Advantages to forecasting are that you will be able to stock up on products that you might otherwise be sold out of, and be able to take advantage of bulk purchase discounts leading to more profit. If you hire help you will also be able to track when your employee expenses might be higher and when you might need temporary employees, or might need to increase the hours of the part timers working for you, or simply schedule more hours for yourself.

Also when planning vacations it is best to let your employees know what time periods are expected to be busy and which ones are expected to be slow. This will help them and you. Being gone during a very busy period for someone who works on commission or on a percentage of income can be financially harmful to your employees, so they will appreciate knowing what vacation times are the least profitable, as will you.

Keeping track of busy and slow times should be a part of your natural record keeping. You keep track of income and expenses for tax purposes. Making sure that your bookkeeper or site manager also keeps track of the number of clients you have and of the types of treatments they prefer will help. It will also assist you in marketing efforts. You’ll be able to see what areas are most profitable and which areas should be promoted more.

Your methods in this day and age will probably be computerized. Many software programs are available to keep track of customers including what they spent, who they saw, and what treatment options those chose. These programs generally integrate with your accounting, checking and tax preparation software as well as your tickler file for sending appointment reminders and your mailing list database. But even if you don’t use a computer and software for this purpose, just keeping track in a notebook puts you ahead of the game and allows you to make these basic business decisions. Taking care of business means knowing where you are at financially and forecasting will help you in this area.

Traditional methods of advertising and promotion have been consistently loosing market share to Internet marketing for several years. Take a look at newspapers as an example. Newspaper readership is down all over the country. News junkies and those who casually stay current with the news are en mass going to websites to read the latest wire service stories, and by the time it comes out in the next day’s newspaper it is old news. With readership down, advertising revenues for newspapers have gone done and the papers have raised advertising rates to maintain their income. So with newspapers you are paying more money for fewer readers.

Think about your phone book. The Yellow Pages is great and maybe still needed in some locations, but remember that the phone book is closed 99 percent of the time, and many people now use online resources to find phone numbers or addresses when they need them. Yellow Pages rates are going up and fewer people are using them. Radio and television suffer a similar fate as segmentation means more choices, but rates staying about the same for fewer listeners or viewers.

Your website on the other hand costs very little to set up. You can do it yourself using templates and wizards, or hire a web designer for a reasonable fee to create a site for you. Using organic search engine optimization will bring more people to your web site through Google, MSN, yahoo, Alta Vista, Dogpile and other search engines when they are looking for the services you offer in the location you reside in.  Your website can be a way to educate your client base, offer coupons and discounts, and use other methods to draw people into your business. And if you don’t have time to wait for organic search engine optimization to kick in, remember the PPC or pay per click options. Both Google and Yahoo offer paid ads that only cost you a fee when someone clicks them to go to your web site. This can be as low as a few cents a click, and if your site is designed properly you will have a high ratio of click through who become clients. You control the amount you spend, and by properly using your website and modern technology you can turn a small business into a large business with minimal expense.

The combination of neuropathy (the deadening of nerves) and poor circulation means that diabetics must take extra caution when it comes to the care of their feet. Even a small nick can quickly become infected and turn ulcerous; diabetes is, in fact, the number one cause of non-traumatic lower limb amputation. For this reason many diabetics are cautioned not to seek pedicures at all, and urged instead to visit a podiatrist on a regular basis to have their nails trimmed and nothing more.

What should be true for all your pedicure clients must be double true for diabetic spa clients. Baths and tools must be stringently and rigorously disinfected without lapse or exception – some spas even go so far as to insist that diabetic clients bring their own tools.

It is estimated that somewhere in the neighborhood of 12 million women over the age of 20 in the US suffer from diabetes; the introduction of podiatry within the context of a medical spa setting can be a good way to attract and care for this sensitive demographic.

One well known salesman and motivational speaker years ago wrote a book on how he acquired customers. One of the tricks that he used with great success was using his business cads as though they were confetti. When he went to a local college football game and his team did something good, a great play or a touchdown, then he threw a handful of his business cards into the air, and they rained down on the other spectator sports like confetti. Some people thought he was a bit crazy for throwing away business cards, since the majority of them wound up swept up by the janitorial staff. However his philosophy was that he could print hundreds of thousands of business cards with the commission from just one big sale. He was in the car business and you are in the spa and aesthetics business, but the principle remains the same.

Many people follow a “three foot rule” when it comes to their business card. If they meet someone new socially they give the person a business card. If they tip a waiter or waitress in a restaurant, they leave a business card. Anyone who gets within three feet of them receives a business card, and the strategy pays off. The idea behind the three foot rule is that many people will keep the business card and while they may not need your services today, things change.

Tomorrow, the next day or the next month they may have a need that you can fill and may still have the card. If they don’t they will probably remember your name, the business name, or your logo –which should always be on your card. You will have achieved top of mind awareness and become the first person in your business that they think of. You will, in effect, have achieved branding.  This is something that mega corporations spend billions of dollars on, and you can achieve it with a simple business card.

What price structure is fair?

Much of the answer to that question depends on the area where you live. Each market is different. For instance, Los Angeles and New York City have higher costs of living that cities in the Midwest and the south. People in those areas are used to paying higher prices. Also areas with booming economies and more money flowing tend to have higher pay structures than those areas that might be a bit depressed.

Have you checked out the competition?

One of the best ways to determine your own pricing structure is to find out what other aestheticians in other spas are charging for similar services.

That will enable you to determine an average price for services. Then determine how much time you need to spend with a client to perform a service and figure out what your average hourly rate of pay is. Of course the next step is to figure in your overhead and come up with a figure of fixed expenses that must be paid every month, every week and every day. Know how much it actually costs you to exist each day and how much extra you need to get ahead and you’ll know how much income to strive for. As an example, if it costs you $2,000 per week to cover all of your overhead and you work a five day work week, then you need $100 per day to stay afloat. If your hourly average is $40 then you need to sell at least two and a half hours of services daily to break even. That also means that if you sell five hours of services a day then you are $100 a head after paying all of your expenses. That can either be money in the bank to save for emergencies or a “rainy day” fund, or it can be money you use to pay expenses when you take a day off, or a vacation. Self employed professionals don’t have paid vacations and need to plan for those contingencies.

Check the competition and make sure that your prices are fair. Not too high and not too low, but most of all be fair to yourself in your pricing.

Prenatal massage is potentially a terrific niche market with outstanding referral possibilities if done well, but there are some things to consider before adding it to your spa services menu. First and foremost is this; a massage therapist needs to be specifically certified to perform prenatal (or postpartum) massage. The positions and techniques involved are different and suited to the specific changing needs of the mother to be (or new mother).

It is also worth noting, after the first trimester, that it is highly recommended a woman obtain a  written recommendation from her doctor or midwife before seeking massage, for there are potential concerns which would counter-indicate massage therapy.

In short, if massage for pregnant women is a niche market you would like to explore, be sure you are well informed before you attempt to branch out.

Regular discounts for regular clients just makes sense. Keeping current clients happy in every way that you can, even when it means taking a few dollars off of the total price, still means that they will be spending money with you much longer than those who come in, try the service and then don’t come back, possibly because a competitor has a discount coupon in the local newspaper or the back of the Yellow Pages.

When you figure up all of the costs of doing business, the cost of marketing – that is, of acquiring clients – is often the largest single expense. Clients are acquired through various efforts including referrals from other clients (probably happy clients or they would not be sending you referrals), advertising, and other promotional activities. There is a cost involved with all promotional activities, even those you do yourself, since your time has value.

Anything you can do to keep a regular client with you, and keep them coming back, certainly costs less than acquiring a new client to replace them. Additionally happy regular clients tend on average to spend more money and increase the levels of service they desire. They also tell their friends, bringing in more repeat customers. With that in mind, offering a small discount, and making sure the client knows that you are doing so, as a way of showing your appreciation, will help you to buy even more loyalty from that particular client.

It never hurts to build the discounts you offer around special events in the life of the client. Know when your clients have birthdays, anniversaries and other special days. Use it as a marketing tool by sending out postcards to those clients right before the birthday, offering a substantial discount to come in within a few days of that special day for full service treatment and you’ll be amazed at the number who take you up on the offer, and at the amount of increased income you’ll receive.

Always find a reason, and keep the client happy.

When it comes to putting together a holiday spa menu, especially if your hope is that it generates repeat business for years to come, the savvy spa owner will do his or her best to ensure that the experience of their customers is not merely luxurious but memorable. The goal here is to have your customers’ experience (and your spa as a result) associated favorably with the holiday season.

The best way to imprint any memory is through scent, so what better way to ensure that your holiday spa menu make an impression than through the use of pleasant scents already linked to the holiday season? A peppermint scrub, a pumpkin body wrap, pine scented bath oils – the inventive spa owner has many pleasant and evocative olfactory avenues to explore.

Spacious – Still – Soothing

A great deal goes into the design and creation of a truly successful spa. Countless hours of hard work behind the scenes, hundreds of tough financial decisions of one form or another, and a thousand little details are what makes a satisfying spa experience possible. It is a tall order for a new spa owner to get right all at once, and it is easy at times to lose track of the forest for the trees.

When it comes to the design, layout, and functionality of a spa treatment room, it is important to keep the three S’s in mind. They are: spacious, still, and soothing. You will note right away that these three considerations are all intangible. Clearly a treatment room needs to be functional, private, and comfortable but more is required.

Spacious, still, and soothing; these features have nothing to do with the practitioner’s ability to do his or her job on a functional level. What these considerations speak to are the experience of the client. Any successful spa owner will tell you that their clients are not simply paying for the treatments themselves but rather for the entire experience of receiving treatment.

When you are dealing in experience, as we in the spa business are, it is not enough to have form follow function. We must deal with the hearts and minds of our clients. A spa treatment room that is spacious, still, and soothing is an absolute must.

As Boomers slowly give way to Xers, time and space once wholly devoted to massage, facials, body wraps, and manicures are being set aside for more specialized day spa treatments like Reiki. This kind of expanded scope is a good match, for while busy Xers might not be willing to track down an Ayurvedic specialist they are certainly open-minded enough to consider alternative treatments when offered and vouched for by individuals whom they trust.

The good news is that even a small spa can test these alternative waters with specialized day spa services simply by developing a working relationship with a trusted practitioner in need of space. Something like Reiki can be offered once a week, perhaps during a slow time, and can serve as a way to expand the spa’s menu and perhaps its client base as well.