Community meeting video recording

DAY 1 - Tuesday November 20

Introductions

  • Women currently in beauty services coop / SEWA members

  • Other beauty workers just coming to see what it’s all about (first time at SEWA) and considering cooperatives

  • Women shared name, where they are from, something they are good at, why they are interested in SEWA/being in a coop

  • Dana and Michelle introduced the project

  • Namya gave introduction to worker cooperatives and platform coop

Benefits of being in the coop

  • Skills development

  • Learn with each other

  • Marketing power

  • Security and safety

  • Can cover the entire city

Journey Mapping / Needs & Challenges

Journey mapping outline - English / Gujarati

1st Group

Challenges

  • Customer comes late

  • Customer wants longer appointment than agreed

  • Customer asks for extra things other than agreed

  • Customer negotiates the price based on someone willing to do it cheaper

  • Customer gives wrong location

  • Customer is not ready for appoint

    • Customer not there and doesn’t answer phone when they get there

  • Not given proper address

  • Location is often easier to find using a low tech strategy like asking a shopkeeper in the general area.

  • Google maps often sends you to dead ends etc.

  • Customer complains about service, including that it’s not hygienic

  • Amount given to coop 15% is too much

  • Customer wants them to use their product

  • Traffic causes them to be late and appnt gets cancelled

  • materials/kit are heavy - eg. for pedicure they cannot carry the machine - customer complains

  • Customer wants to use good brand material but pay less

  • They don’t get back their materials - for example hair pins

2nd Group

  • 1st step is training

    • Need information - where to go, finding the training, other?

    • Goal: learn more and become more confident in what you do

    • Challenges: hard to get info, costly, timing may not be convenient, distance to get there

  • 2nd step is publicity

    • Advertisements

    • Goal: people should know you are doing something

    • Pamphlets are easy, inexpensive

    • Challenge: making higher quality pamphlets expensive (me - team up with other coop?)

    • Easy: word of mouth

    • Challenge - people don’t really look at your pamphlet they throw it away

    • Dana - testimonials?

    • Challenge: newspaper ads are expensive - especially for an individual

    • Social media marketing

      • Challenge: too much competition on social media

    • How to spread the word of good service - FB, WhatsApp?

    • Dana - have a “show”, live beauty services party?

    • A lot of people have started to do it through “the web”

    • Develop promotional packages - buy one get one free etc

    • Promotional tree: Pass this message onto 5 people

    • Points system - service with same person, points add up to reward/gift

      • Dana: maybe they lose points if they aren’t ready for the appnt

  • Journey

    • Get call, get bag, traffic (challenge), customer changes mind when they get there (wants less services than agreed on)

  • Security “always there in back of mind” - inside the house, the room, will it be ok - customers are strangers

  • Competition in the market - beauty parlours - understand what they are doing so we know how to compete (me: skills trade?)

    • Money - what we are giving - what extra the competition is doing so they can compete

    • Technology - e.g. what Urban Clap is giving to client

    • Worker needs to know how to communicate this to the customer

    • E.g. customer wanted X service but worker did not know and did not know that the competition is offering this - how can they know all of what everyone is doing?

    • Customer will order something on the phone then change it once worker is there

    • Customer asks for less things than agreed

    • Customer not there and doesn’t answer phone when they get there

    • Customer says use my product

    • Other women show up at customer house and say do me as well  

    • bartering/bargaining for less

    • Customer is not ready for appoint

General discussion

  • Insist on 24 hours notice? But also want to be able to offer services on short notice

  • Get tired of workers saying no to appointments regularly (because they are busy with other appointments?)

    • Is there some way to allocate automatically?

3rd Group

  • Customer cancels and then next day says come at another time (but that time is booked for her)

  • Call comes and they learn of the location, they need to determine if they can get there in time, they might have a personal appointment beforehand

  • How much work, how much expense - how to calculate is it worth it?

  • Customer asks for less than agreed on (repeat)

  • If they are 15 min late order is cancelled (repeat)

    • Often they are late because the location is wrong

    • They may also have cancelled a personal appointment to get there

  • If customer cancelled previously, it’s always on their mind that they might cancel again - a tension for them

  • Customer and worker should have a price list so it is clear - no negotiation!

  • Personal vs coop work - how to juggle? Perhaps choose days of the week that you are working for the coop, and days you are doing personal work?

    • Dana - can the personal be transferred over to coop?

  • How to show availability clearly - green for available, red for not

  • Area-wise - getting appointments in your area - a system to show location and take appointments in your area so you don’t have to travel far

  • Wants certain type of facial but it’s not appropriate for her and worker needs to convince the customer to do something different

  • E.g. lifting facial is 1 hour - fixed time - customer complains that they didn’t do it long enough, when it is in fact harmful to do it longer - customer doesn’t know this / believe them

  • If travelling long distance need to charge a minimum treatment/cost

  • What to say when customer complains - “next time I will do my best”

4th Group

  • “All of our points have been covered”

  • Want visits to big salons to see what they are doing (have an appointment there?)

    • youtube videos how-tos?

  • We have to do better than Urban Clap!

General Discussion (coop meeting)

  • Have to be tough on prices because if you negotiate once that’s it

  • Have to convince customer on quality - this is worth more than what you are paying

  • Variable pricing based on where customers live?

What they like now and why

  • Putting pictures of hair and makeup in whatsApp and facebook

  • Big salons have Instagram accounts, they are edited nicely, searchable online

  • Albums w pictures of the work they have done

  • Some workers are keeping track in a daily planner/diary - appointments, what they did, what they got paid - some on mobile phone, some on paper

  • How are appointments made now?

    • A few women do the marketing and take the contact now and make phone calls to a list of women - mainly Stephyben

    • How do they decide who to call first?

    • 3 filters -

      • 1. Type of Service (beauty/hair/makeup/mendhi) - depending on what the order is

      • 2. Location

      • 3. Equality of appointments - ensure that all workers are getting fair amount of work/pay

    • E.g there are these 4 women - talk to them - give them the name, amount, location, mobile number, confirmation (phones client)

    • Customers request a particular worker? Have decided that that is not possible

      • Workers say - it might not be me (next time)

    • Same worker if it is a multi-stage treatment

  • Whatsapp groups that others have created with information about how to do things etc

  • 7 people use google to find information, videos etc on new techniques

  • 12/17 have smartphones, others have flip phones

    • Flip phone users have access to computers?

    • not everyone has access to a computer

  • Now - marketing through pamphlets, WhatsApp, old clients from workers that they no longer personally service

  • Can they transfer personal appointments to the coop?

    • If there is more work at the coop will go to coop

    • Don’t want to give up personal clients - lucrative

    • The issue isn’t not enough customers, issue is marketing

    • Even poor women want these services now - there is a trend

    • Private clients would have to agree to use the coop and wouldn’t be guaranteed the service provider

  • Want to offer training through SEWA - women want work - come and do training at SEWA and then join coop

    • Retention ?

DAY 1 Summary

Categorized Challenges

  • Customer not doing what was agreed upon

    • Is late/not ready - makes worker wait

    • Doesn’t answer phone when the worker gets there

    • Wants more services/less services than booked

    • Wants different services than booked

    • Wants worker to spend more/less time than booked

    • Wants lower price / negotiates price (compares price with other service providers)

    • Wants worker to use customer’s own products (and wants to pay less as a result)

    • Asks worker to go and purchase a product in the market

    • Doesn’t return materials (e.g. hairpins) or damages them

    • Cancels appointment / changes appointment time at last minute

    • Asks for things that are unsafe, unhealthy (e.g. longer facial), or not appropriate (for customer’s skin type etc) - worker needs to convince her otherwise

    • Additional women show up wanting treatment and expect worker to stay longer

  • Complaints

    • Services

      • Can’t carry appropriate equipment because too heavy

    • Hygiene

    • How to respond?

  • Location/Travel

    • Addresses unclear

    • Traffic causes them to be late and customer cancels

    • Customer doesn’t respond when they get there

    • Easier to just ask someone (shopkeeper) than use smartphone map

    • Need to be able to determine if they can get there in time

    • How much work, how much expense (for travel, other) - how to calculate: is it worth it?

  • Safety

    • Entering strange home

  • Scheduling

    • Offered an appointment at a time that doesn’t work because of scheduling conflicts

    • Finding a co-op member who is available involves a lot of calling people

    • Personal vs coop work - how to juggle? Perhaps choose days of the week that you are working for the coop, and days you are doing personal work?

  • Wages

    • 15% to SEWA is too much

    • If travelling long distance need to charge a minimum treatment/cost

    • How much work, how much expense - how to calculate: is it worth it?

  • Training

    • Hard to get info

    • Want to visit big salons, know what is current

      • Specifics of treatments being given

    • costly

    • timing may not be convenient

    • distance to get there too far

    • Members need knowledge about how to describe how they are different/better than UrbanClap, other competition

    • How much work, how much expense - how to calculate: is it worth it?

    • Youtube videos

    • come and do training at SEWA and then join coop


  • Marketing

    • High-quality pamphlets are difficult and expensive

    • Newspaper ads are expensive

    • Pamphlets might not be effective - people just throw them away

    • Alot of competition in social media

    • Competition with UrbanClap and other salons

    • Members need knowledge about how to describe how they are different/better than UrbanClap, competition in general

    • There are plenty of customers, just need promotion - women might move to full coop work (let go of personal appointments) if there was enough work

Design Ideas

  • Customers

    • There should be a price list that both the customer and the beauty worker have

    • Insist on 24 hours notice (for cancellation/booking)? But also want to be able to offer services on short notice

  • Scheduling

    • Get tired of workers saying no to appointments regularly (because they are busy with other appointments?)

      • Is there some way to allocate automatically?

    • want to be able to offer services on short notice

    • How to show availability clearly - green for available, red for not

    • Area-wise - getting appointments in your area - a system to show location and take appointments in your area so you don’t have to travel far

  • Location

    • Variable pricing based on where customers live?

  • Training

    • Sharing pictures of styles using Whatsapp

    • Whatsapp training groups

  • Marketing

    • Rewards cards/points (to compete)

    • Instagram account to show past work

    • Whatsapp viral marketing (send to 5 people)

    • Other options are social media and word of mouth

    • before/after pictures

  • Wages/pricing

    • Variable pricing based on where customers live?


DAY 2 - Friday November 23

Small Groups

Group 1

Customer not doing what was agreed upon

Complaints

Group 2

Location/Travel

Wages

Safety

Group 3

Scheduling

Group 4

Training

Group 5

Marketing

Small Group Design Feedback

Group 1

Customer not doing what was agreed upon

  • Worker needs to have customer phone number (SEWA didn’t agree to this request)

    • This could be an issue because it is a coop and it would be better to go through a central switchboard (possible?) - UrbanClap does this

    • Can we indirectly connect people without exposing phone numbers? Call goes to a central number and then redirects to the individual

  • Worker needs to set a clear time of appointment beforehand

  • Wait 10 minutes - penalty for customer - UrbanClap does not do this, it wouldn’t be a good idea now to do this since we are so new and trying to establish customer base

    • What about limiting the number of services (i.e. appnt still ends at the same time)?

  • Customer asks worker to go and purchase a product in the market - they don’t want to do this

  • Customer wants extra treatments - call SEWA - then what? She will convince the customer otherwise?

    • They can decide to do it or not - if they can’t, then call someone from the office to explain

  • Minimum order must be set and communicated on site/pamphlet/to customer

  • Customer wants only partial order from what was agreed - could set another appnt to do the rest

  • Have a returnable deposit

  • Have products listed on website - hygienic, good quality

  • Feedback form, registration form - SEWA will decide ?

  • Want easy way to calculate earnings (income less expenses)?

Dealing with Complaints

  • Poor services

    • Can’t carry appropriate equipment because too heavy

  • Poor hygiene

  • Workers want to know how to respond appropriately to complaints

Group 2

Location/Travel/Wages

  • Now - client texts location (to SEWA?), or they use WhatsApp location

  • Ask for landmarks

  • Write it down (when talking to customer/scheduling appnt) is best because it will be correct

  • Send a reminder with an extra ½ hour buffer - to get there on time

  • Contact customer on the way if you are late

  • Communicate that the worker might be ½ hour late and not to cancel

  • How to appease the customer when they are late

    • Offer free service

    • Offer a product gift? (general disagreement to this idea) - maybe chocolate? :)

  • Distance - Time calculation

    • Travel further they want higher minimum (500?)

    • Cooperative can compensate them for extra travel

  • 15% taken by SEWA will be discussed by members

Safety

  • Talk to woman before entering house - if only husband answers etc wait

  • If woman never shows up leave and SEWA will pay for travel

  • Get a call from SEWA 15 min later - checkin

    • Or some kind of popup that says “are you ok?”

  • Michelle - coop members partner up to check in with each other?

  • Pepper spray

  • Self-defence training - yes they are planning this

  • Calling 181 - new initiative on violence against women - female police officers - very responsive

Group 3

Scheduling

  • Conflict between personal and coop appointment

  • Weekly chart (see drawing)

    • name/area/availability(days)/location - customer/worker matching (SEWA)

    • Eventually automate: 3 stages - availability / location / value of your appnts so far (person earned least so far will get appointment)

  • Short-term bookings - SEWA scheduler can use the chart to make bookings

Group 4

Training

  • Visit big salons

  • Attend workshops in different areas

  • Expensive training - one woman from SEWA can be paid to go and then teach the others

  • Training as recruitment

  • Fix training times that work for everyone

  • Trainings in off-seasons (no festivals, no weddings)

  • Soft-skill training and communication - they can organise it, women just need to make time for it

    • Could make a video and distribute it but then there will still be questions for Stefy

    • DA - remote training?

    • How we are different from UrbanClap and others


Group 5

Marketing

  • Worker login page (see sketch)

    • Panic button (181)

    • red/green button - availability indicator

      • Integrated with weekly scheduling tool

    • Profile with photo

    • How much money they have earned/commission to coop

    • Tracking orders - e.g. how many they have had this month

  • Website!

    • See sketches

    • Join us - fill out a form

    • Gallery

    • Types of services (me - offer packages?)

    • Our Team - photos? maybe

    • Our Work

      • Each one has a page - price, description, team members?,

    • Testimonials (videos? quotes?)

    • Contact info, social media, location head office etc

    • Group photo at the bottom

    • True case studeis / featured case study of woman’s story - photo

    • Small videos of the women working - not with real clients, with each other

  • Website look

    • More images, less text

    • Before and after photos

    • Short videos about services - e.g. about hygiene

    • Customer feedback - star system

    • “Like” system

    • LinkedIn FB Pinterest Snapchat Twitter Instagram


Scheduling tool sketch - Name / Area of Work / Availability(days) / Location

Worker Log-in and personal page

Website design sketch

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