How To Create An Interior Design Website That Books Clients
With a visual industry like interior design, you must present yourself well in all arenas, but particularly with your online presence. For many clients your website is where they’ll first encounter you, first dive in on your business, and eventually make up their minds about whether or not to reach out. So here’s what you need to know to create an interior design website that books clients (from a professional website designer).
This is not an exhaustive list, nor does it really dig down into the nitty gritty since every interior designer and interior design business is different. When I work with interior designers on their Showit Template Website Customizations or Custom Website Designs, that’s when we go deep on their business, the gap between their current and ideal clients, and how I can help them grow with web design. But this list is an excellent starting point.
If you’re working on the first website for your business or planning a relaunch, this list makes for an excellent checklist.
Interior Design Website Ideas That Keep Visitors On Your Website
1. Add quantifiable details about you and your business.
For as much as we protest the necessity of math and numbers in life, humans actually love using numbers to help make decisions. It’s hard to argue with facts. So, find a few spots to add quantifiable numbers about your business on your website.
For example, you can include a small canvas on your about page with a number breakdown: 89 Happy Clients, 417 Rooms Renovated, 5 States We’ve Worked In, etc. Numbers about your business can help clients understand your experience.
You can also use numbers to help clients understand the level of budgets you work with. So, if on a portfolio page, you share the number of days the renovation took, the number of days it included, and even the prices of a few items, you’re sharing to your website visitors the kind of projects you work on.
2. Include videos.
All websites have to fight back against short attention spans. It’s a bummer, but since we know the issue we can begin to solve it. Short attention spans lead to higher bounce rates (how quickly people leave your website), and higher bounce rates can negatively affect your SEO.
Keep people on your interior design business website by adding videos. These can be background videos with text overlaid or informational videos where you’re speaking directly to visitors. Either way, video captivates attention and keeps people engaged in your site.
3. Show your process, don’t just tell us about it.
I love when clients, especially interior designers, share their work process. Those of us who’ve decided we like your work now want to know what it will be like working with you.
It’s a great idea to actually write out your process (and please ALWAYS include it in your client portal or onboarding workflow), but showing it to us as well is phenomenal. Include a photo (or better yet a video) of you executing each step of your process. You can show paperwork or what a meeting or textile selection looks like; anything to help clients envision themselves in the process of working with you.
4. Share curated recommendations about your favorite items and brands.
We all buy off the internet. And we all buy based on recommendations. If you’ve got an interesting or niche selection of items you are evangelical about, share it!
Work with a website designer to find a beautiful way of sharing these items on your website. It will help keep people interested, and if you plan properly, could lead to passive affiliate sales.
5. Include a quiz.
Quizzes are trending in website design, but because of their excellent ROI they may become mandatory. A website designer (ahem, like myself) can help you create an interactive quiz on your website that pertains to your industry.
A quiz can help clients figure out which of your services they need, and then direct them to contact you (increasing your conversions). Or you could include an interior design style quiz on your website where visitors don’t get their results until they share their email address.
Interior Design Website Ideas To Help Conversions
1. Don’t just share, but highlight, testimonials from previous clients.
Testimonials and praise from complete strangers makes an unbelievable difference in your conversion rate. Be sure that a testimonial or carousel of testimonials is included on every relevant page of your website.
And don’t just include them, make them quick and easy to read. Your website should highlight testimonials and make them easy to skim. (Remember those short attention spans.)
2. Include powerful calls to action on every page.
If always given my way, I would require my clients to include a CTA (call to action) on every web page of their site. These are usually sections near the end of a web page that directs visitors to contact you. While the bottom of a page is always a great place to include a CTA, you want to regularly and organically include them in your web copy. Buttons and links can be added throughout your website encouraging people to reach out to you or book you today.
Work with a copywriter on calls to action! This is seriously an artform.
3. Make it easy for potential clients to reach you.
You must have a working contact form. That’s the first hurdle that so many websites miss. Test your contact form regularly if you are unable to tell on the backend that it’s working.
Next, that contact form cannot have 20 fields that are all required. That’s a barrier that you’re needlessly placing in front of a potential client. Make it so easy and stress-free for people to reach you. I recommend no more than 7 fields and only their name and email should be required.
Finally, put your business email address near the contact form (or in the footer of your website). Some people hate forms. Some people want to type you a novel about their need. Make it easy for these people to reach you.
4. Offer an irresistible benefit they receive if they sign up for your newsletter.
The trade off you provide a website visitor in exchange for their email address is called a lead magnet. What it really is is a second chance.
If you’re not able to convert someone into a client during their website visit, maybe you can convert them later. But you can’t do that until you’ve got a way to reach them. Offer an irresistible lead magnet. It’s got to be a good one, something that solves a problem for your ideal client.
Now, you have their email address and can send out excellent newsletters that help them learn to trust you and hopefully lead to a conversion down the line.
5. Create a path to your contact page via multiple places.
We’ve established you need a contact form, and we want to make sure you get people to it. I recommend including a link to your contact page or form in your main navigation, website footer, and then any time you conclude a section about your services or working with you.
After the biography on your About page, include a button to the contact page (“Work With Me”). After a section about the multiple services or after each service description, include a button to the contact page (“Let’s Get Started”). While it would be a delight if everyone would look through every page of your website, we know that it’s a pipe dream. Instead, we want to catch them wherever they’ve decided to join us and always be directing them to make contact with us.
Interior Design Website Inspiration (Personal Favorites)
This is a chic and welcoming interior design website for a design firm based in Nashville. When Aimee and I first talked about the design for her website, she wanted something that felt minimal, but still informed her potential clients on her services, focused on the images of her work, and could incorporate an online shop in the future.
2. Selah-Vie
This website is the definition of minimalism and focusing on encouraging client inquiries. Selah-Vie offers a number of interior design services serving a wide range of clients and needed a website that could speak to a wide audience. We kept the design streamlined and welcoming to potential clients no matter their needs and budget.
Working with Anna on her brand and website design for sustainable interior design business, Motiv Interiors, was so inspiring. She is incredibly dedicated to design that promotes green living and sustainability practices, so I created a brand and website that helps visitors understand her passion and her design skills.
Interior design will always be an evolving industry because it’s so personal. But, because of that, one thing will never change- your website will matter. Your website will help people understand your, your business, your aesthetic, and if they want to work with you. Your website will be personal to them. These methods to help you create an interior design website that books clients will help you relate to website visitors and keep them around long enough to reach out to you.
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Quietly doing good work in my own little corner of the internet.
Having been a visual artist for over 10 years, I know that every part of a brand (even the parts that are often unseen) deserve to be expressed with honesty and beauty. I am happiest standing behind the scenes, creating every design and detail for focused and intentional business owners. I created EP Design to stand beside visionaries and thought leaders who are fueled by joy.
