Spread the word

RICHARD WARD HAIR & METROSPA

Hellen Ward is Managing Director at the gorgeous Chelsea-based salon, and takes care of the company’s PR and marketing strategy. She explains how celebrity favourite Richard Ward keeps the salon name on the tips of the right tongues!

Public relations is about communicating a message to an audience. We work closely with our PR agency to promote our creative skills and business news to the industry, trade media and hair magazines worldwide. With PR, you need to think about what you want to achieve; ultimately, everyone wants to drive greater success for their salon, which will hopefully transfer to increased footfall and sales. Positive PR is the best method of creating awareness, but it may not give you immediate sales results and should not be mistaken for marketing. In order to make it the most effective, you must have a clear view of why you’re building that profile and how this will benefit your business. Otherwise, it may not be a worthwhile exercise for you.  

Before you even start PR,  it’s important to think about what you want to achieve, the audience you want to reach and the return you’d like from the campaign. Begin with a targeted regional PR campaign by getting to know your local journalists; keep the trade publications up to date with your news and progress to the consumer hair magazines with your creative advice.

In addition to external PR measures, it’s important to be creative when promoting people and services within the salon. To promote what we do in order  to attract new customers and retain old ones in such a competitive market place, we create added benefit schemes that will bring new value to existing clients, but won’t alienate those who happen to miss out; this gives those who benefit a feel-good factor.

For example, we might offer a complimentary gloss colour if you book a service during a quiet time, or a free hand massage with every manicure. We find this is far more effective than reducing costs on our services. Creating a loyalty card is also effective and has more meaning and value to people. There’s a multitude of ways any business can market itself – it just takes creative thinking!

This article first featured in Business Builder, the monthly advice cards from L'Oréal Professionnel Business Max and HEAD For Business. For your own binder and cards, simply contact Laura at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

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