Imagine having a very exciting and high-paying job that allows you to use your creativity and resourcefulness to organize one of the happiest days of people’s lives. There are very few jobs that offer this benefit and one of these is the wedding planner job. Aside from this freedom to just use your creativity and resourcefulness, there is no formal education required. As long as you have that desire, it’s easy to become a wedding planner. If wedding planning sounds like a good career for you, follow the easy steps on how to become a wedding planner below.

Step 1: Develop the necessary skills

Successful wedding planners possess common traits. They are creative, love to plan events, and have excellent interpersonal skills. While these traits are natural to many wedding planners, it is still an important skill that you need to develop in an organizational level.

Step 2: Learn about weddings

Wedding planning involves numerous details - from helping the couples decide on the wedding date down to helping them choose the menu for their reception. Although no formal education is required to become a wedding planner, it will still help you to take continuing education classes or buy some books and browser the Internet for self-study.

Step 3: Create a portfolio

Your portfolio is your collection of photographs that show your prospective clients your skills at wedding planning. If you still don’t have one, you can offer your services to your family and friends who are getting married in exchange for free pictures that you can use on your portfolio.

Step 4: Find a wedding planning job

Even if you are planning to start up your own business soon, it is necessary to gain experience and you can do this by getting a job first. Aside from the employment benefits, the wedding planner position you can be used as your stepping stone to acquire contacts and of course, valuable experience.

Step 5: Set up your own wedding planning business

Starting up a wedding planning business is the same as starting up other businesses, with only a few exceptions. You should be accustomed to working from home but make sure you set aside a special office space free from any type of interruption. The setup costs are minimal but you need a computer, business phone line, fax machine, business cards, cell phone, and other marketing materials like a website.

Step 6: Choose your specialty

As a wedding planner, you should offer different service packages based on your specific interests and skills. You can do this better by specializing on different types of weddings. You may be destination wedding planner, or a theme wedding planner, and others.

Step 7: Develop a good relationship with vendors

Vendors are your suppliers of products and services related to weddings. These include limousine companies, photographers, musicians, invitation printers, party supply companies, etc. These vendors can be your networking ally and a partner in planning a memorable and successful wedding.

Step 8: Get clients

One way to get clients is through referral and through your vendors. Supply brochures and business cards to caterers, bridal shops, photographers, florists, and other vendors you often work with and ask them to recommend your wedding planning services to their services who are soon to be getting married. Other ways to get clients include networking, advertising, participating and joining in bridal shows, and organizing your own show.

Step 9: Consult with your clients

Once calls start coming, make sure you arrange consultation meeting with your clients. The purpose of this is to learn as much as you can to help them achieve their dream wedding.

There you go - some steps on how to become a wedding planner. Make sure you do them well and you will definitely be a part of completing a man and a woman’s dream.

One Response to “How To Become A Wedding Planner”

1. Mike says:

   October 20, 2009 at 11:20 pm

   Great advice! Really useful stuff. But let’s not forget about the more emotional side of a career as a wedding planner…