Two ways to make your design business more profitable (without having to find more clients)
Here’s a problem that lots designers struggle with.
✅ They are getting clients
✅ They have projects to work on
✅ They are always busy (sometimes too busy)
✅ Their business is bringing in revenue
But despite all this:
❌ the business runs on low profit margins
❌ the owner of the business takes home very little wage/salary (especially for the amount of time and effort they put in to the business).
Normally there’s two main reasons for this and the good news is that both are pretty easy fixes!
In this post I share two ways you can increase the profit in your business today - without having to go out and find more clients.
It’s simpler than you think to increase your profit
Most people overcomplicate running a business.
They think that increasing profit relies on:
🤔 finding more clients
🤔 implementing complicated sales funnels
🤔 generating more leads
🤔 launching more products/services
🤔 diversifying to other markets
🤔 other complicated strategies
And sometimes those strategies are exactly what a business needs - but more often than not people try and implement the strategies above BEFORE they have optimised their existing business to ensure they are maximising profit.
So if you have a business that is already bringing in revenue and the core problem you face right now is that your profits are low then there are two incredibly simple ways to immediately increase profit in your business.
And that is to:
charge more for the products and services you are already offering
reduce your expenses
And if you combine both of these strategies you’ve got an even more powerful way to immediately increase profit today without having to kill yourself finding more clients or doing other complicated strategies.
Don’t overcomplicate what you are doing!!
If your business is bringing in revenue but it isn’t as profitable as you would like then make sure you look at the easy fixes first.
Go through the simple audit below to see what you can implement to increase your profit quickly and easily.
Method 1: Charge more for existing products/services
Almost every designer I know is undercharging for the work they are doing and the time they are putting in.
The simplest way to increase profits is to increase fees for the products and services you are already offering.
Here’s some things to think about as you strategically raise your prices:
✅ make sure you are selling the value and transformation you offer. The easiest way to confidently raise prices is to be able to talk about the value you are offering to your clients. The amount you can charge is directly related to how well you are able to explain this to your clients and how valuable they perceive what you are offering. Here are some ways to explain value in terms of things that people normally value:
how you save them money (e.g. by passing on all your trade discounts)
how you save them time (e.g. by doing the design work for them so they don’t have to worry about it)
how you save them making mistakes (e.g. you have done this so many times before - you know how to avoid common mistakes and save them money by not making those same mistakes)
how you do X, Y, Z that other designers don’t offer (your point of difference, what makes you stand out from others)
The best way to explain value is by understanding where your client is getting stuck.
why do they need you?
what problem are you solving for them?
why can’t they do it on their own?
Show how working with you solves these problems. The better you can sell this the more you can charge.
✅ make sure you are tracking your finances properly - e.g in a program like Xero - and that you are actually reviewing and analysing your finances regularly. Don’t put your head in the sand. If you are a business owner then you should be able to tell someone exactly how much your revenue and expenses are off the top of your head at any given moment. If you don’t know the numbers then how are you going to fix them?
✅ make sure you know which of your products/services make you the most money (tracking your finances will help you with this). Get rid of any that aren’t showing good results. Simplify your product offering and focus on what is actually working. Do more of what is working and less of what isn’t working!
✅ make sure you know the exact costs of service delivery - how much time are you REALLY spending delivering projects. If you don’t know then start tracking your time (Harvest is a great app for this). You can only charge accurately if you know how much time it takes to deliver a project. Think like a lawyer or accountant - track every part of your day in 15 minute increments. Where is your time really being spent?
✅ automate as much of your project delivery as possible. Spend time up front creating templates, checklists and SOPs (standard operating procedures) for any task that you are going to do more than once. It will take more time upfront but you’ll save yourself so much time later on by automating as much as you can.
✅ think about how you can reduce the time you are spending on existing client work (i.e. so the money you are making goes further). For example delegate or outsource low value tasks to a contractor (find people on Fiverr or Upwork as a way to get started with this).
✅ focus on your existing customers before you worry about finding new ones.
can you offer them additional services/products from your product suite?
how can you create an exceptional experience for them so they share your work with others (i.e. free advertising for you)
is there a way to implement a recurring revenue model to what you are offering to existing clients (e.g. membership program, packaging up hourly work, retainer models)
increase your fees for clients who are already on recurring packages
✅ charge for all of your time - don’t offer free consultations or free phone calls. All of your client facing time should be paid - you aren’t a charity and your advice and knowledge should always be paid for.
✅ ensure administration and other non-client facing work is built in to your fees/pricing model (e.g. driving time, phone calls, trips to suppliers to pick up samples etc.)
✅ learn to say no - don’t accept every client or every phone call or every meeting. Focus on the big picture and only accept high value clients that you know you are going to enjoy working with. It’s your business and you are allowed to love what you are doing.
✅ do a reverse sale - i.e. give people notice when you are going to raise prices so they are incentivised to make a decision on working with you. This isn’t a strategy you want to do regularly but if you are thinking about increasing fees then make sure you let your leads know about this before you do it as it should provide you with an injection of revenue if you do it the right way.
✅ have a plan - where are you trying to take your business? What is the ultimate plan? Without a plan you have no idea what you’re doing or how you are going to get there. Lay out where you are now and where you want your business to be in 1, 3 or 5 years. Are you trying to grow a huge company with lots of employees or are you just trying to stay a one-person business that makes enough for you and your family to be comfortable? There is no right or wrong answer to this - only the answer that is right for you.
✅ track and review regularly - I track my business every month without fail. It keeps me accountable and makes me stop and think how things are travelling and whether I’ve really been putting in the work required to get the results I want.
Here’s a few resources for you if you aren’t yet tracking properly:
A free checklist to use each month:
Method 2: Reduce Expenses
The other way to quickly and easily increase profit in a business is to reduce expenses.
Here’s some ideas:
❌ if you run a business that involves physical product then make sure you manage your inventory properly. Don’t hold more stock than you need and make sure you track it properly. If you do find yourself with too much stock then strategically offer discounts or package prices to try and move it faster.
❌ ensure any employees you have are tracking their time and are always kept busy with valuable work. So much waste in small businesses comes from hiring employees for tasks that you could outsource to a contractor on an hourly basis
❌ get rid of superfluous expenses - e.g.
do you need an office or could you work from home?
do you need to outsource your social media or could you actually do it yourself?
are you paying for software you rarely use?
do you have recurring expenses that you’ve forgotten about (e.g. online tools you no longer use)?
The best way to audit your expenses is to put aside an hour, print off your bank statements from the last 6-12 months and then go through it line by line and see exactly what you are spending your money on. What could be cancelled or removed?
If you have a lot of expenses and don’t have time to go through things line by line another strategy you could use is to cancel your existing cards and then wait to see which emails you get from suppliers about payments that have declined. This is a good way for any recurring payments you’ve forgotten about to resurface.
Overall the best way to increase profitability is to track what you are doing and iterate regularly.
And remember that generally the simplest way to increase profits quickly is to either:
raise prices for existing products/services that you offer
reduce your expenses
And if you do a combination of both of these things then you’ll see even bigger results!
Don’t be afraid to try new things and see how these impact your profitability. The good news about being a business owner is you get to do things exactly the way you want! Tracking what you are doing will help you evaluate what is working and what isn’t. Make sure you act on what you find out and always be focusing on profit.
Remember that a profitable businesses = a confident and stress free business owner.
So focus on maximising your profit!
Courses and Templates for Designers and Architects
DO YOU WANT TO….
Improve your professionalism?
Find more clients?
Bring in more revenue?
Create better systems and processes?
Then check out my business courses and templates for designers and architects.
These courses and templates leave you with work done - not just a long list of things you need to do next. We have a really strong focus on taking action and getting things created that improve your business.
Enjoy the rest of your day!
Clare x
Dr Clare Le Roy
