3 things that are holding your wedding business back

But when I see so many different people from those just starting out in the wedding industry, to those who've been in the wedding industry a long time, I start to see similarities between the things that you struggle with and the things that hold you back. And today, I wanna share with you three common things that I see holding wedding business owners back all of the time. I'm gonna share them in today's.

I am Becca Pountney, wedding business marketing expert, speaker and blogger, and you are listening to The Wedding Pros who are Ready to Grow podcast. I'm here to share with you actionable tips, strategies, and real life examples to help you take your wedding business to the next level. If you are an ambitious wedding business owner that wants to take your passion and use it to build a profitable, sustainable business doing what you love, then you're in the right place.

Let's get going with today's episode. You may have heard it said before that the biggest barrier to success in your business is probably you. So often it's us that holds ourselves back. We're worried about what other people think of us. We put in excuses as to why we can't get things done. But the clients that I work with who see the greatest success are the people who realize this, work out what's holding them back, and then start to break through those barriers and. The change.

So today I'm gonna be sharing with you three and maybe a little bonus one as well, different things that I see wedding business owners and venue workers just like you struggling with in their businesses and why they're using them as an excuse to hold them back and how we can then overcome them. I'm sure that you struggle with some of these things that I'm gonna share with you, and you may find yourself nodding along as I share the struggles.

So be vulnerable, be honest with yourself, because if we can identify the things that holding us back, then we can actually go ahead and make the change. So let's get going with number one. The first thing that I see holding people back as a barrier to their success is lack of time. Have you ever said, if only I had more time, if only my life wasn't so busy and I had more time, then I could grow my business. I want to make all of these changes in my business, but I just don't have the time.

Time is an excuse that I hear all of the time from so many of you, and you may be nodding along as I say some of those phrases. Let's just think for a moment because ultimately all of us have the same amount of time in a week and a month and in a year. In fact, it's not more time that we necessarily need, but actually it's considering how we spend that time. Now, each and every one of you are gonna be in a very different situation when it comes to the time you.

Perhaps you currently work full-time alongside trying to get your wedding business off of the ground. Perhaps you work set hours and therefore you can't get everything you want to achieve done in the hours that you have. Perhaps you've got children or grandchildren that you have to factor in because guess what? They take up a lot of time.

Or perhaps you've got elderly parents or a health condition, which means that you don't have as much time as other people or what you perceive as, as much time as other people. I don't know what your personal circumstances are, and I can't possibly start to address them, but if you find yourself using time as an excuse, then we need to start changing your thinking. This is something that I've implemented for myself in my business, and it really has made a huge difference to my mindset.

I started my wedding consultancy business back in 2016 when I was pregnant with my second child. So I already had a toddler at home. I was about to give birth to another child. It's not the most ideal time to start a new venture, but that's what happened. And while I had two under five year olds, Guess what? I didn't have a whole lot of time. Now. In some ways I had more time because I was on maternity leave. I didn't have a job to go to.

But if you know anything about small children, they take up a lot of time. So I had to build my business in the time that I had in the few hours when they were napping in the evenings when they were asleep, or in the odd occasion when someone else was there to look after them. As they grew and started going to preschool and now school. The hours that I had during the day started to increase, and that meant I didn't have to work so much in the evening.

Now they're both in school and I suddenly have more time than I've had for the whole length of the business. But guess what? There are days when I still wish I had more time. You know what? There's never enough time to get all of the things done that we want to do, so there's no point looking for time that we just can't possibly find. None of us wanna be working all of the hours we need rest. We need recuperation time as.

So if this is you and you struggle with time and you feel like time holds you back, I want you to start changing your mindset around this instead of always thinking, I wish I had more time, which isn't necessarily possible. Instead, I want you to look at your average week and work out where you have the time and how much time you. Instead of asking for more time, we need to make the most of the time.

You had, when my children were little, I only had very small snippets of time, and so that was really valuable time to me. I had to prioritize the things that I was going to do in that short snippet of time because if I didn't and I wasted time, guess what? I didn't have any time left. It also may mean that for some periods of life, you do have to make sacrifices.

I did have to work more evenings when my children were young, but I had the social time while they were at home during the day that I could enjoy with them, taking them out for coffees and that kind of thing. Whereas in the evening, that was when I had to sit down and work not every evening of the week. But I did work more evenings than I do now. So I want you to look at your average week and look at the time that you. We always find time for the things that we want to make time for.

I recently joined the gym and I told myself I didn't have time to go to the gym because I'm too busy working. But guess what? Now I go to the gym probably three times a week, first thing in the morning after I take the kids to school. I'm home by 10 o'clock and I'm getting just as much work done. I'm more energetic, I'm more proactive, and I'm wasting less time. So sometimes it's a mindset.

So sit down, work out how much time you've got in the week and when that time is, and then start to put tasks against that time. Start with the most important tasks are things that are gonna bring you money into your business. Then look at the building tasks, the things that are gonna help you. Build going forward. So for example, if you wanna rebrand or look at your website, then that seems like a big job. So it becomes overwhelming.

But if we think, well, I'm just gonna work on it one hour a week for the next six weeks, all of a sudden you've got six hours of work on that website. The other thing to consider if time is always your excuse, is maybe you need to look to outsource some of the tasks. There was once a stage when I wanted to move all of my information from one piece of software to another. The amount of time that was gonna take me was overwhelming, and there was no way I was gonna fit it into my busy schedule.

So in that instance, it was actually much better for me to spend some money and pay someone else for their time to do that task and manually move the data over. I'm so thankful I did because I could use that time that I saved to bring in other income into the business doing things that I need to be doing rather than some tasks that I just don't have time for. So if time is your problem, I want you to redefine how you look.

Stop. Keep saying you need more time because that might not be possible, but look at the time you have and make sure you're being really productive with it. Don't waste time and remember, you will always find time for the things you want to find time for. Okay, let's go on to barrier number two. The second barrier I see to people trying to build their business for success is money. Perhaps some of these things resonate with you.

If only I had more money, then I could invest in training, then I could get a brand new website. If only I had some money, then I could make more money in my business. I would be successful. Money is a touchy subject and one that I don't really like talking about a whole lot, but sometimes we need to. If you are always wishing you had more money in your business, guess what? Once again, it's not like a tree where money grows on it, just like time.

We can't necessarily get more of it just by wishing it. However, we do need to redefine the way that we look at money inside of our business. The first thing I want to ask you is how do you sort out your money in your own situation? Again, this is gonna be different for each and every person, but my preferred method and what you really should be doing if you're running a business and not a hobby, is dividing your money.

Therefore, you have business money, and then you have your personal money and you work that out as you go. If you're inside of a job, the business money is separate to the money you get paid. So why don't we treat it like that in our business? When I work with clients and people go through my Wedding Pro, business Builder program, we look in depth at money.

I suggest you have a separate account for your business, have a business bank account where all of your business transactions go in and out of that. And then you pay yourself out of that account into your personal account. So either each month you pay yourself an amount or you pay yourself a percentage based on the weddings that you have booked. But you pay yourself regularly out of your business account, into your personal account.

Now, when that money lands in your personal account, that's now your money to do with what you want in your personal life. Whether that's paying the mortgage, going on holiday, buying yourself something new. I don't know how finances work in your home, but the business money is separate. So once you've taken some money out to pay yourself for those lovely personal.

You should be keeping some money in that business account for tax purposes, ready to pay your tax bill, but also so you can start reinvesting into your business. Businesses grow when we reinvest into them. You shouldn't be taking everything out for profit. You should be reinvesting in marketing, on branding. You should be investing in training, all of these things which are gonna help bring more money into the business as you go.

Now once you keep your money separate and start managing it well, you won't feel like it's hard to pay for things out of your business because you feel like you're taking away from your personal money because they are separate. You need to be reinvesting in your business if you want your business to grow. Now when I talk about investing in either training programs or equipment or software, you do need to make wise investments. Think about how you're gonna see a return on that investment.

Now, that's not always a direct return on an investment. So for example, if you were going to a wedding show and it cost you a hundred pounds to have a stand, you would want to make sure that you are gonna get at least a hundred pounds worth of bookings back into the business in order to pay for it. That's fairly straightforward to. However, if you are, for example, starting a podcast for the wedding industry for brides and grooms, you're gonna have to invest in equipment.

Now, you are then gonna have to invest time in creating that podcast, and you might not see a direct return on investment. Straight away. But you will see a return on the way your credibility builds and the way more people find out about you, or more people start recommending you to their couples because you've got a name for yourself. It's not so easy to see the return on investment, but there will be one and you need to work out what that is.

So every time you look to make an investment into your business, be that training equipment new branding. A new marketing strategy, think about it, sit down, work out. Is it a wise investment. One question I always ask when people are thinking about investing in a program with me is for your situation, which again, is gonna be different for everyone. How many wedding bookings do you need to bring in in order to pay back that investment?

It is an investment and not a cost, because when you invest, it should make you more money. So for example, if you were gonna take my Wedding Pro Business Builder program for 447 pounds, how many wedding bookings would you need to bring back into your business in a lifetime to pay for it? For some of you, it may only be one. For some of you, it may be two, three or four, depending on your. Then you need to think, will I learn what I need to learn in this program?

Will it help me bring in those additional bookings? Now I want to say, yes, it will, because if you put in the work and you do the action, you should see a huge return on your investment, not just the money that you spent on the program, but that money again and again and again.

Every single year because you're improving your business marketing, you're improving your branding, you're improving your knowledge, and therefore your business is growing and becoming more successful and more profitable. So you see, all of a sudden it's not taking money away from your business. You are reinvesting your into your business to make more money in the future.

So make sure when you're thinking about money, you are thinking of it as an investment, not a cost, but you are being wise about where you choose to spend it. In business, you have to speculate to accumulate. That's how business works. We're lucky in the wedding industry quite often we don't have huge outlays. Imagine if you are starting a shop, you would have to outlay on the building, on the website, on the branding, on all of the products before you even get a customer.

We're lucky in the wedding industry cuz often people pay before. We have to spend a huge amount. The other thing I want you to think about when it comes to spending money on something like business training, because I know this is a sticking point for some people, is if you wanna learn how to do a job properly, you have to invest in learning from someone who knows how to do it well. If you want to become a doctor or a lawyer or an engineer, you invest thousands of pounds in going to university.

Why to learn how to do that job well. So if you want to have a successful small business, Why are you not wanting to invest in learning and understanding how to do that? Well, it's the same thing. Okay. We've covered off time. We've covered off money. So what's the third thing that is holding you back right now? The third thing that I see holding people back all of the time is lack of knowledge. Maybe some of these phrases resonate with you.

If only I understood how to use Instagram and the reels feature, then I'd be reaching more people and more people would be coming to my business. If only I understood marketing, I just don't really understand it. I dunno how to do it and therefore I'm not doing it well and I dunno where to spend my money, and therefore I just don't have the knowledge in order to grow my. I am rubbish at sales. I don't understand how to sell.

I feel awkward when I'm trying to sell, and therefore I just don't make the sales cause I crumble at the last minute. Or perhaps you wish you were more technical, you understood how to build a website, how to create an amazing brand, how to set up an email list, and all of the things that you've heard are gonna help people. You feel like you don't have the technical knowledge to make them happen.

Lack of knowledge, again, is an excuse I hear all of the time and maybe a reason why you are not getting as far in your business as you want to. I want to say to you, it's okay not to know everything. Nobody knows everything and lack of knowledge is totally normal. However, we don't wanna use it as a barrier to success. In fact, it should propel us on to want to understand, get more knowledge and grow our businesses. We don't know how to do everything.

I recently put a post on my Instagram page all about the things I don't know how to do. For example, I'm rubbish growing flowers or even having flowers in my house, keeping them alive, and definitely not flower arranging. I can take an average photo, but I'm not a professional photographer. I cannot bake a cake. My baking skills are horrendous. But there are some things I do know how to do really well, like teaching you how to sell, teaching you how to market your wedding business.

These are things I have experience in and have taught hundreds of wedding business owners previously before you, how to do them well. Now you are probably incredible at what you do. In fact, I know you are. You are an amazing organizer, an amazing planner, an amazing florist, an amazing cake maker, an incredible celebrant dj. The list goes on, but perhaps you lack in the area of marketing and sales knowledge, and that's okay as well.

But instead of using it as an excuse, this is your wake up call that you need to learn how to do it. Now, listening to this podcast is a great start because there's loads of different little bits of information to help you on here grow your business. If there's an area of business you struggle with, then it's time you got help with it.

One thing lots of my clients struggle with is finance, which is why I work hard in my program to help you understand the financial side of your business, the spreadsheets, the profitability, because there's no point running a business if you're not making money. That's why an accountant is such a good investment because they are. Experts in the financial side of your business and doing your tax return and making sure you pay the right amount and not too much and not too little.

They are the experts. It's okay for you not to know everything, so stop using knowledge as an excuse to stop you in your business. Instead, understand where your weaknesses are and look to upskill in those areas with an expert who knows exactly what they're talking about. This is gonna help you grow and thrive, and it's gonna help your business immensely. Okay. Let's recap then.

The three things that I think are holding you back in your wedding business right now, and perhaps you resonate with all three of them. The first one is time. You feel like you don't have enough time. The second one is money, if only you had more money. And the third one is knowledge. Now, I said at the beginning I was gonna throw in a little bonus one as well, and that's because I think there's one thing that can tie all of these things together and hold you back.

And it's the one that all of us struggle with all of the time, and that's. Confidence. Perhaps this resonates with you. You just don't feel confident in your business. Maybe you've got people around you that have told you it's not possible to make money doing that, or, well, it's just a little job on the side. It's not a proper business. Those things are just not true, but they knock our confidence and suddenly make us believe that we can't do it.

Well, I want to tell you right here, right now, you absolutely can do it. I'm passionate about showing you that you can have a profitable. Business, doing what you love, it is possible. I'm sure you're incredible at what you do, and you may lack a little bit of confidence, but you need to look at your work and realize it's amazing and people are willing to pay for it, and you absolutely should be making money from it. You may not feel confident in your marketing.

You may not feel confident putting your face on social media, but these are things you can learn about and you can grow in confidence over time. Sometimes you've just gotta give it a go, or sometimes you just need someone to help you to be accountable for and to encourage you to go out there and do it. I recently had a client who was struggling with the idea of putting her face out on social media. She was worried about what people would think of her.

She was worried about whether people would think she was too old, and she messaged me to ask me my thoughts on it because I work with her as a client. And I responded to her saying People would love to see you. Age is not a barrier to business. In fact, if anything, it's gonna help people trust you and realize you've got great experience. And ultimately people just wanna know you are good at what you do, which you are. And they want to know, like, and trust you. You want to see their face.

Now, she was really brave. She took action and she put her face on her social media channel. And guess what? People loved. Her engagement and interaction doubled double. The people like the posts on Facebook and Instagram that they did normally. She just didn't have the confidence and she changed that. She got the accountability. She went out there, she tried it, she did it, and she got the results. Don't let confidence hold you back. You absolutely can be unapologetically you. Go out there.

Be yourself. Tell the world how amazing you are at what you do, and be confident in the prices that you charge. I'm here for you each and every step of the way as well. If you need some encouragement, drop into my Instagram inbox and I'll give you all of the encouragement about why you and your work is amazing. As we draw this episode to a close, I just want you to spend a couple of minutes maybe with a piece of paper thinking about what it is that's holding you back.

Which of these things are barriers to you in your business, and how can you start smashing those barriers down? So much of it is in our mindset. What can you change in your mindset in order to break through and start seeing. If you need help in any of these areas, if you're thinking, yep, I wish I had some more understanding of marketing. I don't really know how to take my business forward.

I'm not profitable and I wish I was, I don't understand how to price and sort out the numbers, then guess what? You're in the right place. Check out my brand new program, the Wedding Pro Business Builder. This has been a year in the making and it's for you. Easy, step by step guide that you can follow through in your own time, which is gonna take you through all of these things and give you the knowledge that you are struggling with.

I'm gonna help you with your marketing, help you with your sales, and help you create that profitable wedding business, doing what you love. All of the details are in the show notes, or if you've got questions, again, drop into my inbox on Instagram and I'm more than happy to chat with. Go out there, smash down some barriers, and I'll see you next week.