Liz McKeon is the Beauty Business Expert. Empowering women in business, many of her clients are small to medium enterprises, and as a business expert she often helps them to double their turnover and exceed their targets. She also works with large chains and CEOs of international distributors, mentoring and supporting women to excel in business.
She is also a fully qualified expert witness and regularly attends legal cases, offering her expert insight into the cosmetics and beauty industry in a legal capacity. She is also an ambassador for Shear Haven anti-domestic violence salon training in the UK and Ireland.
She is also a renowned public speaker, and her unique gift for storytelling sees her speak at many of the industry’s top events, trade shows, and Women In Business events. Her expertise regarding business has resulted her in being a panellist and keynote speaker for some of the beauty industry’s biggest brands, delivering on a spectrum of business topics, keeping attendees entertained whilst being incredibly inspiring and motivating.
From independent salons to large chains and huge multinationals, Liz McKeon excels in growing businesses and streamlining them for fast profitability. She has worked with large conglomerates, global skincare houses, pharmacies and franchises and has worked at every level of the beauty business, from retail sales to management.
A business owner and salon operator, Liz consolidated her knowledge and launched Beauty Business Expert in 2007 where she offered training and workshops alongside her expertise to a global audience. Then in 2020, she launched the Liz McKeon Salon Business Academy, an online course with a number of videos helping salons to grow their business and to thrive after the COVID-19 lockdowns. She followed this up in 2021 with The International Salon Business School, which includes in-person and virtual programmes for business owners, managers and teams.
Liz shares her strategies for success around the world and has helped thousands of business owners to maximise their profits. Thanks to her entrepreneurial work, she received the All Stars Thought Leader Award in Empowering Female Entrepreneurs.
Creator and star of the show £200 Salon Turnaround, Liz helped to transform struggling salons with a £200 investment and a few simple tweaks. She has appeared in a number of TV and radio shows, as well as national newspapers and magazines including, Beauty & Hairdressing, Professional Beauty UK, Irish Pharmacy Retailer, International Therapist, Salon NV, Your Nails, Vitality, Irish Beauty, Salon Magazine, Professional Beauty Ireland, Irish Hairdresser International, Business Ireland, Guild News and Scratch Magazine.
In 2017, YWCA Nashville and Middle Tennessee and volunteer Susanne Post – a Nashville-based salon owner and survivor of domestic violence – developed Shear Haven Education Programme, training salons and stylists in anti-domestic violence training.
It consists of an online training course which aims to equip them with the knowledge and resources to recognise the signs of domestic violence int heir clients, successfully navigate conversations with those in danger and pass along tools that can help them get to safety. To date, over 25,000 beauty professionals from around the world have taken the training.
According to the Office for National Statistics, police recorded over 250,000 domestic abuse offences between March and June 2020, a 7% increase from the same period the year before. During and after the first UK COVID-19 lockdown, roughly 1/5 of all offences involved domestic abuse.
There is an understanding that salon stylists and spa professionals have a unique relationship with their clients and they are in the perfect position to hear about and see the signs of domestic violence; but many do not know how to respond or what to do to help.
Now Shear Haven has made its way to the UK, Liz is determined that domestic violence training will become mandatory for all salons and stylists and more domestic violence victims will become domestic violence survivors.
“I’ve had the experience of literally having to run for my life and go into hiding. I just thought I have a responsibility to step up. I know what it’s like to be in that position…I just felt, here’s a resource that would be really helpful to bring to Ireland and the UK.”
Liz has a passion for public speaking, and is a regular keynote speaker at professional exhibitions, industry events and conferences. Her topics include:
– Route to Success
– Making More Money
– Increase Your Retail Sales
– Be the First and Only Choice in Your Customers’ Mind
– How to Future Proof Your Career or Business
– How to Recruit and Retain Quality Talent
– Girl Power: The Landscape for Women in Business
– Anti Domestic Violence: Shear Haven Industry Training
However, Liz’s speaking format can be tailored to suit the needs of the audience, and after an initial phone conversation, Liz can put together a presentation that will suit your needs and goals.
Below: see Liz speaking at a recent salon event about people, sales, profit and making a good impression…
Liz has spoken at events including:
– The Female Entrepreneurs Business Conference
– The Skinbase UK Roadshow across nine locations in their ‘Grow Your Skincare Business’ event
– The Guinot Convention
– Sothys Skincare Christmas Event
– The Image Skincare Annual Conference
– The ASU Awards
– The Professional Beauty Event
– Hairdressing Live
– ‘Face the Future’ Event
– The International Distributors Conference for Medik 8
In addition to this, Liz has been in high demand for podcasts, sharing her first-hand experience and knowledge in regard to business and is a columnist in many of the hair and beauty industry’s most highly acclaimed trade publications. Her articles are shared not only in the UK and Ireland, but also worldwide in countries including America, Australia, New Zealand, India, Dubai and South Africa.
Liz has also appeared on TV to discuss her work as Brand Ambassador for Shear Haven and their anti-domestic violence training initiative, as well as featuring in her own TV Programme, The £200 Salon Turnaround. In 2021, Liz was awarded an All Star Lifetime Award for Empowering Female Entrepreneurs. Liz not only is a highly engaging Business Speaker, but a great host, radio and TV guest.
As part of our ‘Chat with…’ podcast series at Great British Speakers, our director Jane Farnham sat down with Liz to talk about entrepreneurial spirit, business leadership, domestic violence, and her experience as a qualified expert witness.
ASAP Skincare, BABTAC, Beauty by McCauley, Dermalogica, DIBI, Fushia, Gelish, Guinot, iiaa, Image Skillnet, Image Skincare, Janssen Cosmetics, Katherine Daniels, L’Oréal, MAC, Mary Cohr, Medik 8, NHBF, Pomp & Co, SkinBase, Sothys Paris, Professional Beauty, Renaissance Skincare, Skinbrands, Thalgo, Waxperts, Wella Professionals, Xpert Pro.
I had the pleasure of working with Liz on one of our Fingal Enterprising Women Network online networking sessions, where she featured as our guest speaker. From the outset when planning the event, Liz was a joy to interact with as she thoroughly understood the needs of our network members and was able to craft her content to suit the diversity of our audience.
Our members come from all different types of businesses so it can be challenging to satisfy all, but Liz managed to do this seamlessly. The content Liz covered in her session was both highly practical and motivational, offering strategies which people could implement in their businesses straight away after the session.
Sharon Rossi, Fingal Enterprising Women Network
“Dear Liz, I want to express my heartfelt gratitude for your participation as a keynote speaker at the HUB network, your presentation was great, and it undoubtedly provided our guests with valuable and insightful content”
Charlotte Cooper, Events Manager at KAO Salon Division
“It was fantastic to have Liz kick off day one of The Hub Network 2023, sharing her strategies for business growth through increasing revenues and improving systems and processes to generate even more salon profit. Offering invaluable advice, Liz inspired our audience of salon business owners, sharing her insights around leveraging the power of retailing through personalized recommendations and offering tailormade, long-term-lifetime haircare plans for clients; to teaching salon teams how to hear and turn buying signals into opportunity and profit.
Our guests took away some practical and motivational easy wins towards the journey to even more salon success. Thank you Liz for joining us and sharing your valuable insights, learning and expertise”.
Elisa Mirra, KAO Communications Manager
“Liz, huge thank you from Dermalogica UK/Ireland for your powerful insights and messages shared at Tribal last week. Managers were inundated with action plans even before the end of the week, so it clearly landed well. Thank you for taking the time to put it all together and delivering it so well’’.
Dermalogica Team, Dermalogica Skin Care UK/Ireland.
At Professional Beauty London 2019 Liz hosted the most highly attended seminar at a show attended by over 34,000 trade professionals. Liz would be a fantastic addition to any business conference; she is a very engaging speaker and is always very well-received with audiences. I would highly recommend it.
Harry Leyburn, Professional Beauty
Thanks Liz, plenty to think about and to do a plan of action. Can’t wait to get started.
Alison Pauls
Great seminar, with loads of great tips and advice.
Emma Hanrahan