Behind On Your Goals? Build A Wedding Business Plan That Gets You Back On Track

In this episode we’ll cover:

• How to reset your wedding business goals mid-year without guilt or overwhelm
• Why creating a wedding business plan is the fastest way to get back on track
• The simple framework I use with clients to prioritize what actually moves the needle
• How to avoid busywork and focus on what really helps grow your wedding business
• How to reconnect with your original goals and adjust them based on where you are now
• Why doing “less but better” creates more momentum than trying to do everything
• The most important question to ask before planning your next quarter

Behind On Your Goals? Build A Wedding Business Plan That Gets You Back On Track

0:00:00 – Heidi Thompson
Raise your hand if you set big goals in January, ambitious ones, and then watch them fizzle out by summer. Let’s talk about what you can do about it, because you’ve still got half the year to go.

0:00:16 – Intro
In a world where wedding professionals are struggling to market and grow their businesses, one podcast brings together top experts and actionable strategies to help you build the wedding business of your dreams. This is the Evolve your Wedding Business Podcast. Here is your host, Heidi Thompson.

0:00:54 – Heidi Thompson
Hey there, welcome to the podcast. I am your host, Heidi Thompson, and I help wedding professionals of all kinds make their marketing easier so they can book more weddings and build a business that gives them freedom and flexibility. And today I wanted to talk about something that’s probably been weighing on your mind. It is June, half the year is gone, and if you’re not anywhere near the goals you set for yourself back in January, that can feel a little discouraging, maybe even defeating. I’ve been there, I get it, but here’s what I want you to know you are not behind. You don’t have to toss out your goals or wait until next year and write this one off. You just need a better way to move forward, and in this episode, I’m going to show you how to create a wedding business plan that actually works, one that helps you reset, refocus and finally gain momentum in the second half of the year. So let’s dig in and let’s start with this. If you are halfway through the year and feeling like, okay, this is not where I wanted to be, you’re not alone. In fact, I would say this tends to be the rule, not the exception, for most wedding pros around this time of year.

Back in January, you might have set some pretty ambitious goals. Maybe you wanted to raise your rates, maybe you wanted to finally get consistent with your marketing, or maybe you swore to yourself that this was the year you would stop taking on clients that drain you. But then real life happened. You got busy with clients and didn’t have time to work on your business. Inquiries slowed down or came in from the wrong types of clients. You posted on social media for weeks without seeing any results, and sometimes you were just too exhausted to make yet another decision about what to do next. So now we’re here it’s June, and you’re wondering if it’s even possible to make this the kind of year you wanted. I want you to hear this loud and clear you have not failed here. Falling behind does not mean you’re not capable. It just means you need a way to recenter and recommit without the whole guilt spiral that can come along with this.

This is where a lot of people get stuck. They feel behind, so they either you know, in frustration throw their hands up and give up, or they panic and start trying to do everything at once to try to make up for lost time. Neither of those things work. So what does Pausing, resetting and creating a plan that fits who you are and how you work. One of the biggest reasons I see that causes wedding pros to feel stuck in the middle of the year is because they started with a plan that wasn’t designed to work, at least not for them.

Most people set yearly goals in January because that’s what we’ve all been taught to do. That’s the beginning of the year. But here’s the problem. Yearly planning is way too abstract for small businesses. 12 months is too long of a runway. There are way too many variables, too many unknowns and too many things that can change. Between January and December. Your calendar shifts, client needs shift, your own needs may shift, client needs shift, your own needs may shift. So trying to stick to a plan or stick to goals that you made six months ago, well, no wonder it’s not working and it feels hard. Plus, when you only plan once a year, it’s so easy to forget what you were even working toward or to look up sometime in quarter four and realize you haven’t made the progress that you’ve wanted.

The other issue with yearly goals is they often don’t come with any action steps attached. They sound great, they sound sexy, right, book 25 weddings make six figures, get featured on insert big blog name, but they’re not tied to any weekly or daily decisions that you’re making in your business, so they just sit there looking pretty and completely unachievable. That, my friend, is why I teach a very different kind of planning. 90-day planning gives you a clear, focused runway. It’s short enough to stay relevant, but it’s also long enough to make real progress. It keeps you grounded and shows you the progress you are making, the action that you’re taking, and it helps you shift as needed Because, like I said, things change. And it puts you in control of how you’re showing up in your business, instead of flying by the seat of your pants, being dragged all over the place and kind of hoping it all works out.

If this sounds familiar, if you’ve been trying to stick to a plan or stick to goals that no longer fit and you’re spinning your wheels to try to catch up, I’ve got some good news for you. You don’t have to figure this out by yourself. Imagine having a simple 90-day plan that shows you exactly what to focus on next Tuesday to move your business forward. Today, what you’re supposed to do to move your business forward no guessing, no guilt, just clarity. That’s exactly what we do inside the Wedding Business Collective and right now you can join for just a dollar and get your seat for our next quarterly planning session, where we are going to be planning out quarter three. We’ll map out your next 90 days together so you can stop spinning and start gaining real momentum without working 60 hours a week, because the actions you’re taking are actually aligned with your goals and aren’t just busy work. So head over to evolveyourweddingbusiness.com/plan or click the link in the show notes to join us for just one dollar.

Now let me tell you a bit of what it looks like inside the Wedding Business Collective when we do our quarterly planning sessions. We do this in a couple of ways. So we can’t just look forward. So we spend some time in the planning session. Like I said, we do this every quarter and we reflect on the last 90 days what worked, what didn’t work, what needs to shift Because there is a goldmine of information about what you should and shouldn’t be doing in that information. Then we set up three clear, focused goals for you for the next 90 days and we break those goals down into milestones so you know what progress looks like. At the 30-day mark, the 60-day mark and the 90-day mark. We turn it into weekly actions, so you know exactly what to do tomorrow in order to move toward your goal. You know that the actions you’re taking are important and impactful. You’re not just like randomly posting to social media because you feel like that’s what you should be doing. You are taking the actions that, ceo, you decided were most likely to be the most impactful. This is how we get better results out of your marketing without you doing more, without you working harder. And that’s really when things start to click. Your to-do list gets shorter because you’re only doing what matters and you get that feeling of like okay, I know what I’m doing.

I have seen this kind of planning create huge shifts for all different types of wedding pros inside the collective. Casey, a wedding planner, went through this and realized she didn’t even know this. It took the planning process to make her realize she was juggling nine online platforms where she was trying to show up, be visible, be consistent, and she felt stuck and she wasn’t getting the results she wanted from any of them. And after going through the planning session, she told me I feel like a fog around my business has been lifted Now I know exactly what to focus on. Mercy, an officiant, said the planning session really made me acknowledge how much I’ve done and given me clarity on what needs to be prioritized, what can wait and what I can let go of entirely. I’ve never sat down to analyze what I’ve done. It’s always been flying by the seat of my pants.

Carolyn, a floral designer, went from working over 60 hours a week to just 40, not by working harder, but by cutting out busy work and focusing only on the things that were going to generate revenue for her. And then Kay, a wedding planner in Rhode Island, told me I was flying by the seat of my pants, with no marketing strategy, wasting time on social media without seeing results. After creating her 90-day plan, she started getting inquiries from her ideal clients and was checking things off her list faster than ever, and she finally felt in control. Carrie, a celebrant, said I feel like I have more direction now. Planning my last 90 days made me realize that I can’t do it all. I broke everything down into baby steps and my next quarter looks way more realistic instead of overwhelming. And I will tell you that I very much remember Carrie’s first plan that she put together, and it took this quarterly planning process for her to realize that she put together, and it took this quarterly planning process for her to realize.

Oh my God, I’m trying to cram like a year and a half’s worth of work into the next 90 days. It’s no wonder I feel so scattered. It’s no wonder I feel like I’m always behind. I’m literally trying to do something that is impossible. These are the kinds of transformations that happen when you stop guessing at what you should be doing and start planning. Look, you’ve still got six months left in the year. Let’s make them count. If you are ready to get clear on what matters, drop the overwhelm and create a plan that actually works.

I would love to invite you to join me inside the Wedding Business Collective. We’re hosting our next quarterly planning session on July 1st, and it is the perfect way to reset and map out your next 90 days with clear intention and strategy. And if you can’t make it, you will get the recording of that. Our members have access to all of the recordings of our planning sessions and our other live sessions. You’ll also get access to the full six-figure wedding business roadmap with templates, trainings, my support and a community that has your back inside the Wedding Business Collective and it’s a dollar for your first 30 days. So I really invite you to come join us and make this next quarter the one where you take control of your time.

You don’t need more time. So many people tell me they need more time. They don’t have enough time. You just need a better way to use the time that you already have and chances are, going through this process, you’ll actually end up doing less because you can focus on the things that actually have an impact in your business. Let’s build a wedding business plan together that works. Thank you so much for listening. I’ll be back next week with more support to help you grow your wedding business without burning out.

But in the meantime, head over to evolveyourweddingbusiness.com/plan to join the Wedding Business Collective for a dollar and save your seat. For our members only quarterly planning session. I think it’s going to be the change that you need. Talk to you soon.

Bye for now.

Links & Resources:

The Wedding Business Collective
Episode 215: How To Use Quarterly Planning To Squash Overwhelm
Episode 237: 4 Members Of The Wedding Business Collective Share Their Journey To Embracing Their CEO Role

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