With over a decade of experience as a mentor in the wedding industry, I’ve spent my fair share of time talking about marketing with my students and mentees. I know marketing can be really tough–it’s time consuming, energy draining, and full of imposter syndrome. And as a wedding planner, you’re told constantly that you need to market your business in a thousand different ways–always scared you’re making a mistake. Plus, there never seems to be enough time. Today, I’m going to share with you the social media mistakes I see every wedding planner make so you can avoid them as you start or continue to market your own wedding business.
Before you come for me, I know that not every single wedding planner makes every single one of these mistakes. But as you keep reading, I bet you’ll find yourself guilty of at least one of these things.
Sorry, not sorry.
But now that you know, you can fix it! If you want tangible results with your marketing, you’re going to want to take notes on this one!
Social Media Mistake #1: Not Sharing More About You
People want to do business with people. How often do you share about yourself on social media? I know you might feel shy–or feel like your life isn’t perfect enough to share… but people really do want to get to know you.
Sharing more about your personal life–including your sense of humor, how you see the world, and yes your favorite cocktail–can help to accelerate that know/like/trust factor.
What’s the know/like/trust factor? Well, in order for someone to buy from you they need to know you (aka find you). Next, they need to like you–and that’s where sharing more about your personal life comes in. Finally, once they know and like you, you’ve got to get them to trust you.
Once you complete those steps, you’ve unlocked the customer buy button.
So, instead of spending so much time talking all about your business, find ways to share more about yourself.
I believe most businesses fail because they don’t know who they are talking to.
If you’re still not sure about what your ideal client really wants, make sure to take a look at the Ideal Client Cocktail. It’s so much more than “What’s their favorite color?” and “What do they like to eat for dinner?” and more about what your clients truly value and are looking for in a high-end wedding planner. It also shares a whole lot more about how to attract them!
Social Media Mistake #2: Not Having A Cohesive Brand Message
We have all done the “throw spaghetti on the wall and see what works” kind of thing when it comes to marketing. I’ve said before that I believe marketing can be just one big experiment, and you should give yourself permission to have fun with it in your business.
However, when it comes to your brand, you’re going to want something that is both visually and emotionally consistent. That doesn’t mean you need to use the color blue everywhere, but your company should stand for something, and that something should be recognizable to your ideal clients.
As a self-proclaimed purpose pioneer, I believe purpose is the cornerstone of your business.
Your company’s purpose should lead the way in any marketing strategy you try. My motto? Marketing is simply sharing your message so that it reaches the right people. So, friend–what the heck is your message?
Your customers want to know that you value what they value, whether that means being active in social issues or valuing over-the-top floral arrangements. What is your business’ purpose? Why do you get out of bed in the morning? Why do you serve your clients?
Social Media Mistake #3: Not Engaging with Followers and Creating Connections
I know you’ve heard this one before. Social media was meant to be social. To be honest, this is one of the biggest social media mistakes I see every wedding planner make.
Are you responding to comments? Are you reaching out to newly engaged couples and vendors in your area? Do you take the time to acknowledge the folks who engage with your content? And do you also take the time to meet new people and support your peers?
Seriously, take advantage of the opportunity to be social on social media. Personally, I love sending voice notes to new followers because it always catches them by surprise and makes them feel so special and appreciated. I’ve had people say, “WOW, I didn’t expect you to respond!” That’s exactly what I want for my brand!
Social Media Mistake #4: Being Inconsistent With Content
Instead of just trying to research the latest hashtag hack, or hoping to go viral using the latest reels trend, ask yourself if you are actually being consistent with your content.
Whenever one of the ladies I’m coaching comes to me and says their marketing is “just not working”, the first thing I ask is always: Are you being consistent? And if so, for how long? Always remember that running a business is a long game. Even if you’ve been consistent in your marketing for a month or more, that is literally a drop in the bucket.
In the wedding industry, you need to be consistent with your marketing as much as you can. Don’t worry. You can batchwork it to make it a little easier. But truly, nothing will trump pure consistency.
Get into a routine and schedule with your marketing. Don’t fall off the face of the earth for two months and wonder why no one has filled out your inquiry form. Find time to consistently post and connect. If you can’t–then hire someone to do it for ya.
Social Media Mistake #5: Not Sharing The Transformation You Provide Your Clients
As wedding planners, there’s a lot of stuff we do that goes unnoticed. How often have you been told by a customer that they just need someone to “oversee everything” on the wedding day? Just stand there with a clipboard, looking pretty and hand-delivering their cocktails? Or worse yet – asking why they even need a wedding planner at all! Their vendors know exactly what to do. Right?
LOL!
If you’ve been in business for a minute, this is almost laughable, but a social media mistake I see wedding planners make all the time is not talking enough about what you do. What do you do behind the scenes? How do you make your clients feel? What is made possible when someone hires you? Share the transformation you provide your clients. Make them feel so at ease that they can’t wait to add you to their vendor list (right at the top).
Seth Godin says, “People don’t buy paint. They buy painted walls.”
What does that mean, exactly? Let me break it down.
When you head out to good ole Home Depot, you’re not there to buy a can of paint. Yes, you do walk away with a can of paint (plus a new drop cloth, paint roller, brushes, tape, and some new painting gadgets you found on an end cap)…. but is that really what you went to buy?
No, you drove out to Home Depot and dropped a couple of hundred dollars on products because you wanted the painted wall.
You know the one Pinterest’s algorithm served you, and now you have to paint your living room Pantone’s color of the year.
People don’t buy paint–they buy the end product that sent them to the store in the first place.
Yes, sharing more about you and who you are is important. But clients care about themselves. They want to see themselves in your marketing–and if you’re spending more time talking about yourself and not enough time showing them the “end of the rainbow,” you’re in trouble.
When it comes to marketing, I want you to balance sharing more about yourself with what your clients really want. Show them that painted wall, girl!
Remember, people don’t buy paint–they buy painted walls.
Ready to do social media differently (and a lot more effectively!)? If you need a little help, don’t forget we include a strategic marketing plan EVERY month inside the Planner’s Playbook!
Seriously, we covered a lot here, but nothing makes implementation easier than an actual plan. I created the Planner’s Playbook with YOU in mind to share everything I know after over a decade in the wedding industry. Yes, we cover marketing every month, but we also teach you how to deliver what you promise. With weddings, there are no do-overs. When you are confident in the experience you are delivering, your marketing gets a heck of a lot better (with a lot less effort). Trust me when I say you want to get on this waitlist.
Skipping to the end and looking for a summary? Stop making the mistakes above when marketing your wedding planning business and do this instead:
- Share more about you and not just your business.
People want to do business with people who share more about who they are.
- Have a cohesive brand message and look.
Keep your messaging and your brand look cohesive.
- Engage with followers and create connections.
Social media is supposed to be social–so put yourself out there and engage with other folks’ content. Respond to comments, DMs, and people who engage with you.
- Get consistent.
No more excuses, OK? If you want to market your wedding planning business the right way–you need to put yourself out there consistently.
- Share the transformation you provide.
People don’t buy paint, they buy painted walls. Reveal the painted wall to your ideal client as much as you can through your marketing.
Explore More Wedding Industry Resources
- The 5 Best Social Media Management Tools For Wedding Pros
- 7 Easy Ways to Market Your Wedding Planning Business Consistently During Peak Season
- Enji Marketing Software: A Review
- Wedding Planner Marketing: How to Attract and Speak Directly to Your Ideal Client
- Pricing Mistakes You Can’t Afford To Make In Your Business As A Wedding Pro
- Stand Out in a Saturated Market: Performing a SWOT Analysis as a Wedding Planner
- Marketing to Gen Z In The Wedding Industry: 5 Things You Need to Know
- How To Design A Styled Shoot As A Wedding Planner
- 9 Mistakes to Avoid When Starting Your Wedding Planning Business
- 8 Free Ways To Market Your Wedding Planning Biz
- How To Get Wedding Clients When You’re Just Starting Out
- 4 Strategies That Will Help You Book MORE Of Your Ideal Clients
- Why You’re Not Attracting The Right Clients and How to Fix It
- 4 Tips for Creating a Preferred Wedding Vendor List as a Wedding Planner
- 4 Wedding Blogging Mistakes Almost Every Wedding Planner Makes
For More Wedding Planner Business Secrets Follow Me On Instagram
I’ve come to realize that many of us want to have a village, but we don’t recognize that we have to be a villager first.
My friend carla @c10ike is one of those rare exceptions and I want to introduce you to her!
When I started my planning business, I had no contacts and no real idea what I was doing. I was so green it makes me laugh to look back on it now!
And somehow, I got lucky enough to be taken under the wing of this incredible woman who showed up for me then when I was a little baby business owner, and has kept showing up ever since in more ways than I could possibly count.
She’s taught me so much over the years, and I don’t mean in the traditional sense of teaching someone something. She simply lived her life, and I paid attention.
She modeled what it means to be a friend.
A sister.
A daughter.
A wife.
A mother.
A business owner.
A boss.
I learned generosity by watching her be generous.
Compassion, connection, leadership… none of it came from advice. All of it came from the way she carries herself and the way she treats the people around her.
She has taught me more than she will ever know by the sheer act of living loudly and joyfully in every corner of her life.
I am so lucky to call her my friend. So lucky to be one of the many, many people she has been a villager for.
Carla thank you for letting me grow up right beside you. I love you. 🤍
DAY ONE // WPI Spring Retreat 💜
This was our first real day together! The theme of this whole retreat was refinement, so we wasted no time getting into it on Day 1!
The women shuttled up to my home, walked through the gate to mimosas and the biggest hugs, and got their welcome totes filled with goodies I curated from female owned businesses that were mostly local!
Then we settled in, did some tapping to manifest all the answers we needed for the week, courtesy of our very own @ashley.peraino (who couldn’t join us this year, but was SO THOUGHTFUL to record a video for us!)
I opened with a talk on complexity, discernment, and self-trust (today’s podcast episode, BTW) simplifying your business and actually trusting yourself to lead what’s left.
From there the room took over. We had three incredible member gives: @c10ike on trusting your creative instincts, @ininkweddings on refining your creative POV, and @welldressedevents on generating real revenue through Google Ads (it’s giving… LEADS 😉).
In between we had small group discussions, hot conversations about where instinct and POV are out of sync, a homemade Caribbean lunch, and an afternoon of poolside snacks and conversation.
This is what the WPI room looks like. A talented group of women who came with one big business question and spent day one getting closer to the answer while having fun and getting their brains stretched!
All these gorgeous moments captured by our retreat photographer + my business bestie @c10ike 💜💜💜
Do it or delete it.
I said this recently to a coaching client, and now it’s sort of become our mantra inside WPI, because almost every business owner I know has a to-do list with 47 things on it (the same 47 things that were on last week’s list, and the week before that).
They don’t get done. They just travel from week to week collecting guilt, and that guilt somehow makes it even harder to get anything done at all.
After years of coaching women through this, you start to realize that most of those tasks don’t actually have dire consequences if they never happen. They just feel important because they’ve been living on your list rent-free for six months.
I want you to look at your to-do list right now and choose.
You do it… meaning you do it right now or at the very least put it on the calendar with a real deadline.
You delegate it… but only if it’s actually worth someone else’s time, not because you’ve been avoiding it and want to make it someone else’s problem.
Or you delete it… and I mean actually delete it, not shuffle it to a “someday” list where it will haunt you until 2027.
The guilt you feel about your undone tasks won’t go away if you magically “get more productive.” Instead I want you to see it for what it is: a list-curation problem.
What’s one thing you’re deleting today?
PS: I can confidently say these @aritzia sweatpants are 10/10
Syd from @ininkweddings spent $$$$ on a rebrand... and a year later, her gut told her to do it again.
She listened, and that’s how Messy Luxury™ was born.
The Behind the Brand series is BACK on the podcast, and this episode is one of my favorites yet. I’m excited to introduce you to Sydney Meyer (AKA ya girl, SYD) – a talented, vibrant, and dynamic wedding designer / planner based in Austin but serving clients worldwide.
I’ve been coaching Syd inside WPI since 2022, so I’ve had a front row seat to her evolution.
I’ve gotten to watch her build an iconic brand from the inside out, and it’s been one of the great joys of my coaching career. I’m so excited for you to hear her journey and some of the interesting twists and turns she’s encountered because boy, are they RELATABLE.
In this episode, we get into:
- What inspired her to start In Ink
- Why her first rebrand still didn’t feel right and how she knew
- The rock-bottom moment that forced her to build a business for HER, not everyone else
- How she trademarked Messy Luxury and turned it into the most recognizable design philosophy in Austin
If your business doesn’t feel like you anymore or if you’ve been searching for your unique creative POV, you’re going to LOVE this week’s episode!
Drop MESSY LUXURY in the comments and I’ll send you a link to listen!
A special shout out to all the photographers whose images reflect Syd and her great work: @alicialeighphoto @anastasiastratephotography @fallonstovallphoto @lightasgold @natalienicolephoto @haleyfolkman.photo @c10ike
All, Building Your Brand, Ideal Clients, Instagram Marketing, Wedding Industry Marketing, Wedding Planning Advice
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