While spas are havens for relaxation and pampering, anyone who’s in the spa business knows that it’s highly competitive and stressful. There are lots of ways to advertise a spa, but too many people take a similar approach to their marketing and fail to set themselves apart from their competitors. For this reason, social media must be an instrumental tool in a spa’s marketing arsenal (if not the chief one.) Not all social strategies are created equal, however. Here are five tips to help craft a thoughtful plan that could boost your business!
Know Your Audience
If you were deploying an email marketing campaign, you wouldn’t just fire scattershot emails to anyone with an address, would you? No, you would selectively target likely customers or loyal patrons to receive offers. What does this have to do with a social media strategy for your spa? Far too many marketers value the quantity of social media accounts over quality.
You need to be methodical with where you chose to make your social imprint. Generally, spas appeal to adult-to-older-adult women with money to spend. While you can certainly find them on any social platform, you will have better luck if you focus on the ones they are more likely to prefer and interact with. Do your homework and see which way the wind is blowing to line up your social media efforts with the demographic you want to attract.
Show Off What Sets You Apart
Social media gives you the power and flexibility to share your message with words, pictures, video, and sound. It also doesn’t constrain you to the 30-second lengths traditional media has trained us to expect. Take advantage of this versatility to utilize the most important tool in marketing: differentiation.
If you don’t want to get lost in the clutter, you must prove that your spa is one-of-a-kind. What sets you apart? Do you have a massage specialist who offers a technique unique in your area? Do you offer a product line of oils that none of your competitors do? Are your prices or location more appealing than other spas in town? Whatever your differentiator is, make it the cornerstone of your social media marketing efforts.
Spend Some Money
You can’t rely on organic posts to reach the audience you want. Sure, your followers will see them, but most of them are already patrons. If you’re lucky they’ll share them with their friends and followers, but even that won’t get you much traction. In fact, some social media algorithms punish businesses who promote their services on free pages by burying them in followers’ feeds. Invest in boosted and paid social.
The major social media platforms’ ad interfaces support almost any level of advertising budget. The incredible power they provide comes from the surgical precision with which you can specify the audience you want to receive ads. You can pinpoint by demographic factors like age, income, location, and gender. Chances of converting the right potential customers dramatically increase when you focus your efforts on them!
Solicit Testimonials
Word of mouth is crucial in the spa business, so use it in your social media marketing! Ask customers if they would be willing to be in a video for your channels-you can always bribe them with a discounted or free product or service. You can also reach out to them with surveys that include open-ended questions. Just make it clear that you may quote them on social media. You can always just attribute them to “a satisfied customer” if anonymity is a concern.
Offer Discounts and Rewards
Speaking of bribing customers, feel free to boost special promotions or offer discounts to people who say they’ve seen your ad on social media. Be careful with contesting, though. In some cases, it may run afoul of a platform’s terms of use and threaten your page. A discount is usually safe, though.
Social media is the perfect advertising tool to make your spa shine and appeal to new customers. Use these techniques to get the most mileage out of your social marketing, and you may see impressive results!
