Elevate your Interior Design Client Experience Process: Nail Your Sales Calls
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Written August 2020 | Updated January 2025
One of the benefits of having a streamlined client experience process for your interior design business is that it will help you to feel confident during sales calls so you can book more dream clients. In this post, I’m going to share tips for how to structure your sales calls with potential interior design clients.
If you’re new here, you may want to read these posts first:
Step One: Create a Pricing Guide
Step Two: Set Up an Autoresponder for New Leads
Step Three: Screen Your Leads
📩 Need help creating an investment guide you can send to potential clients that makes you look polished and professional? Check out my Done-For-You Client Experience templates that you can send out in less than an hour.
If you follow the above steps and the tips in this email, I know you’ll feel more confident during sales calls, and they will become easier, shorter, more productive, and more highly converting!
TIPS FOR NAILING YOUR SALES CALLS + BOOKING MORE DREAM INTERIOR DESIGN CLIENTS
So you’ve gone through all the steps above, you’ve screened out your new potential interior design client, they know your pricing and have an overview of your process, and they are ready to get on the phone with you. Yay, right!?
Here are a few tips for feeling confident and in control during your sales calls:
TIP 01: MAKE IT EASY FOR POTENTIAL INTERIOR DESIGN CLIENTS TO SCHEDULE A CALL WITH YOU
For discovery calls, I am a HUGE fan of using a scheduler. It is quite inconvenient to go back and forth over email trying to find a time that works when you could simply click on someone’s scheduling link and book a time right away. You’re offering a luxury service, and that means it should feel easy for your client every step of the way.
Sidenote: I have actually NOT moved forward with a company I wanted to hire because scheduling a discovery call was so frustrating and it felt very unprofessional. If they’re that inefficient from the start, what other manual inefficiencies will I be paying for in the price of their service? No thanks.
I use HoneyBook for scheduling client appointments and sending reminders, and I recommend it often to interior designers. HoneyBook’s scheduler is like having my very own personal assistant for a fraction of the price. *Note, I am an affiliate for HoneyBook so if you sign up through my link, I may receive a small commission. I only recommend software I use and love!
When you use a scheduler, it means clients can schedule appointments with you automatically (when you share the link). You can include the link in your pricing guide, or, you can omit it from your pricing guide and send it out only after you’ve reviewed their inquiry so you can make sure you do want to get on a call with them.
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Now, before you say, “Katie, my schedule is different every day, every week, every minute. A scheduler won’t work for me.”, then you really should consider if having NO cadence to your schedule or consistency in your weeks is actually in support of your creative process.
I know for many, it is not.
The benefits of using a scheduler are:
You remove yourself from all the back and forth of finding a date that works.
Clients can book automatically without ever talking to you or waiting for you to email them dates. WINNNNNNNN!!
Schedulers automatically add appointments to calendars with the call info (phone number, zoom link, etc.) so people are less likely to miss the call.
If you prefer not to give clients access to book directly, you can still manually go in and book the appointment type for them so it will send out reminders to you and your client.
TIP 02: BE PREPARED FOR THE CALL, BUT DON’T GO CRAZY
Be prepared for the call. I always do a quick Google search of the property address to make sure it’s aligned with your target areas/price points and to see if there are any listing photos online. This is always SO helpful!
Then, reread the notes they shared via your contact form. Have their information pulled up for your discovery call so you can reference it while you talk.
If you need to see photos or plans for the discovery call, be sure your appointment reminder email requests that information so you have it handy during the call.
Again, HoneyBook is great for this. You can store all the notes, forms, and files within the client project in HoneyBook. Keeps things SO organized!
TIP 03: CALL THE CLIENT (NOT THE OTHER WAY AROUND)
Always BE THE ONE TO CALL THE CLIENT! Don’t ever have them call you. NO. Not professional.
You are the expert; you set the stage and you initiate the call. Always let them know you will be the one to call them. Include this in your reminder emails.
TIP 04: STICK TO YOUR DISCOVERY CALL QUESTIONS TO STAY ON TRACK
During the call, have a template for the questions you will ask and follow it.
Not a script!! I repeat: DO NOT USE A SCRIPT! I am not a fan of scripts and always know when I’m being spoken to with one–no, thank you. Luxury service means customized, boutique, tailored to me — not read from a script that a robot could do.
Having a template of the 4-5 questions you ask during a discovery call with a potential interior design client will keep you on track and in control of the call. It also ensures the call stays productive and doesn’t turn into a free design session (when I teach interior designers how to do sales calls in my signature program, The Designed to Scale® Method, this NEVER happens!!).
TIP 05: KEEP YOUR INTERIOR DESIGN DISCOVERY CALLS SHORT & SWEET
This is a complimentary discovery call to learn more about their project to see if it’s a mutual fit. This is NOT a free design session.
So, few things:
No one wants to spend an hour on the phone with you if they aren’t even sure they’re going to hire you. NO ONE.
If you sent out an investment guide first, you’ll save a lot of time during the discovery call because you won’t need to talk so in-depth about your process or your pricing (because your investment guide has that information!).
And if DO send out an investment guide and the person shows up to the call and hasn’t even reviewed it…to me, this is a sign they don’t value your time or theirs.
Discovery calls aren’t the time to find out what their style is, what their favorite color is, or what hobbies they have. The discovery call is to discover their needs and expectations so you can determine if you are a good fit based on their budget, timeline, location, and goals.
Tip: If your interior design discovery calls last way longer than this, I recommend looking at your contact form on your website to make sure it’s actually gathering the RIGHT information. If all it says is “Name,” “Phone,” “Email,” and “Message,” you’re missing a huge opportunity to pre-screen clients in an automatic way.
Read about how to fix your contact form here.
TIP 06: MAKE YOUR RECOMMENDATION
At the end of the call, it’s up to you, the professional, to make your recommendation to them on whether you can help them, what service will be the best fit, and what the next step is. Then, once you’ve made your recommendation, you should ask them what questions they have for you.
Tip: When they ask their questions, WRITE THESE DOWN and use them for future Instagram posts or blog posts (and maybe even consider adding them as FAQs in your pricing guide). Potential client questions are GOLD!!
TIP 07: SEND A RECAP EMAIL
After the call--DO WHAT YOU SAID YOU WERE GOING TO DO! Oh my goodness, I get so frustrated when I am on a sales call (as the potential client) and someone tells me they’ll send me more info or a proposal or pricing or whatever and then I never get it. Then I have to reach out to them to ask for it and it is just uncomfortable. It’s like, “I’m asking you to let me give you money, and you won’t even send me an email to make it easy for me to do it!”
It’s never good when a potential client feels unimportant or forgotten. They’ll think, “If you don’t care about me now, will you even care about me after I’ve paid you?”
This can be an easy step in your process.
Your scheduler can send out an automated post-call message with the next steps (you should keep this one general) or you can create a template that you can personalize and send out right after each call.
Check out our client experience email templates for interior designers here.
TIP 08: CONTINUE TO FOLLOW UP!
The follow up! This will set you apart from your competitors. I’m telling you that right now. Whether you have a CRM or not, I highly recommend setting a reminder in your calendar to continually follow up with them after the discovery call if they haven’t moved forward in the sales process.
I’ve been having sales conversations in person, over Zoom, and over the phone for 14+ years, and I have always been in the service industry, so I know a thing or two about communicating with potential clients and reading their signs. I can usually tell very quickly, even before getting on a call with someone, i) if it’s a fit and ii) if they’re a red flag.
Do you struggle with the inquiry phase and sales part of your interior design process? If so, I have a few ways we can help you. Because once you know exactly what you’re selling and how you’re delivering it, you’ll feel so much more confident in talking with potential clients.
