Stay Competitive: Keep On Top Of Salon Trends (Barbie!)

Whilst perusing the latest industry news I came across an article on the Hairdressers Journal about how there has been a massive 500% increase in demand for services related to Barbie! For those of you who are film buffs this will make perfect sense because the movie starring Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling has just been released and it’s a very big deal.

I could describe all the various hairstyles, colours and makeup trends that are very popular right now due to the Barbie phenomena but that’s not really the point of this article; what I want to convey is the importance of knowing what the latest trends are in the industry and being able to deliver them.

Start with social media

Love it or hate it, we have to accept the fact that social media is here to stay and it has a massive influence on society today, especially with the younger generations.

Your first step therefore is to be aware of what social media platforms you should be watching. A quick Google search will show you what the top platforms are (Facebook, Instagram & TikTok as of this writing) and do keep an eye on this periodically as they change over time.

One thing to watch out for is that you don’t let your personal opinions sway your judgement when it comes to social media. You may have seen your kids spending hours watching irritating videos on TikTok and as a result you tend to just dismiss it as a kids platform. However, if you look at the stats you’ll find that 53% of TikTok’s user base is actually aged 30+!

What we’re doing here is market research. The simplest way to do this is to look at the trends around #hashtags as these are used in all major platforms. For example this is what has been trending on Tiktok in the US over the last 30 days:

As you can see, Barbie rules right now!

TikTok allow you to dig into their data directly from their website but for other platforms such as Facebook or Instagram you’ll need to use a third party tool. I won’t go into those as it’s beyond the scope of this article and something that is likely to change over time.

The takeaway point is that social media is a great place to spot the latest trends in general.

Consume industry news

Whilst social media can give you a broad overview about what is trending in general, if you want to keep abreast of the specific trends in the hair, beauty and aesthetics industries then it pays to also spend some time looking over some key industry resources. Here are a few resources to get you started:

Beauty Launchpad – A magazine dedicated to salons and stylists in the beauty industry. You can read the digital archives online or subscribe to the print magazine. As well as the magazine contents, the website also contains a ton of industry news and educational resources for businesses.

The Hairdressers Journal – Another magazine, UK based and specialising in the hair industry. The magazine can be purchased in print or read online. Their website also has a wealth of industry news (including trends) that you can read without needing to subscribe to the magazine.

Podcasts – There are a ton of podcasts that cater to this industry and we just so happened to create a blog post listing the top 25 of them so make sure to give some of these a listen!

Follow your competitors!

In business some people say that it is best to ignore your competition and simply focus on what you do best, and that can be good advice in many circumstances. However, the chances are that some of the bigger salons in particular have far more resources than you and are better able to do the analysis and research that we already talked about.

They might have a marketing team scouring the social media and industry sites daily to find all the hottest new trends, and you can be sure that if they find one, they’ll be on it quickly. When they do, you can be sure that they will be talking about it on their own website, newsletters and social media channels. All you have to do is follow them!

Now when I say competitors, I don’t necessarily mean your direct competitors that are operating in your local town – they could be any salon anywhere in the country. Have a look at the top salons in the major cities around the country and see what they are up to. Follow them on social media to make it quick and easy to keep up with their latest developments.

How do you know who the top salons are? Just Google it! It doesn’t really matter who the actual ‘best’ salons are; I mean, how do you even decide that anyway? Just look for salons that have a very active blog and social media presence as that shows they have the marketing budget to do the research into that content!

Need help? Hire the experts

This post might feel a little daunting; it might seem like an awful lot of work to do in order to know what’s going on in the industry and you’re already very busy keeping your chairs filled and doing everything that needs to be done in the day to day running of your salon.

At Salon Guru we have a large team of people who work exclusively with clients in the Hair & Beauty industry and we know our industry extremely well. As part of our service we are not only able to advise you on upcoming trends, but also help you create content around them for your own audience.