If your goal for the year is to automate as much as possible in your interior design business, you have to know this one thing before you invest in technology, consultants, strategists, or done-for-you services. 

If you've ever sent out an interior design proposal to a potential client (you might call it a contract, LOA, scope and service agreement, etc.) and then waited on pins and needles for their response…this tip is for you. 

Expire your proposals.

Most of our designers expire proposals within two weeks MAX. Some expire them within seven days.

Unless you’re a general contractor or a cabinet supplier, your interior design firm SHOULD NOT be ordering building supplies.

This is one area where I occasionally see interior designers taking on responsibilities that cause extra headaches and coordination. Not to mention that ordering building supplies doesn’t yield sufficient profit from markup to offset the hassle. 

Designers should refrain from placing orders for materials that would be considered building supplies.

It’s no secret that interior design is a competitive market. Interior designers need to stay front-of-mind with potential clients by consistently marketing their services. Unfortunately, we see a lot of marketing tactics that don't actually yield any measurable results for interior designers. In this post, I’m sharing the most common ineffective marketing tactics we see so you can STOP doing them and allocate that time toward something that actually generates revenue (or joy!) for your business.

Join The DTS Files for my advice and insights.

Are you using Google Forms in your interior design business? We love using Google Forms, especially as a part of the onboarding and offboarding phases. It’s a great way to send out your onboarding questionnaire and feedback form and allows your clients to submit their information online (rather than having to print out a form or work through a clunky word document).

In this client experience tech tip, I’ll walk you through the most common questions we receive from our clients about using Google Forms, including:

Most of the interior designers we work with source primarily to-the-trade and custom products for their full-service interior design projects. Sure, they'll pull in a retail item here and there when it comes to accessories or styling items. But for the most part, if they specify something, they're ordering it through one of their vendor accounts. 

This may be how you run your business, or maybe you'd like to start selling more to-the-trade items (if this is you, be sure to check out our mini-course: Beyond Retail). Either way, I’ll bet you've heard questions similar to these from prospects before: 

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If you’re not booking interior design projects with five and six-figure design fees, don’t blame it on your market or your clients. Many things have to be in place to book those bigger projects that everyone so desires. And best of all: these things are all in your control. Woop woop.

Without further ado, here’s what needs to be true to book interior design projects with five and six-figure design fees (that’s design fees in the five and six-figures, not project budgets).

If you're using the form feature on your website to collect feedback, new inquiries, etc., these tutorials will show you how to redirect the form submission so your prospects and clients land on a beautiful page, rather than seeing just the generic “Your form has been submitted” message.  

BLEH!