Hello and welcome to episode 38 of design, curious podcast, I am
your host and Mentor. Rebecca Ward.
Today, on the podcast, I have Erika storied who is a fabulous
designer, turned brand marketing, professional, and
I'll tell you all about her in a minute here, by wanted to remind
you about those downloads. I have you can find the links
for them in the show notes, but that is the three things.
I wish I had known before I start a career.
We're in interior design and the roadmap to become an Interior
Designer. So if you're interested in the
career and want to learn a little bit more, you can get
those downloads and we'll put you on the mailing list.
So you can always receive the podcast episodes to your inbox.
Each week, as well as bonus content.
That I might be putting out. And more information about my
design Mentor, which is my membership group for mentoring
people who are starting out in the career of interior.
So you can find all that information in the show notes
and now let me tell you a little bit more about Erica Erica, SRI
leverages a 23 plus year Global career in design and marketing
to transform brands in the home industry with a process centered
on strategy, storytelling and insight.
She began her career as an interior designer working with
ESI and BBJ in York and Ralph. Appelbaum Associates in Beijing.
Ten-Four numerous cultural and Hospitality clients including
the 2008 Beijing Olympics, 2010 Shanghai Expo, Shanghai Natural
History Museum General Electric and Procter & Gamble, so that is
quite a lot. It's very Global and diversified
in 2011, she transitioned to a career in brand marketing for
the design industry, continuing her studies in marketing and
business strategy. At the University of
california-berkeley. A former An educator.
She also holds a master's degree in interior, architecture and
certifications in brand, storytelling from IDE.
Oh, brand strategy and social media marketing, as a global
brand marketing leader, she has LED digital product development
and brand strategy at Airbnb in San Francisco, creative
immersive physical and virtual brand experiences for tag her
and Estee Lauder and worked with top home lifestyle brands in US,
Europe and Asia to Develop award-winning brand messaging
and engagement campaigns. Erica is an inspiring and
motivating public speaker frequently.
Invited to lead industry discussions on marketing brand
strategy, and storytelling, for trade events, and design,
conferences around the world, a southerner at heart and traveler
by trade. She maintains residents in both
North Carolina and the south of France, which is where she was
when I was interviewing her and Asbury jealous because I did
live in the south of France for a year.
We're doing my college studies, and I really want to go back.
So so I am jealous of her situation, but hopefully I will
get over there soon. So, without further Ado, let's
welcome Erica to the show and you'll see that we just really
hit it off. She's just had so much great
information. I think we could have talked for
hours and hours and as it is a very long interview, but I think
you'll find it very interesting. You're now listening to design,
curious a place where you creative one are here to learn
about what it really is. Like, to be an interior designer
and I'm your host and Mentor Rebecca, Ward, if you're worried
about how to succeed in a creative career, if you're ready
to learn your next steps to become an Interior Designer.
And if you want the satisfaction of doing something you love
every day, You are in the right place.
Grab a coffee, a notebook, and let's dig into today's episode.
Hey Erica. Thank you for coming on design
curious. Today.
Thank you so much for having me Rebecca.
I'm really excited to be here and talk to you.
Yeah, I'm really excited to hear your story.
I've been really interested in how you got to where you're at.
So first once you start out, you were an interior designer or,
alright? I think once you have been, you
always will be. But tell us about your path into
interior design and what what brought you to become an
Interior Designer initially Yeah, so I grew up in High Point
North Carolina. And it felt like, well, not
interior design directly was around me, but I was always
surrounded by the Home industry and almost everyone I knew from
relatives to family, friends to kids, I went to school with
their friends and their parents. Everyone was involved in some
way in the, in the industry, which was really cool to begin
with because what that showed me wasn't just about the showroom.
It wasn't just about the Product of, like, I mean, obviously,
there's furniture manufacturing specifically in High Point.
But there's so many other parts and pieces to that industry,
that have to become part of what goes into making a so far.
Chair a table or lamp, you know, obviously there's an
infrastructure for distribution. There's a transportation
Network, High Point was named because it was the highest point
on the railroad, which was shipping things from, obviously,
from one Coast to the mountains of North Carolina.
But then, of course it went, Across the country as well.
The Home Furnishing industry. In High Point started at the
turn of the century. Like the 1900.
It's been around for a very long time.
Yeah. So there was this, you know,
manufacturing part which started from having availability to Wood
and then cotton because there's a lot of textiles growing.
They are cotton growing and creating a textile industry as
well. So like kind of all of this
parts and pieces wasn't specifically about the design or
the button again, the furniture. So it was about all these parts
and pieces and I got to see that really young.
It didn't mean anything. Anything to me until much later.
But I don't know how I look back and I think, okay, you know, get
it. And, you know, I get what goes
into, not just the design industry, but into kind of
making and creating things so growing up, I was super
creative. I love drawing and art and
making things. So I originally went to art
school for my first degree and I have a studio art degree
undergraduate Bachelor of Fine Arts.
And while I was in art school, I also took a couple of courses.
And interior designs. What about the end?
You know, when you have only left over like just thinking
like exactly like I, you know, I've always certainly been
interested, I grew up, you know, rearranging furniture and you
know designing other people's houses, whether they liked it or
not a symptom. So I took interior design
classes, I don't know if schools are organized like this anymore,
but they were in the school of human environmental science.
So it was not in the art school. It wasn't enough.
Design school at all. It was in a totally different
place, you know? So the curriculum was about,
like how does interior design? You know, a lot of it was about
theory about how, you know, the environment changes are, it can
change our lives, it continually review, it can change, you know,
our health and well-being. I thought that was all really
cool. But you know what?
I was really there for was like you know let's design something
that's like yeah, definitely. So okay I was like, great.
Okay, this is what interior design is.
This is cool after graduation I moved.
To New Orleans to kind of become an artist and live, you know,
your life is it. And I'm so, you know, obviously
that didn't go so well. So I got a job like, a real job
to pay the bills and I ended up working in a landscape
Architecture Firm and I thought, whoa, wait a second.
This is like, you know, the thinking and the making and the
creating and obviously I'm like very much into plants but I was
like blown away. I had not ever occurred to me or
I've never been introduced to the idea that, you know, artists
and designers come from the same place, like we speak the same
language. And so I worked there for a
while and I thought, okay, I'm going to.
I feel like this is calling me, like, design is calling me.
And I, of course, the principles of the firm were like, yeah,
there's many things interior design is if that's what you
want to do, you know? Look at that going back to
school. So I went back to school,
graduate school for Interior Design, interior architecture
and it changed my life. I was able to take I fine art
background. My interest in museums are in
calories and really start to apply that to my graduate work,
which was, yeah, it was about exhibition design in museums and
so after graduate school I started working.
I taught at the University level for a while.
I taught visual communication get to use that drawing and kind
of presentation skills, which I was learning, which I found to
be really, really important just from observing NG what was
happening in this design office, as I was working there,
internships through graduate school and then throughout my
like, I was doing, I was a TA in, you know, Communications
courses. And what I was learning then was
that it doesn't matter how great your design is our, how really
incredible your ideas are about a project or, you know what,
you're trying to get out. If you can't present it, if you
can, you know, wrap it into a really kind of interesting.
Or attractive or provocative way, if you can't get people's
attention right away and that's not just your professor like in
design school. But like your peers, you want to
get buy-in from your clients. Essentially, if you can't do
that, you really are going to have a hard time in the design
world, because it's really is about taking very complex ideas
about, you know, psychology and space.
And, you know, when I could sense in architecture and even
all of, again, the pieces of A project I have to come together
and creating a very understandable.
Clear concise message around that you're in trouble.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
The visual communication that you or studying, and teaching
definitely comes into play as designers do their
presentations. They have to communicate these
complex ideas. Like you're saying and really
sell it to the client. You can't sell something.
If it doesn't look attractive. He's been to the client.
Yeah, and if you can't clearly communicate the idea, right?
And again, there's a little bit of psychology around that.
To you have to understand, like, what they really care about.
You know, are you answering their questions are you?
You know really meeting the need that they have.
Right? If you design something, that's
crazy. And I'll Off the Wall, that's
great. If you're able to communicate
why it's going to be relevant and worth spending money and
time on then you'll get the project but if you can't do that
then you know All those great ideas and all that hard work.
Doesn't really mean anything and so that kind of learning stayed
with me through school into my practice into my, you know,
working years. And I spent about 10 more years
working in mostly hospitality and Commercial and exhibition,
source of cultural work that I did that all over the world, I
had the opportunity to travel and spend a lot of time in
China. And at a time, when China was
really booming, and You know, it was the recession here in the
u.s. around 2008 2009 and a lot of my friends were losing jobs
or they were, you know, and firms where that didn't have a
lot of work coming in and I was in China, like, it was crazy.
You know, our clients are like, there's no budget is like yeah,
crazy budget. We want you to do things that
the world has never seen before. So we were like having a ball
with design, a lot of work, of course, but it was such an
exciting time and what happened then was I started getting
pulled into Into, I mean, I became like the pitch girl.
I got mold into a lot of presentation creation, a lot of
new business development. A lot of like, fronting on
behalf of the agency, like what our ideas were and what, you
know, what our capabilities were, and what the potential of
the project might be. And so what again, I Learned
was, it's really about the story.
You're selling to the client, you really?
I mean, art form had tremendous Integrity.
Of course, there's all of this was behind the project, but
right, it's Really about making sure that, you know, you are
able to communicate your capabilities, what makes you
interesting and different and what's going to make?
You really kind of excel at being the best partner.
So once I started doing that, I kind of thought I really love
this because I really love this. It's feeding my creativity.
It's feeding kind of this, right?
And left. Brain side of me.
I'm learning from the marketing team that I'm working with on,
you know, how were measuring the success of certain types of
roaches. And I thought, okay, well
marketing is very creative. Feel like I grew up kind of
naive in a very naive way thinking like things just, you
know, interior design was one thing art was one thing.
Yeah. Everything they didn't sort of
bucket. Yeah, they actually a rollup.
Yeah, totally. But again, you know, many people
go on this journey where you make your own discoveries.
So I had mine and it just so happened that I was able to
transition into marketing roles out of Correct design like out
of drawing, wall, sections, and do we had and kind of doing
plans and sketches. And like I said, I didn't and I
kind of never looked back. How come yeah.
After that, I went to, I, you know, I was learning from some
of the best, you know, marketing mentors.
I could find. And I'm eager to understand
everything, but I also went back to school, and kind of learned a
little bit more formally, more principles of marketing, and
digital marketing specifically, Because I kind of saw that has
the future but now I started my own business after over 10 years
of doing this kind of hybrid marketing design role
specifically, for either design firms, people who do work in the
built environments with commercial and residential
firms. I've also worked with Home
Furnishings manufacturers specifically in North Carolina
and my passion. Yeah, I saw on your website.
You, I don't work with Vera-Ellen which I recently, We
got to visit their showroom, and I already had loved All The
Branding by Mikey. You're the one behind all of
that. So that is why don't I know they
have such. I mean some Brands, it's not so
hard to sell. Yeah.
Because obviously the products are amazing R and the experience
is already there. The owners are really committed
to creating a Vibe and they own it and they put all the
resources toward doing that, and yeah.
So it's not so hard. Yeah, they had a lot Clarity
around. And what their message is going
to be. So I'm sure.
Yeah, just Amplified it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So that's what I do now, I started my own business in covid
in 2020. Okay.
I mean, why not like everything else in the world is true?
So why not start a business? But I had always been kind of
driven to be my own boss, to be an entrepreneur, kind of runs in
my family ever does. Okay, yeah, yeah.
My sister, runs our family's, third generation business.
And yeah, and so I had always, you know, no one ever complained
about their boss in at the dinner table because they kind
of wear them off, right? When you own your own company,
you don't you don't bring, you know, that kind of stuff home
you bring other things. But yeah, yeah.
So I'd sort of seen the just had been part of my life to sort of
working for yourself and making it work.
You know. It seems a lot of work.
It's as you know, it's it's complex.
And it's also land, it requires a lot of, you know, wearing a
lot of hats and figuring a lot of things out.
I love that. Like, what is it?
Building the plane while you're flying it.
Oh, yeah. But now, there's so many great
resources, obviously for intrapreneurs and especially for
entrepreneurs in our industry, like your podcast, of course.
And so we're not we're not alone and obviously the world changed
in such a magical way. Is something that really was
great. That came out of the last few
years was that, you know, we are We may be bound at home, we may
be without an office, or without a kind of physical place to go
back to. But this sense of community, the
sense of like digital Community finding people, you can reach
out to became so much easier. And now, I feel like our mindset
has changed, obviously are working habits and patterns have
changed, but I really appreciate that.
As a result, you have, you know what, we've all in toward?
Yeah, I hope that many people started businesses as a result,
or we're given. That opportunity, right?
And yeah. And as a result, I think it also
kind of helps to fast-track some of our businesses as well,
because we have so much access now to that resource.
And it's right, so many mentors right at our fingertips that we
can just jump ahead, five years for I'm going to take so much
longer before, so that's great. I'm glad that I really good
point. Yeah actually yeah can warp
speed exactly. Yeah, I mean just skip the
initial Just because you're learning from so many people and
then you, yeah, you're on your way, so fast.
Okay, so then you started in during covid.
And so, how has that been for you now that you've been working
on your own for yourself and never go back?
Never go back. Okay, no, truly it's for me.
One of my values is Independence, obviously, I, it's
important for me to be able to provide for myself, you know, to
rely on myself and And I show myself that every day and it's I
have such a sense of Pride around that, but it drives all
my decision making, right? If this is going to be a
decision that leaves me without a certain amount of Independence
either financially or with my time, then I know the answer.
So, but also, one of my values is have fun and work with people
whose value systems are aligned with mine.
Who also you know really respect interior design and its power to
change people's lives. That's really important.
Most of my clients are interior designers or home Brands, so
okay. Why don't one or the other?
Yeah, Architects. The people who, who make the
built environment. Yeah, people who bring that to
life and in all kinds of ways. But if I get a sense, you know,
either from, you know, talking to them, it, you know, that our
values don't align, then it's for me, that's, that's a strong.
No, because I'm going to come at an angle in my work, which is
marketing, branding messaging where I'm going to kind of want
to draw things out of people. And if that That you know, if
that substance not there, it's going to be very difficult for
me to provide the best solution. So it's going really well, just
simply because I'm committed to my values and I'm committed to
making sure that I'm the one in charge of this, the growth and
the trajectory a success of this company.
And I have two incredible partners that I work with who
helped me and we share the same value.
So I say that's yeah, it's going really well.
But it's simply a result of Being very clear on what yeah
what's important to me when I'm sure that's what you help your
clients with as well. So your yes showing by example
I'll say in attracting the client that you want because of
your values. And then telling those clients
that this works for me. And this is what you need to do.
Don't bring you satisfaction. Yeah, what would it take to
become a brand in the industry. So we talked about how easy it
is to start your business because there's so much out
there available to you, but then that also creates a lot of noise
and I think that it is also Harder now than ever to become a
brand in an industry? Would you say that?
Like yes, okay, yes. Well, I think it's important for
people to be really clear about what that means and to really
understand Brands a complex thing, you know, it's not a
logo, it's more than a logo. It's more than, you know, your
commitment to saying. I'm a brand more than what you
post on Instagram. It's a feeling and it again this
gets sticky for some people but brand Literally what the story
and the feeling you have inside of you about a product or even a
service. So, everything we have around us
from the headphones to. The microphone were speaking
into to the clothing were wearing to the homes, were in
the cars. We drive you know the toothpaste
we use every single thing we've made a decision to purchase or
acquire is based on brand and brand is like I said it's a
feeling and A story and an emotion you have about about
that thing. That's going to drive you to
choose it over something else, right?
So, in the case of interior design nerves becoming a brand,
the idea is that you're always going to be like, you're going
to Benchmark yourself against other designers who you want to
be seen as competing with on projects.
And there's a reality to that that may or may not be true.
And, you know, and you can have this aspiration to, you know,
benchmark against certain designers.
It's great and that's what you build your, you know, your
building constantly the storytelling, The Narrative, the
messaging, the images away, you know, even the way you style
your work has to have, you know, a strategy and a purpose to it.
That's what I help clients to do is to kind of figure out, I call
it getting your story straight. Really digging into, you know,
who you are as a business, so that you can switch from a
business mindset to a brand mindset and in I'm saying all
that. I mean obviously, just like
anything in marketing. There's no quick fix.
There's no fast track to becoming kind of a seller brand
even though some Brands seem to rise faster than others, you
know, and there's certain circumstances and conditions
that they invest in to make that possible, you know, it's not
always just money time, it's not working.
So, you know, brand has a long. It has a long tail, has a long
path, but your investment in that is what is going to help
you kind of, right? Is eventually over the I don't
like this a competition but to rise over and stand out amongst
other brands that are other designers, that your clients may
be considering either in your area or online in a, depending
on what your service offerings are.
And that's what I help designers to unpack is to figure out
first. How do we get there?
And second like, what's the most important part?
If I am investing in this, over a certain amount of time?
Where do I start? Art and it's cool work.
It's my life's work. It's what I've been to do.
Yeah. And and definitely because you
have a history of being a designer and you worked in the
industry. It really helps.
You understand your clients as you're working with them?
Yeah. The struggles that they're going
through or the things that they might Overlook that are special
or differentiate them from other people that they just take for
granted. So I feel like that is all the
time. Yeah, I feel like it so
comments, like I need someone else to tell me.
What my story is because I like, I hear it all the time.
I see myself all the time. My story is just there, but
someone else will tell me like, oh, no, actually you're a great
listener and like that. I really felt heard when you met
together and so getting feedback like that is so helpful.
But it's I think it's really difficult to on your own.
Come up with that story about yourself and what?
Yeah, you're too close to it. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah. So is that one of the ways that
you help your clients to kind of Work through their story and
yep. So I think that you think are
special. Yeah, it's one of my I do this
again to not to Brand it but to give people something to
remember when they think about like, you know what, this
process looks like. It's very strategic, you know,
just like any other part of your marketing, you have to have a
plan. You know, a lot of people say,
well, I've been trying this and I've been trying that, and I
even tried to talk and, and I'm like, okay, well, show me.
Where is all this coming from, like, why are you doing all
this? Well, they don't have a plan
there. Yeah, doing what other people
are doing, just because everyone else is doing it.
So I should be doing it too. But they don't have any real
kind of solid strategy or reason to be doing it.
And in the end, sometimes I might get like a little bit of
success but it's not sustainable.
And they haven't really thought through exactly like what either
to follow up with or how to continue to maintain it.
So I always start with strategy and I like I said this, there's
a three-part strategy that I use, I call it the E3 America.
And each of these were starts with an E, so it's okay.
Quite easy to remember. Yeah.
So I start with what makes you extraordinary and that's that
really exciting conversation where we get into, maybe your
background isn't in interior design, maybe you come from
another field or another you know whatever another career
even I see this all the time people wanting to enter into
your design it's not always just one thing it's many things in
fact but what is the thing that's going to make?
You again when people are looking, you know, most
typically at style as benchmarks, you know, you have
to be able to talk about substance instead of just style.
Like what is that thing? That's going to make you more.
Extraordinary and stand out through really spend a lot of
time. Defining, what that is?
That's your differentiator. That word seems scary to a lot
of people so I prefer. What makes you extraordinary?
Yeah. The second thing is really,
really. Also, they're all important.
But the second thing is super super important.
It's what is the emotional connection that you are bringing
to, you know, from your work as a service provider as a maker of
things? How are you going to create that
emotional connection with your ideal client?
Or, you know, whoever it is that you're really trying to, to
serve and do you understand that?
There, I can multiple things that go through our mind.
If you think about that purchase decision.
And when I was saying, like, if you look Everything has been
decided on something because of an emotional connection or a
story that resonated with you that was relevant to you.
And so, how are you going to make yourself relevant to your
particular ideal? However, you want to call it,
your target, whatever your client that you're really trying
to attract, and you have to understand those emotional
drivers. Those core motivations behind
that purchase decision. Now, the purchase decision to
hire an interior designer because it It's usually it's
expensive. It's going to take a long time,
it can create some disruption in your life, you have to move out
of your house or your, you know there's it's a longer period,
right? Then the purchase decision to
buy toothpaste for example, right?
You really have to think about how long that will take and how
will you nurture a relationship to build trust to?
Again make yourself relevant at but all through doing that, you
come to that with the understanding about what their
true motivation is and Interior designers, know that, you know,
the decision to renovate or to redo a space is not exactly what
people say. There's always always always
something deeper. It's always a, you know, an
emotional reason. And that's what we spend a lot
of time on to when it comes to brand, is to say, is there a key
driver behind what most of your clients are coming to you for,
or if you're a new designer and you're just starting to plan
your brand, you know, what is the core emotion?
Of the clients you want to attract, right?
What do they really looking for? Is it a sense of belonging is
it, you know, to leave a legacy and I have five of them that I
have found over the years, really specifically apply to our
industry and so we. Yeah.
So we dig into those and unpack those and create a series of
languages around that and that's where the heart of the messaging
begins. And then the third one, third
e-330 is experience. So, I don't know how exposed
your listeners are to the marketing funnel, marketing
funnel, yes. Some people use a wheel where
it's a circle bent, and I'm, we don't have video, but the idea
is like, you know, a funnel has very broad at the top and it's
narrow in the bottom. And how you think about the
experience from the top of the funnel, which would be how
people just become aware of you. Usually that happens, Instagram
or word of mouth or email or they can meet you at an event
or, you know, there's many ways to create a awareness for your
brand. But what's the message you're
telling at the awareness part at the very beginning, when they
very first encounter you in the aisle of the grocery store for
today, is different like all, you know, on TV or they, you
know, are at a friend's house or whatever.
Yeah. How are how is your interior
design, brand and service? How are people are?
Encountering. It and is the message consistent
like are they seeing the same thing over and over again about
you that you want them to understand?
So that's where we start. Think like, okay, so top of the
funnel, is this awareness? Middle of the funnel is middle
of the cycle is okay. Now they know who you are.
We're starting to understand what you offer them compared to
others, right? They're comparing you, they're
making decisions about how relevant your services will be
in their life. And so your messages have to,
you know, they have to be consistent with the that
message. You're giving an awareness
phase, but then you have to go kind of a little bit further in
a little deeper or you're always working toward an idea of sort
of authentic, obviously being authentically persuasive, you
don't want to, you know, this is where people get kind of turned
off by marketing. Like it feels kind of gross.
I don't ya, good selling myself but in a sense you really should
never feel. Like you're selling yourself.
You're offering something that you can provide that's going to
really help people and change your life.
And yeah, that authenticity comes when you're really in tune
with and you're, you know, you really understand what makes you
extraordinary and It's relevant. And then again, looking at it,
across the experience of all your kind of marketing, touch
points. So, the last part of that is the
decision phase where they sign the contract and yeah, bring you
into their life because, right after that very is, you know
what happens after how they are their story, how do they
communicate to their neighbors, or their friends, or or whomever
right? Are they still sharing that same
message that you want to be candid about it?
They be ambassadors. Now for your message.
Did they get it? And that guy saying the same
thing to other people. Yeah, that's right.
Yeah. And so we help with all of that.
So we help with not just sort of defining that strategy
uncovering, you know, the three, he's uncovering like your
extraordinary part, your emotional connection and then
that experiential Journey than we helped create.
Obviously we do logo design, we do website design, we do email
campaigns which I love great. Yeah, yeah, and social
storytelling. So I was okay like know how do
you share that message. So people don't get frustrated,
many, many people come to me initially because of that, I'm
frustrated on social media. I don't know what to say.
I don't know what to post blah. You know if you haven't heard
that I'm sure yeah, yeah, yeah. All the feeling yourself.
I like what I say today. Okay, I wanted to touch back on
the consistency part of your Sales funnel or your messaging
funnel. And I feel like there is some
resistance when I talk to other designers especially ones who
have been in the industry for a while and are now trying to get
on the bandwagon of social media and things like that.
Like they're like I have a website and I have my pretty
pictures on there and that should be enough.
You know do you get resistance from?
I don't know if people will come to you who are resistant.
But like, have you found in the industry is that there are
designers who are having trouble.
Being consistent with their marketing with from the website
to their social media and then also with that analogy answer.
But I was just thinking about how, like sometimes the
consistency is also Hardware. You are, you've got your
professional like Instagram and you might pose a few personal
things. But then like on your Facebook
personal page, you've got like, cat videos up the Wazoo and
you're like, I like I loved, you know, but you're not marrying
those two things. Things together.
Is that an issue or should you like start putting cat videos on
here work? You know, like how consistent do
you need to be our should you pivot your personal page?
I'll start with the website question, I do get this a lot.
People say, you know, oh, my website is full of gorgeous
photos. I don't need any copy, you know,
I don't need to talk a lot about myself and I think, you know,
that is not true. You need to meet people where
they are. A lot of people will see And
they will be blown away. And they will say, well, you
know, this work is really good and they'll form your own
opinion again, because we're coming to this as individual
people in different parts of our life.
But the words actually, I mean, there are going to be people who
don't understand space at all. Like a lot of times your clients
come from backgrounds where they don't understand what it takes
to build, not even like how long it takes to get to build out a
particular room that you're showing or a home or whatever it
is and Office restaurant. They don't Understand what
designers value is and as far as like they see something that
looks great, they think okay. You know they may not understand
at all, you don't have to over explain obviously but what you
need to do on copy and what's important from my point of view
from the work that we do is to again answer people's questions
about that relevancy. How is this going to resonate
with the people? You want to be attracting,
right? Are you communicating how you
solve the Problem for this client, right?
If you're showing a picture of a kitchen and you're not talking
about like, I mean, maybe it was a full renovation, maybe you
just replaced, you know, maybe just a paint, your Refresh on
the pan, you have to really kind of not give a full scope, but
you have to show and tell people with both pictures, and with
words, so that again, if someone comes and they're not, they're
not visual right there, or they absorb information.
By reading, you have to kind of meet them in both places.
Yeah. And all So just technically the
copy helps your SEO, so it's going to help you.
Yeah. It's going to help you from the
technical side. Just be found easier and save
you money on ya. Great sending people to your
site. Yeah, that's a great Point.
Yep. And I think again, when people
are in the decision phase, telling a story, creating a
bigger greater picture about who you are, who your, maybe your
team are where you live, what's drawn, you and brought you to
design and then talk. Specifically to again, back
about how you solve problems for clients.
When people have, again, our benchmarking between two
different two, possibly three different options.
This is going to help you again stand out because you're telling
that story about what makes you different and extraordinary, and
perhaps there's something that's, you know, relevant maybe
have a shared interest in something or you have a shared
kind of, you know, maybe come from the same place, I don't
know. But, you know, I do, I never
think. Yeah, there's a limit to
oversharing. But when it comes to two
websites, just to kind of wrap on this question II, definitely
feel that you have to have, you know, just as much beautiful
written information copywriting on your site as images.
And this can also help to for designers who are younger in
their career, and don't have so many photos or they feel
self-conscious about the photography that they have, you
know, perhaps you bringing people into your story.
Not just with images, but with words.
Yeah. That's a really good point.
Yeah, I think that's going to be a valuable key for up-and-coming
designers to grasp onto and they're yelling desperate about
their website. That doesn't have her many
photos. So, that's a great thing to
point out for the social media p at, especially if you correlate
your own interests with your professional side and I'm going
to say something that will probably, I don't know.
This seems to be a kind of polarizing point of view but for
me, you know, Instagram and I'll say Instagram specifically first
I don't do a lot of work on Facebook but I think it's
important to have a presence on Facebook.
So I will speak specifically to Instagram.
I think the way people are consuming content now is that
you have to be obviously you want to play, If You're
motivated by growth, if you're interested in kind of growing
the amount of people who are seeing and following you and
really understanding who you are, and Going into your
uniqueness and your your specific brand.
Then you you do need to put the work in the Instagram, simply
because it's a visual platform where a visual industry the
algorithm now. And I think in it's not going to
change in the future is going to prioritize video, moving content
things that, you know, feel more entertainment.
They have an entertainment value to them.
So anything you can do to kind of show who you are and if you
want to be very Very personal about it just make sure that
it's aligned with your values and it's aligned with that thing
that makes you extraordinary. I mean great.
If your brand is about homes and Cat video for lying homes for
cat people, you're doing the right thing.
Yeah, cat videos. But again, if your ideal clients
are really into cats and like, that's the thing for them, it's
going to show a certain story about you which is great.
But you know, check-in With that strategy and make sure that
that's the Persona that you know, even if it is authentic to
who you are perhaps there needs to be a little editing.
Yeah, like I said, this is where the polarizing part because some
people believe you should put everything out there and and I
think that's great for them. I tell my clients, your feed
should be like your website, it should be very elegant.
It should show your, you know, your work that you know, either
you're inspired by and You're crediting back to other
designers or whatever travel, whatever those things are food.
Even all of this becomes part of, you know, the image of your
brand and you want it to look, curate, it just like your work.
You want it to look cohesive. You want it to share a
consistent message and people, you know, it again, they're
hiring you initially. I think most of the time, people
are hiring an interior designer for their aesthetic, until they
dig deeper and find out, you know, maybe it's About Wellness
or maybe history or whatever. So your feed should reflect that
I think. Now like I said with so much
video and digital kind of like moving content, we have There's
real Channel now you can direct people straight you know, in
links to go straight to the reels part of your instead of
going to your feed you can send them to your wheels.
If that's important to you, I call it kind of interstitial
content. This is the thing that's sort of
happening in The Ether around us.
That's where stories. Go.
And you can archive story, our you can, you know send stories
to hash out to your highlights and use those kind of like
browser tabs like more like tabs on your website, where you can
kind of bucket content, but it takes it right out of the
initial. Get to know.
You don't put everything like out first like you would if you
were posting, you know, daily updates on your gerbil or your
cat. This is my point of this is just
my my opinion this is how Yes, dear clients, but I think
whatever you do, do it the best, you can do it with, you know.
Do it with love, you know, do it with intention.
Yeah, so yeah. And it's something that you can
stand behind and like you're totally, I am brings it up.
You're like, oh my gosh, you saw that, not but not, you know, you
don't want that to happen. So you want to be like, you
know, with the cats the other day or whatever, you know, Okay
really get it right, okay? So anything else for an
up-and-coming designer thinking about or something that coming
interior designer, do they need to work with a brand strategy
right away as they're building their company, their website or
what should they do? I think working with a brand
strategist is requires a very specific intention for your
company and it's and it's an investment.
Like I said in time, it's a long-term investment and I think
A lot of times for people who are just entering our field and
tearing as you know new designers you're thinking about
a million things. Oh my gosh.
So yeah, there's anything it can be a little bit overwhelming.
Yeah. What L say is the most
important, you talked about this with an interview Bethenny.
She was your podcasts coach. Yeah, you guys had a fantastic
conversation where you talked about knowing and understanding
your why? And I think again, before you
wrap your brain around, like, rmii brand How do I become a
brand? Because you don't want to get
like to sideline by that that you, you know, lose track of all
the other 50 million things you have to be doing.
But I will say, I highly recommend like listening to that
that episode. But, you know, understanding and
defining your values and understanding and defining, your
y will be probably the very first thing you should do.
Why are you doing this work? And who are you?
Doing it for and making sure that you can check back in with
that value frequently? As you grow and when your fate
to do a formal kind of, you know, strategic strategy plan
for your marketing for your business, then it's time to
invest, you know, I think if you're in the place where you're
starting a business and you want to do that right away, then
that's great. But a lot of times it takes time
that people don't want to put into, you know, slowing down the
promotion or slowing down what they're doing to get.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think again, like I said, it
all goes back to To making sure you're doing things with
intention and knowing why you're doing them is super, super
important and I would say that's for everything.
Like someone said to me, once the way you do one thing is the
way you do everything. Yeah.
And I thought hmm that's really wise, you know like we you fold
shirts is the way you, you know, approach you know new business
relationship. Just like you do it with
intention. Do you do it?
You know quickly to get it over with you think about the
intention behind what you're Doing and yeah, own it.
Yeah, it's so easy to to slip back and just let things happen
but to live in with intention and to live on purpose takes
effort, and it's challenging, and that's why not everybody
does. And that's why I have to be
reminded to think about it, so such good advice.
So really good and we'll link that episode with Bethenny as
well. So people can go back and listen
to that. But, thank you so much for
coming on the park has such a great Conversation.
I really enjoyed it and also to Rebecca's.
Cool. Yeah.
And just meeting a designer who pivoted into another career,
just like Bethenny had to and it's great for our audience to
hear that. There's things besides just the
one on one design that they can do.
They can Branch out into as they discover things about the
industry and career. So, thank you so much for coming
on today. Erica, thank you for your show.
I wish that when I was going through, No design education
that I had or starting as a designer that I had this kind of
resource so I value you and your work and thank you.
Yeah. And where can we find you on
Instagram? I'm sure.
Yeah, Instagram I get in and I get out but I please.
It's at sorry. It sa you RIT creative.
I also have a website at www.csiro.au.
Say, you are Righty creative.com.
And if you want to kind of do a visual, a quick visual check on
your brand messaging to make sure everything is consistent.
I have a kind of template, it's free.
It's called a brand audit to kind of.
Yeah. Get you go through every channel
that you're on like LinkedIn or, you know, in Pinterest or
Instagram, your website. There's a prompt to kind of like
what are your clients saying about you?
What are your employees? Saying, when they introduce
themselves at a party. What do you say when you
introduce yourself? Yeah.
What shows up on your SEO? Like, when you search yourself
on Google, like, what kind of shows up?
So you want to make sure that story is my recommendation?
Is that it says nearly exactly the same thing but this is not
the place to get creative. Yeah, get creative with other
parts of your copy. Because you know, no one's going
to see every single one of those except for you when you do this
exercise, right? Yeah, you know, and if you've
been in business, This for a little while or you know you
haven't minded updating anything.
Maybe you're you know scope is changed in your business or
seeing things are changing any little tweak.
That is a great resource and it's so right.
Creative SAU, RIT creative, .com/briowfc audit all one word
and yeah, you can jump in that and then reach out to me, if you
have any questions or want to schedule a discovery call, I do
30-minute Discovery calls with lots and lots, and lots of
designers. Has to talk about their
messaging and marketing and I'd love to talk to you.
Wonderful would include all of those links in the show notes
and people can easily find you again.
Yeah, it's just wonderful to have you on and we like our to
to learning all those good things.
I'm going to go check out that brand audit.
I think that's going to be really helpful, so thank you.
Thank you very much, Erica. Take Care.
Thank you. So don't you just love that
interview with Erica? I really enjoy talking to people
who used to be interior designers and now are doing
something else because I love being able to promote that
perspective to you, that you can start an interior design and
even move to something else, even though you might be moving
to Interior Design from another career.
So that doesn't mean that interior design is the end of
the the line. It could definitely Branch out
into something else. You might find a new passion
for. Okay, so that is it for this
week. I hope that you guys stick
around for next week. I've got another great episode
about a controversial topic, you'll hear next week.
What that is. So, stay tuned.
And in the meantime, don't forget to leave me a five star
rating and review. I'd love to hear from you on
Instagram. If you want to slide into my
DM's at our Ward design will talk to you next.
Each week and until then stay creative.
Thanks for listening. If you loved this episode,
please leave a rating and a review.
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