How to acquire new customers with email marketing for interior designers

Email marketing is an effective communication channel for laying the foundations of any promotion. According to MailChimp statistics, the average open rate of an email is 20%. This figure indicates that email marketing is the main source of customer acquisition.

How can email marketing help interior designers? Firstly, well thought-out email marketing encourages brand loyalty and trust. Secondly, it helps build a relationship with prospects and facilitates communication with existing customers. In short, email is the most powerful way to share meaningful information and connect with your audience.

Want to know how to design an email marketing strategy that continually brings in new customers? Here are the 3 crucial steps you’ll need to put in place.

Step 1: Generate leads with cold emails

an email marketing strategy for interior designers needs 3D renderings
To build an email marketing strategy for interior designers, it’s vital to answer these 3 questions: who to write to? what to say? and how to deliver the message.

Let’s start with the first: who to target? The crucial point is to find potential customer contacts. There are two ways of doing this: harvesting contact details through social networks or search engine advertising, and buying e-mail address listings. The first solution requires almost manual collection work; the second, more expensive, is by far the quicker.

But where can you find these prospect lists? The easiest way is to think like a customer. Are there services or products that prospects need before choosing an interior designer? If so, it would be a good idea to identify their suppliers and offer them a partnership. Or simply buy a listing and gain access to prospects’ contacts much more quickly.

To deliver the message, you can choose one of the many platforms at your disposal, such as MailChimp or its French equivalent Send in Blue. These platforms enable you to format your e-mails and insert photos, videos, contact forms and more.

Once you’ve got your prospects’ contact details, you need to know what to say to them. This involves highlighting the benefits your prospects will derive from using the services of an interior designer. Here are 3 tips to grab the reader’s attention and turn him or her into a potential customer:

#1 – presenting your added value

The most important part of winning over prospects to an architect’s offer is to highlight its competitive advantages. You can emphasize your strengths and the added value you bring to the project.

For example, the email could explain how a space custom-designed by an interior architect will be better suited to the customer than if he left the job to the property developer. You can also demonstrate how your services can substantially reduce costs (exhaustive list of the best service providers, negotiated agreements with suppliers, etc.).

#2 – proof by example

The other important point in email marketing for interior designers is to prove your level of expertise. Don’t hesitate to showcase your best work in various fields. This is the best way to show that you’re capable of transforming homes into warm and welcoming places, or creating offices that are a pleasure to work in.

In addition, email marketing for interior designers is an interesting opportunity to expand your field of activity into other niches. You could create a project of this type, use 3D visual creation services and present these realistic visuals as if they had actually been made.

#3 – call to action

The defining point of your e-mail will be a clear call to action. You want the prospects who open the e-mail to perform an action. Depending on how you work, you might offer them a phone call, a Skype conference or a meeting in your offices.

The trick here is to offer something useful or valuable, such as an interior design sketch, a free consultation or an online test to choose the interior ambience best suited to their personality.

Step 2: Powerful email marketing for interior designers starts with trust

Once prospects have become aware of your brand, it’s time to launch a well-planned campaign designed to build trust. Here are some ideas for strategies to achieve this with interior designer email marketing.

#1 – for an effective email marketing for interior designers campaign, answer the questions people ask

There are always a number of questions that prospects ask before working with interior designers. These usually concern rates, quality of service, trust and level of expertise. So, addressing their doubts and clarifying the details will be an opportunity for you to present your know-how, handle any objections the prospect may have and make a good impression. This question-and-answer game will enable you to highlight your expertise and achievements, your turnaround times and an idea of your prices without sounding too “commercial”.

Addressing such questions in your interior designer email marketing campaign is therefore an opportunity to be seized. This information will enable readers to ask the pros and cons, judge your talents and, most importantly, get to know you better. So, when the customer wants to renovate their interior, the choice of an architect will be obvious – people naturally prefer to trust someone they feel closer to.

#2 – offer opinion polls

Another way to create a stronger bond with your prospects is to create surveys. They allow you to gather information about their preferences and, more importantly, surveys encourage a form of active communication with the brand. People love to give their opinions: that’s why response rates to surveys posted on social networks or by e-mail are so high.

As a result, it’s in your interest to use surveys to communicate and maintain contact with your prospects.

Step 3: Use email marketing for interior designers to sell your offer

Now that prospects know a little more about your inner professional, it’s time to sell. At this point, it’s time to showcase your best work – examples of projects completed or awards won. This will increase prospects’ confidence in you, and convince them that you’re the right person to make their projects a success. Here are a few examples of how you can tip the balance in your favor with interior designer email marketing.

#1 – present new projects in your email marketing for interior designers

In the first step, you’ll have presented a few examples of your work. This way, email recipients will have appreciated the type of projects you specialize in. The second stage of this interior designer email marketing strategy will be to reinforce the prospect’s opinion with key figures and a wide variety of projects.

Keep in mind that sharing your creations is the best way to leave a lasting impression, as it demonstrates your professionalism and your ability to multiply projects.

#2 – share your company’s recognition

Have you won a prize or competition? Have you made a name for yourself with a fine architectural project? Don’t hesitate to spread the word. An architect can showcase numerous awards on various specialized sites to gain valuable media exposure.

Interviews in feature articles, communications about winning competitions or simple broadcasts of your projects all have the same advantage: they demonstrate that you are being talked about publicly. Such recognition also implies excellence in your work. What’s more, prospects love the idea that their home has been designed by a renowned architect.

So it’s crucial to find such opportunities in order to capitalize on them. So look for ways to incorporate this information into your interior designer email marketing strategy.

Where can you find enough images to support your email marketing strategy?

It may seem a challenge for some to present illustrations that showcase their projects. But think again. Specializing in the creation of interior renderings, Le Studio 3D provides architects and interior designers with the visuals they need for marketing operations or for presenting architectural projects. We can provide a large volume of high-definition visuals:

• Images of the project in progress. There’s no reason why architects shouldn’t use illustrations of their project in progress – even if it’s not physically complete. With 3D architectural perspectives, you’ll be able to present your project in photo-realistic detail – whatever its complexity or degree of completion.
• Visuals of geographically distant projects. Taking photos of projects located in different countries or even continents presents many difficulties. But these can easily be avoided, since the same results can be achieved with 3D visualization of interiors. You can obtain realistic images of the project, from different angles and in high definition.
• Endless artistic opportunities. A 3D visual agency can recreate bespoke furniture elements, sublimate interiors with appropriate lighting and even present projects at night. Unlike photography, 3D artists don’t need to set foot in the customer’s home: everything is done remotely – which is obviously convenient for everyone.

Email marketing for interior designers enables large-scale lead generation. With a little effort, you’ll be able to target new prospects based on your achievements. Once you’ve identified who to write to and how, you’ll be able to start your email campaign. Of course, you’ll be sure to test and refine your strategy.

Once you’ve acquired your audience, you’ll need to turn these prospects into customers. Here again, content plays a key role – and there’s nothing more impressive than presenting beautiful visuals of your projects. If you’d like us to provide you with highly realistic photos of your projects, both completed and unfinished, contact us. We’ll create interior perspectives that do justice to your masterpieces!