Wedding Marketing and Development for the Bridal Industry - Think Splendid®

Splendid Sundays Volume 72

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 13:00:00 +0000

A handful of splendid finds from around the worldwide web:

*Why Facebook is Making People Sad

*The link between child marriage and poverty (and its connection to global wedding revenue).

*David's Bridal released their sixth annual survey on bridal spending.

*For a lighthearted break, check out Practical Ryan Gosling, a wedding-related spin on the Hey Girl meme.

3 people to follow on Pinterest: Courtney from Pizzazzerie, Zainab Alsalih from Carousel, Brandy Rammel

On Achieving Big Goals

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 13:00:00 +0000

Achieving big goals requires you to become a bigger person. You must develop new habits, abilities, skills, and attitudes. -- Vic Johnson

The Myth of Practice Makes Perfect

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 13:00:00 +0000

Studies have shown that the way a person practices is more of an indicator of improvement than the amount of time they spend practicing.

If you want to get better faster or take your company to the next level more quickly, go back through your old weddings and evaluate what went wrong, what you could have done better, how you could have delighted the client even more. Going forward, take these notes within a day after a wedding is over. Write them down so you can refer back to them later. Have your team do the same.

This really is the secret sauce. You will be a lot further down the road in ten years if you review, critique and evaluate your past work on a consistent basis and make the appropriate mid-course corrections than if you just spend the next ten years only relying on the improvements that come from repetition alone.

Moving from Envy to Excellence

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 13:00:00 +0000

When someone newer to the business reaches a shared goal before you do, it can be demoralizing. A bout of envy is normal, it means you're human. No one is generously enlightened and kumbaya every minute of every day.

Staying in that space and allowing your jealousy to transcend to bitterness is a mark of mediocrity.

Acknowledging that a tack different than yours worked and wasn't just a stroke of luck for your competitor is a mark of maturity.

Being willing to swallow your pride, reevaluate your own process, and make changes if necessary is a mark of excellence.

Marketing Words to Avoid

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 13:00:00 +0000

Here are some words that are commonly used in marketing but are proven to increase distrust and skepticism in potential clients, resulting in fewer sales: innovative, amazing, ultimate, premiere, solutions, turnkey, unbeatable, unique, revolutionary, synergy, proactive, outside the box, integrated.

If you feel like you're overselling when you're writing your marketing copy, you probably are. Own your success and expertise, don't overstate it.

On Choosing Generosity Over Scarcity

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

My business is where it is today because of people who have gone before me and who weren't scared to share their hard-earned wisdom. Whether through books, blogs or in person meetings, these people recognized that sharing their knowledge wasn't a threat to their livelihood, but something worthwhile. I could never repay what they've done for me; all I can do is follow their lead of choosing generosity over scarcity.

There's no such thing as a self-made business. There's always more to be gained from strengthening others through sharing than from hoarding.

Abundance of Talent

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

It's no secret that the barrier to entry for businesses in the wedding industry is low. Very few of the sub-industries outside of food and beverage and cosmetology have government regulations. People can launch brands, print some cards and be in business in a matter of hours.

Of course, this leads to the industry being home to a number of inexperienced, mediocre businesses. The silver lining is that it means it is also home to a number of truly amazing artists and professionals.

In today's business world, there's no need to reward bad behavior. If you don't want to work with specific businesses, you have the choice not to. There's an abundance of talent. Choose to work with the companies you respect and like.

Time Management and Priorities

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

The best time-management thing I do is reflect an hour a week on the overall strategic plan for myself — what do I need to do to move my priorities forward? And then there are the 10 minutes a day that I spend thinking about, “O.K., so based on the priorities for the week, how am I going to prioritize my day tomorrow?” I don’t know how I could do what I do without spending that time. I am obsessive about that system because the world seems to be moving faster and faster, so you have to figure out how to still drive things proactively instead of just becoming completely reactive. -- Wendy Kopp, Founder of Teach for America

On Delegating Tasks

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

When you delegate a task, you have to allow for the possibility that people may royally mess it up.

This isn't a valid excuse for not delegating.

Valid Stubbornness vs Ego Stubbornness
How To Improve Your Clients' Experience

The Impact of Words

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

We all know the deadliest words and for the most part have scrubbed them from our vocabulary: "We've never done it that way."

This sentiment manifests itself though in other equally deadly phrases including "you can only" statements: "You can only reach wedding guests through the bride. It's impossible to market to them without reaching her first."

Another success killer? "That's just how it is in __________" (fill in the blank with your city).

Your words carry life, if you let them.

Transparency in Social Media
Online Communication Etiquette

Serving the Bigger Picture

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

The last photo my family has of my grandparents before they both passed away is from a wedding. It's a pretty boring photograph as far as images go, but because of the people in it, it's the one hanging in all of our homes. We're fortunate to have that boring yet special photo because the photographer recognized the value of the bigger picture.

How does what you do serve the bigger picture?

Hint: the bigger picture is never the wedding.

On Assuming the Worst
The Ebb and Flow

Simple Solutions

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

We often overlook or dismiss the simple solutions because they seem, well, too simple. So we spend time and money making things more complex. The more bells and whistles, the better. After all, we get what we pay for, right?

An expensive software program with to-do lists and mind maps and alarms to remind us to stop procrastipinning and procrastitweeting and to get back to work. Yes! Surely this will be the program that turns our lives around and helps us achieve our goals!

Or maybe we just need a notebook and a pen to jot down our goals and the steps we took towards them each day.

Simple almost always trumps complex. If you don't seem to be accomplishing what you'd like to, try simplifying your process. You might be surprised at the clarity that shows up once the distractions are gone.

The Cost of Comparison
Marketing to the High-End Bride

When Things Go Right

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

We tend to notice when things go wrong. Out of dozens of flights, we remember the one where the airline lost our luggage. Out of hundreds of visits to restaurants, we remember the one with the lukewarm rather than hot dish. Out of thousands of phone calls, we remember the ones that were dropped.

What if this week we made a note of everything that goes right? Doing so requires actively pay attention, developing an acute awareness of the world around us. I'm curious to learn what else we'll start noticing when we stop taking our daily routines for granted.

Zen and the Art of Social Media
Four Ways a Blog Can Help Your Business

Splendid Sundays Volume 71

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

A handful of splendid finds:

*U.S. postage rates go up today. Erika at Delphine put together a cheat sheet with common wedding stationery items and their new postage prices.

*The power of a wedding film, 25 years later.

*A sneak peek at Christian Siriano's new bridal line for Nordstrom.

*Another in an interesting trend: Brazil passed a law that states that companies emailing their employees after work hours counts as overtime.

3 people to follow on Pinterest: Cyd from The Sweetest Occasion, Vane from Brooklyn Bride, Chelsea from frolic!

Failures of Design

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

Clutter and overload are not an attribute of information they are failures of design. -- Edward Tufte

Advice for New Wedding Entrepreneurs

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

This post is specifically written towards people new to the wedding industry. If you've been around for a while, feel free to skip it. Or not. Totally up to you.

For those of you who are new to the wedding industry, welcome! It's a fun and challenging industry and one that has afforded many people great opportunities. I hope it does the same for you. Many people new to the industry tend to make the same mistakes when they're starting out, so I wanted to address some of those here so you can take note and not allow these to hold you back.

*If anywhere in your bio you say that you fell in love with weddings while planning your own wedding, rewrite your bio. This sentiment may be true, but the reality is that it has become a cliche and it is one that makes it very difficult for both potential clients AND your colleagues to take you seriously. What else, besides your own nuptials, do you love about weddings? Write about that instead.

*The same goes for being born with a camera in your hand, a paintbrush in your hand, etc.

*Your own wedding should never be included in your gallery portfolio. It doesn't matter if you've planned corporate events for 15 years and just recently got married -- having your own wedding in your gallery makes you look inexperienced.

*If your job requires you to be on site the day of a wedding (photographers, bands, planners, floral designers, caterers, etc), make sure you have the proper insurance for your profession and your state. This is not something you can skip until you become more successful or until you decide if you really like your new career or not. About 10% of weddings have a guest either die or get seriously injured (heart attacks are common as are alcohol-related incidents). Make sure you're covered legally before you need it.

*Do what you have to to make your business work for YOU (within ethical bounds, of course). I did a lot of things "wrong" when I started in weddings: I didn't join the associations everyone said I had to, I didn't advertise where I was supposed to, I didn't wait 5 years to charge what I was worth, I became friends with my clients when everyone said I should keep a "professional" distance and so on. I was running my business for ME and my life circumstances. I had to make it work for ME. And it did work, even though I broke all the "rules."

*This also pissed a lot of people off and some of them started saying mean things . . . some REALLY mean things. I am not going to lie: their words stung. It hurt that people who had met me in passing at a cocktail party were saying things about me and my life that weren't true. Then one day I realized that it didn't really matter what any of my competitors thought because they weren't the ones writing me checks. So, if you run into haters -- and if you start being successful you definitely will -- throw yourself a fully-catered pity party for about 20 minutes and then get back to work. Your haters aren't the ones writing you checks.

*Don't expect everyone to fight fair. More importantly, don't allow that to make you cynical.

*Know your industry history. Respect the fact that there are a lot of people who have been doing what you do for a very long time and doing it well. At the same time, while it's totally okay to look up to the people you admire, make sure that you don't put them on a pedestal. They're just people.

*Take all social media bragging with a grain of salt. All of it.

*There's a book by Marianne Williamson that I love and in it she says, "Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that others won't feel insecure around you." I was once told by a well-intentioned but misguided mentor that I would need to dumb myself down if I ever wanted to get married. I decided that there are worse things than being single. I also decided to stop meeting with that mentor and embrace the truth in this quote instead. Tape it to your computer, your mirror, your fridge, your wallet . . . wherever you'll see it when you're tempted to do anything but your best out of fear of being judged.

On Measuring Success
On Giving Clients What They Want

On Others Judging You

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

If you put something online, it's fair game for people to judge it. If you don't want 3,000 people judging your marriage, don't tweet about your fights with your spouse.

At the same time, if you want your work to change the world, you have to put it out there so people can experience it, and yes, judge it.

Not getting judged at all isn't the option. Define your boundaries and then put yourself out there.

Getting Creativity Out the Door
Amateurs Add, Professionals Edit

SOPA and Your Business

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 10:00:00 +0000

There are more than 7000 websites, including Wikipedia, that went offline today as part of a protest against a bill up for congressional vote called SOPA. Several others darkened content as part of the protest (take a look at the front pages of Google and Wordpress.com). SOPA stands for the Stop Online Piracy Act, which is a nice-sounding name (who doesn't hate copyright theft?), except that the bill goes well-beyond that.

Mashable has a great article on it and here's a link to an infographic that explains more about what SOPA is.

Here's a hypothetical situation:

A bride buys her wedding invitations off of Etsy. What she doesn't know is that the Etsy seller knocked off the designs from another invitation designer.

At the wedding, the photographer takes a photo of the invitation.

The wedding gets published on a famous wedding blog. The bride is ecstatic and so are all of the wedding pros who worked with her. The bride shares photos on Facebook, on her own personal blog and in the two wedding forums she's a part of. The photographer and other wedding pros share some of the images on their own company blogs and in their portfolio galleries.

A reader loves the invitation photo and pins it on Pinterest. Another reader loves it and shares it on Tumblr. Yet another reader includes it in her inspiration board which she then submits to another famous wedding blog as part of a giveaway contest.

The original invitation designer -- the one who the Etsy seller shamelessly copied -- sees her copyrighted design everywhere with someone else getting credit and complains.

Under SOPA, every single website that posted this image could be blocked -- without a trial or court hearing -- regardless of whether or not they knew the invitation violated copyright. Every single one. This means that the wedding professionals' websites and blogs would no longer be able to be accessed. The professional wedding blogs would lose all ad revenue and for most of them, their entire business.

Is this scenario likely to happen? Probably only if a judge decides to make a very public example out of it, like they did with the teens fined millions of dollars for illegally downloading music. Still, under SOPA it could legally happen, whereas right now it can't.

You can send an email to your congressional reps here asking that they vote against both SOPA and a similar bill called PIPA.

Meet Anna

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

Today I'm thrilled to introduce you to Anna Kolander, our intern for the Spring 2012 semester! She hails from Wisconsin (nobody tell her I'm a Bears fan) where she is currently pursuing a double major in Marketing and Business Management. In addition, she brings some bridal industry experience to the table -- a perfect combination. Here is a short Q+A with Anna so you can get to know her a little better:

My Starbucks order is: When I’m counting calories, a Skinny Caramel Latte. When I could care LESS about calories (95% of the time) it's a Vanilla Bean Caramel Espresso Affogato Style. SO bad for you but SO delicious.

My favorite thing about weddings: The dress! I love to see a bride’s personality shine through her dress.

I am known for: Singing being my form of communication (it’s much more fun to sing what you want to say to people than just saying it), being a little bit theatrical when I tell stories (I use quite a lot of hand gestures) and always going to class slightly over-dressed (when you go to school amongst a sea of grey sweat-suit clad, bed-headed college kids, wearing a dress and a pair of heels tends to stick out, but I’ve never seen sticking out as being a bad thing).

People are always surprised to learn that: I go to college on a piano scholarship.

My dream vacation spot is: The French Riviera. I have an obsession with the Roaring Twenties, and the French Riviera always reminds me of those glamorous, stylish, and slightly scandalous days.

My celebrity crush is: Aaron Rodgers (What? I’m a Wisconsin girl!)

When I was a kid I: Looked like a boy. I had a bowl cut and wore my older brother’s hand-me-downs.

My favorite dish to cook is: I make a mean grilled cheese. Other than that, I am hopeless in the kitchen.

You can follow Anna on Twitter or on Pinterest.

Leaving Room for the Miracle

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

Luck's kryptonite? Busyness. People who find their identity through a jam-packed schedule are rarely lucky. To be fair, busyness is often a symptom of something deeper: a desire to be seen as "important", an inability to say no out of a need to have everyone like us, a fear of opportunities going to someone else even if they're a good but not great fit for us, a fear that if we slow down we might have to face the fact that maybe the life we've built for ourselves isn't exactly the one we wanted.

Lucky people have more boundaries, not less. They say no more often so that they have room to say yes to things that truly excite them. They are willing to risk not being liked by saying no. They are okay with being misunderstood for a while. They understand that your priorities do not need to be their priorities and vice versa.

Most lucky people don't plan for luck (or even believe it exists), but they do make space for it. They don't fly in to a conference or event for one session and then fly right back out. They stick around and talk to people. They know that "what's in it for me?" isn't always the right question to ask. They recognize that opportunities often look like work and show up through people or places they don't expect. I call all of this "leaving room for the miracle."

Lucky people leave room for the miracle.

Your Plan is Puny
You're So Vain, You Probably Think This Post Is About You

Splendid Sundays Volume 70

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

A handful of splendid finds:

*Target will begin carrying products made by mom-and-pop businesses.

*Seth Godin on copyright and fair use.

*Intelligence is irrelevant.

*"The simple act of stopping and noticing is how we begin."

3 people to follow on Pinterest: Suann from SIMPLESONG Design, Maria from Ritzy Bee, Style Me Pretty

The Effect of Weddings on the Brain

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

Paul Zak, a neuroscientist whose work I cite in my book, gave a TED talk this past year in which he discusses the correlation between weddings and oxytocin, a molecule in the brain that is known to reduce anxiety and evoke feelings of trust and love.

Click here to view the video if it does not appear in your feed.

The participants who had the highest increase of oxytocin during a wedding were (in order) the bride, the mother of the bride, the father of the groom, and the groom, followed by other family and friends. Zak explains briefly that, from an evolutionary standpoint, these types of life events produce an increase in oxytocin because the new couple needs their family and friends to be loyal and protect them in order to continue the human species.

The video is about 16 minutes long, and while the wedding-related section is near the end, it's worth watching in its entirety.

Stop Watering the Weeds
On Unlearning

Speaking at Event Solutions Idea Factory

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

I'll be speaking at the Event Solutions Idea Factory in Las Vegas next month, an annual trade show and conference for event producers from around the world. Some of the other speakers include Sean Low, Marcy Blum, Preston Bailey, Howard Givner, Ali Phillips and several more.

If you're attending either Idea Factory or Catersource, please stop by and say hello! If you're following along on Twitter, the official hashtag for the event is #esif2012.

Creativity as the Great Equalizer

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

There's no such thing as creative people and non-creative people. There are only people who use their creativity and people who don't . . . Creativity, which is the expression of our originality, helps us stay mindful that what we bring to the world is completely original and cannot be compared. And, without comparison, concepts like ahead or behind or best or worst lose their meaning. -- Brené Brown

Blind Spots in Business

noreply@blogger.com (Liene Stevens) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 13:00:00 +0000

People often underestimate the competition, and if they don't like them personally, they even tend to write off everything they do. They also often tend to overestimate their own ability to hold an objective view of their own business and the marketplace.

This bias leads to projection: what's happening to my business is industry-wide. Everyone else's business is experiencing the same things mine is going through.

One size fits all is never the case and "I don't see it" when someone mentions a problem area is not a valid response. Blind spots are called that for a reason -- we can't see them ourselves. Ask someone you trust, and someone who is willing to tell you what you may not want to hear, to point out any business blind spots you may have.

Then, the hard part: doing the work to change what you couldn't see.

5 Reasons Your Ads Aren't Working
I Will vs I Did