Wedding planning can be one of the best industries in which to start a business. After all, people are almost always going to be getting married, and it’s a lot easier for the bride and groom to enjoy the day if a dedicated wedding planner takes care of all the stressful stuff. There are thousands of decisions to be made, both before and during the big day!
If you’re wondering how to start your own wedding planning business, here are some things to keep in mind so your efforts go smoothly.
Consider Education And Certification
First off, consider the fact that wedding planning isn’t a career you can jump into without any experience or education. It might seriously benefit you to join a wedding planning organization or company and work as an on-site coordinator. This gives you hands-on wedding planning experience and will help you learn the ropes when it comes to juggling guests, figuring out schedules, and handling everything that comes along with wedding planning overall.
Secondly, you can become accredited as a wedding planner or even get a degree in event planning. This doesn’t guarantee that your wedding planning business will be a success. It does give you an air of legitimacy, though, and can help you get clients, especially when you’re starting out.
Make A Business Plan For Your Wedding Planning Business
Once you’ve got any experience or education you want under your belt, it’s time to make a business plan.
This involves figuring out your budget, how much you plan to make over the first few years, and deciding where you’ll be marketing. It’s always a good idea to come up with a solid business plan you can refer back to regardless of the exact business. Just like the bride and groom may want to know how to save on their wedding, you want to know how you can save for your business.
Get Finances In Order
More specifically, figure out how you’ll pay for all the supplies and other costs that running a wedding planning business will necessarily entail. If you don’t already have enough cash saved up, you might need to take out a loan.
It’s also common for wedding planning businesses (and all other businesses, really) to not make a profit for the first few years. Still, have all this decided and understood ahead of time so you aren’t surprised when you take your first clients.
Come Up With A Style And Marketing Strategy
Here’s the fun part: coming up with a unique style that reflects what you bring to the wedding planning sphere.
A wedding is supposed to be a magical day for both bride and groom, and as a wedding planner, you can help make that day even more memorable. To this end, everything about your wedding planning business should demonstrate what you’re about and the aesthetic style you bring to the table. This includes:
- your company name and image
- your logo, colors, and fonts
- any marketing materials you might use, such as pamphlets or business cards
- a portfolio of previous experiences or weddings that were successful
Unlike many other businesses, every little detail of your wedding planning style and aesthetic matters when it comes to finding new clients. Brides-to-be and others helping them find a wedding planner will look at everything you have to determine whether you’ll be a good fit for their day.
This also means you’ll need to come up with fantastic looking business cards and an excellent website.
Marketing Ideas
We’d strongly recommend that you consider how you market your wedding planning website before you begin taking on clients.
Make A Site
A website, mentioned above, is a great place to start since most people find professionals like wedding planners over the Internet instead of in person these days.
Your website should be easy to navigate, and it should be even easier to find your portfolio or examples of stuff you can provide for a new wedding.
Brochures And Print Ads
These are big pieces of any wedding planner’s marketing network. These are physical pamphlets or pages you can hand out to potential clients, especially when you’re already working on someone else’s wedding. Weddings are a great opportunity to meet future clients, as chances are good that someone else at the party is also planning on getting married soon. If you do a good job and hand out some of your pamphlets, you can position yourself as the ideal solution for their needs.
Keep Your Marketing Focused
No wedding planner is perfect for all weddings, especially those with significantly focused themes or niche rituals. It can help if you keep your marketing zeroed in on a particular type of wedding or service. For instance, eco-conscious weddings are becoming more popular: you could potentially position your business as one of the only eco-friendly wedding planning businesses in the area.
Or you can focus more on “ethnic” weddings of varying denominations depending on your own experience. The point is to keep your marketing and your wedding planning business from being too “regular”. Remember, there are plenty of other wedding planning businesses is available. You want yours to stand out by being the best in a specific sector, because it’s impossible to be the best at every wedding.
Set Up Your Wedding Planning Business – Make It Legitimate
Once you’ve figured all this out, it’s time to finally set up your business. It could be helpful to consult with an attorney, especially as you determine which business structure you should choose. Business structures you can choose from include:
- a sole proprietorship
- an LLC or limited liability company
- a corporation
Each business model has its own advantages and disadvantages. But the point is to make your business a legitimate and separate entity to protect you from any legal hurdles you might overcome. It can also protect your personal finances from going under in the event that your business doesn’t do very well.
Setting up your business also involves registering your final business name. Keep this memorable but informative as to your purpose. For instance, “Mary’s Marvelous Wedding Planning” is short and a little old-fashioned, but it’s memorable and gets the job done.
You’ll also want to consider insurance, especially if you have employees (you’ll need workers’ compensation insurance in this case). Insurance can protect you in the event that something goes wrong at a wedding that isn’t your fault.
Start Wedding Planning!
When all is said and done, whether your wedding planning business will be successful depends on you and how well you forge relationships with your clients. With the right planning and determination, you can make a million special days even more wonderful. Good luck!
