You’ve finally decided that you are going to step out on your own and create a name for yourself. You are going to fulfill your dreams instead of someone elses.
Well, now that you’ve made that decision, what’s next?
You are going to have to come up with an identity for your salon. In the sea of marketing, that is no small task. For some reason, hair salon names are hard to make unique. We see things that are overdone and underwhelming.
If you are looking for creative ways to start branding yourself then you have come to the right place. We will show you creative approaches to name your business and throw in a little personality into the mix.
How to land on a unique name
You want your salon name to be unique. You want the image and reputation of your salon to stand out from the hundreds of other salons that will essentially be your competition.
“How will I do that?” you might ask. We are going to show you a good place to start.
You are going to want to grab some paper and something to write with for this exercise. The imporant thing to remember here is that it is just an exercise to generate ideas. Nothing that you are going to write down is too outlandish or silly.
We are clearing space in your head for the good ideas.
You will be dividing your page into two separate columns.
On the left side of the page you will be writing down verbs and adjectives that you associate with the image of salon. Try not to overthink it. You might write things such as cut, wash, blue, trim, etc. Just write down whatever comes to mind.
On the right side of the page you will list nouns that you would associate. This could include sheers, brush, your town, etc. (This is where things get fun, so it can literally be anything.)
You will be taking these results and playing them off of each other in the next step.
On a clean sheet of of paper you will be creating a grid. You will list the responses that you created along the left side of the grid and the right side responses along the top. Where these responses overlap you can choose to write the matching phrase or draw a thumbnail image to represent the result.
This exercise will give you plenty of unconventional results that you might initially dismiss, but it will also provide you with plenty unique names to choose from.
Consider: A great software to run your salon
Traditional Branding
Unconventional methods might not be your thing, and you might be looking at a more traditonal and less time consuming way to come up with something. For this, you might want to start asking yourself some questions to think about.
- What is your why?
- Where are you from?
- Can my name be tied to my services?
- What services do you want to offer?
- What sets you apart?
These questions contain identifiers that could cue in potential clients into who you are or what you offer. Here are a few examples of how answering these questions could help you create a name for your business.
- Fiene Hair Salon – Using your last name
- Trim – Simple word relating to a service you offer
- Salon Indianapolis – Using your location
- Bang! Bang! – Play on words to a popular haircut
- Cut Costs – If you specialize in discounted services
- Red Studio – If you are a color specilist with reds
- Studio Lights – If your focus is blondes
- Solo – If you are a single artist salon
Branding is essential for marketing a salon business, so keep in mind how important this is when laying you foundation.
Luxury names
Maybe you are feeling something more high-end. You want your name to read that of luxury for the elite. You’ll need something a little more classy to stand out from the rest.
You’ll want to understand the psychology behind branding noting that your salon will be different than your average run-of-the-mill salon. Luxury brands use a deeper meaning that stand far beyond the face of a hair salon. In fact, luxury hair salon names tend to be simpler by nature and complex in meaning. You could also insert a bit of humor, but you don’t want to get too creative.
Here is a list of classy names to get you started:
- Capture
- Contagious
- Fashionic
- Identity
- Mellow
- Status
- Singularity
- Identify
Refresh
Maybe you are just thinking of rebranding. You’ve already had a salon, but you want to give it a new feel. This might allow you to keep your old demographic while reaching a new one. Thus, giving your the opportunity for new bookings.
People often change their hairdresser, because they want to reinvent themselves. They might be getting tired of the same techniques and tricks that their previous hair stylist used.
They might want to try out the innovative ideas and creativity of someone new in hopes of turning their boring look into the unexpected. But, in order to make them a new client they have to be able to trust you and your advice to make those changes.
We are exposed to 25,000 new brands a year and experience almost 6,000 a day. In order to have your creative juices be read by the client without smacking them in the face with the point, you will need to be inspired by words that gravitate toward creativity while keeping in the hair industry lane. Complex, right? There are a ton of words that lend a hand to both routes without being overly obvious.
Here are a few to give you examples:
- Paint
- Innovation
- Inspired
- Fantasy
- Mosaic
- Process
- Renew
- Imagine
- Invent
- Next
- Canvas
- Hue
- Lab
K.I.S.S.
Keep it simple, stupid! This might be an unpopular opinion, but you’ll want stick with creative over clever if you truly want to be unique.
The first hair cut on earth may not be recorded, but we can probably assume that they go back to somewhere around the beginning of time. That being said, that tells us that some phrases could potentially get tired and old when it comes to the cliches associated with branding.
You may be able to find a way to make your brand completely unique, but the chances are it has been over used 100 times over.
Here are some examples of “creative” branding for salons:
- Cut Loose
- Ahead of Time
- Split Seconds
- Twisted Scissors
- Hair Affair
- Upper Cuts
- Shear Madness
- All Tangled Up
- Tangled
- Dye Hard
- Mane Attraction
- A Cut Above
Ultimately, what you name your salon is going to come down to what kind of feel and personality you are going to want to present to your demographic. The words that you so carefully select are going to paint a picture of services and experience to your clients.
If you are new to the game or you are looking to expand your clientele book, then you are going to want to attract a certain target marget into your chair. You will want to consider this as you are perusing through your thesaurus. You wouldn’t want to use fancy words associated with high-end services if you are trying to create a cost effective place for children. It just wouldn’t make sense.
It doesn’t matter what kind of feel you are going for, but you are going to want to put some thought into your salon branding. You could try using the grid exercise or asking yourself questions to get started. It might be even worth a shot of doing a little bit of both to get your inspiration on the page.
Just remember that your branding will define you to your audience. Be conscious of what it says about you, your business, your services, your skills, etc. You get one chance to make a first impression, and you want it to be the best.
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