Winning customers as a hairdresser

Hairdressing is one of the most crowded trades in Austria. Positioning and rebooking fill the calendar — not price. This page is an order of operations tuned to how a salon actually earns, with the parts that change when you run the place in English.

Everything below applies whether or not German is your first language. The section after next covers only the parts that change when it is not — and the honest answer there is that one of them costs international salon owners more customers than anything else on this page.

The starting point: how a salon really earns

What carries the business

High repeat purchase: Clients come back on a rhythm — every few weeks for a men’s cut, every few months for colour. Your most valuable marketing action is the next appointment booked before they leave, not the next new face.
Extremely local: Your catchment is the neighbourhood, often walking distance. Being visible in your Grätzl beats reach across Austria.
Built on trust: People hand their head to a stranger. Reviews and a visible portfolio lower that barrier far more than any advertising copy.
Language cuts both ways: It narrows the local walk-in crowd and opens the international one. Which side dominates depends on your district — and it is a decision you should make on purpose, not by accident.

Running this business in English

Vienna alone has tens of thousands of residents who work in English, and they all need a haircut. That is a genuine clientele, and serving it well is a positioning decision rather than a fallback. But it comes with one trap that is worth more than every other tip here combined.

Your customers search in German — even the ones who speak English. Someone standing on your street reaches for their phone and types “Friseur in der Nähe”. If your Google Business Profile is written only in English, you are not in that result. Not ranked low — absent. The profile is free, takes twenty minutes, and is the difference between a neighbourhood that knows you exist and one that walks past.

The fix is not to hide that you work in English. It is to be findable in German and legible in English: German service names, German opening hours, and one clear line saying that clients are welcome to book and be served in English. Both audiences then find what they were looking for.

Two more things follow from this. Reviews will arrive in German, and replying to them in stilted machine German reads worse than replying briefly and plainly — future clients notice. And your visual work needs no translation at all: a before-and-after clip is exactly as persuasive in any language, which is why the platform step below is where an English-speaking salon competes on completely level ground.

What first? The order that works for this trade

Priority	Action	Why here
First	Book the next appointment at the chair	With a regular repeat rhythm, retention is the biggest lever there is. Costs nothing, works immediately, needs about four words of German.
First	A complete Google Business Profile — written in German	Your neighbours search “Friseur in der Nähe”, not “hairdresser near me”. The profile language decides whether you appear at all.
Then	Collect reviews systematically	Anyone handing over their head reads what happened to others first.
Then	One visual platform with real transformations	Shows your hand and your niche, and keeps you in mind between appointments. Images carry across languages — this is where being an English speaker costs you nothing.
Later	Paid local advertising	Only once the profile, the reviews and a clear specialisation exist. Before that you are buying expensive clicks to a page that does not convince.
Not now	Discount battles and voucher portals	Pulls bargain hunters instead of regulars, and undercuts both your price and your retention.

Positioning: what sets you apart

Technique: “Balayage studio”, “curly hair specialist”, “blonde without breakage”. People search for these by name — and they search for them in English too.
The international clientele: Vienna has a large expat, student and diplomatic community actively looking for a salon where they can explain what they want without translating. That is a real niche with real search volume, not a consolation prize.
Audience: A barber with a beard focus, a child-friendly salon, colour competence for over-50s.
Convenience: “Roots done in your lunch break — 45 minutes”, evening appointments, online booking around the clock.
Atmosphere: A recognisable salon experience — quiet and private versus lively and social. It decides who feels at home and comes back.

Where is the gap in your district? Which positioning is missing near you depends on how crowded the market already is. The market check shows competitor density per district from official GISA data — a full market forces you to specialise, an open one rewards range. It will not tell you how many salons already serve an English-speaking clientele; that one you answer by walking the street and reading their profiles.

Content that fits this trade

Not format names — actual topics, each with a strong opening line:

The transformation — “She came in with three months of roots…” · “From chestnut to vanilla blonde — without breakage.”
The care mistake — “Three things that destroy your colour at home.” · “Why your fringe never falls the way it does here.”
The honest price question — “What balayage actually costs — and why.”
The invisible step — “The test I run before every bleach.”
The reaction — “Her face when she saw herself for the first time.”
The vocabulary post — “How to ask for what you want at an Austrian salon — the five words that matter.” A genuinely useful post that only you can write.

Timing: when this trade has momentum

Not every month needs a campaign — these moments are strong here:

When	Occasion
Jan–Feb	“New year, new look” — change stories, before and after
Apr–Jun	Wedding season → bridal and guest looks, book early
Jul–Aug	Summer → sun protection, honest advice on lightening, holiday hair
Sep	Vienna’s international intake arrives — students and new arrivals are all looking for a salon at once
Nov–Dec	Before the holidays → fully booked early; Christmas and New Year looks

Your first 30 days

Realistic for a small Austrian business with no marketing department:

Four weeks, each one doable

Week 1: Complete the Google profile — photos, services, opening hours — in German. If you are unsure of the wording, copy the service names from two established salons nearby; those are the terms people search for. Then make asking for the next appointment a habit at the chair.
Week 2: A review QR code at the till. Ask for honest feedback after each appointment — no incentive, no script.
Week 3: Pick one platform, film three transformations and post them. A phone is enough.
Week 4: Write your specialisation in one sentence — and put that same sentence everywhere: profile, bio, salon window. If you serve an English-speaking clientele on purpose, say so in that sentence.

Mistakes that are common in this trade

No next appointment — the client leaves without a date. The most expensive missed chance in the trade.
An English-only Google profile — invisible to the neighbourhood that walks past your door every day. This is the single most common own goal for international salon owners in Austria.
Discounts instead of a profile — permanent offers attract price hunters and devalue the work.
Stock photos instead of real work — clients want to see your results, not a catalogue.
A bit of everything — five half-dead profiles instead of one that is looked after.
Ignoring reviews — not collecting them, not replying. Both cost visibility and trust.

What a market check answers here How many salons in your district serve how many residents, and whether the market there is young or long-established. From that follows the real question: do you need to specialise sharply because the district is full, or simply become visible because it is open? The market check pulls those numbers from official GISA data. It gives you the picture, not a finished campaign — that you build with the steps above.

Common questions

Do I need to speak German to run a salon in Austria?

Not to hold the trade licence — the registration itself has no language requirement. But your customers search, review and talk in German, so the honest answer is: you need enough German for the chair and the phone, or someone in the salon who has it. What you do not need is perfect German. A salon that is visibly and confidently English-speaking, with a German profile so people can find it, works well in Vienna. A salon that is invisible in German search does not, however good the work is.

Should my Google profile be in German or English?

German, with English mentioned inside it. The profile language decides whether you appear when a neighbour searches “Friseur 1070” — and that search happens far more often than any English one. Write the service names in German, then add one line such as “We also serve our clients in English.” That way you are findable locally and the international clientele recognises you.

The hairdressing market is saturated — is it even worth it?

That is exactly why positioning decides it rather than price. In a crowded market the winner is not the cheapest but the one with the clearest profile and the most loyal regulars. And a full district also means high demand. Check how dense yours actually is — that number tells you how sharply you need to specialise.

New customers or regulars — which first?

For hairdressers, almost always keeping regulars. The repeat rhythm runs from a few weeks to a few months, so a client who stays is worth considerably more over a year than a one-time visit. Secure the retention first — next appointment, reminder — then chase new faces. Otherwise you are filling a bucket that leaks at the bottom.

How do I reply to a review written in German?

In German, short, and without a translation tool doing the talking. Two honest sentences read better than a paragraph of machine phrasing — future clients can tell the difference, and so can the person who wrote the review. If the review is critical, thank them, name the thing, and offer to fix it. Length is not what makes a reply convincing.

I have no time for content next to the salon.

You film what you are already doing: one transformation clip a week, fifteen seconds, on your phone. No editing, no studio. The result on the client’s head is the content — you only have to capture it and show it.

→ Getting found on Google · → Collecting reviews · Legal side: → registering this trade

Marketing practice, not legal advice. These are experience-based recommendations, not a guarantee of results.