Short answer: client and customer experience has its own published category, Best Salon Client Experience, and is also weighted within every other category as one of the jury's core criteria. Free to nominate.
Related published categories
Nominate for client experience, free
Document how you designed and measured the client journey — booking, service, aftercare and follow-up.
Why client experience gets judged twice
Client experience shows up in the World Salon Awards evaluation criteria in two different ways, and understanding the difference helps decide whether a dedicated nomination is worth submitting alongside a business's main category entry. Every category — hair salon, beauty clinic, cosmetics brand, professional — includes client or customer experience as one of its several weighted criteria, alongside service quality, credentials, operational standards, brand presentation and innovation. In that context, client experience is one input among several, and a business can win its main category on the strength of other criteria even if client experience isn't its single strongest point.
Best Salon Client Experience, by contrast, evaluates the client journey as the entire submission — not one factor among several, but the whole case. That makes it the right category for a business whose single clearest, most differentiated strength is genuinely how it treats clients from first contact through to follow-up, rather than a business that's simply competent across the board. A salon with an unusually well-designed booking flow, a distinctive consultation process, a documented aftercare programme, or client-retention figures well above what's typical for its market has a genuinely strong case here — a salon that's simply "friendly" or "welcoming" in the way most well-run salons already are does not, because those qualities alone aren't specific or measurable enough for a jury to score against a dedicated client-experience standard.
Because the two are related but distinct, the strongest approach for many businesses is exactly what the CTA below suggests: enter the primary category (hair salon, beauty clinic, cosmetics brand, whichever fits the business) where client experience is one part of a broader case, and additionally enter Best Salon Client Experience specifically if the client journey itself — not the service quality or product formulation — is the business's standout achievement. Both nominations are free, judged independently, and neither depends on the outcome of the other.
What strengthens a client-experience nomination
- Client-satisfaction data or review scores over a defined period
- Specific service-design details: booking, consultation, service delivery, aftercare
- Staff training focused on client experience
- Repeat-client or referral figures where available
Client experience for brands and clinics, not just walk-in salons
Although "client journey" language naturally evokes a physical salon visit, the category applies equally to beauty and cosmetics brands and to clinics, where the journey looks different but the same evaluation logic holds. For a cosmetics or skincare brand, the relevant journey typically runs from product discovery and purchase through to unboxing, first use, and any follow-up communication or loyalty programme — a brand that's deliberately designed its customer support response times, its post-purchase education content, or its returns and satisfaction process has a genuine client-experience case even without a physical location. For an aesthetic clinic, the journey resembles a salon's in structure (consultation, treatment, aftercare) but typically carries higher-stakes decisions, so documented informed-consent processes, follow-up care protocols and complication-handling procedures become part of the evidence a strong nomination would include, alongside the more general satisfaction and retention data every category considers.
Pair it with your salon or brand entry
Client experience is judged as part of your main category too — a dedicated entry adds a second, free nomination.
Mapping the client journey for a nomination
A useful way to prepare a Best Salon Client Experience nomination is to walk through the client journey stage by stage and note what's genuinely deliberate — designed and repeatable — at each point, rather than what happens to go well. Discovery and booking: is the booking process itself part of the experience, or just a scheduling mechanic — confirmation communication, pre-visit information, consultation scheduling? Arrival and consultation: is there a structured intake or consultation process, and does it visibly shape what happens next, or is it a formality? Service delivery: beyond technical quality (which is scored separately under other criteria), what's specifically designed about how the service itself is delivered — comfort, communication, pacing? Aftercare and follow-up: is there a documented aftercare process, a follow-up touchpoint, or a mechanism for capturing feedback and acting on it?
Businesses that score well here typically can point to something concrete at three or four of these stages, not just one strong moment surrounded by otherwise standard practice. A salon with an exceptional consultation process but nothing distinctive at any other stage has a real but narrower story than one that's designed something deliberate across the whole journey — and the nomination should be honest about which is the case, since a jury evaluating client-experience evidence specifically will notice the difference between a single strong touchpoint and a genuinely designed end-to-end journey.
Customer Experience Awards — FAQs
Is customer experience its own award category?
Yes — Best Salon Client Experience is a published category, and client experience is also one of the criteria weighed within every other category.
Is it free to nominate for World Salon Awards 2027?
Yes. Submitting a nomination for World Salon Awards 2027 is free. No nomination charge applies.
What businesses can enter?
Any salon, beauty business, brand or clinic, with evidence of a deliberately designed and measured client experience.
Is the evaluation merit-based, or is there a public vote?
Evaluation is merit-based. An independent jury of beauty industry professionals scores each shortlisted nomination against the published criteria; sponsorship, advertising spend and gala ticket purchases have no influence on jury decisions.
Does a small independent salon have a fair chance here?
Yes — the category rewards the quality of the client experience itself, which does not require scale to demonstrate.
Is World Salon Awards open to salons and brands outside the Middle East?
Yes. World Salon Awards is genuinely global — hair salons, beauty salons, nail studios, barbershops, cosmetics brands and individual professionals from any country are eligible, with categories judged at city, country, regional and world level.
What if my client-experience data is confidential?
Figures can be described in relative or indexed terms (for example, percentage improvement over a period) rather than disclosed in full.
Do I need to attend the gala to win?
No. Winners are notified in advance of the public announcement and receive their recognition package whether or not they attend.
Should I enter Best Salon Client Experience instead of my main business category, or as well as it?
As well as it, in almost every case — the two are judged independently and a strong client-experience story doesn't replace the need to document service quality, credentials and the other criteria in the main category.
Can a beauty or cosmetics brand enter, not just a salon?
Yes — any salon, beauty business, brand or clinic with a deliberately designed and measured client or customer experience is eligible, not only physical salons.
Does the nomination need to cover the entire client journey, or can it focus on one stage?
A nomination covering several stages of the journey typically makes the stronger case, but a genuinely exceptional single stage (an unusually well-designed consultation process, for example) can still be a credible entry if it's documented in real depth.
How does the jury verify client-experience claims that can't easily be independently checked?
The jury weighs the specificity and consistency of the evidence submitted — named processes, dated changes, measurable figures — rather than independently auditing each business; vague or unverifiable claims score lower than specific, documented ones.