Episode 52: Inspiring 6-Figure Beauty Boss Series with Valerie Weber
What you will learn from this episode:
- Discover about marketing tips that will position your beauty business for massive growth
- Find out the most effective strategy to ensure a consistent flow of clients that will last you a lifetime
- Learn about the challenges as well as the advantages of hiring a professional team
Summary:
How do you put your life together when all you've got is a seemingly crippling situation? You've started a business with your hard work, but don't see a single client around. What rubs insult to injury is the crumbling personal life you've got to deal with without family nearby to help you out.
With massive faith and steadfast determination, you can beat the impossible odds and reach success. Valerie proves it as she shares her story. She did it, so can you.
Valerie Weber is the Founder of Dermagrafix Permanent Cosmetic Studio, a Cosmetic Tattoo Artist and Certified Instructor. She began her journey in cosmetic tattooing, where she felt most at home in her artistic self. After years of striving to learn more to be the best, she realized that it took a great deal of practice and dedication to this craft to be just that. She continued to learn from those she admired and collected valuable knowledge that eventually helped her develop her style. Loving what she's doing is a complete understatement. The idea that a well-executed cosmetic tattoo can positively change someone's quality of life, knowing that drives her to be her best and work side-by-side with other professionals she trusts and shares that same vision as she has. Ultimately, this thought led her to train and mentor others who are also meant to change lives through art. The ever-popular Bi-Fusion Eyebrows and WhipLash Eyeliner techniques were what she played with for years to get just right.
In this episode, Valerie shares what you need to consider in growing your business, the need to hire a team, the structure you need to create, and what comes with getting one. She underscores how not to sacrifice laws and safety even when you are still starting and doing things yourself. You're putting your brand and name on the line here. Though we are already digitally connected, she points out nothing beats creating personal relationships with your clients. That will last you a lifetime. As a business-minded person, she reminds everyone that your time is your investment. Though she's big on being generous, always learn to draw the line where your business assets aren't compromised.
As with every success, you start at the beginning and Valerie shares the most challenging times when she started her beauty business. At that time, her married life was in shambles, she went through a divorce, was left with a 5-year old son she sent to and from school while juggling her work in a clinic. She didn't receive child support; she didn't have a family member to help her out with her son. Her father was dying of cancer. She was all alone and left with no choice. What adds to the awful situation is that she had no clients, but never gave up. With patience and dedication, she painstakingly worked on her portfolio by scrapbooking. She went to every place she could get friendly with the owners and presented what she had. That's when her efforts paid off. To this day, she looks back with pride in her achievements. It was a choice of fight or flight. She chose to fight... and see where it got her today - on the wings of success.
"I'm very business-minded in this way, anything I do is an investment, whether it's time or money, it doesn't matter what it is, it's an investment."
- Valerie Weber
Topics Covered:
04:34 - How she got started in the permanent beauty industry at the time when the internet was not readily available
06:00 - Be resourceful but never compromise laws and safety
07:54 - How maintaining personal relationships with clients is more important than just having digital connections with them
09:25 - What message does it send to clients when you do not do consultations and only take online bookings?
14:34 - How did she start having a team, and what are the challenges of having one?
15:40 - Why you need to create a structure for your staff
17:45 - What you've got to prepare for when dealing with business growth and how to handle challenges that come with scaling up
21:22 - Balancing fairness towards yourself, your clients, and your staff
23:25 - When is it appropriate to act on behalf of the business, and when is it not?
27:22 - What and how she overcame the most challenging phase at the start of her business
34:35 - Lessons she imparts from her personal experience of being a parent and career woman
35:12 - What her marketing looked like back when she started
36:15 - How forging personal connections with people way back when she started, earned her referrals even to this day
37:55 - Your time is your investment
41:22 - Her thoughts on the generosity and helping people
42:50 - Machines she's using
45:00 - Something to look forward to in 2021
47:25 - Her favorite procedure or technique and tips around that
Key Takeaways:
"When I started it was what you did you made you know, business cards, you made personal connections with businesses, you tried to get linked up with doctors, you know, there are so many different ways that you had to get people to know who you are and what you did. And I know my mission back then was okay, let people know who I am and what I do." - Valerie Weber
"My business cards, you do what you have to when you're starting. The areas that a lot of good businesses spend money are in marketing and advertising. And now looking back, I would never advise or encourage anybody to do your marketing and advertising. Unless you have some skill." - Valerie Weber
"I never compromised laws and safety. I held great responsibility for somebody's health and well being and that I was working on somebody's face. And the nature of what I did was very serious. I saved money in other areas."- Valerie Weber
"As much as we bring modernized technology to our business, for convenience for the people that want that, people that are just like ready to go, that's cool. But maintaining relationships with people is really what's going to keep you having those long-term return plans and referrals roll in. Otherwise, you're just a digital person to them. There's no loyalty in that." - Valerie Weber
"I've seen people that put on their websites and stuff like they don't do consultations, and they only take online bookings. I'm not saying this is bad. I'm reading posts that say, booked till 2021, and booked till 2022. If you need to say that to feed your ego, I know that sounds mean, that's okay. But basically, you have to look at it from the client's perspective. Any marketing person would tell you that basically, what you're telling your client is, 'I'm too busy to see you, don't even bot." - Valerie Weber
"Hiring a team is beneficial. It can be very beneficial. But it can also add to a lot of headaches. And it can certainly be very challenging to maintain." - Valerie Weber
"The challenges that come when you hire a team is you need to first figure out what your goal is, as a business, like where are you trying to go? It's not just some aimless goal." - Valerie Weber
"For me, having a team is here because one, my business is a brand. So I don't want to be the only person that's on the pedestal. Like when people come to Dermagrafix, they're coming to see me and my professional team. It's not like, Oh, I want to come and see Valerie. But if you want a cheaper price, you can go to the shoddy person that doesn't do such a great job. We don't do that here." - Valerie Weber
"You have to kind of create like a structure for your staff and find out what makes them tick." - Valerie Weber
If you would like to get a FREE copy of my "Uncommon Strategies to Get Clients Now" where I share my signature Client Attraction Formula then click here for that PDF https://www.aprilmeese.com/client-attraction-formula
Resources:
- For your FREE Live 3-Day Workshop called Get Seen to Get Clients, register here: http://www.aprilmeese.com/getclients
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