208 | LIVE from the How To Summit: Marketing Your Professional Organizing Business
Fresh from the How To Summit in Austin, Texas, we are diving into a live recording of a marketing panel I moderated--featuring Blair Nastri of Erin Condren, and organizers Liz Wann and Cindy Huzenmen. We are talking about ALLLLLL things marketing for professional organizers--including concentrating on marketing, authenticity, and consistency in building a business.
Key takeaways include personalized marketing strategies, leveraging customer loyalty, and the value of consistent effort.
TIMESTAMPS:
00:42 Recap of the How To Summit in Austin
01:46 Introducing the Marketing Panel
03:52 Panel Discussion: Marketing Strategies for Organizers
14:33 The Importance of Authenticity in Marketing
27:06 Consistency and Focus in Business
You can listen here, read the full transcript below, or find us on Apple, Spotify, or anywhere you love to listen to podcasts!
LINKS FOR LISTENERS
We have a brand new FREE workshop called How Professional Organizers Can Get Clients WITHOUT Using Social Media which you can get any time! Head over to poroadmap.com and check it out!
Connect with Melissa and Pro Organizer Studio: CLICK HERE
If you are interested in our Inspired Organizer® program, you can find us at www.inspiredorganizer.com and don't forget, we have a whole library of podcasts here, our YouTube channel, and you can find us on Facebook and Instagram at Pro Organizer Studio.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Hey, pro organizers! My name is Melissa Klug and you are listening to the Pro Organizer Studio Podcast. Professional organizing changed my entire life. After 20 years of working at huge companies, I started working for myself. I opened a professional organizing business, grew it to six figures, and I never looked back.
Now I get to spend all day every day teaching organizers around the world how to find clients, how to market and sell yourselves, how to turn this business into what you want it to be. Whether you have been in business for 15 minutes or 15 years, you have a home at Pro Organizer Studio. I'm excited that you're here.
Let's get started.
Melissa Klug: Hey everybody. I am pretty sure that we probably have some new listeners this week. Because I just returned from Austin, Texas, where I was at the, How To Summit. This is my second summit and it was awesome. First of all, it was exhausting and just the absolute best ways, you know, there's weekends where you're like talking nonstop.
Because you have so many fun, new, interesting people to meet. And I just was able to meet so many people that I maybe have only interacted with online. And I'm just so grateful to everyone who was there. I gave a presentation on Saturday. And it was awesome to get feedback from that. And if you are a new friend of mine from the How To Summit, please remember to reach out to me. You can email me at hello@proorganizerstudio.com or DM me on Instagram. And I would love to keep in touch with you also, if you were at the summit and you didn't come up and say hi, or, I had a couple of people that are like, oh, I didn't get a chance to catch you—please reach out to me on social or on email. I would love to chat with you.
Here's what we're doing on the podcast today. I'm giving you like a little bit of bonus. I did a panel at the summit with Blair Nastri who's the head of marketing for Erin Condren with Liz Wann and Cindy Huzenmen who are professional organizers. And I was able to record it.
And I wanted to give that to you if you weren't able to be there, or if you were there, but you want to revisit some of the things we talked about. So before we get started, though, I will say this is a live recording and I did as much audio magic as I could, but there, it definitely is not the typical sound quality that I would love.
I just urge you to kind of stick with it. The first couple minutes are maybe a little dicey and you're going to be like, Melissa, I cannot believe that you put this into my ears today, but just stick with it. Um, it definitely gets better and there is some really great content that I want to make sure that if you weren't able to be at the summit, that you're able to feel like you were there a little bit, also just FYI.
The summit next year is going to be in Dallas, Texas around the same timeframe and the, um, kind of mid to late September timeframe. So mark it on your calendar because it's just the most uplifting, wonderful event to be around such awesome organizers. The reason I was exhausted. It's because I came home.
I was like 70 billion ideas of things I wanted to do and, you know, people that I wanted to connect with and everything. So I really would love for you guys to make it a, to put it on your calendar for next year. All right. So here is the marketing panel. Again, please stick with me on the audio. I swear it gets better. And you get half an hour of marketing expertise from some great professional organizers and from a professional marketer.
And also just really quickly before I forget. I have a brand new free workshop. It is called how professional organizers can get clients without social media. And you can get that at poroadmap.com. And if you want me to send you a link, you can DM me on Instagram, or you can send me an email and I will get you into that.
All right. Have a wonderful day organizers.
Brandie Larsen: Alright, we are so excited about this next session. Blair Nastri is the head of marketing for Erin Condren. She has years of experience in the marketing world and is bringing that wealth of knowledge to us today. Joining her on stage is Liz Wann, Melissa Klug, and Cindy Huzenman. Let's give it a warm, healthy, gentle welcome right
Melissa Klug: now.
I love you. I love you right back. Okay. Is this on? Okay. While we're, while we're gathering and sitting, I just want to tell you guys a super quick, super quick story. So last night, we had a gathering of all of our the. Lovely people that came here with me, and we're in the Westin bar, and at the end of the night, I'm like signing my, signing my check, and I just say to the bartender, , hey, thanks, I know there were like a lot of people here, and it's like a lot for you guys to handle, you probably weren't ready for it, and he's like, No, he's like, everyone's like, really nice, and they're all just in this really orderly line
like, nobody ever does
Speaker: that!
Melissa Klug: And I was like, well, dude, but here's the deal. We're all professional organizers. And he goes, yeah, someone told me that, but I didn't think they were serious. And I was like, no, we're a very orderly group of people. Anyway. I am so happy to be here. I'm honored to be here, moderating this panel about marketing.
And, yes, we can clap for marketing. Before I do, can we do 20 second introductions of everyone? Who you are, what you do.
Cindy: I am Cindy, from Cindyology,. I'm originally from Panama. But I've been in the United States, Miami, Florida, for about 27 years.
It's nice meeting you all, and like, nice to see you.
Liz Wann: My name is Liz, and I am from Orange County, California. I run Coastal Organizing Company, and I'm so excited to be here again. I've only missed one Home+Sort conference, and It's because I had a baby two days before the conference. I literally was planning on going and getting it, because I would have a baby at
Melissa Klug: the conference.
Blair Nastri: Hi, I'm Blair I am the head of marketing for Erin Condren. I live here in Austin, Texas, but I'm originally from Los Angeles. Born and raised in LA. Woo! Yeah, just got here two years ago. I am super excited to be here to talk about marketing.
I've been with Erin Condren for over ten years. Started as a consumer and then joined the brand side. Super excited to be here to talk about all those kind of things.
Melissa Klug: Fantastic. Okay, what I want to start with is Blair, we're going to get a How to Summit MBA. Can you give us, this may sound like we're starting simply, but a definition of what marketing is, and what's the difference between marketing and sales for small business owners?
Blair Nastri: Marketing would be how you can describe the result and the value that you create.
I would say The most important thing about marketing would be what is, knowing how to clearly identify your brand, and what differentiates you from other brands. What is your competitive advantage, if you will. If you can't tell me in one sentence what you do, and why you do it well, and why you do it differently than other people, That's going to be really hard to make a sale.
You need to, in marketing, you need to market yourself efficiently in order to get the sale. The sale can't come unless you can efficiently market. That's kind of the biggest difference. In marketing, in marketing you might kind of get the bad rap sometimes. It's like a soft skill. When I was getting my MBA, a lot of people were not good at marketing.
And I If people don't know, it's that it's the print that's gonna be a lot of the other stuff. It's extremely important for you to close sales, see results, and really be able to differentiate yourself on the market.
Melissa Klug: When I was in business school there was a guy who was like a heavy manufacturing guy, and he legit said like, we don't need people like you.
I make the things, I actually do something, and I'm like, no one's gonna buy your things if you don't have me. And he was a jerk, but anyway. Yeah, no, that's pretty good. And I also like what you said about, if you can't explain what you do in one sentence. A lot of people call that an elevator pitch, but you have to say it really simply,
Liz and Cindy, can you tell us, what does marketing mean in your business?
Cindy: Marketing for me, it may feel a little different. I use social media as my main marketing. 85 percent of my business comes from social media.
Sorry. It's okay, we can still be friends., it's alright. But, marketing, you know, has to go on. We have to put 100 percent of ourselves, not only face it on social media, because it doesn't work for all. It's, I agree 100 percent with what you said yesterday, what works for me may not work for you. We're in different times, it's an ever changing platform.
Use as much as you can. I didn't use social media when I started. I went door to door, literally knocking. I went on kitchen companies, I went on closet companies. I said use me, let me try. I'll work for free in your company. I'll do your styling on your business. You can, you know, you can sell me to new customers.
I went on a container store. I started 13 years ago and we didn't have a container store in Miami until like, 8 years ago. When I finally got mine, I knocked on that door and I said, Please, hire me.
Tell all your clients. I would walk around The Container Store asking people, Do you, do you need an organizer?? And, and I did. And one of the things that actually worked for me was in one of those kitchen companies. I said, I have an idea for you. You know, try me. And when you sell these 150, 000, 200, 000, these very expensive kitchens, rather than just giving them a bottle of champagne, give me a cigarette.
I am worth more, but you don't have to pay that much, at least try me, and, you know, to say thank you to your client, give me, and try me. And that worked amazing, because I not only got clients, but I also got designers, architects, and all of them getting to know me
Melissa Klug: I just want to say, I feel like you should be really careful when you say give me as a gift.
Oh, well, I meant it. Everyone else was thinking it, I just said it. I
Cindy: speak Spanish, that's my first language.
Liz Wann: Take it as it comes.
Okay, so when it comes to marketing, I know a lot of people get overwhelmed. I want to let you know, it really is simple. It really is. You just have to do something. So I think a lot of times it's easy to be like, Oh, I'm trying to do that because it makes me feel uncomfortable or it just feels like it's so overwhelming.
So when I market my business, I do it simply. I create a flyer, and then you can create the same flyer, you just change the wording. And then I do something with that flyer. I do direct mail marketing. So I write letters to people and know that they're gonna get with it. I connect with other business owners in my area, so your community is really important.
So I connect with business owners in the community to let them know about our services and how we can help them. You kind of have to do a lot of things.
I am on social media, but that is not an end all be all. You can get business without that. But you have to kind of do a lot of things. But it really isn't that complicated. You just have to do it and stay consistent. That's my biggest thing when it comes to success, is just have to be consistent.
And if someone's not returning your emails, or your texts, or whatever, Or whatever you're doing, just keep trying. It's not a no, until they say no. I'm like, one of those people where I'm like, Okay, I know it's going to be like, rejection hurts, right? When someone's not returning your phone calls. I always say, Oh my gosh, they must have died! Because they haven't returned a single email, phone call, or text message.
That's the only explanation. That's the key context.
And then, it all responds. You
Melissa Klug: just have to keep going. Blair, obviously, you work with, I assume, a lovely budget at Erin Condren, which means maybe a little bit more than some of the budgets that we are working with. Can you give us some options, or maybe some of the things that you do at Erin Condren, but how can we use those things to our advantage as professional organizers.
Blair Nastri: Yeah and, so I started 11 plus years ago. And when I started in the LA office, it was very small. The brand was very small. The team was very small. 20 of us. We didn't start paid advertising until the 2017 era. And this was, you know, 2013.
All of our marketing efforts were much different than they are now. So I've been able to see us kind of scale them. But at the start of it, what we would do with things like stationery, for example. If you have anything that you're getting out, and you don't have, you know, a significant margin on that product.
If we were printing stationary notecards and we were selling them in a set of 20, let's say, or 24, we would throw in 5 extra because the cost of that paper was not substantial enough that surprise and delight outweigh the cost. So if you can give extra, if you can do something to surprise and delight them that's not gonna really affect your bottom line, absolutely do it.
We would write handwritten letters and customer orders for their orders. If you can reward loyalty and make them feel special and seen and appreciated, that goes a long way. And when you build a customer's loyalty from the start, that is invaluable. If you can keep them loyal to you and keep them coming back.
I would say things like that. If you can really go above and beyond and have that. we have a really good incredible customer experience from the start. That's going to serve you well for years down the line because people like to talk about, you know, they love to feel special and they like to tell other people about that happening to them and so that would be important now.
That really worked well for us. We also give like, refer a a friend to pay it forward cards in order to try to encourage them to tell other people. Obviously, we're a stationery company, so everything that we had was branded with our name on it, so that was another reason. It was like, give them more.
They send a letter to their friend and their friend likes the stationery. It has our logo on it. Like, it was kind of free marketing for us, so a lot of that sort of, that kind of mentality really in the early days worked really well for us and definitely helped. And I would say in like today's climate, because things were obviously different then in terms of social media and things like that, if you can trade services for, you know, a post, if you don't have the money to pay someone, I know a lot of content creators want and should be compensated for their, for, you know, their content.
But if you can't do that, if you offer to organize something for them, give them free products, let them try you out and not pay you, Authenticity is so key right now in all content, so even though somebody is gifted, if they weren't paid for their content, I still think that authenticity breaks through in what I'm creating.
So those are a couple different things I think we've done along the way before we had a large budget that really added impact. Can you talk
Melissa Klug: a little bit more about authenticity? Because that's a word that I'm kind of obsessed with these days. And like, just talk about its role in business and how personal that you can be and how authentic you can be and why that's important.
I
Blair Nastri: mean, I think, you know, we're, it's such a tough line to straddle We're like, we're trying not to be overly consumer and, but we're still trying to make sales. So it's like, how do you push people to buy things that are maybe discretionary? They don't absolutely need, but it's, it's really hard to try to do that. Right. And I think we're realizing as people are being more aware of this culture and trying to not just push something on Amazon that people should buy.
Like, how do I authentically tell them like, no, you're buying this one planner, right? service, whatever, because it's going to serve you every single day to make your life easier, better, more productive, less stressful. It's a one time investment in a year round return on your own productivity and happiness.
And when we distill that message, and I talk to, like, our affiliate group, People that are creating content, and like, I don't need you to just be saying, Oh, they just launched new pens, they just launched new notebooks. I don't want you to be pushing every single thing, because it's not authentic that someone's ready to buy every time they drop a new product.
But if you can authentically tell them, Hey, this is the one purchase I made last year that I have zero regrets, because I am Way less stress, I'm on top of my schedule, I'm productive, I'm happy, that I believe. And so I say, be as authentic as you can in your content, because we are no longer believing that we need to buy every single thing that people are pushing with their link in bio.
Authenticity is absolutely essential, and I think That translates to just better sales and a better response in general.
Melissa Klug: This is a really specific question, but How do you do the balance of like the hard selling? So like, you know, let's just say it's a social media poster or it's something that you're doing.
What is your line between just, we're doing a post to do a post, or we're doing something just to say, here's who we are versus, I want to tell you about this thing that I have
Blair Nastri: that you can buy. I mean, it's, it's really, really hard, and for us, where we kind of draw the lines, like, we don't do, and this is a very arbitrary line, and for us, like, we don't do in key posts that are, like, a graphic that just is advertising a sale.
I never want you to just see, like, 25 percent off. When you're scrolling on our feed. Some people on our team will argue, we don't think you should, because we want them to see it, and we want them to go to the website. And we're like, of course. But I also want them to be getting something valuable. If they're on our feed, if they're scrolling, if they're being served in their for you page, I want them to get something educational about it.
We need to be giving them something valuable. That's it. A hack, a way that they can get more out of using this product than just a flat sell. Because to me, there's so much content out there, I need them to, to see something valuable and have that grab them. And then, bonus points if they realize there's a sale, but social media for us is not a huge revenue driver.
It's very different obviously for different channels, but for us specifically, it's much more of a education, You know, sort of bottom, bottom funnel, trying to like get them to, to bring awareness, understanding. So we approach it a little bit differently. I love that.
Melissa Klug: Okay, so I am also obsessed with what I call analog marketing.
So you have both discussed it. Handwriting notes, things like that, some of these non digital marketing efforts. Can you talk about this?
Liz Wann: Yeah, I, I feel like personalizing it is so important.
It's the fact that authenticity, connection, that human touch that I miss a lot these days. And so like, after, it's easy. After you have a consultation with someone, whether it's on the phone or in person, take five minutes and write them a handwritten note and put it in the mail. And I promise you, either they may not hire you because they can't afford you, but they're going to tell all of their friends about you.
Like, that's going to mean more to them. than someone else, right? It is so valuable to do something like that, it is thoughtful. Every time we go to a Project 2, we leave a handwritten note, thank you note, and a little gift. But in marketing, you make it personal, right? Like, we used to leave branded cookies, and they would be like, oh, what a hard day it was, and now they're drinking their coffee, and they're like but they do a special and there's a new picture, so it's just that little added touch that we have a connection and have that relationship and we're going to continue to come back because we're different, because we're human and we're showing them that human side.
So I think it's old school, honestly it really Works.. And we even leave posters after we finish a project. Take ten minutes, walk the neighborhood, drop flyers, and it says, I just organized a neighbor's home. Because those neighbors aren't going to be talking. Who's their home organized? Tell me about it. Like, you gotta be creative, and it's really that simple.
Get some exercise.
Melissa Klug: I don't like calling it old fashioned, I like calling it vintage. That makes it more special, Cindy, I know that you are marvelous. You're an amazing, amazing online presence. Do you have any analog things that you do, or do you keep everything online? Well, dinosaur, you're not a dinosaur. I
Cindy: write, I write these, everything.
I don't even have a digital. I do the cookie thing. I, I give a gift. I give them incentives to call me again to. And more than that, I build a relationship. It's very important. I know there's people that, like to walk in a house and do goals and, like, the house is magically organized, and kind of, you know, disappear, but I, I don't.
I make a presence because most of the response from my client is, We miss you. We miss you and your team, when you say that the, the energy that you guys brought to this house was incredible. So I try to build that relationship. I speak to them. I, I mean, I don't become friends, or I don't have a wife, but I could if they asked me to.
But it's, it's kind of like building that relationship because not only will they call you back, but they will tell their friends, they will tell their neighbors, they will tell everybody. And also, like I said, we don't have to give them a discount, but I do tell them, you know, if you tell five friends, I'll give you whatever, 15 percent off the next thing.
Kind of like that. They, they do do it. They actually do it. And I've seen the difference when we don't, when we have to rush out of a project, we have something nice, and I forget to do that. I see, I see the difference, yeah.
Melissa Klug: So this is another How To Summit an MBA question for Blair, but the, the difference between the cost of acquisition of a brand new client versus an existing client.
I think one of the things organizers need to think about is how do you leverage people who have already used your
Blair Nastri: services? Can you talk a little bit about that? Yeah, so the cost of acquiring a new customer is significantly more expensive than a returning customer. If you can leverage, that we are constantly trying to leverage is like, and also the AOV, like your average order value in our suite, but how much they're going to spend with you, is dramatically going to increase if they get a second purchase.
So like, if they come back for a second organization project, and they come back to you multiple times, their lifetime value is going to grow exponentially. Managing that loyalty and trying to keep them loyal to you is extremely important. And, you know, when you have to worry about winning them back, you know, retention, last customers, winning them back on the e commerce side, that's an extremely expensive project.
So you want to keep them active, even if they're not currently active. Working on a project with you, just keeping them warm. I don't know if you send Christmas cards or how you keep them engaged or remembering who you are, but that is crucial that they don't forget that you are top of mind, because it just, the longer it goes, you know, the more expensive it's going to be, the harder it will be to get them back in the funnel.
Melissa Klug: You talked a little bit about referrals, do you have any sort of like active referral program with existing clients referring other people?
Liz Wann: I did in the beginning, I think a lot of times too, as you grow in your business, it's okay to make changes. It's okay to say, that worked for me then, it doesn't work for me now.
So in the beginning, I, my first, This client situation that I got was because I asked my first client, I asked her to post on the mom's Facebook group in her neighborhood. It's like a very active page. And I asked her, can you please include some photos? If you do this, I will give you $30 off. I don't know what I was doing.
$30 off your bill. She did it. And I got 10 clients from it. So I had ten paid clients for it. Then again, when I got those ten clients, I said, can you guys, and I had, I'll say, can you guys write a review and put photos on your Facebook page and help me get $50 off? Right? They did. That was my referral program, and I kept on doing it, and so my first six months, I was slammed because I asked, and they did it, and I used a referral program, fifty dollars, not a big deal at the time for, you know, then to be incentivized.
Now, I don't I work with other businesses, you know, closet companies, or garages, and we refer each other to business but I don't. discount my services anymore. But there's a time and a place where you may need to do that, and that often will in
front of us.
Cindy: Well, I, I reach out. I, I knock on doors. I've, I've always done it and no matter how many years I'm in the business, I still do it because there's always room to grow.
And what I think is that we should never be afraid because the worst thing that can happen when we talk about this is to say no. And, and, and, and no, it's, it's a window closed but then another door opens. So I've never been afraid to reach out whether it's, you know. On social media, or just an email, or somebody that I saw.
Even an interview on TV, I go, you know what, I'm gonna reach out to everybody. It's easy, Google right now will get you anywhere. I find an email, I find the company, I find whoever it is that I need to find, and I say, hey, by the way, this is me. Look at me, I have social media, I have a website, I have a history.
Hire me!? I want to
Liz Wann: share one funny story when you mention that. You know, the whole thing about asking.
You just gotta ask.
You gotta go big. I remember my first year, I was sitting and I was watching The Bachelorette. I don't watch that show anymore, but at the time I did.
And I was watching The Bachelorette and I told my husband, I don't want to organize that girl's house. Because I think she's awesome and I would love to be her friend. It's And he's like, okay, so I'm like, watching the show, and I send her a DM on Instagram. I was year one, I had never done a partnership or anything, knowing what I was doing.
I just wanted to be your friend. DM, he makes this laugh, and he's like, yeah, right, she's not going to respond. And then I like, I started looking on social, and you know, a couple days later, nothing happened, like, okay, whatever. Then I'm like, I'm just going to email her. So I email, nothing. Four months later, I got a call.
And I helped her. I laughed at my husband, hey, you said I couldn't do this, and look what I did. Because I asked. And then I did it multiple other times to people that I thought would never respond to me. And they responded. Because I asked. It's just as simple as watching a show and typing in a message.
And I, on my phone, will keep a message that I think is very, like, personal, and kind, and nice, and I have a draft on my phone. It's not in line somewhere, because you're always in line somewhere, or waiting in a bar somewhere. I copy and paste into Instagram. Use Instagram as a tool for marketing. It doesn't have to be something that you're on every day.
Use it as a tool. I will reach out to the top of the top builders in my area, send them the DM, and then we will schedule a time for coffee for that. Then I start following them, and I'll message them about nothing to do with organizing. And then we become friends on Instagram. Never met in person, and so we scheduled out, you know, in person time to talk, and now they refer me business.
Sometimes I don't even have a chance to meet them, but I send them packages and we talk a lot on Instagram. They send me business, because I asked for it. It's just that simple, you know?
Melissa Klug: Well, that kind of leads into something. We had a very lively conversation yesterday, the three of us.
So I probably should have just recorded it. It was really good. It was really good, you guys. But, Blair, can you talk to us a little bit, actually, all three of you talk to us a little bit about the concept of consistency. And one of the things that I see a lot, and I hear a lot, and we talked about it was you know, you don't have enough clients, you're not feeling good about your business.
What have you done today? What have you done in line for coffee? Whatever. Can
Blair Nastri: you talk about consistency? Yeah for us it's obviously a little bit different, but making sure that we Like, when I hear consistency on the income side, because my job really involves making sure that no matter what channel you're getting an ad, you're getting an email, you're getting a text, you're on a website, no matter what channel you're on, you are getting a consistent, sane, cohesive brand experience, brand message, brand viewpoints.
So that's what I'm looking for, is like, I'm making sure that my team is delivering the right message to the right audience. that they're all being consistent with what we want you to understand. But from a consistency side, are we doing all the things that we should be doing to get business? I would say, like, when we were starting out and we were smaller, it looked, it looked a lot like, for me at least, running our numbers, revenue were we at at 10 a.M. that day? What could we do to get more revenue that day? So was it like, okay, we need to post something on social in order to hit our numbers that we will not see, that, like, we want to see? So I'm going to talk a little bit about this collection, have you sent an email, should we maybe do a smaller email to our top customers, like our Rose Gold Loyalty Program, and not even do a design email, but just do like a personal email that's like, hey, what did you do here for me, we want something new, let me know, we did a lot of like, Personal shopping at the start when we had these big customers and we were a smaller business.
And for many years, even when we grew, these customers still thought they could just, like, email us to order. And it's like, who's going to tell them? But we would do that a lot. We would, fulfill orders for people. Like, they could just place on the website. You could just do it for them for years.
Just trying to make sure that you are checking all those boxes and really, on her side, what you said about the Bachelorette story reminded me, I tell my team, I'm like, if there's a pie in the sky, influencer, someone you feel like really needs to be telling, her 5 million followers about Eric Conner and the Planners and everything that she's using for her kids, I'm like, We know her kids names.
Send a box to her office. We can't get her, we can't find her home address because she's not responding. Her office is public. We know where her office is. Send a box of planners and kids planners and personalized handwriting notepads for her kindergartner. Like, make it thoughtful. Make it very apparent that we did the research and we customized a beautiful personalized package.
For her family, worst case scenario, someone in her office takes it home and uses our notebooks and I'm like, best case scenario, she's touched and her kids like it and she posts about it and 5 million people could potentially see it. We always will try to do something, but when you We customize it when we make it, you know, special, the possibility of it a return is much bigger.
And I totally deviated from your question. No, it's great. You can take it if you want. I don't care.
Melissa Klug: How about consistency? What does consistency look like? Look like in your professional organizing?
Liz Wann: It's everything. It really is. And it's one of those concepts that I think, again, can feel overwhelming because it's really just that simple.
Just gotta do a little bit every single day, right? And maybe it's at lunchtime if you're on a project and you don't have time to do it before or after. That's what I would always do when I was in projects. I'd be texting and calling people at lunch whatever you gotta do, you know?
But consistency is really important and you just can't stop because once you take your foot off the gas, you're going to see and it's going to affect your business. So it's just slow and steady but it's important.
Cindy: I think that consistency also needs to be focus of what we saw, again, that great conversation, the shoe show, where we were first.
It's, it's about focus, but I, and I say from personal experience, I focus on one million things at a time. I said, oh, I want to be there, and I want to do this, and I want to grow into this, and I want to get to do this, and I want to do everything at the same time. And I accomplished. Absolutely nothing. So I think the consistency is also focusing on that one priority in doing that.
And once you get to do that, then follow for the rest. Because otherwise, even though we are super organized, I don't think that our brain is capable of accomplishing all that. Though we're very ambitious, I don't think we make it. And congratulations to the one that made it all at the same time. Three's a lot to me, three somethings.
Because it's hard. So I think that focus, be consistent on that when you accomplish that goal, go for the next.
Melissa Klug: I
Cindy: would also say
Melissa Klug: too, like, there are a million things you could do. And it's very easy to say, oh my gosh, I'm so overwhelmed, her favorite word. Because there are a million things I could do, and so then you do none of the things.
You do zero of the things instead of just one of the things. There are so many things to pick from. How do you decide what are the things that you want to do? And what are the things that are going to get the priority time?
Blair Nastri: On my side, it's looking at the return. Like, what possibly, like, yes, we've all scrambled to include a marketing card, and we've seen that this literally happened a couple days ago.
I was, like, asked to, you know, fast track with a marketing card, that we could include a pop up every day. And I was like, okay, what is this gonna pull, what resources do I have to pull my team off of to make this happen, what is the potential return of this card, does it absolutely have to happen for this game, this season, you know, this started a couple weeks ago.
And so you kind of have to weigh, like, what would you be missing out on if you took time off to do that. And what potential return could you see there? But it is hard, and I would say, on the overwhelmed side of things, this is my pitch, my personal pitch for a paper planner, if you're not using them, because that's how I have to holistically, like, obviously I use a digital calendar, we all do, but like, I have to physically write.
If I know I I have a ton of stuff going on that week, I have to physically see how I'm going to break it down into each day, and then how many things I have in that day, because that is how my brain works, and that is the only way that I can see how I will possibly get things, because otherwise we will just absolutely spin, so that's personal pitch.
That everybody needs to use a paper planner. Yeah.
Melissa Klug: And you, if you write everything down, you can have a breakdown more easily about how many things you have to do and visual. Right. So sort of like the Oscars, we are being played off the stage with silent music, but I just wanna say I came up with a great idea.
You guys wanna hear it? Okay. In the analog marketing thing, which I really do love you can buy. from Erin Condren, a Home+Sort Planner. Leave a lovely note for your clients at the end of their project, and then they have a paper planner from our lovely hosts. Your store is beautiful, by the way, so beautiful.
And then you can leave your clients all that nice, nice stuff to keep them organized and remind them that you're around, all right. Can I say, can I
Cindy: say something? Absolutely. I don't think I've spoken enough. Thank you so much. Off topic, I just want to say thank you to our hosts. I know it's been said, but this is incredible.
I've been here with them. I've been here, and I've seen these girls grow and be the nicest, most humblest people in the world. They ask all of us for feedback. They implement it the year after. They are incredible and I am eternally thankful to them for being so special. They are the loveliest human beings
Melissa Klug: Yeah, alright, well thank you. Thank you guys so much.
I have a brand new free workshop called how professional organizers can get clients without using social media. It is available on demand 24 seven at poroadmap.com.
That is a wrap on this week's Pro Organizer Studio Podcast. I will see you next week. Have a great day, organizers!
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