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“A pain.”
I should handle this myself, but I wanted to train the newer wedding planners too. “I need to pay them another visit. I’ll take Ireland. You stay here and work on the course.” I found that in-person visits were better when you were closing a deal. It made it more personal. It was much easier to dodge someone via email and phone calls. But when you found me standing on your porch, I was harder to disregard.
“It would be amazing if we had another holiday venue to offer couples.”
“I agree. We need to secure that location. At the same time, let’s reach out to other farms in the area to see if those could be an option.” I’d offered Lori an exclusive, but if she wasn’t willing to agree on a contract, I’d need to explore other options.
“I already did. I’ll forward you the information.”
That’s what I loved about Harper. She was quick and efficient and anticipated my needs.
“Where are we with the new course?” I asked, eager to get it started.
“I researched the options for a host. I sent you a spreadsheet on the various options and prices.”
“Which one is the best?” I asked as I pulled up the email on my laptop.
“The one I put at the top. It’s mid-priced, but it has the features we’ll need, and it’s user-friendly.”
“Let’s go with that one,” I said, looking away from the screen.
“You don’t want to review everything?”
“I trust you, Harper.” I hired her, and she’d only impressed me more with every task I gave her. I intended to pay her a bonus for taking on the course because I had a feeling it was going to be huge for me.
I hadn’t felt this excited about anything in a long time. It reminded me of how I felt when I first decided to open an event planning business. Back then, I was scared to do the thing I wanted, which was to focus on weddings. Instead, I advertised as a party planner, thinking I didn’t have what it took to handle just one type of event. After I gained a reputation as a great party planner, I expanded into weddings, and once that took off, I limited my services to weddings.
But this seemed even bigger than that. I’d be marketing to other wedding planners, telling them everything that worked in my business and giving them advice. I felt like I was on a roller coaster. One minute, I felt like I was qualified to teach, and the next, I felt like an imposter. Who was I to teach about wedding planning? What certification did I have?
I had to remember that couples came to me because they heard I was the best. I’d built this business in only a few years because what I created was magical. I had what it took. Brides wanted to work with me. I just needed to remind myself a few times a day that I was on the right path.
It was either the biggest risk I’d ever take, or it would be wildly successful. I was hoping for the latter and planning for the former.
“This is going to be amazing. You have so many tips you could impart. I’m excited about getting started on the content. Do you have any ideas for how to organize it?”
“I have an outline in our shared folder. It’s something I’ve been thinking about for a long time, and I started taking notes when I first started out. I was worried I wouldn’t remember what it was like to start out if I didn’t write down the details at the time.”
“Wow. That was smart. And you knew back then that you wanted to teach?”
“I was thinking about writing a book. Online courses weren’t a thing then. Or at least not a respected thing.”
“You should write a book,” Harper said.
“Really?”
“It would bring attention to your course. While we plan it, you should be writing your book at the same time. Then we can release the book before the course.”
“Wouldn’t I need a publisher for that?”
Harper shook her head. “I don’t know if you know her, but Hailey writes fantasy books and publishes them herself. She works at Brooke’s store, Market Tavern.”
“Could you find out more about self-publishing? I would think we’d need a publisher to get the word out.”
“Hailey always says the publishing industry moves very slow, and even if you get a deal, it takes a year or more to publish your book. If you did it yourself, you could put it out quickly.”
I bit my lip. “I wasn’t planning on writing a book right now.”
“You’re writing down what you already know. Just make sure you don’t give out all your secrets in the book. You want them to get a feel for you and make them want to buy the course. Then you’d have to narrate an audiobook. Everyone loves audiobooks. Especially nonfiction.”
