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00:00:01
How to Be More Productive in Your Planning Business
57 Plays4 months ago
Introduction:
- Amber welcomes listeners back to the podcast and introduces today's topic: supercharging productivity for wedding planners.
- She discusses the common challenge of never-ending to-do lists in the wedding planning industry and introduces the framework of Delete, Delegate, Automate, and Do to streamline operations and boost productivity.
Segment 1: Delete – Simplify Your To-Do List
- Overview: Amber explains the importance of simplifying workflows by eliminating unnecessary tasks and complexities.
- Key Strategies:Identify Low-Value Activities: Review and eliminate activities that consume time but do not enhance client experiences or profitability.
Learn to Say No: Emphasize the importance of declining non-strategic requests to free up time for higher-value activities.
Optimize Processes: Streamline existing processes to reduce unnecessary steps and enhance efficiency.
Segment 2: Delegate – Empower Your Team
- Overview: Discussion on the power of delegation to free up the planner's time for more critical tasks.
- Key Strategies:Assess Your Tasks: Identify tasks that can be effectively handled by other team members.
Build a Reliable Team: Tips on hiring assistants, working with freelancers, and training interns, including setting clear expectations and providing necessary resources.
Feedback and Adjustment: Establish a system for regular check-ins and feedback to ensure delegated tasks meet quality standards.
Segment 3: Automate – Use Technology to Your Advantage
- Overview: Amber talks about how automation can save time and reduce manual effort.
- Key Strategies:Automate Communications: Implement tools for automated email responses and scheduling.
Streamline Operations: Use technology for efficient budget tracking, event design, and task management.
Client Management Systems: Utilize CRM systems to automate client management tasks like reminders and follow-ups.
Segment 4: Do – Focus on High-Impact Work
- Overview: Focusing on tasks that have a significant impact on the business’s success.
- Key Strategies:Prioritize High-Impact Tasks: Concentrate on activities that directly contribute to event success and client satisfaction.
Time Blocking: Implement time blocking to manage various tasks efficiently without distractions.
Continuous Learning: Encourage ongoing professional development to enhance skills and stay competitive.
Conclusion:
- Amber summarizes the episode by reiterating the importance of the Delete, Delegate, Automate, and Do strategies in boosting productivity and reducing stress.
- She encourages listeners to start with one strategy and gradually integrate more to see comprehensive benefits.
Outro:
- Amber thanks listeners for tuning in and teases the next episode, which will continue exploring effective business strategies for wedding planners.
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Transcript
Introduction to Wedding Planner Podcast
00:00:02
Speaker
Are you a wedding planner just starting your business or have you been in the industry for just a few years? Do you want to build a profitable and enjoyable planning business that you're excited about every day? If the answer is yes, then you're in the right place. Welcome to the business of wedding planning podcast. I'm your host, Amber Peterson. I was a wedding planner for 10 years, a marketing strategist for service-based businesses, and now the owner of Planner's Lounge. I know what it's like to work so hard as a planner but not see the growth and profit you dream of. I also know that while you can be the most talented planner in your market, if you don't have the business foundation, it will be hard to continue growing.
Building Your Dream Business
00:00:45
Speaker
I have seen so many talented planners burn out because they become frustrated with things unrelated to wedding planning, like finances, marketing, team growth, and operations. This is where the Business of Wedding Planning podcast and Planners Lounge come in. Our mission is to help you learn what it takes to build the business of your dreams with simple digital product solutions, educational content, and the support of our free community, the Very Important Planners Lounge, or VIP Lounge for short. I understand what it's like to work in this unique industry while having a lot on your plate. During my time as a planner, I had three daughters, bought and moved to two new homes, and launched two other businesses. I am excited to combine my education, industry experience, and passion to help you reach your business goals.
Productivity Strategies Overview
00:01:37
Speaker
Hi friends, welcome back to the business of wedding planning podcast. Today we are going to talk about how to amplify your productivity using four strategies, delete, delegate, automate, and do. I know that my to-do list when I was a wedding planner and now as the owner of planners lounge is never ending. And I like being able to check things off. But for me, there are certain tasks that just are not that important. And those are usually the easy ones that I do the most because it's easy to check them off. But there's only so much time in a day. And as the owner of a business, you should be doing the most high value tasks that are going to actually bring in more revenue or
00:02:28
Speaker
move your team forward or better help your clients. So how do you prioritize and make sure that you're doing the most important things and that you are still getting everything done, but maybe it's not all done by you.
Streamlining Workflow
00:02:44
Speaker
That is where delete, delegate, automate, and do come in. So let's get started. First, I want to talk about deleting. This means just simplifying your to-do list. It's not just about removing tasks. It's about simplifying your workflow to eliminate unnecessary complexities or the things that maybe you're the bottleneck on in your business. So what are those things? You can use this strategy by first identifying low value activities.
00:03:19
Speaker
That means doing a thorough review of all of your daily tasks and identifying which ones consume the most time but don't significantly enhance your client experience or your business's bottom line. This could include overanalyzing minor details that clients don't notice, or attending networking events that haven't yielded any valuable connections or leads, or spending a bunch of time posting on social media channels that you get zero engagement on. You have to learn what is actually bringing in business and what is sort of just a space, takes up space in your schedule.
00:04:01
Speaker
The next thing is learning to say no. I am a recovering people pleaser and used to say yes to everything. And I would find myself so stressed out because I kept saying yes, kept saying yes, and my priorities kept getting pushed further and further down my my list. So learn to say no. Master the art of declining requests and opportunities that don't align with your strategic goals. saying no is not just okay it's necessary to make room for more valuable activities if you're constantly saying yes you have to be you're saying no to something i read a book once and i
00:04:44
Speaker
I can't remember the title, but there was a line almost like that that said, when you say yes to one thing, you're saying no to another. And at that point in my life, I realized I was saying yes to all of these things to do with my business that weren't really yielding any great benefit. And that meant saying no to family time, to um bringing on more high-dollar clients, things that were actually valuable to me.
Delegation and Team Building
00:05:08
Speaker
Finally, when you're looking for things to delete, you want to make sure that all of your processes are optimized. So evaluate your current processes for efficiency and then streamline or completely eliminate steps that complicate tasks without adding value.
00:05:25
Speaker
This could involve simplifying your booking process, reducing the amount of back and forth you have to have with clients ah by implementing some automations, just things that could add time back into your schedule. All right, you've deleted all the unnecessary things off your list. The next thing you want to do is to delegate. Delegation means trusting your team with tasks that do not require your direct involvement. And if right now you're listening thinking, I don't have a team, well, then this might be for future reference, but delegating is something you will eventually need to be able to do to someone, even if it's just a virtual assistant that can take on tasks like scheduling your social media.
00:06:13
Speaker
So, once you're in delegation mode, assess your tasks and analyze what daily activities and what daily activities can be handled by a team member. Consider delegating the routine tasks like vendor payments or checking in with a vendor to make sure they had received your timelines or managing client correspondence to figure out is this something that you as the planner specifically need to answer or is this a question that you and your team get all the time that there's a response for that you ah someone and on your team can handle?
00:06:49
Speaker
The next thing, and this is where if you don't have a team, you want to focus on building that reliable team. So if you're if you're one of the people that is sitting there thinking, I have no one to delegate to, then building that reliable team and some people that you can trust is going to allow you to utilize this part of the process. And this can start with something so small, like I mentioned a virtual assistant, to just handle small tasks. You don't have to jump right into hand ah to hiring a full-time associate planner or anything. So figure out what you exactly need and spend a little time thinking about what could that first hire be.
00:07:35
Speaker
And if you have delegated anything, always leave room for feedback and adjustment. Implement a system for check-ins and feedback on those delegated tasks. This ensures that those tasks are completed to your standards and allows for adjustments to workflows and responsibilities. And if there is a problem, it gives you time to fix it. All right, we've deleted, we've delegated.
Automation for Efficiency
00:08:00
Speaker
Now it's time to automate and use technology to your advantage. Automation is a great way to streamline processes and take things that you do over and over off your plate.
00:08:14
Speaker
The first thing you could automate easily is communications. Utilize tools like automated email responses and scheduling software to handle appointments and follow-ups efficiently. This could mean if you if someone books a consultation with you, then automatically a questionnaire goes out to them that gathers all the information that you need for the meeting. That way you don't have to say, oh, I have a consultation and now I need to send out an email. There are so many things that you can automate just in the back and forth you have with potential clients that could take up a lot of time or give you back a lot of time in your schedule.
00:08:52
Speaker
Next, you can streamline your operations, implement tech solutions for budget tracking, event design, task management. There are so many softwares out there that help us with the planning process and with running our business. I'm sure a ton of you use all sorts of different planning software. Make sure that you're using it to the best of its abilities. A lot of times when I was planning, I would subscribe to an application or a software and I'd use it for you know the main the main tasks, the main things. And I didn't even realize how much there was that I could be using that could be saving me time.
00:09:33
Speaker
So if you're already a subscriber to something, really dig in and see, is there anything else that this application could do for me? The same goes for any kind of climate management system you use. I was a big fan of 17 hats. Um, I still use it in my business. And because I have that whole system set up and in place, it just saves so much time when it comes to billing, communication, make sure that any application that you're paying money for is really being used to its full ability. And I guarantee there are probably things that you can add to it that will give you more time back in your schedule. And if you're not sure where to start with that, most of these applications, they have some sort of help desk or customer support.
00:10:20
Speaker
um that you can reach out to, and in some cases, you can even hire them to build something out for you. um I know when I first started using Seventeen Hats, there was a team that would set up all of my workflows for me and it was a small cost to ah to have that all done and I didn't have to touch it. And the final thing is do. This is the time where you are actually taking tasks off your list and doing them yourself.
Task Prioritization Techniques
00:10:53
Speaker
Concentrate the do portion of the strategy on tasks that significantly impact your business's success.
00:11:00
Speaker
and your personal and business goals. So prioritize high impact tasks. This means identifying and focusing on the tasks that directly contribute to the success of your events, client happiness, and your bottom line. This is where you should allocate the bulk of your time. The next thing you can do is time block. If you haven't heard of this, this is setting aside chunks of time to specifically do certain tasks so that you can really get focused and be in that task and not be context switching from one thing to another. I know that once I started only checking my email like three times a day, it really helped me stay to say focused and not get distracted by other people's priorities.
00:11:48
Speaker
Time blocking can be hard to get into because especially as wedding planners, like there's a million things going on, but on your work days where you're not at a wedding at an event, really try to stay focused on those high impact tasks and get them done in those time blocks. And finally, as with anything that we talk about on this podcast, always be looking for ways to continue to learn. There's always going to be a way to improve how you execute your tasks, whether it's through some sort of new application and new technology or enhancing your own skills or your team skills. Just continuously improving is going to allow you
00:12:32
Speaker
to be more efficient and to figure out better and better ways to run your business. There is a book that I read that talked about working in your zone of genius or your zone of competency. So what that means is as wedding planners and business owners, you can probably do everything pretty well. I mean, you started a business, so that means that you can you know how to start a business. You know how to run a business. doesn't mean that that's your zone of genius. I would venture to guess your zone of genius is actually in wedding planning and in client satisfaction and making sure that your clients are happy and their weddings are just what they wanted.
00:13:17
Speaker
When you're looking through all your tasks that you want to either delete or delegate or do yourself, make sure that the ones that you're keeping fall in that zone of genius and make sure that the ones that are just in your zone of competency are the things that you are giving to someone else to do or you are deleting completely. For example, i I know how to do my taxes. I know how to sit down and do that. It is going to take me probably five times longer than it would if I just handed off to my bookkeeper. So what's the better
00:13:57
Speaker
option there. i'm go If I can spend five hours doing something that's going to further my business or is going to bring more money into my business, that's way more valuable than whatever I'll pay my bookkeeper to take care of that task in less time.
Implementing Strategies Gradually
00:14:15
Speaker
I, one of my favorite business coaches, uh, is Natalie Eckdahl from the biz chicks podcast. And she always said that just because you can't do something doesn't mean you should. So even though you probably can do everything on your list, it doesn't mean you should.
00:14:32
Speaker
So I would encourage you to embrace these four strategies, delete, delegate, automate, and do. And you'll find yourself with more time to be productive, to be productive, but unless time that you're stressed and feel overworked and like your to-do list is just never ending. I would say start with one strategy, go through and just try and delete just the things that you really don't need to do and then gradually integrate the others.
Conclusion and Future Episodes
00:15:00
Speaker
Thank you so much for listening this week. There is not going to be a new episode next week, um but we will be back in the second week in August and we will be having a whole bunch of guests, which I'm so excited about. So I look forward to you coming back and hearing from all of these amazing experts that are going to be coming on. And I hope you have a great start to your August.