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A Wedding Business Podcast - Tips and tricks to, grow and sustain a amazingly successful wedding business in a way that's is fun and gives you tons of freedom.
Welcome everyone to the Wedding Pro Academy Podcast. I'm Nicole, your host. I'm an expert in the wedding industry and I've personally built two 6 figure businesses from the ground up. I am obsessed with building businesses that make lots of money but do so in a way that also create luxurious amounts of freedom. So if you're looking to build, grow, or scale a wedding business in a way that doesn't burn you out, and you'd love some guidance from someone who has done just that, this podcast is for you.
Nicole:Each week I'll cover strategies, tips, tricks that will give you your dream wedding business too. Thanks so much for tuning in today. Let's dive in. Hello friends. Happy Friday.
Nicole:Today we are going to be talking about the biggest mistake preventing you from booking weddings. So let's get into it. The biggest mistake I see so many newbie wedding businesses making is that they are spending six more months focused solely on building a brand, logo, and a website for their wedding business. And it's just one major thing that's holding you back. And if this is you, don't feel bad because this is what I did too.
Nicole:And this is actually what most people think they need to do when they are starting a business. You Google it and they say you need to have a logo, need to have a brand, you need to have a business plan. But here's the consequence If you spend this much time just focused on building your logo and your website, this is a huge thing that's going to hold you back. So the consequences are it's preventing you from actually connecting with couples who need and want your services. It's also preventing you from making sales or booking weddings.
Nicole:And yes, it is the easier, safer feeling route and that's why most people do it because it feels safer. But the truth is that it's holding your business back and it's keeping you stuck. So instead of becoming an actual legit wedding business that makes money, meaning you have actual weddings that you do that you have booked, you become an impostor. Someone who wants a business but never actually makes it off the ground and you stay stuck in this place for months or years. A lot of newbies will do this and I did this as well but most people who are building a business prioritize the building of the brand the logo, the website, etc.
Nicole:And then go on to waste six months to a year of very very precious time and energy. A lot of energy trying to perfect this brand and a lot of times you end up wasting money too. So you spend all this time and all this energy for six months to a year, and then you finally finish. And you have this website, and you have a logo that you're happy with, and you think, okay, now I'm ready to sell. And then you it's out in the world.
Nicole:It's live. It's on the Internet and nobody buys. So what happens then? Then you have to spend another six to twelve months trying to book weddings, and you start feeling defeated because after all that hard work, you thought it would be easy. You thought people would just be lined up wanting to work with you, but it isn't.
Nicole:You can't sell, you can't convert, you can't turn the looky loos into booked weddings. And it isn't converting because you have no demand, you have no testimonials, no proof, no experience because you never spent any time focusing on that part. It's so backwards because it's something that so many newer weddings focus their time and energy on but it's what totally holds them back. Here's the mistake: focusing on the wrong things, focusing on a logo, a brand, a polished website, and then wasting six or more months doing this, getting you nowhere close to a sale or booking a wedding when you could have just focused on getting weddings under your belt. So even if that means doing them for free, if that means that you're doing the work or providing a service at a highly discounted rate just for the experience, that is a better way to build authority and to get more weddings and to get a business that actually makes money eventually.
Nicole:So that is the quicker way to do it and the much smarter way. And this whole thing reminded me of this story that I'm gonna tell you that will make sense once I get through it. But it reminded me of this brand of skincare called Ryman. I don't know if you've heard of it. I never heard of it.
Nicole:I, being in my forties now, value skincare. It's a thing that I'm into and I think most women, well, even men, I think in our thirties and forties, have begun to think about skincare a lot. So, anyway, I'm at this wedding and the DJ, who I'm also really good friends with, I'm sitting next to him. We have a little break in between dinner time, and we get a little chance to eat. We're catching up, and I'm looking at him, and his skin just looks amazing, and he's bright and he's glowing.
Nicole:So I'm like, Oh my god, Kev, what is going on with your skin? You look so good. What are you using? Is something different? He was like, Oh my god, Nico.
Nicole:I just have to tell you about this skincare that I've been using. He just starts going off on it. He's like, It's this Korean skincare, and I took a trip out to Korea with my wife. She's Korean, and I got exposed to this skincare, and I started using it, and she uses it, and it's so great. Like, my hair, even I'm using the hair products, like, my hair started growing back, and all this stuff.
Nicole:This is stuff old people talk about. But, anyways, I started getting very intrigued about it, and he's gushing on it so hard that I become genuinely curious. And I'm and all of a sudden, it reminds me that, oh my god. I saw this post on Instagram from this other event planner that I know in the wedding industry also, and she had done, like, a before and after post about her face. She used to have a lot of acne, and then she started using this product, and now her skin is completely clear, and she looked so good.
Nicole:And I was like, wow. That's awesome. Like, what is it? Like, I paid attention to it, that post. I remembered it.
Nicole:And then I asked my friend, the DJ, his name is Kev Kevin. I was like, is that the same thing? And he was like, yeah. Oh my god. I told her about it.
Nicole:She started using it. And the next thing I know, the wedding's done. Literally, like, a week later, he's calling me. He's like, I'm gonna come to your house, and I'm gonna give you a facial with this seven step face cream process. I'm like, okay.
Nicole:All of a sudden, I'm starting to get, like, you know, the vibes that this might be MLM, but I don't care because I'm just genuinely kinda curious about it. So he comes over and gives me and my husband, like, seven different things to try on our face, and we do it. And I immediately am, like, impressed with the product. And but the the bigger part that, like, got me is just his skin and how much he loved it and then that I had also seen it from somebody else that I knew. So here's the thing.
Nicole:I did not look at the brand. I didn't look them up. I didn't look at their logo. I didn't check to see their website to see if it was aesthetically pleasing. I honestly didn't care about any of that, and I didn't even care that this could possibly be MLM or multilevel marketing because I was so impressed with the actual product and what they were my friends were saying about it.
Nicole:So I was like, you know, what the fuck? I don't care. I'm gonna buy it. I was I was into it. Right?
Nicole:So I go and I buy it with his link, and then I get the product and I use it now. And I actually really, really like it. But I bought it solely on the testimonials, on word-of-mouth. And let's bring this back to why you are not booking weddings and or why you could be booking weddings. So if you look at that story, I bought this product sight unseen without looking at their branding, without looking at their website, without knowing very much about them at all, just totally based on what people were telling me and their reviews.
Nicole:I actually did look up their reviews, and they were all five star, and I was sold already. And I was willing to spend 200 plus dollars on this face cream, you know, that was being shipped from Korea. I bought it. Like, literally that week, bought it. So let's think about this concept with you and where you spend your time and energy when you are working to build your wedding business.
Nicole:So if you spend six months or a year focused on branding and creating a logo and a website but you never really get any people to experience your services. You never get any practice at weddings. You don't have any reviews. You don't have people spreading the word. You don't have people gushing about how awesome you are, then you basically have a whole year, six months or whatever that's wasted.
Nicole:Because at the end of that you might have a beautiful website and a logo that you could be proud of, but you have no proof that your services are legit. You have no testimonials. You have no real brides and grooms gushing about you and your services. And so none of that stuff really matters. So why is this important?
Nicole:Because even if you have a beautiful logo, website, an amazing looking brand, if you don't have the proof with legit testimonials, you are just going to be seen as unprofessional, as not trustworthy, as not legit, and as unsafe by potential brides. Brides won't be able to take you seriously. They can't trust you. They would rather choose someone they know is amazing through word-of-mouth, through testimonials, through hearing about you, through an outside source, than choose someone they randomly find online even if they have a professional, beautiful looking website or logo. So although both things are important, so, like, having a good brand and, like, beautiful aesthetically looking website is important, It's more important to be gathering proof that you are, you know, a legit business, trustworthy, and you have a bunch of amazing testimonials.
Nicole:That stuff will make a greater impact in letting other new potential brides and grooms feel comfortable with booking you. So building that logo website should be secondary to getting real experience and getting real feedback from actual couples. Bottom line, the more feedback and testimonials and reviews you get, the more business you'll get. That's just how it works. So imagine if that skincare company, Ryman, had spent all this money on making this amazing product, and then they tried to sell it only online, only by focusing on their website, on their branding, on their advertising.
Nicole:I would guess that they wouldn't be nearly as successful because it didn't get as quickly into the hands of real people who could spread the word by mouth. And people are always gonna trust people over just a known brand. So this is a great strategy that we can apply to wedding businesses. And instead of focusing on just your logo, brand, and website, you should put all your focus into getting weddings booked, even if that means doing them for free, doing them at a highly discounted rate. If you do an amazing job on these weddings, you now have word-of-mouth happening, and then you get testimonials.
Nicole:What are the benefits of this? Now you have people, real people, real brides and grooms grooms raving about your business. That's going to have a much higher chance of attracting and booking more weddings. You also now have the proof of being a legitimate business. New brides will start to see you as a safe choice.
Nicole:They will start to see you as trustworthy. Plus, when you have a bunch of reviews and testimonials, you have people talking about you, you start to build this attraction around your business and excitement around your business. And you if you have a lot of people raving about the experience of working with you, it attracts more. That just happens naturally. That is a great way to get your business moving.
Nicole:You will automatically start being seen as professional. It's like, don't just take my word for it, see what our couples are saying. That is a really key thing to getting booking more weddings. Another benefit is that you get real life feedback, and a lot of it, from actual couples after each wedding, which means that you now know how to make your business better and better and better. It's the quickest way to grow your business.
Nicole:You have proof that what you do is needed. You have proof that your service is wanted and valued. That is also really important to, like, knowing if this business will succeed or hold long term. So those are all the benefits from focusing in on building experience and booking weddings over just building a beautiful brand online. And in the Wedding Pro Academy masterclass, we focus on strategies like this, stuff that actually creates momentum in your business.
Nicole:For example, in the first module, I teach you these four foundational pillars to implement to make new to to make booking new weddings easier. One of those foundational pillars is testimonials. Like I've said earlier, you can tell, this one is so key and something that a lot of newer weddings miss or gloss over. But it's very important to building trust. But there are three others that matter too.
Nicole:I have a really simple, easy to follow steps breaking down what the four pillars are, how to implement them, what you might be missing, and honestly, once you have those four in place, and you use my process for booking new couples, which gives you a script on exactly what to say to couples when they reach out to you, how to respond, etc. That is how you start building a business that actually is a real business that makes sales. And I don't want you to just have a business that is for fun. Like, I want a business for you, a wedding business that actually makes you enough money so you can stay in business and keep doing it. Because having a wedding business is awesome, but having a wedding business that makes money is even better.
Nicole:And the only way that you can keep doing this is if you make money. So today, I just wanted to give you a little something that may be holding you back and help you correct it so that you can focus on what actually works. If I had one tip on what could be holding you back right now preventing you from booking more weddings and keeping you stuck, it's that you're spending way too much time trying to perfect this brand, this website and logo and all the all that, you know, aesthetic stuff that we think is important, but it doesn't need to be perfect. So don't waste months and months and months on this. It doesn't matter that much.
Nicole:You should have a website up, but it can be simple. It doesn't have to be I don't know, like, as special and perfect as you think it does. It really can be simple. Instead, I want you to prioritize getting yourself out there, getting weddings booked, getting experience, getting testimonials. This should be your number one.
Nicole:The more you can focus on just this, the more your business will naturally take off and you'll have this sort of automatic sales system in place because people will be talking about you. It'll build attraction. You'll get experience. All of that will get the ball rolling, and that'll be really, really helpful to you to building a business that is in it for the long haul. Something that can make you enough money so you don't have to get a second job, so you can quit that other job, so you can be all in on this business.
Nicole:That's all I have for you today. I hope you guys found that helpful. Hope it made sense. You can learn more about the wedding business masterclass that I have at weddingproacademy.com. And if you guys have any questions on anything, I would love to hear from you.
Nicole:My email is nicoleweddingproacademy dot com. Have a very happy Friday, and I will talk to you all next week. Bye for now!