There are only so many hours in a day, and chances are if you’re new to the entrepreneur world, you’re wearing a lot of different hats in your business, trying to keep up with multiple tasks and projects at the same time. 

There are 5 easy ways I have personally started automating my business to allow me to be present with my family and not worried that little things are/aren’t getting done.

First, inquiry responses – –

You should NEVER have to respond from scratch to an inquiry. Responding to each inquiry from scratch is going to take to much of your time. While it might be personalized, it’s going to delay your response time and is going to take away from the time you could be focusing on other tasks.

But Ashley, I want to be sure my response is authentic.

Don’t worry, I hear you and there is a way to do both. 🙂

Option One: Automated Response

I, personally, use Dubsado for my inquiry automation. When a client inquires through my website, I have set up a workflow through Dubsado to each specific inquiry – whether that is florals, planning or planning + florals. This email is extremely warm and friendly and feels like I wrote it directly for that client (even though it’s automated!).

When you are writing automated emails, making them feel warm and inviting is key, as you don’t want to potential clients to feel like they you don’t care.

Option 2: Email Templates or Canned Emails

If you don’t have the means to automate your inquiry form, I recommend at least having a detailed templated email ready to go. Having a template email will drastically cut down on the amount of time it takes you to respond to a lead. You can absolutely still customize these emails for each potential client, but many of the details will remain the same for everyone.

Next is social media:

If you are not scheduling your social media, trust me when I say, you need to!!

When you don’t schedule your social media, you are going to spend much more time scrolling aimlessly through the app and constantly worrying about when / what you should be posting.

Instead, I encourage you to take 1-2 hours at the beginning of the week to schedule ALL of our posts for the next week. When you do that, your post AUTOMATICALLY post to Social Media (including Instagram!) and prevents you from constantly stressing about what you should post.

If you are looking for an easy and free tool, I would recommend Planoly. It’s free option is a great way to get into social media scheduling, as you can post to Instagram and Facebook without paying a dime.

Are you scheduling?

Stop wasting time on all the back and forth with both clients and potential clients to set up meetings. Not only is it extremely time consuming for you, it’s a pain in the butt for clients.

Instead, set up an calendar via Calendly or some other app and let clients schedule a time to meet with you automatically. Once they pick a time, it will automatically show up on your calendar and you will receive an email letting you know that your client/potential client has set up a meeting with you. Don’t worry, you can set your hours, so that clients aren’t booking at all hours of the day. 😉

Client reviews and testimonials

We all know just how important client reviews and testimonials are to our business. In order to ensure you are receiving this feedback, you should be automating this process.

Similarly to your inquiry responses, I recommend creating an email template for this that thanks couples for working with you and that asks for reviews and feedback. Again, if you are using a CRM (like Dubsado), you can schedule this email to go out automatically!

Ultimately workflows are great for your wedding business

A virtual assistant can help set up your workflows to get things automated easier! So when you get a client inquiry they can set up a workflow that sets this up for you.

Imagine having everything automated for you, from when the client is an inquiry, to after their wedding is over. No more spending time remembering to send invoices, follow up on past-due payments, or remembering to send them a client gift!

Automation can make your life much easier. It can give you your life back.