In 2014, Dani Prado moved from Brazil to Connecticut with her husband and son as a result of her husband's work. The now 41-year-old had been a marketing manager for years in her native Sao Paulo but "when we came to the United States, I figured out that it was my chance to reinvent myself, reinvent my career," she says.
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"I always had a dream to have my own business," she says, and when she considered what she loved and was always good at, it occurred to her home organizing could be the service to offer. Prado took courses and read books on the subject, and started her business, Go! Organizer, in 2015.
To begin with, she took on organizing projects for friends in the area. Soon, word of mouth helped grow the business, and Go! Organizer was bringing in thousands of dollars per year.
When the pandemic hit, Prado was in the middle of several projects, and she quickly realized she needed to figure out how to offer her services digitally. She started working with 3D renderings of people's homes and offering video tutorials and shopping lists for clients. She created a profile on Fiverr with her now-digital offerings in April 2020. The business took off, and Prado, whose family is now based in Wisconsin, has brought in $20,000 to date from Fiverr alone. These days, 80% of her business comes from online requests via Fiverr and 20% from in-person ones.
Here's how she's been able to grow her home organizing business.
'I started charging by the hour' and then found a better pricing structure
Even before Prado started offering her services online, she needed to figure out how to price them.
"In the beginning, I started charging by the hour," she says. "That is normally what professional organizers do." Her initial rate was $50 per hour. Eventually, she found "the clients feel more confident" with a project-based price. "I understood with my sensibility that it's not about the time, it's about the solution, it's about the project," she says.
In-person projects ranged from one-room reorganizations, which she priced between $500 and $800, to full home reorganizations, which run $5,000. "I had normally two big ones in a year," she says, "and just a few individual organizations."
Realizing a room's design 'needs to be aesthetic'
After a few years of focusing just on organizing, Prado realized she could expand the business. She'd long included minor interior design tips in her work, whether it be suggesting a new type of light in a space or a different color palette.
"I figured out that one piece was missing," she says. "Because it's not just functionality and something in order. It needs to be beautiful, too. It needs to be aesthetic. So I decided to study interior design."
Prado is completing her certificate in interior design from the New York Institute of Art and Design this year and started implementing some of her interior design tips in her work on Fiverr. She focuses on small changes that can be made in a space by using what's already there and adding specific items such as a "cozy" blanket, she says.
Positioning herself as a 'premium' business
These days, Prado offers three packages on Fiverr. The basic package, which transforms one room and costs $295, the standard, which transforms two rooms and costs $560, and the premium, which transforms three rooms and costs $795. Each comes with mood boards, a design plan, a shopping list, and a video guide.
Prado's services in the category are among the highest priced on the site. But she stands by that decision and it seems to be working. "This is my strategy to positioning myself" as a premium business, she says. "Premium in delivery, premium in quality, premium in experience."
The article "This home organizer brought in $20,000 in under 2 years on Fiverr" was originally published on Grow (CNBC + Acorns).
