We recently connected with Vanessa Rudd and have shared our conversation below.

Vanessa, appreciate you joining us today. Can you recount a story of an unexpected problem you’ve faced along the way?

When running a business, unexpected problems are something that come with it. I have few unexpected problems pop up on me, but the main one is social media marketing.

When I first started doing hair, social media marketing was just starting in the beauty industry. Let’s be honest my main focus around that time was hair and hair only, not marketing myself at all. Plus, when you work for a commission salon the marketing is done for you in a way.

Being 28, you would think that this would not be a problem for me, but it is!
I was never really into posting on social media personally, so doing it for my business for marketing has been a little difficult.

I have been in business for a year now and looking back, there was a lot of ups and downs with this problem. There might of been a little bit of tears that came along with them.

The hardest part for me was understanding the algorithms. That right there was a challenge in of itself for me. Just thinking about it now is making my head spin.

It is crazy to look back now and see how far I have come, but I am still learning. The one thing that helped me see that I am learning and grow from this is when a new client comes in and tells me how they found me. When they say social media…. It put a big smile on my face and I kinda lowkey want to cry.

There was a couple of things, or should I say people, that have helped me a lot to resolve this problem. One, I was blessed with a client who does marketing and she started coaching me and creating new way for me to understand everything. The second person is my cousin, that girl right there is a true one.
She stays on it about reminding me to post, helping create ideas, staying on the FaceTime with me to make sure everything looks right.

At the end of the day, life will always throw unexpected problems at you. As a business owner, you have to learn how to handle/adapt to those issues quickly as well as grown/learn from them. Especially, when it comes to something as crucial as marketing.

Vanessa, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I am Vanessa Rudd, a 28 year old hairstylist in the Twin Cities . I am an owner of Beauty.By.Van at Sola Salons in St. Paul MN. I have been in the beauty industry for 7 year, which is crazy to think about sometimes. I got started in this industry all because of my mother, who was a hairdresser for 20+ years. I remember going into the salon with her and immediately falling in love with everything hair. I was definitely that kid that used everyone in my family has hair models.

My dream was to always own my own salon and it is something that God had put in my heart since I was a little girl. So after many years of working at salons under people, in 2023, I took a big step and opened up my own studio! But let me tell you, it took a lot of work to get to where I am. It all started with watching my mom run her own place, being a receptionist for some years, to a new stylist in training and perfecting my craft and watching how salons run.

Lived in looks from color, blondes and cuts are what I am all about, but most importantly I take pride in preserving the integrity of your hair. Helping my clients find what fits, but also what works for their life style is my favorite thing to do, I want to make life easy for you guys as much as possible. The best part about being on my own is I get to try and play around with a lot of products! It’s like a kid being in a candy shop for me.
Right now my go to hair products are
Pureology
Wow Color
Design Me especially their mousse
Verb

What I am most proud of is that I have own my own business for 1 year already and looking back on how much growth has happen. What I would want my potential clients to know, is when you sit in my chair you are joining a family. I love getting to know you guys and hearing about hear your life.

Where do you think you get most of your clients from?

Word of mouth and tik tok

We’d love to hear about how you keep in touch with clients.

The way I keep in touch with my clients is being personal with them and making them feel like family

Contact Info:

• Website: https://beautybyvanessasalon.glossgenius.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/beauty.by.van/?hl=en

Image Credits
Seamless Media for the first 3 Colette Rochelle Photography for the last photo