Bridal show season is roughly a month away, you need to be planning your follow-up now.

Really? Yes, really.

If you don’t follow-up on the leads from a wedding show then why are you bothering to do one in the first place? I understand that most people don’t, but if you want to win, I want you to be on top of it.

Let’s start at the beginning.

How will you collect leads?

If you are counting on the leads the show producer sends you are missing the boat. I will admit that those leads are getting better, but they are still a shotgun blast. Better is for you to collect leads in your booth. If they have come to your booth, they have already shown interest in you and your product or service. That makes them a warm lead. You want their contact information.

To get brides to give you an email address that they actually check you need to offer them something in return. It’s called an ethical bribe.

You should be deciding now what your ethical bribe will be. It could be a gift card or a discount or an add-on product or service. If you are a planner it could be a one hour “help” session via Skype.

You need to determine what your ethical bribe is  NOW so you can use it in your booth design and in your signage and collateral.

Most people do it backwards, they design the booth first and then hope to get everything else done in time. WRONG

You have your leads, now what?

First of all, pay off on the bribe. Duh. Use the opportunity to begin the conversation with your new prospects.

A good bulk emailer has an auto-responder function. Use it!

The first email your prospect should receive is an opt in.

Hi {bride’s name},

it was great to connect with you at the XZY Bridal show yesterday. I promised you {an ethical bride} and there is just one thing you need to do first, click the like below so i know I have your permission to email you at this address.

FYI, we will never sell, rent you share your email address. It’s just between us. Oh, and I promise not to flood your inbox.

Talk to you soon.

The next email:

Send the bribe.

Here is the tricky part that most people bail on, the auto-responder. You have their email AND permission to use it, so use it!

You will need a series of brief, fun, friendly emails that are 90% information about your part of the industry. Tips, tricks, trends and advice are all good ideas. Include links so you can track what is getting your reader’s attention.

Load them in to your auto-responded and set them to send at about 7 day intervals. You don’t want to up your frequency much from that because they will also be getting your regular weekly email updates.

Every email should be customized to include you logo, contact information and links to your website.

I have said it before and I will keep saying it. You need to have these emails loaded into your auto-responder BEFORE the bridal show.

Something else I want to remind you about. Track this stuff so you can learn. Take note of what gets clicked and what doesn’t. Pay attention to which headlines get the highest open rates.  Which each new bridal show you can update and massage your email campaign with just a little effort.

If you want to know, I use and recommend AWeber for email. I have from the beginning and yes, I am an affiliate.