Wedding Pro CEO | Building Profitable Wedding Businesses

296. Why Your Wedding Business is Stuck at $100K (2025 Summit Keynote)

• Brandee Gaar • Season 6

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You didn’t start your business to stay stuck. If you're ready to finally hit 6 or 7 figures WITHOUT burning out — book a call with our team → https://weddingproceo.com/application


Ever feel like no matter how hard you hustle, you just can’t break past that $100K mark? Working every weekend, buried in client work, and still stuck? 


Wedding Pro, it’s not your clients—it’s how you’re spending your time.


In this keynote from the 2025 Wedding Pro CEO Summit, I’m breaking down exactly why you’re stuck and how to start thinking (and acting) like the CEO of a 6- or 7-figure wedding business. Let’s get you out of the weeds and calculate what your hour is really worth.


✨ Need help delegating or calculating your CEO hourly rate? Check out Dan Martell’s book “Buy Back Your Time” — it’s required reading around here.


The (FREE!)ASSUME Sales Training: 2x your wedding bookings in 30 days—step by step. Thousands of wedding pros have already used it to land more clients immediately! http://weddingproceo.com/freetrainingorg


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EPISODE BLOG, LINKS & MORE:
https://weddingproceo.com/why-your-wedding-business-stuck-at-100k/


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Thank you for tuning in to this episode of the Wedding Pro CEO Podcast. If you find these strategies helpful, make sure to share this episode with your fellow wedding pros. And remember, in the world of weddings, it's all about building genuine relationships and showcasing your best work. Until next time, keep shining, CEOs!
Heads up, friend! Some of the links I share may be affiliate links, which means I may earn a small commission if you decide to purchase—at no extra cost to you. I only recommend tools and resources I actually use and love, and that I believe will help you grow a profitable, sustainable business you’re obsessed with.

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Hey there, CEO. Today on the podcast we're bringing you behind the scenes into the room of this year's wedding Pro CEO Summit, our fourth year hosting the event that's helping wedding business owners. Scale beyond the overwhelm and finally step into their role as CEO. What you're about to hear is my keynote from day one, and let me tell you, it is not a sugarcoated motivational speech. It's a wake up call. We're talking about the real cost of your time, the four figure tasks that are draining your business how to buy back your life so that you can finally focus on growth. This keynote is full of stories, strategies. And the exact equation I teach to every CEO in our program to help them value their time and scale sustainably. If you've ever said, it's just my time, or feel stuck in client work and wondering why your revenue isn't moving, this one's for you. And just like I told the CEOs who were in the room that day, you don't need a hundred new to-dos. You just need one shift that will change everything. And if you're listening to this episode and you're like, yes, Brandee, I love this, And I wanna know how I can be in the room next year for the fifth annual wedding pro CEO summit. I am telling you do not miss out on the opportunity to join the wait list because tickets will be going on sale in just a few short weeks. And y'all, we are pulling out all the stops for year five. Just head over to weddingproceo.com/summit to join the wait list so that you'll be the first to know when tickets drop let's get into the episode. So here's the thing. Every hour has a price. Do we know that? Mm-hmm. Every hour has a price. The reason I say, do we know that is because the reality is, raise your hand. Um, I don't feel like this is too vulnerable of a question. Raise your hand if you've ever said, it's just my time. I don't have a lot of overhead. It's just my time. I did, it's like a huge part of my story of becoming a coach, because I remember saying that all the time. I would just say like, oh, I, I mean, our overhead is so small. We, it's just, it's just me. It's just my time, or, it just takes us this many hours to do it. Yall. Time is our only renewable resource. It's the only thing we can't make more of. And I know when I say like, you can always make more money, but you can't make more time. People are like, well, tell me how to make more money. And I'm like, well, right. That's what I do. But, but the reality is if you spend a dollar today, you can make another dollar tomorrow. Right. You can get more. You can get more of them, but you can't get an hour back. Every hour that you are spending here at this conference has a price to it, right? Every hour that you've been doing anything in your business has a price to it, but what is your price? What is your hour worth? Has anybody ever calculated what your hour is worth? Do you know exactly? I see Erin in the back like, yes, girl. She's our money girl on the back. She's like, yes, I do. Um, has I, that's a genuine question. Does anybody, like if I came up to you and said, how much is one hour of your time worth, would you be able to tell me an answer? Right. Okay. That's what I thought.'cause I was there too, right? Um, now I'm like, yes, I can actually. Um, but the reason that we want to know that is because if you don't, when you say yes to something, you don't know what it's costing you. And so you have like, when you go buy a pair of jeans at the store, you're not like, I mean, I don't know, whatever they cost, ring it up, I don't care. Right. I mean, maybe sometimes we're doing that at retail therapy, but for the most part, you wanna know what the cost is before you say yes to it. Right. But for whatever reason, we never do that with our time. We have no idea what every hour of our time costs. Right. Okay. Anybody know who this guy is? Dan Martel. Yes, Eddie. I knew you would know. Okay, so, um, this is Dan Martel. He wrote the book that we gave you today. It's called Buy Back Your Time. So the Black Thing, your Swag is his book. It is one of my favorite business books of all time. Um, I think it was actually recommended to me by Jonathan, one of my students, Emily's husband and I read it last year and it. It totally changed the way I look at my time and I've always been kind of like every minute of my day has to be accounted for. Every minute has a, has a price, but this book changed that for like, changed how I even do business and um, we wrapped them because the books are neon blue. So I was like. Katy worked so hard on the vision today. I am like we are wrapping these suckers 'cause I can't have neon blue books everywhere. So feel free to unwrap them at your leisure. They're not wrapped for any special reason except the fact that I don't like the cover. Um, okay, so this is Dan Martel. Um, has anybody ever heard of a Bubba Watson? I think probably only Eddie and my husband might possibly know what that is. Um, Bubba Watson is a watch, so it's the watch that he's holding here. And I know nothing about watches, like literally nothing. I wear an Apple watch. I'm not even wearing it today. Um, I could care less about watches, but apparently they're worth a lot of money. Some of them are worth a lot of money. Um, this one is worth half a million dollars. That's at least what Dan Martel says. I don't know. I, but he, I'll tell you a story about Dan. So he was out for a run. Now this is a TikTok video I saw. And if you guys know anything about me, most of my summit presentations have been inspired by a TikTok. So don't let anybody ever tell you TikTok rots your brain because it doesn't. It's good for you. It's good for business. Um, okay, so this, uh, I was watching a TikTok with Dan. He was running out for a run and some guy stops him and says, are you wearing a Bubba Watson? And he was like, how? Do you know what that is? Yeah. I am wearing a Bubba Watson. And he's like, do you wanna wear it? And I'm like, okay, this is clearly staged.'cause like you don't just like be running and be like, yeah, you wanna wear my half a million dollar watch. And so the guy's like, oh my gosh, yes, this watch is worth a half a million dollars. And Dan Martel's like, I know, I know it is. I bought it for myself as a reminder of what I'm building. And the guy was like, what does that mean? And he said, my goal is to build a billion dollar company. Okay. So, um, he, when he. The reason he bought himself this watch is because to build a billion dollar company every hour that he spends working on his company has to be worth half a million dollars. So the reason he wears the watch is as a reminder that if he says yes to something that isn't worth half a million dollars, it's not gonna make his company half a million dollars. He just cost his company money. Does that make sense? Is everybody kinda tracking there? So how did he figure out? That to build a billion dollar company every hour had to be worth half a million dollars. Right. Are you guys kind of like, okay, I don't, but I don't get it. How did he figure that out? Right. Well, let's do the math. Okay. So I loved this TikTok, by the way. Like I saved it. I immediately, it was like summit, like this is what we're talking about. Summit. I love it. I love Dan Martel. Anyway, but, okay, here's the math billion dollars, right? You guys can do it with me if you want, but on your calculator. But I'm gonna, I'm gonna, um, kind of show you everything here. So he wants to build a billion dollar company, right? There are 2000 working hours in a calendar year. That's a number you should know. And if you're one of my students in my programs, you should know that number because that's how we calculate how we pay an employee, right? We know they work 2000 hours in a year. So when you're calculating salaries, when you're calculating really anything, having to do with pay, you wanna know that there's 2000 working hours in a year. Basically that's 40 hours a week, times 50 weeks. We always throw two weeks out. Ones for vacation, ones for just. You know they're not working right. Junk time, Christmas, new Year's Eve, that kinda thing. So it's 2000 working hours in a year, which comes out to $500,000. That's how he got that number. It's that really that simple. So that's how we're doing the math of what his hour is worth. Here's the thing, the reason that TikTok stopped me so dead in my tracks was because I was like, I don't even. Think through my time like that. And when I tell you guys I am psychotic about my time, like I no is a full sentence for me. Like I do not have a hard time saying no. I let very few things into my stratosphere, like, I'm like, no, I don't have a lot of time. Like I wanna make sure every hour is accounted for. But that even stopped me. I was like, do I think about the things that I say yes to through the lens of what am I building? Or even what is my revenue this year? Right? Like if I, if I don't count for the hours that I'm trying to build, how would you possibly hit your revenue goal? Right? So often we, we throw a dart at a revenue goal. We talked about this a little bit in some of the VIP sessions yesterday. If you don't, if you don't know how much you need to get there, right? Sometimes we just say, okay, my revenue goal for the year is $300,000. Well, are your packages priced high enough for you to even get to$300,000 and a reasonable work year? Right? So like you have to know these kind of things. It's so important to growing your business when you don't value your time, when you don't know what these hours are worth. You get stuck in busy work. Anybody. I think I heard this like 60 times yesterday. I'm just stuck in client work. I'm stuck in client work. I'm stuck in client work. I get it. We all do it right, but every time you say yes to something like you, you've got like an event management client, right? That text you and it's like, can I just five minutes? Just five minutes. I just need five minutes of your time. And you, you don't give them calls on your, in that package you said? Yes. How much did that cost your company? It's a big deal because it means you're not working on something you should be working on to move the needle, right? You get stuck in busy work. Burnout is around the corner. I mean, burnout is kinda like a staple word in our industry at this point. I hate this word. I'm like, enough, let's stop calling it burnout. But it's a thing, right? Um, strategy and growth are always later. Like we talked about this a lot yesterday too. Strategy and growth, marketing sales get put to last because you, you're not thinking through like, if every one of my hours, let's just say is worth $300, then why on earth are you using those hours to do admin work? You could pay somebody $15 an hour to do, like, why, why are you doing it? And we, but we don't think about it like that, right? We're like, oh, well, I, I can just do it faster. I can just get it done. But you're costing your company money and then this is what is the worst, the re the revenue starts to backslide and we feel that, right. I was talking to a couple people yesterday at the sessions, and this was something that happened in my company was when I outsourced sales, which was the last thing we outsourced for my company, we outsourced it because what I noticed, so I'm in Florida, our busy seasons are spring and fall. Fall is also engagement season, but we literally don't like see the light of day from like September to Christmas Eve. It's just so busy. And so what would happen? I wasn't doing sales follow ups, I wasn't marketing. If the only reason we would sign contracts is because somebody would be like, can I get that contract today? And I'll be like, yeah, I'm so sorry. Let me, let me send it out. Right. It was like a bother, not, not that sales are ever a bother, but you, we weren't doing follow ups, we were not doing marketing. We were not, we were absolutely not driving sales. So what happens about six to eight months later, we felt it. Because in the wedding industry, that's how far out we're booking, right? And so then all of a sudden, I don't feel it right away. It's six or eight months later and I'm like, what happened? Where are all the leads? Where's all the weddings? What happened? And then what? What do we do? All of a sudden we're all in on sales and marketing, and then we ride the roller coaster again, and then we do it the next year, and then we do it the next year. Right? So your revenue starts to backslide because we don't understand that the value of our time is best spent growing our company. Now the reality is, you guys, I know some of you are thinking like. All good Brandee, but like I still have client work. I get it. I did it for years. I've been in, had my wedding business for 18 years. My last wedding was just this year, so I get it. I know what that feels like. Right. And we will work through how you start valuing your time, and then we're gonna to calculate your buyback rate today we're gonna calculate what should you pay somebody. To make sure you're getting your hours. That's exactly what we're gonna calculate today together. So I'm excited about this because I think for me, at least, if I have a concrete number, does anybody else feel that way? It's like, okay, but if I know the number, then now I've got like, okay, I can do this. Right? So that's what we're gonna calculate. Okay. So now it's your turn. What's your hour worth? So we're gonna be doing this a little bit as a group activity. Um, is this task worth my time? That's what we're figuring out today. Like, should I be doing this task? If yes, we're gonna do it right once we've calculated our buyback rate. If not, we're gonna delegate it, automate it, or stop doing it. There are so many tasks we do that we're like, if, if you really looked at it, you'd be like, I don't know why we do this, but we've always done it. So I, I just do it right? And it's like, dude, delete that. Like stop doing it. So that's what we're gonna be looking at. Okay. So let's find your value. So I am gonna ask you guys to get in groups of two to four. And it doesn't matter, you can just like squeeze together with people at your table. But I want you to do this together with other people 'cause we're gonna talk about these numbers. Are you guys ready? We're gonna calculate your value, but the reason I want you to do this together. For those of you that are in my programs, and I think you guys are all scattered about, so you can vouch for this or make people feel a little bit more comfortable. I am all about transparency and vulnerability. So we y'all, like sometimes even on like a group called like 60 people, somebody pulls up their budget spreadsheet, somebody pulls up their lead spreadsheet, like we don't hide numbers. It's okay if you don't feel comfortable with that, but the reason we do this is because that's how you encourage each other and that's how you get beyond a surface level of just being like, oh, you're a wedding pro too. Great. Yeah, no, we wanna dig in with each other. We're building community. This is a lonely industry at the top. You have to be able to be like. It's okay. Like, tell me the truth. Like how would you fix this? What would you do? What do you do in your business? Right? So numbers are gonna be shared a little bit here. If you aren't comfortable with that, you don't have to. But just so you know, it is like a core value of mine that I think that's how we break down, um, a really deep community. So, okay, here's what we're gonna do. Your revenue this year divided by 2000 hours. So, um. So when you're thinking about your revenue, so with Dan, he did it based on what he's building. And that's certainly something I want you guys to do. Or you can, if you can calculate both really quick, feel free to do that. Um, but I do want you to know your number this year because like I said, we, we put this summit specifically at six months into the year so that for the rest of the year you can be like, is that worth my dollar? Is that worth my dollar? No. So I want you to calculate this based on what you're projecting your revenue to be this year. And when I say projecting. There's the company yesterday that shared with me, they've already hit their revenue goal for this year, so they've gotta readjust that revenue goal. So if that's you, please do it based on what you think you're actually gonna hit this year. Okay. And then, um, you can share it your, at your group for just a, a minute or so. Cool. Okay. Calculate that number. Yeah. What if it's not what you want though? Because like this guy was saying, it's million. Yeah. So calculate it for this year, and then also if you know what you want to build, do both. So it's like this year and then goal. Yeah. Question. Yeah. Hang on you guys. Well, hang on. I'll come back there. I just know. So my value is different from what my team's, oh, you want me to do it louder? Oh, no, it's okay. Okay. So my team's value is different from what my value is and my time is not the problem. It's there. So what do you suggest I do? Because. That's a good question. Their time. That's a definitely not worth this. No, no, it's not. But also you have two different companies. Yep. So you could split it by company, right? Yeah. And then it kind of is like, Danielle's time isn't worth that. Danielle's time. Yeah. But, and so like Sophia for me would be worth that, but like, yes. Your, your employees, but how about the others? Well, the employees, we have a different calculate. It's a similar but different calculation. Yeah. But this is, yeah, I'll, ill, Your time, not your team. Yeah. This is what we want because we want you to see, like you shouldn't be focused on the day-to-day work, which you don't really have an issue with, but like you should be focused on things that are making your company this much money. Does that make sense? Yeah. It's CEO work. Right. And the general idea that we're looking for is to find the value of your hour. Do you know what I mean? It's not what you're paying yourself, obviously. I mean, unless you are, I think we, I think we wanna go with the half million, like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. Well, I think you should do both. I think you should do your revenue this year. Which year should be at least three? Yes. 75. Yeah. No, it needs to be 150 an hour. Yeah. Because you guys need to think like, okay, but that's what my, our time is worth to our business. Does that make sense? Yeah. Don't get too granular necessarily what we're charging. No, it's what, it's what our value is. So, and that's why it's different if you away on garbage, you just cost your company money. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yay. Justin does. Can I? Turn this mic on. Sorry. I guess I should've, can I turn this mic on? Yay. Okay. Um, okay. Anybody wanna share, anybody feel comfortable sharing with the whole group what their value is? It's okay if not, but I'll do it. Yeah. Okay. What am I sharing? Your value, your hourly value. Um, so my hourly, hourly value came up to $112.50. Perfect. Okay. I love it. Anybody else? Yeah, Julie said she'd share back here and you can explain the question you guys kind of asked too, if you want, since you're a partnership. Um, so Lindsay and I are a partnership, so we were just asking, obviously it's 2000 hours for each one of us, and I was like, split and we decided no, no. So it's $150, I guess an hour. Yeah. Yeah. And the reason for that you guys, is because we aren't trying, this isn't what we're paying you. Right. You're not like gonna go write yourself a check for this, though. That would be great if you did or could. But you, it's more for, for you to have this mindset of like, if I am trying to build this and I spend time doing tasks that could be outsourced, I'm costing my company money. Right? So for the partnership, could they split it? Yes. But now we're getting into like the granular, their time is worth $150 an hour. So the two of them as the owners should only be generating, doing tasks that generate that much revenue, right? Or that are worth that much, right? And, and we're gonna get to how you're gonna buy back that time. And you guys, you'll kind of see it all come full circle. Okay? So your revenue divided by 2000. So if you have a half a million dollar business, your hour would be worth $250. These are just some examples. If you have a hundred thousand dollars business, your hour is worth 50. Okay, this is your hourly rate. We're gonna calculate another rate, so please make sure this is your hourly rate, you as the CEO of your business. And also, Susan asked me a good question. I'm gonna clarify Susan's question too, because I think this pertains to some of you guys. So Susan said, well, my hourly, am I calculating this for me or for my team? Because. She's not really in the day-to-day of her business anymore. Right. So she's like. I, this is not their, this is not their rate. Like No, that's kinda the point. Right. But for, for instance, so Susan has, I guess Danielle's title's like president, right? Okay. So Danielle's title's president, but so we should be calculating this for Danielle, right? Same thing like, um, Sophia's here from my business. I wanna calculate this for her because she runs our business, right? So when I'm calculating it for me, I'm more calculating it from the wedding pro CEO side, because that's the business that I work in the most. So what we're trying to help you to understand is that your time needs to be spent on these tasks that generate this much revenue. Okay. Don't get stuck in the weeds on it, but it is not your team. Your team is paid a salary. We don't need to worry about what their hours are worth. They're worth the salary you pay them. Um, but for everybody else, you need to, um, for anybody who's running the company, that's what you need to think about. Okay, so now what? So you're like, okay, Brandee, this is great, right? But like, what do I do? Like, am I just gonna go start paying somebody that, you know, if, if the task is worth less than.$200, then I have to go pay somebody to do all of that. No, that's not realistic, right? So now what we talked about this, if the task is worth your time, do it. If it's not, what? Delegate it. Automate it. Eliminate it. Right? So eliminates easy. There's tons of tasks that you guys do that are silly and you shouldn't even be doing them. Um, or nobody should be doing them. Automate's kind of easy too, right? It's like, okay, well, could I automate this? Um, Patty, we talked yesterday about some of the automations you can put in your business, right? That would save you so much time. And the thing is, sometimes we get like overwhelmed, we're like, oh my gosh, I don't, I don't even know how to start with this. Or it's expensive to set it up, but it's like, think about the hours it could save you, right? So automations and then the last one's delegate it. So if we delegate it, we have to pay somebody to do it. And that's scary, right? There's a couple of business owners I was talking to yesterday that were like, but how, like how do I start paying somebody? How do I know how much to pay them? We're gonna figure that out right now. Okay. So let's find your buyback rate. Okay, so is this, this is what Dan Martel is famous for. This is really what this book is about, is, um, how to buy back your time, right? So you guys are ready for this? This is gonna be fun. Okay? So it's literally your hourly value that you just calculated divided by four. That's it. So do that calculation really quick. Your hourly rate divided by four. So why are we dividing it by four? There's really no reason except for there's no, like, there's 2000 hours in a year that's like very black and white. This is more we want you to get a four times ROI on what you pay a staff member. Okay? So what, when you're paying to outsource a task, we want you to get a four times ROI on that, in an ideal world. So the reason we have you divide by four is because that's gonna tell you. If say, well, I have a couple of examples here. Okay. So I'm like, I can't do this math in my head. So let's say for instance, you're building a half a million dollar business, okay? And so your hourly rate, your rate is$250 an hour, but to buy your time back, you could pay up to $62.50 an hour for anything that you are doing in your business you shouldn't be doing anymore. So the, what are some of the tasks that you do in your business that you shouldn't be doing anymore? Anybody wanna share? I think I have a slide for this. Ha, I do look at that. Um, okay. So what are you doing that's below your rate? Anybody wanna share? Answer emails, answering emails? Yes. Yes. Answering emails. Okay. What, who else? Scheduling consultations. Scheduling consultations? A hundred percent. Yep. Can we automate that? That's an easy one to automate, right? So that's like one of those where you don't even have to pay somebody, you just automate it. That's free. Okay. Who else? Customizing proposals. Yes. Customizing proposals. Okay. Yeah. Gracie. Like forms or following up with Yeah. Pipeline. Yeah, exactly. Which can also be automated to some degree, right? Like reminders can be set and things like that. Um, what are some of the things you should stop doing? And I, I want you guys to write these down. Because these are things you like when you go back. These are easy, like knock'em out, like knock them out. What should you stop doing? Are there any things that you guys know that you're thinking about yourself? Like is there something I should stop doing in my business? Anybody? Yeah. Caly for me, and I know for this is D, a bit different, I'm a white vowel speechwriter and I'm hundred percent remote. For me, one of the things I. To stop doing different services. Yeah. So editing a speech that somebody already wrote felt like a quick, easy way to, to get money in the bank. Yeah. But I found it took up too much time compared to a full service, full customized wedding speech. Mm-hmm. And so now I no longer offer the editing service. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think that's great. Um, can you share Caitlyn, 'cause I think you have a really great example of something you delegated out, which was. Yes. Okay. So the writing portion has always been, I don't wanna say my baby, but it's been the thing I've held the closest to me and I was very, very hesitant to delegate that. And then through Brenda's coaching program, I was inspired to and I found the right fit. And that has been huge because I get off of a call and instead of me having time blocks on my calendar for me to transcribe the audio, write the first draft, edit it. Now I use Fathom, so it's already transcribed. I hand it to the writer, she gives me the first draft, and then I go through and punch it up and polish it and put the brand voice into it to make sure it has that, that feel to it. Yeah. That clients have come to expect and it has saved hours every. Yeah, hours per client. I, the reason I ask Caitlyn tell that story, and I hadn't planned on that, so I'm glad that you raised your hand, Kaitlyn, thank you. Is because a lot of times what I hear from wedding planners especially, but photographers and all the rest of the pros in here too, is, but I have a creative service so nobody can do it but me. That's what I thought. That's exactly what Caitlyn said to us when she came into the program. And I was like, girl. Um, so everything can be outsourced, everything can be delegated. But what I want you to hear about the way Caitlyn did that is that she's not just like, uh, okay, well then I guess I'll just hire a bunch of writers and they'll write and I hope they write like me. Like that's not, that's not protecting your brand. Right. We wanna protect our brand. Of course, you have a unique service that you provide, but what Caitlyn's able to do is she's able to outsource the first draft of it, which takes hours. And then all she has to do is spend, I don't know how much time she spends on it, but like an hour, let's just say for instance, she's going from now five or six hours to an hour delivering the same quality. Okay. And in more transparency, it is about finding the right fit because I. Hired a second writer. Yeah. And after two projects, I, I was like, this isn't a fit. Yeah. I had to spend too much time revising his draft. The, the brand voice was too off. Yeah. That I could only learn after him actually doing it. And so making sure, like when you find that right person Oh, you hug them tight. Yeah. That part is key too, that it's not just anyone who was written before can do this. Yeah. Like it's still flushing out. For your brand. Yes. Does that make sense for you guys? Like there's ways to delegate out pieces of what you do so that you start working in only your hourly rate. Right? So now think about how much more money Caitlyn makes from one vow writing because she can now do so many more. Right? Okay. The last thing is, what high value tasks should you double down on? Any that you guys can think of that you're like, oh, this is something that actually I am doing and I work within my hourly rate, like it is of my value, but I'm not doing enough of it. Marketing. The networking sales. Marketing, networking and sales. Correct answer. There was, this was not a trick question. Marketing, networking, and sales. Oh, Patty, you're the best. Thank you so much. So here's what happens. We wake up, we go straight to our computer and we open our inbox. And then guess what? You never get out of it. And then at the end of the day, you're like, I didn't follow up with leads. I didn't, um, you know, I didn't market today. I didn't do a reel. I didn't engage on social media. Right. All the things that actually make you money because we let all the other tasks in. So, um, you can't scale a seven figure business doing four figure tasks. And that's, that's honestly you guys, what I want you to kind of take away from this is like. Okay, stop doing four figure tests. And just to give you a quick example, I mean, I've been in business for a long time, you guys, and like I said, I value my time wildly, but last August when I read this book, I was like, I think I read it in a day.'cause I was literally so intrigued by it. Um, I, I sent the audio version to Ali. If you guys haven't met Ali, she is like my right arm to everything. I sent the book to her. I was like, I need you to read this by Friday. And then we will meet. For brunch. And she was like, okay, I needed her to read it 'cause I needed her to buy in. And I was like, here's the thing. My inbox I will never touch again. Like I'm never touching my inbox again. So if you guys have not heard my recent podcast on this, I promise you that I only look at that inbox on Friday mornings for about 30 minutes max, unless Ali slacks me and says, urgent email needing your attention. Right? Like if somebody sends me something pressing. I, I'm gonna obviously pop in, but for the most part it's either flagged for me or she knows how to answer it, or she forwards it or she does it or whatever. Right. And the time I have gotten back, because think about it. I know, I know there's some of you in here that are like, I couldn't do that. No, it doesn't work for me. Thank you though for the suggestion. It does work. Because the thing is, is how often do you get an email where it's like a vendor asking, what time did you need me There again? What time do we get vendor access or a, a client emails you and they're like, who'd you say that DJ was that I should reach out to? Or, you know, I have a thousand dollars. Which photographer should I reach out to? You're like, none of them. Um, but, but you know, everyone has a budget. Um, but your team, someone on your team can answer those. And then flag them. Right. So I might have at this point, honestly, we've been doing this for a long time, I'm not gonna lie. It was bumpy in the beginning, right, Ali? We were like. Do. How do we flag this one? How do we flag this one? Can you answer this one? But the more she learned how I would answer something. So a lot of times, like she would flag something and I would say, Hey, you could have answered this. I copied it back to the inbox so you could see how I answered it. Um, but for next time, you'll know, right? So in the beginning, yeah, it's a little choppy, but we give up and we think like, oh, that wasn't worth it. I spent too much time. I promise you guys. I. Promise you this is like the biggest game changer of my entire business because I do not get in that inbox anymore. So that's something that I think is really, really important to think about is what four figure tasks can you delegate? And now you should have a number, you should have a number sitting in front of you. What can I pay someone to do tasks? And if you're, if, if your number was like 1250, let's be honest, right? Sometimes it's like, oh, 1250. Okay, who am I finding to do work for 1250 an hour? Fiverr. Upwork, they're there. Like find people to do tasks that you can, little tasks that you just do on a daily basis that don't move the needle, right? You can do it, and if you have questions about how you can do it, Ali and I are both here for the next two days, so please ask us because we're happy to share. Okay? So we're just gonna recap. Buy back your time. Buy back your growth. Delegate a $25 an hour task to reinvest that time into a $250 an hour CEO task. Does that make sense? You're going to delegate out a task, not so you can go eat bon bons on your couch. That's not it. We're delegating out a task to get an hour back so that we can grow. You're focused on growth, sales, marketing, networking. Okay. Marketing and networking. You're kind of same thing. Um, okay, so your commitment to yourself. Write this down in your journal, in your notebook. On your computer, on your wrist, wherever you wanna write it. I want you to write down what is your commitment to yourself. And to be honest, you guys, this is actually a really great writing prompt for your letter to yourself too. By the end of this year, I will have stopped doing what? You don't have to do that, but I'm just giving you an example of what you can write to yourself. I will stop doing what and then, and I will use that time to what? What's your commitment to yourself? It's worth you making this commitment to yourself. Okay, I'm gonna give you guys just a second to do that this week. I will stop doing what to spend that time doing. What? A really quick, good example of this would be, and I shared this with a CEO yesterday, was, um, when you get up in the morning, make a list for yourself of the things you have to do before you're allowed to check your inbox. If you're not giving up your inbox yet before you are allowed to check your inbox or your Slack, don't use that. Like, my slack now has become a little bit of like an inbox because I use it for so much, but I, I do not open slack until my marketing and my sales are done. Don't do it if it's not worth it. If it's your inbox, if it's your Slack, if it's your team, set a time and say, I

am not available until 10:

00 AM unless the venue is on fire and the wedding is today. Sorry, because. Our company is it it, it has to have me focused on sales and marketing. So before you open your inbox, before you open your Slack, before you start chatting with your team, engage on social media, whatever networking you need to do, like if it's setting an appointment with another vendor, follow up with all of your leads before you let the rest of the world in. Okay. Your business depends on it. Okay, so at the beginning of this presentation, this all started with a watch, right? So Bubba Watson, Dan Martell has a Bubba Watson. He wears it to remind himself. And while I won't be giving you guys Bubba Watson's, I know my husband would be like, hello, where's my swag? Um, I won't be giving you guys Bubba Watson's, I am gonna give you a clock. So the, this is the wedding pro CEO clock. Each one of you has one in front of you, but we want you to have a reminder of what is your hour worth. So Hailey's in the back with, She Lettering and she's gonna be engraving your clock. So during the break, and I know Hailey is amazing also, Hailey did like all of our signage. All, I mean, so much of this, she's amazing. So she's gonna be engraving all day today. So she has post-its in the back at her table. Write what you want as your reminder. It can be either your hourly rate, it can be your name, and your hourly rate. It could be the date, today's date, it could be whatever will make you, if it's sitting on your desk, go. Why did I say yes to that? Like, I should stop doing that. I want you to have a reminder just like Dan Martel does. And then really quick before we take our first break, this is our team. If you guys don't know who our team is, I just wanted you to be able to put names with faces. Obviously I think you know me. Uh, a lot of you know Katy in the back. Katy is our associate coach and Wedding Pro, CEO. Erica is our new community manager, so we're so excited to have Erica. Um, inside of our programs, Susan Sutherland is a beast in the back. She was my mentor forever, so, uh, get to know her. And then Ali, I think most of you guys have met Ali. If you have any questions throughout the week, grab any speaker, but grab any of our team. If you wanna know more about like Wedding Pro CEO, if you're not already part of it, grab one of us as well. And, um, yeah, we're gonna go on a quick break. Make sure you drop off your clock with Hailey in the back and I'll see you guys in just a little bit. You got about 10 minutes.

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Brandee Gaar

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