We were lucky to catch up with Anna Kameshima recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Anna, thanks for joining us today. One of our favorite things to brainstorm about with friends who’ve built something entrepreneurial is what they would do differently if they were to start over today. Surely, there are things you’ve learned that would allow you to do it over faster, more efficiently. We’d love to hear how you would go about setting things up if you were starting over today, knowing everything that you already know.

When I first started my business Coord By Anna it was more of a “side gig” I had a full=time corporate marketing job and felt very comfortable with my full-time income. Wedding coordination was just a fun side hobby at the time so when I first started I didn’t spend a lot of capital or resources on setting up a website, or google ads or getting on platforms like The Knot, Wedding wire, etc. Part of the reason I didn’t do all of that initially was maybe some insecurity of mine that this could never be a full-time thing therefore didn’t need all of that “extra” stuff. And Instagram page was all I needed. Truthfully I probably talked myself into that position because I felt really comfortable in my job. Fast forward to now I no longer have that corporate job cushion and I’m all in on my business. I’m now having to play catch up spending resources on a website, setting up google ads, etc. I’m grateful that I was able to steadily grow only through organic social but had I had spent time to set things up more in the early stages I might be further along in-terms or reach and attracting more inquiries. Lesson learned is if you have a passion or side-hobby you want to monetize set things up properly even if you don’t have a huge client base already. Especially if you have the privilege of having another income source that you can rely on.

Anna, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

My name is Anna Kameshima and I’m a wedding coordinator based in Oregon. This whole wedding coordinator thing started in 2013 when I was 18 years old. I was asked to help with a friends family wedding at 18 with no experience (just a reputation for being organized)! Miraculously it wasn’t a disaster and the wedding went off without a hitch. At that time I had no experience in the wedding industry and had no idea wedding coordinators were thing. I quickly learning that there’s many levels to wedding planning services based on what the clients need. It could be Full-service for those who wants a planner to take of every single detail from concept design to execution or day-of coordinator who is more logistically focused and help clients with executing their vision and plan.

Fast forward a few years, I’m working full time as a marketing specialist but once in a while another friend would ask me to help with their wedding. I often got asked “hey, you’re really good at this why don’t you start a business and help other people?”. Back then I thought of coordinating as a fun side hobby while I focused on my 9 to 5. I was soon convinced, that my passion for events and organizational skills could extend beyond just helping friends. So Coord By Anna (coord short for coordination by Anna) was born! i’ve coordinated for large scale 250+ weddings and small intimate elopements. No matter the scale, I know each wedding requires lots of dedication and hard work to bring to life. Weddings aren’t one size fits all.

With more experience under my belt I found myself in the day-of coordination niche. I learned to customize my own service list to what I personally think a day-of coordinator should execute to provide the best experience for the couple. Every day-of coordinator is different I think what sets me apart is that I’ve developed a service list that is more in between a day-of coordinator service and a partial planning service while still offering affordable prices. In my market research I’ve seen a lot of day of coordination services that don’t start working with their clients until 2 weeks before the event date or the month of. Then on the actual event date may only be available for 8 hours. Rather than follow what everyone else was doing I adjusted my service list to what I personally think helps me to provide the best service. I start working with my clients up to 15 weeks ahead of their event date. There’s a lot that can change and a lot of prepare starting 3 months ahead ensures I spend enough time with my clients to plan all the logistics down to smallest details. In additional I offer up to 12 hours of service on the event day. I do this so I can provide coordination and support for all of my clients vendors and have the max amount of time for myself to set up any personal items. Depending on how DIY my clients are personal item set up could take 3-4 hours! So an 8 hour service time is simply not enough for set up, being present for the duration of the event and tear down. Rather than ;make my clients pay for additional hours I build it into my base price so it’s not a surprise cost.

to date I’m most proud of the community and reputation I have built with my clients and the vendors I have worked with. I really value being positive, providing a stress-free environment and going above and beyond for my clients and their vendors. This has allowed me to build such trust that many of my clients have referred me to their family and friends. I’ve had venues that put me on their preferred vendors list and positive feedback from photographers and DJ’s (two vendors I work the most closely with during the event). I want people to know that I understand how important it is for everyone involved to feel confident in my work. This is why I am meticulous about preparation and offer all day service during the event.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

I am still growing on Social media and have many goals I want to achieve but in the last year I’ve seen massive growth. This has all been through consistency and regular posting. Prior to this year I only really posted when I had a client and highlighted their wedding. This meant that I was only posting a couple times every other months as I was growing. I’ve learned that consistency and building community is more important than numbers. If you are consistent with you posting and providing value to build community that engagement will come.

Where do you think you get most of your clients from?

Organic socials and referrals has been my best source for new clients. Referrals is huge in the wedding industry, especially in Oregon I think the community is still pretty small I tend to work with a lot of the same vendors especially if I was referred my client through a past client. I’ve also grown my organic social inquiries to double my referral clients in the last year. And this is through posting consistently, including relevant hashtags and keywords and making sure my content is discoverable by my ideal client,

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @coord.by,anna
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/annakameshima/

Image Credits

Photography by Vincent Pham