Do you often feel like taking care of the day-to-day admin duties of running an interior design business takes up more of your time than the actual design services you offer? Do you find yourself making constant mental notes of all those little things you need to do, like remembering to update those client details or trying to recall the vendor name where you sourced that gorgeous mirror on a previous project?
Whether you're a large-scale firm or you operate solo, there are numerous admin tasks that need to be completed on a daily basis so projects keep moving forward. Every office manager or principal designer can benefit from having access to the best industry-specific software. From project planning to accounting, business management software that's designed specifically to meet your interior design business's unique needs can make your job ten times more efficient, more streamlined, and more enjoyable.
Are you interested to know how your design-life could change by using an administrative tool explicitly built for interior designers? Well, keep reading to discover the differences you can expect for your admin job before and after DesignDocs.
BEFORE DESIGNDOCS...
Client information is utilized in many different areas and at many different times throughout a project. When you're mid-way through a project and a client's contact detail changes, it takes time to sit down and methodically update the details in all those little places, such as proposals, invoices, or receipts. Sending any of these documents to your client with inaccurate and out-of-date information lessens their confidence in your firm. If you're generating invoices with an old contact number, does it mean you also forgot to update the supplier on the backsplash color change?
AFTER DESIGNDOCS
Updating client details is a breeze – quick, easy, and requiring a minimal amount of your brainpower. Simply update their client file in DesignDocs with the new detail, and rest assured it will automatically update across all documents where it's featured as well. What could take 15 minutes or more as you battle with this Excel spreadsheet here and that accounting software there is done in under a minute. This leaves you more time to focus on the important things like designing, sourcing, or working on your firm's long-term financial plan.
BEFORE DESIGNDOCS...
A client calls you looking for an update on their project. What's the total of all the invoices owing for their principal bedroom? What is still unpaid on their kitchen renovation? You know accurately answering this question will take you some time, as you need to wade your way through spreadsheets or have to wait for a response from your bookkeeper. So you casually explain to your client that you'll confirm this information ASAP and get back to them. Once the phone is down, you scramble to set the wheels in motion to compile all the necessary information and get back to them in a timely manner.
AFTER DESIGNDOCS
You're able to manage this client's request for information with confidence and efficiency, providing them with accurate real-time data and financials with a click of a button. For instance, by generating the built-in Project Summary financial report, you can easily see a breakdown of the total value of approved goods by project area as well as the value that's already been paid and what's outstanding. Your client is left feeling confident that you're on top of things and you're left to carry on with what you were doing before their call!
BEFORE DESIGNDOCS...
You find yourself retyping the same information repeatedly on documents such as client proposals, purchase orders, and invoices. You find this duplication not only frustrating because it's a waste of your time, but you've also noticed that small errors are creeping in, and information is not consistent across documents.
AFTER DESIGNDOCS
You save yourself time as you only need to enter the information once. Then you watch as it's automatically pulled through DesignDocs to populate the other places where it's needed as well. Information is consistent, reliable, and accurate, and matches up across every project document, meaning fewer client or vendor queries and less double-checking that's needed on your part.
BEFORE DESIGNDOCS...
As much as you love the sourcing stage, you wish there was an easier way to keep track of your favorite vendors or most frequently used items. So often, it feels like there is an endless world of options out there. You daydream about how great it would be to have a searchable database of vendors that would help minimize the effort and time needed to find that perfect piece.
AFTER DESIGNDOCS
The time you spend sifting and sorting through vendors is reduced ten-fold as you utilize your personalized vendor database in DesignDocs. By using vendor tags, you're able to filter your vendors by name, category, or price quickly. You can sort by city, state or category, making finding the right vendor much easier. You can also create and set your own tags based on vendor specifics important to you (ethical, fast-shipping etc.).
BEFORE DESIGNDOCS...
Your stress levels are at an all-time high as you struggle to keep all your project files systematically organized. You know you risk misquoting estimated project costs because you don't have historical data showing project level actuals. As a result, you find yourself unable to focus on or visualize the big project reveal. Without any systematic project management processes in place, you feel like you're just treading water until something, somewhere, comes unstuck.
AFTER DESIGNDOCS
By using DesignDocs integrated project management and accounting software, you're able to increase your firm's productivity and efficiency as your internal processes are streamlined. These seamless workings lead to a lowering of your stress levels. You're able to better service your existing clients and find yourself with more time to develop future relationships too. You can organize the business needs based on current deadlines and cash flow, allowing you to better plan out and act on a growth strategy that'll take your business to the next level.
