It often seems that some people appear to have the magic touch when it being comes to being successful.
Everything they do just seems to be the right thing, at the right time – nohting ever seems to go wrong.
Or maybe that’s all an illusion……
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Success is not magical; it’s about making the right decisions, based on the right information, and taking the required action – most of the time.
In this article, we’ll take a look at what sets apart the successful business owners so that you can also implement their winning strategies in your business.
Successful people surround themselves with new ideas.
If you haven’t been investing in your professional business development, then you’ve stopped providing yourself with the opportunity to learn new and better business ideas and strategies.
It may be more fun, but it’s not enough to just attend training that teaches you about new products or services. These are important, but you mustn’t neglect information that teaches you how to run a more successful business and make a profit.
Those business owners who take the time to read quality business books, undertake business-related courses, or work with a business coach will be constantly exposed to fresh ideas and motivation.
And without a constant stream of fresh ideas, you generally end up doing things the same old way you’ve done them for years – successful or not. This is not the recipe for success. Times change, information changes and opportunities come and go.
If you have cut yourself off from fresh and vital information, growth will come to a screaming halt.
Successful people implement the great ideas they learn.
In a room full of learners, there are only a tiny minority who will go away and actually implement the great ideas they‘ve been exposed to. These people are the Doers.
They don’t waste their money on attending conferences, buying books, doing seminars or getting business coaches and then do nothing with the information they’ve received. They don’t constantly whinge or make excuses as to why ‘they can’t get things done‘, ‘they don’t have enough time‘ or stating ‘it won’t work in my salon‘ before they’ve even given it a go.
Instead, Doers understand that in every bit of business training they receive, there is at least one gem of information. With this in mind, they immediately pull apart the information they’ve received to find the business gems that they know will improve their business.
Find the gems, make the plans and take action.
Successful people learn from their mistakes.
Yes, successful people do make mistakes. Just like you and me, they don’t get it right 100% of the time.
However, the successful person can identify a mistake quickly. How do they know? Well, they closely monitor their outcomes and, because of this, they quickly learn if they’ve had a great success, a moderate improvement or an outright failure. And this knowledge means they don’t keep repeating their mistakes and suffering the same undesirable consequences.
To grow your business requires trying new things and with that will come the odd bad decision – other wise known as a mistake.
Learn from your mistakes but don’t stop trying new things.
Successful people regularly monitor their numbers.
This is one of the most important things that should be done in any business. However, in the beauty business, it’s often one of the most neglected. Knowing, and more importantly, understanding your numbers, means you will see problems heading your way before disaster happens.
As a business coach, I encourage my clients to take time out to actually read and understand the extremely valuable reports their software programs can generate. These reports can often pinpoint problems with staff productivity, rostering, retail and service sales, client attraction and retention plus so much more.
So, if you’re in the habit of using your computer software simply as a point-of-sale system and a way to send appointment reminders, it’s time to jump in and discover just how much valuable information you can access. It’s all at your fingertips and available with just a few button presses.
Knowledge is power and knowing your figures gives you a great deal of power.
Successful people understand the difference between revenue and profit.
This is a truly powerful and important point. Many salon owners are led to believe (by would-be gurus) that increasing revenue (sales) will automatically increase profits.
This is often not the case.
To give you an example, if a salon chooses to drop the price of their facials from $90 to $45 (50% discount), they’re most likely going to generate lots of additioanl revenue. New and old clients will surface to enjoy tyour fantastic low-priced facials.
Revenue will inevitably increase as clients arrive and depart the salon in droves. The only problem is that the extremely popular $45 facial actually costs $55 in product, consumables and labour to deliver.
What this means is that every single facial delivered is actually increasing your expenses and not generating more profit for your business. These extra facial sales could end up costing you a ton of money.
The only way around this is to upsell lots of additional full-priced services (good luck doing that with a client who is only interested in a discount treatment in the first place) or sell lots of retail (ditto).
So the lesson to take from this is that before you jump in and discount your services, in an attempt to increase your revenue (get more sales), be absolutely sure that there is sufficient profit in each sale to help you cover your many other expenses and stay in business.
Naturally, there are numerous other actions that successful people take every day, however the ones discussed in this article are, in my opinion, some of the most important. These are the mistakes I see struggling salon and spa owners make most often and consequently suffer from the outcomes.
So, if you’d like your new year to be wildly more successful that your past years, think about the points discussed and how you can start to implement more success strategies in your business. It really is all up to you!
“Successful people do what unsuccessful people are not willing to do. Don’t wish it were easier; wish you were better.”
— Jim Rohn