How To Make More Money In Your Design Business Without Hiring A Team
In 2020 our design studio was growing faster than ever! After 10 years of running a design business - scaling our business has been the biggest challenge.
And scaling means to increase revenue without increasing costs - but to us, scaling meant increasing time while also increasing $$$
What we thought the next step was? Hiring a team, delegating tasks so that we can stay in our zone of genius.
We learned quickly that hiring a team was NOT it. It was not for us.. so I always asked myself… what if I want to stay small, what if we don’t want a team? Can we still reach our income goals?
Fast forward to 2025 - we’re a small lean team of two and our business generates multi 6 figures… without a team! It’s just us. We cracked the code on making more without sacrificing our livelihood!
How? By offering VIP design days!
Step 1: ask yourself: what does scaling mean for ME?
Stop listening to what everyone else is saying about: you need a team, you need $100,000 a year, you need to delegate..
And ask yourself, what does scaling my business LOOK like for me? How can I do it differently? Can I outsource certain things like accounting, copy, photos, etc instead of hiring people on my team?
For us: scaling meant having more TIME to work on other projects other than client work and having more freedom, money, and growth without adding MORE time & big client projects to our calendar.
Step 2: Reverse engineer
Figure out your goals & what you need to get there
Once you understand what scaling means for you - now it’s time to know your goals! What are your life goals? Business goals? Use that to reverse engineer the numbers for how much you need to earn in order to reach those goals!
Scaling is meant to help you generate more income - but without knowing your “enough” or the exact numbers you need to make..it’s more difficult to set actions in place to reach those goals!
An arbitrary make $100k a year just because is not enough to motivate you to get there.
Step 3: Create offers that allow you to work less & make more $$
Now that you have your numbers, you know where you want to go.. it’s time to create offers that allow you to work less and make more $$. Map out how many you need to sell to reach your goals.
Scaling does not mean being busier, adding tons of hours, and losing money (aka TIME)
Create offers that you can charge more for - work fewer hours, and create great results! We did this by adding ‘VIP Design Days’ to our business which gave us more money, and more time..which tbh is way more valuable than money!
Step 4: Automate: set up automations for your services + product
Scaling means increasing revenue without a substantial increase in costs..to us costs = time.
How can you create more time? With automations, systems and processes that are very dialed in.
All of our offers are automated! Our website templates are auto-delivered, our VIP days and design service emails are pre-written and auto-delivered.
We use Honeybook to help save us tons of money and time with the ability to rinse and repeat emails, proposals, contracts, and invoices,
The Impact of VIP Days and Design Intensives
As you can see from these examples, incorporating VIP days or design intensives into your business model can significantly increase your income while reducing the stress of managing multiple long-term projects.
If you want to learn more about how to implement VIP days effectively in your business, check out our signature course Fast & Fierce
This model for your design business can help you make more money and work less. The key lies in balancing your workload, managing your time effectively, and pricing your services appropriately. By doing so, you can increase your income, reduce stress, and enjoy more freedom in your schedule.
