Matthew Reilly – The Scarecrow Story on the Beauty-Market
In the sci-fi thriller ‘Scarecrow’, the author pits two groups fighting against each other. One of the groups belongs to the iron and steel industry, and the other belongs to the beauty industry. The lobby is headed by someone called ‘Lilian Mattencourt’ – an intelligent pun on Liliane Bettencourt. It is interesting to note that the market for beauty products and services thrives at all the time except for times of war.
The beauty industry traces its origins to Ancient Egypt where kohl was extensively used to augment the eye-beauty of the royal women of the Pharaoh’s court. Today, the beauty industry stands at a staggering valuation of $425 billion across the globe. The market is only expected to grow with every passing year.
The Changing Landscape Of Beauty Industry – Not Just For The Cream Of The Society
The expected steadiness of growth when it comes to the beauty products and services industry can be attributed to the fact that it is no longer confined to the high-class. Today, even the middle and lower-middle class people have started to use high-end beauty products and services. It’s not uncommon to see the products of L’Oréal in a supermarket in Cambodia.
The online and mobile revolution has also contributed in making the reach of products and global, which otherwise would have been confined to local markets. The mobile-and-online revolution has contributed to the beauty industry in multitudes of ways.
Beauty Industry And The On-Demand Revolution
One of the ways in which mobiles contributed to the growth of the beauty industry is in making beauty services available on demand. The mapping and GPS systems meant that consumers could request for specific beauty services to be offered at a place of their convenience, and at a time when they needed it.
This small change in mobiles resulted in a plethora of apps providing different services like transportation, food delivery, handyman services, and of course, beauty services. Even within the confinement of beauty services, there are various possibilities.
Creating Apps For Beauty Industry
The different services that can be provided within the beauty industry include but are not limited to:
- Salon services at home
- Beauty products home delivery
- Hiring beauty professionals for an occasion
- Appointment booking for beauty salons
- Skincare and wellness services at home
- Dermatological and trichological services
The Beauty Services On-Demand App
With such a wide spectrum of possibilities, there are different apps that can be created for fulfilling different purposes. However, the skeleton for most of them is bound to be similar. The ecosystem of beauty services on-demand is held together by three vertices – the user, the administrator, and the service providers, who, in most cases, is a salon-owner.
Each entity is provided with a dedicated app that facilitates its process to the executed without any hassles.
The App For Users
The primary aim of the user is to avail of the services provided by independent beauty professionals and by salons. The user should be able to choose, book, avail, and pay for the services in the most convenient manner. For the user to experience their services, there are a few features that need to be in place.
The user should be able to quickly register for the services by using generic credentials like Google or Facebook. They should also be able to register themselves with their email and/or phone number.
The profile of the user will be linked to the registration-information. The profile will also contain information about the history of the user’s orders, the payment methods, and the review/rating given to them.
The user should be able to view all the available salons/professionals and the services they offer. They should be able to sort and filter based on the services, the star-ratings, and the time-for-arrival.
The user should have a facility to subscribe to services. This helps in keeping the customer hooked to the brand and its services. The subscription will also mean monetary benefits for the customers, which is likely to increase brand loyalty.
The customer should have the facility to make payments using multiple methods including but not limited to credit cards, debit cards, UPIs, internet banking, wallets, and cash. After the completion of service, they should be able to give reviews and rate the salon/service-provider.
The App For Salon-Owners
The salon-owners or independent beauty professionals are the ones who offer beauty services to the customer. They should be provided with an app that helps them manage their services, allocations, and the payments.
One of the best ways to assure that you acquire salons as customers is to make the sign-up process simple and easy. The salons and the professionals should be able to register themselves without complications.
The salon-app should also be provided with facilities to manage the assignation of professionals, manage the availability of services, manage appointment-slots, and release coupon codes and offers.
They should also be able to accept or reject customer-requests. They should also be able to quickly encash their earnings.
The Administrator App
The administrator functions as an overseeing authority of all the activities that happen on the app. They should be given the power to perform activities in the interest of safeguarding the sanity and sanctity of the app. They should be able to manage both users and salons.
They should also be able to manage the payment methods and should be able to quickly access the revenue and commission-rates.
All the vital information should be viewable on an intuitive dashboard that gives a complete picture of all the vital statistics governing the app.
The Features That Would Make The App Better
The features discussed above are more than enough to make the app function optimally. However, adding a few features would mean that the app’s appeal increases considerably.
- Using a cloud environment would ensure that data is managed efficiently.
- The user can be given occasional promotions and offers that make them hooked to the brand.
- In-app chat ensures that the customer gets support from the technicians as and when they need it.
- Social media integration can passively help in quick-sharing and brand-building.
Building An On-Demand Beauty Services App
Putting an on-demand beauty services app is all about bringing together elements of impeccable coding/development, intuitive and interactive UI/UX, and marketing it in the right avenues. Creating the app might be expected to consume a lot of time and money. However, with the availability of Uber for beauty, creating an on-demand beauty services app might not be difficult. These white-label solutions can be purchased and customized according to your requirements.
Conclusion
If you are an aspiring entrepreneur who would like to capitalize on the massive beauty market by creating an on-demand beauty services app, you can always get in touch with our team. They will take care to gather your requirements and create your app. After all, your business needs a face-lift too right?
