Being able to pursue your passion for interior design as a career may lead you to start up your own interior design business. If you hope to keep the business afloat, you need to promote and get the attention of new clients, and there’s no better venue than the Internet. Remember, you’re competing with all of the best graduates of interior design schools, so you have to make yourself stand out. Thanks to the internet, you won’t have to spend a lot if you focus on the most effective marketing strategies.

New clients are going to want to know: What sets you apart from your competition? Your competitive prices and quality service are definitely a part of that, but from the very get-go, new clients should be able to look at your business and think, “That’s different! And that’s exactly what I need!” The most effective way to do this is to specialize. What are your interior design strengths? Perhaps you want to specialize in certain rooms in a home or office, or you want to be known for using bold colors. Whatever your specialty, capitalize on it. Put it in the name of your business and let your potential customers know you specialize because you believe that people looking for the very best should come to you, not to a jack-of-all-trades who spreads his or her focus too thin and does a so-so job with everything.

The cornerstone of Internet marketing is the business website, the place online you want everything else to direct to, the place that’s entirely about you and your business. It’s worth hiring a professional to design your website, especially when you consider it could be the first taste new customers have of your design sense. Work with a Web designer to incorporate your interior design photos and sketches into a clean, attractive, uncluttered and easy-to-use website. Drab or difficult-to-use websites can prove a huge turn-off to the Internet community. Don’t forget that many people access the Web via tablets and smartphones, so talk to your Web designer about incorporating touch-based applications to your website if you want to seem ahead of the curve.

There are millions of people on the most popular social media websites, and they’re free to join, so capitalize on this opportunity to reach new customers. Create business profiles for social media websites. Update them at least once a day with something relevant — but avoid spamming your potential customers with too many updates, or updates that seem unimportant or robotic. You can link to a blog, link to some news, talk about a new service, upload photos of completed projects or spend a day focusing on one aspect of your design business.

Make your website the go-to source for interior design news and ideas, and you’ll start getting bookmarked and re-blogged, meaning people will come to rely on you and will seek you out the next time they need design work completed. On your website, host a blog and update it several times a week with industry news, tips for decorating and information about your services. Promote the blog through your social media profiles, and let your potential customers share the blogs with their friends. Keep an eye on traffic statistics; if one type of blog post is more popular than the rest, continue to write blogs on that topic.

Pay to advertise online through sponsored ads on social media websites and in search engine results pages. These targeted ads will appear specifically to people seeking out interior design information or something relevant to your work. They may be more of an investment than doing social media promotion for free yourself, but they take less effort on your part and have the potential for big results.

Promote your interior design business online by zeroing in on your specialty, making a website, joining social media, writing a relevant and interesting blog and advertising online. Think of the Internet as a way to get your business’s name out there far more effectively than you could through things like TV ads and door-to-door campaigns. The Internet allows you to market subtly, effectively and affordably.

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Image from Flickr’s Creative Commons

About the Author: Annetta Milos is a contributing writer and a small-business owner. Annetta enjoys giving out internships to graduates from interior design schools in order for them to gain work experience in the industry.