Wedding Industry Insider Podcast

WII 095: Jordan Kentris Explains How to Mine the Data for Your Ideal Client Personas

To get the best results for your business, you need to make sure you’re talking to the right person. That is to say, your ideal customer. To do that, you need to know your client personas, which today’s guest is here to talk about.

Jordan Kentris is the founder and owner of A Good Day, a boutique design firm providing hand-crafted wedding invitations and stationery. A UX designer by trade, he also helps business owners develop their branding through research, logo design, audits, and additional branded elements.

Recently, BizBash recognized him as one of the Most Innovative People in 2020. Jordan was also a finalist for the NACE One Awards for 2020 Industry Innovator of the Year.  

In this episode, Jordan talks about how to get the most out of working with a stationer as well as what he recognizes as the attributes of successful planners. Specifically, he breaks down why it is imperative to know your ideal client and how you can evaluate or further develop your current client personas.

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Wedding Industry Insider Podcast

WII 093: Randi Bushell Gives You the 3D Way to Make Faster Design Decisions

In event design, each decision matters and every decision has so many variables.

That’s why today’s guest shares the tech tool that helps you accurately create and customize your event vision

So, just hit play to hear the full details!

Randi Bushell is the Founder and CEO of Merri, a 3D visualization platform made for event planning. With a background in retail and E-Commerce, Randi started Merri after planning her own wedding and finding it difficult to capture her design vision with 2D renderings. Now, she continues to revolutionize event planning with Merri’s all-in-one software solution for visualizing, designing, and booking events.  

In this episode, Randi explains how Merri gives you the tools you need in order to easily create and share customized, 3D event designs with your clients.

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Wedding Industry Insider Podcast

WII 083: Troy Williams on the Role of Artistic Intuition in Designing Moments Your Guests Will Feel

Whether it’s a detail designed for the guest of honor or one sitting off to the side, this industry leader says the key to producing events that keep people talking is to bring joy to planning each moment the guest will experience.

To hear more, be sure to tune in to this podcast episode!

Troy Williams is the Principal + Event Designer at Simply Troy Lifestyle + Events, where he designs and produces events for celebrity, corporate, social, and charity clients. With over 20 years of industry experience, his background includes working as a Senior Publicist for Warner Bros. Pictures on over 450 premieres and special events. He is also a national speaker, television host, and lifestyle expert. Additionally, he was recognized in BizBash 500 Most Influential Event Professionals, and he is listed as a top wedding planner by Harper’s Bazaar, PartySlate, and Brides.

In this episode, Troy talks about the roles that gratitude, kindness, and intimate details play in designing events filled with unforgettable moments. Specifically, he says to listen to your intuition so that what you create will be authentically felt by others. 

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Wedding Industry Insider Podcast

WII 082: Lindsay Landman Shares Her Handbook for Scaling Your Wedding Planning Business

Is expanding your business one of your goals? Do you want to learn more about how to do it? According to this guest, the first step is to figure out the numbers that reflect not only where you’re at but also where you want to go.

So, be sure to tune in for this podcast episode!

Lindsay Landman is the President and Creative Director of Lindsay Landman Events, a planning, design, and production firm that executes events in New York and around the world. Celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2021, Lindsay Landman Events has its own complete in-house production team, as well as headquarters in both New York and California.  BizBash even named Lindsay in The BizBash Top 1000 People in the U.S. Event Industry.  She also has been recognized as one of the world’s best wedding planners by VOGUE, Harper’s BAZAAR, and BRIDES.

In this episode, Lindsay challenges common misconceptions about pricing and explains why scaling requires more than booking a client with a larger budget. Specifically, she breaks down what you can do to successfully scale your wedding planning business.

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Wedding Industry Insider Podcast

WII 081: Calder Clark Explains How to Highlight Your Brand Without Overextending Yourself

Are you a wedding planner who loves design? Or do you thrive in logistics? Perhaps you enjoy both sides of the planning process.

Yet, regardless of which skillsets fall in your wheelhouse, you can’t do it all. Ultimately, it helps to bring in support, which is why this guest shares how you can affordably outsource in a way that highlights your brand.

So, be sure to tune in for this podcast episode!

Calder Clark is the owner and Creative Director of Calder Clark, a full service consulting and design firm. With over 22 years of experience, she now focuses on producing a limited number of exclusive weddings and events each year, as well as serving as a sought-after national speaker. Additionally, she is recognized as a top planner by the following publications: Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Martha Stewart Weddings, Southern Living, and The Knot

In this episode, Calder explains the role of vision in guiding the way that you manage the design and logistical details of event planning. Specifically, she offers practical advice for how you can outsource specific areas in order to level up and step away from doing everything yourself.

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Wedding Industry Biz

The Art of Balancing Planning and Design

By Kim Sayatovic, Belladeux Event Design

Events are created in two stages: design and planning. Together, these two components meet to put create a client’s vision, from the color of the flowers in the centerpieces down to the timing of the grand entrance. When you’re handling both aspects of the event, it’s essential to put in an equal amount of time and effort into each.

For those who tend to focus on one side, but have hopes of developing into a full-service, now is the time to get a feel for how the event process flows, and how to find a happy balance between design and planning.

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The first piece of the event puzzle is the design – what do your clients want the final result to look like? What do they want it to feel like? Do they have a certain color palette or a particular theme that they want to stick to? More often than not, this is where the Pinterest boards roll in and fabric swatches get compared.

This is also the point to finalize the budget and vendor options in order to put together a solid team of event professionals who can bring their vision to life. Generally, I like to allocate the first three to four months of the timeline to design so we can get into all of the little details; however, this may vary depending on the complexity of the event.

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Once the team is together and the vision is understood by all, we enter the realm of production. A planner helps clients with signing contracts, paying deposits and coordinating all of the vendors to ensure that everyone is on the same page. This can take some time since event production involves a lot of moving pieces, so we typically factor in seven to eight months. While each vendor is responsible for their own role in the big day, it’s up to the planner to check in and ensure that everyone is on track.

As the planning winds down, we get into the final stage of the process: event management. At this point, most of the logistics should be ironed out and now is the time for finalizing itineraries and adding all of the final touches. Communication is key throughout the whole event planning process, but it’s most important during the management stage as the final decisions are what will guide the day-of schedule.

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Our clients tend to be either design-focused or planning-focused, but we have found that things go best when they become involved in both aspects of their special day. Although we certainly try to cater to their interests by including them heavily in either design for the visual folks or planning for the Type-A folks, it’s essential that they get the final say on all major decisions.

By ensuring that the design, planning and management stages all go smoothly, you can rest assured that the event will go off without a hitch!

Kim Sayatovic is the Founder and Chief Creative Officer of Belladeux Event Design, a full service wedding and event design firm based in New Orleans, Louisiana.