Latest / Wedding Pros who are ready to grow - with Becca Pountney / Preparing your Wedding Business for the future

Transcript

Preparing your Wedding Business for the future · Wedding Pros who are ready to grow - with Becca Pountney

• 0:00
  Becca: If you're really serious about growing your business, then
• 0:02
  there will likely be a time when you need to outsource some of your
• 0:05
  business tasks because it becomes too much to do it all on your own.
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  But whether you're ready to outsource right now or whether it's in your future
• 0:12
  planning, there are ways you can organize yourself in your business right now.
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  So you're right ready when the time comes.
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  I'm Becca Pountney, Wedding Business Marketing Expert.
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  Speaker and blogger, and you're listening to the wedding pros
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  who are ready to grow podcast.
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  I'm here to share with you actionable tips, strategies, and real life
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  examples to help you take your wedding business to the next level.
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  If you are an ambitious wedding business owner that wants to take your passion
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  and use it to build a profitable, sustainable business, doing what you
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  love, then you're in the right place.
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  Let's get going with today's As you may know by now, I run the Wedding
• 0:48
  Pro Agency as part of my business.
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  We have a whole bank of clients that we work with from regular
• 0:54
  social posting for them to building them nurture email sequences.
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  We even send monthly email campaigns and sometimes even website updates and builds.
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  I love working with all of these clients.
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  But whenever I'm onboarding a new client, there are certain things
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  that I need and the agency needs.
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  So if you're prepared for that, the whole process becomes a whole lot easier and
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  a whole lot less time consuming for you.
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  And what often I find is that when you're ready to outsource, you need
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  the help right then, right there.
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  So you don't have the time to go back and do all of these processes.
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  So today I'm going to share with you some of the processes that if you
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  implement them now in your business and update them going forward, it's
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  going to make outsourcing a whole lot easier for you in the future.
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  So step one is that you need a brand guide.
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  Whenever we take on a new customer into our business as part of the Wedding
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  Pro Agency, the first thing we're gonna ask you for is your brand guide.
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  This is because each and every one of our clients has a completely different brand,
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  and so we can't do things in the same way.
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  And in order to make it as effective as possible and to make the transition
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  really smooth so that your social media followers, for example, don't realize that
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  now it's not you posting that content, it's us as the wedding pro agency.
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  Pretending to be you, then we need to keep it as accurate as possible.
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  So when we are asking you for a brand guide, there are a couple
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  of things that we need to know.
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  And if you have this all together in a document, it's going to make
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  life a whole lot easier rather than scrabbling around to find it.
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  So first thing you need to do in your business is make a brand guide.
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  So that brand guide should.
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  Be a PDF document or a document that includes all of the following information.
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  So you need to know your logos.
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  So for example, if you have a large logo, a circle logo, maybe a
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  brand icon, make sure you know what you have and where you use them.
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  You also need to include in that your color codes.
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  So if you use certain colors in your business, which you.
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  Absolutely should do.
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  Then you need to know what color codes they are.
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  So what is the hex code for that color?
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  And you need to detail that because you can't just say my brand color is
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  red, for example, because there's so many different shades of red out there.
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  We need to know which shade of red it is that you want to use.
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  So inside that brand guide, you would detail your colors and the hex
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  codes that go alongside those colors.
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  Now, if you've had a brand designed for you, your brand logo or brand designer
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  will be able to give you this information.
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  If you've designed it yourself, you need to do a bit of backwards engineering
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  to work out what your color codes are.
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  Also included in that document, we want to know your fonts.
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  Not every font is created equal.
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  And we need to know what fonts do you use on your social media posts?
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  What fonts do you use in your headlines?
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  What fonts do you use in your paragraph posts or on your website?
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  So that when we're putting things together, For you, we can match
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  your fonts as closely or hopefully as accurately as possible.
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  Now, a couple of other things that are important in a brand guide.
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  First of all, it's really helpful for us to know your tone of voice.
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  So how do you talk as your business?
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  Give us some words to describe your tone of voice.
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  Give you an example.
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  I'm going to share with you my own tone of voice.
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  This is part of the brand guide for the Becca Pountney side of my business.
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  And this is what it says.
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  My voice is experienced and supportive.
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  Positioning me as a knowledgeable mentor in the wedding industry, who understands
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  the challenges of a creative professional transitioning into a business owner, my
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  tone is encouraging and understanding, conveying a sense of empathy for
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  the doubts and insecurities faced by individuals, navigating the business
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  aspects of their creative endeavors.
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  I write in a relatable and motivational style using personal anecdotes,
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  conversational approach to guide and inspire creative professionals in
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  building successful wedding businesses.
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  Now, obviously that's quite an in depth tone of voice, but that's super helpful if
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  someone is going to write something as me.
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  Also really helpful if I'm talking to an AI.
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  So, I'm going to start off by saying that I'm not the kind of tool who's
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  talking as me because I can tell it.
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  Talk as Becca Pountney.
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  This is Becca Pountney's brand voice.
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  Now, write me a social media post.
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  It's the same thing as when you're working with us as an agency.
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  We're just the humans doing it, not the robots.
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  Now, of course, you might not want to have something quite as involved in
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  that, but there's some really key words that come out in my brand tone of voice.
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  Things like being supportive, encouraging, understanding, relatable, motivational.
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  What I'm not is stuffy.
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  I don't talk in a really formal manner.
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  However, you might talk very differently to me.
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  And therefore you need to make sure you position to us or to
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  your people you're outsourcing to what that tone of voice includes.
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  You want to include some words to describe how your tone is.
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  And for example, do you swear a lot?
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  Do you not swear at all?
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  Do you talk in quite a formal tone, an informal tone?
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  Do you try and be funny?
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  Do you use emojis?
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  All of these things are really helpful for a person to know when
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  they're doing some work for you.
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  So that's your brand voice.
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  And then the final thing is it's really helpful for us to know
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  a bit more about your brand.
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  So the three describing words that describe your brand, you know, are you
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  vegan, friendly, fun and energetic?
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  What are the ways that you could describe your brand to us in just a
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  few simple words that we can take and use to kind of put together your brand
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  aesthetic, your brand sound on social media or in your email sequences.
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  So that's step one, having a really great brand guide.
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  Now this will take you a little while to pull together, but actually once
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  you've got it, it's really helpful.
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  You can use it for all sorts of things and it's great to have it to hand.
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  Now I actually cover this in detail in my signature course,
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  the Wedding Pro Business Builder.
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  We do branding and brand guides as a whole module.
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  So if you've been through that program, hopefully you've already got the
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  tools you need to put this together.
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  If you haven't, and this is sounding way too far above you, then.
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  You're probably not a place where you need to outsource, but actually maybe
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  you're a place where you should look into whether you need to take that program.
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  The Wedding Pro Business Builder, I'll put the link to it in the show
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  notes, and you can go through that.
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  And I teach you about how to come up with these colors and brand
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  styles and fonts so that you can put together that brand guide.
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  And So that's step one.
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  Do you have a brand guide in your business and if not, can you put one
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  together so that you've got it ready for when you need to outsource to either
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  someone in your own team, to someone like us at the Wedding Pro Agency,
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  maybe even a brand or website designer.
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  These are all the things they're going to be asking you for.
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  Okay.
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  Step two.
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  is templates.
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  So if you use graphics, for example, on your social media and you use them
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  regularly, are you using the same one?
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  Are you using template?
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  Because if you are, it's really easy to hand that over to someone else.
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  So for example, whenever I post on my own Instagram, I have a template for a quote.
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  So if I'm quoting myself or someone else, I have these quote templates.
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  I have the same template.
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  I have it in three or four different colors, right?
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  All in my brand colors, all with my logo on the bottom.
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  And all I go in and do is change the wording on that template, export it,
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  and upload it to my social posts.
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  Now, if I was to outsource this task to someone, I know I've got all of those
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  four different colors and four different things in one template inside my Canva.
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  All I needed to do is share it as a template link to someone else
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  that's going to work on that.
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  They can then access that.
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  And it's all there in one place.
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  I've not got it all messy all over my Canva.
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  So if you are posting and creating graphics for your social
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  accounts, are you using the same kind of template every time?
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  If not, again, aesthetically, brand wise, it looks much better.
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  If you are, it's great to rotate it around the colors.
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  So it gives a bit of change, but if you have that, make sure you're using it
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  all as one document on Canva so that if you need to share it with someone
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  who's going to take over your social media, you can share that as a template
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  link, send the link to us, and then we can carry on doing that for you.
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  And it works really effectively.
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  So that's step two.
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  Are you using templates, particularly for your social
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  media, and do you have them in one?
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  Easily accessible place that can be edited within your Canva.
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  Okay.
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  Step three, when you're looking to outsource, one of the best
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  things you can do is to have implemented a password manager.
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  Now I highly recommend using a password manager anyway.
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  The reason is we know how many different accounts we have to log into online.
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  All of the time, and it gets confusing.
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  We can't remember the password.
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  And then we use the same password for everything, which makes
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  everything really insecure.
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  Or maybe we use really basic passwords.
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  Maybe we have them written in a notebook.
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  I don't know how you're looking after your passwords at the moment, but
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  nowadays we're in 2024, we have so many logins to remember, I highly
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  recommend using a password manager.
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  Now the password manager I use is called LastPassword.
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  Pass.
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  I recommend it.
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  It's great.
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  There's a free version of it and there's a premium version of it, but you can do
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  quite a lot with the free version of it.
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  Now, what this does is it basically creates a vault with one very super long
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  password that you do need to remember, and then it remembers all of your passwords.
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  And so if you've got loads and loads of different logins, basically, it's a
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  little widget on the top of your browser.
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  Google Chrome or on the top of your browser.
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  And it means that it also fills passwords for you from all your different sites.
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  It also will tell you if your password's been in a data leak or if you've used
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  the same password too many times.
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  It's really great just for anyone, whether you're outsourcing or not.
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  Now, the reason this is really helpful when you are outsourcing is because
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  you can actually share passwords with people without giving them your password.
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  So for example, you could share your login.
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  Me and my team, and we don't actually see what the password is.
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  You can just give us approval and then our button will auto fill it into that
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  system and it will be starred out, but it will be your password, so it'll let
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  us log in, but we won't actually be able to see the word that you've used.
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  As your password.
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  So if you want to keep it all secure, that's a really great way of
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  being able to share login details.
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  You also then can manage access to that password.
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  So if you don't want us to have it anymore, you can cut off the access
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  to that immediately at your end.
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  We haven't got anything written down.
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  You don't have to go and change your password.
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  We just won't be able to copy and paste that password.
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  In any more.
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  Now, the reason I recommend getting this ahead of time is because
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  number one is much better for your own security and your business.
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  We know that increasingly people are getting their accounts hacked.
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  Things like LinkedIn Instagram, Facebook accounts getting hacked all of the
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  time, and often it is weak passwords.
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  And also if you have the same password on everything, then
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  they get access to everything.
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  So this is just going to secure your stuff up even more, but also quite
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  often when we go to log into people's.
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  Systems for them so that we can, for example, write you a blog post and log
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  into your WordPress and upload it for you and create it for you as a draft.
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  You don't always know your own passwords.
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  So quite often it takes you quite a long time to work it out because you're used
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  to just having it open on your browser.
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  You'd have to log in every time.
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  Maybe you can't remember what your password is.
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  So it just makes the whole process.
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  A whole lot simpler for you and for whoever you're outsourcing to.
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  So there are lots of other password managers out there.
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  The one I use personally is LastPass.
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  Obviously, Google also has its own inbuilt password manager, but I
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  don't think you can share passwords.
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  From there to other people.
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  Although if anyone knows differently, do let me know, whereas on
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  LastPass, you definitely can.
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  So that's step three, make sure you're using a password manager.
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  So if you're getting people to log into your accounts, they can do it
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  very effectively without you having to actually hand over your passwords.
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  Okay, step four.
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  Now this is probably the biggest thing when we start working with
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  clients and the thing that ends up taking people the most amount of time.
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  However, this is also the thing that if you start implementing it now, it's going
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  to take you a whole lot less time and it's going to make everything more organized.
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  And that is how you organize your image files.
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  Now we know that we need images.
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  We need images for our website, for our social posts, for all of these
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  different things in our marketing.
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  And in the wedding business, we often are very lucky that we get a lot of images.
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  So maybe we get sent images from a real wedding.
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  Perhaps we're part of style shoots and we've got banks
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  and banks of images of them.
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  Maybe we've had our own brand shoot.
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  We've got photos of us and our team.
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  But what we're not very good at quite often is keeping these organized.
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  Now, the first thing we're going to do once we've asked you for your brand
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  document, if we start running your social media accounts for you, is we're going
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  to ask you to upload your images to a Google drive or to share your Google
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  drive link with us, because we cannot post on your social media without images.
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  So if you've got all of that ready to go, you can just share a link with us.
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  It's very easy.
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  Not time consuming.
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  However, if you've got images saved on hard drives on all different
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  computers, on your phone, all over the place, it actually can take you
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  quite a long time to consolidate them.
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  So I'm going to talk to you about a way you can file your images, which is going
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  to massively help if you ever need to outsource, especially at short notice.
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  So first of all, I recommend if you can organize some of these file
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  images on a cloud based system.
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  So something like Dropbox or Google.
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  Because then we share it with someone outside of your computer.
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  If everything's just saved on your computer, then that's quite
• 13:55
  difficult for someone to access.
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  However, if it's also on a drive, not only is it backed up.
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  So if something happens to your computer, it's still all there.
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  It's also much easier for a team member or someone who you're outsourcing
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  to, to go in and grab those images.
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  Now within those image files, as you go along, it's really helpful.
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  kind of coordinate your filing system.
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  So the filing system I recommend is that first of all, you break
• 14:19
  them down by types of images.
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  So for example, you could have a style shoots folder, a real weddings folder,
• 14:27
  a photos of you folder, and then I would always have a logos folder as well.
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  So for example, you go to your Google drive, you've got a
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  folder, it's called real weddings.
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  Inside of that folder, you would then add a folder for each of your real weddings.
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  Now I recommend naming the folder.
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  The name of the couple whose wedding is, and also if you're
• 14:48
  not the photographer, whoever the photographer was for that wedding.
• 14:52
  This is information that may be stored in your head, but if you're
• 14:55
  going to outsource this to someone else, we need that information.
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  When we post an image, we can only credit the photographer, which we need to do if
• 15:02
  you've told us who the photographer is.
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  So if you save this information as you go along, it's going
• 15:07
  to save you a lot of time.
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  So have that image.
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  Maybe it's a Becca and Ben's wedding.
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  And then the wedding photographer is Becky Harley photography.
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  And then inside that file, you add all of the images of that wedding.
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  So now if you hand me that file to put on your social media, I can
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  say, look at these pictures from the lovely wedding of Becca and Ben
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  captured by Becky Harley photography.
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  That's it.
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  Don't our flowers look amazing and we've got all that information because you've
• 15:34
  already saved it in that way in the file.
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  So inside of the file, make sure you're naming the folder within the folder.
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  So you've got folder one is real weddings.
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  Inside that you create the folder for that particular wedding, Becca
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  and Ben, photographer, Becky Harley photography, and then inside of
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  that folder is all of the images.
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  You would do the same.
• 15:54
  So if you've been
• 15:55
  in styled shoots, have your styled shoot folder, then inside the styled
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  shoot folder, then have the different shoots that you've been part of.
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  And again, credit, maybe name it the name of the shoot that you called
• 16:06
  it at the time, and then put the photographer's details in the folder name.
• 16:11
  Again, if you've got branding images, you need to credit the
• 16:13
  photographer, you can do that inside of that photos of me folder.
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  So.
• 16:19
  Really thinking about how you do this is really important because if you can get
• 16:23
  your images updated as you go along, this is going to be a lot less time consuming
• 16:27
  than trying to do it all in one go.
• 16:29
  Because once you've got this system going, you know, next time you get a
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  real wedding or a styled shoot, you know immediately I need to upload that
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  to my styled shoot folder, and I need to change the name of the folder name
• 16:39
  and make sure all those images are.
• 16:42
  Now going a step further is also really helpful if you add in any notes or.
• 16:49
  Or things about that shoot or about that couple as you go along.
• 16:53
  Again, this information otherwise is all stored in your head or in
• 16:56
  random places all over your computer.
• 16:58
  So if you upload a style shoot to the folder, make sure you then put in a
• 17:01
  Google doc or something like that into that same folder, which you've copy and
• 17:05
  pasted all of the suppliers that need crediting every single time, and maybe
• 17:08
  a couple of lines about the format, the theme of the shoot, that kind of thing.
• 17:12
  Now, quite often, whoever's organized the shoot will produce something like
• 17:16
  this for you, and therefore you can just.
• 17:17
  Upload that document into the folder with the images.
• 17:21
  It's the same with the real wedding.
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  So again, if you had a real wedding, someone sends you the photography
• 17:28
  pictures, the professional photography pictures from that wedding, upload
• 17:31
  them with the name of the photographer, but maybe have a little Google doc
• 17:35
  that you put inside that file with things like the venue where it was
• 17:38
  at, any little details about the wedding, maybe any other supplies, you
• 17:42
  know, that were part of that wedding.
• 17:43
  So that if someone from the outside goes into that folder to use a photo
• 17:47
  like that on your social media.
• 17:48
  Yeah.
• 17:49
  You can then take that information.
• 17:51
  We can see that information and we can sound more like you.
• 17:54
  So we can say we loved doing the flowers for Becca and Ben's wedding
• 17:57
  at Fannam Hall Hotel in Hertfordshire.
• 18:00
  It was such a sunny day and all of their guests loved the bouncy castle, right?
• 18:05
  Because we can see that information.
• 18:07
  If you don't give us that information, it's just a picture of two people
• 18:10
  getting married and it makes it really challenging for us to make it
• 18:13
  personalized and sounding like you.
• 18:17
  So to recap, because of.
• 18:19
  Feel like that was a big point that I shared with you.
• 18:21
  Make sure you organize your images and start doing it now.
• 18:24
  Have them in a cloud based system that you can share.
• 18:27
  So something like Google drive or Dropbox, have them organized into sections so
• 18:31
  you can have, you know, the big section, which is all our photos inside of that,
• 18:36
  maybe real weddings, styled shoots.
• 18:39
  Photos of me and then within each of those subfolders have the folders for
• 18:44
  each couple or each shoot with those photos and also some notes about that.
• 18:49
  Make sure you're including the name of the photographer in the title of
• 18:53
  the folder as well so that's easy for people to get to and everyone
• 18:56
  is getting the credits they need.
• 18:58
  Now not only is this going to help you because it's going to make everything
• 19:02
  more organized, It's also going to save you a huge amount of time and effort.
• 19:05
  If you do go on to outsource your social media or your marketing to
• 19:09
  someone, because you can just say, here's the link to my Google drive.
• 19:12
  I've shared it with you and you can go in and access every single one of my images.
• 19:16
  All of the information is already in there.
• 19:17
  All of the credits are in there.
• 19:18
  Happy days, off you go.
• 19:20
  Whereas if you've got to sit down and do that all in one
• 19:22
  go, it can take a little while.
• 19:24
  So start doing it now, start doing it little and often, and now add
• 19:28
  new things as and when they come in.
• 19:31
  Okay, step five is having clear processes lined out that people
• 19:35
  can come in and do for you.
• 19:37
  You will find that there's quite a lot of things in your business that
• 19:39
  you do over and over again, and you know exactly how to do them.
• 19:43
  But if someone else comes into your business, it can take quite a long
• 19:45
  time to explain to people All of the ways to do everything in your business.
• 19:50
  So if you can find ways to keep a log of some of those tasks that you do regularly
• 19:54
  now, then if you do go ahead and outsource it to someone, it can be really simple and
• 19:59
  easy to share the information with them.
• 20:01
  Now, I actually use a tool for this called Scribe and you can get it at scribehow.
• 20:06
  com.
• 20:06
  It's a free plugin.
• 20:08
  And again, it works with Google Chrome.
• 20:10
  I'm not sure what other browsers it works on, but you can try
• 20:12
  it on your browser as well.
• 20:13
  And this is a really nifty little plugin.
• 20:16
  For demonstrating things.
• 20:17
  So what you do is you add it to your browser, scribe how and it comes
• 20:21
  as a little button on your browser.
• 20:23
  Then what you do is turn it on.
• 20:25
  So you set it to record, and then you do the task that you're
• 20:28
  trying to teach someone how to do.
• 20:30
  So for example, if I was trying to show you how to update a blog post on my
• 20:34
  website, I would hit the scribe button.
• 20:36
  I would hit record.
• 20:38
  And then I personally would go into my website and start making the script.
• 20:41
  All of the necessary things to update the blog post.
• 20:44
  Now what Scribe does when you stop recording is it takes screenshots
• 20:48
  of each part of the process and AI writes a description of how to do it.
• 20:52
  So for example, if I've done that, it might say, go to this page, log in.
• 20:56
  Then click on posts, then click on add new, then type in, and it
• 21:01
  will tell people how to do it.
• 21:02
  And it's a really fast way of documenting how you do certain things in your
• 21:07
  business in a really simple way.
• 21:08
  It then turns it into a PDF that can be saved.
• 21:11
  So why not think about creating some of these process documents for the things in
• 21:15
  your business that you do regularly, that you might want to get someone else either
• 21:18
  in your own team or to outsource to do it.
• 21:22
  So that you can show them very quickly and simply how to do it.
• 21:25
  Now you can, of course, record a video, but that takes a
• 21:27
  whole lot more time and effort.
• 21:29
  This scribe plugin is excellent for really showcasing how to do very simple tasks
• 21:34
  and it does most of the work for you.
• 21:36
  Obviously you need to go in and check that it makes sense.
• 21:38
  But this is a really good starting place, so why not have a think about
• 21:41
  creating some of those now, download the plugin, start creating some and
• 21:45
  testing it out, and if there's certain things you're thinking, oh I'd love to
• 21:48
  get someone else to just go in and do this really simple task for me, but I
• 21:51
  don't have time to explain all of the ways to do it, create a scribe next
• 21:55
  time you do the task, save it somewhere, and then you've got it ready to go if
• 21:58
  someone needs to do that task for you.
• 22:01
  Now the final three steps are things that really you should be doing in your
• 22:04
  business anyway but I do think can get neglected especially when we're working
• 22:08
  on our own because we just have all the ideas and thoughts going around
• 22:11
  in our head and often we make snap decisions on what we're going to do.
• 22:15
  But in an ideal world you would have processes in place for doing these
• 22:19
  final three things and actually they're really really helpful when
• 22:22
  it comes to outsourcing your work to us as the agency and it will
• 22:25
  help us give you the best results.
• 22:27
  So step six is having a clear plan yourself on what you want to achieve.
• 22:33
  So quite often people come to us and say, Becca, can you build us a
• 22:36
  nurture sequence for a wedding show?
• 22:38
  And my first question is, yes, of course we can.
• 22:41
  What do you want to achieve?
• 22:42
  And sometimes people don't know the answer to that.
• 22:44
  Now I can obviously talk you through that.
• 22:46
  That's the benefit of working with me and my team as outsourcing, because
• 22:49
  I will teach you how to do it and show you how to do it and give you
• 22:52
  the strategy behind it, rather than.
• 22:54
  Just going ahead and building the email sequence to, for you.
• 22:56
  So there is a, an element of which we will help you and give you that input.
• 23:00
  But if you know your clear objective, so if you say to me, Becca, can
• 23:04
  you build me an email sequence?
• 23:05
  I want to use it for a wedding fair.
• 23:07
  I want to send three follow up emails.
• 23:08
  Each of those emails needs to encourage people to book an
• 23:11
  appointment on the phone with me.
• 23:13
  And as Becca said, Part of that to get people to sign up, I'm going to
• 23:16
  run a competition on the stand, or I'm going to give away a checklist.
• 23:19
  Are you able to do that for us?
• 23:20
  Well, that's a great piece of information.
• 23:22
  You know, your clear objectives.
• 23:24
  We can go away.
• 23:24
  I can brief my team.
• 23:26
  We can build that for you very, very fast and send it back to you
• 23:29
  for your approval and go ahead.
• 23:31
  But if you don't know your objectives, that is a harder thing for us to do,
• 23:34
  because then we're kind of making it up as we go along and what we think is your
• 23:38
  objectives and it might not necessarily be what The thing that you want to achieve.
• 23:42
  So, are you clear on your objectives in your business?
• 23:45
  Are you clear if you want to build a nurture sequence,
• 23:48
  why you want to build it?
• 23:49
  What the purpose of that is?
• 23:51
  Now, you don't need to give us the nitty gritty details.
• 23:53
  You don't need to write all the emails for us.
• 23:54
  But if you have a clear vision and purpose for what you want to achieve,
• 23:57
  and you tell us that, then we can go ahead and create it for you.
• 24:02
  It's the same with your social media accounts.
• 24:03
  Do you have a clear objective of what you're trying to do
• 24:06
  on your social media accounts?
• 24:07
  Are you trying to network with other business owners?
• 24:10
  Are you trying to give lots of tips and advice to attract new followers?
• 24:14
  Are you just trying to keep a shop window open so that people can see
• 24:18
  your best work if they're doing their research and it's all about making
• 24:22
  it look aesthetically pleasing?
• 24:23
  If you know what your objectives are, it's a lot easier for you to share
• 24:27
  those with other people and to go ahead.
• 24:29
  And get some of that work outsourced.
• 24:31
  So have a think, are you clear on what you want to achieve when
• 24:34
  it comes to some of these tasks?
• 24:36
  If you come to us for blogging, do you know why you want to blog?
• 24:39
  Are you going for certain SEO benefits?
• 24:41
  Are you just trying to keep your website updated?
• 24:43
  Is it just because someone told you you should blog and you
• 24:46
  don't really know what to do?
• 24:47
  Or have you got a really clear objective that you want to post 12 blog posts
• 24:51
  over the next year, and you want each one of them to focus on a different
• 24:54
  specific area that you're trying to rank for The more information you give
• 24:58
  us, the better job we can do for you.
• 25:01
  Okay.
• 25:01
  Step seven on a similar theme is do you have a marketing
• 25:05
  calendar for your whole year?
• 25:06
  Now we often know when and where in our business things
• 25:10
  are going to get more traction.
• 25:12
  So for example, maybe we know in January is a good time for getting couples
• 25:16
  who've just got engaged over Christmas.
• 25:18
  Now, if you have a marketing calendar for the whole year that you hand
• 25:21
  over to us, Before we take over your social media accounts or at least
• 25:25
  for six months, then we can do some really targeted things for you.
• 25:28
  Now, obviously we can run generic social posts all through the year
• 25:31
  based on getting people to know, like, and trust you entertaining,
• 25:35
  inspiring all of those things.
• 25:36
  However.
• 25:37
  If you know from your own business insights that lots of people book
• 25:42
  you six months before the wedding for a winter wedding, then we know six
• 25:46
  months before winter, we can be doing some posts about it's not too late
• 25:50
  to book us for your winter wedding.
• 25:51
  If you know that Mother's Day, you get loads of traction for some of the
• 25:55
  offerings you do in your business around Mother's Day, then let us know, and then
• 25:58
  we can make sure we're promoting that.
• 25:59
  If you have workshops at Christmas you want us to talk about, if you want Open
• 26:02
  days that you're going to, if you have specific events or things that you want
• 26:06
  to talk about at certain times of year, again, if you have that all laid out in a
• 26:10
  marketing calendar, we can use that and we can make sure we're creating the content
• 26:14
  as effectively as possible, hitting your objectives and making sure we're
• 26:18
  covering off all of those marketing tasks.
• 26:20
  If you have a focus for different times of the year, different months,
• 26:23
  different weeks, and you know what we're going to talk about, it's a lot
• 26:26
  easier for us to plan that content for you and make sure that it's effective.
• 26:31
  Okay, that brings us then to the final step.
• 26:33
  Step eight.
• 26:35
  Do you have a good handle on your KPIs?
• 26:38
  Now, KPI stands for key performance objectives.
• 26:41
  It's a posh way of basically saying, do you know your numbers?
• 26:44
  Are you on top of your targets?
• 26:46
  Now, this is something that I'm really focusing on at the
• 26:48
  moment in my own business.
• 26:50
  And I've been encouraging my wedding business owners to do it
• 26:52
  as well over the last year or so.
• 26:55
  Yeah.
• 26:55
  If you're in the Members Lounge, Wedding Pro Members Lounge, we have
• 26:58
  lounge calls every single month where we go through goal setting.
• 27:01
  We've actually got one coming up this week.
• 27:04
  And what happens on those calls is we all get on a Zoom call together.
• 27:07
  I go through our goal setting worksheet that I've put together and we look back
• 27:12
  over the last month and we look forward.
• 27:14
  So we look at things like how much your Instagram's grown, how much your
• 27:17
  Instagram Email subscriber lists grown.
• 27:19
  Have you been targeting certain connections this month?
• 27:22
  How are your sales targets going?
• 27:24
  How are your inquiry targets going?
• 27:26
  What things went well, and we do a real deep dive into some of those numbers.
• 27:30
  And the idea is we do that every month so you can look back on the
• 27:33
  month before and learn from it.
• 27:35
  We can look forward and set targets, but also we can start to see patterns
• 27:39
  emerging by doing that on a regular basis.
• 27:42
  So I highly recommend you doing that.
• 27:44
  Why not join us as a member of the Wedding Pro Members Lounge?
• 27:47
  I'd love to have you.
• 27:48
  It's only 37 a month and we're accepting new members right now.
• 27:52
  So come and join us and you can be part of those monthly calls.
• 27:56
  I've also turned my monthly goal setting sheet.
• 27:58
  into an actual physical workbook that you can buy on Amazon.
• 28:01
  Just search Becca Poutney on Amazon, you'll find it and it's undated.
• 28:05
  So you can do this same exercise on your own in your own time or
• 28:08
  with us in the members lounge and go through this process.
• 28:12
  In my own business, I've been setting myself KPI day as the first of the month.
• 28:16
  So it's now in my calendar.
• 28:18
  So on the first of the month, I go and note down all of my
• 28:20
  own KPIs for the month before.
• 28:22
  So some of the metrics that I will track.
• 28:24
  Business I had to my website, how many new email subscribers I've got,
• 28:29
  how many new Instagram followers, LinkedIn followers, Facebook followers.
• 28:32
  I've got how much money I bought into the business in the last month, what my costs
• 28:36
  were in the business on the last month.
• 28:39
  And I'm tracking these each and every month.
• 28:41
  Now I know that you're thinking, well, that's great.
• 28:43
  Cause I need to do that in my business.
• 28:45
  But why is this important when it comes to outsourcing Becker?
• 28:48
  Well, the reason is, is because often people think.
• 28:52
  The outsourcing is a miracle worker and actually it's not.
• 28:55
  So when you take on the Wedding Pro Agency, we're there to
• 28:58
  assist you with your tasks.
• 28:59
  We're not there to work miracles.
• 29:01
  We're there to take some of these tasks that you're already doing off your hands
• 29:05
  and do them in a regular, consistent way.
• 29:08
  So what you need to know is your own KPIs so that we can make sure that
• 29:13
  it's getting better or consistent with what you were doing before.
• 29:16
  So for example, if you see that every month you Get on average
• 29:20
  five to 10 Instagram followers.
• 29:22
  Now, if we take over your account, you shouldn't suddenly expect now you're
• 29:25
  going to get a hundred new Instagram followers, but actually we should be
• 29:28
  tracking the same as or above what you were already doing in your business,
• 29:32
  because we're just taking off your hands.
• 29:34
  We're not creating miracles for you.
• 29:36
  for you.
• 29:37
  So if you know your numbers, you know your KPIs and you're tracking
• 29:40
  them yourself, you can also see that the work we're doing in the agency
• 29:43
  is tracking along how it should be.
• 29:45
  You can see if anything has changed or anything needs to be done more
• 29:49
  of, and you can see how that's having a direct impact on sales.
• 29:53
  However, if you don't track those numbers and you're just going off
• 29:56
  gut instinct, it's never really that effective and you won't know what's
• 30:00
  working at And what's not working.
• 30:02
  So I highly recommend you get involved with me, with KPI day, doing your goal
• 30:06
  setting, join us in the wedding pro members lounge and do it as a group.
• 30:09
  It's a really fun call where we do that goal setting and also talk with
• 30:13
  each other and build new connections through networking breakout groups.
• 30:18
  Or grab that book off Amazon, do it in your own time, but make sure you're
• 30:21
  doing it on the beginning or towards the end of the month, looking back at
• 30:24
  that month and looking forward to the next month and having a good handle
• 30:28
  on your KPIs will not only show you whether you can afford to outsource,
• 30:32
  but it will also help you monitor that outsourcing that you do in the future.
• 30:37
  Okay, I'm going to recap very fast, those eight steps to make sure your business
• 30:41
  is right, ready to be outsourcing.
• 30:44
  So step one, have that brand guide ready to go.
• 30:46
  Step two, turn your canvas.
• 30:48
  Things into templates for social media.
• 30:50
  Step three, start using a password manager.
• 30:53
  Step four, organize your image files.
• 30:55
  Step five, have your clear processes lined out.
• 30:58
  Remembering that scribe plugin I mentioned.
• 31:01
  Step six, know your objectives.
• 31:03
  Step seven, know your marketing calendar and step eight, start tracking
• 31:07
  your metrics every single month.
• 31:10
  Now, let me just reassure you that if you're thinking, I don't have
• 31:13
  any of this in place, that's okay.
• 31:16
  Take it one step at a time.
• 31:17
  This episode's here.
• 31:18
  You can go back and re listen at any point, take them one step at a time.
• 31:22
  The idea is that you start implementing some of these things into your business
• 31:25
  so that you don't have to do them all at the day when you're ready to
• 31:29
  outsource because often people outsource because they're already stretched.
• 31:32
  And so you don't have loads of time to add all this extra work in.
• 31:36
  So it ends up.
• 31:37
  Harming yourself.
• 31:38
  Whereas if you do it now and start building on these things, you'll
• 31:42
  have it ready to go when you need it.
• 31:44
  However, rest assured, I'm not asking that if you do want to work with the agency
• 31:48
  or anyone else for that matter, you don't have to have all these steps in place.
• 31:52
  Now you can do them.
• 31:53
  We will walk you through them.
• 31:55
  Once you book with us, I'm just giving you this information now
• 31:58
  to hopefully save you time in the future and to get yourself more.
• 32:02
  If you do this at the Wedding Pro Agency, we would absolutely love to help you with
• 32:06
  your social media scheduling, perhaps building you an email nurture sequence,
• 32:09
  writing you blog posts, updating your website, or doing any of those other tasks
• 32:14
  that you just want to get off your hands.
• 32:15
  If you're interested in that, reach out to me.
• 32:18
  At Becca Pountney on Instagram, drop me an email or go to the wedding
• 32:21
  pro agency website page, which I'll link in the show notes below.
• 32:25
  Get in touch and we can see if we can help you.
• 32:28
  I hope today's episode has helped you get more organized.
• 32:31
  Let me know if you implement any of it into your own business
• 32:34
  and I'll see you all next time.