Skip to main content
search

Podcast Transcripts & Articles

Mar 11 2016
Love0

Veamos nuestro primer baile de casados … oh, es cierto, no podemos

By Uncategorized

Originally published, in English, in Beautiful Bride Magazine, “Let’s watch our first dance … oh, that’s right, we can’t”, has been translated for our Spanish speaking compañeros to enjoy as well.  To see the original English version, click here.

 

Veamos nuestro primer baile de casados … oh, es cierto, no podemosAlan-Berg-Beautiful-Bride-Magazine-video-article-231x300
Contratar a un videografo es más importante de lo que piensas
por Alan Berg – publicado en la revista “Beautiful Bride” www.BeautifulBrideMagazine.com

Recientemente estuve ayudando a mis padres a limpiar su casa cuando me encontré una caja de rollos de película 8 mm. En su mayoría se filmaron con la cámara de la familia cuando mi Hermana y yo éramos niños. Uno de los rollos era más grande y venía en una canasta plástica muy linda y no de metal como las otras. No recordaba haberla visto antes y me dio mucha curiosidad saber que contenía. Read More

Feb 12 2016
Love1

There’s Always a Cost

By Uncategorized

I was conducting a private group mastermind the other day and the discussion turned to investments versus expenses. I remember reading that business people, including most CEO’s, always look at the cost of an opportunity, before asking about the potential return. I guess it’s just human nature that when presented with an opportunity you want to know how much it’s going to cost you. Then it dawned on me…there’s always a cost, but it’s not always money.

What’s the cost?
Whether it’s for your business, your family, or in a personal relationship, there’s always a cost of taking, or avoiding taking, action. Your cost may be: Read More

Jan 14 2016
Love0

Don’t Make Resolutions, Make Priorities!

By Blog, Uncategorized

At this time of year, it’s common for many of us to make New Year’s resolutions, Depositphotos_84020278_m-2015and they’ve become a running joke as they should come with expiration dates. How many resolutions have you had that have fallen by the wayside, all too quickly? Why is that? At the time you made them you had the best intentions; the underlying reasons, whether personal or business, were sound. I believe that they fall by the wayside because they never get the priority they need and deserve.

Priorities drive our schedules
If you need to get your kids to school by a certain time in the morning, that’s going to be your priority over getting on the new treadmill you bought for the holidays. The treadmill will be there when you get back from dropping them off at the bus or at school, but the kids can’t be late. So, if the treadmill is still there when you get back, why don’t you get on it? Read More

Dec 16 2015
Love0

Making it Right, When You Got it Wrong (or even if you didn’t get it wrong)

By Blog, Uncategorized

I was conducting a group mastermind the other day and the subject of handling
problems and issues came up. While we all agreed that making the customer happy should be paramount in our decision making, that’s easier said than done in the real world. It’s even harder when it’s your business, and your money that’s at stake. The connectivity and access of today’s world adds another dimension. So how should we react when something goes differently than planned?

The worst thing you can do is to look for why it happened. The customer doesn’t care why, they only care that it happened to them. The importance and emotions of a wedding day are just fuel on the fire. Advertising and marketing sells the idea of having a ‘perfect’ wedding, but that’s an unattainable dream. There are just too many variables Read More

Dec 07 2015
Love0

You Win Some, You Lose Some – 5 WAYS TO HANDLE LOSING A SALE

By Uncategorized

This article was published in the November/December 2015 edition of Wedding Planner Magazine entitled You Win Some, You Lose Some – 5 WAYS TO HANDLE LOSING A SALE.   If you would like to use this on your site or blog, email Alan to receive the .pdf and Word versions, along with the attribution to include.

You Win Some, You Lose Some – 5 WAYS TO HANDLE LOSING A SALE
By Alan Berg, CSP, WWW.ALANBERG.COM, Kendall Park, NJ

In a perfect world, we’d get every sale we want, for the dollars we want. But we don’t live in a perfect world, do we? There are no trophies for second place when it comes to winning a sale. You either get the sale, or you don’t, so what’s a wedding planner to do? Here are five ways to handle losing a sale:

1) Rejection is in the eyes of the beholder. When you don’t get a sale, you might feel like you’ve been rejected, but that’s not usually the case. They just liked/trusted/believed in someone else more. Is that semantics? I prefer to call it optimism. When it comes to choosing a wedding planner, there can be only one winner—that doesn’t make everyone else losers. Prospective clients may like you enough to hire you, but they have to choose one pro among the many available. How many weddings do you do each year? That’s how many times clients chose you and not another planner. Are you the winner? Yes, but you may not have been their only choice. Had you not been available, they would have chosen someone else, someone very capable, nice, and likely at a similar price point. This isn’t like second grade, where everyone gets a trophy these days, there’s a winner and then there’s everyone else.

Read More

Nov 20 2015
Love0

Gratitude vs. Entitlement

By Blog, Uncategorized

There’s a lot of talk about how today’s couples, the millennial generation, has a
strong sense of entitlement. Rather than appreciating the opportunities, they often act as if it’s their right to have virtually unlimited choices. It makes sense since they’re the children of the baby boom, a time of unprecedented prosperity and hope in our country. It makes sense when you think that they can search on Google for free, interact on Facebook for free, and read/post reviews online for free.

What’s your first thought when you receive an inquiry?
The wedding industry is one that should be based upon gratitude. It costs very little to get married, just a license and someone to perform the ceremony. Yet, billions of dollars are spent on wedding celebrations each year, money they don’t have to spend if they just want to be married. Read More

Oct 14 2015
Love0

GOAL is a 4-Letter Word

By Blog, Uncategorized

We live in a society driven by goals, whether in sports, school or business; but IGoals had my perspective on goals changed a few years ago by my uncle. He told me not to use the word GOAL because goals, by their nature, can be self-limiting. If you’re trying to achieve the goal, you may deprive yourself of achieving more. In other words, if we just do our best, every time, we’ll achieve exactly what we’re capable of. On the surface that sounds plausible, but does it work in the real world?

When are goals good?
When you’re driving down the road you need to know the speed limit, as that’s the maximum allowable speed for that particular road. Did you know that many roads also have a minimum allowable speed? If you drive 20 mph on the interstate (when there’s no traffic slowing you down) you can get a ticket for driving too slow. Your car is capable of much more that any legal speed limit, but you have to hold it back to the target speed (or something close to it ;-).

Minimum goals, or targets, have their place as well. Besides not driving too slow to be a danger to others, it’s OK to have a minimum target when it comes to your sales and/or income. We all have to cover our expenses, put a roof over our heads, feed our families, etc. Many theme park rides have signs “you must be this tall to go on this ride”, and that’s for your safety. So, there are times when a minimum is good.

Goals don’t all have to be monetary Read More

Sep 20 2015
Love0

What’s Your 1, 3 and 5 Year Plan?

By Blog, Uncategorized

I recently attended a conference session about creating 1 year, 3 year and 5 year What's Your Plan - Ready Planning for Success Strategyplans for your business. The speaker, Liz Weber, posed some very interesting and introspective questions. I wanted to share with you some of my key takeaways and how I’m using them in my business, and with the wedding and event businesses with whom I consult.

My biggest takeaway was that my 1 year plan can be written in ink, but my 3 year, 5 year (and longer if you want) will be in pencil—or dry-erase marker if you prefer. While I have my 1 year plan written in ink, I keep the white-out handy (as when I do the NY Times crossword puzzle in ink).

As I look back at my current business (a little over 4 years now as an independent speaker, author, consultant and sales trainer) I can see that I’ve changed my business model and product/service mix a few times. There are certain services I used to offer that I no longer do. There are others that have been added to my product/service mix that I hadn’t imagined 4 years ago. Still others proved to be either not profitable, or not enjoyable for me; both good reasons to vote them off my island.

Read More

Aug 14 2015
Love0

Friday and Sunday Pricing – Should It Be Lower?

By Blog 9 Comments

I often see heated discussions on social media about whether you should charge Calculator How Much Can You Afford or Savethe same for Friday, Sunday, weekday, and off-season weddings and events, as you do for Saturday nights. There are passionate arguments on both sides. Some people contend that you’re doing the same work, therefore you should charge the same. That’s a sound platform. Others say that they’re only going to do a limited number of events per year, therefore they hold to their price, also a sound argument.

The other side speaks of not getting as many inquiries for Fridays, Sundays, or weekday events—so they offer a discount to encourage those to book. That too is a sound platform. There are successful businesses on both sides of this discussion.

So what’s the right answer? Read More

Close Menu

Want to talk? Call/text +1.732.422.6362