A Comprehensive Guide to Running a Local Medspa/ Salon - A Professional Marketer's Firsthand Perspective

If you are a MedSpa or a Salon owner or looking to become one, you have landed on the right page. After working with many Dentists, MedSpas, Plastic Surgeons and Salons, everyone is facing problems in attracting the right clientele or generating consistent leads. If you are offering high-quality services, you will need strategic marketing and operational excellence to find people to offer those services to.

In this guide, I will walk you through the basics of developing a marketing strategy to help run a successful local MedSpa. I will also include approximate lead costs, advertising strategies, and common pitfalls to avoid.

Understanding Lead Costs and Acquisition

One of the most important factors in a successful marketing strategy for a Med Spa / Salon is acquiring leads at a reasonable cost. The average cost per lead can vary widely based on factors such as location, coverage area (serviced area and its population), your competition, cost and type of service, and the marketing channels you are using to get your message across.

For example, if you are offering a HydraFacial at $199 versus a full-face thread lift at $2000, the results would vary, as you are comparing potatoes with juicy oranges.

On an average the MedSpa's Meta (Facebook, Instagram) Lead Generation ranges from CAD $5 to CAD $20. Click the Image to view actual 30 days stats for one of our Med Spa clients.

Setting Monthly Lead Goals and Advertising Strategies

In my personal experience, whenever I start a new marketing campaign for a service with which I am not very familiar, I don't set a monthly lead goal initially. This is because I am not aware of how much it would cost me to generate a certain number of leads. As explained earlier, a Full Face Thread Lift worth CAD $2000 is an expensive treatment that not everyone can afford. Therefore, it can be assumed that finding leads for such a treatment would be more difficult and hence more expensive compared to something more affordable.

I also consider another factor before I set my monthly lead goals. Ill explain it using an example. Lets say you have Med Spa in Toronto Downtown and another branch in Brantford - using the same marketing strategy and for the same services and same price list, the outcomes may vary.

Reasons for this variation can be due to awareness and competition, which are actually working against each other. If in a set geographical area, we see that the population is more aware of a service, you can also assume that there are more competitors, hence the price per lead should be expensive (or in other words, Cost Per Acquisition of a customer may be higher). On the other hand, if you play it smart, you can properly outmaneuver your customer with better offers or more attractive packages. Word of caution here, dropping your price to capture market is not the best of the ideas.

Along with the above factors, determining the number of leads you should aim for each month, majorly depends on your business goals, capacity, and budget. To start with, I do a trial run and see what is the CPL (cost per lead), audience response, etc.... So, I usually set aside a budget which I am willing to lose to learn some basic stats before I plan my actual Monthly goals. Once you are past that, the goal setting has a basic guideline, aim to generate enough leads to keep your appointment book full while maintaining a healthy conversion rate.

When it comes to advertising, a mix of channels often yields the best results. Consider leveraging social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, as well as search engine advertising on Google. Each platform offers unique targeting capabilities and audience demographics, allowing you to tailor your ads for maximum effectiveness.

The Pitfalls of Traditional Approaches

Many business owners fail to achieve the desired results, despite understanding lead costs and employing various advertising strategies. This is often due to a lack of cohesive marketing strategy, ineffective use of resources, or failure to adapt to changing consumer behaviors and needs. I also advise many of my customers to allocate 30% of their budget for growth hacking techniques - whichever works, include them in the major chunk of your budget and eliminate the ones which are going obsolete.

"Cohesive marketing refers to the practice of maintaining consistency across all marketing channels, campaigns, and materials to present a unified and seamless brand experience to the audience. It involves aligning messaging, design elements, and strategies across various touchpoints to reinforce brand identity, values, and objectives."

"Growth hacking is a marketing strategy focused on rapid and unconventional experimentation across various channels and tactics with the goal of achieving accelerated business growth. It involves using creative and data-driven techniques to acquire customers, increase revenue, and expand a company's user base quickly and cost-effectively."

Introducing the Six-Phase Program

I have learned that in order to address such challenges and to maximize your medspa's potential, I advise adopting my six-phase program, which I have designed to optimize the marketing efforts and drive sustainable growth.

Assessment and Optimization: We start by examining your current systems and operations. Target is to identify areas for improvement.

Social Media and Paid Ads Analysis: Next, we analyze your social media presence and paid advertising channels. By looking at your current numbers and previous assessments, we point out areas for improvement and mark the strategies which are working.

CRM Setup and Lead Generation: We strongly advise setting up a customer relationship management (CRM) system tailored to your medspa's needs, integrating lead magnets and sales funnels to streamline the lead generation process. It allows your support staff to maintain the customer journey/history and enables more personalized messaging, which customers value the most.

Customers are willing to pay more to a barber who knows them by their name and remembers past conversations. For example, greeting them by name and asking about their partner's opinion on the last haircut they had would allow the barber to suggest trying a new service they've introduced.

Strategic Marketing Plan: Based on our findings, develop a comprehensive marketing plan aligned with your business goals, budget, and target audience. (Link to a marketing plan)

Budget Allocation: Now move to define a realistic budgwt for executing your marketing plan over the course of one quarter, ensuring that resources are allocated efficiently for maximum impact.

Continuous Improvement: Finally, the most important part is to make data-driven decisions to continuously improve your marketing plan. By continuously monitoring performance and making adjustments as needed to optimize results and drive continuous improvement strategy, you can stay on top of the game.

Conclusion

Running a successful local med-spa or salon requires more than just offering top-notch services; it demands a strategic approach to marketing and operations.

You need to understand the lead cost (CPL - Cost per lead) and CPA (cost per acquisition or conversion), set realistic goals, and implement a cohesive marketing strategy. This approach will help you unlock the full potential of your marketing efforts and attract a steady stream of clients.

If you enjoyed reading my blog, please consider sharing it with others. If you are interested in learning more about our marketing services, including the six-phase cohesive marketing program, I offer a free 30-minute consultation which you can utilize. I will do my best to assist you, or if needed, you can utilize our services for your business.

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