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Lizzie Grieve is the owner of beauty shop and nail salon The Beauty Factory in Blackburn. As well as managing her business, Lizzie works as an educator, and tells Salon Magazine of the importance of harnessing social media in publicising your work.
When I first started my journey into the beauty industry I thought it best to set myself up a business page on Facebook. This is where it all began for me. I was aware that a lot of people were drawn to the use of social media to find the best places for treatments and recommended therapists. However, at this point I had know idea the power of social media for building up a clientele base.
I soon began to realise that people look to the different social media platforms in order to find their next treatment, the new trends in the beauty industry and book their appointments. Social media is everything nowadays but it equally can take a while to get your head around the various platforms and ways to post in order to gain the most engagement.
I started working from home and so had a very small client base, however when I progressed into a salon, this is when I took more interest in using social media to build up my clients. I am a manager in a very busy salon now and have successfully built up a clientele through the use of social media so, I am proof that this can be achieved! You just have to be dedicated to the use of it, make posts regularly and know your audience.
I would highly recommend setting yourself up on every social media platform available. This may seem daunting and a lot to do, however it takes only a matter of minutes to set up a business account. Even if you haven’t got a large following on every platform, you will soon start to see which has the most activity and engagement, for example Instagram. Then use your other platforms to direct traffic to your best performing account. For example if you have a new treatment or offer, post about this on all accounts and state that they can find out the terms and information from your busiest social media platform. This can also help you build followers on your main used account.
Every platform has an insights section, this has been so helpful and informative for me and many others as it can help you see when you are getting the most engagement from your posts. It provides lots of useful information such as the times that your followers are most active and online. You can therefore time your posts using that information to get the most engagement. This also then boosts how many people see the post, and increases interest which shows up to your followers.
I always add a touch of personality on my social media. This doesn’t mean making it about your private life – after all, it is a business account. I have found adding personality can help when building a clientele, so when they scroll through your images and posts, they don’t just see pictures of nails, hair, lashes etc. They see more interesting content which increases people’s engagement and catches their attention as it is something different. I will also add what is known as a ‘call to action.’ This has been proven to increase engagement from followers, and the more comments you gain on a post, the more it shows up on people’s newsfeeds! Engage with your audience, know what their interests are, ask them what they think, or for a comment on the post you are making. This helps you get to know them and what they think about the content you are posting.
Social media has such an influence on people’s choices and decisions which can create success for you and your business. My advice: be you, be positive, be original and, last but definitely not least, support others! We are, after all, just trying to build up a business! Why not give someone else a like, or a comment to say you appreciate their work. Everybody has the same goal – to achieve! You can make this happen by using social media platforms to your advantage.
See Lizzie’s work on instagram.com/beautybyelizabeth and facebook.com/Lizzienailsandbeauty
