Event planning is one of the fastest-growing jobs on the market.
That means if you’ve ever dreamed of starting your own event planning business, now is the time to do it.
What if you don’t know the first thing about event planning or running a business?
Read on to learn how to start an event planning business and be successful at it.
1. Gain Experience
The first step to getting any job is gaining the experience and skillsets needed to be good at it.
Fortunately, event planning is detailed and experienced-based, so you don’t need a college education to make it work.
You can take several routes to gain the experience you need from hosting your own events for friends and family, shadowing or working for an event planner, getting certified, are a combination of the three.
2. Pick Your Niche
There’s a wide variety of events that need planning out there and you can’t do them all. Or you can try and hate yourself for it.
Once you gain some event planning experience, pick your favorite type of events to plan. These can be parties, weddings, fundraisers, art festivals, or any kind of event.
By focusing on one, you’ll streamline your business model, get better faster, and make it easier to promote your services.
3. Build Relationships
Event planners deal with all sorts of people every day. This includes suppliers of everything from flowers to cakes and musicians to catering. One day you might even need a jumping castle for sale.
It’s a good idea to form relationships with these other people and businesses because it will make it easier to find reliable services and increase your chance of obtaining discounts as a planner.
Depending on the type of event planning you do, you might need to form relationships with the people involved as well.
If you put on art shows, for example, you’ll need to build a database of artists and vendors.
4. Get the Money to Invest in Your Business
One of the first steps in how to start an event planning business is getting the money you’ll need to invest.
Running a business has several costs from operating expenses to renting a space.
You’ll want to make sure you consider every expense you’ll incur. This can even include the cost of gas to drive to different venues.
Once you know how much you’ll need to start you can save up the money yourself, ask for investments from people you know, or get a loan.
5. Make Your Business Mandatories
If you’re starting an event planning business, you’ll want to make sure you have all the mandatories that will make your business a professional entity.
Before looking for any clients, make sure you have a website, business cards, and any legal contracts you’ll need.
6. Figure out Your Marketing
No business would succeed without some sort of promotional strategy.
You should decide how you plan on marketing your business, and how this strategy will change as your business grows and you make more money.
Common tactics include advertising on social media and starting a blog.
If you don’t know how to do these things yourself, you can hire freelancers without paying for a full advertising agency.
7. Research, Research, Research
One of the best tips for growing your event planning business is to always stay up to date on market trends and what your competitors are doing.
This way you can make sure your business doesn’t go out of date as you work to offer innovative services.
You should always try to differentiate yourself from your competitors in some way, but looking at what they’re doing can provide inspiration for your event planning.
8. Prepare Mentally
Being a successful entrepreneur running your own business can be a stressful job.
It doesn’t help that event-planning is already stressful as is. As an event planner, you’ll frequently have to deal with extreme detail, picky clients, and high-pressure scenarios.
Making sure you have ways to mentally cope in advance can save you a breakdown.
9. Decide How You’ll Charge
Just because you’re doing what you love doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be making money. That’s the point of running a business in the first place, after all.
As such, you’ll have to determine how to charge your clients.
You should start by referring to all of your business expenses, such as supplies, as well as how long it takes you to plan an event.
Using these numbers you’ll decide if you want to be paid hourly or charge a flat fee per event.
10. Make a Plan
If you’re party planning as a business, it only makes sense that you’ll need a business plan.
Making a business plan in advance will ensure that you know what you’re getting into and help prevent you from running into legal or financial trouble.
You’ll want to include all of the prior steps in your business plan, along with a business budget and how much you intend to profit.
Make sure when designing this plan that you stay reasonable and make room for error.
Once you start your own business, you’ll also need to obtain business insurance. There is specialized business insurance for event planners.
Use These Master Tips For How to Start an Event Planning Business
Knowing how to start an event planning business is the first step in making your dreams come true. Running your event planning business means doing what you love, being your own boss, and making more money.
When you’re ready to take a chance, following these 10 master tips will help lead you to success!
If you enjoyed this read, be sure to check out our blog for more.