The Four Golden Rules of Wedding Business Follow Up

By 4 Comments

How many times do you follow up your wedding leads?

The very sad truth is that most wedding vendors follow up only once…and sometimes not at all!…and even that follow up happens more than 24 hours after the lead rolls in.

Want to boost your wedding bookings without adding any extra marketing or advertising expenses? Follow the 4 Golden Rules of Follow Up.

The 4 Golden Rules of Follow Up:

  1. Follow Up Fast.
  2. Follow Up Frequently.
  3. Follow Up With Multiple Methods.
  4. Follow Up Creatively.

Let’s look at these individually…

Golden Rule #1 – Follow Up Fast.

He who follows up the fastest gets the booking. It demonstrates professionalism, availability and reliability…all of which is very important to the bride.

Studies show that the best time to follow up is WITHIN 5 MINUTES. Waiting even one hour decreases your likelihood of contacting the bride or groom by 21 times.

Golden Rule #2 – Follow Up Frequently.

If you aren’t following up at least 5 times, you are missing out on 80% of your potential bookings!

This is because most sales are not made until the 5th to 12th contact. (Kellogg School of Management)

Golden Rule #3 – Follow Up With Multiple Methods.

Brides and grooms may ignore your email, or it may get stuck in spam.

But if you also follow up with a direct mail piece (that’s good for good old-fashioned snail mail), a friendly telephone call, and they see your ad on Facebook, there’s a good chance that at least ONE of those methods is going to reach them.

When you follow up in multiple mediums, each exposure makes an impression on the couple, and you increase the chances of a response exponentially.

Golden Rule #4 – Follow Up Creatively.

One of the biggest mistakes wedding vendors make with their follow up…besides not following up at all…is following up exactly like everyone else.

If you want the bride or groom to respond, your follow up must be:

  • Attention getting.
  • Interesting.
  • Include a compelling call to action that earns the response.

That’s right; you have to EARN a response. If you want the bride to actually respond to your feedback, you’ve got to give her a very good reason to contact you.

We’re sharing more of our most successful follow up strategies and tips in a series of new videos just for wedding businesses. Watch this video to learn more…

“Enter Your Name and Email Below to Learn “The 10 Fatal Follow Up Myths of Wedding Vendors” Right Now!”

 




 

Photo Credit

If you'd like to get more free information and strategies like this, join our Wedding Business Tips email list here.

Filed Under: Bridal Marketing, Email, Home Featured, Home Page, Leads & Traffic Tagged With: , , , , , ,

How to Make Sure the Bride Gets Your Email

By Leave a Comment

Why don’t brides respond to your emails?

Well, there’s one reason they might not be answering you that many wedding vendors haven’t considered…

They never got your email.

Did you know that if you send out emails to five or more recipients, and even one of them has an AOL email address, NONE of those emails will get delivered?

Yep, AOL sends them right to the bride’s Spam folder. And they aren’t the only ones, either. Yahoo, Windows Live and other email clients are working overtime to keep spam out of their customers inboxes, and in many cases, your email gets hit with the spam label and never sees the light of day.

In 2011, 19% of email sent did not even reach the inbox, according to Return Path’s Global Deliverability Benchmark Report.

The bride or groom obviously can’t open your email if it never arrives. So what can be done?

The #1 thing you can do to make sure your emails get delivered is to use a reliable email marketing service.

An email marketing service (like Aweber or Sendpepper) is a service that lets you send personalized mass emails that don’t get stuck in the spam filter. These services specialize in making sure your email gets delivered. They monitor anti-spam laws and work hard to keep their collective act clean so that your message is received.

If you are sending an email to more than five people, you simply must use an email marketing service, or your emails are NOT going to get through. There isn’t any way around it.

Benefits of an Email Marketing Service:

  • Time savings.

    At the touch of a button you can send an email to hundreds or thousands of leads. No copy and pasting necessary.
     

  • Deliverability.

    Your email actually gets through. Using a service makes sure you email gets delivered. 
     

  • Personalization.

    An email service allows you to insert the bride’s name, wedding date or other details into an email easily, so you can send personalized emails automatically. 
     

  • Tracking.

    You’ll have a report of how many people opened your email, how many clicked through and more. This lets you know if what you’re doing is actually working. No more guessing about whether your email got stuck in cyberspace. 

The good news is that email marketing services are inexpensive and easy to use. A few of our favorites…

Recommended Email Marketing Services

  • Aweber – Our favorite email marketing only software, with the best reputation in the industry for high deliverability, flexibility and integration. Recommended for any level wedding business. Get a month trial for only $1!
  • Sendpepper – Awesome email marketing, contact management, tracking, tagging, landing page hosting and more. We recommend the Habenero level and above for wedding businesses needing a more advanced level of system integration and organization. Free 15 day trial.

So stop wondering if your emails are getting delivered and make sure they do.

Got a tip about emailing brides and grooms? Leave a comment and tell us about it!

Photo Credit

​

If you'd like to get more free information and strategies like this, join our Wedding Business Tips email list here.

Filed Under: Bridal Marketing, Home Featured, Home Page

Pricing for Profit: Are You Charging Too Much or Too Little?

By Leave a Comment

Cake topper on a stack of dollar bills

I’m a strong supporter of getting paid what you’re worth. Too many wedding vendors work hard, deliver excellent products and services, and get paid only a fraction of what they deserve.

How Much Should You Charge?

In 2002 we attended the Mobilebeat Convention in Las Vegas and attended Mark Ferrell’s “Getting What You’re Worth” presentation. His speech inspired us to raise our rates when we got home, but we quickly discovered that it wasn’t that simple.

You can’t just decide to raise your rates, even if you’re the best in the area. It’s kind of like standing on your roof and screaming, “I’m the best and you should hire me because I cost more!” and expecting customers to come running.

Your price has to align with reality or it simply won’t work. Your price needs a reality check.

How does your price measure up against the REALITY of your market?

Reality Check Points

  • Demand in your market.

    How many weddings do you need to book make your sales numbers? How many weddings are happening in your area, and how many of them have the budget for your service? 

  • Your experience and reputation.

    If you are just starting out, your price should probably be average or just below average for your market. If you’re very well-established, your price can be higher because couples will pay more for a “sure thing.” 

  • Your competition.

    As much as I’d like to completely ignore the price of my competition, you can’t. Couples judge value by comparison, and if your price is completely out of the ballpark, you may be fighting a losing battle.

Don’t just pick your price out a hat and cross your fingers in the hopes that brides and grooms will go for it. Do your homework first to find out the reality in your local wedding market and ensure that your price makes sense.

You’re looking for some very specific information…

Pricing Numbers You Need to Know:

  • Number of weddings in your market. 

  • How much the average couple in your market spends on your products or services. 

  • How many competitors you have.

So how do you find these all important numbers? It’s not like someone gives you the Pricing Handbook For Wedding Vendors when you start your wedding business. (Nice thought, though.)

5 Ways to Get Stats For Your Local Wedding Market

  1. For US wedding vendors – Go to TheWeddingReport.com for a comprehensive breakdown of budget, price for your services and number of competitors, down to the zip code! 

  2. For UK wedding vendors – Go to Hitched-WIFE.org to get stats for the UK wedding market. 

  3. National wedding vendor associations.  Associations often gather statistics for their members, so check with your professional associations to gather your market info. 

  4. Shop your competition.  Search online to gather pricing information, send out a few emails or lurk in the local bride chat rooms to find out what brides are paying.  

  5. Ask for the “vital stats” in your local government office.  Most government agencies will share their “vital stats” on the number of marriages in your area. They don’t provide budget information, but you’ll be able to discover how many potential customers you have.

When you’re gathering your market research, don’t get stuck on any of this stuff. You don’t need exact details; just get a rough indication of pricing, budgets and the competition. That will be enough to help you determine your price.

Spend a couple hours doing this market research and you’ll be EONS ahead of your competition, and well on your way to pricing for maximum profit!

Now I want to know…how did you determine your price and how is it working for you?

 

If you'd like to get more free information and strategies like this, join our Wedding Business Tips email list here.

Filed Under: Home Featured, Home Page Tagged With: , , , ,

Top Wedding Vendor Questions

By 34 Comments

These are the most Frequently Asked Questions of wedding vendors and blog posts that offer tips and strategies to answer them.

We’ll be adding to this list as we go, so if you have a question you’d like us to answer, please leave a comment and we’ll get to it as soon as we can. Thanks!

  1. How Do I Deal with Price Shoppers?


  2. How Do I Educate Customers About My Value?


  3. How Can I Convince Brides About My Value Immediately?


  4. How Do I Get More Leads for my Wedding Business?


  5. What is the Best Way to Beat the Competition?


  6. How Do I Find Time To Do Everything For My Wedding Business?


  7. How Do I Get Everything Done for My Wedding Business?


  8. How Can I Get Leads When I’m New to the Wedding Business?


  9. What Should I Do With That Bridal Show Lead List?


  10. How Do I Get Brides To Open My Email?


  11. What is the Best Way to Get My Name Out at a Reasonable Cost?


  12. How Much Should I Charge?


  13. How Can I Attract High End Brides?


  14. What Should I Name My Wedding Business?

 

If you'd like to get more free information and strategies like this, join our Wedding Business Tips email list here.

Filed Under: Bridal Marketing, Home Featured, Home Page Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,