Welcome to Today By Design!
By · Comments
Delighted YOU made it to my blog (well, at least one of them)! Today by Design is all about YOUR business success. After a rocky start (check out Meet Melissa above for the gory details) and a lot of expensive, time consuming, and painful mistakes I found my path to success. Here I give you the 20% I did right! My hope is that you’ll implement the wisdom and save yourself some of the learning curve. At the same time, I really want YOUR FEEDBACK and COMMENTS.
I like to think I do business differently and I suppose we all do. But really and truly about 5 years into mine I found that I was earning triple and more than my colleagues. It isn’t that I’m more talented, I’m not. It isn’t that I was smarter, I’m not (well, maybe a little bit! lol). It isn’t that I have connections, I don’t. It is simply that I figured out how to build lasting relationships based on trust with my clients and that gives me a lifetime of demand! I’m no rocket scientist but I do know business and I know how to succeed.
» When you want more, sign up for the feed!
» When you want language and words to drive your profits, get ebook to the right!
» When you are ready to really rocket your business, get mentoring (top button details.)
My only desire is to serve and support your success. I get a major high out of empowering others to get the six figure compensation, appreciation, and lifestyle they deserve and desire sooner rather than later. Six figures isn’t elusive or even difficult once you get the systems, take action persistently and consistently, and have the necessary support. I’m here for you.
The best way to make a sale is to build trust with your prospect. The fastest way to build trust is to prove the value in the product or service you are selling. There are three shortcuts that make building easy, simple, and fast.
#1 Give a Sample or a Guarantee
Now depending on the business you are in, this can be hard or easy. If you are in the food business then a sample is expected, everyone likes to taste what they are getting. Even in restaurants now many have turned to “tapas” to allow patrons to try taste-sized portions, smart restaurants offer a tiny taste of a new dish before each meal. There are many other product based businesses (think skincare) that serve up samples by the boatload, certain that when you try, you’ll buy! Often it works.
In a service business, it is all about being confident of your expertise and your offering so that you can make the prospect more comfortable. I guarantee my design services! Yes, that’s right I do. I guarantee that if you aren’t happy with it, I’ll buy it from you. I’m that certain that I am going to deliver a superior product. When you aren’t that certain, maybe you need to examine what it is you are offering. Often you can guarantee the quality of the experience but steer clear of guaranteeing the end result. This is especially a good fit for consulting. The end result depends on the users’ implementation, but you can guarantee the quality of the process you are presenting.
#2 Give Information
Often to get someone closer to a sale, they simply need more information. Women particularly, studies have shown, are prone to research their purchases before they buy. This is why while a man may know exactly what he wants, know precisely where to get it, and make one short trip; a woman, on the other hand, loves a mall or outlet center. 
She will check literally every shop that has anything close to what she wants, make a full comparison analysis and then buy. So when you can provide those comparisons upfront it can work in your favor. Consider the bold moves of several insurance carriers, Progressive being the #1, who offer this service. They know that if they do the leg work, the prospect is more likely to buy from them, even if they are potentially higher priced.
Information in many businesses can be done through a “Special Report,” the 5 Biggest Mistakes You Are Making in Decorating! or 3 Reasons You’ll Never Get Your House Sold. A “Special Report” provides value content that the prospect didn’t have before and drives them closer to a decision. This is a great leave behind item in a first call, or better yet an opportunity to catch web traffic. “Get YOUR Free Special Report” just give me your name and email address. You’ve captured the prospect to continue pursuit.
#3 Give a Testimonial
Third party credibility is one of the simplest ways to make a sale. Most small business owners when asked how they market reply “by word-of-mouth.” This is testimonials. 
The efficient way to do this is to create a process for regularly collecting these rave reviews by using specific questions designed to elicit in-depth and on target responses. Often it is best if you aren’t the one getting your own testimonials, as clients can feel put on the spot.
In the internet world, testimonials can make or break a sale as often the goods being sold are solely information based. If your audience doesn’t know you, doesn’t trust you and you need a sale consider providing some of your goods or services at a reduced rate or complimentary just to build up testimonials.
Whatever method you choose, these are key strategies for building trust quickly and effectively with prospects that you might not otherwise get a chance to profit from. Business isn’t old school anymore and it is up to you to get creative, consistent, and persistent in your methods.
_ _ _ _ _
Want to use this article? You can! Simply include the text here: Want more great business building tips and easy to implement marketing strategies? Check out www.todaybydesign.com. If you are ready to take your design or creative business to the next level, be sure to check out www.sixfigureprofessionals.com for your free, no-strings-attached 30 minute strategy session with Melissa.
Track Your New Year’s Progress! Mentoring Me.
By · Comments
Are you keeping track of your New Year’s progress? It is often easier for us to focus on what we aren’t getting done instead of what we are. This leaves us with that unpleasant sense that we are perpetually behind! STOP. Take time at the close of each day to list 5 things you got accomplished. And, at the close of each week, complete the success form found here (PDF).
My greatest satisfaction and joy is from empowering you! So I decided to share a tool that I use in my mentoring practice. Usually I reserve this strictly for mentee clients but I don’t think they’ll mind if I share it. I’ve had too many tell me that this alone makes an enormous difference in how they feel about their accomplishments and determining their priorities.
Making Progress and Keeping Track (PDF)
Mentoring is not a mystery! And it isn’t coaching either. It is a cross between having your very own business consultant and your very own coach. Typically a consultant tells you what to do and a coach asks you questions that lead you to the answer and supports you in the process. In mentoring you get the best of both. You get the shortcuts, tools and strategies to drive your design business and the how-to-support along the way. Answers, methods, and encouragement on the road to success! Are you ready to explore mentoring to take your design business to the next level? Go to www.sixfigureprofessionals.com and schedule your complimentary strategy session. You’ll get immediate tips, tools and more for growing your business.
Together we’ll all go farther! Prospering by Design, Will You?
Despite my success in social media, I am still learning! This week I am avidly listening to the Social Media Success Summit with my favorite Mari Smith and the legendary Gary Vaynerchuck. Gary started in his family’s wine business and took a $4 million company to over $50 million with social media! He had some great success habits to share last evening and I want to share them with you.
Put family first! Now coming from me that may sound a bit odd, some of you anyway know that my Mom passed 25 years ago, my sisters and I rarely speak, and my father ran off to Australia! But for me it means spending time with friends who have become family (and some awesome clients who have also.)
Ditch the TV! Gary really jumped on this one, especially American Idol and I can see why. To catch it occasionally can be fun, but to tie yourself weekly or nightly to programming that is neither educational nor about anything other than someone else’s success isn’t going to move you or your business forward.
Get healthy! As Ralph Waldo Emerson once said “Health is the greatest wealth.” Yet so many of us (I can be guilty too, at times) indulge in fast food, over eating, skip exercise and wonder why we have low energy, heart burn, and are getting fat. We need to wake up and take care of ourselves.
Never be ashamed to make a living! I loved this as often we tend to give ourselves away, under value our talents, and forget to monetize our skills. While I love to teach, mentor and speak, if I do it for free then what do I send my mortgage company? I don’t think they’ll take just great reviews, they want cash! Value yourself, your information and get comfortable and confident asking for what you are worth and commanding it.
_ _ _ _ _
Want to use this article? You can! Simply include the text here: Want more great business building tips and easy to implement marketing strategies? Check out www.todaybydesign.com. If you are ready to take your design or creative business to the next level, be sure to check out www.sixfigureprofessionals.com for your free, no-strings-attached 30 minute strategy session with Melissa.
Marketing success is largely dependent on your communication skills. This can be tricky because everyone communicates slightly differently and you can never quite tell if someone is a visual learner, an auditory learner, or a kinesthetic learner. So to play it safe and cover all your bases, here is a shortcut that will touch each of those learning methods and allow you to hit more home runs with your prospects and clients.
Tell Them! The first step in any marketing plan is telling your prospect what you do. If you’ve done your homework you know clearly who your target is, what your best prospect looks like. If not, well then you will be telling a lot more people about what you do, with whom you do it, and how you do it! I recommend doing your homework as a clear target is always easier to hit than one that is out of focus. The hard part is that we often suffer the illusion that it is obvious what we do and everyone already knows it. In fact, often few know clearly what you do and the depth of the service you offer, so you must be comfortable talking about it.
Now, I didn’t say dump on them about it, or bore them with it, but create a couple of short illustrative success stories around clients that share the before they worked with you and the result of working with you. Stories are remembered far better than facts and figures. Make it colorful, richly detailed, and entertaining if at all possible (and it is almost always possible unless you are a physician or mortician.)
Show Them! Got a portfolio? Got press clippings? Got a media kit? Got articles? Got a book? Whatever you have put it in a presentation format online (more cost effective and portable) and offline (a book) so you have it ready to share. This is a step beyond just TELLING and goes into actually SHOWING then what you can do. If your career track doesn’t lend itself to graphics, consider articles or papers you’ve authored, a book you’ve written, or even an online rave review site (or leather bound album) sharing photos of happy clients with testimonials about your work. There is nothing more powerful than third party credibility. Oh and the best time to get these comments isn’t weeks, months or years later, but right as you wrap up or even in the middle of working on a project or job.
Get rave reviews when the client’s enthusiasm is still high and they aren’t in the “punch list” phase. And this phase isn’t limited to design professionals but applies to many service industry professionals, there is always a time when the client reviews our work and sometimes we need to address challenges or concerns. That isn’t when you want their comments!
Follow Up with Them! I have more small business owners share with me that they put a bid on a job and never heard anything further. They don’t tell me they didn’t get it; instead they say they never found out, they never followed up! Don’t assume that it is the prospects job to let you know, be proactive. Whenever you submit a bid or proposal always let the recipient know specifically when you will follow up, and if you get no reply to email, for goodness sake pick up the phone! It is in your best interest first and foremost to get the job.
Years ago, when I was working in hotel purchasing, I had an interview with Opryland Hotel. I thought it went well, but the recruiter came back to me and said that while they liked me and I was a good fit, the man who interviewed me couldn’t tell if I wanted the job!! YIKES, can you imagine someone not clear that I was excited about the opportunity? I cleared that up and got the job. Your prospect may be thinking the same of you when you fail to follow up. Remember ASK, ASK, ASK.
_ _ _ _ _
Want to use this article? You can! Simply include the text here: Want more great business building tips and easy to implement marketing strategies? Check out www.todaybydesign.com. If you are ready to take your design or creative business to the next level, be sure to check out www.sixfigureprofessionals.com for your free, no-strings-attached 30 minute strategy session with Melissa.
How Color Sells: Are You True Blue?
By · Comments
Color is about more than interior design and fashion; it is used for marketing products from diapers to diet soda, from office supplies to electronics, from bargain buys to luxury investments, color sells. The key is to learn how to use color to your advantage as it is often a subliminal influence. Once you know the psychology and the cultural differences you can layer hues from light to dark, subtle to bold, to achieve the desired response.
Blue means loyalty and trust, and it’s what you want your friends to be! Blue is the most popular of all colors universally, largely because it is the sky above and sea beyond. It truly does promote trust, and some of us can recall when police wore blue and not black and we knew them as the men in blue. It is also considered a power color among men.
I’ve often considered that it was blue that always got me the job, I frequently wear it on new client interviews. The effect is subliminal but nonetheless successful! Give it a try on your next or current job search. While it might be your great resume, the right blue suit could be your tipping point.
On the flip side, blue lowers one’s blood pressure and is often used to connote “feeling blue,” “in a blue funk” and emotions of a depressive or sad nature. At the same time it is a great appetite suppressant, after all usually if it is blue it is time to toss it! (My Mother always just scraped it off, and said it was a little extra penicillin.)
Blue is also about longevity as in “once in a blue moon.” And it is frequently associated with celestial elements, the heavens, and of course religion and the Virgin Mary. Once you have mastered the mystery of color, you can put the psychology to work for your success and even your profit.
_ _ _ _ _
Want to use this article? You can! Simply include the text here: Want more great business building tips and easy to implement marketing strategies? Check out www.todaybydesign.com. If you are ready to take your design or creative business to the next level, be sure to check out www.sixfigureprofessionals.com for your free, no-strings-attached 30 minute strategy session with Melissa.
These quick and effective steps are ones I use regularly to turn prospects easily and quickly into clients (if there is a fit), and you can too!
Listen. It sounds simple and it can be but too often we get caught up in wanting to tell them all about ourselves. This isn’t about us; it is about them, so focus on how much you can learn, not how much you can teach.- Ask for the details. When a prospect calls and shares that he/she is moving to a new home, immediately ask for details about the new house and about the house they are still in. Use this as a chance to dive deep and get involved in their process.
- Get excited. Any business can be stressful; it is your job to make it fun and easy. Share with your prospects that your goal is make the design process easy and fun. Offer flexibility to them while still maintaining control of the project and communications.
- Banish the budget. Never ask for their budget, instead ask them what they are willing to invest. These are vastly different questions. An investment can be made at any time, in any amount, for any reason, with anyone; while a budget is a limitation, an expense with a lifecycle.
- Stop quoting. Too many design professionals jump in with a price or hourly rate when asked. If you are being evaluated on your rate, you are at the bottom of the market! A designer of genuine talent is measured on their portfolio, their presentation, and their personality. These are intangibles and therefore eliminate the competition rather than encouraging it. Don’t quote until the prospect is ready to be a client.
- Acknowledge their time frame. Often prospects have specific time frames in mind, be sure you are aware of these and that they are reasonable. Always acknowledge by restating what they have shared with you and that you are available and their expectation is realistic. If it isn’t then educate them about why it isn’t. Don’t leave them with a false expectation.
- Give them homework. Always ask prospects to complete a Lifestyle Questionnaire together (if there is a partner or spouse) and to review current design magazines and catalogues for their Wish List. They will gladly do this and become further become attached to your process. If they aren’t willing to do their homework, don’t work with them. If they don’t invest emotionally, mentally and financially, you can’t deliver.
When you take the time on the phone with a prospect to exercise the steps outlined here you will find that you can determine if that prospect is a good fit (and not everyone is) and knock out the competition at the same time. In 15+ years as an interior designer, I’ve never bid a job. You don’t have to either!
_ _ _ _ _
Want to use this article? You can! Simply include the text here: Want more great business building tips and easy to implement marketing strategies? Check out www.todaybydesign.com. If you are ready to take your design or creative business to the next level, be sure to check out www.sixfigureprofessionals.com for your free, no-strings-attached 30 minute strategy session with Melissa.
SOCIAL NETWORK SUCCESS: Keep Your Followers Following
By · Comments
The only way to ensure you don’t lose followers is to consistently provide quality content on your networks. The only confusing part is that means slightly different things on each network. Here is a cheat list of content Do’s and Don’ts for the top three!
Twitter Do: Keep it upbeat, fresh, and relevant. Positive quotes are always welcome.
Twitter Don’t: Talk about the weather, your dinner, or share if you are bored.
Facebook Do: Make it more detailed about your activities, events, career, travels, and they love pics, after all it’s called FACEBOOK for a reason.
Facebook Don’t: Any inappropriate comments about sex, drinking, partying, and the like. They are okay with the weather and dinner if you must.
LinkedIN Do: This is about business, make it valuable, relevant, and include trends, current events, latest and hottest, best practices and such.
LinkedIN Don’t: Personal chit chat, weather, dinner, errands, junk.
Each post you make is a tiny snapshot into who you are. Think hard about that and you’ll find that you will be more careful in what you post. Consider that a new follower, friend or contact may or may not look hard at your profile, but rest assured they will look at your latest posts and maybe only the last one or two. Do those posts accurately reflect who you are and what you are about? This is about defining your essence and continually putting your best self forward.
I’ve actually tracked follows and unfollowers in my Twitter account (not as easy to do on Facebook) and noticed that when I digress into a comment about just getting home, or going for a walk, even though I include it is a glorious day, I lose followers. It is mundane! We all have mundane parts to our lives so do you really want to share those? This is a unique opportunity to invite a more exciting interpretation of your life and showcase that to the world. Did you take your family to Disneyland? Or did you meet the most famous mouse in the world? Did you attend another industry conference, or can you share a nugget or two you gained from the conference that will make a difference to those reading it?
Think of social media as a way to mine for the gold of success in what we often see as an ordinary life. Each of us has extraordinary events, connections, and opportunity every day, it is in how we view it, share it, and interact with it.
_ _ _ _ _
Want to use this article? You can! Simply include the text here: Want more great business building tips and easy to implement social media success strategies? Check out www.todaybydesign.com. If you are looking for a social media speaker, consultant or coach, get in touch directly at melissa@melissagalt.com to learn what Melissa’s social media savvy and strategy can do for your business.
How Color Sells: Chocolate Is Sexy and Dependable!
By · Comments
Color is about more than interior design and fashion, it is used for marketing products from diapers to diet soda, from office supplies to electronics, from bargain buys to luxury investments, color sells. The key is to learn how to use color to your advantage as it is often a subliminal influence. Once you know the psychology and the cultural differences you can layer hues from light to dark, subtle to bold, to achieve the desired response.
Brown, it’s dependable, reliable, and solid. Do you realize we don’t ship, we UPS, good old Brown! These guys knew what they were doing when they chose brown for their logo. Having a company perceived by performance and branding as trustworthy and steadfast is priceless.
Several years ago, in fact, UPS was profiled in the marketplace section of the Wall Street Journal in a feature that suggested many of the drivers were having affairs with customers on their routes, brown is SEXY too! Now granted this may not have boosted their reliability but it certainly made them memorable.
Brown is also the color of the world’s favorite sweet, chocolate. And you must know that it is far easier to sell chocolate, mocha, Godiva, and caramel than brown. By using your customer’s sense of taste you will generate desire and emotion, not to mention start them salivating. Whether you are selling actual chocolate or something with that color, the point is to make it mouthwatering.
Brown is also the color of the 60’s, it is an earth friendly color. Gaining traction with today’s eco-friendly designs, brown is a grounding force for many of nature’s brights. It is also a great neutral, much warmer than black or white and looks terrific paired with the jewel tones of sapphire, topaz, amethyst, ruby, and emerald. It can go walnut with a black undertone for a cooler feel or more caramel with gold highlights for more warmth.
Used right brown can be sexy and reliable and that’s a unique combination no other color can boast! Once you have mastered the mystery of color, you can put the psychology to work for your success and even your profit!
_ _ _ _ _
Want to use this article? You can! Simply include the text here: Want more great business building tips and easy to implement marketing strategies? Check out www.todaybydesign.com. If you are ready to take your design or creative business to the next level, be sure to check out www.sixfigureprofessionals.com for your free, no-strings-attached 30 minute strategy session with Melissa.
