Is it Worthwhile to Be An ASP® in a Rural Small Town?

Becoming an Accredited Staging Professional® can open a great many doors in a larger city. As Staging has been proven to influence the selling price of a home, many individuals will hire an ASP® to help with the process. However, can the workflow for becoming an ASP® be justified if you live in a rural community of less than 5,000 people? What if your town has less than 1,000? There are only so many homes for sale. The answer is…YES!…as long as you can market yourself well. Expanding Your Vision – Just because you live in a small community of 250 people, it doesn’t mean that you have to maintain your focus on such a location. Many rural employees travel outside of their communities in order to find work and you shouldn’t be any different. Even using the Internet provides you with a great deal of tools that can help you develop yourself as a well-known ASP®. You just need to take the time to get your name out there. Social Media Marketing – Today, it seems almost everyone has a Facebook page or a Pinterest account. In fact, some household pets even have accounts on these popular social sites. Combined, these two hubs can work for you to market yourself as a staging professional. Facebook is widely used by many to post regular professional information, and Pinterest can be used to provide your potential clients with images pertaining to your past success stories. As the adage goes, “A picture is worth 1000 words.” Why not give someone a novel’s worth of imagery to promote yourself? Don’t Limit Yourself – Although gas prices and time constraints could put a hindrance on traveling to a client’s location, you shouldn’t limit yourself too severely. Depending on the area you live in, it could be quite a distance to visit someone in need of professional guidance. Many people will gladly invest the extra money on gas expenses if it means increasing the selling price of a home by five to ten percent. Don’t be afraid to include mileage in your billing. If you’re a great distance from a location, some individuals may even be OK with travel time expenses as well. Online Presence – Social marketing can help your design business flourish, but you still need to work on improving your online presence. With more than four-billion smartphones activated in the world right now, a large portion of these individuals are using search engines to find local establishments. Since Google and Bing are focused on returning local results primarily, your name needs to be within the top 10 for your area. In a rural location, this can be quite easy. However, it doesn’t hurt to continue this growth in order to include nearby cities and towns. The easier it is for someone to find your name, the more often you’ll be involved with various staging plans. While it may take a bit more work to promote yourself as an ASP® in a rural community as opposed to a larger city, it’s not impossible to become quite successful. Through determination and tenacity, you can promote yourself well for nearby locations that could benefit from your knowledge of Staging and how to engage others to feel a home is worth more. Don’t let your location discourage you from doing something you love to do. Ken Myers is a father, husband, and entrepreneur. He has combined his passion for helping families find in-home care with his experience to build a business. Learn more about him by visiting @KenneyMyers on Twitter.