Marketing Strategy for Interior Design Business
Hello friends!
In today’s post, I want to talk about one of my favourite topics about interior design business – marketing. The longer I work as an individual entrepreneur, the better I understand that major part of any successful results that I get is related to my marketing efforts.
Whereas in my e-book I talk about specific tools that you can use to attract new clients for your interior design business, this post will be dedicated to steps you need to make for building a successful marketing strategy.
Before I start describing them I want to share my observation about the most common mistake that many people make when it comes to promoting their business. They try something, see zero or little result and they stop any marketing activity at all. Before you discover things that will successfully work for your business you need to understand that any strategies are built through trial and error. So I recommend you trying various tools at first and then focus all your efforts on those which bring the major outcome.
Another important rule – is called “72 hours”. If you put anything on your to-do list, try to accomplish it within 72 hours, otherwise, there is a big chance that it will be lost among more urgent upcoming tasks.
Here are the steps to build successful marketing strategy:
- Define your niche
I know that this is probably the most common advice and most likely you have heard it already many many times. At the same time, you can’t neglect the importance of narrowing down your niche for building successful interior design business. Moreover, the narrower is this niche the higher are your chances to get noticed in this saturated market. I give you an example – one of my friends defined his niche as “design of one-bedroom apartments and studios in Moscow”. Soon he became expert number one in designing such flats. His studio now is very famous and he gets all sort of projects – not only small apartments but also big houses, commercial projects, etc. However, the algorithm towards success is always the same: Defining the niche – becoming an expert in this niche – getting recognized as an expert.
Here are some tips for you in order to understand better your niche. Think about your ideal client and answer these questions:
- where does he live?
- what is his age?
- is he single or has a family?
- what is his preferable interior design style?
2. Create portfolio
In the beginning of your career, this should be priority number one but there are some important considerations to think about:
- When starting with small budget projects make sure they don’t look cheap – otherwise, you will get stuck there and always attract low-budget clients (unless this is the niche you want to work in). There are many ways on how you can make any interior look more expensive. For example, many galleries would agree to borrow paintings and sculptures for a photoshoot – expensive art will always make space look luxurious. Accessorize, accessorize, accessorize – again if the budget doesn’t allow you to buy many decorative items, borrow them from the shop for a deposit and make some nice photos.
- Having interiors in a certain style in your portfolio will attract future clients who like this style – so if you don’t like working in it, don’t take such projects or don’t include them in your portfolio.
- Create for portfolio your dream project – make some quality 3d renderings of an imaginary space – the way you would decorate it if have no boundaries or limitations. This will attract clients who might make this dream project executed in the real life.
3. Grow your expertise and become recognized as an expert.
Make sure that every new project that you take challenges you in terms of knowledge and skills. Grow as professional with every new interior that you create. Constantly study – short courses, seminars, workshops, exhibitions should always be on your list. Identify your weak spots and work on improving them. For example, for me, it was working in CAD so I hired a private teacher who gave me lessons 2-3 times a week until I felt confident in that area.
Becoming an expert is difficult but getting recognized as such is even more challenging. But definitely possible!
- get your projects published in all sort of media
- when you don’t have new projects, simply write an article with useful tips about interior design (magazines are constantly looking for such content so it is very easy to get it published)
- start your own blog and spread the knowledge. I started this blog 5 years ago and I can’t count how many wonderful opportunities it has brought to me.
4. Focus on PR
Of course, everyone dreams of getting a badass PR agent like Samantha Jones from Sex and the City who could help them to become an overnight success. However, you have to admit that in the beginning of your career most likely you need to become Samantha Jones for yourself. For many people, the idea of self-promotion looks very daunting and intimidating but in order to grow your business, you need to start doing it. Connect with editors of various magazines and TV shows, bloggers and Social Media Influencers. Remember that you lose nothing if you approach them and ask for a feature. In the worst case – it won’t happen, in the best case scenario, you will get some free publicity.
