July 31, 2024 • 22 mins
In this episode of Website Success, Chrissy Rey interviews Dawn Hoelz of Snapdragon Event Design about her experience building a website for her new business. Dawn shares insights on choosing Squarespace, creating a brand identity, and the challenges of DIY website development. Chrissy shares tips to help Dawn clarify her target audience as she works towards completing her website. The conversation offers valuable tips for small business owners embarking on their own website creation journey.
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Episode Transcript
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Chrissy Rey (00:09):
Hey everybody, this is Chrissy Rey with Website Success.
Welcome back.
Today I am talking with Dawn Hoelz.
She is with Snapdragon Event Design.
She's based in Severna Park, andshe does full event planning, day of
services, and she also specializesin custom event decor for events,
(00:29):
so none of that off the shelf stuff.
She actually makes her decor, andshe does this in the Baltimore area.
And today we're going to talk a little bitabout Dawn's business and what she does.
And I'm also going to try to helpguide her through a few things to
help her finish up her website thatshe's been working on for awhile.
So Snapdragon event design,relatively new business.
(00:51):
Is that correct?
Dawn Hoelz (00:53):
Very new.
Yes.
Very new.
Chrissy Rey (00:54):
And you, so you don't have your website up and running yet.
You're currently working onyour website and it's going
to be in Squarespace, right?
Dawn Hoelz (01:04):
Yes.
Chrissy Rey (01:04):
What made you choose Squarespace for your website?
Dawn Hoelz (01:08):
Snapdragon events is a side gig for me right now, but in my full
time job I actually built our websiteand we built it in Squarespace, so it
was the platform that was chosen forme, and it's the one I'm most familiar
with, so that's why I chose to use it.
Chrissy Rey (01:21):
What do you like about Squarespace?
Dawn Hoelz (01:23):
It's pretty self explanatory, so I like that they have lots of
templates you can use, you can drag anddrop photos that they have available,
you can put your own photos in, itis pretty I think, user friendly.
Chrissy Rey (01:36):
Do you have web development experience from before or just, we
were talking about you have worked onwebsites for other people before, but
do you have development experience?
Would you consider yourself aweb developer, a web designer?
Dawn Hoelz (01:49):
Absolutely not.
Chrissy Rey (01:50):
So Squarespace is a good choice for somebody who's not a web
designer, needs something user friendly.
Would you say that's accurate?
Dawn Hoelz (01:57):
Yes, totally.
If you're, you don't know how, if you,yes, if you are not a actual web designer
builder, it is a great way to createa simple website with minimal effort.
Chrissy Rey (02:11):
And for the current website, so for the Snapdragon
events, event design, it'ssnapdragoneventdesign.com, are you doing
it all DIY or do you have somebody?
Okay, you're doing it all DIY?
Dawn Hoelz (02:24):
I'm DIYing the whole thing myself.
About the only thing I haveis a family member who's in
communications who's probably goingto look at some of the content.
But otherwise, yep.
Doing it all myself.
Chrissy Rey (02:35):
Okay, and are you pretty, pretty confident with it?
You feeling pretty good about it so far?
Dawn Hoelz (02:38):
I am.
I've had it I was able tobuild it pretty quickly.
I think the only thing holding me backright now is just getting portfolio
photos, trying to collect those fromvarious events I've done over time
before this was an official thing.
So they're not very well organizedand I'm getting some testimonials.
Chrissy Rey (02:56):
Okay, great.
And we, as we talked about earlier,you have worked on a website.
You said you were doingSquarespace for your day job.
Have you used any other websitebuilders for other websites in the past?
Dawn Hoelz (03:10):
Yes, many years ago a similar situation, the company I
was working for needed a websiteand I built one in an Adobe product.
I think it was called go live.
It was much more difficult and much morefelt more meant for programmer developer
type people, but I somehow muddled my waythrough and created a website back then.
Chrissy Rey (03:30):
That's pretty impressive.
I used to use what WasMacromedia, now Adobe Dreamweaver.
And I am a professional developer.
So I, I do it for a living.
And, but that stuff is not super easy forsomebody without a background in it, it's
not the easiest thing in the world to use.
So I'm impressed.
Dawn Hoelz (03:48):
Yeah, absolutely not easy.
I guess I was slightly lucky in thesense that I had familiarity with
Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator.
So I knew Adobe products.
It helped a little bit, I don'tknow, but it was many years ago.
Chrissy Rey (04:03):
So what kind of planning did you do for your website when you
said I'm going to make a website.
Here are the steps I'm going to take.
What kind of planning did you do for that?
Dawn Hoelz (04:12):
Actually I didn't I would say mostly what I did was go around and look
at other websites for similar companies.
So I looked at some other company eventplanning websites and tried to see
what they have And then decided whichpieces do I want to contact me page?
Do I want a portfolio page?
Do I, what was important to me to show?
(04:35):
And then I just laid it out andthen put things in the order
that I thought they should be.
And then it seems that websites thesedays tend to be much more minimal than
they used to be several years ago.
And more like one page ish, likeyou just scroll through one page.
So I sort of tried to plan how I wantedthat to look when you just scroll.
So mine is just a, like a homepage,one page, but it just scrolls all
(04:57):
the way down instead of multiplepages to click and link to.
Chrissy Rey (05:01):
Who is your target audience for your website and
for your business in general?
Dawn Hoelz (05:05):
Anyone and everyone.
Anyone that's throwing a party, whetherit's, a private at home party, whether
a corporate holiday party yeah, justanybody that's planning an event.
And again my specialty is event decor.
So I'm really into the design aspect,how the event looks, the feel, the theme.
Everything from invitations to, flowersand parting gifts, all that kind of stuff.
(05:29):
But I do full on planningand event coordination.
So I can help get, vendors and locationsand deal with those contracts and
help manage day of and set up andflow and all that kind of stuff.
Chrissy Rey (05:41):
Have you found in your experience with the events that
you've been doing so far, is thereone type of event or a particular type
of customer that you find yourselfworking with more often than the rest?
Dawn Hoelz (05:54):
Considering I'm very brand new at this, I wouldn't say I
have found any kind of pattern yet.
But I think what I've donethe most or more just private
events neighborhood parties.
I did a gala for my son's school.
Some more private things rather than big,no big conferences or anything like that.
Chrissy Rey (06:15):
Okay.
And now I have to put my web designerhat on here and make the recommendation.
Try to narrow your targetaudience a little bit.
If you say you'll work for anybodyand everybody, It's hard for your ideal
client to see themselves in your website.
So it, it does help to think aboutif you were gonna do a party for
(06:38):
a client, what do they look like?
Not specifically like physicalcharacteristics or anything, right?
But who are they?
So are they a woman?
Are they a man?
Are they 30 years old?
Are they 70 years old?
What is their income level?
Because certain people are goingto be able to hire a party planner.
Some people may not beable to hire a planner.
So you might want to think about the sortof financial availability that they have.
(07:01):
If there's particular geographiclocations that you prefer over others,
then that might be worth adding.
And there's, so there's two things thatI want you to do after we're done here.
Number one is just describe yourtarget audience a little bit more
specifically than just saying everybody.
Try to narrow it down a little bitand then create what's called an
(07:22):
ideal client or an ideal customeravatar, which is a fictional person
that represents your ideal client.
And the reason that's super, super helpfulis because when you pick out your colors
for your brand certain colors are goingto resonate with certain audiences.
Actually, I'm going to skipahead a little bit because we
haven't talked about brand yet.
(07:43):
Did you already pick outyour colors and your logo?
Dawn Hoelz (07:45):
Yes.
So I have designed a logo.
I've got the colors pretty narrowed down.
Fonts are narrowed down.
I guess they're narrowed down in the senseof I have a particular font for the logo.
Chrissy Rey (07:56):
And what colors are you using?
Dawn Hoelz (07:59):
It's actually mostly in the purple realm.
There's purple and a little bit of alittle bit of pink and white and lilac.
Chrissy Rey (08:08):
Why did you choose those colors?
Dawn Hoelz (08:10):
I wanted to have my look be more modern.
And originally I was looking atlogos and designing stuff in teals
and they were looking antique y andI was like that's not really me!
the feel I wanted.
I wanted something a little bitmore fun and streamlined and
colorful and bright and modern.
Chrissy Rey (08:31):
Okay.
So what you're doing, you arethinking of what your potential,
your ideal client is going to like.
Like the theme thatyou're trying to give off.
So you I'm thinking you havesome idea of who your idea is.
Dawn Hoelz (08:45):
Yeah, I probably do have a better idea than what I expressed.
Chrissy Rey (08:49):
Yes.
And I find that a lot.
I get a lot of clients that comein and say I already have my logo,
I've already got my colors and.
Just by looking at the logos andcolor, I'll say why did you pick this?
And they'll sometimes they'llsay cause I like those colors.
And that's not a good,that's not a good reason.
Yeah, it is a good reason.
You need to like your logo.
You need to like your colors, butthose are really going to be more for
(09:10):
your client and your target audience.
It needs to speak to them.
They need to be able to relate to it.
It sounds like when you said you wantedto go for a more modern look and feel.
To me, it says, youdidn't say I like purple.
Which, again, is totally fine.
Dawn Hoelz (09:26):
It's actually not my favorite color,
Chrissy Rey (09:28):
But there you go.
But it sounds like the people thatyou want to appeal to like purple.
Does that sound pretty accurate?
Dawn Hoelz (09:36):
Um, maybe I looked up what does it mean for logos that have purple
in their color and they were likeit's like a represents like royalty.
And I'm not looking to workfor royalty by any means.
But I think, you know, people probablythat are in the middle to upper class
would be more likely to be my clients.
(09:58):
I wanted it to be something that was mademe look professional and Not so much like
I'm doing this as a side gig, which I am.
Chrissy Rey (10:06):
So see, there you go.
You said the upper to middle income.
Dawn Hoelz (10:09):
Upper to middle.
Yeah.
Chrissy Rey (10:11):
So you're already narrowing down that ideal client
avatar a little bit there.
That's one of the things youwant to think about is that,
that, those kind of demographics.
And purple means luxuryfor a lot of people.
It's luxurious, it's rich.
Even if it's not financially richit's got that rich feel to it.
So that's painting a picturefor that ideal client.
(10:32):
I think if you just fill it in alittle bit more you'll, it'll help
you and is your logo already done?
Dawn Hoelz (10:39):
I think so.
Chrissy Rey (10:40):
Okay.
Okay.
Yeah, you haven't put it up yet.
So I was wondering your fontsyou haven't, you said you're
still working on your fonts.
Dawn Hoelz (10:47):
I have the font of the logo, but I haven't really
decided on a tiered font structure.
Like your main, supporting fonts.
Chrissy Rey (10:54):
Having some, a better idea of who that ideal client is
might help you with picking your fontsbecause, there, there are certain
fonts that, that some people will like.
And some that they will not like.
So if your ideal client, if youpick a font that they're just like,
no, that's not a good, I don'tlike the way that looks, they're
not going to like your website.
You're not going to speak to them.
You're not going to, they're not goingto see themselves in your website.
(11:17):
So I do think it, it would be good to,to narrow that down a little bit before,
before you finish the website, at least.
For the ideal client avatar, ifyou've never done this practice
before you want to think abouttheir sort of identifying things.
So you give them a name, likean actual name, like you can
call them Martha or something.
And then you say like, where do they live?
(11:37):
What is their income?
What jobs do they have?
Do they have kids?
What is their education level?
What kind of things are they interestedin like outside of your business?
What, what are, do they like to go hiking?
Do they like to go, are they outdoorsy?
Are they more they like to go clubbingon a Friday night or, are their hobbies?
All of the things like,what do they like to do?
(11:59):
What is their personality like?
What are some adjectivesthat describe them?
And then you also want to thinkabout what are their goals?
What do they want?
What do they need that you offer?
What kind of things do they need?
If you offer custom event decor, maybeone of their wants is that they just
don't like the off the shelf stuff.
(12:19):
And so they want something that looksbespoke and really shines at the party.
And everybody's Ooh,where did you get that?
That looks awesome.
Those speak to theirwants and their needs.
And like the pain points that might bethat they haven't been able to find.
Exactly the decor thatthey wanted in the store.
So they might need something custom.
(12:40):
And then you also need to think aboutwhere do they get their information from?
And this is going to come into likewhen you're sharing the website.
You need to know like, whereare they on social media?
Where are they on the internet?
What websites do they look at?
Where do they get recommendations?
Where do they do research?
And then, also know a little bit abouttheir buying behavior so that when
(13:00):
you write your content, which we'llget to in a minute but when you write
your content, you're speaking in away that they'll understand it and
they'll recognize themselves and say,Oh, yeah that's exactly what I need.
And you're going to be speaking to them.
I want you to do that when we're done.
Dawn Hoelz (13:16):
Okay.
Okay.
I've been taking notes.
Chrissy Rey (13:19):
Okay.
Awesome.
Awesome.
Awesome.
Now speaking of content I know yousaid you are, you have a family member
that's helping you with the content?
Dawn Hoelz (13:27):
Yeah, she hasn't looked at it yet, but she, I was
just talking to her other days andshe offered to read everything.
So I'll be giving her alink to look at it all.
I will say that was one of thethings that I found really nerve
wracking when I started was whatdo I write and how do I write it?
And I definitely turned to AI.
(13:48):
So I, had my basic ideas I wouldput down and then ask AI to clean
it up and make it sound pretty.
Chrissy Rey (13:54):
And what tool did you use for that?
Do you remember?
Dawn Hoelz (13:57):
I used the one that was in Squarespace.
Squarespace now has an option for it.
And I also, I think one of them was, Ijust wasn't getting anything I liked.
And so I went to ChatGPT.
Chrissy Rey (14:09):
Okay, I will, another recommendation, for writing, I've
found that CLAUDE aI, it's C L A U DE dot A I, is really good, especially
if you do that ideal client avatarexercise, and you basically paste
all of that in there and say, I needhelp writing content for this person.
And then it'll write to speak totheir challenges, their pain points,
(14:32):
their wants, their needs, theirbehaviors and all of that stuff.
It's pretty good at doing that.
Dawn Hoelz (14:36):
Okay, great.
Thanks.
Chrissy Rey (14:38):
And I would recommend before you speak with your family member about
the, or before you share the contentwith them is maybe try to do that
ICA and share that with them as well.
Cause it would probably help for her tounderstand who you're trying to write
for when she's reading that content.
And then, and we did already speakabout your brand a little bit.
So you've got your logo, your colors.
(14:59):
What kind of planning went intogetting all of that together?
I know we talked about a little bit, butcan you go a little bit more in depth
in what you did as far as thinking aboutwhat your brand was going to look like?
Dawn Hoelz (15:11):
Yeah, and it what I planned for initially and what I wound up with
in the end were totally different.
I think when I started planning, I startedthinking one of some of my favorite
colors, so I started working with thoseand I knew that with the name snap dragon,
I wanted to have a snap dragon in my logo.
So I tried playing around with that.
(15:31):
And I just I had a particularsort of style in mind.
That was more.
I don't even know I antique wasthe first kind of term that came to
my mind like a modern antique mix.
But more I developedvarious logos and I used.
I used Canva for creating my logo.
(15:53):
It just kept evolving and changingand what I liked and didn't like
in the end were very differentthan what I thought they would be.
But I shared lots and lots oflogos with family and friends.
I think they got sick andtired of seeing them all.
But ultimately just went withthe one that I liked the best.
That spoke to me more than the others.
Chrissy Rey (16:11):
Now this is a big question.
I know a lot of my listeners aredoing the DIY with their websites.
How long have you beenworking on your website?
So when did you start working on it?
And when did you stop?
Do you think you're going to beready to launch your website?
Dawn Hoelz (16:25):
Okay.
So again, this is a side gig.
So I haven't been able to commit.
If this was just all I was doing, Iwould have been done a lot faster.
I probably started toying with it, mostlytoying with the logo in December of 2023.
Got the logo probablynow down in February.
(16:46):
And then started building the website.
So I've probably been buildingfor most of the spring.
So yeah.
And I'm hoping to be done.
I thought I'd be done by now, butI just got held up with the two
pieces of getting portfolio photosand getting some testimonials.
So I just have to reach out and reallyget that and get the reach out to people
(17:08):
and then get those photos organized.
And I'm hoping to be able tofinish it by the end of the summer.
Chrissy Rey (17:14):
How many hours a week would you say that you work on it?
Dawn Hoelz (17:17):
Oh, I'm lucky if it's one.
Chrissy Rey (17:20):
Okay, so it's been, let's see, December, so six
months, seven, seven months?
Does that sound right?
Dawn Hoelz (17:27):
Yeah, if you're including Logo in that development, yeah.
Chrissy Rey (17:31):
Okay, so you probably worked on it like 30
to 40 hours so far, altogether?
Dawn Hoelz (17:36):
That sounds about right.
Chrissy Rey (17:37):
And you said you wanted to try to launch it this summer.
So you think maybe what are youlike another six to eight hours?
Dawn Hoelz (17:45):
I would yeah I'm, hoping end of august beginning of september.
Chrissy Rey (17:49):
Okay, that's I mean for working on it, you know about
an hour a week that's completelyreasonable totally reasonable timeline.
For those of you listening if youare diying your timeline is up to you.
If it's your side gig, you've got tothink about how much time you have to
commit to actually working on the website.
And it takes time.
You can get a template, but youdon't want to launch a template.
(18:12):
You want to launch your websitewith your content and your
branding to speak to your audience.
Cause if it's a template andthere's 50 other businesses using
the same template, you need to havesome way to stand apart from them.
That having it customized isreally going to do that for you.
So let's say that you werestarting over from scratch.
Would you use the same processthat you used this time?
(18:35):
Or would you maybe tryto tweak it a little bit?
Dawn Hoelz (18:37):
That's a good question.
I would have been a little better abouttrying to organize my photos and various
things ahead of time and been ready forthat so that when I did all the building
I could just plug those in and be done.
But I did all the building andnow I'm sitting there with a
portfolio page with nothing in it.
And I would like to spend moretime focusing on it than I am.
(19:00):
So maybe planning better my timingand when I work on it and, probably
could have done a better job aboutthat and been done a little bit faster
Chrissy Rey (19:10):
When you're doing it as a side gig and you're DIY and you got it,
you got to use the time that you've got.
And if you can't necessarily make moretime cause you've got your day job,
so you can't really pull hours outof that to work on your own stuff.
So it's, I, it can be a little tricky.
Is there anything else that you wouldlike to share about your website or
about the process that you've beenthrough so far or any plans that you've
(19:32):
got for your website in the future?
Dawn Hoelz (19:35):
Just getting it launched, I think I also need to get my social
media presence available as well.
So I wanted to have the website donebefore I did much on social media.
So I at least had, somewhere to put it.
point.
And I also, I made a mistake ofprinting up some business cards
before I launched my website.
So everyone I have to give it to, I haveto be like, the website's not up yet.
(19:58):
So that goes to your previous question.
What would you do differently?
Um, so yeah, for I guess I don'treally, nothing else about the website,
I think for as far as what's to come.
I think it's just got to, I got Sitmy butt down, get this last couple
things finished and get it launched,get some social media going, get
that connected to my website, andthen see how it goes from there.
(20:20):
And I guess future wise, we'llsee what kind of feedback I
get on the website from people.
. If I need to make changes ortweaks or that kind of stuff,
and we'll see where that goes.
And I'm hoping one day I cando this, not as a side gig and
have it be a full-time job.
And maybe one day I'll be ableto have a actual developer clean
up my website and make it nicer.
Chrissy Rey (20:40):
You gotta take those steps.
Some people they start with aprofessional from the beginning.
Either, they don't have the time, orthe desire, or both to do it themselves.
And that's totally fine.
And then some people want to DIY when theystart out and that's totally fine too.
Both ways are totally fine.
In some cases it ends up being lessexpensive to get a professional
(21:03):
to do it, because if you thinkabout how much time you spend on it
versus how much money you could bemaking in that same amount of time.
Sometimes it evens out or ends upgoing one direction or the other.
Yeah, so it's definitely somethingto keep in mind with that.
Dawn Hoelz (21:19):
Yeah.
Chrissy Rey (21:20):
I so appreciate speaking with you.
It's really good to get the perspectiveof someone that is currently in the weeds,
so to speak and working on their websiteand trying to get something launched.
Thank you for coming on.
Do you have anything else youwant to share about your business?
Dawn Hoelz (21:34):
Just keep an eye out for the website, Snapdragon events.
It's snapdragonevents.
com, right?
snapdragoneventdesign.
com is the website.
Chrissy Rey (21:44):
You open to feedback from listeners?
Dawn Hoelz (21:46):
Absolutely.
Chrissy Rey (21:47):
Okay.
Yeah.
So fill out her contact formand send her some feedback.
If you've got it, if you'rewilling to share, especially
if you are her ideal client.
Thank you everybody for listeningwith, again, I'm with Dawn Hoelz
with Snapdragon event design.
She is again, based in Severna Park andshe works on events, event planning,
day of services, and custom eventdecor in the Baltimore metro area.
(22:10):
Thanks again for listening.
Make sure you've subscribed ifyou haven't already, and I will
catch you in the next episode.
Hey everybody, this is Chrissy Rey with Website Success.
Welcome back.
Today I am talking with Dawn Hoelz.
She is with Snapdragon Event Design.
She's based in Severna Park, andshe does full event planning, day of
services, and she also specializesin custom event decor for events,
(00:29):
so none of that off the shelf stuff.
She actually makes her decor, andshe does this in the Baltimore area.
And today we're going to talk a little bitabout Dawn's business and what she does.
And I'm also going to try to helpguide her through a few things to
help her finish up her website thatshe's been working on for awhile.
So Snapdragon event design,relatively new business.
(00:51):
Is that correct?
Dawn Hoelz (00:53):
Very new.
Yes.
Very new.
Chrissy Rey (00:54):
And you, so you don't have your website up and running yet.
You're currently working onyour website and it's going
to be in Squarespace, right?
Dawn Hoelz (01:04):
Yes.
Chrissy Rey (01:04):
What made you choose Squarespace for your website?
Dawn Hoelz (01:08):
Snapdragon events is a side gig for me right now, but in my full
time job I actually built our websiteand we built it in Squarespace, so it
was the platform that was chosen forme, and it's the one I'm most familiar
with, so that's why I chose to use it.
Chrissy Rey (01:21):
What do you like about Squarespace?
Dawn Hoelz (01:23):
It's pretty self explanatory, so I like that they have lots of
templates you can use, you can drag anddrop photos that they have available,
you can put your own photos in, itis pretty I think, user friendly.
Chrissy Rey (01:36):
Do you have web development experience from before or just, we
were talking about you have worked onwebsites for other people before, but
do you have development experience?
Would you consider yourself aweb developer, a web designer?
Dawn Hoelz (01:49):
Absolutely not.
Chrissy Rey (01:50):
So Squarespace is a good choice for somebody who's not a web
designer, needs something user friendly.
Would you say that's accurate?
Dawn Hoelz (01:57):
Yes, totally.
If you're, you don't know how, if you,yes, if you are not a actual web designer
builder, it is a great way to createa simple website with minimal effort.
Chrissy Rey (02:11):
And for the current website, so for the Snapdragon
events, event design, it'ssnapdragoneventdesign.com, are you doing
it all DIY or do you have somebody?
Okay, you're doing it all DIY?
Dawn Hoelz (02:24):
I'm DIYing the whole thing myself.
About the only thing I haveis a family member who's in
communications who's probably goingto look at some of the content.
But otherwise, yep.
Doing it all myself.
Chrissy Rey (02:35):
Okay, and are you pretty, pretty confident with it?
You feeling pretty good about it so far?
Dawn Hoelz (02:38):
I am.
I've had it I was able tobuild it pretty quickly.
I think the only thing holding me backright now is just getting portfolio
photos, trying to collect those fromvarious events I've done over time
before this was an official thing.
So they're not very well organizedand I'm getting some testimonials.
Chrissy Rey (02:56):
Okay, great.
And we, as we talked about earlier,you have worked on a website.
You said you were doingSquarespace for your day job.
Have you used any other websitebuilders for other websites in the past?
Dawn Hoelz (03:10):
Yes, many years ago a similar situation, the company I
was working for needed a websiteand I built one in an Adobe product.
I think it was called go live.
It was much more difficult and much morefelt more meant for programmer developer
type people, but I somehow muddled my waythrough and created a website back then.
Chrissy Rey (03:30):
That's pretty impressive.
I used to use what WasMacromedia, now Adobe Dreamweaver.
And I am a professional developer.
So I, I do it for a living.
And, but that stuff is not super easy forsomebody without a background in it, it's
not the easiest thing in the world to use.
So I'm impressed.
Dawn Hoelz (03:48):
Yeah, absolutely not easy.
I guess I was slightly lucky in thesense that I had familiarity with
Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator.
So I knew Adobe products.
It helped a little bit, I don'tknow, but it was many years ago.
Chrissy Rey (04:03):
So what kind of planning did you do for your website when you
said I'm going to make a website.
Here are the steps I'm going to take.
What kind of planning did you do for that?
Dawn Hoelz (04:12):
Actually I didn't I would say mostly what I did was go around and look
at other websites for similar companies.
So I looked at some other company eventplanning websites and tried to see
what they have And then decided whichpieces do I want to contact me page?
Do I want a portfolio page?
Do I, what was important to me to show?
(04:35):
And then I just laid it out andthen put things in the order
that I thought they should be.
And then it seems that websites thesedays tend to be much more minimal than
they used to be several years ago.
And more like one page ish, likeyou just scroll through one page.
So I sort of tried to plan how I wantedthat to look when you just scroll.
So mine is just a, like a homepage,one page, but it just scrolls all
(04:57):
the way down instead of multiplepages to click and link to.
Chrissy Rey (05:01):
Who is your target audience for your website and
for your business in general?
Dawn Hoelz (05:05):
Anyone and everyone.
Anyone that's throwing a party, whetherit's, a private at home party, whether
a corporate holiday party yeah, justanybody that's planning an event.
And again my specialty is event decor.
So I'm really into the design aspect,how the event looks, the feel, the theme.
Everything from invitations to, flowersand parting gifts, all that kind of stuff.
(05:29):
But I do full on planningand event coordination.
So I can help get, vendors and locationsand deal with those contracts and
help manage day of and set up andflow and all that kind of stuff.
Chrissy Rey (05:41):
Have you found in your experience with the events that
you've been doing so far, is thereone type of event or a particular type
of customer that you find yourselfworking with more often than the rest?
Dawn Hoelz (05:54):
Considering I'm very brand new at this, I wouldn't say I
have found any kind of pattern yet.
But I think what I've donethe most or more just private
events neighborhood parties.
I did a gala for my son's school.
Some more private things rather than big,no big conferences or anything like that.
Chrissy Rey (06:15):
Okay.
And now I have to put my web designerhat on here and make the recommendation.
Try to narrow your targetaudience a little bit.
If you say you'll work for anybodyand everybody, It's hard for your ideal
client to see themselves in your website.
So it, it does help to think aboutif you were gonna do a party for
(06:38):
a client, what do they look like?
Not specifically like physicalcharacteristics or anything, right?
But who are they?
So are they a woman?
Are they a man?
Are they 30 years old?
Are they 70 years old?
What is their income level?
Because certain people are goingto be able to hire a party planner.
Some people may not beable to hire a planner.
So you might want to think about the sortof financial availability that they have.
(07:01):
If there's particular geographiclocations that you prefer over others,
then that might be worth adding.
And there's, so there's two things thatI want you to do after we're done here.
Number one is just describe yourtarget audience a little bit more
specifically than just saying everybody.
Try to narrow it down a little bitand then create what's called an
(07:22):
ideal client or an ideal customeravatar, which is a fictional person
that represents your ideal client.
And the reason that's super, super helpfulis because when you pick out your colors
for your brand certain colors are goingto resonate with certain audiences.
Actually, I'm going to skipahead a little bit because we
haven't talked about brand yet.
(07:43):
Did you already pick outyour colors and your logo?
Dawn Hoelz (07:45):
Yes.
So I have designed a logo.
I've got the colors pretty narrowed down.
Fonts are narrowed down.
I guess they're narrowed down in the senseof I have a particular font for the logo.
Chrissy Rey (07:56):
And what colors are you using?
Dawn Hoelz (07:59):
It's actually mostly in the purple realm.
There's purple and a little bit of alittle bit of pink and white and lilac.
Chrissy Rey (08:08):
Why did you choose those colors?
Dawn Hoelz (08:10):
I wanted to have my look be more modern.
And originally I was looking atlogos and designing stuff in teals
and they were looking antique y andI was like that's not really me!
the feel I wanted.
I wanted something a little bitmore fun and streamlined and
colorful and bright and modern.
Chrissy Rey (08:31):
Okay.
So what you're doing, you arethinking of what your potential,
your ideal client is going to like.
Like the theme thatyou're trying to give off.
So you I'm thinking you havesome idea of who your idea is.
Dawn Hoelz (08:45):
Yeah, I probably do have a better idea than what I expressed.
Chrissy Rey (08:49):
Yes.
And I find that a lot.
I get a lot of clients that comein and say I already have my logo,
I've already got my colors and.
Just by looking at the logos andcolor, I'll say why did you pick this?
And they'll sometimes they'llsay cause I like those colors.
And that's not a good,that's not a good reason.
Yeah, it is a good reason.
You need to like your logo.
You need to like your colors, butthose are really going to be more for
(09:10):
your client and your target audience.
It needs to speak to them.
They need to be able to relate to it.
It sounds like when you said you wantedto go for a more modern look and feel.
To me, it says, youdidn't say I like purple.
Which, again, is totally fine.
Dawn Hoelz (09:26):
It's actually not my favorite color,
Chrissy Rey (09:28):
But there you go.
But it sounds like the people thatyou want to appeal to like purple.
Does that sound pretty accurate?
Dawn Hoelz (09:36):
Um, maybe I looked up what does it mean for logos that have purple
in their color and they were likeit's like a represents like royalty.
And I'm not looking to workfor royalty by any means.
But I think, you know, people probablythat are in the middle to upper class
would be more likely to be my clients.
(09:58):
I wanted it to be something that was mademe look professional and Not so much like
I'm doing this as a side gig, which I am.
Chrissy Rey (10:06):
So see, there you go.
You said the upper to middle income.
Dawn Hoelz (10:09):
Upper to middle.
Yeah.
Chrissy Rey (10:11):
So you're already narrowing down that ideal client
avatar a little bit there.
That's one of the things youwant to think about is that,
that, those kind of demographics.
And purple means luxuryfor a lot of people.
It's luxurious, it's rich.
Even if it's not financially richit's got that rich feel to it.
So that's painting a picturefor that ideal client.
(10:32):
I think if you just fill it in alittle bit more you'll, it'll help
you and is your logo already done?
Dawn Hoelz (10:39):
I think so.
Chrissy Rey (10:40):
Okay.
Okay.
Yeah, you haven't put it up yet.
So I was wondering your fontsyou haven't, you said you're
still working on your fonts.
Dawn Hoelz (10:47):
I have the font of the logo, but I haven't really
decided on a tiered font structure.
Like your main, supporting fonts.
Chrissy Rey (10:54):
Having some, a better idea of who that ideal client is
might help you with picking your fontsbecause, there, there are certain
fonts that, that some people will like.
And some that they will not like.
So if your ideal client, if youpick a font that they're just like,
no, that's not a good, I don'tlike the way that looks, they're
not going to like your website.
You're not going to speak to them.
You're not going to, they're not goingto see themselves in your website.
(11:17):
So I do think it, it would be good to,to narrow that down a little bit before,
before you finish the website, at least.
For the ideal client avatar, ifyou've never done this practice
before you want to think abouttheir sort of identifying things.
So you give them a name, likean actual name, like you can
call them Martha or something.
And then you say like, where do they live?
(11:37):
What is their income?
What jobs do they have?
Do they have kids?
What is their education level?
What kind of things are they interestedin like outside of your business?
What, what are, do they like to go hiking?
Do they like to go, are they outdoorsy?
Are they more they like to go clubbingon a Friday night or, are their hobbies?
All of the things like,what do they like to do?
(11:59):
What is their personality like?
What are some adjectivesthat describe them?
And then you also want to thinkabout what are their goals?
What do they want?
What do they need that you offer?
What kind of things do they need?
If you offer custom event decor, maybeone of their wants is that they just
don't like the off the shelf stuff.
(12:19):
And so they want something that looksbespoke and really shines at the party.
And everybody's Ooh,where did you get that?
That looks awesome.
Those speak to theirwants and their needs.
And like the pain points that might bethat they haven't been able to find.
Exactly the decor thatthey wanted in the store.
So they might need something custom.
(12:40):
And then you also need to think aboutwhere do they get their information from?
And this is going to come into likewhen you're sharing the website.
You need to know like, whereare they on social media?
Where are they on the internet?
What websites do they look at?
Where do they get recommendations?
Where do they do research?
And then, also know a little bit abouttheir buying behavior so that when
(13:00):
you write your content, which we'llget to in a minute but when you write
your content, you're speaking in away that they'll understand it and
they'll recognize themselves and say,Oh, yeah that's exactly what I need.
And you're going to be speaking to them.
I want you to do that when we're done.
Dawn Hoelz (13:16):
Okay.
Okay.
I've been taking notes.
Chrissy Rey (13:19):
Okay.
Awesome.
Awesome.
Awesome.
Now speaking of content I know yousaid you are, you have a family member
that's helping you with the content?
Dawn Hoelz (13:27):
Yeah, she hasn't looked at it yet, but she, I was
just talking to her other days andshe offered to read everything.
So I'll be giving her alink to look at it all.
I will say that was one of thethings that I found really nerve
wracking when I started was whatdo I write and how do I write it?
And I definitely turned to AI.
(13:48):
So I, had my basic ideas I wouldput down and then ask AI to clean
it up and make it sound pretty.
Chrissy Rey (13:54):
And what tool did you use for that?
Do you remember?
Dawn Hoelz (13:57):
I used the one that was in Squarespace.
Squarespace now has an option for it.
And I also, I think one of them was, Ijust wasn't getting anything I liked.
And so I went to ChatGPT.
Chrissy Rey (14:09):
Okay, I will, another recommendation, for writing, I've
found that CLAUDE aI, it's C L A U DE dot A I, is really good, especially
if you do that ideal client avatarexercise, and you basically paste
all of that in there and say, I needhelp writing content for this person.
And then it'll write to speak totheir challenges, their pain points,
(14:32):
their wants, their needs, theirbehaviors and all of that stuff.
It's pretty good at doing that.
Dawn Hoelz (14:36):
Okay, great.
Thanks.
Chrissy Rey (14:38):
And I would recommend before you speak with your family member about
the, or before you share the contentwith them is maybe try to do that
ICA and share that with them as well.
Cause it would probably help for her tounderstand who you're trying to write
for when she's reading that content.
And then, and we did already speakabout your brand a little bit.
So you've got your logo, your colors.
(14:59):
What kind of planning went intogetting all of that together?
I know we talked about a little bit, butcan you go a little bit more in depth
in what you did as far as thinking aboutwhat your brand was going to look like?
Dawn Hoelz (15:11):
Yeah, and it what I planned for initially and what I wound up with
in the end were totally different.
I think when I started planning, I startedthinking one of some of my favorite
colors, so I started working with thoseand I knew that with the name snap dragon,
I wanted to have a snap dragon in my logo.
So I tried playing around with that.
(15:31):
And I just I had a particularsort of style in mind.
That was more.
I don't even know I antique wasthe first kind of term that came to
my mind like a modern antique mix.
But more I developedvarious logos and I used.
I used Canva for creating my logo.
(15:53):
It just kept evolving and changingand what I liked and didn't like
in the end were very differentthan what I thought they would be.
But I shared lots and lots oflogos with family and friends.
I think they got sick andtired of seeing them all.
But ultimately just went withthe one that I liked the best.
That spoke to me more than the others.
Chrissy Rey (16:11):
Now this is a big question.
I know a lot of my listeners aredoing the DIY with their websites.
How long have you beenworking on your website?
So when did you start working on it?
And when did you stop?
Do you think you're going to beready to launch your website?
Dawn Hoelz (16:25):
Okay.
So again, this is a side gig.
So I haven't been able to commit.
If this was just all I was doing, Iwould have been done a lot faster.
I probably started toying with it, mostlytoying with the logo in December of 2023.
Got the logo probablynow down in February.
(16:46):
And then started building the website.
So I've probably been buildingfor most of the spring.
So yeah.
And I'm hoping to be done.
I thought I'd be done by now, butI just got held up with the two
pieces of getting portfolio photosand getting some testimonials.
So I just have to reach out and reallyget that and get the reach out to people
(17:08):
and then get those photos organized.
And I'm hoping to be able tofinish it by the end of the summer.
Chrissy Rey (17:14):
How many hours a week would you say that you work on it?
Dawn Hoelz (17:17):
Oh, I'm lucky if it's one.
Chrissy Rey (17:20):
Okay, so it's been, let's see, December, so six
months, seven, seven months?
Does that sound right?
Dawn Hoelz (17:27):
Yeah, if you're including Logo in that development, yeah.
Chrissy Rey (17:31):
Okay, so you probably worked on it like 30
to 40 hours so far, altogether?
Dawn Hoelz (17:36):
That sounds about right.
Chrissy Rey (17:37):
And you said you wanted to try to launch it this summer.
So you think maybe what are youlike another six to eight hours?
Dawn Hoelz (17:45):
I would yeah I'm, hoping end of august beginning of september.
Chrissy Rey (17:49):
Okay, that's I mean for working on it, you know about
an hour a week that's completelyreasonable totally reasonable timeline.
For those of you listening if youare diying your timeline is up to you.
If it's your side gig, you've got tothink about how much time you have to
commit to actually working on the website.
And it takes time.
You can get a template, but youdon't want to launch a template.
(18:12):
You want to launch your websitewith your content and your
branding to speak to your audience.
Cause if it's a template andthere's 50 other businesses using
the same template, you need to havesome way to stand apart from them.
That having it customized isreally going to do that for you.
So let's say that you werestarting over from scratch.
Would you use the same processthat you used this time?
(18:35):
Or would you maybe tryto tweak it a little bit?
Dawn Hoelz (18:37):
That's a good question.
I would have been a little better abouttrying to organize my photos and various
things ahead of time and been ready forthat so that when I did all the building
I could just plug those in and be done.
But I did all the building andnow I'm sitting there with a
portfolio page with nothing in it.
And I would like to spend moretime focusing on it than I am.
(19:00):
So maybe planning better my timingand when I work on it and, probably
could have done a better job aboutthat and been done a little bit faster
Chrissy Rey (19:10):
When you're doing it as a side gig and you're DIY and you got it,
you got to use the time that you've got.
And if you can't necessarily make moretime cause you've got your day job,
so you can't really pull hours outof that to work on your own stuff.
So it's, I, it can be a little tricky.
Is there anything else that you wouldlike to share about your website or
about the process that you've beenthrough so far or any plans that you've
(19:32):
got for your website in the future?
Dawn Hoelz (19:35):
Just getting it launched, I think I also need to get my social
media presence available as well.
So I wanted to have the website donebefore I did much on social media.
So I at least had, somewhere to put it.
point.
And I also, I made a mistake ofprinting up some business cards
before I launched my website.
So everyone I have to give it to, I haveto be like, the website's not up yet.
(19:58):
So that goes to your previous question.
What would you do differently?
Um, so yeah, for I guess I don'treally, nothing else about the website,
I think for as far as what's to come.
I think it's just got to, I got Sitmy butt down, get this last couple
things finished and get it launched,get some social media going, get
that connected to my website, andthen see how it goes from there.
(20:20):
And I guess future wise, we'llsee what kind of feedback I
get on the website from people.
. If I need to make changes ortweaks or that kind of stuff,
and we'll see where that goes.
And I'm hoping one day I cando this, not as a side gig and
have it be a full-time job.
And maybe one day I'll be ableto have a actual developer clean
up my website and make it nicer.
Chrissy Rey (20:40):
You gotta take those steps.
Some people they start with aprofessional from the beginning.
Either, they don't have the time, orthe desire, or both to do it themselves.
And that's totally fine.
And then some people want to DIY when theystart out and that's totally fine too.
Both ways are totally fine.
In some cases it ends up being lessexpensive to get a professional
(21:03):
to do it, because if you thinkabout how much time you spend on it
versus how much money you could bemaking in that same amount of time.
Sometimes it evens out or ends upgoing one direction or the other.
Yeah, so it's definitely somethingto keep in mind with that.
Dawn Hoelz (21:19):
Yeah.
Chrissy Rey (21:20):
I so appreciate speaking with you.
It's really good to get the perspectiveof someone that is currently in the weeds,
so to speak and working on their websiteand trying to get something launched.
Thank you for coming on.
Do you have anything else youwant to share about your business?
Dawn Hoelz (21:34):
Just keep an eye out for the website, Snapdragon events.
It's snapdragonevents.
com, right?
snapdragoneventdesign.
com is the website.
Chrissy Rey (21:44):
You open to feedback from listeners?
Dawn Hoelz (21:46):
Absolutely.
Chrissy Rey (21:47):
Okay.
Yeah.
So fill out her contact formand send her some feedback.
If you've got it, if you'rewilling to share, especially
if you are her ideal client.
Thank you everybody for listeningwith, again, I'm with Dawn Hoelz
with Snapdragon event design.
She is again, based in Severna Park andshe works on events, event planning,
day of services, and custom eventdecor in the Baltimore metro area.
(22:10):
Thanks again for listening.
Make sure you've subscribed ifyou haven't already, and I will
catch you in the next episode.
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