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Hi, everyone! (New member)

borntostageborntostage subscriber Posts: 1
edited October 2006 in Marketing
Hello!
My name is Becki and I`m a new member.  Last spring, I completed a home staging course and since then I`ve been trying to get my new business off the ground.  I`ve had the opportunity of staging a few homes and the results were fantastic!  One was for a realtor that asked for graduates of our class to stage a home on the market (at no cost to her).  A few of us agreed to stage it so that we could gain experience and it sold a week later! 
The second home was a vacant that had been on the market for a month.  I staged it with another student and it sold in just 4 days!  We kept the costs low as the client (the homeowner) was on a tight budget, so, we didn`t earn much profit.  Overall, it was a good trial run and we learned a lot about staging a vacant property! 
Last week, I teamed up with another new stager and we approached a realtor about staging a vacant property that had tons of potential.  We`ve decided to work together as a team and want to get our names out there!  The past month was rather quiet in the real estate market (after a HOT spring/summer market) and we`re hoping to generate more business in the near future.  We realize that "word of mouth" is such an important tool in advertising and hope we can get some good feedback from our current staging "job".  The realtor is about to relist the house since it`s been on the market (vacant) for nearly 2 months.  We`re keeping our fingers crossed that it sells quickly!  We purchased a lot of our own furnishings and accessories for this particular house and we don`t want to tie up our inventory for too long.
Can anyone offer some advice as to marketing ideas?  We`ve tried a few ideas and hope that they turn into leads, but, things have been a little slow.
Thanks!
I look forward to hearing about all of you!
Becki

Comments

  • borntostageborntostage subscriber Posts: 1
    Hi, Craig.
    Thanks for the welcome!  I found the posts from the archive thread you`re referring to and actually meant to send my reply in response to those.  I realized that this site works a little differently than others I`ve participated in and think I`ve figured it out!
    Thanks again,
    Becki
     
     
  • virtualchaosvirtualchaos subscriber Posts: 0
    Hi Becky,
    I`m in the sign industry and work exclusively with with real estate.  All of our clients have interior decorators that "stage" their models.  My suggestion for you would be to locate companies in your area that do condominiums -- preferrably the smaller outfits. 
    One way to locate them is to review the newspaper -- look for the smaller ads that are often black and white.  They should have a name of a marketing company -- that is whom you want to contact.  The marketing company not only provides signage, advertising, brochures, etc., they arrange for the staging of the unit.
    Most home builders also use stagers for their model homes.  Don`t start with the big boys but build a reputation with the smaller builders. 
    Also, it is very important to take some very good photographs of your work for your portfolio.
    Hope this helps -- good luck!
    Daye
    Perception Is Everything...Expand the Possiblities...
     
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