Where interior designers plant their portfolio: sprout new leads from your past projects.
I’d even go so far as to say you shouldn’t even take photos of your projects if you don’t have a plan on how you’ll use them! Don’t tell the other photographers I said that!
I’ve spent years photographing houses for designers and getting their work published in all the glossy places (online and irl).
Up to this point, here’s my job:
🕵🏼♀️ Spot what makes a project special.
📸 Capture it.
📦Package the story in a way that makes editors care.
Hint: editors care about what their readers care about. And who are the readers? YOUR DREAM CLIENTS.
📝 Pitch it.
Which means I know what your clients care about. I know the details that make them stop dead in their scroll and text their husband, “What if we did this?”
The problem isn’t your portfolio, it’s not your content either; it’s that all your effort has no place to land.
The Portfolio Reality Check
I’ve spent almost ten years photographing jaw-dropping homes for talented designers like you. And nothing makes me want to throw my camera into a vat of fertilizer faster than seeing those same photos hit Instagram with captions like:
☕️ “I’d like to drink my coffee here this morning!”
🧸 “This cozy room is perfect for staying in!”
👩🍳 “This kitchen is mom-chef approved!”
YAWN. You’re so used to getting your photos back, saying, “Now what?” and then just sharing the most boring instagram post ever that you don’t even question what you’re doing (because everyone else seems to be doing it too!).
But honestly? I get it - marketing isn’t your thing and you’d rather eat a box of zellige tile before you spend any kind of time figuring out what to write for an instagram post.
If you want your portfolio to start doing your sales, you’re in the right place.
For the “Now what?” Designer
Photos of your past projects can get you new projects. Without an editor. Without a big glossy editorial spread. Without a huge PR campaign. And without going viral.
The catch? Photos themselves don’t do that. I promise, as an interior photographer, I’d love for you to hire me to shoot your projects and for those pics to automatically get you new dream clients with dream projects but it just doesn’t work like that.
It’s how you use the photos that gets you new clients and right now, you’re probably ~wilting in the default~ approach to interior design marketing:
INSTAGRAM: Passively post the pics on instagram with a caption like “I want to drink my coffee here every morning!” *YAWN*
OR
EDITORIAL Let the photos slowly die in PR purgatory for 12 to 24 months while you wait for an editor to give you your moment in the sun… all to totally forget to harvest that editorial opportunity once it’s published.
Photos of your past work can get you new clients...but how?
Wilting in the Default Approach
The default approach to interior design marketing is soul sucking (and budget sucking lol) and honestly? I get it, you’ve got enough going on with project management & procurement… you don’t need to add “revolutionary CMO” to your title.
So what can you do to market your design business better when the only thing you’ve ever tried doesn’t work?
🌱 You gotta plant your projects.
You give them a place in your marketing garden that keeps growing, blooming and attracting dream clients with dream projects (even while you’re designing something else). Want me to say it in non-marketing fluffy language? You target your content directly to the people who need it most.
So what can you do to market your design business better when the only thing you’ve ever tried doesn’t work?
You have to plant your portfolio.
01.
The Method
Tend
In phase 1, Tend, we organize your stories, visuals, and values so every piece of content lands with a memorable message.
Plant
In phase 2, Plant, we put the do-it-once systems in place so that your portfolio can sprout into new clients while you're sleeping.
Sprout
In phase 3, Sprout, we set up your perennial content garden so your marketing follows a strategy, not a panicked posting habit.
Bloom
In phase 4, Bloom, all that hard work is done in a community of like-minded interior designers. You'll batch, schedule, and set your portfolio to start harvesting leads.
- A marketing system that runs in the background while you take care of your current clients, delivering on your promises
- A miracle-grow approach to marketing that doesn’t rely on going viral or chasing trends; it focuses on serving the ideal client who actually needs to hire you
- Clear path from content to contract: serving your ideal client with what they need at the exact moment they’re ready to hire
Your Marketing Grows Your Business.
- Stuck in a soul-sucking and trend-chasing social media posting that asks more of you than it gives back.
- Throwing your best assets - your portfolio - at a machine that chews up content & spits it out with no real path to getting you new clients
- Continue to submit projects to the media machine that gatekeeps your access to the clients who need to hear from you the most without a backup plan for if your editorial plans fall through
- Creating content with no next step so your ideal client doesn’t know what they have to do to solve their problem.
But Without The Nursery
Charleston, South Carolina based Interior and architectural photographing luxury custom homes and hotels for editorial purposes and legacy-building portfolios.
