During these unprecedented times, in which anxiety and insecurity due to Covid-19 have taken over our lives, significant changes have been identified in consumer behavior, in the professional beauty services industry.
Consumers are firstly no longer eager to visit their salon out of fear of crowding. Secondly most events have been cancelled so they is not much need for beauty services. Thirdly many consumers have changed their habit of going to hair and beauty salon and prefer to ask a professional to treat them at home.
Enhancing customer experience in the salon and increasing the chances she will want to come back soon, are at this point crucial.
One proven way of doing that is through the neuroscience of exceeding expectations.
The main strategic goal for the next six months is to achieve customer fidelity and increase re-visitation, and exceeding expectations can be the key for success. Expectations are beliefs about what will happen in the future. They shape our experiences and have a powerful impact on how our brain processes information as we experience it in real life. Expectations shape our perceptions and therefore our behavior and they are affected by the stereotypes and biases we have, as well as the social pressure we receive. We constantly update our expectations and thus our behavior based on the information we get.
The Anterior Cingulate Cortex works as a hub in the brain for attention, memory and emotion and has massive connectivity with other parts of the brain which process social context, how your body feels, memory, predicting future events and current feelings and status. Scientific research suggests that when an event or an experience in our life is combined with an intense emotion, it creates a stronger and longer lasting memory. When we exceed a woman’s expectation in the salon, we create the strong and sharp emotion of surprise. The combination of the emotion and the experience will be kept in her memory stronger and for longer.
In addition, dopamine is a hormone released when an unexpected event happens that surprises us. When dopamine is released,we feel a sense of wellbeing and happiness.We want our customers to constantly feel that they are in the reward state so that they are not affected so strongly by social pressure and safety insecurity.
Would you like to learn more about the Neuroscience of Customer Expectations in the Hair and Beauty salon. Contact us!