Gain the Competitive Edge Over Massage Envy
July 30th, 2010 • Posted by Spa Kat • Permalink
SpaBoom received great feedback from our last webinar, How To Compete with Massage Envy, some participants wanted examples of how they can use online marketing tools to gain a local competitive edge over large spa concepts like Massage Envy. I just happen to have a personal example.
Joie De Vivre is a company that operates 33 boutique hotels in California. In a recent TechCrunch article they outline how they have used social media very successfully to compete with larger hotels.
Every Tuesday, Joie De Vivre’s Twitter account will Tweet an exclusive deal to its nearly 10,000 followers. Followers have only hours to book the steeply discounted room rate. For example, this past Tuesday, it offered $79 rooms at the group’s Galleria Park Hotel in San Francisco in November and December. The company also operates similar deals for its 5,000-plus Facebook fans on Fridays. –Lena Rao
I am just back from holiday; I stayed at Shorebreak Hotel, a Joie De Vivre hotel in Huntington Beach, California. I checked their Facebook and Twitter accounts every day leading up to my trip. I found relevant information about what was happening in town and at Shorebreak Hotel and obsessively checked for the deals to post on Tuesday and Friday. My family had a fantastic stay and I let the hotel know via Facebook when I returned. The entire family loves Joie de Vivre, we will stay at one of their hotels in California next summer.
This is exactly why SpaBoom has created a powerful, integrated online marketing platform for spas that allows them to enter an event on their website and have it automatically post to their Facebook and Twitter accounts. It works, it encourages your clients to LIKE your spa via social media and take the step to get your posts regularly.
With SpaBoom's online marketing suite, a spa menu is updated, website content is added, special events are activated, email campaigns are created, Facebook and Twitter messages are generated all from a single login. It can handle a spas important online marketing functions simply, saving considerable time and effort for their business.
Just as clients leave your spa, after experiencing a fantastic set of treatments, let them know you offer deals every week on Facebook and Twitter. I guarantee it is the fastest and best way to build your community of avid followers. I am still dreaming of the sun, surf and fun I had at Shorebreak Hotel, I'll check out their weekly deals and consider a tempting opportunity for a quick dash to California and catch the wave.
• Trackback • Posted in Creating Customers, General, Social Media, Spa Business Management, Spa Marketing, Spa Technology, Spa Website Design
Love the articles about leveraging social media to increase bookings but I would say that the best way to get the fastest response and build the most loyal group of clients is to build your own list of subscribers to your own in-house email database. For the past 6 years we have been following this path and now we have over 10,000 individuals who subscribe to our list and we average between 15-23 new sign-ups per day, everyday. The entire system is now on autopilot and it links to our Twitter and Facebook accounts but the driver is the email database because it allows for a much more personal engagement with our clients and lets us present a very clear call to action. Now we can fill an empty day in approximately 8.25 minutes if we need to.
PS — We also use text messaging when necessary because everyone reads their text messages whereas only a percentage ever read their email, Twitter, or Facebook posts.
Best, Scott