Episode 160: Creating Beautiful and Rich Spaces in the Design Space and Carving Your Own Path, with Lauren Li of Sisällä Interior Design
In this coaching episode, Fiona has a chat with Lauren Li, founder of the Interior Design Studio Sisällä. Lauren has been in the design space for 20+ years and has a passion to create beautiful, rich spaces that are reflective of people's actual lifestyles and their designs. Fiona and Lauren talk about how she's built so many offers within the design space, how you set yourself apart in a crowded industry and the importance of showing up and putting yourself out there. Lauren also shares why it's important to carve your own path even if not everyone will like what your offer.
Topics discussed in this episode:
Introduction
Catching up
Her business during Covid
Starting Sisällä
The Design Files' impact on Lauren's business
On getting your name out there
Making the first move
Tips on standing out
Collaboration instead of competition
Mindset shifts when starting a business
About The Design Society
On multitasking
Mentor/coach and resource suggestions
Connecting with Lauren
Her most proud moment for her business
Conclusion
Get in touch with My Daily Business Coach
Resources mentioned in this episode:
Get in touch with Lauren:
@sisalla_interior_design – Instagram
Inside the Interior Design Industry – Facebook
Episode transcript:
I don't think of it as competition because my clients are different from the next person's client, who's different from the next person's client. I suppose it comes back to trying to figure out what your design aesthetic is. For me, I love Scandinavian design. If I want to attract that client, my brand name Salah. I look to that part of the world for inspiration to hopefully attract those kinds of clients.
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Welcome to episode 160 of My Daily Business Coach Podcast. If you are in the design space, especially in the interior design space, you're going to want to hang around for this episode. Thank you so much for choosing to tune into it. It is a small business interview episode and that's where I interview curious and creative, small business owners from across the globe who are living passion, purpose, and profit in their business. I find it so inspiring to talk to these people. This episode’s guest is no exception.
Before I jump into that, I want to acknowledge the traditional owners and custodians on the land on which I'm lucky enough to live, work, play, raise my children, and of course record this podcast, the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation and I pay my respects to their elders. Past, present, and emerging, and acknowledged that sovereignty has never been seated.
I also pay my respects to any elders of the other indigenous communities around the world who may be listening to this. The other thing I wanted to mention before we get stuck into this interview episode, and it's a good one that you're going to take away so many tips and insights from this is to remind you that we are actually if you're reading in real-time, I am off on holidays, so I tend to take a month off of my business every year, I'm going to get some beachside activity happening and do some work on my business. I'm excited. I won’t be seeing clients during this time.
However, I do want to put it out there that group coaching for 2022 is going to be starting a bit earlier than we had initially planned. We already have a bunch of people on the waitlist. We'll be in touch with them shortly. If you are interested in doing group coaching, which is where I work with a group. It's a very curated small group of ten. We work together every two weeks for a whole year. We go through everything from mindset through to systems, content, marketing, brand strategy, figurehead, so much stuff, we have incredible experts as well that come in and of course, you meet so many people that are like-minded and running businesses as well. If you're interested in that program, please make sure that you're on the waitlist, the people on the waitlist will get the information first.
The way that we interview people for this program is on a first-come first-served basis. You want to get on that waitlist, and you can do that at MyDailyBusinessCoach.com/waitlist. If you need that link, you can always send me a DM at My Daily Business Coach or you can find this in the show notes which are always available at MyDailyBusinessCoach.com/podcast. If you're interested in the Sidestep The Hustle group coaching program, definitely check out the waitlist and make sure you put your name on it. It’s MyDailyBusinessCoach.com/group-coaching-waitlist.
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I am going to be joined in this episode by the wonderful Lauren Li who is the founding director of the Interior Design Studio Sisällä and is based right near me in Melbourne Australia. Not right near me, she's more in the city. I'm out in the burbs. I can imagine that we're very close. I came into contact with Lauren through the design files we both write for. Lauren has a column that she does quite regularly on there. All about interior design with practical ideas like rugs, let's talk about them or how to work with an interior designer.
Lauren has been in this space for twenty-plus years, she has all the credentials, went to university worked in incredible places, both here and overseas. She founded her residential practice in 2012. She has a passion to create beautiful, rich spaces that are reflective of people's actual lifestyles and their designs. It's not a cookie-cutter approach. It's a very real approach to say, what does the sanctuary at home feel like for you what is soulful for you? What is it that your family or your lifestyle needs, requires in a home and she builds it, and she does so beautifully?
If you are not already following Sisalla, make sure that you go over to Instagram. After this, of course, read about the goodness first, @sisalla_interior_design. We'll link to that in the show notes as well. The other thing that I love about Lauren is she doesn't just run her business, where she works with clients and helps them create these beautiful places. She also gives back to other people coming up and people at the same level, even in the interior design world. She has a membership called the design society. She also sells courses. AutoCAD, InDesign, SketchUp, all sorts of things. What I love about that approach, it's very much collaboration over competition.
Lauren is helping so many people that are doing the same business. Not exactly, obviously, but in a similar field to her. It's not the paid membership, she has a free Facebook group. I know that she was doing clubhouse I'm not sure if she still is. I'm not sure if anyone is still doing clubhouse. That's a different topic. I know that Lauren does whatever she can to help her community by designing Theseus people in the interior design space. The work she also does with the design files is massively helping people that may become a client, but also may never become a client to understand what's the design process all about. Breaking down. What can sometimes be seen as that's another world or, the interior design space can sometimes feel a bit pretentious or a bit out of people's league.
I love that Lauren takes this beautiful design that she does, but also breaks it down for everyone to be like, “This is how you could do it yourself,” or, “This is how you could build your business.” She truly wants the best for everyone, whether they are a client, a student, one of her members, or they are somebody way out in the distance that is coming across her work through platforms like the design files, and Instagram. I had to have Lauren on the podcast. I have loved working with her. I've gone into her membership group. I've talked to her people. We have a very similar audience. It's my absolute pleasure to have Lauren on here.
I have to say an extra special thank you to Lauren because we scheduled it before the lockdown. She came onto this podcast with a brand-new baby. I did say we could reschedule if she would like it. The thing Lauren, she's like, “No, we have a date. I'm going to turn up, I'm going to do this.” You can hear her beautiful third child, the little son in the background. Of course, I'm also a mom, I get it. I welcomed that into my interview because that's life isn't it. This is what having a business is all about your business needs to integrate with your life. They are not two separate things that are all the idea of work-life balance, I believe that it's much more work-life integration. They both must work and be aligned, and alignment is a huge part of what I work with my clients on.
If you have not already been a huge fan of Lauren and I know that there are so many people that follow me that already are, you can check out everything that she's doing over at Sisalla.com.au. You can find out all about the design society there if you're in the space and you want to join a group. On Instagram, you can find Lauren and the team at @sisalla_interior_design and lash over all the beautiful stuff that she posts there. She also has an online shop. Let's get into the interview and Lauren can talk about how she's built so many things in the design space. Thank you again, Lauren. Here it is, for everyone reading. My interview with Lauren Li from Sisällä.
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Hello, Lauren, thank you so much for coming on to the podcast and making time, especially with a brand-new baby. Congrats on baby Benji. How are you?
Thanks, Fiona. Good, it is early days with the new baby. He's number three. We're doing good. How are you?
I'm good. I don't know if you take offense to this when people say, “You're very brave. Number three.” Also, very blessed. I'm sure some so many people would love to be in that position. It's such a beautiful thing to have a beautiful big family.
A bit of both, I think.
That's three young ones. I was like, “My goodness. How do you do it?” But you just do it, so you just get on with it. Speaking of children, having a newborn, and being pregnant, how has it been running a business whilst also being pregnant? Having two little ones at home, homeschooling, lockdown after lockdown, you’d launched things. Are you trying to get through to some holiday or break? Have you booked anything?
We've been doing well. Like a lot of small business owners, it's a bit of a juggle. We had our studio on Chapel Street. We've closed that down in 2020 and we've been working from home, which has its challenges. I've got two girls in primary school and now a little newborn baby. Things are busy but looking forward to summer and we're going to be getting away to regional Victoria, so we can't wait. We've got through okay.
We're also going on regional Victoria. I don't know about you, but I do feel a bit worried about going anywhere else for a little while.
I was catching up with some family and they're going to Queensland and they booked it during a lockdown. They must have a crystal ball or something. Good on them, regional Victoria. There are so many great places to go. You don't have to go too far. Just getting out of their house is pretty exciting these days.
Anything that gets you out of the house is great. Speaking of COVID was the change to the studio purely because of lockdowns? Closing that down? Was that something that you had coming anyway?
We decided that we will pack up our studio during COVID, during the second lockdown, because we were doing in-person studio sessions like workshops in our studio. We couldn't do them anymore. We pivoted and went online to do that. That was good. We have this space that we couldn't use and we're working from home so we decided to pack everything up and pop all the furniture and stuff into a storage unit and just work from home. It's been fine. We moved house to somewhere a little bit bigger so that we would have our studio. I guess you just do what you got to do.
Did you find you were busier because so many more people were at home? I don't know if it was busier more in 2021 when people had realized a bit more what was happening? Did you see a big increase in business? I work with a lot of people in homeware products as well as some of the service offerings. I know with the products, at least, there was a massive increase for a lot of them because people were spending more time at home. I'm wondering, did you see that in your business because of the industry that you're in?
In 2020, we were already working on projects. Although people were already planning to take on a renovation or something, and it was like, “Let's do it now.” This 2021, it's been a lot of people. It's definitely an uptick and people have bought holiday homes, or they want to renovate their homes, or they've moved. That's a result of COVID, and we have an online store as well with homewares and things, we saw an uptake with that. It's been a problem getting stock from our suppliers in Denmark. The world has its challenges with COVID and shipping in freight and it's hard for them to increase production so much.
Everyone would have read a little bit about your business in the intro but can you tell us a little bit more about Sisällä?
It's a Finnish word that means inside.
How did you find that word? Are you Finnish? How did you start the business? Why did you start it? I know that you're working at these top architect firms here and in London, I believe. Can you tell us a bit about all your different offerings?
Going on maternity leave, working at architectural practices with a lot of long hours, and I take my hat off to any mums that work in that area. That's challenging. Going on maternity leave and thinking, “Do I want to go back there?” Or whatever I want to do and then you take on one private job, and that leads to another one. You think one day, “Maybe let's print out some business cards,” and you are running a business.
It started quite organically like that. I take it a lot more seriously. The word sisällä, my background is Finnish. I liked that Scandinavian aesthetic. Finding that name, I was thinking, “I would like to work with other people from that part of the world, or that at least have an appreciation of the Scandinavian type of design and furniture.” That's been nice. I have had a few Finnish clients reach out to me.
You do design but you also have this homeware brand that you've talked about. You sell other people's brands, is that correct?
We do interior design, that's our primary business. We have an online store called The Apartment, and that's selling like Danish furniture and Homewares. What we started a few years ago, as I mentioned, doing in-person is helping other interior designers upskill. We've moved a little bit more into a bit of a mentoring space as well. That's through the design society. It's something that I've started that people have been asking me for, and I'm like, “Alright.” I like diversity and a bit of variety. It keeps me busy.
I can imagine. I know that we crossed paths. With Instagram, when you're DM-ing people you're like, “I can't remember exactly how we first connected.” It was through Lucy and the team at The Design Files. I used to have a column on there, and you write regularly for them for years. From my experience, The Design Files had a positive impact on my business, and continue to, how much has it had an impact on you?
It's hard to quantify. Writing for The Design Files like when they asked me to write as their Interior Design columnist, a few years ago, I was like, “Oh, my God,” because I put The Design Files on such a pedestal. I've been such a fan and a reader since it began. I love talking about interior design. I suppose that's why I like helping other interior designers with their businesses. We get to talk about interior design and that kind of thing with other designers. I enjoy it.
I have had a few clients through there as well. When you have a column that comes out every month, it builds that level of awareness with people, and they get to know you and then they follow you on Instagram and your other channels as well. I love it. The Design Files are such a great blog. I'm a huge fan.
That's great that you brought up awareness because I always talk about the buyer cycle. It starts with awareness. Often with my clients or in my marketing course, I'll talk about collaborations and look for where that audience already is, particularly when you're just starting or you're creating a new offering. What else do you think has helped with the growth and awareness because you're well known and respected in this industry? Not just for the interior design but also for guiding and mentoring people and they come to you for that as well. What do you think has helped you most with getting your name out there? Because I know there'll be people reading that are either in a similar boat or somewhere else and they're thinking, “I wish I had a role or that awareness about my business.” Is there anything else that helped you with that?
The Design Files is one great place to reach a whole lot of like-minded people and clients. Probably, my ideal clients since they are interested in design. I also contribute to the domain which is part of The Age newspaper. That's another way I suppose. It takes a lot of time. I enjoy talking about design. That's one way of engaging with the media a little bit.
I tried to talk to people on Instagram, and I find that fun. I know that some people struggle with using social media and stuff but I like to make connections with people that way. I have a Facebook group as well. It's called Inside the Interior Design Industry. We can talk about the ins and outs of running your own business. Sometimes I don't try as well. I simply enjoy connecting with people. Go into events and things.
I'm genuinely interested in this and it sounds like you are as well. Let's say, for my instance, like a small business and creative small business. I often talk about love-hate, I get the damage that is done, as well, in general, social media, not just Instagram. I also watch an inspirational platform because you can just go down a rabbit hole and then suddenly, you're DM-ing with somebody in Mexico, because you're like, “I love what you do.” You can build these connections.
I'm sorry to put you on the spot. Say I'm an interior designer or any small business, but a service base where you're not. I know that you have products, but let's imagine this imaginary person reading. How do they make the first move? What advice would you give them? Because you may be confident enough to do that. I know I do that all the time because I'm insanely curious. It also has come from my career in journalism and having to ask questions. Is there anything that you'd say to somebody reading, where they're like, “It's all well and good to say I'm making connections on Instagram,” How do you do that?
The Design Files, how that even start? It's a hard one. When I was growing up, I hated my birthday because everyone was looking at me. I was shy, I didn't like it. I used to cry. That's not my natural place to put myself out there. I realized I had to push. You must push yourself out there. You must, even if it might be a bit uncomfortable. Where I got my first client, I was doing a workshop, at CAE which is the Center of Adult Education. What was a challenging thing to do was to go in front of a class and talk about interior design to a bunch of strangers. You do these things once, and then you do it the second time, and it's a little bit easier, the third time was a little bit easier.
Maybe if you're looking to get yourself out there, you could do a workshop. You could get in touch with maybe your local ANS training or sketch if you want to do kitchen things, or you could approach, a Furniture Showroom or something like that. That could be one way. With The Design Files as well like that, I guess doesn't come out of the blue that much because I used to write a blog back in the days when everyone was selling blogs. I used to write about something every day. Maybe, Lucy knew that I was interested in that. That's why they approached me.
Also, have something to say. Take a point of view take a stance on something. Some of the things I've written have been controversial. White kitchens are out, and colored kitchens are in. See the trend cycles and things like that. I don't think of it as being too serious. I'm not saying to people, “If you've got a white kitchen, you better be changing it because it's not trendy anymore.” It's a bit of fun and something to talk about. If you're going overseas, and you're seeing what's happening with the trends, talk about what you are seeing, it’s good to have a point of view and to have something to say.
If you see a product that you think is great, do you send them a DM and say, “I love this. This is a bit about me.” I know it's probably not thought out, like, “How many DMs am I sending today? What's my message?” That's what I often do. I will reply to stories, or I'll be like, “I love that,” or send a voice note or something.
I don't do it with that intention. It's more chit-chat. I don't know sometimes I'll create some stories on Instagram about, “Do you prefer this kitchen or do you prefer that kitchen.?” or whatever. I suppose in a way that's generating content. If you wanted to be an interior design contributor or a columnist or something like that, start creating content. Maybe the person out there watching from a magazine or an editor or something like that might be, “They're already doing that.” You never know where those kinds of things might lead you. That's if you want to do that.
At the end of the day, if you're an interior designer, you want to work on interiors for clients. The most important thing is to think about who your ideal client is and speak to them on Instagram. Those kinds of fun stories or something to engage with something to make people think that they can get to know you a little bit as a person and I’m passionate about design but it's not like life or death. I don't take it too seriously. I find it fun. That's my point of view. I suppose you do you on Instagram, or whatever. Find what your point of view is.
I love what you said about them. The way that I interpreted it was, don't wait to be asked. If you're interested in this and you want to put across your point of view, start doing that.
That's what happened with me and our business as well, starting to write a blog every day. I've had a few people ask, “How could I write for The Design Files?” “Start a blog and write every day.” They're like, “I don't think I could do that.” Just start doing it. You never know what opportunities might come.
It also gives you so much more content to repurpose in all sorts of ways. Sending my Sunday email. I often talk about that, I sent it to nine people or something at the start. It wasn't like, I waited until I've got 100 people on the email list then I'll start, I’ll just start, then it grows. People talk about it and refer people. You're so wise to have started, that's the big thing. Even you are asking, saying to someone to start and do it every day and saying, “That's too much work.” That there's often a whole lot of work that's gone on behind the scenes before that seemingly big break happens overnight.
You're so right about your emails because that was a word of mouth. I found out about your emails through somebody I met at some event. They mentioned you like, “You should sign up to these amazing emails every week.” That's the kind of word of mouth, that meeting in person as well.
Thank you to whoever said that. I work with a lot of interior designers, landscape architects, and a whole bunch of other people, interior photographers, and all sorts in that sector. I know other people as well. One of the things that come out is, “How do I stand out? How do I figure out my niche?” You have done that well. What advice would you give to anyone reading, regardless of what industry they're in who's maybe getting down about the level of competition? Like, “There are so many other people doing this.” I see interior design as a growing industry. There are so many people out there doing it. Exactly like business coaching or marketing consulting. What have you done to stand out? What advice would you give to someone who's thinking, “It's all too hard. There are too many other people in the mix.”
On one hand, I'm saying, it's great to engage with people on Instagram and stuff like that, but maybe don't as well. Do your own thing. I don't spend that much time scrolling on Instagram, I probably spend more time posting my stuff. Talking to friends that I've met in person rather than reaching out and scrolling on Instagram.
It's one thing as well. I don't think of it as competition because my clients are different from the next person's client who's different from the next person's client. I suppose it comes back to trying to figure out what your design aesthetic is, and for me, I love Scandinavian design. If I want to attract that kind of client, I've got my brand name, Sisällä. I look to that part of the world for inspiration to hopefully attract those kinds of clients. Maybe your niche is different from mine, whatever it might be. I'm focusing on a part of the world, my design is hopefully quite approachable.
I like working in a family home. I've been able to narrow down what type of client that I like working for and in what locations as well. Try to think about who you're speaking to, it comes back to what we were saying about trying to find your ideal client. If you know who your client is, it's different to my client different from the next person's client, there's room for everyone. Now, the interior design, the industry is bananas, it's busy, I feel like there's room for everyone. That's why I enjoy sharing information. Because if we can share information as a community, we can all do better work. We can all elevate interior design as a profession. That's my point of view. I don't see people as competition that much. There's room for everyone.
I love that. Because of the abundance mindset, as I would say, I completely agree. I often say to people, if you're feeling competitive, think of it as a collaboration like, “How could I collaborate with that person?” Maybe that will diminish the idea of, “They're my competition.”
Also, sometimes when I do go down that Instagram, rabbit hole and go, “I love that. How's that designer being able to use those core products? Why can't I do that? My clients never spend that money.” That gives me a bit of fire in my belly to be like, “I'm going to try to do that next time.” It turns into a positive feeling. Try to think about it like that, I would say.
I read not that long ago that the difference between feeling jealousy and feeling envious. Envious is, “I love that. How could I do it? I would like it also, but I'm happy for that person.” Jealous is, “How are they doing that? They shouldn't do that. I don't want anything good for that person.” I feel like even that thinking, do I want to be jealous or do I want to be envious, in which case, I'm going to build something for myself.
You put it perfectly. I love that. I'm going to write that down.
Another thing I know, that comes up is, charging your worth, setting boundaries. This is a huge one for all small businesses, but especially those in the service space. Because a lot of the time, you're selling yourself, your style, your appreciation of things, expertise, and experience. I won't wonder how you have done this or overcome boundaries or not overcome set boundaries and overcome any issues around like charging what you're worth and knowing your value at Sisällä. What mindset changes or shifts have had to come about since you started your business?
Huge, big changes. In the beginning, I was working the business by myself. My husband did come into the business but I wasn't charging nearly enough to make a profit. That's embarrassing to say, but it's true. Also, at the beginning of my goal was a bigger picture. I wanted to photograph my projects. I realized that I would have to spend money on great photography and all that type of thing to build up because I wanted to create a business that I could charge a decent design fee. You can do that through amazing photography. It's a bit of smoke and mirrors in this business as well. A lot of the photoshoots that you see, furniture has been bought in and I've done that myself, I've literally bought in a truckload of furniture and started up a project.
Some projects are not decoration projects, some projects might be the interiors, the kitchen, the bathroom, or the heart finishes selections in the spatial planning. When you want to shoot it, you can't shoot an empty project. We'll invest in bringing in furniture, styling, and photography because in the bigger picture I want to be able to attract clients that have money for the design fee. In the beginning, I didn't charge as much as I should have. That is difficult when designing is your livelihood but now our business is our livelihood. My husband works in the business. We must make this thing work for us. It's not a hobby that I feel like if you got some decent photographs in your portfolio, you could build up that confidence as well. That's something we talk about quite a bit is confidence.
It's so much easier to say to somebody, “Just be confident, do it a few more times, it does make it easier.” I can talk to my clients or potential clients these days about my fees for the design process. If they don't want to accept the design process, or they think my fees are too high, we have a pretty good track record, I suppose. Sometimes you might meet a client for the first time and they're not the right fit for us. The projects are too small, like our design fees going to be eating too much into their budget.
It's all about trying to attract the right client, what I want is somebody that values design, and that respects what we do, and that husband is a key in working on a great project and having a great relationship. If I meet both husband and the wife, or sometimes it's when the husband's the one that reaches out, I'm like, “This is great. He's invested in this.” We're going to have fun. The husband is the key.
When you said that before, someone can say, I'll be confident, but it's something that you must learn, it's a muscle that you must practice and use and use again before it gets strong. I know that you do a lot of mentoring and you've got The Design Society. I'm assuming that you teach basic things inside of there. Tell us about The Design Society and why that came about.
We do talk about confidence inside The Design Society and give you some tools to have under your belt before you go into consultation with a client and some steps into layout that actual meeting and how to talk to a client in the beginning, The Design Society is an online community, and coaching, and courses all in one. It came about because every now and some interior designers that I talked to, again on Facebook, or Instagram, saying, “Can you help me with this thing about these fees? I don't know what this client or whatever dilemma is that they have? Could you talk to me about it?” I love to share that information because I've made all the mistakes. Why should they make the same mistakes?
I thought, “Wouldn't it be great to have a safe place that we could go, which is outside of Facebook and share notes and what we've been going through?” We've been going through the design process step by step. We're going to be covering fees, photography, and getting your work published. The topics that I see designers asking about quite often. We have Zoom chats, every week we catch up, we'll cover a part of the course. It’s a group coaching session as well. There's a whole lot of templates in there. You can dive in and work out who your client avatar is or work on mindset stuff. There are examples of fee proposals in there. It's been so great, especially during lockdown to have this group of cool designers in their own, so chuffed and thrilled to have such a great group of designers in there. It's been fun.
That's amazing, that you're doing and offering that to the people in the same industry as well. That's a perfect example of not seeing everyone as a competition thing, the more in the collaboration space, but how do you manage all the parts of your business? You've got the membership of The Design Society, dealing with suppliers out of Europe, you've got that part of the business, the selling products, the interior design, and multiple clients. You've got your writing and the other things that you do, how do you do it? Do you have time blocking? Do you think you're very organized?
I wish it was that. I hate to talk about the time blocking and like, “I'm going to do that.” I'm going to quickly do this other thing first and get distracted. Sometimes whatever mindset I feel like doing. I want to dive into some interior design projects that we've got now. You're talking about setting boundaries. I have met with a few potential clients, and I have two clients and I must decline projects because I'm not able to, I know I'm not going to be able to make their timeframe, even though I want to work on it. I know I've got other commitments with The Design Society, and with other aspects of our business and our online store. I love having our online store and I love all the products in there but we're not digital marketers. We can't spend as much time as we would like on that. We've been prioritizing The Design Society and the clients that we have before we take on too many clients.
That's another great thing inside The Design Society, if I get any inquiry, I can say to the guys in there, “Who wants to take on a project over here or who's interested in this?” Maybe I can recommend some other designers to people that come my way. It’s hard saying no to projects, especially when they're great projects. I know that I'll get excited in the beginning. I've got too many balls up in the air, and I let them down. I must be realistic about what I can take on. We don't employ people in our business. We have a lot of different people that work for us, like consultants, I guess, or contractors. We outsource some of the work, which helps a lot too.
Delegation is so important. Outsourcing and providing somebody else with some work as well, along the same way. You have helped so many people, and you're helping so many people, have you had mentors or coaches, or do you have any key mantras or any resource that you would suggest to anyone reading this who's thinking, “She's got a great business.”
This book that I read, it's called Passion Purpose Profit: Sidestep the #hustle and build a business you love. That's such a great book, though. I do love that book. I heard you mentioned the other day, one of your podcasts as well. I'll so listen to your podcast. It's quite an honor to be on your podcast. You mentioned Pat Flynn. I am a fan of him. He talks about what we're doing with the design side, we also do SketchUp, and AutoCAD online courses as well. We have a few digital products that we have on the go. That helps with that side of the business.
I was in membership for digital products. Her name is Molly Ho, but she's closed her membership now. She has some great digital templates for Canva and stuff like that. Her membership was how to offer your digital products. That's what I've been doing with my courses and the membership online, although it would be great to meet in person sometimes. Hopefully, we can do that in 2022.
There is another book that I love. It's called Design is a Job. I've got the audiobook of that. I love this guy's mindset about, as you mentioned, before charging your worth and how a client sees value in you and what you do in your design, rather than counting the number of hours that you spend on a project. That's a great resource to that book, or I listen to the audiobook, now and then. I’ve got a bunch of coffee table books on my desk. Sometimes I need to feel inspired and get off-screen. That's always helpful. I don't have a mentor or anything.
It sounds like you're your mentor, which is great about that. It's interesting, I teach people like group coaching and other things. Even doing that and regularly updating your Instagram, forces you to be learning these things yourself as well. Always updating and improving and increasing your education.
Exactly, like you’re never done. It's never like, “I've got this now my contracts done, I'll never have to look at it again.” It's always evolving, and you're going to evolve, the industry's always changing. It's true.
What is next for you? Where can people connect with you?
We are opening to new members for The Design Society. If you wanted to connect with me, you could go onto Instagram, and find me under @sisalla_interior_design. You can find a link to join the waitlist to join The Design Society if that's something interesting for you. You can find me in my little Facebook group, which is called Inside the Interior Design Industry if you're a Facebook person.
I'm so thankful for your time because I know you've got a brand-new baby. It's hard to find pockets of time. Thank you again. Finally, what are you most proud of from your journey in business so far?
I'm most proud of being able to make a living as a designer. It’s something I'm probably proud of. It's something that running our business as a family business, I suppose my husband and I were full time in the business. It's hard but it's so rewarding. We get to do score pickups and drop-offs and spend that family time together. That's what we value. Let alone making a living in design is something that I'm proud of.
You should be, that's a wonderful way to end our chat. Thank you so much for all the ideas and tips and tactics and everything that you've given in this chat. It's been such a pleasure chatting with you, Lauren. Thank you.
Welcome. Thank you so much for having me.
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Thank you so much, Lauren, for all the information insights, down to earth nature with which she shared so many things that I know people will take away from this podcast. I would love to know what you most took away from this. Especially if you're in the interior design space. What stood out for you? What resonated most? Maybe you're not in the interior design space, maybe you're in another service industry. You're thinking about starting a membership. Now you're like, “You know what, I'm going to go ahead and do that.” I would love to know what you found most interesting from this chat that I had with Lauren Li of Sisällä.
Don't be a stranger, you can send me a DM at My Daily Business Coach on Instagram. You can always reach out through email Hello@MyDailyBusinessCoach.com. Of course, I'm sure Lauren would love to hear from you as well. Many things stood out, the two that stood out for me were when Lauren talked about The Design Files. She talked about the blog that she'd had for years beforehand. She talked about showing up every single day to that blog, and that there was a whole lot of work that happened before the design files came calling. That is something we often forget.
I know quite often I'll be doing a one-on-one coaching session with someone, and they'll say, “That's so simple. Why haven't I thought of that?” Or, “You're good at this.” Yes, because I do this all the time. This is my job. I see the same business problems over and over again. I'm about to enter my seventh year of doing this in 2022, which is huge. Before that, I worked in brand and marketing and content for 15 to 16 years before I started my own business. I have been doing this for decades.
That's the same thing with Lauren. She's so good at what she does because she has been in this space for so long. That is not to say you need to work for twenty years before you can do anything. Not for a minute. There are people out there that are doing incredible things that are new to a particular industry or career. Sometimes from the outset, we can look at someone and be like, “They've got it so easy. They got this thing given to them.” We don't see all the other work that went on to get there. I know in my own life, people have commented sometimes like, “It's so easy.” I'm like, “No, there was ten years of grunt work before that thing came along.” I wanted to put that out there.
The other thing that I loved is the concept of which goes to that it's still in point one is the idea of don't wait to be asked. I see it all the time where people say, “I'm not going to send a newsletter until my email list is this big,” or, “I'm not going to start a podcast until my Instagram followers are this big.” I have an audience and yes, I am all for creating your audience. I'm also all for getting started don't wait for some perfect number that you think you need to hit before you show up and put your voice out there in any format. I loved that one.
I loved when Lauren was talking about how you set yourself apart and particularly in an industry that like business coaching is inundated there are so many interior designers there are so many interior stylists it is a thriving industry and it's also thriving because the demand is there as well which that must happen supply and demand.
I love that she said, “You do you, find your point of view and your point of view may be very different from whatever else is out there.” Trust that there will be people that love your point of view. I know that in my Sunday email which I send every single week so if you're not on that get on that you can just find it MyDailyBusinessCoach.com/subscribe.
Sometimes I will talk about things that are quite personal, or I'll talk about something that's a little off the beaten track of business as such in air quotes. I will see a shift in unsubscribes but I will also see a shift in the number of replies that I get. Sometimes you are going to say things that repel people, and that's fine. Other times you'll say things that attract people or say something that is going to do a bit of both. That's fine, you are niching down, you're finding your people, not everyone is going to love you.
Every time you do something. Every time a brand comes into the market, there will be a whole lot of people who don't care. There'll be people who love it, who can't stop raving about it. There'll be people for a variety of reasons. It's not the right fit. That's fine. You don't want to be something for everyone even it be everything for someone.
I just love that she talked about that because it is such an important thing to remember. Carve your path. “You do you,” as Lauren says. I love chatting with Lauren, she's so great. Again, her ability to multitask whilst also keeping and feeding your child, looking after a brand-new baby and two other children, as well as running this business with her husband is so commendable.
Absolutely, thank you again, Lauren, for coming on to the podcast. If you'd like to connect with Lauren, you can do that through Instagram. You can also find out everything about The Design Society and Sisällä as an Interior Design Studio over at sisalla.com.au. Just a reminder again, that if you are interested in our group coaching program, which will kick off in 2022, and you can be from anywhere in the world, we have had people from overseas, join that program, you just need to be available at a certain time. We go through that. We pick the right time that's going to sit well with the overall group. I can find the waitlist for that at MyDailyBusinessCoach.com/group-coaching-waitlist.
If you have any questions about that, feel free to send me a DM at @mydailybusinesscoach. I hope you are gearing in for a wonderful festive season however you celebrate and whatever you celebrate at this time of year, I hope that you are surrounded by loved ones. If you find this a difficult time of year, please know I'm sending you a giant hug. I also find it sometimes a bit difficult. I have lost both my parents.
It is the second Christmas that I'll have now without my family and my mom made Christmas the most incredible thing. Know I'm sending you a giant hug regardless of what situation you're in. If you are alone, know that there are people out there to call, maybe look around, at your networks. Look at anyone that's in your contacts and maybe just send a text and be like, “Thinking of you. Would love to have a chat.” You never know what is going to come from that. Alright, thank you so much for reading and I'll see you next time. Bye.
