Intro: Do you feel like you were meant to have a kick-ass career as a hair stylist? Like you got into this industry to make big things happen?
Maybe you’re struggling to build a solid base and want some stability. Maybe you know social media is important, but it feels like a waste of time because you aren’t seeing any results. Maybe you’ve already had some amazing success, but are craving more. Maybe you’re ready to truly enjoy the freedom and flexibility this industry has to offer.
Cutting and coloring skills will only get you so far, but to build a lifelong career as a wealthy stylist, it takes business skills and a serious marketing strategy. When you’re ready to quit, just working in your business and start working on it, join us here, where we share real success stories from real stylists.
I’m Britt Seva, social media, and marketing strategist just for hair stylists, and this is the Thriving Stylist Podcast.
Britt Seva: What is up, my loves and welcome back to the Thriving Stylist Podcast. I am your host Britt Seva and I’m really excited this week to geek out with you over social media.
You guys, we are so long overdue. It’s been a really long time since I’ve done a social media episode. Since I last did one, the world has turned itself upside down, right? In the last social media episode I did, I actually talked about things like the marketing trifecta and how social media was already seeing a shift and pivot, right? The Instagram we knew of 2016, 2017, 2018, really changed a lot in 2019. And — whoa — in 2020, are we seeing Facebook, Instagram video, just social media as a whole, really experiencing a change.
And what’s funny is it’s exactly what we asked for. However, now that it’s here, a lot of us are feeling very raw, and very vulnerable, and very unprepared, right?
Social media used to be about who looked the fanciest. Planning out your 12-square grid. Do the colors line up? What is your pattern, right? It was very curated, which is so funny because it’s a far cry from what social media was when it started.
Raise your hand if you’re my age and you remember things like MySpace, Facebook at its first inception? No one worried about being cool. It wasn’t about that. Even Instagram, when it first started, nobody worried about cohesiveness of their grid, right? How do I use Lightroom? Like all of these things.
We weren’t expected to be professional photographers. It was just literally showing the behind the scenes of your business and it was still this learning curve. As we started to learn it, the bar raised higher, as it does with any skillset, and the challenge was the bar was raised so high that for many of us it seemed insurmountable (especially people who jumped on social media late.)
It was like, “Oh man, I miss those inception years…and now I’m supposed to learn four years worth of training in four months. I can’t do it.”
So what’s interesting is we are seeing a shift back from perfectionism to realism. Show me what you really got. Show me what you’re working with. Don’t sell me on a dream; sell me on the reality, which is so interesting and something we haven’t seen in years.
What I want you to know is that people who are following you now are asking this question: “Who can I connect with on a deeper, imperfect human level through this digital platform?”
I’m going to say it again for the people in the back: “Who can I connect with on a deeper, imperfect human level through this digital platform?”
And when I say that, are you nodding your head? Did somebody in their car just say “Yes!” When I said that, I know because I want that too. I’m like, “Forget it. Throw your photo shoots in the trashcan.” I want to know who you are and what you do and what’s your heart. I want to know I’m dealing with a human being on the other side of this experience, right?
I jokingly say, throw your, your photo shoots in the trashcan. You better believe my girl Morgan is still going to get hit up from me for a quarterly photo shoot. But the way we do those photo shoots, the way I’m going to show up, the way my captions are going to read, and the way I’m going to choose to connect in video and in written form and in everything is going to change and become more humanized and less perfect.
I want to encourage you to do the same because I tend to think that when clients are looking for stylists, there is now this new level that we’re trying to overcome. What is it? The safety barrier.
It is an emotional safety, it is a physical safety, it is a lot of safety issues that weren’t there before. What did it use to be? Going into a hair salon for a good cut and a good time, right? I want to look good when I leave. I want to have fun while I’m here.
Well, that’s still in place, but now there’s this additional layer, right?
I’ve been saying for a long time, good hair is only going to get you so far. Well, now the playing field has been leveled even deeper and clients are looking for professional businesses to go to. When they’re picking and choosing who they want to work with, do you think their standards have been decreased or increased? I’m here to tell you they have been increased.
What they want on social media is to know who you are at your core before they walk in the door and good hair will only get you so far.
I want to walk through an exercise with you. It’s going to be interactive. If you’re on a walk, no worries, just think about these things as I ask them. We’re going to interact and do some brainstorming together on this episode because I want you to think about how you might want to shift your social media based on the current tone.
Let’s start with this question. What do you want to be known for?
I know 70% of you just said great hair. I heard you say it. So that’s great…except for the 70% of you chose the same thing, 70% of you said great hair. How are you going to stand out with great hair when 70% of the industry is doing the same thing?
You ever heard that saying, “If everybody’s special, nobody is”? We all talk poorly about the “everybody gets a trophy” generation, but that’s what happens when we choose a specialty like “I do great hair.”
You and every other stylist on the block have that claim. Great hair, great scalp massages, great customer service. So that’s just playing the game then, because if that’s everybody’s promise, we have to do better.
One of the things I’ve said for years is have a specialty. What is it that you are known for? You don’t have to get crazy with it. You don’t say, “I cut hair with a butcher knife.” Like it doesn’t have to be something weird and bizarre. It just has to be special and a talking point.
“I want to be known for the best bridal stylist.”
“I want to be known for incredible, attainable everyday looks.”
“I want to be known for curly hair.”
“I want to be known for extensions.”
You don’t have to revolutionize the wheel, but if you’re like, “I do root touch-ups. There’s nothing fancy. I do.,” okay. So then achievable looks with root color maintenance and lifestyle haircuts. That’s something that you can choose to be known for, but choose it because just saying a stylist who does good hair and offers good customer service, that’s not it. That’s not special enough. That’s what we all do. That’s what makes us industry professionals dig deeper.
I want you to ask yourself “What do I want to be known for?” And here’s a good way to phrase it. Let’s say your best client. Jessica is trying to sell you to her friend. Jessica knows you’re amazing. Can you imagine if Jessica was like, “Oh my gosh, you should see my girl Britt. She does the best hair.”
And then her friend, Nikki is going to be like, “Well, I have a girl and she does good hair too.”
“No, but like Britt has such great customer service.”
Nikki’s like, “Oh, okay. My girl does too. I always have a great time there.”
And then Jessica’s like, “Oh but Britt gives these scalp massages. You wouldn’t even believe it.”
Can you see how Nikki is going to be like, “Uh-huh. And what else? Cause my girl does that too.”
What can Jessica say about you that’s going to blow Nikki’s mind? Do you see what I’m saying there? What can we do that makes you so special and so different?
The reason we ask that is you need to showcase that specialty on social media and that’s the missing piece for most people. “Well, my clients know that I do that.” That’s nice. Somebody who’s looking at you on social media hopefully is not your client yet, so how do they know that’s what makes you special if you’re not talking about on social media?
Ding! Did you see those light bulbs go off above your heads when I said that? You have to remember the goal of social media is attracting new people to your brand who don’t already sit in your chair. It’s not for entertaining your existing clientele. You’re trying to win people over.
So if you’re not talking about what makes you special, what makes you different? What makes you referral-worthy on social media? How are you expecting to get referrals? It doesn’t even make any sense. So what do you want to be known for as question number one?
Question number two: What about you is relatable, special, or different? Go ahead, right? Wave that freak flag high. Now is the time to do it.
So what do you have to offer that the guy down the street doesn’t? And this ties into the first question, but it’s actually different. When you say things like communication, well, you’re going to have to really blow my mind because most hair stylists really lean into the fact that they’re excellent communicators.
If I asked this room of people listening to this podcast right now, the vast majority would try and tell me they’re an excellent communicator, so that can’t be the X factor, unless you’ve got some sort of secret sauce formula, but then I want you to talk about that on social media, right?
Your salon atmosphere. Is it different? Is it edgy? Is it modern? Is it upscale? Is it feminine? Is it masculine? What is it? I don’t know. And I should know that on your social media.
This is why I say you can’t just post hair. You have to answer more of these questions for me to win me over. Are you a curl expert? Do you do extensions but you do six different methods? I don’t even know that there are six different methods, right? But do you do all six? And then if you do all six, how do I know which one to choose? Teach me that, right? Maybe you just do one extension method, but you are just amazing at it, like no one can touch you. You are off the chains.
How are you going to sell me on the fact that nobody’s better at it than you, your extensions? Can’t just look good because I can name 200 stylists right now in my Bay Area community whose extensions look good. So how do I pick from those 200 incredibly talented extension artists? Or just pick the one that lives closest to me? Or do I pick the one that’s showing off her specialty where I’m like, “I’m going to drive for her. She looks amazing.”
So you can’t just be good at something. You have to be incredibly special at something. And it’s not that hard. You might want to ask somebody around you. Sometimes it’s hard for us to see our own specialty. Say, “Hey, what do you think it is about the way I do extension? So the way I color blend or the way I do whatever?” I don’t know. I don’t do extensions. But what is it about the thing that I do that makes me special? Ask somebody else, even ask a client who maybe be able to give you some really impactful feedback.
How has your life changed recently? That’s something that’s really good to talk about on social media. Are you reprioritizing? Most people are. Are you talking about that on social media or are you just talking about cut, color, curls, happy to be back in the salon? Be relatable. You’re looking for human interactions.
And there’s a disclaimer that goes along with this, we’re getting there, but be human. What are some of the relatable things that you’re experiencing right now? What are some of the things you can share that others might too?
You’ll hear me say this in a moment, but we want to keep it professional. I always like to say personal with a professional twist. I’m not saying let’s have a dear diary moment where we just spill our guts about everything we’ve been going through on social. This is a professional platform and we’re looking to gain clients and they don’t usually want to read our diary, right? Do our clients want to read your deepest, darkest thoughts? Probably not. So we don’t want to put those things on social media either.
But when I say, “What are some relatable things you’re experiencing?”, think did anybody wear a topknot a few too many times over the quarantine period, or another experiencing breakage. That’s relatable. And if you, the stylist, say that, people are like, “Oh my gosh, she’s human.”
We had this concept that we had to be perfect. Imperfection is trending. Be relatable, be human. So they can be like, Oh my gosh, she gets me. Yeah. I wore a top knot 17 days in a row. She gets me. She’s not going to judge me. She understands me. See, I’m creating connection points.
Question number three: what should a guest expect when they book with you? So some of the things guests would like to know: salon atmosphere, guest experience, will they be educated, what is it about your salon that’s different?
Like I said earlier, is that modern, eco-friendly, classic, high-energy, edgy. What is it?
If I had a nickel for every time I scrolled social media and I looked at somebody’s Instagram and it was just pictures of the stylist’s face, pictures of hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, stylist, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, stylist. I still have no idea what it’s going to be like when I go into the salon.
And then we tell ourselves, “Oh, well, if they look at my website…” My love, they didn’t even get to your website because your Instagram or your Facebook or your Google My Business, or your Yelp or whatever didn’t convince them to go there. So while you’re like leaning into that as the crutch of “Well, maybe that’s not on my social media, but if they just keep looking harder…” We don’t want them to have to look harder, right? We want to make it easy.
Generally speaking, people will either look at our website first or look at our social media first and make a judgment. Your social media needs to tell a cohesive and full story, not a piece of the picture; the whole pie.
When I look at your grid, do I get a sense of what it’s going to be like to sit in your chair? Good hair isn’t good enough. What more can you tell me when you post on social media about coming in to see you that’s going to win me over.
Now we’re going to do a little work. I want you to create your focus points based on what’s bubbling to the surface based on what I just walked you through.
I want you to think about what you actually should be sharing on social media right now, so that you are — remember what we said earlier — connecting on a deeper, imperfect human level through this digital platform.
What I want you to do is through the brainstorming we did, make a list of five things you want screaming from your social media loud and clear.
I made some notes. Let’s pretend I’m a stylist and my specialty is I work with clients with thinning hair. Now that’s not all that I do, but that’s a part of what I do. I’m a woman who has thin hair like IRL. That’s Britt Seva. I have very thin hair. It’s why I wear extensions. For me talking about thinning hair comes naturally. I could fill a whole feed about it if I wanted to.
Let’s say I’ve chosen that as my specialty, but the services I do most often are root touch-ups and highlights. That’s two different talking points. My salon I work in is eco-friendly, that’s a third huge talking point. My guest experience is second to none, but I have to sell you on that. So how do I prove to you that my guest experience is second to none? That’s my job. I have to do that on social media. And let’s say I’m located in Lake Tahoe, which is the place I’m yearning for right now. That’s our family vacation spot. I miss it dearly.
So let’s say those are five things that are special about my business. Now that’s my content map. I sit down and say, “How do I convince people who find me on social media that I’m a thinning hair specialist who does root touch-ups and highlights? Primarily my salon is eco-friendly. My guest experience is second to none. And I live by the Lake. How do I convince them of that in four seconds on my social media feeds?” That is your job. And to be relatable and doing all of those things.
“So what,” you ask yourself, “is what photos do I need? I’m going to need before and after photos of how I’ve cut and styled these thinning hair clients to maximize volume, right? She comes in her hair is flat. I blow dry it the way we’ve cut it the way we’ve colored it even right.”
There’s a lot you can do with hair color for thinning hair clients that can really change the way the density appears, right? I need to be showing those things.
I need photos of just happy clients. It doesn’t always have to be before and afters, right? But that people like coming to see me. A smile says a lot.
I need photos of my salon space, photos of elements that emote an eco-friendly salon, maybe it’s retail, plants, maybe I want to use essential oils. Like it doesn’t have to be pictures of what is my salon, but how do I showcase, “oh my gosh, she must be eco-friendly,” right? How do I say that in picture?
Then I need photos of me. I’d love to have photos of me and my guests, photos of my community or me in my community here. I am planning out my schedule for the week in Big Bear Coffee Shop or whatever here in beautiful Lake Tahoe.
How do you want people to find your social media, connect with you, and be like, “That’s my girl/that’s my man. Where have they been all my life? This is somebody who gets me. I relate. They know what I want. They speak my language. Yes.”
That’s what someone should say when they look at your social media, right? So then what would your captions be? Your captions wouldn’t say “Loving this beachy blonde.” They wouldn’t say, “So happy to be in the salon. I really miss doing Sarah’s hair over quarantine. You look good, girl.” That’s not what they would say.
They’d be talking about thinning hair education about thinning hair education, about why I choose different kinds of highlighting methods, right? How many of you use the same foiling pattern on every client? Nobody, right. Well, why not? Your clients don’t know that you need to educate on things like that.
That’s what makes you impressive. What, clients know that we don’t do that? No, they don’t. No, they have no idea. Cause no one’s talking about it and they’re not paying that close of attention. Sell me on it.
Education about why you choose to refresh ends, right? Not all stylists refresh ends with a root touch up. Why do you, or why don’t you?
Education about why you adjust formulas and have re consultations annually. Do you do that? Sell me on it.
Education about why your salon is ecofriendly. Why was that important to you? And why should I be nervous to go elsewhere? Why is your salon safer for me? Safety is sexy right now. People are into that. Sell me on it.
Captions about myself and my personality, who I am, right? I’m a little cheesy. I’m a little goofy. I use a cuss word from time to time, but that’s who I am.
So you like the way I show up or you don’t and that makes you choose me or choose somebody else. And that is what I want, right?
In any brand that I have, I want to be attracting and repelling people to me or away from me so that those that choose to work with me are my people, right? That’s what an effective brand does.
Your brand should not be, “I am the most professional stylist you’ve ever met.” Your brand should be, “I read People magazine every week cover to cover, I eat pizza for dinner every Friday night.”
Be a human. Everybody’s professional; human is rare. Be a human.
So take action. I want you to find the line between using social media for business growth and using it as a personal blog.
I mentioned that a few minutes ago, I’m not saying open up your diary on social media. I’m saying let’s break down the wall. Let’s strip it back a little bit and take off our professional hat. Maybe just tip it to the side ever so slightly and connect on a deeper level.
That’s the gray area. I don’t want you to cross the line and get too personal in sight of the fact that this platform at the end of the day was to get clients in your chair. And I know a lot of times we kind of use the caveat, “Well, the people who follow me on social media love me.” Well, not all of them do. If we’re using social media to gain new clients, they don’t love you yet. They’re just checking you out from afar. If you start opening up that diary and scaring them away, like, “Whoa, it looks like he or she is kind of going through something. I don’t know if I want to step into that right now.”
Listen, it’s okay to go through some stuff. We all go through some stuff. But your professional industry ‘gram isn’t your dear diary.
If you’re actively working with your business, just find that fine line between human vulnerability and sharing a little too much.
What would make a client fall in love with you and is that actively being on your social media? What would you make you stand out from the crowd and what would prove to followers that your existing clients are fully obsessed with you?
And they should be too, like, nobody wants to go to the empty restaurant. Everybody wants to go to the restaurant where the wait list is three weeks long, right? Sell me on that and your beautiful hair photos. Don’t tell me that your clients love you. I need to know that other people love you so how are you going to convince me of that on social media?
Closing thought, you guys remember, it’s not about photos of good hair. We’ve got to go deeper and I challenge you to do so. Remember, I want you to connect on a deeper, imperfect human level through all of your digital platforms.
You guys, so much love, happy business building, and I’ll see you on the next one.
