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00:00:01
Creating Services & Packages for Your Ideal Clients
68 Plays6 months ago
Overview of the episode's focus on crafting well-structured wedding packages to simplify client decision-making, enhance marketing effectiveness, and increase bookings.
Main Discussion Points:
- Benefits of Well-Structured Packages:
- Clarity and Simplicity: Ensures potential clients understand what they are getting, reducing confusion and helping in decision-making.
- Targeted Marketing: Tailors packages to specific wedding types or client needs to attract ideal clientele.
- Perceived Value: Designs packages that showcase the value of services provided, encouraging investment.
- Streamlining Operations: Improves business efficiency through predefined service outlines.
- Upselling Opportunities: Facilitates the addition of services for an extra fee, enhancing client experience and business revenue.
- Competitive Differentiation: Distinguishes services in a crowded market by highlighting unique selling points.
2. Understanding Your Client Base:
- Importance of knowing the target market before designing packages.
- Strategies for gathering information on potential clients’ needs, preferences, and budget considerations, including market research and client feedback.
3. Components of a Compelling Wedding Package:
- Detailed breakdown of essential elements every package should cover, such as planning time allocation, scope of services, onsite presence, and level of involvement.
- Importance of clear, concise, and attractive package descriptions for effective marketing and client communication.
4. Flexibility and Customization:
- Discusses the significance of offering customizable packages to meet diverse client needs and enhance satisfaction.
Additional Resources:
- Mention of free downloadable resources like the Planning Package Checklist and the Pricing with Confidence guide available in the show notes.
- Invitation to join the free wedding planner community, the VIP Lounge, for further resources and support.
Closing:
- Recap of the importance of understanding the target market and continuously refining service packages.
- Reminder for listeners to tune in to the next episode focused on detailed pricing strategies.
Links Mentioned:
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Wedding Planning Podcast
00:00:05
Speaker
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 the owner of Planners Lounge.
Creating Appealing Wedding Packages
00:00:18
Speaker
Today we're discussing strategies for creating wedding packages that appeal to your ideal clients and make the booking process a bit easier. Before we get started, keep in mind your packages will likely undergo several iterations throughout the course of your time as a wedding planner, but having a solid understanding of how to create attractive service packages will hopefully help reduce the trial and error of developing your services over time.
00:00:46
Speaker
Okay, let's jump in. Having well-defined service packages is important to your business for a variety of reasons. First, clarity and simplicity. A well-defined and easily understood service package helps your potential clients understand exactly what they're getting. It makes it easy for them to see that you're meeting their needs and it reduces confusion and streamlines their decision-making process.
Differentiating Service Packages
00:01:16
Speaker
I'm sure we've all purchased things, our services, where there's a variety of options, but it's difficult to tell exactly what the difference is between each choice. Spending time to really define each level of service is going to help your potential clients see exactly where they need to be.
00:01:37
Speaker
This also leads to more satisfaction once they're done working with you and less misunderstandings. There's nothing worse than having someone sign up to be your client and then they're confused of why they're not getting the things that were listed in this service package or they realize they actually needed something totally different and it feels or it can feel to them like a bait and switch. So spending time to make sure that you really
00:02:06
Speaker
have differentiated services in each package that you create for your potential clients is going to save you a lot of headache down the road.
Tailoring Packages for Ideal Clients
00:02:17
Speaker
The second reason is targeted marketing and I know I've talked about this a lot on here and I will continue to talk about it.
00:02:24
Speaker
But marketing to engaged couples, it's not a one size fits all kind of thing. This is where you go back to knowing who your ideal client is and in terms of your service packages, tailoring them to attract that type of client.
00:02:44
Speaker
If you know that you're offering services that your very specific ideal client wants, it's going to be a lot easier to market to them. You'll be able to curate your messaging, all of your marketing activities to speak directly to that type of client.
00:03:01
Speaker
By specializing your service packages to reach that target market, you're going to make it more likely that they're going to discover you in search, that you're easily referable by other wedding vendors, and that it just shortens that sales period where they're trying to decide if you're the right one for them because if you specialize in the type of wedding they're having,
00:03:25
Speaker
the type of person they are, it's just going to make it that much easier for them to make that final decision. Well-defined services also can help streamline your business operations on the backend. When you know exactly what you're delivering to each couple, you can set up systems of operation, checklists, all the things that make planning for your clients that much easier. It becomes
00:03:53
Speaker
really simple to create all of those things on the backend of your business to help you and your team deliver the best possible service that you can. Streamlined operations also improve the client experience and ensure a more smooth delivery, especially after you have used the same processes and procedures for multiple weddings.
Standing Out in the Wedding Planning Market
00:04:17
Speaker
Finally, well-defined services can give you some competitive differentiation in the market. As I mentioned before, if you're offering unique services to a specific market, it can set your business apart from all of the other wedding planners in your area.
00:04:34
Speaker
As we know, if you're not getting a direct referral from someone and couples are searching for you on Google or on different wedding websites in your area, they're probably going through and looking at all the different planners. And there is kind of standard services that we all offer. But even if what you're offering is similar to three other planners in your area, if you can
00:05:02
Speaker
message and differentiate a bit differently when those couples are sitting down and looking back through all their research, you stand out if you have a bit more than full partial and wedding day management services. If you can differentiate in some way, it helps you stand out a little bit from the masses.
00:05:25
Speaker
As I mentioned before, if you're a new planner or you haven't even started your business yet, these packages that you create and the services you create, they're not set in stone. Over the 10 years that I was a planner, my service offerings evolved and changed many times based on
00:05:44
Speaker
how my business was changed and what clients were asking for. So if you're sitting down and starting to draft these ideas, don't get stuck on perfect. Just get something on paper that you can start working with because it's likely you're going to make changes as you learn more about your market and as you learn more about what people want.
Understanding and Targeting the Market
00:06:06
Speaker
All right, I know I need to create packages or you've been in business for a while and you're thinking, I have services that I offer, but I never really figured out who my target market is. Then I want you to stop here and spend some time working on that.
00:06:23
Speaker
Understanding your client base is going to make the rest of developing your service offerings so much easier. There's a lot of reasons for this that I've touched on lots of times, but let's run through them in relationship to creating services.
00:06:44
Speaker
The first reason, obviously, you can tailor your services to what your specific client needs when you understand who that client is. When you know your target market, it allows you to tailor your packages to meet their needs, preferences and expectations.
00:07:01
Speaker
Different demographics all have different priorities and these could range from budget constraints, style preferences, cultural traditions, or simply the desired level of service they want to book. By really understanding who your target market is, you also can create a really effective pricing strategy. You want to understand what can your ideal client afford and what are they willing to spend.
00:07:28
Speaker
That way you can set your prices appropriately. So this not only ensures that your services are accessible to the clients you want to serve, but also it's going to help maximize your profitability over time. Next week, we're going to dive deep into pricing strategies and pricing pitfalls. But knowing what your ideal client has to spend or what they're willing to spend is going to be crucial to creating appropriate prices.
00:07:58
Speaker
Again, when you know who your ideal client is, it makes marketing so much easier. You want your messaging to resonate with the people you want to work with, not with everyone. Because when you're trying to talk to everyone, you virtually are speaking to no one. So knowing who your ideal client is is going to help you
00:08:20
Speaker
enhance your marketing efforts with the appropriate messaging and you're going to be able to figure out where should I spend my marketing budget? Where are people that I want to reach spending time? Is it on social media? Is it wedding shows? Is it a combination of a lot of places? But marketing is an expensive venture, but so important to growing your wedding planning business. So you don't just want to be
00:08:48
Speaker
fire hose spending, trying to reach people anywhere you can. You want to be really strategic about where you spend those marketing dollars. And finally, knowing who your target market is gives you a competitive edge. If you are trying to book anybody who is getting married, then it's going to be hard to reach them with a good message and you kind of just
00:09:14
Speaker
fade into the masses of wedding planners available to them in the area.
Pricing and Budget Considerations
00:09:19
Speaker
If there's no differentiation, why should they pick you over someone else? And a lot of times what you might realize when you're working with couples, and generally in any kind of like big purchase, if there's no way to differentiate based on what you offer, your expertise,
00:09:39
Speaker
Anything like that, it comes down to price and you don't want to be competing on price. So knowing who your target market is, what they value, what they need is going to allow you to stand out from other wedding planners as the planner who specializes in exactly what your ideal client is looking for.
00:10:00
Speaker
So make sure you spend some time really thinking about who is that ideal client I want to work with? What kind of weddings are they planning? And as I've mentioned in previous episodes, you can niche down based on the type of venue. You could work at only specific venues.
00:10:19
Speaker
Maybe you only do home weddings. You specialize in creating an amazing wedding in someone's backyard or private residence. There are so many ways that you can niche down and I encourage you to spend some time thinking about what is it that gets you excited about a wedding and is there a smaller target market in that interest and excitement.
00:10:46
Speaker
In order to figure out your ideal client needs and interests, you might have to do a little bit of research. And this can be done in a number of ways. You can conduct some market research to understand the broader trends and preferences within the wedding industry. This could include looking at some online surveys if you have previous clients that you've worked with.
00:11:13
Speaker
you can analyze industry reports to gather information on what different demographics are looking for in wedding services. I know when I was starting out, I utilized a service called the Wedding Report where you could put in your zip code and find data about
00:11:31
Speaker
how much is the average wedding costing, how are people prioritizing, booking different types of vendors, things like that. And it's a company that they do all the market research and then you can just purchase that. And that was actually really helpful to me. So looking for ways to
00:11:50
Speaker
either do your own market research or tap into other people's or other businesses is a great way to gather some deeper insight. This is where you can use your networking skills and connections with people that you have in the local industry by speaking to people who also have a lot of interaction with engaged couples such as venues, florists, photographers,
00:12:16
Speaker
really anyone that is working in our industry, they're gathering insights as they go as well. And if we can share with each other what we're learning, that just makes the industry as a whole better. You're going to be able to hear
00:12:31
Speaker
what they're hearing from their potential couples, their booked couples, about what is important to them, what they're feeling about planning a wedding at this point in time, all of those kind of things that people just gather the information in conversation. So this is another reason and place that having a good network, trusted wedding professionals is going to be really helpful to gathering more information.
00:13:01
Speaker
And finally, just join your local social media forums where engaged couples are chatting with one another and asking questions. Couples will post a lot about understanding the industry that they're currently planning this huge event in. They all share things about their style, the themes, the colors, all the things they're working with. And you will be able to
00:13:30
Speaker
gather what's important to them, what's not important to them, and in some forums, you can even engage directly with those couples. You just want to make sure you're not coming across as either super salesy like
00:13:45
Speaker
hey, I'm a wedding planner, hire me, hire me, but more as a conversation. And this is obviously going to wildly vary based on the type of forum you're in, whether it's a Facebook group, it's a private community, things like that. But you can definitely
00:14:06
Speaker
gather a lot of insight just by reading through the posts and listening to what couples are talking about and what they're finding challenging, what they're finding easy, all of those things about the wedding planning process.
00:14:22
Speaker
If you do have past clients that you've worked with before, you can also start utilizing client questionnaires and surveys. So before any consultation, you likely have something that you use to gather information from potential couples.
00:14:41
Speaker
And even in those questionnaires, you can also include questions about the vision for their wedding, their preferences and style, theme, the size of wedding, specific needs, wants, what's important to them, and also include questions about budget to understand what are their financial constraints and capabilities.
00:15:02
Speaker
This information will obviously help you with your consultation, but you'll be able to look at the trends of what type of couples are contacting you, which will either allow you to modify your packages to fit the specific needs of that type of client or
00:15:22
Speaker
If that's not the type of client you want to work with, if there's something that you're just not syncing up and becoming a good working relationship, then it allows you to spend time making modifications that will attract a different type of client.
Adapting Packages Based on Feedback
00:15:40
Speaker
When I was a wedding planner, I started out with kind of the typical packages of full, partial and wedding day management. And I really thought that that's just what you had to do at the beginning. I just didn't think there was anything different because that's what everyone else did. And at that point in time, I was nervous about being too different. So I was like, well, this is what I'll do, too. And what I was noticing was
00:16:09
Speaker
booking wedding day management, no problem. That type of couple easily fit into that service bucket. But I had a lot of couples who should have signed up for full planning, but they would choose partial planning because I wasn't differentiating them enough. And I also wasn't holding boundaries once we were in contract.
00:16:32
Speaker
So basically most of my partial planning clients, they ended up getting full planning, but just at the partial planning price. So I decided that I didn't want to do partial planning anymore because the scope creep that was happening was always happening. And I
00:16:53
Speaker
really didn't feel like partial planning existed for me. And so I got rid of that and it didn't really affect bookings at all. People just knew, okay, I need more than wedding day management. And so this is the other thing she has. And in the last few years of my career,
00:17:12
Speaker
as a wedding planner, I realized that what I enjoyed most and what was the easiest for me to book was wedding day management. And so I completely changed my services to only offer that with the add-on of design services if that was something they wanted.
00:17:36
Speaker
So like I said, you will probably change what you offer as your business evolves, but a lot of it just comes based on how each season goes, how each wedding goes, what you are enjoying, not enjoying in the moment.
00:17:52
Speaker
So make sure that you are looking at your services, looking at your pricing at least once a year before your booking season starts. But it should sort of be a constant ongoing process to make sure that you're profitable and that you are continuing to offer services that you enjoy offering and that your potential client actually want and need.
Defining Service Components
00:18:20
Speaker
Let's talk about what makes a compelling service package. You want to break down all of the essential components that couples are looking for when they're trying to make their decision. So some of these include how much time is allocated to the couple. You want to clearly state the amount of planning time that's included in the package.
00:18:44
Speaker
Depending on how you want to do this, it might be that there is a certain number of hours or meetings that the planner will dedicate to each client. Also, you want to make sure that you state any limits there might be on how much communication, how many meetings, if there's any limitations, make sure you're upfront.
00:19:07
Speaker
This is really going to help manage expectations and it clearly defines your availability through the planning process. For example, where I'm at in Washington, there were venues that were out on islands that you have to take a ferry to. There are venues that are an hour from where I live just because the county that I mostly planned weddings in
00:19:34
Speaker
was really spread out. So, for some venues, especially the ones on the islands, I wasn't gonna run up there every weekend to meet with them or, you know, once a month if we were doing full planning. That was just so unrealistic for the amount of time it took and the cost that it took to get to those places. So, if a couple decided to get married,
00:20:01
Speaker
It was almost considered a destination, even if they lived there, because I had to factor in travel costs, things like that. So I would clearly put into my proposal that there would be X number of onsite meetings. And these would, these should hopefully include
00:20:21
Speaker
Um, final walkthroughs, you know, those kinds of things so that they understood, okay, we do get time at the venue with our planner, but for every single meeting we have, we're not meeting at the venue. So just make sure that those kinds of things are really clear.
00:20:37
Speaker
You also want to define the scope of your planning services, and this means defining what aspects of the planning process you're going to handle. So this can include venue selection, vendor management, budget planning, design, sourcing decor,
00:20:55
Speaker
creating timelines and scheduling and logistics. A lot of this stuff, you're probably thinking, yeah, of course, I'll handle that. I'm a wedding planner. Just keep in mind what is really understandable to us who are in the industry is not so easily understandable to people who are planning this major event for probably the first time in their lives. Overexplaining is
00:21:22
Speaker
better than not explaining enough and then dealing with mismanaged expectations later.
00:21:28
Speaker
You also want to define how much time on site will you be during the wedding. Some planners, they are there from the time the venue opens to the time the venue closes. That was how my business was just because I did not feel comfortable leaving until everything was shut down and I knew everything had wrapped up nicely at the venue. But there are other business models where
00:21:56
Speaker
you come for setup and stay through the cake cutting. And once open dancing starts, you're done for the day. It's totally up to how you want to structure your business, but you want to make sure that your new clients or potential clients understand, okay, I'm going to get there at 10 a.m., but I leave by 7 and they're not at 7.30 going, where's my wedding planner?
00:22:21
Speaker
You also want to define your level of involvement in decision-making and execution. And this is really where the packaging structure is really handy. So with full planning, you're pretty much involved in everything. From the time they come on as a client to the end of their wedding, you're helping them with all aspects.
00:22:44
Speaker
Partial planning, this, again, I mentioned before, not my favorite, which is why I got rid of it because I feel like it is a lot of gray area and it is easy for scope creep to happen. But this is where you're dealing with selected areas of the planning process.
00:23:04
Speaker
while the couple handles other things. And then finally, wedding day management, or as some people think of it, day of coordination, you're really focusing on managing the wedding day itself without a lot of the pre-planning responsibilities. So in this case, the couple has likely done all the work, and then you're coming in at a designated time before the wedding day to execute on everything they plan themselves.
00:23:30
Speaker
And finally, you want to outline any additional services that they might be a la carte or add on, such as RSVP management, rehearsal dinner coordination, coordination of any post-worthy activities.
Upselling and Flexibility
00:23:45
Speaker
Of course, you can include these in your packaging.
00:23:48
Speaker
But it also can be a potential place that you can upsell. So let's say you have a wedding day management client that is also a little stressed about their rehearsal dinner, which happened to me frequently because they're so focused on planning their wedding day that
00:24:06
Speaker
that pre-party was sort of an afterthought. And so a lot of times that would be an easy add-on that I could help them with that coordination. So if there are places that you can add an additional service that they can select, you want to also have those outlined very clearly on your website and speak about them in your initial consultation.
00:24:31
Speaker
I want to mention the importance of being flexible and being able to customize options within packages. I always feel like your packages are a jumping off point and no couple, no wedding is going to fit neatly into a box for you.
00:24:54
Speaker
And so if you're flexible and they can add on to packages, that is not only a place to have some additional revenue, but it's going to make them feel a little bit better. The one caution I will say is
00:25:10
Speaker
When someone wants to add on, always make sure you're charging for it because if it's outside of the scope of the original agreement, then that's something you should charge for. I'm a big fan of upselling for additional add-on things, but I never would take away because nine times out of 10
00:25:32
Speaker
couples would say, oh, I love full planning, but, you know, we don't really need RSVP management. We can do that ourselves because that's something I included in full planning. And a couple of times I took it off and I was like, OK, I can discount it this much. But most of the time it came back like, oh, well, could you do this one thing with our RSVP list? And then it's like, well, OK, but we have to add that back on, which I for a while was not great at.
00:25:58
Speaker
it basically ended up they got a servicer free. So while I am always happy to add on to my wedding planning packages, I don't ever take things away. If they want to build their own custom package, I guess you could do that. I would charge a premium for it though and make sure that that is extremely well-tracked.
Free Resources and Community for Planners
00:26:20
Speaker
So to wrap up, I want to share that we have a free download for this episode, and it's just going to be a quick checklist of what to include in your wedding planning packages. As you're sitting down to either create them for the first time or revamp them or wherever you're at in the process, this checklist will help you just look through and make sure you're hitting all the high point.
00:26:43
Speaker
Next week, we are going to really focus on pricing strategies and pitfalls to avoid when you're setting prices for your services. To wrap up, remember when you're sitting down, before you start doing anything, make sure you understand who your target market is. Do some research to understand and determine what is actually needed for wedding planners in your area.
00:27:07
Speaker
Decide on a pricing model, which tune in next week for more of a deep dive into that and understand that this is an ongoing process of refining and cultivating exactly the services that you want to offer and that your ideal clients are looking for.
00:27:24
Speaker
If you want to get a head start on the pricing conversation, we do have the pricing with confidence product in the wedding or the Planners Lounge shop. And I'll link to that in the show notes. And I also want to invite you to join our free wedding community, the very important Planners Lounge or the VIP Lounge.
00:27:43
Speaker
It's totally free and inside there, there are wedding planners from all over the world where you can post questions, offer your insights, and generally just get a little bit of extra support. And I'll also put a link to that in the show notes. Thank you so much for listening and I am excited to chat with you next week about pricing. Talk soon.