Engage!09 :: The Encore

After hearing all the excitement surrounding the Engage conferences, put on by the dynamic duo Rebecca Grinnals and Kathryn Arce of Engaging Concepts, I finally had the opportunity to experience it first hand!

Last month, I flew to Vegas with my partners in crime Jean Marks and Gloria Wong Tritasavit to attend Engage!09::The Encore. It was held at the fabulous new Encore, which is a sister property of Wynn, by Steve Wynn.

I'm quite behind with posting any type of 'recap', so it is best to refer to a few of the other wonderful recaps already out there:

The Southern Weddings Daily Blog (LOVED meeting the awesome Lara Casey, who was just stunning her little red dress at the Blush party!)

Momental Designs (Kristy Rice is just ridiculously talented--look at her sketches in this post!)

Splendid Communications (Liene's blog is literally the FIRST thing I lay eyes on in the morning--she offers SO much valuable information for us to learn from!)

Julianne Smith (Kudos to Julianne for live blogging throughout the day...AND for putting a new twist to the old garter tradition!)

I thought I'd share a few valuable things I learned from the amazing speakers that were there. I would be writing pages after pages if I were to list everything in detail, so I will just do simple one liners to give you a flavor of it!

1. Average of 43 businesses involved in an American wedding
2. New term--> High Value Bride
3. Social media is here to stay. Take a look at this powerful video below!



4. Good marketers tell a story
5. Price from top down, not the other way around

Along with all the other attendees, we were incredibly inspired by Simon T. Bailey, author of Release Your Brilliance. Some of the wisdom he shared:

--How you start your day determines your day
--Connect first, then sell
--You need to slow down in order to speed up
--Breakthrough strategy comes when you are right about to quit
--Hire for attitude, train for success

There are about a million other things I learned from Rebecca Grinnals, Sean Low, Marcy Blum, Todd-Avery Lenahan, and all the other fabulous speakers there but the BEST part of Engage was getting to meet and connect with other like minded professionals from all over the world! I got to meet Maria Cooke of Ritzy Bee, Sylvia Weinstock, Blair and Christy of Junebug Weddings, Harmony Walter of Bridal Bar, Randy Fenoli, just to name a few. I also got to reconnect with the lovely ladies at the Wynn wedding salon, and they were just as gracious and welcoming as I remembered them to be.

I am really excited that Sean and Rebecca will both be speaking at The Academy for Planners + Designers in March. Because this event is focusing only on wedding planners, event designers, and floral designers, they will be crafting a very tailored presentation for this specific group. If you are a planner or designer, you definitely don't want to miss this opportunity to learn from the best. Read more about it on the Wedding360 blog!