If You Think Your Interior Design Business is Broken Here’s What To Fix
Updated September 2023
If you're anything like me, you have a gazillion things you want to do in your business. But how do you know where to start when you have SO MANY things you want to do? And on the flip side of that, if everything feels broken but you also want to add in more things, where do you begin?
The key to success lies in knowing what to focus on first.
This got me thinking:
Let’s say you're working with a client who wants to do several rooms, but only has the budget to focus on one room at a time. They will rely on you, the expert, to help them prioritize which room will be the most impactful, and therefore, which one they should take on first
I would bet you have a hierarchy you go through to help them determine which room to prioritize. Maybe you rank their answers to questions like:
How often do you use the room?
Does the room currently meet your functional needs?
Is the room causing other issues in your home or your daily life?
Which room would be the easiest to complete?
Rooms that are used frequently but are NOT currently functional are likely the rooms you would advise a client to work on first. Why? Because the results would improve their day-to-day life almost immediately.
So, how can you apply this same hierarchy to your business?
First, this really depends on how things are going in your business. Are things going well and you’re looking to grow? Are things pretty smooth but you know there’s room for improvement? Or, maybe everything feels broken and something has to change before you burn it down.
I like to look at these three questions:
01 | What is currently broken in my business?
02 | If my client load doubled tomorrow, what in my business would break?
03 | If I had to 10x my fee, what would I need to do?
Then, write down the answers to those questions for each pillar of your business.
Do you see how you did that? You identified the problem (#1), what you would need to take off your plate (#2), and the solution (#3). You’re amazing!
Now focus first on the area that has the most things broken. If your sales and marketing only have 1-2 items in them, but your operations category has 10, START there (in my experience it’s usually a broken client experience process that does cause all the other symptoms).
This will take some time, but this exercise and the examples I’ve provided below should help you to identify what to focus on first.
Here are some things that might be broken in each category:
MARKETING
no leads coming in
low quality leads coming in
no referrals
low conversion rate on website (meaning, you have traffic but no one is submitting your form, booking a consult, or signing up for your newsletter)
SALES
low close rate
long sales process
can’t facilitate that many consultations or custom proposals
delivery of custom proposals takes too long, or is clunky and is different for every project
OPERATIONS
team making mistakes
team not giving you any leverage
team not taking initiative
repetitive tasks are being done manually
buried in admin and $10/hour tasks
no consistent process for anything
you’re doing everything yourself
FULFILLMENT
always missing deadlines
clients are frustrated
clients are pushing back
mistakes are happening with project delivery
not completing any projects
no boundaries
clients are shopping your designs
you are making no revenue on products
FINANCES
not making enough money
inconsistent monthly revenue
not able to pay yourself after expenses
not able to hire top talent
don’t have money to invest in the business
pricing is different for every client
Here are some things that might break in each category if you doubled your client load:
MARKETING
you would need to outsource your marketing
you would need to know when you could book new clients and how long projects take
you have no time to keep the website updated with new project photos, so marketing could get stale
you might be making one of these marketing mistakes
SALES
can’t facilitate that many discovery calls, consultations, or custom proposal creation
manual signature and billing process would need to change
follow-up process would need to be automated
OPERATIONS
team would not be able to handle the volume
repetitive tasks would not get done
expensive mistakes would happen with no one to double check important details
you’d be responsible for everything happening the right way and wouldn’t have time to delegate and oversee all the work
FULFILLMENT
would need to extend all project deadlines or limit how many projects at a time
client updates and other little manual touches wouldn’t happen
overloaded with questions from clients, inboxes would break
no time to properly style or schedule photographs so that would have to wait
quality control on your orders would fall through the cracks
lower quality designs to existing clients
FINANCES
would need to hire more team but wouldn’t have time so likely would lose some money on a few bad hires
more income coming in but working all the time so not actually making more money
paying for more mistakes because too busy
your client billing would fall behind and you’d miss hours
Here are some things you might need to do if you had to 10x your design fee.
MARKETING
improve your overall branding and messaging to attract clients with larger budgets
create demand and a sense of urgency for your services
SALES
say NO to projects that aren’t a fit for the company
have a seamless sales system
have someone else do your sales calls to protect your boundaries and increase the perceived value of your time
OPERATIONS
hire a client concierge to manage all the touchpoints and customer service
automate parts of the process to elevate the client experience
clearly define your process so clients always know to expect
FULFILLMENT
deliver impeccable communications
complete projects ahead of schedule
improve your clients’ lives by making the experience stress-free and seamless
curate the best products for their functional and aesthetic needs
add more value to your services by increasing your skills
FINANCES
set minimums and stand firm in pricing
increase your price
know your pricing
invest time in hiring the best team and building out the best systems
Where to start when fixing your business
Once you identify what’s broken, choose the area of your business that has the most broken things and start there. You might also notice that for each broken item, you have already written out the solution in step three. For example, let’s say you identify that your marketing is broken. Using the examples from above, let’s see what that looks like:
A | WHAT’S BROKEN WITH YOUR CURRENT MARKETING
no leads coming in
low-quality leads coming in
no referrals
low conversion rates on your website (meaning, you have traffic but no one is submitting your form, booking a consult, or signing up for your newsletter)
And you’ve identified that these are things you’d need to do if you 10x’d your design fee (the solution).
B | YOUR MARKETING IF YOU 10x YOUR FEE
show only your best projects online
improve your overall branding and messaging to attract clients with larger budgets
create demand for your services and a sense of urgency
Do you see how you’ve already identified the solution in B to fix what is broken from A?
This exercise — identifying pain points, then identifying their related solutions — will work whether you chose to address marketing, sales, operations, fulfillment, or financial issues within your business. It is more of a top-down, solutions-focused approach to problem-solving rather than getting caught in the weeds of what is broken.
Now for your Dakota Design Biz RX:
If your marketing is broken, check out these resources:
If your sales are broken, check out these resources:
If your operations are broken, check out these resources:
If your delivery is broken, check out these resources:
If your finances are broken, check out these resources:
And if all parts are equally broken and you have no idea how to start, start by mapping out your process for each service. Grab my Signature Client Experience Blueprint here to help you do that.
Looking for more? Keep reading:
