Client booking software is great… but it falls short in a few critical ways.
To make booking more convenient for clients, many salons have started using appointment booking software, like DemandForce, Millennium, and Booker. These apps allow clients to book online, without having to call the front desk and go back and forth on availability. It’s a great experience not only for guests, but also for the salons and their staff, since their books fill up without the annoying game of phone tag.
While booking software collects information about clients, such as name, service history, telephone number and email, it is almost never used effectively for client outreach beyond confirmation emails and texts. Rather, it is a passive tool for appointment setting, which falls short when it comes to proactively engaging your customers.
Driving client engagement and retention
To drive client engagement, Thanx works side-by-side with booking software, giving salon owners the tools they need to engage effectively with clients, creating a more personalized experience for loyal clients. With Thanx, salon owners improve customer retention, drive increased visit frequency and even change customer behavior.
For example, many customers leave the salon and visit online review sites to leave feedback about the service and the beautician. Thanx provides a private channel for client feedback and intercepts bad reviews before they go public on social media channels. Here’s how it works: Right after the client’s credit card is swiped, they are immediately asked to provide feedback about the service within the app. The feedback goes directly to the salon, and salon owners are immediately notified of critical feedback and can respond privately and immediately, often addressing issues even while the client is still on the property. This real-time engagement means that issues can be solved immediately and bad reviews can be avoided.
To improve customer retention, Thanx provides a customizable, world-class loyalty platform that automatically engages and retains your best customers, allowing salon owners to focus on running their business. Customization is important because salon owners know best what incentives will drive their clients to come back more frequently and allows not only ‘intro rewards’ and ‘loyalty rewards’ to be customized, but also allows owners to turn on the engagement campaigns that they want to use, depending on their needs.
Customizing your loyalty program to meet your needs
For example, many salon owners opt to identify their top spenders and give them preferential treatment. Thanx’s VIP campaign tool allows salons to segment their very “top” clients and provide them with incentives or rewards not available to other clients. For example, you can offer your VIPs a free manicure with every haircut, or a free mimosa with every visit. Thanx’s VIP campaign is a great way to not only keep your highest value customers coming back, but also a great way to encourage regular customers to spend more. As customers get close to reaching VIP status, they will be alerted that they are close to earning VIP, which drives them to increase their frequency in order to achieve the elevated status.
Another powerful tool available to salon owners on the Thanx platform is the Exclusive Deals feature. Exclusive Deals allows salon owners to sell goods and services to loyalty members directly within in the Thanx app. Since customers purchase deals in advance and redeem in-salon, Exclusive Deals is a great alternative to blanket discounting sites, like Groupon or Yelp, which don’t allow you to track redemption back to an individual. Exclusive Deals allows salons to lock in advance revenue and the loyalty of their best clients. For example, a salon can sell eight haircuts for the price of six, or a free shampoo with the advance purchase of three cuts.
Thanx’s suite of campaign tools allow salon owners to surprise and delight clients on their birthdays, incentivize visits on slower days or times, and win back lost clients. To learn more, please contact us for a demo.
