Consider the new possibilities created by rapid advancements in tanning technology, and it’s natural to think of equipment first. Revolutionary sunbed technology has propelled the industry forward in recent years, marking a new era in tanning. The same can be said of spray tanning innovations, new wellness and spa offerings, and an unprecedented range of advanced formulas and ingredients from top tanning and skincare brands.

For salon owners, these are exciting developments, but the practical impact on your business depends on how you implement, price, package, and promote your equipment and products. Fortunately, you’re not navigating this alone. Salon software is another tier of technological innovation that’s helping tanning businesses make smarter decisions. Constant upgrades from the industry’s leading software companies offer salons new ways to streamline operations, increase productivity, and enhance profitability.

These software providers, like the leading tanning product and equipment manufacturers, have extensive experience in the industry and maintain a deep dedication to helping their salon partners succeed.

For over 25 years, TanTrack has been a trusted tool in salons across the country. Designed to give salon owners maximum control, TanTrack combines user-friendly functionality with all the essential features needed to operate and grow a successful tanning business.

“TanTrack has always been an innovator in our industry. We’ve always used the latest tools and languages to develop our software. Primarily, over the years, we’ve been known as being the easiest to use. It is straight-up simple. We also develop our software in-house with our own full-time staff, so we have full control over the features we implement and can generally bring them to market faster than our competitors,” says Jeff Oakes, President of Nichesoft, the parent company of TanTrack.

SunLync is the salon software division of JK Products & Service, the U.S. branch of industry leader JK Ergoline. Known for empowering data-based decision-making, SunLync provides the comprehensive analysis tools needed to plan investments, monitor daily operations, track sales, manage usage, and optimize staffing – covering all facets of a successful salon business.

“SunLync is a complete salon management system that manages all aspects of the business – everything from equipment maintenance and ticketing to inventory maintenance and customer management. We’ve been on the market since 2002, so a lot of extensive research has gone into meeting the needs of salon operators. Most of the features and functionality that you see come from requests from our customers. We’ve got everyone from single salon operations all the way through large multi-salon operations that have scaled and grown with us over the years,” says SunLync Sales Manager Melissa Damiani.

Helios salon software is also backed by one of the tanning industry’s major players. Founded in 1988 and later acquired by ETS, Helios became part of MH Equity’s New Sunshine portfolio in 2006. This strategic alignment has allowed Helios to leverage cross-marketing opportunities across the New Sunshine brands.

“Part of the assignment I was given in taking over the Helios team was to figure out ways we could leverage the strengths of both teams and more wholly integrate Helios into the greater New Sunshine company,” says New Sunshine Vice President of Technology Christian Fordham, who heads the Helios team at the New Sunshine offices in Indianapolis. “It also allows us to be a little more seamless from the sales and marketing perspectives.”

Salon software offers countless, ever-expanding ways to help business owners simplify procedures, save time and money, and boost efficiency. However, perhaps the greatest potential lies in the data these platforms deliver, helping you uncover and execute strategies to increase revenue and sales based on customer behavior, employee performance, membership engagement, purchasing trends, equipment utilization, and much more.

Monitoring and Improving Employee Performance

One of the most cost-effective ways to boost revenue is by enhancing your staff’s ability to sell. It’s exciting to realize that you and your team (with a well-structured commission system) can make more money using the same equipment, products, and environment simply by selling more effectively. While training and education are the cornerstones of improving sales performance, monitoring data, and implementing strategies accordingly will help you stay proactive and pinpoint specific areas for improvement. Enhancing employee performance and sales isn’t just about raising the bar for those who need it but about elevating the entire team, including top performers.

Effective employee management is foundational to any successful business, especially in customer-focused industries like tanning. Salon management software provides a suite of tools with actionable data that allows you to monitor employee performance across key metrics, making it easy to drive continuous improvement. By utilizing this data, salon managers can hold constructive performance reviews, recognize high-achieving employees, and set individualized goals.

At the most basic level, employee performance will improve simply by ensuring that team members understand their goals and expectations and are updated on their progress continually, rather than just at the end of the month or the pay period. For multi-location businesses, live data not only allows you to create some friendly competition between staff members but also between the different locations.

“SunLync Desktop, which is included in point of sale, is a helpful resource for all employees because there are several different rankings and averages. When we implemented that, our customer base said it increased sales all around because it allowed employees to see how they’re performing. For multi-salon operations, they can see where they compare to other locations. It’s in real time, it’s always readily available, so they have time to do something about it – if they have to wait until the end of the month or pay period, it may be too late to increase performance,” Damiani says.

“Operators don’t have to spend a lot of time compiling data and formatting it into a usable format. The data that’s collected business-wide is updated in real time, and there’s a central database even if a salon operator has multiple locations. We have a group of reports we refer to as management that are high-level owner-type reports that provide a lot of helpful information to make decisions, especially for future forecasting.”

The breadth of data at the owners’ fingertips is key to any useful software program. Rather than just asking an employee or your entire team to sell more, hundreds of data points allow owners and managers to accurately analyze each employees’ performance and pinpoint areas where there’s potential or need for improvement and instruct and train accordingly.

“We have several reports that track sales by employees in different ways. For example, comparing employees on the dollar amount they’ve sold isn’t very fair as different employees get better or more shifts. One of our reports will allow you to compare your employees on the average dollar amount sold per client. This is a far more accurate way to see which employees are truly hustling. We also have reports that compare salon sales in many categories against other salons in your chain,” Oakes says.

It’s an old adage that businesses tend to suffer when the owner isn’t present. Frankly, no employee will ever care about the business to the same degree the owner does. But, with multi-location businesses and owners that want to step back from front-end duties for any number of reasons, you can have the next best thing by getting real-time data simply by logging on from anywhere in the world.

“Now, with the new back office, managing your salon has never been easier. As long as you have internet access, you are able to log in and have the same functionality as you would from the salon with the exception of running transactions. Check in on your store(s) from home, the office or even the corner coffee shop,” Helios states on its website.

Evaluating Memberships for Increased Retention and Revenue

Another way to make more money practically out of thin air is to tinker with memberships and purchasing options in ways that will make people buy more, make more people buy, make them buy more often, and make them keep their memberships longer. Memberships are a significant revenue stream for most every tanning business today, offering clients flexibility while ensuring recurring revenue. However, managing memberships effectively requires a clear understanding of member engagement patterns.

Software analytics help identify which membership tiers are most popular and profitable, as well as those that may need to be restructured to increase appeal. If the data shows an underperforming tier, owners might enhance it with added benefits or reprice it to make it more attractive. By tracking cancellation rates and examining when and why customers terminate their memberships, salon owners can identify trends that signal potential issues. For example, if there’s a spike in cancellations during specific months, targeted retention efforts can be implemented before that period to minimize churn.

Data-driven insights on memberships provide salons with the tools to offer the right mix of benefits, target the right customers, and increase overall retention.

“How long are customers on average holding certain memberships? If a certain membership with spa services is retaining members longer, they may want to look at adding that to other memberships as well,” Damiani says. “Looking at pricing or equipment mix or the additional benefits may be helpful to determine how you can improve the different membership options.”

In some cases, having the right systems in place via your software can even help enhance membership revenue without you actively doing or changing anything.

“Another big component that salon owners have really gotten behind is trying to get out from underneath the heavy credit card fees. We connected with a company called KickFees, and developed a solution in Helios that helps salon owners. If they sign up with KickFees, they can turn on functionality within Helios that will recoup credit card fees they would otherwise pay. In many cases, they can recoup tens of thousands of dollars by utilizing this feature. It’s been received very positively by our customers. We continue to have more customers sign up for it,” Fordham says.

On TanTrack’s capabilities for recapturing lost revenue to do credit card declines, Oakes says, “Many salons use our multiple card on file feature. It allows TanTrack to automatically bill a second credit card if the first card declines. If both cards decline, TanTrack will freeze the package until payment is made. It can also send out e-mails or text messages instantly notifying the clients that their card(s) have been declined and provide a link for the client to update their payment method 24/7. This directly affects the reliability of the salon’s membership packages and saves time and money in employee labor chasing down payments.”

Evaluating Equipment and Service Utilization

In a similar light, streamlined data from your salon software will give you a clear, objective picture of where you stand with your equipment mix, what you might need to add, and what might need to go. In today’s tanning industry, the considerations are far more complex than in decades prior. You’re not just evaluating tanning equipment but any number of other equipment and services you offer or could consider offering.

Tanning equipment is a significant investment for salons, and management software offers crucial insights into how each piece of equipment performs. Data-driven decisions regarding equipment help salons optimize their offerings and maximize the value of their machines.

“There are specific reports that are helpful for salon owners to leverage the information and make it useful for future planning. For example, sessions by equipment type, they may see certain equipment has a higher frequency of use than another. That could be helpful if they’re going to refresh their mix or add a price of equipment to determine what’s going to make the most sense,” Damiani says.

Keep in mind that profitability isn’t synonymous with how much equipment is used. For example, you may think that your older “base-level” tanning units are still an important part of your business because they are constantly in use. But by the time you evaluate how your customers are using it rather than just how much, you might find that the numbers don’t really add up. By using your salon software to evaluate individual units or levels based on factors like cost per session, how many sessions members are doing per month, overhead costs, and maintenance, you will get the true picture of the profitability of any given unit. In the case of base-level equipment, you might find that it would be more profitable to change the pricing or force customers to move up by removing that level completely. Remember, your goal isn’t to serve as many customers as possible, but to make as much money as possible, and catering to more customers for less money carries an associated cost and burden even beyond what’s easily quantifiable.

“As part of our large volume of reports, we track things like overhead expenses and electric rates to calculate the true cost of a tan. TanTrack can pull your bulb hours and even track UV meter readings over time, or detailed visit logs,” Oakes says.

In this day and age, with the ever-increasing functionality and connectivity of equipment, there’s even more you can manage without actually being in the salon. For instance, the innovative Mystic Tan Unity automated spray tan booth features API Integration with leading PoS systems. A web-based portal for all Unity spray tan booths in a single location provides access to alerts, diagnostics, tele-metrics, granular pricing, and other important operator functions. MT CONNECT Technology also monitors the performance of the booth and sends email alerts before an issue becomes a problem.

“Sunless, Inc. has come out with the new Mystic Tan Unity spray booth. They reached out to us specifically, knowing that the implementation of that booth is different than typical salon equipment. The Unity is very different technology, so as they were developing the booth, we were developing software within Helios to support that booth. We had that update in Helios ready as soon as they rolled that booth out,” Fordham says.

Developing Targeted Promotions for Enhanced Customer Engagement

Promotions play a critical role in driving salon traffic and increasing sales. Salon management software data categorizes customers based on their behavior, preferences, and purchasing history, providing valuable data to create targeted, personalized promotions that resonate with specific customer segments. For example, sending a birthday discount on a customer’s favorite service or offering a customized skincare recommendation based on past purchases makes customers feel valued and enhances loyalty. By developing targeted, data-driven promotions, you can maximize engagement, drive sales, and build stronger customer relationships.

Salon management software also helps you track the success of past promotions, revealing which offers generated the highest response rates. By analyzing this data, salon owners can refine future campaigns based on strategies proven to resonate with their audience. Sales data from past years will also help predict high and low periods, enabling salon owners to plan timely promotions.

“One of the most powerful things is, maybe a salon runs a radio ad, and they think it does really well, but when they actually look at the data, their referral program actually brought in more new customers. That referral program may have been a lot cheaper. You can use the data to make educated decisions and really plan your future business model,” Damiani says.

One of the standout benefits of Helios is its seamless integration with the New Sunshine Marketing Hub. The platform offers professionally designed template websites tailored for salons. Helios also supports comprehensive email marketing with industry-specific templates and automated triggers that respond to customer behavior, allowing salons to reach out at the perfect moment. Mobile marketing tools extend this functionality, providing each salon with a customized keyword and automated triggers to engage customers directly on their phones. The integrated Social Media Manager allows salons to schedule posts in advance, share links and photos, and engage followers from one unified interface.

Automating certain points of contact with your customer base via your salon software is one of the easiest ways to stay in touch with customers who aren’t regulars and encourage them to come back in without taking the time to come up with fresh marketing campaigns and strategies on a regular basis.

“TanTrack can export your client list with additional data into popular e-mail marketing tools to allow you to create automated marketing campaigns.  For example, a birthday free tan or discount, or for clients who haven’t visited in a certain amount of time,” Oakes says.

The sky is the limit when it comes to the ways you can segment your customer data to produce highly targeted, effective marketing efforts. For example, by segmenting by product purchases over $100 who haven’t visited in a while, you could tap directly into a segment of customers that is likely to have some disposable income, then target them with offers related to your higher-end services or products.

“New customer analytics, how customers have heard about you, are important to determine ROI for ads or promotions. Overall, the data held in the system can be really powerful because with our email or text marketing integrations, you can trigger certain sets of data. If a customer hasn’t been in in the last six months, maybe you want to send out a coupon, or you might want to send out a targeted email to customers who have a specific membership. Maybe you want to thank customers who have spent ‘X’ amount of dollars in a time period,” Damiani says.

In the increasingly complex tanning business, data-driven decision-making is a major key to staying ahead. Salon management software provides invaluable insights that empower tanning salon owners to optimize every aspect of their business, from employee performance to membership engagement, inventory management, equipment utilization, and promotional effectiveness.

By embracing these tools and the data they provide, you can deliver a superior customer experience, increase operational efficiency, and create sustainable growth. Like any modern business, technological information has and will continue to enhance the capability to transform data into actionable insights. And those who leverage it will reap the rewards in customer satisfaction, loyalty, and financial success.