the ramblings of a chronic over thinker

anyone know a thing or two or three about marketing?

welcome back! so this week i’m focusing on marketing. during our last staff meeting we got into a pretty interesting conversation about exposure, promotions and marketing. all kinds of suggestions were given. my personal favourite was that jumbo inflatable person-like thing that grabs your attention. i mean, i’m watching it move, but i’m not sure i’m going to come in for a set of highlights because of that guy…

a very long time ago i remembered someone saying your marketing budget should be 10% of your gross, blah, blah, blah. in the grand scheme of things, that’s not a lot, but it’s also sometimes not enough. the way marketing works is this: you plan, you execute, and then you wait for the results. hopefully the ‘plan’ was fool proof and the execution timely. even with a flawless plan and meticulous execution, do marketing groups or plans have a guarantee? like the inflatable tube guy, if i bought him, is there a guaranteed number of folks that would come into my shop? can the formula of marketing promise me more than 1% return on my investment?

can this convince you to get a haircut?

in my industry, the best marketing is you guys! the best promoting is from the patrons that use our services and can attest to the quality of the goods and services we provide. word of mouth is still killing it aaaaand you don’t need 10% of your profits to implement it.

she’s telling everyone about her new haircut!

there are two main topics i’d love to market and promote. fresh knowledge and a styling line for afros. fresh knowledge offers courses integral to our industry because there is no formal training for afros and other hair types (from the government) and there is no formal product lines either (from our suppliers). the powers that be have made it very clear that afros and other hair types are not a priority in the hair industry. this course could help so many stylists equip themselves so they can provide services for afros and other hair types. the government and the supply companies only let hanging hair have a seat at the table. hanging hair! you know what that is. essentially everyone whose hair grows out of their head and is effected by gravity. it hangs straight down and when wet, has absolutely NO VOLUME. if you have hair like that, you’ve never had a problem getting any hair service (well maybe you did, but it wasn’t because the stylist didn’t know what to do). for the rest of us that fall in between hanging hair and afros, we had to figure out cutting, styling and colouring on our own.

so i can spend thousands of dollars to use a company to package and promote fresh knowledge but will it work? could they guarantee me more registrations? maybe? how about the product line? after i create it, produce and package it, would marketing help me sell it all? i mean, maybe some, but could i get a guarantee?

two incredible ways to increase my revenue and make a difference! the reality is, the cost to communicate my new ideas isn’t feasible for my business in this current climate. how long does one wait? when there’s marketing money available? when i have all the time to plan, produce and execute a product line? well, stay tuned.

✌🏾

-p