3 Free Strategies For Digging Up Hidden Bridal Leads Today

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Bride Searching

The #1 question we get from wedding vendors is, without a doubt…

How can I get more leads?

Before I answer with a wise ass comment like, “What do I look like, a lead vending machine?” we really can’t answer that question, not really, really well, until we know a little more about you.

But if I were a wedding vendor (wait a second, I AM a wedding vendor!) and if I needed to get more leads right now, as in TODAY, here’s what I would do.

How to Get More Leads Today

1) Start dating your wedding vendor friends.

You have friends in the wedding business, don’t you? When was the last time you called them up? Asked them to lunch? Sent them a referral?

Other wedding vendors are the best place to find an endless stream of leads. So if you want to start getting more today, get our your Rolodex and contact them!

Hint: don’t make your lunch date a pitch fest. Instead, find out what you can do to help them first. This makes them feel an unconscious pressure to return the favor and do something nice for you.

Kinda cool when you can use psychology like that, eh?

2) Check your in box.

In our expose’ on the 10 Fatal Follow Up Mistakes of Wedding Vendors we revealed the disturbing truth that 80% of sales are made AFTER at least 5 contacts.

How did you follow up with your leads? Have you followed up in multiple mediums: email, phone, direct mail?

If that leads you already have in your hands have NOT heard from you at least five times in multiple formats…it’s time to follow up again.

Go through your inbox and pour through your email inquiries from the last two months. Listen to those old voice mail messages.

Think of an interesting, compelling way to follow up with them. Be different and give them a reason to want to respond.

I guarantee you have a real lead in there somewhere.

3) Spend some time with friends…social media “friends,” that is.

You can start attracting bride leads TODAY by going to where they hang out online and helping them out. Facebook is the easiest place to try this out.

Find the local Facebook business pages that have lots of bride fans and make sure you “like” that page as YOUR business. Check out the conversation and contribute to it by posting as your business page, if you have one.

Whatever you do, DON’T directly promote your business! Give the page owner a compliment, answer a question, share a cool resource brides like such as a link to a cool Real Wedding blog post.

You can even ask a provocative question such as, “What do you think about brides wearing colored wedding dresses? Would you do it?”

Network with other wedding vendors online, too. Use the same strategy of doing something nice for them first: like their posts, leave a comment, share their words of wisdom. They’ll return the favor and spread the word about you.

When you start showing off your personality and expertise in the places where brides hang out…in a non-promotional way…they’ll click through to your page. They’re curious about what you do and if they like what they see they may even “like” or friend you. Heck, they may even visit your website, if you give them a good enough reason.

Those are leads just waiting to be found.

Getting More Leads, the Next Generation

Those are the 3 things I would do if I had a wedding business and I needed to get some more leads coming in TODAY. These methods require no money and you probably already have everything you need to do them.

However, they aren’t the “big pay-off” strategies. The strategies that lead to a flood of leads and booked weddings take more than a day to pull off. But they’re still pretty easy.

Want to Learn How to Capture More of the Leads You’re Missing Out On?

Watch this video to learn the 10 Fatal Follow Up Myths That Are Killing Your Wedding Business!

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

Disappointed with Bridal Lead Lists? These Two Strategies Book ‘Em Faster and Cheaper

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A couple weeks ago, I wrote a blog post asking the question, “Do Bridal Lead Lists Actually Work?” and shared it on Linked In.

Before we dive into what we uncovered, let’s quickly define what we’re talking about when we say, “bridal lead list.”

We’re talking about those icy cold lead lists you buy either in bulk from wedding directory sites, magazines and bridal shows, or individually from lead generating sites like Respond.com. They are brides or grooms who haven’t met you, haven’t visited your website, and tend to be more price motivated.

Well, leave it to the innovative and helpful members of the wedding business community to not only answer that provocative question, but to share strategies for following up with bridal leads that work and alternatives that work even better.

Are you ready? Because these guys knocked my socks off.

The Reality of Bridal Lead Lists

The owner of A Better DJ and Photographer shared his results from bridal lead lists.

Based on his experience with hundreds of thousands of bridal lead lists:

  • 4% actually respond by phone or email.
  • 50% of those that call book immediately.
  • Calls his wife takes book 100% of the time.
  • Calls he takes book 85% of the time.

These results are actually high, which indicates an offer that is a good match for these type of bridal leads; most wedding pros get a response from 1% of these leads. Yeah, not too impressive, huh?

Out of 100 bridal list leads you contact, expect only 1-4 of them to respond.

What is A Better DJ and Photography doing right with these bridal leads? He’s tracking and measuring his results.

He knows exactly how many leads he’s going to book from that list, so he can easily decide if it’s worth his time and money. He even knows that it’s in his best interest to keep his wife glued to the phone!

An Alternative to Chasing Down Unresponsive Bridal Leads

Over time, A Better DJ and Photographer traded in his time chasing down unresponsive bridal leads like these for focus on search engine optimization for his website and social media. This results in higher quality, more targeted leads that he can book in less time.

“I used to invest 40-60 hours a week chasing leads…” he explains. “Now I invest 20 of those 40 to 60 hours into SEO each week and the other hours have been converted to actually booking clients.”

Nick Choroshyliw, owner of Rochester photography company, Nix Images, reported similarly disappointing results after two years of combined email and direct mail marketing to bridal show lead lists. In other words, these leads were mostly duds.

However, Nick struck upon a much more cost-effective strategy that DOES work with bridal show lead lists.

How to Book Bridal Show Leads Without Going to the Show!

No, we’re not suggesting that you hide in the parking lot and pounce on brides leaving the bridal show, throwing business cards or leave fliers on their windshields. That would be bad, bad juju.

Nick no longer attends these shows in person. Instead, he pays a much smaller fee to have his printed information added to the bridal gift bags distributed to every bride. This way, he gets his business in front of the 400-450 brides who receive the bag upon registration.

After the show, they sort through the cards they’ve collected from vendors…along with the ones that came “pre-stuffed” in the bag…and many end up contacting him.

“What’s interesting is that many of the brides who contacted me say that they liked my display at the show,” Nick says. “Well, I wasn’t at the show! My 6×8 glossy cards were stuffed in the information bags…The organizer charges a fraction of the cost…to stuff the cards into the bags and it appears that I actually get a better response than being there.”

If you can design a postcard that gets results, like the one Nix Images is using, this can be an effective, low cost alternative to getting quality leads from a bridal show.

Thanks so much for sharing your experience and ideas with us, guys!

Now I want to know…what’s YOUR experience with bridal lead lists? Do they work for you or do you have something better?

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Filed Under: Advertising, Attracting Ideal Clients, Bridal Marketing, Home Page, Leads & Traffic, Personal Development Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

48 Websites Where You Can Get Free Marketing For Your Wedding Business

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Does FREE marketing, the kind that actually works, even exist?

It’s true that marketing is going to cost you either time or money. But there are some amazing free wedding marketing resources you need to be taking advantage of.

What started out as “14 Free Wedding Marketing Websites” has grown to a list of more than 18 websites and 30 local business directories.

Before you start using these free marketing resources, there are some key things you need to know or you can mess this up. We’re going to tell you why this is important, which sites you simply MUST list yourself on, and the mistakes to avoid.

Do this right and it will bring you more leads. Do this wrong and all you’ll do is waste more of your precious time.

These directory sites and listings get a lot of website visitors and have a lot of activity. This means that typically they have a lot more visibility and ranking that your website does. When a bride or groom is searching, they’re more likely to find you on these higher ranking sites.

These websites and directories also act as multiple points of contact with the bride and groom, so that your business is everywhere.

Studies show that it takes 5-12 contacts with your business before they buy.

Every time they see you on a review site or a business listing, it gets them one step closer to booking you. Long story short: list your business on these sites and you will make more money!

Watch This Video to Learn 48 Websites For Free Marketing

CLICK HERE to get the Holiday Triple Play Special at 78% OFF the regular price! and collect today’s “Mystery Bonus” revealed in the video.

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

Filed Under: Attracting Ideal Clients, Bridal Marketing, Home Page, Leads & Traffic, Wedding Business, Wedding Business Income Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

6 Sneaky Tactics to Get Your Wedding Business on Page 1 of Google

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Getting in front of more qualified brides and grooms is the #1 challenge of wedding vendors. In this video, we’re going to show you 6 sneaky ways to get more leads for your wedding business the cheap, fast way.

It’s true that when you’re running a wedding business, it’s going to cost you either time or money to get leads. Most of us don’t have much of a marketing budget to work with, so we’ve got to work like a “bootstrapper.”

A bootstrapper uses marketing strategies geared towards making the most money, with the least amount of time and money invested. Because as bootstrappers, we can’t afford to waste a penny!

One of the most efficient and effective ways to get more leads is using your website and the internet. Why? Because 86% of couples use the internet to plan their weddings. They’re actively searching for you already; you just need to make sure they find you.

It’s also incredibly efficient because if you set it up right, it requires only a little maintenance and it works for you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Here’s the challenge; most couples are using Google to search for you. So if you want to be found, you need to be on Page 1 of Google.

There is a lot of competition for Page 1, which means that it can be hard work, and it takes time. If you really hit it hard, you can do it in a few months when you know what to do.

What if you don’t have a lot of time or money to invest?

That’s where we come in! In this video we show you…

6 Sneaky Tactics to Get Your Wedding Business On Page 1 of Google

  • How to do it FAST. Sometimes even overnight!
  • How to do it cheap.

Watch This Video to Learn 6 Sneaky Tactics to Get Your Business On Page 1

CLICK HERE to get the Holiday Triple Play Special at 78% OFF the regular price! and collect today’s “Mystery Bonus” revealed in the video.

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

Filed Under: Attracting Ideal Clients, Bridal Marketing, Home Page, Leads & Traffic, Website, Website Tools & Tips, Wedding Websites Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Do Bridal Lead Lists Actually Work?

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Question:

HI Stephanie & Jeff,

Still benefiting from your Book More Brides videos, excellent value for money.

You raised an interesting point about having leads stopped, one of the biggest providers I have been using for years has just stopped his business. I know you are on the other side of the pond but do you know of any good firms that sell bridal leads over here in the UK?

Bye for now

Terry

Answer:

Hi, Terry.

Most paid sources of bridal lead lists are not worth the money. The leads aren’t targeted for your specific business by type of client, budget, style, etc., making them very poor quality. It typically takes a lot of work following up for very little return.

Our clients have reported getting a response from only 1 out of 100 bridal leads of this type! Apparently, they sell them cheap for a reason. :)

A better investment would be to put that money into turning your website into a real money-making machine, or possibly running some Facebook ads. They are much more targeted demographically and you can test your results. More ideas for effective wedding marketing at a reasonable cost here.

In other words, rather than purchasing leads, build your own bridal lead list! When you send targeted traffic to your website and then get those brides and grooms to enter their name and email to get a cool freebie (what we call a “Bride Bribe”), like a free report, video or valuable checklist, you’re creating a list of very warm, qualified leads you can now follow up with.

If you DO decide to purchase bridal leads, investigate their quality first. Ask your wedding vendor friends about their experiences, and grill the company for statistics and references.

You’ll want to ask:

  • How many unique visitors do you get?
  • How do you qualify your leads?
  • Do you provide stats on my ad views and click throughs?
  • What exactly these brides think they’ll be receiving when they sign up? If the bride hasn’t contacted you directly, she often considers your emails to be spam, no matter what she agreed to upon sign up.

With any bridal lead list, start out with a monthly trial if possible to measure your results before committing to something long term.

I was very impressed with the advertising experiment with the UK site, Wedding Chaos, done by Claire Gould over at English Wedding. They offer great metrics for tracking and you can learn a lot from her results and test them out for yourself, which I highly recommend.

Good luck with everything!

Stephanie

What do YOU think about bridal lead lists? Have they worked for you?

Got a wedding business question you want answered? Email Stephanie & Jeff and you could be the next Question of the Week! All personal details about your identity will be removed unless you specify otherwise.

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Filed Under: Attracting Ideal Clients, Bridal Marketing, Home Page, Leads & Traffic, Website, Website Tools & Tips, Wedding Business, Wedding Business Income, Wedding Websites Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Urgent Pinterest Update for Wedding Pros

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Just last week Pinterest introduced a new feature you need to know about: Pinterest business accounts.

While there really aren’t any benefits to having a “business” account versus a “personal” one right now, if you’re already using your Pinterest account for your business, you need to convert it to a business account as soon as possible.

Here’s why:

Pinterest updated their terms of service to now require that any account being used for commercial purposes must be a business account.

That means, just like with Facebook, that if you’re using your personal account for business purposes, they can shut you down. It’s not likely they’re going to do that any time soon…it wouldn’t be very fair since they just made the announcement…but if you value your Pinterest account, I’d say it’s better safe than sorry.

How to Convert to a Pinterest Business Account

  1. Go to this link and login to your Pinterest account.
  2. Follow the instructions to fill in your company name and type of business.
  3. Hit “save” and you’re all set!

Keep your eyes on Pinterest for what comes next. The stats report (depending on the source) that 80-97% of Pinterest users are women, and wedding planning is one of the top uses for Pinterest.

The brides are there, and with the new addition of Pinterest business accounts, it’s likely that you’ll be able to purchase advertising or perhaps even “sponsored pins” in the future to promote your wedding business even more effectively.

I’m dying to know… Are you using Pinterest for your wedding business? What do you think about it?

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

Filed Under: Advertising, Bridal Marketing, Home Page, Leads & Traffic, Mobile Marketing, Pinterest, Social Media Tips, Wedding Websites Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Wedding Marketing Lessons from the Presidential Campaign

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Confession: I am a political junkie.

We just survived the Presidential election. Call me weird, but I actually enjoy the election season game. Let me be clear; I hate robo-calls, and I don’t particularly enjoy watching two people try to destroy each other. The negative part isn’t very fun.

I love the creation of the candidate’s image, the branding process, the rolling out of a national message through political commercials. Some are successful; some aren’t.

Whether you liked or hated the results, there’s a lot to learn from the experience.

Each side is selling their product: the candidate. They use a whole slew of marketing techniques to do this. Some of them you can directly apply to your wedding business. Others, you might want to stay away from.

Watch this video to learn more:

What do think about the political “marketing” process?

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Filed Under: Advertising, Attracting Ideal Clients, Bridal Marketing, Home Page, Leads & Traffic, Personal Development, Wedding Business Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Free Event for Wedding Vendors Shows You How to Book More Weddings Fast

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The top concerns of wedding business people are…

  • Getting more leads.
  • Booking more weddings.

That’s what the Wedding Business Acceleration Summit, a free event just for wedding professionals, is all about!

It’s 7 days of totally FREE, high value wedding marketing strategies you can use to book more weddings at higher prices.

Watch the video below to learn more:


Enter Your Name and Email Below to Join Us for Free!

Here are the awesome presentations lined up so far:

DAY 1 – “21 Must Have FREE Tools and Resources to Turbo Charge Your Wedding Biz” with Stephanie & Jeff Padovani of BookMoreBrides.com. (That’s us!)

DAY 2 – “Power of 10: How 7 Small Changes Can Double Your Profits!” with Brian McGovern of BrianMcGovern.com

DAY 3 – “The Power of Pinning: How to Get More Leads and Customers With Pinterest” with Melanie Duncan of PowerofPinning.com

DAY 4 – “Effortless PR: How to Generate a Promotional Buzz Without Working Your Tail Off” with Meghan Ely of OFDConsulting.com

DAY 5 – “Blog Swapping: How to Steal Other People’s Traffic, Fans and Readers…and Have Them Love You For it!” with Kathy DalPra of BrideAppeal.com

DAY 6 – “The Secret to Getting Brides on Facebook in Only 15 Minutes a Day” with Christine Dyer of BridalTweet.com

DAY 7 – “How to Book Yourself Solid with Youtube in 3 Steps” with James Wedmore of VideoTrafficAcademy.com

This is a ground-breaking, one of a kind event just for professionals in the wedding business, with experts from inside and outside the wedding industry, so don’t miss out!

JOIN US HERE.

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

Filed Under: Advertising, Attracting Ideal Clients, Bridal Marketing, Free Resources, Free Wedding Business Tools, Home Page, Leads & Traffic, Personal Development, Pinterest, Social Media Tips, Website Tools & Tips, Wedding Business, Wedding Business Income, Wedding Vendors Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Why A Bad Wedding Business Tactic Might Not Be Bad

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How many times have you tried some new marketing tactic and it’s either failed, or just not turned out as planned? I would guess it’s happened multiple times. Everyone has things that just don’t work for them. However, as Les McKeown points out in his article, the problem might not be in the idea itself so much as something else connected to the execution of the idea.

Before you stop using a new wedding business tactic that you’ve been trying, take the time to figure out why it failed. Was it that your new website was a bad idea, or was the actual problem in the layout of the new website? When you are learning to ride a horse you don’t give up the first time you fall of. You get up and try it again and again until you master riding. New business tactics are the same. When a store re-brands itself it can either do wonders for the store, or kill it. The only reason re-branding kills a business is because it was done poorly, not because they shouldn’t have tried to update themselves.

While there are some horrible business ideas out there, most of them are actually good ideas. Think about the advertisements you see on TV. Some are great, others are terrible. You don’t stop advertising because one ad didn’t work out. You just come up with a new idea, hire new people, and keep going. What do you think?

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