How to Make Customer Satisfaction the Core of Your Barbering Biz
As a barbershop owner, manager, or whatever-the-heck-title-you’ve-acquired that essentially says you run the show, it’s no secret that you’ve got an absolute ton of stuff constantly on your plate.
You’re probably constantly crunching numbers, accommodating barbers, trying to be a good boss and keep your dream team happy, making sure the shop is up-to-date on the latest and greatest barbering trends—in short, you’re probably doing a whole heck of a lot at any given moment.
If this is you, we advise you to take a second and slow your roll—yeah, like right now—and ask yourself the most important question you’ll ask yourself all day, week, month, or quarter: are your customers satisfied?
If you can’t answer that with a resounding, 100 percent, without question ABSOLUTE yes, then we’ve got news, fam—somethin’ ain’t right.
This is a question that we advise you to ask yourself constantly because when it comes right down to it, the customers (and their satisfaction) are the core of your entire business.
Sure, your talent matters. And of course, your flexibility and your location and your creativity all matter, too.
But at the end of the day, you’re not a creative business. You’re not an artist running a gallery. You’re a barber and you’re providing people with a service—albeit a badass service, but a service, nonetheless.
That’s why we’ve come up with this can’t-miss list of barbering tips for ensuring that customer satisfaction is at the center of your entire barbering world. If you read through these and find you’ve been missing out, we suggest you give them a whirl—your customer satisfaction scale might just be on the upswing.
Think About a Loyalty Program
This is one of the simplest ways to really boost your customers’ satisfaction levels. Notice we didn’t say easy—we’ll get to that part in a minute.
The reason loyalty programs work so well for companies is because they’re designed to make your customers feel valued and respected. Which, by the way, are integral pieces of the customer satisfaction puzzle.
Your customers want to feel like they’re important, they want to feel like you understand their value, and they want you to reciprocate that in a way that goes above and beyond just a fantastic cut (although to be fair, a fantastic cut can be the greatest sign of respect ever, but we digress).
Loyalty programs, when done correctly, are designed to keep your customers coming back for more, and by gifting them value, they’ll feel satisfied with their experience. Quick note, though—customer loyalty programs are not for everyone. If it’s not a financially prudent move, we don’t recommend going all-in on one.
The choice is yours, but we encourage you to check out some pros and cons of loyalty programs to see if it’s a good fit for your shop.
Get Your Employees on the Customer Satisfaction Page
If you can’t get your employees all on the same page pretty quickly, you can bet your customer satisfaction dreams are bound to sink. In order for your customers to feel welcomed, valued, and totally satisfied with their experience, there needs to be an agreement from staff to focus on that as a priority.
If your customers aren’t getting that vibe from everyone in your employ, you better believe that it’s not going to be the leading feeling they take from an experience at your shop. Get your dream team on board and make sure they understand what’s at the root of this idea—the more you train them, the better they’ll get it.
And remember, training is a constant, living, breathing thing—it’ll take time and dedicated effort on your part (but that’s part of your leadership role!)
Embark on the Customer Experience
We mean exactly what this subheading sounds like—embark on the customer experience yourself. Go through every step the customer goes through in order to step foot in your salon.Is the online booking function on your website easy to operate? When you call in for an appointment, is your staff helpful and polite? When you walk into the salon, are you being greeted immediately and taken care of?
If you work through every single step of the customer service experience—all the way to the follow-up messages a few weeks after an appointment—you’re bound to gain a better understanding of where you can improve and what you’re missing in your customers’ experiences.
Poll Your Customers & Listen to Feedback
In that same vein, don’t ignore your customers. You more than likely have a few regulars that you can chat transparently with—we’re sure they’d be happy to dialogue with you about where you can improve or what you’re doing well.
Further, listen to your online reviews. Check the feedback people are leaving about your shop. Is there something you could be doing better? One of the biggest mistakes people—in all industries—make is neglecting to acknowledge the very real feedback and criticisms that clients give them.
Don’t be that shop owner or manager. Listen to the feedback that’s there and make necessary changes—your customer satisfaction rate is guaranteed to shoot up!
Remember, the Customer is Always Right (Well, Most of the Time)
We’re not going to pretend that every person who complains or critiques your business is right—a lot of times, you might get an unfair shake from a customer. But we are going to let you in on a secret—there are plenty of times where your customers are wrong, but it’s not worth the blowup to ensure they know it.In a lot of cases, your customers are going to have to be “right”—it’s just the name of the game with customer service. Sometimes, we all have to swallow our pride and be the bigger person when dealing with customers who are rude, disrespectful, and even wrong.
That being said, we never advise you to let someone walk all over you or your employees—if you have a customer who is clearly out of line, is causing anyone harm, is making you feel unsafe, or is disruptive, that’s not okay by any means.
Forget that whole customer is always right thing. But, if you’re dealing with a run-of-the-mill, unhappy person whose only offense is being a little bit annoying, we suggest you let them have the win.
Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop Improving
Spoiler alert, this is a never-ending game. Yeah, we know, that sounds overwhelming, but at the end of the day, it’s the blessing and the curse of the business we’re in. Your customers are always going to be the core of your business, and it’s up to you to ensure that their experiences are always better than ever.A static experience is never as great as a dynamic one, so don’t be afraid to continually evaluate and make changes to the customer experience.
Loving these barbering tips? We thought you might.
If you have a few suggestions for customer satisfaction that have worked in your salon, we encourage you to comment below and share with your fellow barbering community—we bet you anything they’ll be ecstatic for your feedback.
If it’s more barbing tips like these you’re after, insight on barbering trends, of barbershop biz advice, we encourage you to keep up with our regularly updated NAOB blog right here.
We’re constantly adding in the tips, tricks, and barbering must-have knowledge that’s bound to help your burgeoning barber business blossom.