Covid-19 Outbreak Archives - Kendrick PR
July 8, 2020

Which Way Now? How to Re-Open Your Beauty Salon or Aesthetic Clinic

It’s been just over a week since we launched our Back to Business Clinic Marketing toolkit to help beauty businesses in the UK re-ignite their marketing for the post-lockdown world, and we’ve already received great feedback from leading aesthetics practitioners and clinic owners.

However, many UK clinics were prevented from opening on July 4th 2020 at the last minute: this weeks’ u-turns and subsequent confusion on which businesses can open (and when) means practitioners need all the support they can get, and we want to do even more to help.

We have now reduced the price of our Post-COVID Back to Business marketing toolkit to just £99! This discount will only be available until Friday 17th July 2020, after which the toolkit will revert to £149 – so grab yours now! To claim your exclusive £50 discount use the code KICKSTART50 at the cart page.

The UK Beauty Industry Latest

As our industry struggles to recover, this week has demonstrated just how little value the Government places on one of the most highly valuable and innovative business sectors in our economy. Worth around £3bn a year, anti-wrinkle injections and dermal fillers make up almost 80% of aesthetic treatments carried out in the UK. Multiple aesthetic industry bodies, the British Beauty Council and All-Party Parliamentary Groups have been pushing the Government hard to reconsider and clarify, calling out the hypocrisy of allowing pubs to reopen and beaches to throng with people, yet preventing clinical businesses trained in infection control from re-opening their doors.

Thankfully, some progress has been made – with Save Face managing to get a clarification on the latest reopening guidance to ensure that practices delivering medical treatments can reopen. However, there is still a long way to go before there is any kind of consistency in the approach and reassurance for clinics.

Why is PR & Marketing So Important?

As the re-opening debate rages on, some clinics and salons can reopen, while others must continue to hold their breath, but the critical theme for both will be clarity of communication. It is critical to maintain visibility and an open, regular dialogue – to manage patients’ expectations, educate them on what the new ‘normal’ will be like in-clinic, manage an upswell in demand or launch a pre-opening waitlist strategy. All these elements are covered in our Back to Business Clinic Marketing Toolkit – with guidance, how-to’s, template materials and easy tips to take away the stress of your post-covid marketing, and give you back the time to focus on what you’re best at!

Get your Post-COVID Back to Business marketing toolkit for just £99! Use code KICKSTART50 at cart page to claim your exclusive £50 discount before 17th July 2020.

For more information or to discuss your clinic marketing needs further, please don’t hesitate to reach out to the Kendrick PR team.

June 17, 2020

NEW LAUNCH: Back to Business Marketing Toolkit for Clinics

Are you an aesthetic practitioner or beauty salon owner? As a result of COVID-19, you’ve probably had limited cashflow or client consultations since late March… Thankfully, lockdown rules are starting to ease and it’s time to kickstart your marketing, PR and social media to get business flowing when doors re-open again!

At Kendrick PR, we realise that marketing may feel like an overwhelming task and we want to empower you to revive your business post-lockdown. Our team of marketing and PR experts have designed a Back to Business Marketing Toolkit for Aesthetic Clinics and Beauty Salons for ambitious business owners like you.

This effective toolkit is designed to help you re-engage with existing patients, to drive bookings and generate cashflow in those vital first weeks of re-opening, and also attract new customers to support ongoing business growth. It contains step-by-step strategic guidance and tips to re-ignite your clinic marketing plus, simple yet effective tools and templates you can implement straight away.

Who is this toolkit for?

We have designed this toolkit specifically for aesthetics clinics, beauty salons and wellness businesses. This straightforward and easy-to-use online training tool is perfect for marketing beginners and practitioners struggling to find time to promote their business.

3 reasons why you need this toolkit

  1. To save significant amounts of your valuable time so you can refocus on working IN your business, as opposed to ON the marketing.
  2. To kickstart cashflow by driving existing customer bookings and attracting new customers through regular, tailored communications via newsletters, blogs and social media
  3. To improve brand visibility and awareness, boosting word of mouth referrals and keeping your clinic diary packed once lockdown lifts.

What’s included?

Your bespoke marketing toolkit contains expert strategies and business tips, alongside tailored, easy-to-use marketing tools, including:

STRATEGIC GUIDANCE

  • Getting Ahead in the New Normal
  • Post-lockdown business tips – how to re-ignite your clinic and re-engage patients
  • How to create a waitlist marketing campaign

TEMPLATE MATERIALS

  • Template patient newsletter content
  • Template x2 clinic blogs

BONUS TOOLS

  • 10 tips for free PR cheat sheet
  • Creating your customer avatar exercise
  • Template clinic PR & marketing planner template

How much is it?

The Back to Business Marketing Toolkit for Aesthetic Clinics and Beauty Salons is only £149 incl. VAT for a limited launch period. You can purchase your toolkit for instant download right here.

Award-winning beauty, aesthetics, and wellness PR

Kendrick PR is an award-winning communications agency, working with leading brands and businesses across the beauty and medical aesthetic industries. Launched in 2015, we are passionate about bringing unique, innovative and exciting brands to life: we deliver strategic, multi-faceted PR, social media and marketing campaigns; alongside impressive celebrity and influencer support, hosting unforgettable events, talent management and strategic commercial partnerships. Our team are a mixture of seasoned PR experts, marketeers, publishers, publicists and social media experts – all dedicated to creating real success for our clients.

June 10, 2020

Life Without Tweakments: The Negative Mental Health Effects of Covid-19

During the ongoing COVID pandemic there has been an increased focus on mental health and wellbeing, and more recently has shone the spotlight on the impact of being denied regular access to beauty and aesthetic treatments. It appears there has been increased reporting of a negative impact on people’s feelings of self-worth, happiness and confidence as a result of extended lockdown – away from some of those services which form part of people’s wellbeing rituals, such as hairdressers, beauty salons, spas and aesthetic clinics. 

Essential or non-essential? 

Pre-Covid, undergoing aesthetics or beauty tweakments at certain periods across the year was something that many had built seamlessly into our routines – a timely confidence boost that, with the enforced closure of the “non-essential” businesses who perform these procedures, has been swiftly brought to an end. This can even result in feelings of anxiety and a buildup of negative self-image. 

What this lack of accessibility to popular procedures has forced us to ask is: just how much do these tweakments affect how we feel about ourselves? A cursory glance at recent media articles suggests that tweakments have a strong bearing on the self-esteem and mental health of consumers. 

In a world where we’ve all been forced to weigh up the things that really are essential, it seems that the health and beauty treatments we used to take for granted are, for some people, crucial to both the maintenance of their identity and positive mental health. 

Unsafe practices 

Whilst in the best interests of public health, these closures have also fostered a sub-culture that seems designed to take advantage of those currently struggling with their confidence and self-image. Reduced access to tweakments has led to a surge in clandestine aesthetic treatments by unscrupulous practitioners – or ill-advised patients attempting to administer themselves with home kits purchased online. When treatments have been delivered incorrectly there are reports of tissue damage, paralysis, and even blindness among those who have either self-administered Botox and fillers, or paid a disreputable practitioner to do it for them in an unsafe and poorly sanitized environment.

Additionally, this increase in illegal and unsafe practices has highlighted the serious need for better regulation in the aesthetics industry, with calls for more legislation around the sale and administration of injectable treatments. 

How to manage mental health during lockdown

Mental health is about so much more than just body image – but for some patients, their beauty rituals and tweakments have been a big part of their self-image, positivity and confidence. With clinics planning to open their doors around early July, here’s what you can do in the meantime to work towards feeling better about yourself in other ways:

  • Dress for the day – Working from home has given us the freedom to sit in our pyjamas each and every day, should we so desire. This may be a dream come true for some people but could have a very telling effect on the mental health of others. Psychologists have suggested that dressing for the day can make us feel more prepared, proactive and ready to take on the world, meaning that taking the time to dress in office attire and to “put your face on” could be what is needed to break you out of the slump.
  • Regular exercise – Having to see other people on a less regular basis can really limit our activities and make our world seem much smaller than it used to be. To counteract this, regular outside exercise is recommended as it will allow you to escape from the current monotony of working and living and expose you to a different setting. Don’t worry about bumping into too many people while doing so if you aren’t feeling your best self as it’s still advised to keep 2m apart from anyone from a different household. 
  • Learning new skills – Lockdown has allowed many of us to tap into our inner baker, writer or craftsperson – amongst other things – with lots of people using this downtime to get to grips with a new skill or hobby. Doing this could be a useful way of winding down or de-stressing and will give you licence to place your creativity elsewhere. 
  • Focus on self-care – Even though aesthetics clinics are closed, that doesn’t mean that your health and appearance has to experience a decline in other areas. Many people have used this time to really focus on getting their skin back into pristine condition and several beauty brands have reported a renewed interest in bathing and skincare products instead of makeup and cosmetic items. Think of this time as a way of starting afresh and giving your body the chance to recover from always having to look “presentable” and “acceptable”. 

Kendrick PR 

We’re an acclaimed communications agency best known for our work in the beauty and medical aesthetic industries. As such, keeping abreast of the things currently affecting the industry is a natural part of what we do. To find out more about us, or to enquire about any of our services, you can visit our website here.

April 3, 2020

Should I Alter My Marketing Strategy During The Covid-19 Outbreak?

As the Covid-19 (coronavirus) outbreak continues, many of us have not just had to change how we work, but adjust to a completely new way of living. With updated advice being offered by the Government on a regular basis and the situation developing rapidly, the nature of social distancing and the enforced closure of many places of work has left many brands, businesses and marketing managers with a tough decision to make: should their marketing strategy be altered during the Covid-19 outbreak?

At present, with the high street beginning to shut down and all but essential businesses advised to close, it’s only natural that certain business owners will start to consider things from a financial point of view and ponder the use of promoting of a business that, at least for the time being, will experience a significant downturn in footfall and a potentially negative return on investment.

This is all influenced by the nature of a business, of course. Those who have been deemed key to keeping the country ticking over during this difficult time – supermarkets, pharmacies, garages and more – will not suffer as badly as, say, businesses such as clinics, gyms or restaurants. So, how do we tackle this head-on and make the best of such an unprecedented predicament? Read on to find out more.

The value of adaptability 

The more astute marketers will have had their future campaigns mapped out months in advance, working hard to capitalise on all of the trends through the year. But the coronavirus pandemic has changed all of that. With marketing strategies being canned overnight due to the quickening spread of the virus and its impact on how we live, many businesses have had to adapt to survive. There are stories of many businesses who have had to shapeshift out of necessity – think of all of the restaurants currently offering delivery services – and those who have used the power of social media and digital marketing to spread this message to their customers. 

With Government advice around Covid-19 changing all the time, this is where the value of adaptability really becomes clear. Structure your marketing campaigns around this current guidance and don’t work too far in advance. At this point, it’s difficult to anticipate what’s coming next.  

Community spirit

One of the most positive things to come out of the Covid-19 outbreak thus far is the fantastic amount of community spirit that has been demonstrated across the country. Many brands have been upfront and honest over how they have been working to keep their staff safe and well and what sort of plans they have in place should their employees become ill. Those who have lent support to their customers during this difficult time – whether in the form of offering free deliveries of products or holding special shopping hours for the more vulnerable amongst us – have rightly used the internet and their social media platforms to keep everyone updated as to these important safety measures. This has allowed brands to build trust during the outbreak and showcased the notable humanity and kindness of spirit that many of them possess. 

Remain on brand

Although it’s ill-advised to ignore the seriousness of the coronavirus outbreak, it’s also worth remembering that the online world – social media and websites in particular – is our only consistent channel of communication at this present time.

Integrating content around Covid-19 might be important to the survival of your business, but you need to make sure that this is done in a way that is reflective of your brand’s values and tone of voice. People are very perceptive and they’ll be able to sniff out when you’re trying to turn a situation to your advantage. This means that getting your messaging right during this time is a delicate operation and something that must be carefully considered. 

To avoid opening a can of worms, it might be a good idea to use your social media channels just to keep awareness of your brand alive. But make sure you don’t go for the hard sell when doing so. At this point in time, they’ll be a noticeable change in customer behaviour, so don’t be surprised if your customers don’t respond to you as well as they used to. Just remember that this may not continue when we are finally able to get this pandemic under control.

Stay safe 

These are unprecedented times and we’re all doing our best to acclimatise ourselves to the complexities of the current situation. For now, you should do what you can to protect your brand and make adjustments accordingly, putting the safety of your business, staff and yourself at the forefront of everything you do. Stay safe and follow instructions carefully. Together, we can beat this.