Mother’s Day Promotions for Reflexologists

Planning a Mother’s Day promotion for your reflexology business and not sure what message to use or how to market it?

There are 2 ways to approach Mother’s Day from a sales perspective.

1. Get adult kids and partners to book a session or buy a gift certificate for the mom’s in their life.
2. Get moms to gift themselves with a session.

Looking at your current audience of clients, social media followers, people on your email list etc. is the easiest place to start from a promotion standpoint. So decide if your audience is more likely to be moms who would book an extra session, or book something special as a Mother’s Day gift to themselves or if the people are more likely the type to buy a gift for their mom or a mom in their life.

A third option is to get the moms on your list to ask their loved ones to book a reflexology session for them. Basically encourage them to drop some hints, or not so subtle ones by forwarding your messages, tagging their kids, etc.

What to promote for Mother’s Day?

While the first thought might be to offer a discount on gift certificates (and you’re welcome to do so), you don’t have to have a sale where you discount your rate to run a Mother’s Day promotion or to encourage gifting reflexology sessions.

Instead you could try:

• Creating a value added package that includes more than just a standard session (and at a higher price depending on what you include). You do not need to discount the items in this bundle. The incentive comes because it’s not something you normally offer (even if they could add the items together on their own, it’s not marketed that way).
• Create a package combining your services with products/services from another small business that you both can promote and share in the sales. Keep in mind the buying trends say the top categories for spending are greeting cards, outings, and flowers if you’re thinking about items that might be a good partner fit since it where the gift givers are initially thinking.
• Offer special extra’s you wouldn’t normally include during sessions booked around Mother’s Day such as special treats which can include but isn’t limited to food and drink, music, flowers, etc.
• Hosting a special event for moms. This could be an open house where they can sample products, services, services and products from other service providers and businesses you partner with it. And it doesn’t have to be a free event, but you can sell tickets/charge admission too. Granted this might not be as practical depending on COVID-19 rates/restrictions, but outdoor events or even virtual events could be work too.
• Partner with another reflexologist if you’re a solo practitioner to offer “mom and me” packages where they can come together. Or if your audience has young children, partner with someone who can watch the kids during the mom’s session.
• Offering gift cards for shorter sessions to help meet smaller budgets.
• Buying gift certificates online – it doesn’t have to be a special promotion, just that you’re making it easy for savvy shoppers spending big on mom to get a gift in a COVID-friendly shopping manner where they don’t have to leave their couch.

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Buying Trends for Mother’s Day

This section is for the data nerds like me. I love looking and analyzing this stuff. But I’ve only included the most relevant to you that can help you get in the head of gift-giving shoppers for Mother’s Day and use it to craft your promotions to appeal to the shoppers you’re hoping to attract. This can be helpful data if you plan to run ads as well since digital advertisers like Facebook for example let you target people by age, gender, etc.

For 2021, the National Retail Federation (US) survey found:

•  83% of consumers plan to celebrate, spending $220.48 on average (which is up $16 from last year).
• The top 3 categories with the most people buying from them are greeting cards (72%), special outings (49%), and flowers (68%).
• Men plan to spend more than women (S284.90 vs $159.27 per spender) on average.
• Most people are buying gifts for their mother by a landslide with wife in a distant 2^nd position, followed by gifts for daughters, grandmothers, sisters, friends, Godmothers, and others all getting less than 10% of the gifts and spending. 
• The 25-34 aged crowd are the biggest spenders and have the highest participation in celebrating Mother’s Day. While those in age groups on either side (18-24 and 35-44 age groups) plan to spend almost $100 less than the 25-34 year olds, both groups are still planning to spend over $250 on average with over 90% in those age groups planning to celebrate.
• The 25-34 aged group is also most likely to give a gift of personal services (44% of them at least) and those on either side while not as likely aren’t off by much in this area. 
• As for what’s important in picking out a gift… giving something that’s unique or different was the most common response (44%) followed by a gift that creates a special memory (40%). Convenience (25%) and cheaper/cost effective (15%) weren’t as important to the majority of shoppers.
• Age plays some factor in what’s important with the younger ages saying a gift that’s unique or different as being important more often than the older age groups.
• Expected spending per person according is:
  • $47.76 on jewelry
  • $32.52 on special outings (this is lower than pre-COVID spending in this category)
  • $26.09 on electronics
  • $21.91 on gift cards
  • $20.85 on flowers
  • $16.57 on personal services
  • $12.66 on housewares/gardening
  • Less than $9 for other, greeting cards, and books/CDs
  • Keep in mind these are averages which mean plenty of people are planning to spend more (while others who aren’t your target are spending less in the category).

The following chart shows what percentage of shoppers plan to purchase gifts from the following categories. While more are included in the chart, this graph only shows the more relevant ones that could include reflexology related offerings. I highlighted “personal services” in yellow to distinguish it from outings.

Spread the word about your Mother’s Day promotions

Here’s a checklist of sorts to help you cover all the bases in promoting the gift of reflexology for Mother’s Day:

• Post on social media, on your business page of course, but don’t forget to look for groups that allow promotional posts too
• Send an email to your list (if you don’t have one… you should read “Do I Need an Email List as a Reflexologist?”)
• Print postcards that you can give to clients to pass on to their kids and partners or just leaving lying around to drop some hints
• Print postcards that you can leave at other complementary businesses to hand out to their customers
• Put up a flyer on community bulletin boards
• Put flyers in the windows of other nearby or complementary businesses
• Run ads on social media where you can target the 25-34 age group specifically with messaging that speaks to their interests of gifting personal services and unique gifts to their moms
• Partner with complementary businesses to promote each other’s offerings via social media, your email list, and in your business
• Create a gift guide featuring your offerings along with those of several other local businesses and hopefully they will also share your guide
• Contact mid-sized to larger business offices in the area and ask if you can work with them to help their employees shop for Mother’s Day by delivering gift certificates to their office or letting you set up to sell them over the lunch hour, etc.
• Go to where the best shoppers are (see the spending data above), which are more likely to be men and more likely to be younger adults, such as bars, sports and recreation areas, organizations targeting young professionals, etc.

Social Media Graphic Ideas

Here are a few ideas to get your juices flowing, remember that in the More Feet Club members have lots of ready-to-post and editable graphics to make this part quick and easy.

If you’re looking for general wishes, try these Mother’s Day quotes to honor all the mums out there:

• “Mothers are like glue. Even when you can’t see them, they’re still holding the family together.” –Susan Gale
•  “The world needs our mothers.” –Liya Kebede
•  “Motherhood is the exquisite inconvenience of being another person’s everything.” –Unknown
• “Any mother could perform the jobs of several air-traffic controllers with ease.” –Lisa Alther
• A mother’s hug lasts long after she lets go.” –Unknown
• “If love is as sweet as a flower, then my mother is that sweet flower of love.” –Stevie Wonder
• “A mother’s arms are more comforting than anyone else’s.” –Princess Diana
• “The phrase ’working mother’ is redundant.” –Jane Sellman
• “A mother understands what a child does not say.” –Jewish proverb
•  “A mother’s love is more beautiful than any fresh flower.” –Debasish Mridha
• “God could not be everywhere, and therefore he made mothers.” –Rudyard Kipling
• “Being a mother is learning about strengths you didn’t know you had.” –Linda Wooten
• “Grandmas are short on criticism and long on love.” –Unknown
• “If nothing is going well, call your grandmother.” –Italian Proverb

Looking for more ideas?

Many of the Valentine’s Day ideas can be adapted to moms for example. Check out the other gift-giving holiday ideas or join the More Feet Club that’s filled with ready-to-post Mother’s Day graphics, promotion ideas, and tutorials to help you do it all:

Reflexology Marketing For Valentine’s Day [Comprehensive Guide]