Staging Diva Dispatch

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It's pretty hard not to feel like "Chicken Little" after a few hours in front of CNN these days. I try to filter out some of that negative news coverage. It's not motivating and half the battle in running your own business is keeping up your momentum. This is hard to do if you're running around like Chicken Little worrying the sky is falling.

I'm certainly not saying that we should put on rose colored glasses and ignore reality but it's also important to remember that in the news business, the worse they can make everything sound, the more you'll be glued to your television.

I know the current economic news is scary, but keep in mind that there is actually more security in working for yourself than in trusting your destiny to a company whose first concern is not your well being.

At least when you are your own b0ss, especially if you're in a business like home staging with little to no overhead (you don't need inventory, office space, or a store front), you are the one charting your course, not living in fear waiting for the other shoe to drop.

I say this as someone who has been an entrepreneur supporting myself since 1989.

There have certainly been times when I had to cut back on the non-essentials like take out meals, social events, babysitters, trips, wine, movies, etc., (heck I drove the same car for 18 years) but I always continued to invest in my business because that's what would make me a f.i.n.a.n.c.i.a.l return.

Many of my students start their staging businesses part-time while they keep their other j0bs, and others leave them or turn to staging when they are faced with a sudden j0b loss or divorce.

I had the craziest staging request last month during the Toronto International Film Festival. The city was filled with stars for the week attending their various premieres. My business phone rang at 6:45 AM on a Sunday and I only answered it because I was so annoyed. "Hello, this is the Four Seasons calling to see if you'd be able to style a room for one of our guests for a TV interview they're doing tomorrow. The catch is you'd have to do the work between 3am and 6am starting tonight."

My answer was a definite no, but only after I hung up did I realize I should have milked the caller for more details before turning it down! Who knows, my clients might have been Brad and Angelina! Not that I'd have got to meet them in the middle of the night!

I hope you find the content of this issue of Staging Diva Dispatch helpful. I welcome your opinions, success stories and/or new story ideas; it's a challenge deciding what to write about month after month!

Debra Gould, President Six Elements Inc.
Creator of The Staging Diva Program

It has been really busy at Staging Diva headquarters. Several new products that have been under wraps are finally ready to go.

I'm especially proud of the new Home Study Kit which will have special appeal to anyone with a slow internet connection or computer challenges.

If you've been reluctant to order the Staging Diva Home Staging Training Program because you wanted a physical product that you could hold in your hands rather than downloading, your wait is over. You'll read more about this below.

As a Staging Diva Dispatch subscriber, you're the first to hear that the Ultimate Design Guide will be published on time for Christmas.

This will be a great gift idea for the people in your life wondering how to support your success as a home stager!

Digital Cameras: The Difference Your Lens Makes

If you want to build your home staging business it's worth investing in a decent digital camera, but an absolute must in my opinion is a wide-angle lens. It allows you to capture SO MUCH MORE of a room. The difference is astounding.

Without my wide-angle lens there is no way I could have shown both sides of this room to be able to accurately portray the transformation I achieved by changing the position of the bed and staging with rental furniture and accessories.

The wide-angle lens gives perspective to my before and after portfolio shots. I replaced the curtains with pre-made drapery panels and used the $1.49 tie-back technique I describe in course 3, Taking the Mystery Out of Home Staging Consultations. I also brought in new bedding, accent pillows, lamps and furniture to create this master bedroom.

I bought my first digital camera 8 years ago, it was a Nikon Coolpix 990 with a separate wide-angle lens. I built my entire business from the portfolio shots I took with that camera. While it cost me plenty at the time, I never regretted it because it served me well and brought me hundreds of clients.

I would still be using it, were it not for the battery compartment catch that finally gave out and was almost as expensive to fix as getting something new. Prices of digital cameras have come down considerbly in the years since my first, and the capabilities of the cameras have increased. So you get way more features and better pictures, for less m0ney today.

This year I got a Nikon Coolpix P5100 with an adapter so I could still use my same 8 year old wide-angle lens. My new camera sat in the case for over a week until I had to take it out to a client and was forced to see how it worked. While it does have lots of options, I just turn it to "automatic," attach my lens, turn the flash off (because it doesn't work with the lens attachment) and shoot. No big deal! What was I so afraid of?

Before you buy anything, go out to a proper camera store so you can get the right advice on cameras. If you're in some big box store talking to someone who also sells microwave ovens and big screen TVs, do you really think you'll get proper camera advice?

What I use may or my not be right for you. I just wanted to be specific since so many people ask me what camera I use to shoot my portfolio images.


Before a very dark shot of the dining room.	After a close up "vignette" created from the larger shot, by cropping and fixing the lighting.

Another secret weapon in my arsenal for getting great portfolio shots is learning how to use digital image editing software. With a very dark dining room as shown above, I created the vignette you see above at right by cropping in on the flowers and deleting everything else.

You'll get lots of tips like these in the, Staging Diva® Ultimate Portfolio Guide: Winning Clients With The Perfect Home Staging Portfolio.

If you're getting calls and no clients, or lots of visitors to your website and no calls, I highly recommend you invest in this ebook to find out where you're losing business.

If you get one more hour of work out of what you learn in this Guide it will more than pay for itself.

Learn more

Staging Diva In the News

I'm really excited about a radio interview I'm doing this week for Live 88.5 Start Up (Ottawa). This is my fifth radio show and I love answering questions on air. I've been featured on the radio in Ontario (CBC Radio One), Los Angeles (CBS Radio), Denver (Radio Colorado Network) and Lincoln NE (KFOR 1240).

The best part is, every one of these shows invited me on because they found me from my website. Graduates who participate in the Staging Diva Directory of Home Stagers get media attention too!

Learn how to join the Staging Diva Directory of Home Stagers so you can get media exposure too.

Read more about Staging Diva in the News.

Would you like the complete Staging Diva Training Program Delivered Right To Your Door?

I taught my first group of students how to start and grow their own home staging business back in January of 2005. Today there are over 900 Graduates and many more doing individual courses, all over the United States, Canada, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Brazil and Barbados.

Up until now the only way you could order the Staging Diva Training Home Staging Training Program was by ordering the downloadable course notes and course recordings. This is still an excellent option because you get everything sent to you by email as soon as you order the program and it keeps the c0st down to only $995 (an amount you'll likely make back with your first client!). By the way, you can also order downloadable courses one at a time for $249.

For those students who don't mind waiting for their materials to be packaged up and mailed to them, you can now order the Home Study Kit.

In an attractive tabbed binder, you'll get:

all 5 sets of course study notes
Staging Diva Home Staging Checklist with Room-by-Room Planning Forms
Staging Diva Business Quick Start Checklist: 20 Steps to Start Your Home Staging Business
Staging Diva Training Program Workbook (b0nus)

In separate and convenient media case, you'll get:

all 5 course audios, a total of 10 professionally edited CDs
an extra b0nus Q & A CD

The Home Study Kit is available now for $1295 or you can go with 3 easy payments of $495 spread over three months.

No matter whether you order the Home Study Kit or the downloadable Staging Diva Program, you get the the same professionally edited course recordings and your Graduate Certificate is sent to you in the mail along with a sales sheet you can use for your own marketing efforts.

Learn more about these course options