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Interview With . . . Tammy Costa The Organized Consultant Plainville, MA by Maria Gracia 1. What is the name of your company? Where are you located? How long have you been in business? My name is Tammy Costa. The name of my company is The Organized Consultant. I am located in Plainville, MA and I have been in business for 1 1/2 years. 2. Is this your primary business, or a part-time business? This is my primary business. 3. Are you a member of NAPO? (Please indicate if you're an officer.) I am a member of NAPO and NEPO (New England Professional Organizers). I am also the Public Relations Coordinator for NEPO. 4. Why did you become a professional organizer? I was blessed with instinctive organizational skills that I displayed at a very early age. I remember organizing my own toys, dolls, doll clothes, etc. and then my friends things as well. I was able to utilize my organizational skills in my different jobs and it was that part of my job that I always loved the most. Then one day my Mother gave me an article about a woman in Wisconsin that has her own Professional Organizing business. My Mother said 'Tam, this sounds like you!' I read the article and at that moment, my life changed forever! 5. What type of organizing do you specialize in (home, office, etc.)? I specialize in residential, home office and small business organizing. 6. Do you sell products, services, or seminars? Please describe. I offer Gift Certificates for sale. It is a unique gift idea and good for a number of occasions such as New Home, New Baby, New Job, Birthday, Office Move, etc. Clients can choose from the following gift basket selections: Home Sweet Home Gift Basket, Home Office Blues Gift Basket, or The Unorganized Executive Gift Basket. 7. Have you written a book(s)? If so, what is the title(s)? Not at this time. 8. Do you publish a newsletter? If so, is it a print newsletter, or an e-zine? Is it free, or is there a charge? I do publish a free printed quarterly newsletter entitled 'Organizationally Yours' that I mail out. The mailing list for this newsletter is growing! 9. Do you have a web site? If so, what is the address? Yes, I have a web site. The address is http://organizedconsultant.tripod.com/ 10. Is travel a big part of your business? Not at this time. 11. Who is your primary target audience? After extensive research, I came up with the following criteria for my target audience. For Residential Organizing: Females, 30-55 years of age, Homeowners. For Office Organizing: Male/Female, 30-55 years of age, Home office, Small business, Lawyers, Accountants, Realtors. 12. Describe your typical workday. Mornings are mostly reserved for office work (and that all important first cup of coffee). I check my e-mail and respond if necessary, return phone calls, do telephone consultations, process mail and work on any upcoming promotions or advertising projects. In the afternoon I schedule my organizing appointments. I try to end my work day by 5:00pm to enjoy time with my family. 13. Every person interested in entering the professional organizing field is wondering, "Can I make enough money doing this?" What is your outlook on this question? It depends what your definition of 'enough money' is. If you're looking for a lavish life style, realistically, probably not. If your goal is to be comfortable and enjoy the luxury of your family, then yes. I found that I am able to work half the (billable) hours that I did prior to having my own business and still maintain the same comfortable life style. Keep in mind that the administrative part of the job can be extremely time consuming (i.e., marketing, networking, responding to inquiries, billing, etc.). 14. Which of the following marketing vehicles have you used to help you grow your business (direct mail, newspaper advertising, free workshops, radio, television, web site, e-zine, telemarketing, yellow pages, joint ventures with other professionals, publicity, other: please describe)? For marketing vehicles, I currently utilize direct mail to new homeowners, a quarterly newsletter, ads in several newspapers, as well as various web sites that have free directory listings. I am listed in the business section of the phone book. I recently launched my own web site and registered it with several search engines which is helping to drive traffic to my site. I joined my local Chamber of Commerce and participate in networking opportunities. I am a member of NEPO as well as their Public Relations Coordinator and a member of NAPO. In the fall, I will be participating in a Home Show that I am hoping will increase my client base significantly. 15. Which one marketing technique have you found works the best for you? Please describe. Very simple, talk to people. Tell everyone about what you do - it's free publicity and it really does work. A helpful hint: have a professional looking badge made with your name and the name of your company, wear it when you go out. People will ask you about it. 16. Describe a successful, creative marketing technique that you use, or that you've used in the past. Field Trip Days. That's the best way to describe them. I get some business cards and brochures together and map out an area, then off I go. I spend the day 'out in the field.' I go door to door to businesses that I think could use my service and let them know what I can do for them. I leave my business card and brochure then off I go to the next business. It's a great way to meet people and I find that when people can put a name and a face together, you get a much better response. 17. Do you feel that networking plays a big role in growing your business? I do to a certain extent. Let me explain. I don't find that the formal networking groups produce too many referrals, but the untraditional networking methods i.e. talking to people in the grocery store line, or in the waiting room at the doctor's office, often work better. 18. What do you do to generate referrals? I offer a promotion called 'Refer a Friend, Earn Free Organizing Time.' Clients seem to like it. As long as the referral generates billable time, the referee will receive an hour of free organizing. 19. What do you find to be the most exciting part of your business? The feeling of accomplishment. When you can take stress out of your client's life and free up time for them to do things that they really enjoy-that's a GREAT feeling. 20. What do you find to be the most frustrating part of your business? If a job goes unfinished by my standards. If I don't feel that the organizing job that I was hired to do is 100% complete, that is very frustrating to me. 21. Describe your greatest success in this field. I feel that my greatest success in this field is the reality that I am doing what I love to do. How many people can say that. I love the whole idea of organizing as a profession. The ability to relieve stress in someone's life. As I mentioned earlier, there's no better feeling. 22. As a professional organizer, do you have a funny story to share? Sometimes I do 'take home' projects for my clients. While organizing a mail station for one of my clients I noticed this wicker basket in her living room. My client said that there were recipes in it. I told her that if she would like, I would take it home and organize it so that she could actually use these recipes. She loved the idea. I told her that it wouldn't take me more than a couple of hours to do. Well, once I got into these recipes and found that they went back about a dozen years, it ended up taking me about a dozen hours to organize! Moral of the story, don't ever assume to know the amount of time it may take to organize something by the size of the container it sits in. 23. As an organizer, what professional organizing information or tools are you always on the lookout for? One tool that I utilize in my residential organizing business is a 3 inch binder titled 'Organizing Ideas.' This binder is broken up into different sections for kitchen, living rooms, bathrooms, kids rooms, CD/Video storage, closet/laundry room, storage containers, misc. organizing ideas, home office. Each section is filled with organizing product ideas that I got from different magazines, catalogs and department stores along with the name of the company and a telephone number or web site address to order these items. I take this binder with me to each residential organizing job I have and it has proven to be indispensable. So I would have to say that the one thing that I am always looking out for would be organizing tools to add to my binder. 24. Looking ahead, what do you see as your greatest challenge? My greatest challenge is keeping up with me. I find that my head is filled with all these wonderful ideas about my business and where I want to take it and the vehicles that I will use to get there. One lesson I learned was that you can't go far without a Business Plan. Don't put it off, once you get your ideas down on paper, everything else will fall into place. 25. What is your best tip for people interested in becoming professional organizers? If you want to become a Professional Organizer it's probably because you were born to organize. It's in your blood. It's what makes you tick. Success doesn't happen overnight, but if you remember the 3 P's - Patience, Persistence and Perseverance, it will happen. 
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