When was the last time you “shopped” your store? When you visit, keep in mind the things that matter to the customer:

• Is it easy to navigate? Can they find what they are looking for?
• Does it feel “bolted on” or does it express your spa brand?
• Are there product reviews?
• Is it integrated with your Facebook Fan Page and other social media?
• Is the shopping cart and checkout process fast, smooth and secure?

If it’s time to revamp your store, keep in mind:

• This is not an overnight process. Even with the new, simpler templatized solutions, it may make sense to hire someone with experience in that platform to set it up and train you in its use. After that, you can update and maintain the store in house, or with minimal assistance.
• You’ll need to customize the store template to ensure that it reflects your spa’s colors, images, branding, etc. Preston Wynne Spa worked with a programmer experienced in the Big Commerce platform to refine the look of its store template.
• You can’t get all the bells and whistles on your wish list with a templatized store solution. Be prepared to compromise here and there; you save a lot of money. As the store’s sales grow, invest more to customize and improve it.
• Product pictures must be consistent in appearance. Do the backgrounds match?  Are they clean? Use a “drop out” white background and you’ll find that many of the product images you need can be provided by the vendor. The rest should be done by a photographer (unless you are one.) Freelance product photographers are inexpensive, consistent and fast.

Need help starting? I’m part of the project team that can remodel your web store, and even update your website (on an platform that you can maintain yourself.) We also assist spas with their social media programs. For more information, contact Wynne Business. Or if you have a question about your web store, drop me a line at erin@prestonwynnebusiness.com.

But there’s one unintended consequence of all this discounting that doesn’t seem to be on the radar yet: inflation.

Money, like water, finds its level.  If dizzydizcounts.com grabs 50% of my 50% off service, and I’ve gone down that coupon road, ultimately I’ll be raising my suggested prices to enable constant discounting. Department stores have done this for years, knowing that a substantial percentage of their fashion inventory will have to be sold at discount.

As well, as small businesses turn to mindless, cattle call extreme discount marketing, their profits will drop. What do you do when you’re staring at a P & L and the bottom line has dropped out? Hey, let’s raise prices and sell more coupons! In the ecosystem that is the free market, endless discounting will just lead to endless price increases.

We’re already seeing “discount fatigue.” Discounts are sexy when they’re deep…and rare. When they’re deep and common as dirt, they lose their cachet for more affluent consumers. Once tickled by the novelty of a shocking discount, even the customers from the Affluent demographic recognize that the spas who pimp themselves this way are not the ones you take home to mother.

Churn is very hard on a quality spa, and discounting can turn your facility into a churn-factory. It’s hard on employee morale to work with demographically unqualified customers, people you can’t retain no matter how happy they are with your service. It’s hard on employee morale to have your compensation discounted for the promise of future business.

If you’re going to go down that road, any deeply discounted offer you concoct should still be at the net price point of a full-price treatment, i.e., if you’re giving 50% off, it should be on two treatments, not one. And for heaven sakes, unless you just opened your doors, you have a database full of inactive clients who’d love to receive your very own 50% off coupon, and share it with a Friend. They are far more likely to be retained than Newbie McNotip.

Seriously–if you’re gonna get naked, do you really need to pay Groupon to take off your clothes for you?

Discounts encourage a mentality that is the exact opposite of what a clientele-based business wants to cultivate. Discounts train customers to want more discounts, not to be loyal to that kind and generous business that offered them a discount last year.

My last conversation with a Groupon rep lasted for about an hour, an entertaining bit of gladiator combat that I initiated. I was impressed by his passion and we had a fun and lively debate. Here’s what I told him the Groupon promise boils down to: “We’re going to fill your spa with a giant Caterpillar tractor scoop full of dirt. In that huge scoop of dirt is some gold, and it’s your job, Ms. Spa Owner, to find it. If you don’t find it, it’s because you’re blind, not because it was, in fact, nearly 100% dirt.”

In other words, the only reason our discount lovin’ Groupies won’t toss away that next 50% off coupon for Trollop Spa, and offer to stay with you and love you forever, is that you didn’t provide them with a quality service.  Groupon,  a company that’s blessedly virtual, unsullied by the bricks-and-mortar, blood sweat and tears work of delighting actual clients in the real world, would have you believe that if their customers don’t return to your spa at full price, it’s because you suck.

Groupon is the fastest growing company in history, and it’s not surprising. Parasites usually grow faster than the hosts on which they feed.

Did you miss our 5/17 webinar? Register for this live encore presentation.

FREE with advance registration. If you can’t attend live, you can still register to receive a copy of the webinar recording via e mail.

A great public relations program is more important than ever, and there are more outlets for public relations than ever before–including online review sites, Facebook and Twitter! But which modalities are working best for spas in the era of social media?  Which are a waste of time? Are you in control of your brand’s reputation, or is it careening out of control? Kim Marshall, a veteran public relations professional who specializes in spa, hospitality and wellness businesses, takes you on a journey through this fast-changing, sometimes hair-raising, and highly competitive landscape.

This fun, fast-paced webinar, designed to help you separate urban myth from reality, will help you to focus on the marketing tools that “move the needle” and to avoid wasteful experiments. Find out what editors really want–including the topics that travel and beauty editors are interested (and not interested) in right now. Kim has the ear of a diverse array of media professionals, and will share with us exactly what they’re telling her! Gain a valuable understanding of the key components of a compelling public relations campaign–and an insider’s perspective on how public relations actually works–from one of the pioneers of the spa industry.

Moderated by Peggy Wynne Borgman

Give us an hour and we’ll kick start your marketing plan with our stimulating online Marketing Round Table. During this Wynne Business web conference, you’re invited to share your best ideas from 2009 and your plans for the New Year. This is a rare chance to find out from other smart, savvy spa operators from all over North America what’s working for them.

This fast, fun, peer-to-peer learning event is moderated by Peggy Wynne Borgman and Lisa Starr of Wynne Business, as well as guest panelist David Victor from Accelerator Enterprise Technologies, our resident web marketing expert.

To register, visit the Wynne Business Webex Training Center and click on the “upcoming” tab.

Your customer conversation is truly going online. Why let your spa lie there and take the pummeling of Yelpers in silence? You can be part of the dialogue. You MUST be part of the dialogue.

Social media experts agree, this is not a one-night stand. As with all effective marketing campaigns, social media campaigns are for the long haul, not just for “crying wolf” as one expert calls it. They take time and nurturing. And golly, no one has quite explained how they’re going to make money yet. But the collective wisdom is, we all need to get on the train, even if we’re not sure it will take us to Profitville.

“I don’t have the time!” protest small businesses. But I think we all agree that we have time to talk to our customers. If a customer calls you on the phone, you answer it. If ten customers did, you’d answer those ten calls. And maybe hire someone to help you. Even spas are finding social media geeks within their teams and turning over much of this dialogue to them. We know that talking to customers is Good. And talking to customers generally leads to selling things to customers.

So when it’s time to re-imagine your website, your Newsroom page is going to be a lot more dynamic, not a mouldering graveyard of old media placement pdfs, as most of ours currrently are. We’re as guilty as the next, for the moment.

No, our website’s new newsroom is going to look a lot like this souped-up baby, The Social Media Newsroom, a copyright free template from the nice folks at PR Squared

I’d love to hear from spas who are getting results from social media. What are you doing?