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Tuxedos, Old Spice and Wedding Marketing

August 3, 2010 By 1 Comment

I have been following the articles over on eWedNews concerning the demise of the formal wear industry. So, you know me, I started looking at their marketing.

First question: What marketing? Why isn’t there a gorgeous man in a gorgeous tux in every bridal gown ad? Isn’t there usually a groom at most occasions to wear a bridal gown?.

Second, the ad I do see most is the Men’s Wearhouse ad that speaks directly to men. Pffffft! If you want men to wear tuxedos you have to pitch the brides.

Which brings us to the Old Spice Man. If you haven’t caught this bit of viral brilliance then you have been living in a cave. What started as an ad on the Super Bowl transformed itself into a social media phenomenon with the Old Spice man responding to tweets in YouTube video spots. Brilliant social media marketing, but that isn’t the point I want to make.

*pause for random opportunity to include gratuitous half naked hunky guy video

This is: 80% of the purchases made in the US are made by women. The Old Spice campaign is aimed at women. Yes it is a product for men, so are tuxedos. However, body wash isn’t something that most men think about, neither are tuxedos. They are both something women think about. Whether it is a wife or partner that does the shopping and decides which body wash to buy or a bride deciding what to dress the men in the wedding party in, it is the women that make the decision. That is why you need to pitch to her.

Seriously, do you really think that an ad with a hunky half naked man was created to appeal to MEN? I didn’t think so. But what happens to the single guy that sees his date pay attention to said hunky half naked guy? He is going to pick up that product thinking that he may get her to pay that kind of attention to him. Either way, it was the woman’s influence that drove the sale.

Back to formal wear. If you want men to start wearing tuxedos, you are going to have to sell women on the idea first.

Say for instance, when the most recent Bond movie came out, why wasn’t there a tie in with how sexy Daniel Craig looked in formal wear? I mean come on, he had on a tux in the poster for Casino Royale!!! Sexy man> sexily dressed. Pitch perfect for a campaign directed at women.

Here is another, I ran across a couple of beach wedding pictures that had the bride in a traditional formal gown and the groom in cargo shorts and a bowling shirt. How about a picture like that with the tag line, “Don’t you deserve better?” Maybe if the tuxedo manufacturers produced a line specifically for the beach weddings, after all the gown manufacturers have.

Back to the gown ads. Those ads I do see in magazines with men in tuxedos usually have him looking disaffected and women fawning over him. That is pitching to men. Let’s turn it around, how about have him looking on adoringly at her? Every girl is crazy about a sharp dressed man, but on her wedding day the last thing she wants is all of her bridesmaids fawning over her new hubs. The better story is “Look at this gorgeous man that only has eyes for me.”

More important than the end user of your product, think about who is most likely to influence that purchase. That’s where you aim the pitch.

Filed Under: Announcement, wedding marketing, What's Hot Tagged With: , , ,

Is Email Eating Your Life?

June 2, 2010 By Leave a Comment

In the early days of this website one of the things I used to go on about was email; how if you weren’t using it with today’s brides you were way behind the times. With the state of our inboxes today I almost wish I would have kept my mouth shut.

While it is true that email is still the primary form of communication with today’s brides some of them have gotten completely out of hand. The other side of that coin is that we have let them do it. A few weeks ago I sat next to a wedding planner at a board meeting and she spent the entire meeting replying to email on her blackberry. I know another planner that is notorious for sending email on her Treo while she’s driving. I won’t ride with her anymore. It is not unheard of for people to have 400 emails a day. Now I’ll grant you that 1/2 of them are things that don’t require a response like newsletters, humor or those “keep it going” chain letters but how do you sort through that large of a tangle to get to the stuff you need. For people like me that spend my day on a keyboard the constant ping telling me I have new mail can get deafening. Then comes the angry post on the forum that so and so doesn’t answer his/her email. Every little question a bride has is of earth shattering importance to her and if you don’t respond in a timely fashion –read nanosecond- she thinks you are dropping the ball.  What the heck are you supposed to do?

There is a growing movement to shut it down. More and more people are taking the step of putting an auto responder on their primary email accounts saying something along the following lines:

“I appreciate your email but I have made the decision to only check my mail at the following times: 7:00 AM and in the late evening. If this is an issue that needs a more immediate response please reach me on my cell phone.”

This way they know why they haven’t heard back from you. It also lets you pick up all seven or eight of those silly little questions some brides have and bundle the answer into on email response, saving you a bundle of time.

Another tactic that some are employing is if an email conversation runs into three or more exchanges they pick up the phone, settle it all out in one conversation and be done with it. Great idea.

Personally what I have done is set up multiple email accounts, gmail, Outlook and thunderbird. I have different addys running through each one. Depending on my work load that day I can keep one or all of them open. I also use IM for quick discussions and if I have an ongoing conversation there I can easily switch it to my cell. I have also shut down all my newsletters, if they have an RSS feed I can catch it on my blog reader when I have time with out it cluttering my inbox.  Just to give you an idea there are 700 unopened email in my inbox right now. If any of them were that important they would have called, don’t you think?

Filed Under: What's Hot Tagged With: , , ,

Wedding Trends for 2010

June 2, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Originally published 1-1-10

As always, I’ll here to wade through the deep waters to bring you the good stuff. Just like every other year there are articles everywhere telling you what the top trends will be for the New Year. One says this, another contradicts it. Then there is always that one article that pops up on at least a dozen different site that says the exact same thing, word for word.

I try to stay on trend for you all year long. This month rather than one of my usual trend lightning rounds I thought I would pull a lightening round on everyone elses trend list. Hehehe. There is some funny stuff out there.

This year, the prize for the most over copied article goes to this one about wedding gown color. It starts this way:

For dresses, black is still a leading trend for the fashion-forward bride that wants to make a bold statement for the Big Day. This color scheme was popular on the Paris fashion runways in 2008 and has remained in the forefront of wedding dress trends in subsequent years. Black dresses embellished with lace and pearls are…read more.

Now personally, I’m not seeing it. Edgy brides have always made interesting color choices, but I just don’t see mainstream brides flocking to black or red wedding gowns for formal weddings. Bridesmaid? Well of course, but not brides.

Another interesting thing I found concerned the cocktail hour. According to Linnea Tangerra quoted on WeddingWindow.com, “Couples are choosing to not only extend the length of cocktail hour but to make it a more important part of their wedding.” Yet over on StylishWeddingIdeas.com the opinion seems to be just the opposite, “One of the biggest trends is a shorter cocktail hour.” What the heck?

As for trends I ran across that I do think have legs, number one is the non-linear aisle. I’ll bet on this one for a couple of reasons, mostly because it allows for a non-traditional entrance. A bride can enter from the side or wind through the seating or you can have a couple enter from either side simultaneously and meet at the altar. If you add to this the trend toward non-traditional seating such as benches or lounge furniture, it all works together to create a unique ceremony.

The next trend I am seeing, well actually two, reinforces it even more. Wedding professionals are seeing more and more “at home“ weddings as well a move toward “on site” ceremonies.

Whether couples are choosing to invest what they would have spent on a reception location into home improvement or brides are seeking the comfort and nostalgia of marrying in the home they grew up in, more couples are tying the knot in the comfort of home. I’m sure this is partly due to the economy.

The corollary to this is that more venues are building  or setting aside areas specifically to host the ceremony. Again, this may be a money saving trend on the part of the couples and/or a money making trend on the part of the venues. Either way, you not have a non-traditional space for the ceremony. Since couples are no longer restricted by the center aisle in their house of worship, they can now think of other ways to approach the altar.

This one I found a bit odd in light of all the cost cutting and budget crunching going on, but there seems to be a nearly universal opinion that favors are making a comeback. The best reason I came across for this was that couples have a better understanding of the money and effort it takes on the part of their guest to attend their wedding and want to find a way to better express their gratitude. On that note, favors are becoming more personally meaningful. Gone are the cheesy bags of Jordan almonds or personalized M&Ms. Replaced often by handmade treats or real keepsakes.

Invitations are all but traditional. The words I keep seeing are: texture, die cut, laser cut, retro.  Interestingly the one word I didn’t see come up on the trend lists was the rip roaring trend for 2009, letterpress. Could it be that it is fading? Traditional invitations with their cream or white stock and copper plate printing and formal wording have become such a distant memory that I predict they will make a comeback in the next few years.

The other  thing I can’t leave out is social media. Yes, your B&Gs and their families will be tweeting from the reception and updating their status as a part of the ceremony. ~sigh~ Live streaming will also get bigger. As wedding guest list shrink, our techie couples will still include their followers by social media. Strange world we live in, isn’t it. Welcome to 2010.

Filed Under: Trends, What's Hot Tagged With: ,
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