available and accessible.
6. Ask your clients for reviews, people forget to post a review when they are happy, but when annoyed they go to the internet to tell everyone else but you.
Dishonourable Competitive Complaints (DCC)
Competitors have found a dishonourable way to rubbish another competitors name whilst promoting there own business or services.
Be aware that there are many DCC complaint websites that are not policed in anyway and allows anyone to post a destructive message without any real link back to them.
Messages can also be posted against your Youtube videos, facebook, Google, blogs and articles, so it is sometime worth ticking the box that allows you to approve any messages before they are posted against your name or business.
Get the brush your hair deserves
None of us have the time to go through the internet with a fine toothcomb, but bear in mind that when people use to talk about each other behind each other’s backs, it was all word of mouth and often without your knowledge.
The internet has changed all this and it can be very devastating for small businesses when a client decides to wage a campaign against you and your only sources of income is from your business.
So my advice is to keep posting positive articles, blogs and testimonials from happy clients.
Hopefully in the not too distant future the same rules that apply to newspaper defamation will also apply to the internet.
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