We often share details about our podcast on our social media channels and a few episodes ago I did an entire episode on “How do I advertise that I have appointments available without looking desperate?”. If you haven’t listened to that episode yet – go check out episode 189 HERE.
One of the points I made in that episode in response to this particular question was that posting your availability is not effective in getting new clients to book with you because their pain point is NOT knowing your availability – the primary reason clients aren’t booking with you is that they either don’t know or don’t trust that you can help them with their problem (aka feeling f-ugly!).
Now a little behind the scenes view of podcasting – I write out show notes for every episode prior to recording so I don’t just ramble on and go on tangents and I like to keep these episodes to 15 minutes or less.
In the first draft of the show notes – I included a section about why this strategy works and who it works for which is primarily those who are fully booked where your audience’s pain point actually IS that they don’t know if you have available appointments because your availability is so scarce!
But I removed that portion because it wasn’t relevant to answering the question the episode was based on which was not coming from someone who is fully booked – and about 90%+ of my listeners are not fully booked either – so I cut that section out of the episode.
Fast forward to a week later – when we had an Instagram Reel about this episode go a touch “viral” because of several followers who loudly disagreed (and respectfully I might add cause this community is amazing!!) and guess what…
They were a part of the 10% or less of my audience who this strategy DOES work for because it’s a scarcity marketing tactic and they’re fully booked
(Curious about some of the juicy responses that led to this week’s episode as a response to these cries of “wrong doing” on that Instagram reel :-P, you can check out that post here on my IG.
However – I don’t let an opportunity to educate and coach pass me by cause people disagree with me – in fact – it excites me to be loudly disagreed with because I very carefully think thru the strategies I teach and how they can be done well to help you grow!
This week’s episode is dedicated to WHY your business is telling you you’ve got a big problem in your business if posting your available appointments on your social media is working to draw in clients!
So whether posting your availability on social media works for you or not – here’s some things I want you to know.
When Should I Use “Appointments Available” Type Posts?
What I was speaking to was this thing I see frequently that lash artists and beauty business owners do where they post a screenshot of something like “Friday 2pm full set available, Saturday at 1pm available” and then hours later post another one where they’ve got one crossed out to indicate it’s no longer available.
The majority of people that reach out to me, who are struggling to build a clientele, see other artists doing this and copy it too. But this strategy often doesn’t work for artists who are not fully booked because it’s not actually solving the pain point and the REASON why people are looking to you for the services you offer.
People really really disagreed with this post because posting their availability has worked for them to get clients. But here’s the thing…
I would say every single commenter who said this strategy works for them – is already FULLY BOOKED.
Why the “I’m Available” Strategy Doesn’t Work If You’re Not (Close To) Fully Booked
When you’re fully booked and have a last minute cancellation, the strategy of sharing your availability is effective in getting a client to book because the pain point the client actually has when you have that much demand is that they do not know when you’re available because you are fully booked.
Supply and demand. You guys probably have heard that thrown around before. But that is why that strategy works for those that have VERY LITTLE availability where they’re fully booked. Those are the people that disagreed with that post – and it wasn’t actually directed at them.
It’s mostly for people who are struggling to build a clientele and see other people doing it thinking that’s why clients aren’t booking – “they need to know when I’m available”. No, no, no, they don’t necessarily care when you’re available until they’re ready to book the appointment. But you haven’t even gotten them to the point of wanting to book an appointment.
Your online booking should be where people go to find out your availability – that shouldn’t be a secret that’s kept that you only post about every once in a while.
WHY Does This Strategy Work?
But even if you are fully booked and posting your “availability” works for you, I want you to understand WHY that strategy is working for you. So many people in our industry get to a level of fully booked and they have no idea how they actually did it. They’re just kind of like willy nilly doing it all and then all of a sudden they have demand and they’ve built up a clientele at a certain price point.
And they’re kind of like “well now I’m fully booked, but I don’t know how to recreate that, I don’t know how to create demand” and so they see what everybody else is doing in this industry and just post “fully booked” #blessed, or “no availability”.
Here’s what that’s doing to your business – it’s stunting your growth. Your business is no longer growing.
You have no more time in the day, you have no more days of the week to be able to add at all. You have this intense amount of pressure and fear around disappointing people because you’re getting people asking to book with you and you’re like “I literally can’t get to you for a month or I don’t have a new appointment or a full set available for three months.” But nobody really wants to book that far out. So then you just lose the client. What that is indicating is that you’ve actually stunted your business growth.
What is Scarcity Marketing and How Does it Work?
This strategy where you’re posting your availability, it’s called Scarcity Marketing – and it’s very effective when there is more demand than supply available. My rule of thumb is: if you’re fully booked for anywhere from two to three months, that is a good indicator that the demand you’re experiencing is not seasonal. It is consistent and your business can grow.
What I would tell you to do, if I was your coach, is you need to increase your prices to drop off some clients and be able to work less and make either the same amount of money or make more money! I’m happy to share with you how that works, and how much you should raise your prices. I’ve got a whole guide on that actually.
Dropping off some clients with the intention of creating more availability. The ideal is that clients go to book an appointment proactively without having to wait around for you just to post that opening. We want clients to be proactive in booking an appointment with you because they want the service and they want it now or within the next week or two.
The Mistake Many Business Owners Make When Hiring an Employee
If you don’t want to raise your prices or you feel like you’re at a good price level, the goal might be to build out a team. Now hear me out on this. This does not mean that you hire the most skilled lash artist that’s out there and pay her 50% and you’re good to go. That is a great way for you to actually pay yourself LESS.
Because what usually happens is this: a lash artist gets fully booked and they need help. They just hire somebody who’s skilled and just give the new employee the extra clients. About six months down the road – maybe even three months – the demand does not stay that high because you’re not marketing. Because you don’t have time to market because you’re still taking a full client load.
You also don’t have time to train this new lash artist to do it the way that you do to get clients results. So therefore, your clients do not want to go to the new artist because she doesn’t get the same results as you do. So then you’re paying a heck of a lot of money to this person who is doing it their own way and walking away with 50% of the service fee. So depending on your operating expenses – what it takes to run your business – you might actually be losing money by having a team member at that payroll. Now you are stuck, stuck taking clients to pay her and your income starts to go down. Happens all the time.
How to Hire Your First Profitable Team Member By the End of the Year
We are now testing out a new program that I created to hire your first profitable team member. It’s called Society X – and it is for those who want to hire their first team member within the next three months. I have step by steps on how to do that.
If that’s something that you’re curious about, I’d love to share more about that program. You can DM me #hire on Instagram and I will share with you what we’re going to do. So that by the end of this year, you’ve hired your first team member where you are paying them in a way that your business can handle what that team member is generating in profit. We teach the six steps to hiring and the process of their 90 Day onboarding.
I’m going to show you exactly how many clients this new team member needs to break even on your investment into them as a legally employed team member. This is also open to international as well – so if you’re in Canada, Australia, the UK – we take the legal part out of it, but all the financial stuff is still there and all six steps of the hiring process still work.
If you want to learn how to increase your prices, head over to my instagram at www.instagram.com/thelashpreneur and DM me #priceincrease for my step by step guide on “How to Raise Your Prices”.
If you’re interested in hiring your first PROFIT-producing team member by the end of the year, DM me #HIRE and let’s chat about how I can work with you to do just that!
