From the Experts, Your Event Career
Getting the Clients You Really Want
QC tutor Regina Osgood is the owner and creative director of Meant2Be events, a top Arizona wedding planning firm that manages over 250 weddings a year.
With a new year comes a chance to regroup, reprioritize, and even re-brand. I started knee-deep in 2016 with a re-launch of my business. It’s our 10 year anniversary this year, so it was time for a facelift!
Which then begs the question, how do we re-launch our business, maintain our success, and up our game? How do we still target our client demographic? I’ve asked others who are seeking my advice or just starting up about their target client base, and too often the answer I get is incredibly vague: “20-30, recently engaged.” My response is to say sarcastically, “So basically everyone?”
Well, we all know how the story goes: you cannot please everyone. Also, what exactly do you think makes you the best planner for everyone? Marketing for this purpose will make you the needle in the proverbial haystack!
When our clients come to us there are two comments we get. The first: “We heard you were the best planner for us from [insert name here] and we have to have you!” The second: “I found your website and I know you are the best planner for what we’re looking for.”
So for the purposes of this post, let’s focus on the second comment. We have spent years developing our target market, and because of that time and effort our demographic is laser-focused.
Here are some questions to ask yourself to get started on figuring out your target demographic:
- Age?
- Education?
- Profession/Income?
- Associations?
- Religion/Culture?
- Hobbies/Interests?
- Style?
- Engagement/Planning length?
- Local/Destination wedding?
Each of these questions can be answered in full paragraphs and developed in increasing detail. The more information you can include about your ideal client, the more likely you are to attract them.
Why spend time doing this? Because your target audience will influence every business choice you make. Your ideal client is the foundation of your company. It will shape your company’s image, the advertising choices you make, the associations you join, and the people you network with. The result: you’ll end up with clients that will need little sales pitching, won’t shop around, and will pay more for your assistance.
For us, this has gone as far as a client changing her contracted date with her venue to a date when we were available to participate in her journey! Imagine having clients find you and go out of their way to assist you because their impression of you is so powerful—that’s the power of marketing to your target audience.
Take a look at some more of Regina’s work with her dream clients!
