Small businesses need help to compete against the larger businesses. Hair salons are no exception. Whether you have name brands behind you or are an independent barber, you need foot traffic through your salon to thrive. To do this effectively, you will need to market. Billboards, signs, word of mouth...they're all great tools for marketing, but in today's world we need to speak the average customer's language. And that's by using the one thing they always have with them: their mobile phone. Mobile marketing is becoming more and more popular.

Mobile phones have two basic ways to receive marketing material. The first is SMS, or short messaging service. This is where you receive a text, often from an unknown source, with a short message. The second and more common, is MMS, which is multimedia service. This format is where a photo or other media is sent to the phone, giving the end user information.

Hair salons are a great business that can benefit from marketing materials. Think about all the different things you can communicate to your clients. Specials on products, buy one get one spa services, or even when a certain hair stylist has time available. Many times, people walk into the salon, have their service done, and leave. But what about keeping track of them? How do you contact your entire customer base to share specials without calling each one of them?

QR codes are the answer. Everyone has seen these. It's the square box of black modules in magazines, signs and commercials that you can use your phone to scan. Once you scan the image, it turns into data, either showing you a picture or sending you to a website. This can turn your salon upside down! Think of the possibilities...

Hair salons everywhere should put QR codes into their marketing plans. A sign in the salon with a QR code will attract attention. Clients will scan the code and then be directed to a link where they can opt in to the salon's mailing list. You will then have access to everyone's contact information without messy papers and data entry to deal with.

Once you have a customer base with their phone numbers in an easily manipulated database. Send specials instantly letting them know you're running a three hour special on shampoos. Or let them know that tomorrow you're running a customer appreciation day. They get information immediately and are happy to enjoy in the savings.

Send occasional specials to your customers to keep them happy. Don't overload them with something every day, but enough to keep your salon in the back of their mind. It will improve customer retention and will ultimately increase profits. More profits mean a booming business and opportunities to expand. All because of the mobile phone.

Mobile marketing for hair salons is the best way to increase business. Marketing in general will help expand a business, but using the very thing that everyone has with them at all times makes sense. QR codes are the biggest form of marketing now and small businesses can easily get in on them as well. It will be the best thing that ever happened to your business.

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Most small retail shops, the ones who rely on daily foot traffic to drive their sales numbers, find it difficult to compete with larger national chain stores when it comes to advertising budgets. This makes it all the more important for retail merchants to utilize QR Codes into a marketing plan that will allow them to capture and quantify their customer base and create properly opted-in email and SMS text lists that they can market to directly.

Studies have shown that a mere 5% in customer retention can cause a 10-25% increase in profits. This is significant. If a retail merchant can quantify its customer base, meaning, actually determine the number of regular customers it has and build a list of those customers, it can easily see a 5% customer retention rate, thereby causing increased profits.

By far the easiest and best way to create a customer list is to use QR codes. These codes are all the rage in Asia and Europe and are now gaining popularity in the US. These codes are intriguing and can be used simply by posting a code on the window next to the front door of your shop. When the customer sees the code (and your message telling them to scan the code with their smartphone) the customer will scan the code and be taken to your mobile landing page which will have an optin form for their email and cell number. After about 60-90 days, you will have captured the bulk of your customers and can now start communicating with them directly.

QR Code Popularity

QR codes are not as popular here in the United States as they are in Japan. In fact, Japan has been using this technology since 1994. So it makes us think, "What's so bad about this technology that we haven't used it here as much?" The answer is, nothing. Using this technique is an effective QR code marketing strategy that involves customers with the company through their cell phones.

Mobile Marketing Trends

As we commonly see, several individuals are buying smart phones with internet access. Most of these phones already come equipped with QR code scanners, but for those that don't, any free QR scanning application can be downloaded. Once the phone is equipped with such software, all the user needs to do is take a picture of the QR code. Then the code can either direct the consumer to the website, or offer discount coupons to encourage them to visit the store.

Keep Customers in the Loop

After the customer database has been initially built, the retailer can now begin to inform customers about upcoming events or holiday sales. It is important to offer consumers good content in your emails, as well as a good discount in upcoming sales so they actually end up visiting the store. Exclusive discount can be given only to customers that opted into the email list via the QR code from their smart phone. So that makes more and more consumers interested in scanning your code.

I wish you the very best success using these amazing codes in your marketing efforts.

Michael Weir
QRscanit, Inc.

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Mobile Marketing Strategies Using QR Codes

Mobile Marketing Strategies Using QR codes exploit the benefits of both platforms. First, Mobile marketing strategies make use of a fast and easy-to-setup promotion campaign medium that can both reach a global audience while retaining its local targeting if deemed a better strategy. It is also cost effective, in that, cell phones are almost universal, making it easy to build quick, widespread brand awareness without much expenditure and effort.

Furthermore, mobile phones provide 2-way communication not limited to calling but text messaging as well. Next, QR code marketing strategies are a spin-off of mobile marketing, and therefore, can likewise provide a cost effective platform for reaching customers. It does not require the costs of print collateral yet can be just as widespread. One approach to using these strategies is to use the different QR codes for multiple promotions. You can easily distinguish the results of each. For example, newspaper ads with these codes can point to a coupon for a discount on your website as well as open the website itself. On the other hand, a different code used on another ad can lead to your contact information or a direct call placed to your business. You can even have the code open the smartphone's internet browser to a page you set up to capture their email and SMS text information.

Other mobile marketing strategies using QR codes you may consider are to use people's natural curiosity by making QR codes very visible outdoors. Calvin Klein, for example, has put these codes in the nation's spotlight using massive billboards in Times Square. On a smaller scale, your strategy can utilize building wraps, street furniture, vehicle wraps, and simple window decals.

The best strategy for the retailer who relies on daily foot traffic for sales, is to place a QR Code in their store window right by the front door. Have this code opt-in the customer to your loyalty club so that you can market to them directly using email or SMS texting. To learn more about this, go to YouTube and search for a 15 minute video by QRscanit. You will be amazed by the inexpensive but powerful use of this latest technology.

If you have a smartphone, search your app store for a free QR scanner and download it. Then, read below about how to find my book titled, QR Codes and Mobile Marketing for the Small Business Owner; you will use the scanner. You can download it for free at my website for further information on mobile marketing.

I wish you the very best success using these amazing codes in your marketing efforts.

Michael Weir
QRscanit, Inc.

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