twitter — Think Like A Bride-Marketing Mojo for Wedding Businesses

Facebook or Blog?

January 18, 2012 By ndulj Leave a Comment

I ran across an interesting question today about where you should put more effort, in your blog or your Facebook page.

I’m not really sure why that is a question. Let me break it down for you.

Your website is your own personal piece of internet real estate. Think of it as your home because in terms of your marketing, it is. Your blog should be the heart and soul of your website. In web design today, integrating your blog as a page on your website is the only way to go. If your blog is off on another url from your main one you are missing the boat.

Today’s brides go to one place to find their vendors above all others:

SEARCH.

If you aren’t ranking high in search engines for what you do and where you do it, you are behind the game.

Reread that last sentence. Notice I did not say for your name. I hope to hell you rank number one for your name. Unfortunately, that isn’t how brides search. They search for things in places.

Huh?

They search for florists in Bucks County.They search for wedding planners in Washington, DC. They search for caterers in Fairbanks, AK. They don’t search for Polly Sue Purebreds Catering. If they do it is because they have already been made aware of Polly Sue from a referral and that is a post for another day.

Now that you understand this, you understand why your personal piece of real estate is so important.

Back to the original question: your blog or Facebook.

Every time you post to Facebook, you are sending all that Google juice to Facebook.com, not to Polly Sue’s url. Great, I’m sure Mr. Zuckerberg appreciates the Google juice, but frankly, you need it worse than he does.

Think of it this way, you have an office or a store but you still meet people in the local coffee-house. Instead of investing to improve your office or store, you take time and treasure to improve the coffee-house. That’s just dumb.

How about this instead, you work on improving the store, and then post updates on the coffee-house bulletin board. When your potential customers start looking for you the coffee-house bulletin board is one of the many signs pointing to your store. When they get to your store, they see how amazing you are.

Enough with the analogies, if you don’t get it yet you never will.

Your blog should be an integrated part of your website.

Facebook should send traffic to your website, not the other way around.

Post to your blog and have it automatically cross-post a headline and an excerpt to your Facebook page leading them to your website.

Done.

Filed Under: Announcement, Marketing, Social Media, Website marketing Tagged With: blogging, blogsites, bridal marketing, Facebook, twitter, web/blogsite, Website traffic, wedding marketing

How to Collect Testimonials

September 3, 2010 By ndulj Leave a Comment

We all know how important testimonials and reviews are; but where do you get them? You probably already have more of them floating around out there than you may think. You just have to know where to go to harvest them.

Your Inbox: Go back over those emails and hunt for any positive feedback. Chances are good that your clients have told you how wonderful you, your service and/or your products are. There names are right there. It’s a good idea to just use the reply button to ask them if they mind if you use the testimonial in your marketing material. That way, even if the email is a year or two old, you will be reminding them of the nice things they said.

Wedding Wire: You can either copy and paste onto your website or just link your reviews to your site. Wedding Wire has a handy badge that puts a few of your reviews right into your sidebar.

Yelp!: If you are getting positive reviews on Yelp! you might as well use them. Again, copy and paste.

Twitter: Check any tweets that mention your name. (You do this any way, right?) You can hit Twitter search for your company name or you can just check for tweets with @{your twitter name} If you watch HGTV, they do a brilliant job of this.

Facebook: Check your fan page for positive comments from your fans. Send them a private message and ask if you can use their comment or ask if they would elaborate for your marketing.

Your blog: Go back through the comments. I bet there are some that attest to your design style or just general brilliance. Go with them, they are already public. You should also consider putting a tag in you signature line inviting people to comment on the post.

Google Alerts: In addition to what other Google Alerts you have set up, you should also have them set up for your name. You never know when some one is going to mention you on their blog. You can always add that to either your testimonials or your press page. This should also yield any mentions on the Knot or similar sites.

Email marketing: If you do email marketing, include a survey in your emails and just come out and ask for testimonials.

Wedding Websites: Get in the habit of asking your clients if they have a wedding website. This may yield a lot of information in addition to testimonial. What do you want to be they will post wedding pics? I don’t know anyone that doesn’t complain about not getting images of their works. Be sure to ask if you can use them first. Before the wedding, you may be able to get a deeper feel for your client and what they really think by reading their site.

Now that you’ve got them, what do you do with them.

Put them on your website.

You should have a testimonial or accolades page in you main navigation menu. More that that, pepper them through out your site. If you do a blog post about a wedding and then get a testimonial you can always go back and add it to the post. It’s a little known fact that if you have a dynamic website your homepage is probably not where most of your traffic from search lands first. If they do a search for pink and green weddings or wedding food on skewers or escort card they will land on the page that talks about that, not your homepage. So, it pays to put testemonials in as many place as possible in addition to your accolades page.

Marketing Package

If your business is the kind that puts together a full on marketing packet, you should have a page of testimonials in it. You never know who will see these and you always want to let them know what others are saying.

Testimonial are powerful, in some ways they are another form of word of mouth marketing.

Filed Under: Back to Basics, What Brides Say Tagged With: accolades, blogging, bridal marketing, Facebook, Think Like A Bride Articles, twitter

Is Branding Still Important?

June 30, 2010 By ndulj 1 Comment

July 2010

I have been reading some interesting things lately about branding and the Wedding Industry. For years now I have been telling you how important branding your business is, and to a certain extent in your local market , it is.

Where I see it beginning to change in on the larger national level.

Let’s take a look. First you have things like Vera Wang banding together with David’s Bridal. That pretty much dilutes her brand to smithereens. She has done the same thing with her line for Macy’s. Once a brand that epitomized luxury and understated elegance, the Vera Wang label now is within reach of anyone.

While we are on the topic of bridal gowns…

I recently interviewed several of the bridal salons that I have worked with over the years. These salons all carry both moderate and couture labels. The one thing that they all said was that brides were no longer seeking a specific label of designer but a particular style and price point. As opposed to saying, “I am looking for a Reem Acra” they are more like to say I want a trumpet style in the under $1000 price range. This is a strong departure from just a few years ago when high end brides would often identify themselves on forums as being “ A Reem Bride.”

I am getting a sense of this happening across the board. With such a glut of wedding vendors in the market place today, brides are finding what they want in a variety of price ranges. Those labels don’t mean a lot anymore.

Take for instance invitations. Having Crane invitations once said a lot about your wedding. Now brides just buy Crane paper and print then at home.

As the average budget for weddings is dropping due to the current economic stress, the label, it seems, has been the first thing to go.

What does that mean for the small local vendors?

For one thing, it means that you can no longer depend on the lines you carry to draw in clients. You are better off trumpeting the fact that you offer goods and services in multiple price ranges than advertizing your lines.

As for branding your own business, I think that is still important in a local market. But you had better be doing it on customer service rather than price. Build your brand and your reputation around an image of being the most dependable and honest vendor in your category. Brides know they can get anything cheaper just down the lane, but it is still true that for this occasion they are willing to pay a bit more for peace of mind and anything to relieve stress.

Here is one tip, go back through you testimonials and rearrange them putting the ones that compliment your customer service closest to the top.

Get in the habit of asking your brides what you can do to make their planning easier? It could be something like if you are a florist you can arrange their linen rental for them. First, you have made their planning easier but you should have also made a little extra coin on it.

Photographers; you could offer to recommend, even set up consultations with make-up and hair professionals for your brides.

Band, DJs, are you recommending dance instructors?

The beauty of all this is that you are offering them help at a time of certain stress in their lives without it costing you any coin, just time.

You won’t have to cut your prices if just holding their hand gets you the sale.

Filed Under: Back to Basics Tagged With: Branding, Customer Service, twitter, wedding marketing

How Not to Fail At Twitter

April 27, 2010 By ndulj Leave a Comment

I see it all the time, wedding professionals tweeting like crazy but never really getting it. Twitter is really a powerful tool for marketing if you take a little time to understand it. Here are some pointers if you want to use Twitter as a marketing tool.

I see so many people using Twitter as a platform for chat. Fine, that’s fun and a great way to make friends but it isn’t really a marketing tool.

The other thing I see is the ones that pretty much do nothing but tweet spam. Wow, that’s annoying.
So what is the right way? Share your passion with me. Chances are good that you are passionate about your business or you wouldn’t be trying to grow it. So show me!

I teach best by example so here we go.

Last night I spoke with a chef for a catering company that had been assigned the twitter account. She was at a total loss. I told her to tweet about the fabulous artichokes that came in today and the ideas she had for them. I told her to tweet about the new recipe she was developing. I told her to tweet about how amazing the spring lamb smelled as it roasted for tonight’s party. I told her to make me drool.

I have a client that is a floral designer that always takes pictures at the wholesaler of anything that looks particularly lovely and tweets it. She tweets pictures of brides reaction as she hands them their bouquet on the morning of their wedding. She shares her passion. Sometime she tweets about the madness that is a floral design studio on the day before a huge function.

Another tweep I have been coaching to talk about all the amazing changes taking place at her venue. They are doing some moderate renovations and everything in the garden is coming to life. I suggested that she talk about the interesting way each bride transforms the space into her own. I suggested that she tweet that some of her brides are renting the place for an afternoon well before the wedding to use a setting for boudoir photo shoots. In the telling of these, she is intriguing me enough to want to find out more about her property.

Talk to me about your passions; show me why I want to join you in your world. Invite me in and inspire me.
No matter what you do, if you share your passion with me I will feel it and most likely become engaged enough to want to explore you and your product or service further.

That is what customer engagement is all about in the time of social media.

Filed Under: Blog, Marketing, Social Media, wedding marketing Tagged With: bridal marketing, social media, twitter, wedding marketing

Social Media Seminar in Nashville

March 26, 2010 By ndulj Leave a Comment

You can RSVP here

The What
Social Media Marketing for the Wedding Professional:
Blogs, Tweets & Beyond
Tuesday, April 20th 6:30pm – 9:30pm

What is Social Media Marketing and just how do you do it? Blogs: Why you need one, where to get one, how to write effective posts for both readers and SEO, how to read & understand your stats. Twitter & Facebook: How to use both to effectively increase your exposure in the market place and increase your readership. Email marketing: Best practices, effective design and writing, and reading and understanding your tracking stats. Understanding what brides look for online, especially what they look for in your website

Deliverables:
1. Come away with a deep understanding of the new media available.
2. Who can benefit from using these new tools?
3. How to effectively craft a blog and its posts for maximum results.
4. How to put together an effective campaign using a full spectrum of social media tools.

The Who
Christine Boulton, marketing diva to the wedding industry has been writing about, speaking on and helping her clients navigate the new marketing waters since 2005. Her eZine, Think Like A Bride is blunt and to the point, each month bringing her readers the things they need to know about how today’s bride thinks and the tools needed to reach them.

A seasoned veteran of the wedding industry, she not only understands your target market better than anyone else out there, she also understands the wedding industry from your point of view. After all she has been there done that as the owner of a boutique bakery for 20 years and board member of TN Wedding & Events Specialist Association for 10 years.

The Why
Today’s brides are the most tech savvy we have ever seen. Unless you are on top of the changing landscape of marketing in the new media you will never reach the brides you are seeking. You know as well as I do that running your own business leaves very little time to keep up on anything else.

In this 2 hour presentation you will learn more about who today’s brides are, how they plan their weddings and how you need to be marketing to them than in all the other seminar you have attended put together. Her blunt style and take no prisoners attitude is what has people coming back for more.

Christine gives you the tools that every wedding professional needs to have in their marketing arsenal today. You will not only understand what they are but you will walk away knowing how to use them in your overall marketing plan.

Unlike so many dry presentations, Christine’s seminars are all about give and take. Your questions spark her creativity and give you the answers! Nothing is off the table.

The Where
The Place where old meets new in grand style! Top O’ Woodland, Nashvilles most beautiful classic Victorian venue located in the heart of Nashville’s Hippest Neighborhood. You have to see Top O’ Woodalnd to believe it.
Top O’Woodland
Historic Inn and Wedding Chapel
1603 Woodland Street
Nashville, TN 37206
Tuesday, April 20th 6:30pm – 9:30pm

What People Are Saying

I learned so much from your presentation and I am very excited to add some marketing features to my site…I loved your energy, and you kept me very interested in what you had to say as well as caught me up to date with what the way brides think. I will definitely contact you with any questions you truly have the heart of a teacher.

YOU WERE TERRIFIC and I learned more in your seminar than all the other programs I attended on this topic. Also what a DYNAMIC SPEAKER AND ENTHUSIASTIC PERSON YOU ARE…

Excellent…thanks for being so blunt

Very interesting session, had a lot of usable content

Filed Under: Announcement Tagged With: internet marketing, social media, twitter, Wedding Business Success

Two Schools of Thought on Social Media Posting

January 26, 2010 By ndulj 2 Comments

There are two distinct schools of thought on how to handle how you use social media: short and frequent versus longer and less

social media graphic

often. Is there really a difference and which style is for you.

The conventional wisdom for blogging was that the best strategy was to put up short posts on a daily basis. Limit yourself to 500 words or less but do it every day. This is the part that got a lot of my clients groaning. The thinking behind this was that in the eyes of the search engine every post represents a page on your site. Another factor was to keep subscribers happy and coming back. Well with the rise in popularity of microblogging sites like Twitter a new thinking is beginning to emerge.

First let’s look at Twitter. If you are on Twitter than you know what I am talking about when I say that there are too many people clogging the twittershpere with mundane stream of consciousness nonsense. “Yum, starbucks here we come” “Uploading Saturday’s wedding” “Such a nice day and no photo shoots” Please people, I have a life, I don’t want yours. Then along comes an article on how the CDC is using Twitter to keep everyone informed about the Swine Flu issue. (which, btw, I found on Twitter in the first place)

Be Simple and Selective on Twitter, Don’t Over Complicate: Unlike many of us (myself included) who congest Twitter’s airwaves with excessive banter, the CDC exercised impressive restraint in sharing only the most essential content. In a weird way, its Twitter account @CDCemergency felt more authoritative precisely because it didn’t spray unnecessary junk our way. Everything it shares is important, timely and actionable. When it arrives, you know it’s important.

Precisely because it posted only the most essential content, you pay more attention to it. I follow close to 500 people on Twitter; it is the ones that only post meaningful things that I really pay any attention to at all. Do you want your followers to hear what you have to say or are you just posting to hear yourself tweet? Constant tweeting can be a plus for name recognition but are you getting recognized for what you want to be known for?

Some one that is doing frequent right on Twitter is Bravo Bride. They post about once an hour but always with a new item on their For Sale boards. It’s almost like watching the Home Shopping Network pop up on my twadget sidebar. What a wonderful, guilty pleasure.

As for blogging; more often doesn’t have to be the only way. There is such a thing as evergreen posts; those posts that will be just as relevant 2 years from now as they are today. Suppose you write really great how to posts, those will most likely look good for the life of the blog. It’s ok for these to be longer. They may also have the added benefit of looking better to the Googlebots and if they are really good they may just land on the front page of Google and stay there for up to a year. One of the keys is that these posts have to be really well done. Mediocre just won’t cut it for a long post, so edit, edit, edit.

If the posts you write tend to be more topical and time sensitive then you have to be a frequent poster. Just by the nature of the beast you will want to lean toward quick hits here. Think of them as more of a news flash than a well researched feature article. Get your facts right, make your language concise and hit it and get it. Toss in a couple of well labeled images and you are on your way.

Here is an example of the difference.

Short post: Amber & Josh’s Wedding.

This would be an example of a post that would be short. Get in all the important information and relevant keywords like your location and the venue complete with town and state. Use your great pictures and let them carry the information for you.

Long Post: Why Amber’s Wedding Makeup Looked So Great & How Yours Can Too

Same wedding, maybe even same images but this time you are giving the brides tips on how to achieve the look they want in their pictures by using the right makeup tricks. Yep, you may have to pick up the phone and ask the makeup artist a few questions, do a bit of refining but you will have a post that has staying (and search) power.

There isn’t anything wrong with either approach. There isn’t anything wrong with a combination of the two. What you want to be careful of is mixing them up. No one wants to read a 1500 word review of some strangers wedding. If you go long, make it packed with information that your readers can use.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: blogging, Facebook, social media, twitter

How to Collect Testimonials

Now that you’ve got them, what do you do with them.

Is Branding Still Important?

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