This Week in Weddings

This is the time to dig into projects that have been on the back burner for far too long, and for many wedding pros, that may include updating their website. But the pretty pictures on your company website aren't the only things that are important. The words on your website are just as important, but are left as an afterthought. In this week's episode of the This Week In Weddings podcast, we're chatting with Katy Taylor, lead copywriter and brand communication strategist for Ideaction Consulting. She's setting us straight on the importance of the language on your website and how a few strategic tweaks can make a big difference in attracting potential clients and converting them into customers.

About our guest:

Katy Taylor Jacobson is the lead copywriter and brand communication strategist for Ideaction Consulting. Katy, and the team at Ideaction Consulting, help wedding and event professionals find their voice and stand out from their competition. Not stand out by describing how much they love cats or pumpkin spice lattes… But by determining what their clients do, who they really are and how they make a difference in the lives of their customers.

Katy has actual experience selling luxury weddings and events for over 25 years - to brides, grooms, their families, and other event professionals. She knows a thing or two about the way clients buy and what they need to know from you in order to move forward with your services. Because she’s walked in your shoes, with success -  selling over $25 million for brands like Warwick Hotels and Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts.

Katy and her husband Sam, founder of Ideaction Consulting, geek out about helping event professionals make more money with how-to sales tactics and techniques that are surprisingly quite simple. When they aren’t teaching event pros at their workshops, they are living their best life on an island, in the middle of the ocean (seriously), with their two 11-year-old kids, Nick & Emily - who are turning them gray while keeping them young.

In this episode, listeners will hear about:

• Katy's background in the wedding industry, from catering sales to consulting and copywriting
• The basic purpose of your website and it's importance in the sales process
• English 101 - including the difference between first person, second person, and third person writing
• Best practices for the language on your home page and how that should different from your about page
• Tips for making the language on your website sound like you actually talk

Want to connect with Katy?

• Online: https://www.ideactionconsulting.com/
• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: @ideactionconsulting
• Facebook: http://facebook.com/groups/sellweddingslikeapro

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SUPPORT THE PODCAST!

Have you gotten value from This Week In Weddings? If so, it's time to pay it forward! Your contribution of as little as 10-cents a day will help us offset our costs, like file storage, web hosting, and editing. Plus, a larger donation gets you perks, like access to a private Facebook group to discuss each week’s episode!

Check out the ways you can contribute to the show.

With events not taking place throughout the country in the near future, wedding pros are being forced to take time off. But what are you doing during the down time to make it productive? In this week's episode of the This Week In Weddings podcast, we're chatting with wedding planner Sara Bauleke, who is no stranger to taking sabbaticals. She shared with us in Episode 124 how and why taking a sabbatical can be transformative, and in this episode we're chatting about how this Covid-19 imposed break is so different. From giving yourself grace to brain dumping that neglected to-do list, we're chatting all about the ways we're getting through this challenging time in our lives and businesses.

About our guest:

Sara Bauleke, a wedding planner & designer, has been creating modern, fun filled weddings that are distinct reflections of her clients' personalities for over 15 years. A logistics expert who's also a creative, Sara brings a rare combination of skills and savvy to wedding production.

Sara is a West Coast native who, as the daughter of a minister has been surrounded by weddings her entire life. After relocating across the country, Sara founded Bella Notte in Washington, DC in 2004. Sara and her team are passionate about working with modern couples on creative, quirky, and fun weddings that are still stylish and sophisticated. 

Sara's work has been featured in countless magazines, including Martha Stewart Weddings, and Town and Country and Bella Notte has been named one of Washington's Best Wedding Planners by Washingtonian Magazine for over a decade straight. While they take pride in these accomplishments, they're most proud of their personalized approach with each couple, resulting in a wedding that truly represents their personal style, as well as a fabulous wedding celebration for all involved.

In this episode, listeners will hear about:

• Sara's previous sabbatical experience and how this time is emotionally different
• Why we should of lower our expectations for productivity during this time of crisis and cut ourselves some slack
• The importance of writing down your backlog of to-dos
• Choosing projects to work on based on how you're feeling in the moment

Want to connect with Sara?

• Online: www.bellanottedc.com
• Instagram: @bellanottedc
• Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/bellanottedc/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/bellanottedc

SUPPORT THE PODCAST!

Have you gotten value from This Week In Weddings? If so, it's time to pay it forward! Your contribution of as little as 10-cents a day will help us offset our costs, like file storage, web hosting, and editing. Plus, a larger donation gets you perks, like access to a private Facebook group to discuss each week’s episode!

Check out the ways you can contribute to the show.

With so much unknown about when events will take place again, it's no wonder that wedding pros around the world have fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of change. Fear about money. Fear about what will happen with their businesses and livelihood. But what if we could use that fear as motivation instead of something that holds us back? In this week's episode of the This Week In Weddings podcast, we're chatting with a photographer about embracing the fear that many of us have right now and moving forward successfully.

About our guest:

Chris J. Evans is a luxury wedding and destination photographer who creates photographs you not only see but truly feel. His images transport you back to the very instant they were created. That cool breeze fluttering the back of your neck, the warmth of your soulmates embrace, this is his art. Chris has photographed weddings in Italy, Santa Barbara, Laguna Beach, Maui, Oahu, Kauai and Lana’i, with features in Brides, Martha Stewart, The Knot, Destination Ido and Wedluxe. Your wedding will be told through style, grace and gratitude. From this moment forward, you’ll never walk alone.

In this episode, listeners will hear about:

• Chris' background and how he got started in the wedding industry
• How Chris has embraced fear not once but twice with big relocations across the country
• Harnessing fear as a motivator and using it to push you
• How the experience with Covid-19 has changed Chris' relationship with money
• What wedding pros can be doing during this down time to align their brands with their values
• Book: The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles

Want to connect with Chris?

• Online: www.chrisjevans.com
• Instagram: @chrisjevansphoto

This episode of This Week In Weddings is sponsored by Honeybook.

With events not taking place in the coming weeks, all of us in the wedding industry have a little bit of down time. There's never been a better time to take a look at your online presence and do an audit of your brand. But what does that even mean? And how do you do it? In this week's episode of the This Week In Weddings podcast, we're chatting with a brand strategist who works with creative professionals in the wedding industry. Kaleigh Wiese is sharing some amazing tips for doing a brand audit, and now that we have some time to do it... there are no excuses!

About our guest:

Kaleigh Wiese is an endless creator, visual branding educator, entrepreneur, and public speaker. She has worked her entire career helping creatives find their visual voice. She found Méldeen in 2008, a luxury branding and paper goods company focused on designing unique touch-points throughout the wedding experience. LABEL by Méldeen launched in 2018 with resources and services to help event pros and creative find their brand voice and visually share their companies uniqueness. Through her work in the industry, she has been featured in The Huffington Post, Enterpreneur.com, Fortune.com Martha Stewart Weddings, Grace Ormonde and has shared trends at Wedding MBA, WIPA, ILEA and other niche creative workshops across the country offering tips for growing your business through visual marketing. in 2020, she has launched her fourth year partnership with WeddingPro (formerly The Knot & Wedding Wire) focusing on sharing her message of strategic brand techniques across the country. When she’s not on the go, you can find her at home in Austin, Texas experimenting in the kitchen, with a book in hand or boating with her husband, Michael, and their two rescue pups, Charlie and Jack.

In this episode, listeners will hear about:

• Kaleigh's background and how she got started as an entrepreneur 
• What makes up your brand
• What auditing your brand means
• The steps you should take quarterly to monitor your online presence
• The importance of doing a Google search of your name and your brand to see what comes up
• Doing a self-audit, but also bringing in an outside perspective with a stranger audit
• Easy ways to create cohesion between your website and social media profiles
• How a brand refresh may be all that you need without a complete re-brand or brand overhaul
• FREE DOWNLOAD: 5 Tips for Self-Auditing Your Brand
• FREE DOWNLOAD: Kaleigh's color theory guide

Want to connect with Kaleigh?

• Online: https://www.kaleighwiese.com/
• Instagram: @gokaleigh

This episode of This Week In Weddings is sponsored by Honeybook.

If you're anything like us, you've been thrown into a whole new world where it's difficult to tell what day it is, your workspace isn't what it used to be, and your "co-workers" (a.k.a. children) don't understand what business hours are. Welcome to the new world of shelter-in-place and working from home! In this week's episode of the This Week In Weddings podcast, we're chatting with a wedding industry professional who has worked at home from the inception of her business and has never looked back. She's sharing some of her top tips and tricks to make the WFH life efficient and productive.

About our guest:

Alexandra is the owner of Ladybird Paper Co., a full-service stationery and calligraphy studio with a focus in weddings. She loves integrating her life-long love of fine art with custom watercolor or hand-drawn sketches of florals and venues into her invitation suites, and of course finishing everything off with a scripted address.

She first dabbled in the invitation world in 2010 designing children’s birthday party invitations for her roommate’s Preschool class while she began her career in Product Development. As she advanced in her career traveling around the globe for retailers large and small, she left the party invites behind. It wasn’t until her own wedding in 2015 that she decided to revisit the world of stationery. Once the spark was ignited again, she couldn’t put it out. She designed for friends and family quietly and by request, but decided this is what made her the most happy and fulfilled. She used her experience in corporate retail and degrees in Design and Business from Auburn University, to build a brand while still maintaining an 8-5 career. It was during this time that she really honed in on efficiencies. In 2018 she took Ladybird on full-time from her in-home studio, and has since been featured in D Weddings and Brides of North Texas. In 2019 she had a baby, where she sharpened those efficiency skills more than even she knew possible. Owning a business that allows her to pursue her creative passion and being there to witness her daughter’s first milestones are what drives her to make it all work.

In this episode, listeners will hear about:

• Alexandra's background and how she got started in the wedding industry
• The importance of having a defined workspace, as opposed to working from your couch
• The benefits of not having a daily commute and how you can better use that time
• What to wear when working at home so that you're both comfortable but also feel productive
• Working on a schedule and shutting down at the end of your workday

Want to connect with Alexandra?

• Online: https://www.ladybirdpaper.com
• Instagram: @ladybirdpaperco
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LadybirdPaperCo/
• Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/lady1456/

This episode of This Week In Weddings is sponsored by Honeybook.

If there's one thing that the coronavirus has taught us, it's that as business owners we can never be too prepared. Just like a tornado or an earthquake, COVID-19 is a disaster, and now that the event world has a little bit of down time because of it, what should we be doing to be better prepared for the next unexpected situation? In this week's episode of the This Week In Weddings podcast, we're chatting with a seasoned event planner who has seen her fair share of event complications over the years. She's sharing some of the risk management tools she uses in her business that we can all incorporate.

About our guest:

Kawania Wooten, CMP, is an innovative event management executive, who excels at competitive strategic planning, convention and trade show management, and volunteer management. Her expertise lies in developing operational and programmatic initiatives that provide added value, reduce operational costs, streamline internal processes, and standardize association policies and procedures. As the owner of Howerton+Wooten Events, Kawania uses her strength in contract negotiations, logistics management, budget management, and strategic marketing to make considerable enhancements to the overall attendee experience of a convention of 5,000+ attendees filled with high caliber events.

Additionally, Kawania is also an adjunct instructor in the hospitality, tourism and culinary arts department at Prince Georges Community College in Landover, Maryland. Over the years, she has taught various classes, such as “The Fundamentals of Convention and Event Management,” “Introduction to the Hospitality Industry,” and “Hospitality Entrepreneurship.”

In this episode, listeners will hear about:

• Kawania's background and how she got started in the wedding and event industry
• What Kawania learned on her first big corporate event when the keynote speaker died the night before
• The information Kawania and her team collect from the entire wedding party
• How our mental health may be impacted during all of this
• How communication is key when it comes to handling crises 
• Business insurance and the benefits to having an insurance agent to talk to directly

Extras:

Listeners get 50% off anything in the Howerton+Wooten shop using the discount code PODCASTLOVE

• Risk Management Template 
• Wedding Planning Guidebook for Emergency Preparedness and Crisis Management 

Want to connect with Kawania?

• Online: https://www.hwevents.com/
• Instagram: @hweventsdc
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HowertonWooten

This episode of This Week In Weddings is sponsored by Honeybook.

Tom Hanks. Andy Cohen. Idris Elba. We all know what they have in common. And without a doubt, that list of stars who have first-hand experience with COVID-19 is going to continue to grow just as the list of ordinary people who contract it continues grows. Truly, no one is immune. In this week's episode of the This Week In Weddings podcast, we're chatting with a wedding and event photographer who has joined the list of Covid-19 survivors. Now that she has recovered, she's doing her part to educate others by sharing her story. Listen in as she shares how she contracted it, what her symptoms were, and her experience with the illness and recovery. And not only that, but she has some solid ideas on what we all must do to now in order to save lives.

About our guest:

With a MFA in visual art and a passion for empathic storytelling, Lara has built a successful career within the photography field. Her ability to bear witness and translate that emotionally through striking compositions has created a strong reputation within the wedding industry over the past 13 years. Her work has been featured in Martha Stewart Weddings, Boston Weddings Magazine, Grace Ormonde Wedding Style, Style Me Pretty, The Huffington Post and many more. Lara is based in Boston and travels all over the U.S. and internationally for weddings and commissions.

In this episode, listeners will hear about:

• Lara's background and how she got started in the wedding industry (more than 13 years ago!)
• How Lara contracted the coronavirus (You guys!!! She was working an event!)
• Lara's first symptoms and how she found out she may have been exposed to the virus
• Lara's experience as one of the first suspected cases at her Boston hospital
• The timing from contraction to recovery and the steps Lara took to ensure her husband didn't also get the virus
• Having experienced Covid-19, Lara's thoughts about events continuing and what we must do to prevent the continued spread of the virus

Want to connect with Lara?

• Online: http://thestudionouveau.com/
• Instagram: @studionouveau_
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/studionouveau/
• Email: [email protected]

This episode of This Week In Weddings is sponsored by Honeybook.

You guys... what in the holy hell is going on??!? COVID-19 is hitting us all in the event industry HARD, and now is the time to look at your business and adjust as best you can. In this week's episode of the This Week In Weddings podcast, we're chatting with Michelle Loretta about ways to prep your business for the economic impact of the coronavirus.

About our guest:

Michelle Loretta is a strategist for the wedding industry and creator of Sage Wedding Pros, founded in 2009. She blends her past as an accountant for Deloitte, a sales and marketing manager for DDLA, a merchandiser for Coach, and a wedding stationery entrepreneur to help entrepreneurs better their businesses. Sage Wedding Pros produces Be Sage Conference, a master-level event for wedding professionals nationwide. Michelle has been asked to speak at a number of industry conferences, including Wedding Wire World, NACE Experience, and The Special Event. She was named to the TOP 1000 Event Professionals by BizBash in 2019.

In this episode, listeners will hear about:

• The effects of the coronavirus and COVID-19 on our industry
• The importance of lobbying for client's to postpone instead of cancelling
• Safeguarding your cashflow by adjusting your payment processes going forward so that they match the scope of work and milestones
• Michelle's thoughts about collecting remaining balances from couples when their event is postponed or cancelled
• When it's time to consider a business loan or a line of credit
• SBA Loan info for Coronavirus Impact: https://www.sba.gov/page/guidance-businesses-employers-plan-respond-coronavirus-disease-2019-covid-19
• Ideas for pivoting in your business to generate quick income
• Buy Me a Coffee: https://ko-fi.com/
• How to Prepare for a Recession: https://sageweddingpros.com/2020/03/how-to-prepare-your-event-business-for-a-recession/
• Sage Wedding Pros COVID19 Resources: https://sageweddingpros.com/2020/03/coronavirus-covid-19-and-your-event-business/

Want to connect with Michelle?

• www.sageweddingpros.com
• Instagram: @sageweddingpros
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sageweddingpros
• Twitter: @sageweddingpros

This episode of This Week In Weddings is sponsored by Honeybook.

We've said it a million times, but without a sale, you don't have a business. And most of us in the wedding industry haven't had formal sales training experience. In this episode of the This Week In Weddings podcast, we're chatting all about sales techniques as well as the different personality types that you might be selling to in the wedding industry. Identifying the type of person you're selling to can give you an advantage in the sales process as you can tailor your approach.

About our guests:

Beth Lindsay Chapman is a veteran of the fashion industry and is known for her work as a bridal boutique owner, stylist, mentor, author, and wedding fashion consultant. After her tenure as a Vice President of Merchandising for Ann Taylor, her love of bridal fashion, and sincere desire to create a memorable shopping experience for brides, compelled her to launch The White Dress by the shore, a Connecticut based luxury bridal boutique, in 2004.  Beth is also the founder of Beth Chapman Styling + Consulting. After running a bridal store herself for over a decade, she recognized the need for support and education for bridal store owners. Her passion for teaching and education and her desire to empower independent bridal retailers, has led her to mentor other bridal store owners on elevating their brand and increasing their sales and business profitability.

Through the consulting arm of her business, Beth launched a series of training videos for bridal store owners and their staff, called The Series 2.0. These videos are intended to guide bridal store owners to run profitable businesses and to train their sales associates on product knowledge and effective selling techniques.

Beth is in the process of creating a course for Wedding Pros that focuses on assisting wedding professionals in changing their approach to sales and increasing their closing ratio. The course is due to launch in Spring of 2020.

Beth is also a sought-after stylist.  She not only assists brides in selecting fashion for their wedding and provides day of wedding dressing services, but she works with publications and brands on styled editorial shoots. Beth’s fashion artistry has allowed her to style editorial shoots throughout the world.

She is the co-author of two books, The White Dress in Color, and The White Dress Destinations  and has also contributed to Wedding Bible by Sarah Haywood, and Simple Stunning Bride by Karen Bussen.

In this episode, listeners will hear about:

• Beth's background in the wedding industry and how she got started focusing on selling techniques
• How mindset makes a big difference when you're selling so that you're helping a client to buy
• The five elements that should be present in order to close the sale:
  1. Why a strong "pre-sell" process and identifying your target client is key
  2. Building a relationship as the second step of the sales process
  3. Why asking the right questions and listening to the answers is imperative in sales
  4. Educating the client in order to build trust
  5. Reassuring the client in the decision as the final step before the sale
• The Shopper Personality
• The Detached Client
• The Expert Personality

FREE Personality Identifier Download: Text the word Beth to 38470.

Want to connect with Beth?

• Online: www.bethchapmanstyling.com
• Instagram: @bethchapmanstyling
• Facebook: bethchapmanstyling
• Twitter : beth_styling 

This episode of This Week In Weddings is sponsored by Honeybook.

If you're wanting to make the move into the luxury wedding market, you have to have a high end portfolio. And while not every wedding client may have a six- or seven-figure budget, there are certainly ways to make a piece of every wedding stand out. In this episode of the This Week In Weddings podcast, we're chatting about the ways to highlight the best features of a wedding in order to up-level your portfolio and your brand.

About our guests:

Starting off on Craigslist, Abby photographed her first wedding for $200 (including a wedding and an engagement session!). She knew from the very beginning that she wanted to be in the luxury market. So it was incremental strategic steps that she took along the way to create the luxury business she wanted. Abby has consistently grown the business every year and has been published in numerous publications such as Martha Stewart Weddings, BRIDES and People Magazine.

After five years into the business, Abby’s realized there was high demand for another photographer to fulfill the inquires she was receiving. That’s when the talented Lisa Ziesing joined, expanding the scope of weddings they cover. 

It’s in Abby’s nature to be a nurturer, and Lisa always thought she’d be a teacher like her mom and sister. So it was only natural that they started helping creatives in the wedding industry to help them reach the luxury market and therefore book their ideal clients.

In this episode, listeners will hear about:

• Abby and Lisa's background and how they got started in the wedding industry
• The importance of protecting your brand through the images you post
• Why you may not want to blog every single wedding
• The pre-event conversations that Abby and Lisa have with their clients in order to properly highlight the best wedding details

Want to connect with Abby and Lisa?

• Online: https://www.abbyjiu.com/ 
• Instagram: @abbyjiu

This episode of This Week In Weddings is sponsored by Honeybook.