Latest / Wedding Pros who are ready to grow - with Becca Pountney / Is it time for a wedding business rebrand? With Katie Lake

Transcript

Is it time for a wedding business rebrand? With Katie Lake · Wedding Pros who are ready to grow - with Becca Pountney

• 0:00
  Katy: Rediscover what's going on with your business and remember the reason why you
• 0:05
  started your business in the first place.
• 0:07
  And if those things are no longer working for you, then reassess them.
• 0:12
  And then if you kind of look at the visual brand and you go, Hey, do you
• 0:16
  know what those values and that brand no longer align, then perhaps it's time for.
• 0:22
  It could even be a brand refresh, it could be sort of not completely overhauling
• 0:28
  the brand, but some aspects of it.
• 0:32
  Becca: I'm Becca Pountney, wedding business marketing expert,
• 0:35
  speaker and blogger, and you're listening to the Wedding Pros
• 0:37
  Who Are Ready To Grow podcast.
• 0:40
  I'm here to share with you...
• 0:41
  Actionable tips, strategies, and real life examples to help you take your
• 0:45
  wedding business to the next level.
• 0:47
  If you are an ambitious wedding business owner that wants to take your passion
• 0:51
  and use it to build a profitable, sustainable business doing what you
• 0:54
  love, then you're in the right place.
• 0:56
  Let's get going with today's episode.
• 1:00
  Today I'm chatting with Katie Lake, owner of Studio Lago Design.
• 1:03
  Having worked in the wedding industry for eight years, her world shifted
• 1:06
  entirely during the pandemic.
• 1:08
  Katie now provides creative design solutions for other businesses, offering
• 1:12
  both branding and web design services.
• 1:15
  Her goal is to help business owners revamp their online presence
• 1:18
  and give them the confidence they need to thrive and to grow.
• 1:21
  Katie, welcome to the podcast.
• 1:23
  Katy: Thank you.
• 1:24
  Thanks for having me.
• 1:25
  Becca: I'm thrilled to have you.
• 1:27
  Thank you for getting in touch about coming on.
• 1:30
  I know that my listeners are going to really enjoy this conversation, talking
• 1:33
  all things branding and web design because it's an area lots of them struggle with.
• 1:37
  But before we get into that, I would just love to hear from you just a brief history
• 1:41
  really of how you went from being in the wedding industry to where you are now.
• 1:45
  Katy: Yeah.
• 1:46
  So, well, it was It was COVID, as you mentioned, so during the pandemic,
• 1:51
  obviously, weddings weren't happening for quite a long period of time.
• 1:55
  And I had been sort of thinking about what I might do to, I suppose, not
• 2:04
  be reliant on a big bunch of people being in a room all together at one
• 2:07
  time, because we didn't know how long that was going to not be allowed for.
• 2:12
  So I just wanted something more sort of stable, and I I did design at university.
• 2:18
  I've always been a designer and And actually it just kind of came to me
• 2:24
  this idea that I would set up a business helping other, I think in, in the,
• 2:29
  in the beginning it was other wedding professionals and helping them to, you
• 2:33
  know, recreate their branding and update their websites because I started doing
• 2:38
  that during the pandemic for myself and it's something I've always done.
• 2:43
  And so I went through a rebrand and, created a new website for my own business.
• 2:48
  So that was Malarkey Cakes at the time.
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  And had a few people comment and say, Oh, who did your branding and website?
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  And I was like, actually, actually it was me.
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  And, you know, I had a few people saying, would you do the same for me?
• 3:02
  And so it just kind of grew organically from there.
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  And I thought, you know what?
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  I've got nothing to lose.
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  Let's launch forward with this.
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  And it's just become a really big passion because I now get to help
• 3:13
  people who are running businesses.
• 3:16
  Just like the one I, I've been running with Malarkey Cakes and, you know, helping
• 3:21
  them with the same kind of issues, the same kind of problems that I was having.
• 3:25
  So I can really relate to them, relate to, you know, people in the wedding
• 3:28
  world, small business owners, and all of the issues that they face with, with
• 3:33
  branding, websites, and, you know, how to stand out online and get visible.
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  So, yeah, that was the kind of the transition between.
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  from one to the other.
• 3:43
  Yeah.
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  And now, you know, I absolutely love what I do.
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  It's, it's so nice to be serving people that are so similar to me and kind
• 3:51
  of helping them essentially like fall back in love with their businesses.
• 3:55
  So yeah, that's kind of how it went.
• 3:58
  Becca: And are you still making cakes or have you stopped
• 4:00
  malarkey cakes altogether?
• 4:02
  Katy: So, I still love making cakes.
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  I still love that business, and I'll always have a part
• 4:10
  of me that will do that.
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  But I sort of, now it's more of a sideline business, and it's It's
• 4:17
  a passion, I guess, that I'll always carry forward with me.
• 4:21
  But now I kind of get to pick and choose what weddings I do and which ones I don't.
• 4:25
  You know, if an inquiry comes along where a couple are getting married at some epic
• 4:30
  venue that I've always wanted to work at.
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  Those kind of orders I will take on.
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  So the two businesses work, they work alongside each other quite well.
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  So malarkey cakes is still very much in operation, but on a
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  smaller scale than it was before.
• 4:46
  Yeah.
• 4:47
  Becca: So you're kind of keeping your hand in both sides of the business.
• 4:50
  And you mentioned in the introduction that originally you thought you'd be doing this
• 4:54
  branding and web design for wedding pros.
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  Are you only working with wedding professionals or have you branched out
• 5:00
  and worked with other people now as well?
• 5:02
  Katy: So I have worked with a lot of wedding professionals but I do also
• 5:06
  work with other, it's essentially now service based business owners.
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  So predominantly female as well and I've realized as I've kind of gone through
• 5:16
  the process of of growing my business to where it is now that it's not so
• 5:20
  much about the type of person of the type of industry that the person who,
• 5:25
  you know, runs a business is, is in, it's more about their, their mindset.
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  So they're a service based business owner, but equally, they're ready to kind of take
• 5:36
  their business to a new level to elevate things to really, you know, get Get
• 5:42
  themselves out there, get visible online.
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  So, I help a lot of coaches, I've helped educators, all kinds of
• 5:51
  service based business owners now.
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  But I'm lucky and I'm really happy to say that I do also help wedding professionals
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  because I love that world and I love still having, you know, a part of me
• 6:03
  still very much involved in that world.
• 6:06
  Becca: Absolutely.
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  The wedding industry is the best place to work.
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  You never want to lose that.
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  So you've obviously seen a lot of different wedding business
• 6:13
  websites over the last few years.
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  You've worked with lots of wedding business owners.
• 6:17
  Do you think that there's certain things you see regularly, the mistakes that
• 6:21
  people in the wedding industry are making when it comes to their websites?
• 6:26
  Katy: Yeah.
• 6:26
  So, I do, I do see the same sorts of things over and over.
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  I think one thing I'll say with branding and websites in general, just sort of
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  overall with marketing, is that it's so, so important to remember that
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  everything should be ideal client centric.
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  Everything should be based on who, who your ideal clients are and
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  about getting inside their head.
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  And so, if you really want a website...
• 6:54
  that really works for your ideal clients, it's got to be bespoke, it's
• 6:59
  got to be, it's got to really talk to that person to a certain level.
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  And so, I do see lots of websites that are kind of, you know, they
• 7:07
  can feel like they're just sort of out of the box, and not particularly
• 7:11
  bespoke, and not particularly tailored to speaking to that ideal client.
• 7:16
  Perhaps they're not put together strategically
• 7:20
  enough, I would say, in that.
• 7:22
  They don't look at how the customer journey would work through the website.
• 7:27
  So I create all of my websites strategically which would mean that
• 7:31
  I plan out or help my clients to plan out customer journeys through
• 7:36
  the website to think about the best way that you can guide people
• 7:40
  on your website to your goals.
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  So say if you're a business.
• 7:45
  a service based business owner.
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  For example, if you're a wedding professional, it's highly likely that
• 7:50
  the biggest goal for the website is for people to get in touch with you.
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  So you need to make that as simple and as easy and quick
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  for people to do as possible.
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  So we see a lot of websites that, that actually you would land on on
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  the website and it's not entirely clear, not only what you do, but also.
• 8:09
  What to do next and how to get in touch with you.
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  So I'd say, yes, a lot of websites are created possibly for the
• 8:18
  aesthetic rather than the strategy.
• 8:21
  But a website that can really work for your business with a strategy
• 8:25
  can make such a huge difference.
• 8:28
  Becca: So the other thing that I noticed in the wedding industry,
• 8:30
  which may be similar to your own story is that when people start
• 8:33
  out with their wedding businesses, they don't have loads of budget.
• 8:36
  They don't have loads of money.
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  And so they go ahead and try and build their own website.
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  And then as they evolve as a business, that website doesn't
• 8:43
  really evolve with them.
• 8:45
  So quite often I'll go on a business's Instagram page, for
• 8:48
  example, and it's incredible.
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  And then I click through to their website and it's like, What happened to this?
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  Like what, what happened to this?
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  What should we be doing to make sure that we keep our website
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  up to date and looking on brand?
• 9:00
  Katy: That's a really good one.
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  And that is something that I talk to my clients about all the time.
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  It's.
• 9:08
  Yes, this is such a big thing and it's something I'm really passionate about
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  and I'm trying to get my kind of my message out there as to say to people,
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  you know, how would you get, how would you let your website go out of date?
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  I have so many people come to me who say, Oh my God, Katie, I'm so
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  embarrassed to send people to my website and I'll say, okay, what,
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  why do you think that's happened?
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  What are the reasons behind that?
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  And I think there can be so many reasons, you know, if
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  you've built your own website.
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  Maybe you found it hard, maybe you found it laborious, it took you months, and then
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  the last thing you want to do is go and log into your website and make changes.
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  Or, you know, perhaps you taught yourself how to do all of it,
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  and it's been a year, and...
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  You can't remember and you haven't got time to go back in, log back into
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  the website and make those changes because you're going to have to re
• 9:58
  learn everything all over again.
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  So, there are different ways, I think, with this and I think it's so
• 10:05
  important to think about your online presence as kind of one entity.
• 10:12
  So rather than having your Instagram over here, your website over here, I
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  always say to people, It's so important to have your website as the center
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  of what you do in your business, rather than a lot of people put too
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  much emphasis, I think, on Instagram.
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  And I always say this to people because, you know, at any, at any
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  time, Facebook, Instagram could come along, just pull the rug from
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  underneath you and change everything.
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  So see your, your website as the biggest asset that you
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  actually have in your business.
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  And I'd recommend even just having a really simple strategy for updating your
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  website, whether that's I don't know, setting a reminder once a month to log
• 10:56
  in and make any changes or, you know, with my clients, I also, if they work
• 11:02
  with me, they get like half an hour, it's even half an hour a month with me.
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  I check in with them and I literally say to them, right, any content that you want
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  me to add to your website this month.
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  So I keep them.
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  Accountable to it.
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  They have to do it.
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  So that's one way of looking at it But I think it's essentially a seeing kind
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  of your website and your instagram as an interlinked thing Therefore you
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  shouldn't really have one without the other so yeah I'm kind of on a bit of
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  a campaign to help people to be more aware of the importance of updating
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  their websites and I'm a firm believer that You know, I, I build websites that
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  give my clients access to edit them themselves and to empower them to do that.
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  I hand over with tutorial videos, and I make sure, you know, that, you know,
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  they've logged in, they've watched them, and they've made sure that they
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  can, they can do things themselves on their site, because I think
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  that's also really, really important.
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  So, I think it's about empowering, and I think it's about having
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  a really simple strategy.
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  to updating the site frequently.
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  Becca: I think as well, we often become blind to our own websites.
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  I definitely know that that's a problem that I have, and I think it's a problem
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  others have, where you've built this website you thought is really through
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  a lot, and then you suddenly realize, oh, I haven't updated it for ages, but
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  now I don't even know where to start.
• 12:27
  People say it's not working very well, but you you kind of get blind to what it
• 12:31
  is because you've spent so long on it.
• 12:33
  How do we have that outside perspective?
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  Katy: Oh, that's a good one.
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  Do you know, I think it's like, it comes back to what I said earlier on.
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  It's all about thinking about your, your brand, your website,
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  all of your marketing with.
• 12:48
  The view of being your ideal client.
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  So I think with anything to do with your business, it's so important to step out
• 12:54
  of your kind of your brain somehow and jump into the view of your ideal client.
• 13:02
  So if, if you haven't already, or if you haven't recently, I highly
• 13:06
  recommend reviewing and reviewing again who your ideal client is.
• 13:12
  And how they would view your website.
• 13:15
  So, that includes things like language, so the copy that you use on your site.
• 13:22
  All the way down to how it works and those sides of things.
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  But also one thing that would be really, really good.
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  And I do this in my business.
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  I am literally do market research calls.
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  So I speak to.
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  previous clients who I've had a great time working with but I also speak
• 13:41
  to people in my audience and I say to them would you mind hopping on a 15
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  minute call with me and answering some questions and what you could do is
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  ask people to go through your website.
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  And give, you know, give them, give you your, their honest
• 13:56
  opinion on how things work.
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  Because sometimes when you're working on your own website, your own marketing,
• 14:03
  you can't see the wood for the trees.
• 14:05
  And so it's really, really good just to have that outsider perspective.
• 14:09
  You know, and they might even pick you up on, Oh, this button's not
• 14:12
  working or this link's not working.
• 14:15
  So it's just super helpful to incrementally from time to time
• 14:19
  to be doing an activity like that.
• 14:21
  Becca: Yeah.
• 14:21
  It's so much better when someone else looks at it as well, because
• 14:23
  they notice things you don't notice.
• 14:26
  And again, something I'm trying to foster in my community is looking at
• 14:28
  each other's websites, but also telling people when there's things that are
• 14:31
  wrong, because if no one tells you the button's broken or the link's not working,
• 14:36
  or it takes you to a dead page, often you don't go through and Realize that.
• 14:40
  Whereas actually if we just tell someone I went on your website and the button
• 14:44
  didn't work, then they can fix it.
• 14:45
  But we're all too scared to tell each other anything vaguely critical.
• 14:49
  So if you're listening to this and people share their websites, go and look at
• 14:52
  their websites and if you find something that's wrong, tell them it's wrong.
• 14:56
  Is there a way on your website that you can find out whether the buttons are.
• 15:00
  working rather than just going through every page and
• 15:03
  clicking on all the buttons.
• 15:04
  Katy: There is stuff that you can use depending on what platform you're
• 15:08
  using and how sort of advanced it is.
• 15:10
  I know on, I use WordPress for all of my websites and there, you know,
• 15:15
  there is It's kind of tech that you can plug into it to say where
• 15:19
  are the broken links and things.
• 15:21
  With Squarespace and other platforms, I'm not 100 percent sure, but there
• 15:25
  are definitely things out there.
• 15:26
  You can run your site through a kind of like user experience checker and you can,
• 15:32
  you can check for all of these things.
• 15:34
  But I would say it's important to kind of have a real human
• 15:38
  doing stuff on the site as well.
• 15:40
  Because actually...
• 15:42
  You know, with SEO, one of the most important things now to
• 15:47
  Google and how it's ranking sites is all about user experience.
• 15:52
  It's all about, like, websites being human and speaking as a human and being
• 15:58
  relatable and being easy to navigate.
• 16:00
  So there's nothing quite like having a real human going through
• 16:04
  it and just checking it out.
• 16:05
  Becca: One thing that jumped out to me that you shared earlier was that
• 16:08
  sometimes people are embarrassed to show you their websites.
• 16:11
  And I have this all the time.
• 16:12
  So I'm teaching people marketing and they say, Oh, don't look at my Instagram.
• 16:15
  Don't look at my website.
• 16:16
  I hate my branding, all of these kinds of things.
• 16:19
  And often I say to them, well, maybe it's time to change your
• 16:22
  branding or change your website.
• 16:24
  So how do we know as wedding business owners when it's time
• 16:27
  for us to dive in and go for a rebrand or go for a website change?
• 16:31
  How do we know that we need to evolve in that direction?
• 16:34
  Katy: Yeah, that's awesome.
• 16:35
  That's a really good one because
• 16:37
  I think as a business owner, you can tend to be like, Oh, okay, well,
• 16:41
  things don't, you know, feel aligned.
• 16:44
  So it's probably time for a rebrand and all of that.
• 16:47
  It's not always time for, I would say a visual rebrand as
• 16:52
  we sort of think of branding.
• 16:55
  And this is something I'm.
• 16:57
  I feel really strongly about is that a lot of people think of branding and they think
• 17:01
  of a logo and a color palette and, and that's where things begin and things end.
• 17:06
  But actually, the process of working on branding and
• 17:10
  certainly how I work with branding is a lot more strategic.
• 17:14
  So actually what we do is start right from the beginning and we
• 17:18
  really dig deep on what the business goals, values and vision are first
• 17:24
  before we even look at the visuals.
• 17:27
  So we look at going through, I hopefully essentially help my clients fall back in
• 17:34
  love with their business and remember why they're doing things in the first place.
• 17:38
  So, you know, it might not need.
• 17:40
  a new logo.
• 17:41
  It might not need a new bunch of colors and that sort of things.
• 17:45
  You might need to rediscover what's going on with your business and
• 17:50
  remember what those values are.
• 17:53
  Remember what the reason why you started your business in the first
• 17:56
  place and if those things are no longer working for you, then reassess them.
• 18:02
  And then if you kind of look at the visual brand and you go, hey, do you
• 18:06
  know what those values and that brand no longer align, then perhaps it's time
• 18:12
  for, it could even be a brand refresh.
• 18:15
  It could be sort of not completely overhauling the
• 18:18
  brand, but some aspects of it.
• 18:21
  But as I said before, it's so important just to be thinking of it
• 18:24
  from an ideal client point of view.
• 18:26
  So What kind of thing will they want to see and what kind of
• 18:30
  thing will they be attracted to?
• 18:32
  So I think it's, it's a, it's a, sort of an easy go to if you like.
• 18:36
  Like, oh, it, you know, it must be the visual brand or
• 18:39
  the website that need updating.
• 18:40
  But often, it's about rediscovering...
• 18:43
  the very basics of the business and making sure that all parts
• 18:46
  of it are then aligned as well.
• 18:49
  Becca: Yeah, and I think that's a good exercise for us all to do actually every
• 18:52
  single year because each and every one of us evolve, our offerings evolve, our
• 18:56
  talents evolve, what we're doing, our ideal clients evolve and actually I think
• 19:00
  particularly towards the end of the year.
• 19:02
  calendar year is a really good time to start thinking, right?
• 19:05
  What, where am I at now?
• 19:06
  What are my values?
• 19:07
  Where do I want to go next year?
• 19:09
  And as you said, does my brand and my website still align with that?
• 19:13
  So if people are doing that exercise at the end of this year and they're thinking,
• 19:16
  okay, I can see that my brand isn't quite aligning anymore with my values.
• 19:21
  Do you have any quick fixes that they can do to try and uplevel their brand,
• 19:25
  get it back to where they want to be?
• 19:27
  Katy: Yeah.
• 19:27
  So I would.
• 19:28
  You know, I would essentially think about firstly making sure that their
• 19:33
  goals and their values and their vision is all as they want it to be.
• 19:38
  And then from that really start to think about, okay, is what I'm doing
• 19:43
  really going to be attracting the ideal clients that I'm hoping to speak to?
• 19:47
  Because if not, then yes, potentially it's time for a bit of a visual rebrand.
• 19:53
  And you can look at what you're doing visually and perhaps think, well, What,
• 19:58
  what aspects of what I've got here are working, what perhaps are not.
• 20:03
  There are really simple things that you can do.
• 20:05
  You can kind of go back and create a mood board, perhaps.
• 20:10
  Mood boards, I create mood boards with every single project that I create.
• 20:14
  And sometimes just going, and don't go too far down a Pinterest hole here.
• 20:19
  Big tip.
• 20:20
  So do that.
• 20:22
  But simply just go and kind of research visuals and really think about the
• 20:26
  kind of the visuals that your ideal client would potentially want to see.
• 20:31
  Really get inside their heads as much as you can and then look at what you
• 20:35
  have and see if those two things are aligned or if the mood board kind
• 20:40
  of then leads you on to Something different in terms of the brand
• 20:45
  Becca: visuals.
• 20:46
  I love a mood board.
• 20:47
  I love a Pinterest mood board as well.
• 20:48
  But you're right, you can end up down a massive rabbit
• 20:51
  hole and we don't want that.
• 20:52
  Okay, so we've talked about quick fixes to up level our brand.
• 20:55
  What about if we're happy with our brand, but we feel like our website is a mess?
• 21:00
  So maybe our contact information isn't very clear.
• 21:03
  Maybe our customer journey experience is poor.
• 21:06
  Do you have any thoughts or must haves for our website quick
• 21:09
  fixes that you can help us with?
• 21:12
  Katy: Absolutely.
• 21:12
  And this is a classic situation.
• 21:14
  So a lot of people are kind of happy with their brand, their visual brand
• 21:18
  and all of that side of things, but the website can be seriously lacking in, you
• 21:24
  know, you might not be getting leads.
• 21:25
  You might not be getting people doing what you want them to do on the site.
• 21:29
  So I'd say the most important thing is to make sure that firstly, your
• 21:33
  brand is reflected on the website.
• 21:36
  And if it's not, you can, you know, make some updates visually.
• 21:40
  You can do some things to bring the website to life by
• 21:44
  adding, you know, more kind of.
• 21:48
  stylized Aspects to the website and there are loads and loads of amazing templates
• 21:52
  out there that you can use that are already You know, they look incredible.
• 21:57
  And all you need to do is then Your spin on them and your brand and your copy, but
• 22:03
  you can also go beyond that and really think about you know making sure you
• 22:09
  Consider what your business needs really are and make sure you consider that
• 22:13
  Navigational journey of your ideal clients through your site as well but I would
• 22:18
  say in general some top tips for your website are You know, sometimes a lot of
• 22:25
  people don't realize the importance of a homepage, so your homepage is probably one
• 22:31
  of the most important pages of your site, so I want to give you some homepage tips.
• 22:37
  So, think about your homepage, people land probably the first Place they land on your
• 22:43
  site will be your home page and that top section of your site is called your home
• 22:48
  page hero section And it essentially is called that because it is designed to grab
• 22:54
  people's attention super quickly pull them in and And then tell them to take action.
• 23:01
  So, in that section, you really need to concisely, and clearly say exactly who you
• 23:08
  are, what you do, and who you do it for.
• 23:12
  And that can be in the form of a header, a little bit of text, and a call to action.
• 23:17
  And that call to action should consider your...
• 23:20
  Overall website goal for, as I said, for a service based business, that is probably
• 23:25
  to get in touch with you or to go via your services to get in touch with you.
• 23:31
  And it also includes some super on brand visuals there as well.
• 23:35
  So if you've got some epic visuals from weddings you've done to make sure
• 23:40
  that that top section of your site is.
• 23:43
  It's like super, super on brand and really working hard to pull
• 23:48
  people in because people also, they make a decision to stay or leave
• 23:54
  your website super, super quickly.
• 23:56
  We're talking within like 2.
• 23:58
  6 seconds or something like that is the current stat.
• 24:01
  So this is a really important part of the site to get really
• 24:05
  right, completely right.
• 24:06
  Becca: And do you think there's a perfect place to have that
• 24:09
  kind of contact us button or the inquiry form on your homepage?
• 24:13
  Should it be in a certain place or, or is it up for interpretation?
• 24:17
  Katy: It's, it depends.
• 24:18
  It depends on what your goals are.
• 24:19
  I mean, I would say see your homepage as a kind of like, it's almost like
• 24:24
  the hallway of a house or an index.
• 24:27
  So your homepage should set the tone for the rest of your site.
• 24:33
  And so let's say on the homepage hero section.
• 24:36
  So that top section, if people don't take action there, what can they learn next?
• 24:41
  So here's an introduction to your services.
• 24:44
  Then here's an introduction to you, for example.
• 24:48
  And then I would always though make sure that there is another opportunity for them
• 24:52
  to get in touch with you, whether that is.
• 24:55
  Right at the bottom of the page or potentially in your footer.
• 24:59
  Make sure that there is always an opportunity on screen for
• 25:03
  people to get in touch with you.
• 25:05
  You can also have on a website, you can have a header navigation
• 25:10
  that Kind of scrolls down with you.
• 25:13
  Now that's one option.
• 25:15
  There are lots of people that love that, other people that don't.
• 25:18
  But you can also have side buttons and things that mean that you've always
• 25:22
  got a contact button on the screen.
• 25:25
  So another tip as well is to make sure that you don't have any
• 25:28
  website dead ends.
• 25:31
  So what I mean is once they get to the bottom of the page, there then
• 25:34
  needs to be something for them to do.
• 25:37
  So if they run out of things to do and you don't tell people what to
• 25:41
  do, there's every chance that they will get bored, get distracted by
• 25:45
  their sandwich or whatever and leave.
• 25:48
  So you've got to make sure that there's always an opportunity for them
• 25:51
  to do something, to take an action.
• 25:53
  Becca: I love that.
• 25:54
  We need to get people stuck in the rabbit hole of our website, going round and
• 25:58
  round and round and round until they know everything there is to know about us.
• 26:03
  So lots of my wedding pros say to me, yeah, I'm ready to get a new website or
• 26:09
  I'm ready to get a new brand, but I don't even know where to start looking for that.
• 26:13
  I don't know how much it's going to cost me.
• 26:15
  I'm worried it's going to be expensive.
• 26:16
  I don't know how to find the right person that fits with what I do.
• 26:20
  So obviously you have your own business, but if you were to give an
• 26:23
  outside perspective and someone was coming to you with the same questions.
• 26:27
  What would you suggest to them?
• 26:28
  How would you help them go about finding the right person with the
• 26:32
  right prices for their situation?
• 26:35
  Katy: Absolutely.
• 26:36
  I think it's so important to find the right person.
• 26:41
  That can mean, like, you somehow have a personal connection with that person.
• 26:45
  You feel like they're right for you.
• 26:47
  Because a website redesign is...
• 26:50
  It can be quite a long process, so you're essentially going to be working
• 26:54
  with that person for quite a long time.
• 26:56
  Other things that I would look for is perhaps that they've got
• 27:00
  experience helping people like you.
• 27:03
  Check out their portfolio.
• 27:06
  It's not always about the kind of the style of websites they, they create.
• 27:11
  It's also, I would say, it's important that they're actually considering you as
• 27:17
  a business and that, you know, I think there are a lot of website designers out
• 27:22
  there who will just go and throw together a website for you in a couple of weeks.
• 27:27
  And I think that works to a point.
• 27:30
  But I would say...
• 27:33
  to have a, you know, a really successful website that really reflects your
• 27:37
  business vision and your goals and your, your ideal clients, et cetera.
• 27:41
  It's so, so important to look for someone who considers
• 27:45
  strategy in what they do as well.
• 27:48
  But it's also important to consider what stage you're at in your business,
• 27:53
  because obviously that affects, you know, how much budget you're going to have.
• 27:58
  How much you're going to be able to spend and and often a lot of website designers
• 28:03
  will have different packages that cater to those different things as well So for
• 28:08
  example, they might have an entry level where it might just be the standard sort
• 28:13
  of four or five page website That will help you get online versus It's a kind of
• 28:19
  all singing, all dancing, 15 page website, which is for someone who's already online.
• 28:25
  They've already got all of that content, but it needs to be recreated
• 28:29
  in a bigger website essentially.
• 28:32
  So questions to ask a potential web designer would be things
• 28:37
  like, have you worked with business owners like me before?
• 28:41
  And make sure you can find evidence of that and then yeah,
• 28:45
  just make sure that you kind of.
• 28:47
  Get each other, have a call with them, and don't be afraid to ask them questions
• 28:52
  about your specific business and how they think they can really, you know, tailor
• 28:56
  their service to help your business.
• 28:59
  Becca: That's incredibly helpful.
• 29:00
  Thank you for sharing that.
• 29:03
  Now, I always end my podcast with the same question and that's this.
• 29:07
  What's one thing you wish you'd known sooner in your own business?
• 29:11
  Katy: Wow.
• 29:12
  Yes.
• 29:13
  So I've been through this process a few times in my business and
• 29:17
  that is about reframing things and making sure that I'm doing things.
• 29:24
  From a kind of, I like to say from a kind of CEO point of view.
• 29:29
  So there's lots of chat out there at the moment from, you know, people online
• 29:33
  who are saying have a CEO mentality.
• 29:36
  And I've always been like, I don't really know what that means.
• 29:38
  I don't want to be a CEO.
• 29:40
  I don't work for a big corporation.
• 29:41
  What?
• 29:42
  I don't understand.
• 29:43
  And now it's making a lot of sense to me.
• 29:45
  So obviously when you work running your own business, you wear a lot of hats.
• 29:50
  And that's, it's tricky, it's tricky to be wearing all of those hats, but
• 29:56
  it's also so important to kind of eject yourself from that personal, Oh, this
• 30:01
  business is me and kind of really see it from an outsider perspective and
• 30:07
  be that, you know, CEO or big boss or whatever you want to call it and be really
• 30:12
  running your business as a business.
• 30:15
  So one thing I really learn, and I think.
• 30:18
  I would say to myself at the beginning of this business would be Okay
• 30:24
  You're actually winging it here.
• 30:26
  You're winging it here in terms of If you get to the end of the year and
• 30:30
  you don't know how to set out your goals for next year or they feel a
• 30:35
  bit arbitrary it's because you don't have a plan on how to execute them,
• 30:41
  how to actually make them happen.
• 30:44
  So, and I'm going through this business, this process again with
• 30:47
  my business at the moment which is literally going back to basics.
• 30:50
  reframing everything and creating an actual business strategy so that I
• 30:56
  feel more confident and more, I feel more clarity around what I'm doing
• 31:01
  rather than say, getting to a Monday morning going, Oh my God, I don't
• 31:05
  know what I'm posting on social media.
• 31:07
  I don't know what I'm doing in any.
• 31:09
  given day, week, month, and I don't know how to project how much I'm gonna
• 31:14
  make next year, next month, et cetera.
• 31:17
  So, it's kind of about seeing things from a CEO point of view, rather
• 31:23
  than, Oh, I've got some inquiries through, thank God for that.
• 31:27
  It's not the winging it side of things, I actually feel like now I'm
• 31:31
  running a proper business, rather than just waiting for business to
• 31:35
  come to me, if that makes sense.
• 31:37
  So that's been a massive learning curve for me.
• 31:40
  Becca: That makes total sense.
• 31:42
  And I know a lot of my wedding pros will be feeling exactly the same and therefore
• 31:46
  they need to get that CEO mindset as.
• 31:49
  Well, Katie, it's been such a pleasure chatting with you, hearing about all
• 31:53
  your different ideas for my pros to up level their brand and their websites.
• 31:57
  If people want to find out more about you and your business, where's
• 32:00
  the best place for them to go?
• 32:02
  Katy: Well, I have to say, they can go to my website, studiolagodesign.
• 32:06
  com, but I'm also over on Instagram, studiolagodesign and LinkedIn as well.
• 32:12
  I've got quite active on LinkedIn recently.
• 32:15
  So it's Katie Lake over on LinkedIn.
• 32:17
  Becca: Fabulous.
• 32:17
  And I will be sure to add all of those details to the show notes.
• 32:21
  Katie, it's been a pleasure.
• 32:22
  Thanks for being here.
• 32:23
  Katy: Thank you.
• 32:26
  Becca: I love that conversation.
• 32:27
  I know so many of you need help with your websites, with your branding.
• 32:32
  So if you have been inspired to take action as we get towards the end of the
• 32:36
  year, set out your goals and intentions for next year, have a revisit of those
• 32:40
  values and take another look at your web.
• 32:42
  site and brand and ask yourself, am I still aligned?
• 32:45
  And if you're not, it's time to do something about it.
• 32:48
  I'll see you next time.