Oh, the perfect day that kids dream about! The day they get famous and marry the person they’ve loved all their lives. It can’t be wrong! But making plans for the perfect day might be hard. The wedding planner comes to make sure that this is the best day of their lives. If you like making plans, why not make money from it? You can start your own wedding planning business with a small amount of money.
But first you have to go through the process of firm planning. To do that, you need to know how to do it, and today is your lucky day! This step-by-step guide is full of tips and ideas that will help you plan a great wedding.
Step 1: Find Out if this is the Right Business for You?
Positives Vs Negatives
| Make ladies’ dreams come true on their wedding day! Pay 10–20% of the total cost of the wedding. Flexibility means that the business can be run from home. | Bridezillas: Everything must be perfect for the wedding! Weekend Work – Weddings over long weekends |
Industry Trends
- Size of the industry and how it has grown in the past: The wedding planning business in the US is worth more than $900 million. Every year for the past five years, the industry has dropped by 7%, but it is still big enough to offer chances.
- Growth prediction: From now until 2030, the global wedding services industry, which includes wedding planning, is expected to grow at a rate of 5% per year.
- Number of businesses: In the United States, there are about 20,000 wedding planners.
- Employees: About 25,000 people work in the industry.
Cost of Starting Food Packaging Business
Costs to start a wedding planning business range from $2,000 to $5,000. The most expensive parts are a website and the first money you spend on marketing.
Is Food Packaging Profitable?
You can charge anywhere from 10% to 20% of the total cost of the wedding, with 15% being the average. The average cost of a wedding is $20,000, so you should make about $3,000 from each one. Since your costs will be low, you can expect to make about 90% of what you spend.
For the first year or two, you could plan 12 weddings from home and make $36,000. If the profit ratio is 90%, this means that the net profit is more than $32,000. As you get better known and get more recommendations, that number could go up to 40 weddings per year. At this point, you might decide to hire someone, which would cut your profit margin to 60%. If you made $120,000 a year, you would have a nice $72,000 in your pocket.
Entry Barriers
- Excellent planning skills
- In competition with services that help you plan your wedding online
Step 2: Create a Strategy
Identify a Gap
Look into wedding planning companies in your area to find out about their services, prices, and what other people have said about them. You want to fill a gap in the market. Maybe there isn’t a wedding manager in the area who takes care of delivery to the event.
This might get people talking about you and bring you business right away.
Solutions
- Make a list of everything you will be responsible for at the wedding. Think about making different service packages with different prices.
Pricing
Planners are usually paid 10% to 20% of the total cost of the wedding. Your costs will be limited to advertising and gas for your car. It’s best to have a profit margin of 90% or more.
After you’ve figured out your costs, you can use this tool to figure out your markup and the final price. Don’t forget that the price you set at start should be open to change if the market tells you to.
Target Market
Most of your customers will be brides and the parents of brides. This is a very large market. You should use TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook as part of your business mix.
Location
You might decide to run your business from home at first to save money. But as your business grows, you will probably need to hire more people and maybe even rent an office. Sites like Craigslist, Crexi, and Instant Offices may help you find office space to rent in your area.
When looking for a place for your business, keep the following in mind:
- The position is handy, and public transportation makes it easy to get there.
- It has lots of natural light and is well-ventilated.
- The lease is flexible and can be changed as your business grows.
- Space that is ready to be used and doesn’t need any big changes or fixes.
Step 3: Write a Business Plan
A plan is important for any business. This will help you guide your new business through the launch process and keep your eye on your main goals. A business plan also helps possible partners and investors understand your business and its goals better:
- Executive Summary: A brief outline of the whole business plan that should be written after the plan is done.
- Business Overview: A summary of the company’s goals, vision, purpose, assets, and control structure.
- What we make and what we do: Explain in detail what you’re selling.
- Do a SWOT analysis and look at market trends like changes in demand and growth opportunities.
- Competitive Analysis: Look at your key rivals’ strengths and flaws and make a list of what makes your services better.
- Sales and Marketing: Look at the unique selling points (USPs) of your business and come up with sales, marketing, and promotion plans.
- Management Team: An overview of the team’s tasks and professional backgrounds, as well as a business structure.
- Operations Plan: Your company’s operational plan includes how it will get supplies, where it will put its office, what its most important assets and tools are, and other practical details.
- Financial Plan: A three-year plan for money, including start-up costs, a break-even analysis, predictions of profits and losses, cash flow, and a balance sheet.
- Appendix: Add any other papers related to money or business.
Step 3: Create a Marketing Plan
Some of your business will come from passersby or people who find you online, but you should still spend money on marketing! Getting the word out is especially important for new businesses because it will bring in more customers and make people more aware of the brand.
Link your website to your social media accounts once your site is up and running. Social media is a great way to market your business because you can make posts that are interesting and sell your goods.
- Facebook is a great paid advertising site that lets you reach specific groups, like men under 50 in the Cleveland area.
- Instagram has the same perks as Facebook, but the people who use it are different.
- Website: Search engine optimization can help your website show up near the top of relevant search results, which is important for growing sales. Check to see if the calls to action on your website are the best they can be. Change the font, size, color, and placement of calls to action like “Schedule Now.” This could make a big difference in how much people buy.
- Google and Yelp: Listing on Yelp and Google My Business may be important for companies that depend on local customers to get more customers and be seen.
- Use signs that draw people’s attention in your store and on your website.
- Flyers should be passed out in your neighborhood and at events for your business.
- Sales in Stores: Tell people about your wedding planning services in beauty shops.
- Make a video: Make a movie about your _____. If you make it funny, it might go viral.
- Email marketing and newsletters: Send customers and potential customers emails regularly. Turn them into yours.
- Make a blog and keep it up to date. Change your information up and put it on many different websites.
- Offer prizes to customers who tell their friends about your business.
- Paid social media advertising: Choose sites where your target market is most likely to be and run focused ads on those sites.
- Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising Use Google AdWords to make your search results better. First, you should look into keywords.
- Influencer marketing is when you pay people with a lot of followers on social media to talk about your wedding planning services. You might be able to find micro-influencers who have fewer fans and charge less.