laneimageconsultingAs you know, I’m an Irish girl living in the South of France. I’ve been an ex-pat most of my adult life having spent many years in Singapore and Bahrain before moving back to Europe. I’m blessed to have many siblings (yes, your typical BIG Irish family!) and friends scattered all over the globe.
I go back to Ireland several times a year to see my parents, who are now in their 80s and purposely set my business up online so I can take my work with me wherever I go. As well as several trips to Ireland, this year I’ve also worked from Sweden, Dubai and the US, and there’s no reason you can’t do the same if that’s your dream too!
I’m sure many of you are already online with your styling services, but I know there are many more of you who’ve taken training but are not yet up and running. Then there are others who are yet to dive in at all. Whatever stage you’re at, I hope this email will encourage you to take the next step.
I’m focusing on the beliefs that tend to hold people back from going online with their styling services. You can have all the training in the world and still not go for it because of the negative chatter going on in your head, so I’m going to help you halt that chatter so you can kick things up a gear in your business!
9 beliefs that hold stylists back from taking their services online
1) I lack the technology skills to go online.
Many stylists, particularly those who’re a little older, feel they don’t have the tech skills to get online. I’m telling you, if you can find and join me on my Friday lives in my Facebook group, then you’ve got as much know-how as you need! (You can join the group here if you haven’t already: https://www.facebook.com/group… 😉),
The essentials to get going with online styling consultations are:
- 1) To use Zoom, Teams or something similar to have online video calls with clients.
- 2) To give a simple presentation using PowerPoint or Canva.
- 3) To send emails to your clients.
- 4) To create and modify documents in Word or Canva (if you provide your clients with a style guide).
Many people try to overcomplicate the process, but that adds a lot of stress, so my advice is to keep it simple.
2) It won’t be as much fun online.
I thought that about online styling sessions too! I used to love seeing my clients in the studio because I’m a real people person. I didn’t believe I’d be able to build the same kind of relationships with online clients, but honestly, that’s not at all what I found.
When I moved my business online, I rekindled relationships with clients from my time in Singapore, who went on to buy more services. Even old school friends got in touch to buy styling sessions! The connections online are real, just as they would be in person.
In many ways, working online is more fun because it doesn’t deplete your energy like face-to-face sessions. You don’t need to tidy your studio, set out your drapes, put the kettle on, or run out to buy some more biscuits or anything else you do for in-person clients.
It’s easier to stick to time when you’re online. If you’re a people person like me, you’ll likely find it hard to get face-to-face clients out the door when the consultation has ended! All the chatting eats into precious time for marketing and other business essentials. It’s easy to set time boundaries online because most people are Zoomed out after about an hour. Of course, you can set up a further appointment with clients if you need more time with them. You have so much more flexibility when online.
3) I won’t build long-term relationships online.
This isn’t true! When someone completes a style consultation with you, you can invite them to join a membership support group where they continue to get access to you, and of course, from other members in the community, with shopping for new items, for example.
4) I won’t get the same results online as I do in face-to-face sessions.
This is total poppycock! You can get BETTER results from online sessions.
I don’t do much online styling anymore because my focus is on helping you do it for your clients, but I used to have my online clients prepare before they arrived for a consultation. They’d send me photographs so I could assess their body shape ahead of time, and then I’d send over a personalised style guide for them to look through.
Once we were on the call, I’d take them through all the details in their style guide, and they’d often have lots of questions I’d answer, which they wouldn’t necessarily have had the opportunity to voice when just presented with the guide at in-person sessions.
Analysing clients’ body shapes using photographs and sending documentation before we got on the calls allowed me to give much more personalised advice during the consults. The clients were more informed having been able to consider my recommendations beforehand and start to think how they’d take the theory and apply it in their wardrobes which gave much greater depth to our conversations.
5) I don’t have enough experience to work online.
Aside from IT skills, stylists believe they need additional technical skills to go online with their style consults. Yes, you do, but don’t let that put you off. I’ve got everything you need in my Unstoppable Style program.
I’ll teach you how to do a body-shape analysis without taking measurements. I’m sure many of you are doing that already in your face-to-face sessions because many clients don’t like to know their numbers, and it all gets a bit awkward when you approach them with a tape measure. We work from photos because any measurements your clients provide will be unreliable because they’ll not know what they’re doing and will likely measure the wrong area!
I’ll teach you how to get the right photos of your clients and how to estimate the vertical and horizontal body shapes so you can make the correct diagnosis. I’ll also show you how to promote your online styling services on social media. It’s all just an extension of what you already do, and all the tools and training you need are there for you inside the program.
6) Online styling consultations are not accurate enough.
This is not my experience at all. If you are properly trained and have appropriate support, there’s no reason why you can’t achieve accurate results and get happy clients providing testimonials to prove it. I want you to challenge that belief and stop it from holding you back.
I’ve got happy clients all over the world that I’ve trained and who do online consultations for their own delighted clients every day. Pop over to my website and read their testimonials: https://laneimageconsulting.co….
7) How can I do online style consultations if I haven’t done any face-to-face consultations yet?
It’s not a requirement to have done in-person consultations before you go online! I’ve had several clients who’ve never done in-person styling before. I’ve trained them fully online, and they’ve jumped straight into online-only sessions and been very successful with them too. Face-to-face experience isn’t a pre-requisite for the Unstoppable Style program. You can even take the online training methods I teach and transfer them to in-person sessions if you want!
There is no reason why you can’t get online today. When you join the Unstoppable Style program, I encourage you to start promoting your online service immediately because I provide everything you need to conduct an online consultation by tomorrow. That’s how quick the turnaround is!
Your return on investment is very speedy because you can start taking on clients straightaway, and guess what often happens next? They want their colours done online. Then they want a personal shopping experience. Then they receive a wedding invitation so ask you to help them choose a beautiful outfit. On and on it goes.
Just start. Stop with the excuses; get out there and start offering online styling services already!
8) I’m not sure I can make money from online style consultations.
Sure, you can! As I’ve already shown above. ⬆ There’s a real skill to selling your services and that’s why I’ve included training on this essential business knowledge inside the Unstoppable Style program too. As I always say, you can be the most talented stylist on the planet, but if you can’t sell, you’re not going anywhere.
9) It can’t be that simple.
Some personality types are notorious for making things more complicated than they need to be. I see stylists paying for more and more training on different style systems, learning all the different ways to do it, and confusing themselves with too many options. I’m the opposite and believe in making things as simple as possible.
In the Unstoppable Style program, I’ve stripped it all back and given you all the basic information you need to get going immediately so your clients get amazing results, go away happy, and you get a good return at the end of the day.
What are you waiting for? Get going right now!
Buy immediate access to the Unstoppable Style program right here: https://landingpage.laneimageconsulting.com/order-form-pay-pal1651067802148