Beauty Therapist

A beauty therapist is professionally trained and specializes in offering beauty treatments to their clients within an ever-flourishing industry. Trends in self-care can fluctuate, but the fundamental beauty treatments are consistently in-demand within salons and from mobile-therapists, varying from skin-softening facial massages to hassle-free hair-removal procedures.

Your daily tasks as a beauty therapist may include scheduling appointments, maintaining the hygiene and cleanliness of your equipment and building a rapport with potential customers to expand your client base.

A beauty therapist may be employed within a salon, but there is also the option to work as a freelance beauty therapist, offering treatments from home and/or mobile. Due to the nature of the role, it is important that all beauty therapists are aware of the health and safety procedures, as well as hygienic requirements, before embarking on a role in this industry. The Beauty Academy offer a wide range of treatments to assist you in launching into this chosen career with confidence. 

To embark on a career as a successful beauty therapist, it is important that you are able to make your clients to feel relaxed and welcome in your company. Interpersonal skills are necessary to successfully network potential clients, as well as a tactful and diplomatic manner in the company of clients to ensure repeat custom.   

You will also benefit from having a business-orientated mindset when at work; being able to retail products whilst you are performing treatments could potentially generate further income and selling additional treatments can encourage repeat business; many salons and mobile beauticians work closely with brands for this purpose.    

You will develop all the appropriate technical skills for this career route during your training, covering the basics of hygiene in the workplace, health and safety factors, contraindications, as well as the specific treatments involved in becoming a beauty therapist, working to an industry-required standard.

To work from home and/or mobile, you will need to obtain diploma certificates in your specified treatments in order to obtain the necessary insurance.

If you are considering gaining employment within the industry in the future, or looking to eventually open your own salon, it is in your interest to achieve a Level 2 and/or Level 3 qualification.

As a self-employed beauty therapist, your working hours will be structured around the appointments you make with your clients. Your working days and hours can be flexible, and you have the scope to structure your hours to your own schedule, however you may be required to work both in the evenings and over weekends, as this is when many people are likely to book in treatments. This working pattern is particularly suitable for those with other commitments, such as young children, who like to schedule their work inside of school hours, and many beauty therapists are self-employed over salon-employed for this reason. 

A factor to be aware of as a beauty therapist is the travelling involved in working from mobile. You may have to travel to your clients’ houses, which could be a distance from your own, depending on the range of which you wish to work, so it is important you have the means to do this.  Being self-employed also requires you to rely on your clients to generate your financial income; it is important that you are aware that clients can occasionally be unreliable. However, you have the opportunity to see as many clients in a day as you can, whereas a therapist in a salon is capped on income they can earn. 

Many beauty therapists find their work rewarding for the reason that they are responsible for making their client’s feel good about themselves. Furthermore, it is often not just the treatment that client’s look forward to, but they enjoy the overall experience and connection with their therapist during the treatments.

As your business expands and your client base grows over time, you will earn an increasing amount of income and you will have established a respectable, mobile business. You may choose to open your own salon once you have the means to do so in terms of clientele and income, and respectively employ junior therapists to work for you whilst in a managerial role, giving you more flexibility in working hours. 

Furthermore, you may also want to enhance your knowledge of the industry by undertaking a Level 2 or Level 3 qualification in beauty (if not achieved already), enabling more career options for you, including gaining employment in a salon, either in a therapist or managerial role, depending on your previous experience. You may also wish to complete a qualification in teaching (such as VTCT Level 3 Award in Education & Training) if you are interested in training students as a Beauty Tutor.

Book your training… 

It is important that if you are looking to work as a self-employed beauty therapist, you hold the required certificates to obtain appropriate public liability insurance to cover you working from home or mobile. You will also need to be working to an appropriate level of practice, including hygiene requirements and health and safety factors to avoid incidents. Your training with The Beauty Academy will cover this vital information, along with the required practical skills. If you are looking to open your own salon or gain employment at some point in the future, it may be in your interest to look into completing a Level 2 and/or Level 3 qualification.

Build up your client base… 

As soon as you have begun your training, you will want to start building a client base to offer your treatments. Advertising via social media, creating hand-outs for friends and family to spread around and even advertising in the local paper can all help encourage potential clients to book in for treatments with you. Once they have received and enjoyed their treatment, it is likely they will recommend you to their friends and thus building your client base.

Create your brand…

To establish your business, you will need a memorable and appropriate brand to represent what you offer. Elements to your brand, such as logo, website and social media pages are all important in ensuring your brand has the appropriate amount of exposure and accessibility to potential clients, and this will inevitably help you to get noticed and discover more clients. Our Starting a Business in Beauty Therapy will help you to acquire the required business know-how to do this successfully.