Many interior designers today maintain one or more social media accounts as a means of promoting themselves and their firms. Many also say they don’t get much new business from their social media efforts. In part that may be because they’re not really familiar with the best ways to leverage their social media presence.

In this episode, Gail talks with Laurie Laizure, founder of the Interior Design Community (IDC). As the name implies, the Interior Design Community was established to be an online place where design industry professionals come together and share tips, tricks, and industry information, ask questions, or just vent. Today, with some 94,000 members, the IDC has a presence on Instagram and Facebook. Its activities include offering questions of the day to encourage designers to share and learn from one another, spotlighting interior designers doing exciting projects, and sharing the industry news or initiatives that matter most to its members.

Laurie’s expertise with social media goes back to the early days of Google+ a decade ago. She has been experimenting with and testing various social media technologies and services ever since. The key to any and all social media success, she explained, is commitment.

“If you really want to be great at social media you have to spend a lot of time at it,” she said. “Don’t do social media if you’re not going to do it well.”

That involves not only keeping your content fresh but also making time to interact with viewers, followers and queries. It’s called “social” media for a reason. “Engagement is everything,” she said. People coming to your social media channel or page are not just passively eyeballing images, videos and other content. They are looking for a response from you.

What kind of content should you post? “Share what you know,” Laurie advised. Don’t just post photos of projects with no information or explanation. Viewers want to know how you did it and why you did it. Combine great visuals with storytelling. Think “infotainment.”

Be clear about who you are trying to reach. “Designers often make the mistake of posting as though they are posting to other designers, not to potential clients,” she said. What do potential clients care about and want to know? Take time to understand what their problems and challenges are. Offer them solutions, and demonstrate how working with you can save them time and money.

Laurie also shared some best practices for posting on different platforms, as well as strategies for growing your following. For all that and more, listen to the entire podcast.

If you’re listening on your favorite podcast platform, view the full shownotes here: https://thepearlcollective.com/s10e8-shownotes

Mentioned in This Podcast

To learn more about the Interior Design Community, go to the IDC website at interiordesigncommunity.com.

Note: Transcript is created automatically and may contain errors.

Welcome, Lori. We have known each other for so many years and I’ve always admired your commitment to the interior design industry. So I want you to tell us a bit about your background. How did you get involved in the industry in the first place? Well, it was sort of by accident. I came into this industry from the printing industry. I worked in the fine art reproduction industry for a long time. I knew that industry very well, knew all the players in that industry well.

And I’d run across this material that was at the time very new that you print on it, stick it onto a wall and peel it off. was a peel and stick wallpaper material. Back when digital printed wallpaper was like not even out there yet, really. And I recognized it was something that would be kind of interesting to do. I thought it would be, you know, something that would take, you know, as far as if you’re thinking of the fine art reproduction market,

you don’t have to frame it. don’t have to, you’re really just cutting the pieces, rolling them, boxing them and shipping them rather, very little finishing goes into it. but there, and there’s a lot of quantity of materials used for wallpaper. So I thought this is a really interesting product. And I think that I might want to do something with it. At the same time, my brother was an addict. And unfortunately we, my husband and I had to take custody of

He had three kids, we had one of our own. And so overnight we went from a house of like one family of three. And I, at the time worked for a company where I had to do some traveling, my husband worked for a company where he was doing some traveling, so we were juggling that. And we got custody of these three little kids who needed a lot of help and care. And we loved them so much, we wanted to give them as much attention as possible. So it kind of seemed like…

well, this is the right time to do this. You know, let’s just go into this wallpaper business. When I wasn’t really a hundred percent committed or prepared to do that. And so I thought, you know what, one of the things I hit on really quickly was condo complexes. And I got a bunch of them in the local area to put our samples in and we started getting orders from those people. But I knew I needed to invest in website and I needed to invest in social media.

and that was brand new and I needed to get in touch with people that would specify this kind of material. And so I kind of thought it’d be great. I joined a couple of interior design chats on Twitter and I just found it was really like there was nowhere to go to share information. I was really starting to get super fascinated about digital marketing and websites and like I just fell into that bucket and just like absorbing as much as I could and

and paying attention to it. And I had felt like I had information to share and that other people probably had information to share. And I didn’t, how do we, there was nowhere to share it. Like Twitter was just not a space that allowed for you to go into deep conversation. Like, are you using the scheduling tools to get onto Pinterest when Pinterest was brand new? And how are you getting conversions from

emails and how are you doing? You know, there were just so much of it out there and, you know, so many tips and tricks and so many new emerging products that I, you know, I felt like I could share some information I could learn from someone else. And then at the time, Google Plus was the place to be because they were, you know, they’re they’re they own search. Right. So like 90 percent of search happens on Google. And

At the time, their social media network, Google +, if you put a link in it, it would automatically index that link faster. They were doing really neat things with this thing called authorship, where you’d have a picture of your own face on your blog to show that you had authority on a specific subject, which was awesome. And they started this thing called Communities. And I thought, okay, I’m gonna start this thing. I’m just gonna do it. I didn’t care what would happen to it at the time. I was just

I’ll have a spot. I’ll invite some people I’ve met through Twitter and whatever to come into this group and see where goes. And I didn’t really have any expectations. I just started interior design community and within a day we had over 200 members and it just never stopped growing wherever we put it. I mean, it just, and it sort of became a bigger focus and more, I became more passionate about it than the wallpaper business. So I ended up selling the wallpaper business

focusing on that. So that’s really how I jumped into it. Long story, but. Wow, that’s great. Well, and you’ve got a real passion for it. And you also have a passion for social media. I’ve seen you everywhere for a very, very long time. And so how did you learn how to use it so well, so quickly? I think it’s a lot of mixture of reading from reliable sources that are

doing or developing these products and also testing for yourself to see what works. I’m gonna be straight up with you. Like if you’re really gonna be great at social media, you have to spend a lot of time doing it because they want you on the platform. So you have to be able to have the time to do that. So my kids would be at school or when everybody’s playing video games, I’m on there doing

testing a post or responding to someone or in DMs or putting a story up or making a graphic or something like that. So I was always trying to figure it out and trying to see what worked and what didn’t work and how that tested. I’m a very analytical person. So I would definitely look at the analytics and see what worked and what wasn’t working and what people responded to versus.

what they didn’t respond to and how I could grow. I actually really liked the process of growing, but I also liked how rewarding it was to help as many people as we were helping over time. It’s such a wonderful thing when you’re like, hey, you could do this an easier way and you tell someone and then they come back to you two weeks later and they’re like, thank you so much, that helped me so much. You’re just

It’s like a little drug almost, you know, that endorphin that you get from like helping someone solve a problem. And we just did that over and over and over and over and over again, thousands of thousands of times. So it just, it was exciting. fun. What platforms are the most important ones for designers today? You know, visual platforms I think are still the most popular. So if I were investing in, you

in social media as a designer today, I would still be on Instagram. think that leading into doing more video content and duplicating that video content onto TikTok, because I think TikTok is the fastest growing social media network there is right now. So and you can it’s do it’s duplicate. So you can put it on as real. You can put it on as a TikTok. You’re not spending more time doing it. It’s just one piece of content. Plus, I think that there’s just really

a great way to use video to tell a story. People are not expecting and actually there’s science that goes along with this. They don’t want polished videos of you with professional videographer making it look sparkly and like a commercial. want real, like, tell me the truth. How does that work? They want the real advice. They want that realness from you. And there are so many…

points in a designer’s day that I just see that that’s content. That’s content right there. You when you came in to your client site and you know, the tile was the wrong tile. That’s content. And not only are you creating content for your audience, but you’re also teaching your potential next client how you work, what the process of design looks like. You you can’t complain.

that like HGTV or the TV thing is is unrealistic for designers and then not provide another alternative. And the alternative is share what you know. And it’s beyond the pretty picture. It’s beyond the finished, everything’s curated image, which we all know if you’ve ever been on a Photoshop or design, all the other rooms around it look terrible while

propped everything up to a perfect in this one little picture, the reality of design. Why did you choose the things you chose? Why did you do this in this way? What is your process? What are you saving your client from thinking about just because you have these thoughts in your head? So it’s so much content that a designer can bring to the table that visually and storytelling can entertain.

their audience, but also educate them. So edutainment. Yeah. Yes. Infotainment is, guess, infotainment is the way to go. OK. So also just a question, since you mentioned that you should be posting also on TikTok. What about Facebook? What about LinkedIn? What do you think about those platforms?

I would think different for LinkedIn. mean, I think that there’s ways to be strategic on LinkedIn. You you could link in with business owners in your local area. You could link in with editors for magazines you want to be published in. You could link in with brands that you want to work with. You know, there’s a strategy there too, a thoughtful strategy and reaching out and one -off

and showing what you do on every platform has their own strategy and you can be successful on every any platform you choose to to go for. But they’re all different on Facebook. I think ads are a great way to do it, but really super, super targeted ads. So if I were a designer in where I live, I would put together instead of like women from, you know,

40 to 60, I wouldn’t make that a broad, you know, an audience. I would make it like men and women, a certain age. would make it people who follow the local boarding school or people who follow, who are, who like the Mercedes dealership in my town, who like the Land Rover dealership, people

are belong to the Manchester Country Club. Things like that, where you can create these small little pockets of ads. And then I would do an ad of what, with my best photography and my best pictures of what I do and advertise that, are you looking to renovate? Are you da -da -da? And be the solution and think about, oftentimes I think about marketing from,

The way I market is different than the way a designer should market. And that sometimes I always, have to bridge that gap. Like this is how you, I can give you all the tips on how you could get designers to follow you, but they want clients, potential clients to follow them. And so they have to start thinking in the mindset of not designers. I see this all the time actually, is designers will make a mistake of posting like they’re posting to other designers.

and they relate to their peers and not to their potential client. And they have to think about what is my potential client care about? What matters to, I think about that from designers. I think what do they care about? What are they afraid of? at this point we have 11 years of doing this. I’ve heard from hundreds of designers. So I know what they’re passionate about. I know what they fear.

I’ve had heart to heart conversations with designers. I’ve had phone calls with tears. Like I’ve heard it all at this point. know, I know, I know designers very well. I know a lot about them and you need to know that much about your potential clients. You need to know, you know, are they overworked? Are they tired? Are they, you know, do they have easy time communicating, a hard time communicating? How do they like to be communicated with? You know,

Is it the man making decisions or the woman making decisions? Do they have kids? Do they have no kids? Do they love sports? they value having free time or they really workaholics? All of the things that you can think of that encapsulates a client. You have to think about how to categorize them and how to meet

in their needs, you know, and how you can work with them. And I think that’s a lot about like, that’s really all marketing is, is knowing who you’re talking to, you know, at the end of the day. Sure. And understanding their problems and having a solution for that. Yeah. Right. Because, I mean, that’s what they’re buying, right? At the end of the day, they’re buying that solution to the problem. So, you know, and understanding what they’re going through in the process, I think

Sometimes the design gets this bad rap that it’s very exclusive and prices are gonna go start going up. But the reality that I see in design is that it’s a navigator in the process of construction that saves money and time because they’re able to, they’ve done this.

so many times before, so they know the process and they know where you can fall into problems and they know how to get you to the right conclusions that are gonna give you the best results. And that saves you money and that saves you time. And I think that’s rarely talked about in design. It’s always like the luxury of it when really there’s so much more that goes into thoughtful decisions that really save time, save money.

Those are all very true statements. And I think that’s a really good point, which helps people not just in their social media, but also thinking about how they close a client deal. Somebody comes to them and they talk to that client. That’s what the client needs to know is what is that connection? What can they do saving the money, saving the time? All of those things are really critical to buyers too. And it’s many closings of a deal. It’s not just one closing of the deal, the closing of the deal.

where yes, they’re now your client, that’s one closing, but then you have hundreds, if not thousands of closings of sales every time you talk to them. You’re selecting lamps, you’re selecting sofas, you’re closing, closing, always be closing, you’ll be seized. That’s definitely a big part of it. So let’s go to this next question, which is really talking about how much the algorithms have changed for a lot of the

platforms, including Instagram and Facebook and all of those. So what are some of the keys to growing your following since today it’s not as easy as it was even five or 10 years ago? You know, the real thing that’s really helping me grow is video. I do as if you follow Interior Design Community, we have two posts for you normally do, which is one is a meme, funny video post, and

get me followers. They do, because they have and they get a lot more traction than my questions. But the questions get more comments and more conversation. they’re two different vehicles that I drive. One is going out there to people I don’t know, know, so that video gets shared. You know, we have videos that get shared a thousand times, two thousand times. So not only are my followers seeing it, but

their followers are seeing it, if they’re sharing it. So that’s how I will get new followers through video, especially videos that have information in them that people wanna share. So something funny, something interesting, anything that will get you shares is going to get you more followers, but then you still need things that you don’t always, that doesn’t have to be, you don’t have to use the same tool every time. And so we do questions, which maybe they don’t get as much,

new followers from our questions, but we get great conversations that are happening with the people that are in our tribe. So, you know, I think that they’re both very valuable to what we’re doing here. know, one is that like comic relief and making people feel like they’re not alone. And the question also like makes people feel not alone, gives them education, helps them.

navigate a difficult situation, those kinds of things. Should our listeners focus on one platform over another and or that should they just focus on one platform like Instagram? You know, I think it depends on what what they have time to do and what they want to do. You know, if you really hate social media, you don’t have to do social media. There are other marketing avenues for you. Maybe maybe you would like

Pick up every magazine that’s local to you and national for you. And you want to write down every writer and every editor and you want to link in with them and you want to really work on getting yourself in magazines. That’s like that’s what you want. You want to get in blogs and you want to network with like like minded businesses. know the people that would have clientele that would attract the same clientele that you have. Like maybe you’re going to network with the owner of the local steakhouse because

he’s bringing in that luxury client too. And how can you, maybe they do an event where they have a wine food pairing thing and they have a little talk or something and you’re at the golf club and they have maybe a little women’s group that comes in or something. There’s always networking opportunities in your surrounding area that are boots on the ground, go out and meet people. If you don’t like social media, you don’t have to use

You don’t have to do it. I people feel like it’s a must. It’s better to not do it if you’re not gonna do it at all. You know what I mean? Like if you’re just gonna once a year do a post, it’s confusing to people. Like, are you in business? Are you not in business on here? You know, those kinds of things. And then you have to remember it’s social. So there is a component of

that doesn’t shut off and that can be annoying. like there is, I’m communicating with designers and all hours of the day. Sometimes I’ll have a designer bring a problem to me when I’m going through a problem myself, personally. So there’s things like that that can happen and you try to have to like, but there’s still that job of that, of that communication. They don’t know that they’re talking to you at a time when…

whatever just happened in your own life, those kinds of things. So because of social media, it is not real life. It’s not, these aren’t, it’s part of your life, but it’s a very visual, this is what I’m sharing. This is what people see. There’s a whole other part of it that people don’t see and that’s reality. So I think it’s just, it’s about what you choose to do. And then making a plan.

like us being strategic about it and how are you gonna go about it to get the results that you want? So if it is picking one, that’s the time that you have to dedicate to it. Looking at all of them, thinking about where strengths and weaknesses lie. Like, are you better on email than you are on trying to get on a video? Maybe LinkedIn would be better because you can like network with people.

locally or Facebook groups would be a good way for you to interject that you’re a designer or maybe you’re not great at taking any, you want to be able to participate in content, don’t want to produce content, things like that. Being honest with yourself about

Well, and it’s interesting because our team, I like LinkedIn. I’m on LinkedIn most days. Erin is on Instagram every day and we haven’t touched Twitter in years. Facebook, well, you know, might get a little attention. either. I haven’t touched Twitter in years. TikTok. So we’ve kind of picked our areas and I just happen to like LinkedIn because I’m more business oriented and she’s more visually oriented. So we kind of split our

responsibilities. So maybe you can find somebody within your own company that has an interest in one or the other and they can be the chairman of that particular. I think that’s a great idea. You know, I mean, it doesn’t have to always be you, you know, and then sometimes you can use resources or ideas to like get your content calendar put together too, you know, so that you’re, you know, if someone else, if you’re not great with video, but maybe you have someone on your team that is great on video.

you allow them to do some video content for you or you think about how you can fit that into the content calendar for the year, you know, and how that could work. I hear you. Okay. Social media impact SEO on a designer’s website.

Well, there’s lots of ways that it doesn’t necessarily impact SEO because they’re not really super linked. You can put your Twitter link and your Instagram and your LinkedIn and all of those on the bottom of your page, but they have their own search optimization. People do search now on Instagram for, it is its own search engine.

It’s almost they’re disconnected in that way. SEO works just as, I mean, that’s really where Instagram and LinkedIn have gone is to create their own, basically it’s like their own Google. So you can search that way. You can find people that are in your area that way. A lot of people vet designers through social media without even ever going to a Facebook page or website. And I have designers who don’t have a website at all. They just have social media.

So, but it could be great for us for how interior design community, I use sometimes the questions of the day as a springboard for blog content. So they’re great because they have great, know, our members contribute such amazing answers that we can create a blog article around that topic. And we can pull quotes from

our members about what they said about certain topics and we’re able to include, give them a link back to their Instagram page. So we’re pushing people back to look at them. But it’s really solid, amazing advice from people that are experienced in what they do. So it helps us for SEO that way. I see.

What are some of the best practices for posting and how often and what type of posts get the most engagement? I know you talked about video being really important today, but besides that, what else? I would say it depends on the platform. So sometimes the best case scenario is working in a group, like in one of the groups. LinkedIn has some amazing groups, Facebook has some amazing groups, and sometimes networking in those groups is the best way to

to get engagement. And so you might go in in the morning and just chit chat about certain things and, you know, answer questions. And then that shows you as an expert and people want to hire you. Sometimes it is creating great a video that is showing what you do and how you do it. You know, I follow this, this woman, I think her name is Erin Setzer, something she is Holmes and she works with

She does a lot of like, she’s more of a contractor type and she does a lot of videos on how they do certain things, like how they hide the outlets or, I remember her doing one on pocket doors where she talks about painting the interior black so that when you’re opening it and closing it, you’re not seeing the guts of the pocket door.

when they put that together, when they’re putting it together, they paint everything black on the inside. And I was like, you know, just these little things that designers think about every day, you know, just little moments that they’re creating. You know, I remember a designer years ago talking about how she’d worked with this fabric and it would snag. And so she didn’t like to send it out to the workroom to be hemmed. She’d have the workroom come and hand hem it.

because if you didn’t do it that way, it just wouldn’t hang correctly because of the way the material worked. so she’s thinking ahead of the game, what can I do to alleviate any kind of worry from my client down the line that I don’t know how to handle these situations. I’m gonna head them off. Well, all of those things that you do,

are also really great content. And what it does is it shows that you’re an expert and you know what you’re doing and how you’re thinking about the process of how you order. Like you have to order the sink before you’re ordering your countertops because you have to give your sink to your countertop fabricator so that it can be under mount, so they can measure it so it can be cut properly to be undermounted.

And some people don’t know, you know, if you were just, they don’t know that your client doesn’t know that, that these are things that you’re thinking about ahead of time, because that’s the process of putting in a kitchen. They just think, you know, I’m giving you the money for the check for the kitchen, you know, and when is all this going to be done? You know, so if you’re showing them, you know, how difficult it is or what the steps are, these are, these are the things that need to happen in this order.

It also educates them about what the job really is and why it takes as long as it takes and what the steps are to go through the process of design. And I think there’s just not enough content out there about that. I think that we could do a lot better job, you know, showing that part of the process and really showing how brilliant designers are. They’re always thinking about

creative solutions to really, you know, difficult problems within a home to provide a client with such a great experience with their own home, like how they live their lives. So it’s just, it’s interesting to me that designers will sometimes choose to just like, just do profile pictures and portfolio pictures over and over and not get into the nitty gritty of like, okay, here’s how that was done. You know what I mean? Like here’s.

here’s what I did on this project, you And even in websites, you know, how often, Gail, do you look at someone’s website, a designer’s website, and their portfolio has no words in it? None. It’s just like the pictures. Which they’re great. Yeah, they’re great, but it’s like, what happened in that project? Like there’s a whole story there. There’s a

story, a huge part of that designer’s life went into those pictures, you know? Tell people what it was. With who they were with the clients, what did they want from you? And these are the same practices you should be doing when you’re pitching to get at your work in magazines too. Like feed the story to the writers. You can go in any magazine and it tells you who the writers are. You can write to that magazine and they’ll send you the editorial calendar.

you can write to them and say, hey, I think this would work for your June issue next year. You’re going to be talking about outdoor kitchens. And we did this beautiful outdoor kitchen in the Hamptons. we did this, here’s the client. They had this problem. We came in and we came up with a solution. And we wanted to position the stove in such a way that the

The fumes from the gas grill wouldn’t reach into the home or into the pool area. You know, we were, this is how we solve that problem with events. And, you know, we put these plants here to detract from mosquitoes and, you know, all the things that you do think about in design and then feed that feed it as a story and then put in like, obviously like brands really liked because you’re that brands love a shout out, you know, you’re building partnerships.

You know, certainly if you’re pitching to a magazine, think about which brands you use, their advertisers, they care about, mean, that’s what they care about, you know? So, and you have to think about these things. If I were coming onto your website, what would I want to know about you? What would I want to think? You know, how am I going to learn about what you do if you’re not telling me what you do and what your process is? So I think the more we are open about the process

letting that and letting ourselves be vulnerable in that because it is hard to do. I’m not going to say it isn’t to be vulnerable and to share yourself in that way and to mess up a little bit and maybe not look perfect when you’re telling the story, but you’re getting out the story. I think it’s I think it’s really charming and it’s it lets people know who you really are. And that’s who they’re working. That’s who they want to hire this you the person, you know, so and you the team.

So knowing a little bit about that is really good. Sure. How important is engagement on social media? I think engagement is everything. I honestly think it’s, you know, it’s about we’re all people. Social media is should be social. You know, it’s it’s about knowing people and getting to, you know, I have met so I mean, you know, we met so many wonderful people on social media.

and that I never would have, I I live in a small city in New Hampshire. I would not have met the people that I’ve met in my career if I had just stayed in my little bubble and not had a social life beyond it. I have lots of local friends and lots of local family, but in order to be online and to do this online, you have to give of yourself and you have to learn about other people and be social with them.

and engage with them and talk with them. If you’re putting out content and you’re never giving back to the people that you’re just putting something, you’re not going to go anywhere. People want someone responds to them and wants someone who listens to them and cares about them. And it’s gotta be kind of, I mean, it really does have to be genuine in that way, you know? And that’s a really wonderful thing is designers really love what they do.

So that’s not gonna be hard for them to share. Like this is what I do and this is what I love. And then like, just let that be, the work is the work and just let that live there and people will like it or they won’t and don’t be so afraid of that. If someone is just starting on social media, hasn’t given it much attention, how important is it in the marketing arsenal today? I know you said that

People don’t want to do it, don’t do it, but if you’re counseling somebody, what do you say? You know, I should say, if I’m a student, if you’re a student and you know you’re in the world of design and you, I think the very first thing is I would tell people, claim your social media, claim your web address early, start thinking about that stuff from an early standpoint.

and really giving it some serious thought, because I know so many designers who’ve regretted the decisions that they’ve made with branding. And there are lots of schools of thought on it. Like, you want to be, from my name, Lori Lasher, do I want to be Lori Lasher into your design? Do I want to be Lori Lasher Studios? Do I want to have my name in there? Do I want to have like,

Maybe I just want to be, you know, spotlight design or something like that, you know, and what play out the scenarios of that, you know, so how could that work? Like, for instance, what if you get married and your new name is not that name you picked? What if you get divorced and that name is doesn’t feel like your name anymore? What if you hire people and then they don’t? mean, the school thought was always your name plus design and

I don’t know that that is a really the best strategic plan anymore because of so many life changes that can happen. And I think that also like you’ll have, you know, junior staff come on and then maybe they don’t want to deal with the junior staff because your name is on the, you know, you’re the name that they hired and they want you and how do you get them to respect the junior staff as well as they do you. And that stuff kind of plays

in several scenarios over and over again. We’ve seen it from, you know, people who have their children on their team or people who have spouses on their team or just people that they hire on their team. And it’s hard, it’s a hard transition. And then to build a business that is, has a succession plan from the very beginning, thinking about if I wanted to sell this business in 20 years, how am I going to be able to do that? So thinking about these things, I know it sounds

crazy as a person who’s just starting the idea, but you’re buying real estate and you’re even if it’s free, these are you’re picking your handle. You’re picking your website. You’re picking those things and you’re kind of thinking like, what do I want my future career to be? And you could do a few of them because you just have different plans. Like, do I want to go with my name? These are free to do. So why not? Your name design, your name.

you know, buy the URL and then buy another name you really like, you know, maybe your mom made name and, you know, house or something, you know, whatever you like that could look like a plan for your future. And then if I was a student, I would be networking with people that could give me a job. When I get out of design school, I would be posting what I am learning. You know, we did a post a while ago that was asked our

our community, what would you be looking for in a hire from a design school? And they said, we really like people who know social media. We really like people who know CAD. We really like people who are team players. So show some of these qualities while you’re networking, while you’re in school, because you have content. Once you graduate, your content kind of disappears a little

You don’t have those weekly projects that you’re supposed to, or monthly projects that you’re supposed to be working on for school. You don’t have access to the samples. You don’t have access to the CAD programs that you have for free. All of those things that you were playing around with for school are content to show that you know what you’re doing, that you’re building knowledge. So I always tell people, it’s free to do this. Why not sign up and get your names, put those all in a, you

in a file that you’ve got like, you’ve got claimed URLs on everything. If you don’t use them, you don’t have to, but you have them if you want to use them down the line. Okay. Well, you’ve given us a lot of tips. So let’s pick three that are your favorites to share to end the call today. Sure. I would say, well, that one, like claim your spaces, especially if there’s something new comes out. Like even if you’re not going to use it, I remember when

when threads came out for Instagram, that same day, I’m not a big Twitter person anymore, but I was like, I’ll just sign up for threads. what they did was they had everybody who follows you automatically followed you on threads in the beginning. I don’t know if it still works that way, but so you’d get the followers really quickly because they already follow you on Instagram. If they signed up for threads, they’d automatically follow you on threads. So if there’s a new social media that you’re

that’s interesting. Get your name right away. Why not? And start to recognize what you’re good at. I think the second one is start to recognize what you’re good at, what you like to do, what the resources on your team look like, and divide the marketing plan that makes sense for the skills that you have. And third, always remember who you’re marketing to. Always. Because you’re not marketing to your friends or your family or your fellow design.

friends out there, you are marketing to a potential client and you really need to think about that. Like you’re on, you know, criminal minds and you’re an FBI agent trying to profile someone. You need to build a profile for your client and you need to know who they are, what they want and how they, what they respond to and think about content that goes along with that, know, educating them about what goes along with that, not just what you want to share, but also what they want to

Awesome. These are great tips and I really appreciate it so much. I think this is really interesting and I’m sure we could spend hours having conversations about social media. But thank you for being on the podcast. Yes, thank you.