Yingjie+TAO

=media type="custom" key="12736148"= =Barber’s shop online= After I have learn something from this lesson. I want to write something to improve the service of Barber’s shop. First I want to say that this article is not suit for all the barber shop. Maybe just suit for the Franchise barber shop like the USA one The Kennedy’s and the big league Barber. I also know many Franchise barber shops in China. But I do not know the name of the Franchise barber shops in Europe. So let’s just assume that there is a Franchise Barber shop in France which called French Barber. And it has more than 200 shops in France.

Background of Frenchise Barber
As I have assumed it is the biggest Franchise Barber shops in France. It decided to open a website which they think can let them make more profit. So there is some function of the online website. First they can make an appointment to the barber shop. Second they can have a full knowledge of the fashionable hairstyle and update the latest news in the fashion area especially in hairstyle. Thirdly they can design their own hairstyle with the help of the modern technique and some other excellent service. Last point is that they can share the picture of their hairstyle and also they can comment on other clients’ hairstyle.

The SEO of the French Barber Online
As a barber shop website, I think the key word should be Barber shop first it is the main function of this website. It show what this website for. Second one should be the name, It is the franchise barber shop so the name should be searched for many times as you may search the McDonald’s other than fast food. Thirdly I think the hairstyle is also very important, many people will search the website to find a fashionable hairstyle before they go to the barber shop. So this is very important to catch the client. And also the fashion is a key word to the website, because we can recommend and chase the latest fashion news, so maybe some people just search for the fashionable cloth but find our website by chance so they find there’s a tendency to have such a hairstyle.

Augmented reality
I think augmented reality can be applied to such website, when you choose the hairstyle you can open the camera of your laptop or your computer and try on the hairstyle to see whether it is fitted. The Augmented reality do not only used to try on the hairstyle, you can also make some changes according to your own appetite. For example if you have choose a hairstyle you can change the color, maybe the whole color, you can change some part of the hair as well, like red in the front and green in the back, What’s more you can change the length of the hair. Thus make you design the hairstyle which fit you most. And in the further way I think the website can add another function like stimulate the hairstyle. You can choose a hairstyle and stimulate the growth of the hair. What will it be in 1 month or in 2 month. You can chase your hair and this function will enable you make your hairstyle fashionable every day. Just use the comb to change a little. After you go to the barber and have your hair cut. The barber will input the information to the computer data system. When you find you hair has grown a little bit, and do not look like so good, you can just log in. The website and the stimulation system will show you the way to make the hairstyle at home. So you do not need to go to the Barber shop very frequently. You can also decide it before you go to the barber shop. If you hate the barber shop (like me) you can set a length of 3 month maybe, and choose a hairstyle which can be really good not only at first but also in 3 months of time.

Mobile phone application
As we are in the 21st century, the mobile phone is very important to every one. So I think the barber shop online also should make an application in both platform of IOS and Android if possible it should be found in Windows mobile as well. So I think these are the functions should be put into the Mobile phone application:
 * 1) Make the appointment. The application will show the barber shop in the map and you can make an appointment with the help of the application you can choose the time the barber and also the location.
 * 2) As I have said in the Augmented reality. You can chase the hairstyle every day. So this application will show the hairstyle which fit you most today and make some recommendation for you.
 * 3) The application can show the latest fashion news like. Last football match between England and French. David Beckham has changed his hairstyle. You can follow up the latest fashion style and fashion tendency.
 * 4) You can download the picture of your hairstyle which you stimulated by the augmented reality. To be more clearly it means, You have choose the hairstyle with the help of you laptop and you can save it to the profile, And the mobile phone can download it, when you make an appointment with the barbershop you can just send the picture to them. And they may prepare it before you come. It can save a lot of time. Also you can save it to publish it in Facebook or twitter.
 * 5) Some function like facebook, if you see some hairstyle you like very much you can just click the like button and you can see the hottest hairstyle in your mobile phone. You can also make friends with other client. You can make comment or can “Steal” their hairstyle.

Social Media
Facebook We can have a one click button and facebook related service. Which means you can log in with your facebook account and When you have choose the hairstyle and make a photo of it. You can just click a button and the photo will publish to your facebook very soon, You can see the react of your family and your friend. We also have the Facebook page which will focus on the fashion tendency all over the world. As I have mentioned before you can add our page to your friend list and trace the latest fashion. And with the help of our own application, you can import your friends list in facebook to our website. To see what hairstyle your friends are trying. One very important thing is that if you use our website or mobile phone application to publish the photo or stimulate the photo. There is a line of our name in the photo. So It can be a very good advertisement for our website

Twitter Twitter has the similar function with facebook, but we will publish some other things on Twitter. We may chat with the clients freely and also publish some events and some interesting sites in Twitter. If you have some problem with the service or the hairstyle you can just ask it online and we will solve it very quickly.

Profit model
As a barber shop website, the website does not just want to make money. It is more like the tools to promote the barber shop. So we can divided the profit model to 3 parts: This Is the website for the barber shop, So I think the shampoo company like P&G will interested in our position of advertisement. We can sign the contract as they provide the product which we can use for haircutting at a lower price and we make the alliance with them to make the advertisement for them.
 * 1. Alliance **

We divide the client to 3 parts: Diamond client, Golden client and Silver client. Diamond client: You buy the card of 3 years. It means in 3 years. You can enter the barbers for free and you can use all the function of the website also you will have your own hairstyle designer you can have the video chat with them to make sure you have the best hairstyle for you. Golden client: Buy the loyalty card of 20 times, which means you can enter the barber for 20 times. And after that you are not the client of the barber. In this stage you can also use all the function of the website but you do not have a hairstyle design. Silver client: Buy the loyalty card of 10 times, this type of client has the limit access to the website for example, you can not make an appointment to the barber shop. And although you can use the augmented reality you can not make the stimulation, you can pay an additional money to use it. Also you do not have the hairstyle designer.
 * 2. Client from the barbers **

This kind of the users are not the client of the barber and has no loyalty card. So they can just read the news and use the augmented reality to try on limited style. They can pay a little money to have some more functions. All the client which has the loyalty card can have their authority until the deadline of their loyalty card. These 3 types of the profit model enable us to make money both from the barber shop and the website itself. We do not only establish the website as a tool but also the life style website.
 * 3. Free users **

Network effect
I think this website has the network effect which like the facebook. If one of my friend register in the website will enable his friends to join it too. And the more clients the website has the bigger it will be. The network effect also influence the revenue of the barber shop. So if the barbers are good enough and the network effect can make all the client which registered in the website to be the potential users to the barber shop. But the problem also can be if the barbers are not good enough, although the website is very brilliant, they still has no willing to go to the barber. Instead they just use some function which they think is useful for them.

Problems in this business idea
Although I think this is a brilliant idea, there are also some problems in this business idea.

1. How can us protect our service
As I have mentioned some people can use all the service but some people can just has limited service. So can you imagine that one family can just buy one loyalty card, and all the family can use all the service. It will be a big issue to prevent such things happened.

2. The revenue to build the website and the maintenance of the website
The barber shop is not information related company. So it may outsource the website to another company and this will make them to lose the maintenance of the website. Also the revenue to build the website may be very high because it contains a lot of modern technology such as augmented reality, So as a barber shop. It is a big issue to decide whether this website really suit for them. Since the website may cause the negative cash flow in the first few years, so it can be a good risk to build such the website.