Quote of the Month!
"Don't let your
throat tighten with fear. Take sips of breath all day and
night."
(Rumi)
Staging Diva Staging Tip
Chipped paint on door and trim,
and no time to paint?
Most trim is painted white. When it gets chipped you often
see right down to the dark wood below, especially on an older
home.
The high contrast draws your eye right to the
chips.
Try camouflaging it with liquid "white out." You know the
stuff we used to hide typos when we had typewriters. .
.
OK, I'm older than you thought . . . but this really
works!
Staging Diva Network Members Chat It
Up
The Staging Diva Network Online Discussion Group just got
even better with the new Live Chat feature. This add-on service is
included in the monthly membership fee of only $20.
I'm hosting a live chat May 16, which is f'ree to all Staging
Diva Network Members.
Learn now
to join the Network and get one month f'ree
The Staging Diva Team!
Peggy, our
Manager of Operations is absolutely fabulous. If you have any
questions, please don't hesitate to email
her.
Sandy is my
Executive Assistant who does a great job getting Graduation
Certificates out to you in a timely fashion, keeping the Staging Diva
Network humming and many other behind the scenes
details.
Peggy and Sandy will
quickly handle your questions about registrations, certificates,
course downloads, memberships and more.
Don't worry, I'm
still accessible but with over 200 emails a day, I need
help!
Getting Media Attention
If you've
already taken the Staging Diva Program, you know I'm a big fan of
the Publicity
Hound.
If you've never
checked her out, do it now!
Learn more about
great PR
Great Book
This book by
"the world's number one small business guru" plus the TeleClasses
I've attended with him motivated me to sign up to go to San Diego to
have Michael E. Gerber coach me in person.
Learn
more about E-Myth Revisited
Choosing
training
Don't take home staging training just because you want
"credentials" since there are none (not
official ones at least).
Anyone can call themselves a professional home stager, there
are no requirements or licenses to do so.
The only real reason to take a course is if you feel the
content will improve your chance of success.
Consider your own strengths and weaknesses.
Decide exactly what you need to get out of a program and then
find training
that offers that.
Look for a trainer that has a proven
track record of success in whatever they're going to teach
you.
Otherwise, what proof is there that their methods work in the
real world?
Look for evidence that there's a genuine interest in sharing
real information with you and providing ongoing support for your
growth.
If
it's all about "selling a course" then don't expect anything else
once you're a paying customer.
I
also recommend you check out comments
from real people who have
taken the program.
If
student testimonials have no names, no photos and no way to locate
them, how do you know their comments are real?
No
single training program will be right for everyone! You owe it to
yourself to research your options and choose wisely, based on your
specific needs.
Read
the rest of this story
Read
student comments about the Staging Diva
Program
|
Issue
11: May 2007
You are receiving this newsletter because you
expressed interest in learning about the business of Home Staging.
If you don't want to continue, use the "Preferences" link at the
very bottom of this email.
Hi ,
I don't know about you but I felt like spring would never get
here! It's such a pleasure to see the daffodils and hyacinth coming
up in my garden after all these weeks where the only thing "spring"
was the real estate market.
To celebrate Mother's Day, I'm offering you a
$25 sa.ving in this issue.
If you have tips on where to stay while I'm in
San Diego working
with the world's leading small business guru and best selling
author, Michael E. Gerber, let me know!
There are now over 450 Staging Diva Graduates across the US
and Canada and in many international countries. Unfortunately we
don't have anyone in Tel Aviv, because I have a
homeowner with a $600,000 home and no one to stage
it.
I hope you find the content of this issue of Staging Diva
Dispatch helpful. I welcome your feedback and/or new story
ideas!
Happy Spring, Happy Mother's Day, Happy Victoria Day and
Memorial Day long weekends!
Debra Gould, President Six Elements Inc. Creator of The Staging Diva Program
In this
issue:
Main Section
Using Art in Home Staging
Quiz: Do you
think like an entrepreneur?
Three Key
Elements to a Client Testimonial
Student/Graduate Success Corner
Staging Diva in the Media
|
Left column
Quote of the Month
Staging Diva Staging Tip
Network Members Chat it Up
The Staging Diva Team
Getting Media Attention
Great Book
Choosing Training
|
Using Art in Home Staging
The goal
of any staging project is to create an environment where
potential buyers fall in love with a home and imagine living
there.
It’s important to remove diplomas, personal photos and
religious items since these distract buyers and remind them
they are walking through someone else’s personal
space. |
| Many homes,
regardless of price range, don’t have any art to speak of. As a home
stager I bring in art to help showcase the property. The art
should:
- complete the look
- making a room feel comfortable, open and inviting
- not
become a focal point or distraction to home buyers.
Usually, I stick to pretty traditional art that enhances a
room while staying somewhat in the background. Landscapes, still
life, botanicals and some more contemporary abstracts. Depending on
the house, I sometimes use reproductions of: Van Gough, Kandinsky,
Monet, Miro, Matisse, Warhol, Rothko, O’Keeffe, Seurat, Klee and
Wyeth. Black and white photos in dark black frames also work
well.
I avoid
religious art, most nudes, and edgy contemporary art with subjects
that might upset buyers. The art is there as a backdrop to support
the beauty of the house itself.
The
photo above is from the very first home I staged for a client.
Rearranging their art, and deciding where to hang the 10 paintings I
rented, were among my favorite activities in the whole
project.
|
Staging Diva
Spring Quiz: Do you think like an
entrepreneur? |
1. You get a
referral for a home staging project in your area. You know the
potential client has your contact
information.
Do you:
a) Wait
to hear from the potential client and assume they hired someone else
if they don't contact you?
b) Wait
a week to contact the client so they won't think you're too
desperate?
c)
Contact them immediately to introduce yourself and express your
interest in learning more about their project and how you can help
them?
2. You discover
there are other stagers in your
area.
Do you:
a)
Assume the market is saturated and give up your dreams?
b)
Decide to go into business anyway and charge less than the
competition because you're just starting out?
c)
Research the number of homes for sale in your area over a year and
evaluate whether that sounds like enough potential work for you and
all the other stagers in your market?
3. You invest in
your own web site or having a profile page built for you in the
Staging Diva Directory of Home Stagers. After less than two months,
you've only had one project.
Do you:
a)
Decide the Internet is a bad way to promote your staging business
and take down your website or Profile page?
b)
Decide to run one newspaper ad or send flyers door-to-door
instead?
c)
Evaluate whether the site has had any traffic. If it has, you try to
determine whether there is anything you can do to encourage more of
the visitors to actually contact you?
4. You've been
in business for several months but you don't have as much business
as you'd like.
Do you:
a) Sit
at home and wait for the phone to ring?
b)
Spend hours discussing your lack of projects and hoping someone will
give you the "quick and easy" solution to building your
business?
c) Pull
out your list of strategies for dealing with the "slow times" from
Staging Diva course 1, look at your list of business building ideas
from course 2 and all the marketing ideas in course 4 and take
action to change your situation?
I
listened to a very interesting TeleClass this week. Michael Port
was talking about the shared characteristics of successful
entrepreneurs. One of them was a "sense of urgency around
achievement." In other words, they don't wait for success to happen,
they go out there and take action to make it happen and they treat
this as an urgent priority, not something to get around to
later.
In my
quiz above, you should be answering "c" to all the questions if
you're thinking like an entrepreneur and if you REALLY want to turn
your creative decorating hobby into a lucrative staging
business.
Learn more about the Staging
Diva Training Program.
The Three Key
Elements of a Strong Client
Testimonial
|
Excerpt from the Staging Diva Ultimate
Portfolio Guide:
"People feel more confident hiring you if they can read
what others have to say about the experience.
A
strong client testimonial is one that:
- Mentions how it felt working with you.
- States the results that were
achieved."
| I'll tell you
how to get this kind of testimonial, even before you've had your
first paying client in the Staging Diva Ultimate
Portfolio Guide. This Guide to creating a portfolio that
really sells your services includes over 100 pages of specific steps
to improve your writing, photos, logo, presentation and
more!
To celebrate
Mother's Day, I'm offering $25 off the Portfolio
Guide
Student/Graduate Success
Corner
|
A big
congratulations to Staging Diva Graduate Kris
O'Neill of A Cents
Of Design Inc. who just finished taping show seven for
HGTV's "My First Place." Once they
experienced her talent, they kept her on for all nine Atlanta
shows. The series second season airs this
fall.
|
Kris
writes, "Debra, thank you for playing a major part in my
success. If it weren't for the tools you instilled in me, and
my own flare for design, I would not have had this
once-in-a-lifetime opportunity! My hats off to you and your
invaluable techniques in promoting and building my
business!"
|
Congratulations to Jo Ann Kostik of Jo
Ann Kostik Interior Design whose active participation in a
fundraising event for the New
Orleans Home
Builders Association not only raised much needed funds for the
area, but also lead to an invitation to stage a builder's
parade home. Jo Ann writes, "your information from course 3
will really help me with pricing. I can't wait to finish the
other two courses!"
|
Congratulations to Staging Diva Graduate Nancy
Maurer of Whitehall Interiors & Home Staging LLC
who submitted an article on home staging for the local paper's
Real Estate Showcase Section. As discussed in course
4, this is a great way to showcase your company and
establish yourself as the local expert. Within 24 hours of the
story appearing, Nancy had her first paying client! More
projects will follow since other readers realizing
they'll need a stager when they're ready to sell their
homes, likely
saved her
article.
|
|
|
Congratulations to Judy Gardner of
Unionville on doing such an awesome job of staging her own
home that the person who bought it wants to hire her to stage
his!
This is just one of the many beautiful images her proud
husband sent me of their own staged home.
Well done Judy. You've definitely got a stager's eye--
you're a natural! |
Staging Diva Students and Graduates, send me your successes so we
can celebrate your triumphs and inspire
others!
Staging
Diva In the Media
This week I was interviewed for a home staging story
for America Online's Real
Estate. The story will be up within weeks and include a
link back to stagingdiva.com. |
|
This is tremendous news
from a search engine standpoint since the single biggest way
to boost your site's search engine ranking is to have a high traffic
site link to it. You can't get much bigger than
AOL.
If you're not part of the Staging Diva Directory of Home
Stagers, you are really missing out on how much it can do to build
your business.
Learn how
you can benefit from this AOL
exposure
|
I'm really excited about the home staging story for
this fall's Better Homes and
Gardens. The
reporter called me back this week for more photos for the
story, plus she interviewed two of my clients to help
illustrate the difference we can make in our clients'
lives.
|
With a circulation of over 38 million, this article will send
significant traffic to the Staging
Diva Directory of Home Stagers this fall! To buy a tiny ad in
Better Homes and Gardens costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. The
value of being part of the editorial content is even higher because
readers put more faith in editorial than
advertising.
A growing number of reporters are grabbing
their stories right off my websites without even interviewing me. If
any of you see me in a local paper or magazine, I'd appreciate you
letting me know! I'd be happy to send
you a thank you gift in exchange for a copy of the
story!
|