FEATURED ON THIS EPISODE:

INTERIOR DESIGNER’S GUIDE TO CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT

WHAT YOU WILL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE:

THE IMPORTANCE OF TAKING TIME TO LEARN EACH INDUSTRY PARTNERS DIFFERENT PAIN POINTS

UNDERSTANDING PAIN POINTS IN YOUR CLIENTS

HOW TO DETERMINE IF YOU CAN RESOLVE THE PAIN POINTS FOR OTHERS AND YOURSELF

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After talking to and hearing from many designers and hearing all of their questions, I started noticing this underlying theme in most of the questions the designers were asking.

I thought it couldn’t all boil down to this one similarity, but it did—and that was pain points. Almost every question I read involved a lack of fully understanding the pain point of whoever they were working with. 

‘Pain points’ has become a trendy or new phrase, along the lines of ‘being your authentic self’ and things like that. I don’t love these trendy phrases but I also think we need to fully understand what they are. 

So, I looked up the definition of a pain point.  Ofcourse, there were a few variations of it, but the general gist of it was ‘A specific problem or issue (or multiple) that people experience causing discomfort, inefficiency, or dissatisfaction.’ 

We all have pain points.

Pain points are so much easier to understand when they’re our own.

We really know what the hell pain points are. When you’re trying to solve someone else’s pain point, especially someone you don’t know that well, that’s where I see designers getting hung up. Because they think they understand the pain point for that person, and what I’m finding is the issues that designers are having seem to be coming more from missing the mark on that person’s pain point than on the delivery of whatever that service may be. 

Understanding someone’s pain point, say your industry partners, is starting to understand exactly what a realtor’s pain points are, for example, and then, you start marketing your services based on what those pain points are. 

And you may be wondering how you’re supposed to know what these pain points are.

You’re supposed to know by talking to them. I know that takes time, and we all want something tomorrow, or hell, even today is good. But in truth, the best relationships are built on a strong foundation. Now, this doesn’t have to take years and years, but your marketing has to be targeted enough that the realtor wants to call you. 

We are all inundated with services from all kinds of places, so you truly need to understand their actual pain points. Unfortunately, there will be different pain points within the same industry. 

I get this takes time, and time is incredibly valuable to all of us. But sending out an email with general messaging is not moving you forward. So, I would much rather you spend the time and get 1 or 2 decent connections that will produce leads and projects to fill your pipeline. 

There are ways of making segments where you send a more targeted email that addresses those specific pain points. 

I share another example in today’s episode of a client. The designer said everything was going smoothly, and then suddenly, her client pulled the rug out from underneath her.

Anytime I hear that – all of a sudden – red flags go up for me. Was it really all of a sudden, or did you miss little signals along the way?

The designer thought that it was her role to solve the request for more beautiful furnishings. What she missed was that there was a pain point in finances. So, ongoing discussions with the client, really, truly listening to what they’re saying, would have helped her value engineer it. Put it into phases, what have you. There are a variety of solutions to this. 

I also hear designers asking for help with things like social media, marketing, and drawings…they want to hire someone or say they just need an extra set of hands.

I’ve also said those same things over the years, but I am also confident in sharing how I’ve screwed up over the years with all of these. 

For example, I had an experience, which I shared in today’s episode, about how I thought social media was my pain point. And if it is, what am I going to do about that? So, I tested things. I got rid of my social media managers. Got rid of that overhead costs. Posted when I could and tracked the numbers. And you’re not going to believe this – I sure didn’t. The number of followers went up. 

Do not get me wrong, it could be a whole lot better. I know that. But I realized it was never a pain point. It was an insecurity and something for me to work out. What I came to find out was stress was my pain point. When I was stressed, I just couldn’t figure out what to post and didn’t want to get on stories. But when I wasn’t stressed, social media was fun for me. But by looking at what my true pain point was, I looked more closely I could help that. 

Our pain points in our own businesses might not be what you think they are. It’s possible outside help might not resolve it. It actually might add more stress. 

What is it that would truly help you in your business? Do you need to start outsourcing your drawings? What is making you inefficient? Are you type A++ and feel like you’ve got to do it all? Simply being able to do it all doesn’t mean you should do it all. 

We are all experiencing pain points; it’s just a matter of determining what they are and how and if you can resolve them.