2015 Goal Review

2015 kinda just flew by there didn’t it? Seriously, we were thinking this morning that we had just gotten used to saying “2015” and now we’re supposed to say “16”. Wowza! We had a lot of fun last year, so it makes sense that it went by rather fast. As with every new year when the air is cold and the trees are bare, we give ourselves some time to reflect on the previous year, and map out where we want to go in 2016. Our year Goals List is also something we share here on the blog, so everyone who follows us, and all of our couples, are aware of what we’re working towards. Before we jump into our goals for 2016, we need to assess how things played out in 2015. Here’s a review of our 2015 goals…

 

Professional

Provide the best experience we know how to give to our couples. Every time. – This one is where we’ll always put our priorities, and hearing from all of our 2015 couples we can say, happily, that we achieved this goal. We will never be able to thank you all enough.

Quick photo delivery – check! This year we continued to deliver wedding and engagement photos as quickly as we did in 2014. This is a huge part of client experience and customer service, and although we might have been up far too late into the night a handful of times, photos were delivered in terms of days rather than weeks (months? no.).

Update the blog with a fresh design and look – Done! We are still in love with the fresh, light, airy feel to our blog. So glad we checked this off the list!

New head shots – We did this twice! Double points!

Client welcome magazine – Well… it’s designed and written. There are a few place holder images that need to be adjusted, and after checking one last time for spelling mistakes we’ll be able to take this to the printer. Now, all we have to do is finish ten thousand other things first! So we’ll say this goal is 90% finished. We’re looking to get this printed by the Spring!

Submission process streamlined – Two things happened when we assessed our photo submission process: we realized we needed to be more selective with the publications we were submitting to, and we realized that “being featured” is not that big of a deal to us. Like, at all. These “as featured on” badges are not badges of honor. They do not define the worth of our work, and they don’t really do much for us in a business sense. Our couple’s reviews are what we hold up for everyone to see. We’re not getting more bookings from features. Yes we appreciate anytime our couples gorgeous weddings are featured, because they get to relive their day and it’s a special thing for them… but for us it’s not something we need to prioritize. We’re glad we figured this out in 2015.

Take more behind the scenes photos – Technically, we probably took 3 or 4 more behind the scenes photos in 2015 than in 2014. So we’ll say this was a win 😉

Personal

Take one day off a week – This pretty much happened! We can say that thanks to the baby, we were forced a little more often to take a day away from the hustle. It didn’t always happen, and we didn’t have the type of consistency we would have hoped for with our day off, but we did do a much better job of finding at least one (almost full) day away from the computer.

Say thank you – With the help of the amazing vendors we work along side, we’re able to do this work we do to a much higher level. Without our friends, we’d be nowhere. Saying thank you in 2015 was something we really wanted to do. We doubt we’ll ever be able to say “thank you” enough, in all it’s different forms, but we did try hard to make sure those who mean so much to us, knew it.

Take care of our bodies – Eh. Lets just say we didn’t run any marathons 😉 We did at least quit eating on the run. Remembering to pack snacks on wedding days was great, and allowed us to eat healthy things while we were working to avoid Chinese takeout at 11pm when we got home. So we at least took those steps to eating better. Maybe this year we’ll actually come up with a plan.

Take more family photos – Holy cow yes! With the baby around, we had our cameras out a lot more in 2015 than ever before. They weren’t perfect, they weren’t supposed to be. These photos are just for us, for our kids, and for the generations to come. Snapshots of our lives outside of work, is what we focused on, and we did this for sure. They might not have been edited and printed right away, but these family photos were taken and eventually they found themselves hung on our walls.

Alright then! Not a bad year! Next up… 2016 goals! Look for those soon 🙂