Wedding Planning Certification

These days most of the grooms and brides don't have the time to sit down and make all the necessary arrangements for their wedding ceremony. They prefer to hire a wedding planner to take care of everything. Due to this, the career opportunity for bridal consultants has increased immensely over the past few years. Learn how to become a certified wedding planner below from any of the online schools.

Bridal consulting is a very important part of a wedding planner's job profile. You can get yourself enrolled for an online wedding consulting course and run your entire business out of your home. A weddingplanner course will let you acquire the skill of organizing advanced and or even basic events. Training gives you the knowledge that you need to be a successful wedding planner as well as a good wedding planner. Get started with a course on how to become a wedding planner.

An online wedding planner course will help you in operating a bridal consultant business of your own. The course will teach you the different skills and techniques of ranging from ordering of the cake to arranging photography for the ceremony. It will help you to arrange and coordinate receptions and ceremonies regardless of size. The course will also give you the skills that you require to dress a bride in the best possible way and make her look gorgeous on her special day. The course will also teach you the skills of selecting the right kind of wedding invitation. It will even teach you the right techniques of arranging flowers during ceremonies and receptions.

Some online wedding planning courses require you to have either a high school diploma or a GED as your educational qualification. However, there also some online courses that you can begin immediately without any special educational qualifications. These are usually certificate programs in bridal consultancy which are offered by many of the top online certificate schools listed. You can do some research on different types of wedding consultancy courses and programs and select one that best suites your needs.

Once you have completed with your wedding consultancy course, you can start working as a wedding planner for an event company. A wedding planner is not only one individual but can be made up of a team of individuals but you'll be the one leading the way. Your course will help you to get a good job within the team. Once you have full knowledge of the business we recommend looking into starting your own business first as a consultant, then as a full blown wedding planning company.

There are many people who learn how to become a wedding planner and then move onto the field of organizing corporate events and personal events. This is also possible once you have gone through professional training. This explains the wide career opportunity in this field. Most of the online bridal consultancy courses can be completed in as less as six credit hours (less than 3 months). What are you waiting for; enter the exciting world of bridal consulting today!

Wedding Planner Job Duties

Wedding planning means so much more than just creating schedules and working with vendors. You are responsible for the biggest day of someone life. The most challenging part of working with all the different vendors that will be doing parts of the wedding. You’ll deal with photographers, caterers, rental companies, food and beverage companies, florists, etc. These will all have to be coordinated perfectly. As a wedding planner or consultant working with the bride and groom will be an everyday occurrence. They will have a good idea of what they want and it will be up to you to make it happen and within their budget.

Wedding Planner Certification Education Requirements

Finding the right wedding planner school to attend to get the training you need can be difficult. Many of the schools have campus locations so if you aren’t near one you can always take the program online. Many of the schools we list offer online training to all 50 states. Online training program are the same quality as a campus based program. The main requirement to enroll is that you have a high school diploma or GED. If you are attending a school that offers financial aid make sure to ask them what other forms of payment options they have. Some offer 0% loans which will end up being cheaper for you than Title IV federal aid.

Wedding Planning Schools Online

One of the big misconceptions is that you need to be licensed to be a wedding planner or consultant. What you need is a good training program and then we recommend taking some certification classes and belonging to several associations. The first association you should join is the American Association of Certified Wedding Planners. This is a great organization that helps planners with tons of resources. The biggest advantage of these memberships is you can show your potential client not only your education certificate, but the different memberships you belong to. This is also a great way to connect with other members and get referrals for your business.

Wedding Planning Training

Over 50% of all wedding planners own their own consulting business. They may do all the work themselves or have a larger business where they employ other consultants to handle more work. To start your business you’ll first want to decide on a name. We recommend picking a name but making sure you can buy the domain name that matches. You’ll then need to register the company as either an LLC or S corporation. By doing this it protects you as a business legally but also you’ll gain the prestige associated with being a business.

Once you have your business it is now time to find clients. After your website is made you can connect to many of the paid membership sites or lead generation sites where you can pay for prospects. These are individuals that are looking for consultants. Often these sites charge $10-75 per lead. You’ll want to make sure you have brochures and business cards produced so you can have a wedding planning kit available to every client. We always recommend finding your first client by using a friend or family member. Once you have completed your first wedding you can use that to showcase it to your future clients.

Earning Potential

As a wedding planner you’ll get paid on a per wedding basis. The more weddings you conduct each month or the larger of a wedding you consult with the higher of a salary you can charge. The median salary for a wedding planner is $47,000 per year. The top wedding planners make over $70,000.

Online Wedding Consultant Courses

Many wedding consulting schools offer specialized courses in wedding planning so make sure to fully research what programs each school has to offer. Below are some of the topics you’ll cover during your certificate training:

- Etiquette
- Working with Vendors
- Writing Wedding Speeches
-Wedding Vacation Planning
- Photography & Portfolio Creation
- Catering
- Budgeting for Weddings

Wedding Consultant Resources:

Association of Bridal Consultants - Last visited January 6, 2019
American Association of Certified Wedding Planners - Updated January 1, 2019
AFWPI- Updated December 22, 2018