Networking with Colleagues

It is so easy to network with other wedding professionals who are not in direct competition with me: photographers, videographers, florists, etc. So why is it so difficult to get other wedding planners together to talk about our field?

A little less than a year ago, I met someone who really made me want to develop a local network specifically targeting ethnic wedding/event planners. She found a location for us to meet and I found the planners to meet with us monthly. Because we only had a handful of planners attending our monthly meetings, I needed to find a way to expand our network.

By pure chance, I stumbled upon Meetup.com, an online forum for finding people who share the same interests. After joining a few groups, I decided to put our wedding planning group online. In 3 months, our group has grown from 5 members to 42 members.

I have found that there are a lot of people trying to get into this business. Attending networking events like ours is one of the best ways to get started. Established planners need to be more open to helping the "newbies" recognize the high standard they will be expected to live up to, but also tell them how to achieve this goal.

For more information about the R&M Wedding/Event Planning Network, please visit our meetup site.