Sal Capizzi, Marketing Director at Book4Time and a former Director of Spa and Wellness at NEXUS Luxury Collection, shares his expert insight into your reader questions.
Send your queries about managing staff, operations, and anything else you want to know (challenge him!) to scapizzi@spaexecutive.com
Q. Dear Sal: “I’m trying to come up with downtime tasks for my concierge team so they can stay productive during downtimes.”
A. This is a great question because no team is free from the occasional slow day at the spa. The first thing you want to do is assess why you are having a slow day. Is your team pre-booking appointments? Are they incentivized to pre-book appointments? Creating healthy competition amongst your desk staff is a surefire way to have as many pre-booked appointments as possible. But maybe operations are solid and this is a one off.
Start with outreach. Have an outreach plan for your desk staff to start chipping away at instead of playing Candy Crush. This can be anything from clients who haven’t visited the spa in 30/60/90 days to reaching out to clients who have open gift card balances and reminding them there is still pre-funded money on their account that needs to be spent!
Create the ultimate guest experience. Send a thank-you email or write a phone call script for your staff to begin communicating. I personally wouldn’t suggest calling someone who visited the spa more than 30 days ago but thanking clients for coming in for a visit within the first 48 to 72 hours is essential. This is also a great time to offer these clients a pre-booking incentive just in case the team “forgot” at checkout.
Correct that wear and tear. Your spa is busy and chances are the equipment you use will have seen better days as time goes on. Have your team take an audit of table mechanics, towel warmers, oil stains on walls in treatment rooms and common areas, and double check any amenities that see a lot of traffic. This could involve your lounge area down to your steam room.
Generate visibility. We don’t always have the chance to grab our phones and post on social media during a typical work day. Use your downtime as a chance to showcase any new services or products that you are offering in your spa.
Plan promotions. As a business operations manager it is your responsibility to create promotions during the holiday season and for special occasions throughout the year. If your spa has been busy and you have been putting that Mothers Day/Father’s Day/Family Day promotion off, now is the time to plan it from start to finish! Once your promotion is create, let your concierge staff take it and run with it. Have them run a report to see who visited the spa during the same time range or for the same promotion in past years and have them reach out to these clients to let them know the promotion is happening again. Chances are they enjoyed their experience and the promotion so much that they will purchase it again. Want to take it a step further? Create that healthy competition amongst your staff and reward them with a signature treatment or a monetary bonus for whoever books or sells the most promotion packages!
Good luck!
Sal
Spa Executive is published by Book4Time, the leader in guest management, revenue and mobile solutions for the most exclusive spas, hotels, and resorts around the globe. Learn more at book4time.com.
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