I hope everyone had a good Christmas and Santa brought you everything you wanted. For some reason I seem to attract “Mr Men” slippers as presents and it must be a sign of me getting old that this year’s pair were emblazoned with Mr Grumpy - it was only two years that my skippers were Mr Perfect, how times change!
Anyway, I write this on a cold New Years Eve while in the office completely on my own, not even the receptionists are in these few days before New Year and I’m not sure if that makes me committed, obsessed or mad. Maybe a little bit of all three, but I’m sure my wife would tend more towards the latter two options!! As Christmas always puts me in a good mood and I’ve no one else to share it with other than you guys on the blog, I thought I would add a New Year offer to set 2009 off on the right foot!
If you have been following this blog for any length of time then you will know that I offer a free wedding advert to everyone and anyone, no ties or catches, just free wedding advertising. Well just to prove that I don’t warrant my Mr Grumpy slippers I’m going to offer a free featured advert for all the readers of my blog
Originally I wanted to keep this offer open for the rest of the year, but as that equates to just under 9 hours I didn’t want it to appear that my “Mr Grumpy” slippers were justified so I’m extending it to the whole of January until the site goes live!
If you want a free wedding advert then just sign up on the Evolution site. If you want to see more websites where you can advertise your business free of charge then read our free wedding advertising guide detailing the best 5 sites to choose.
Uncategorized
I just wanted to take this opporunity to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and every luck for the New Year.
The Evolution Office will be closed Christmas Day and Boxing Day and there will only be limited coverage for next week, however if there is anything urgent the please drop us an email as I’ll be picking them up all over the holiday period.
I look forward to speaking to you all in the New Year.
Edward & all at Evolution
News
The start of January will prompt Wedding planning season and all seasoned wedding professionals will know that the months between January and April will make or break their year. With the current financial turbulence, this year is going to be even more important than previously as Brides are going to be fewer and competition more ferocious! With this in mind it is very easy to get sucked into the trap of spending extra money on advertising, but you should hold on to your money - certainly don’t spend it on advertising anyway!
Here is a list of 7 FREE methods you can use to make a difference this year:
- Joint Ventures - this is the biggest untapped market for wedding suppliers and is really easy to implement provided you are willing to give something back. If you want more information on creating Joint Ventures in the wedding industry then visit the main Evolution website.
- Blog - You’d be amazed at how effective a blog is as a means of communication and marketing method. They are seriously easy to set up and don’t have to cost you a penny. For more information on creating a wedding blog & blogging for wedding businesses visit the main Evolution site.
- Email Follow Ups - Many people do all the hard work by attracting potential customers, but then let all their hard work go to waste by neglecting to follow the enquiry up. This method can increase your profits by as much as 100% depending on how bad you really are.
- Business Networking - Ok so this one isn’t entirely free but for the cost of a breakfast its pretty close! Business networking can open doors in various different ways, but you need to understand how to get the best out of it as it can be worthless if you don’t!
- Advertising - You probably know that I am NOT a fan of advertising! 99% of the time it is overpriced, mis sold and as good as worthless. HOWEVER, there are numerous places where you can advertise free on the internet and this has got to make sense right? It certainly can’t do any harm thats for sure. There is a guide to free wedding advertising on the Evolution site which will give you some of the sites which offer free wedding adverts. Please let me know if you know of any that aren’t on there.
- Publicity - Getting yourself publicised can really give your business a massive boost! There are a variety of different places you can get publicity, by far the easist is online PR. To get more details on publicising a wedding business visit the main Evolution site.
- Your Website - If you have a website already, then unless you are in the 0.1% of people who have analysed their conversion analytics and made the necessary changes, it is probable that just by thinking in a different way you can get more enquiries from the visitors you are already getting.
If these points are of interest to you then I would highly recommend that you check out the Evolution Programme which is a step by step guide to creating a marketing plan for a wedding business. The programme will take you through each one of these points in detail and tell you how to implement them in your business. There will be a January Bonus on the Programme which you can keep up to date with by filling in your details below.
Advertising, Blogging, Free Stuff
If you are a supplier of the wedding industry you used to be able to get an advantage by having a web site. Things have come a long way from those early days of the internet and now it’s not only an advantage having a site but essential, with over 95% of brides visiting a supplier website before she will make a decision on them.
It doesn’t stop there though, you may have a friend or relative who know’s a bit about computers who can put something together for you on the cheap, but you need a site which fulfils the needs of the modern bride for it to be fully effective. If it doesn’t match these criteria, not only will you be losing money from potential customers, but you will also be rendering any money you spend on advertising almost worthless as your site will be the first stop for a bride who has seen and liked your advert.
All in all over 99% of brides use the internet to search for companies to supply their wedding so it is vital that you have something for them to find in the first place. Once they are there, if your site isn’t designed and constructed well, over 50% will leave within the first 2 seconds never to return again.
At Evolution we use our extensive knowledge of all areas of the UK wedding industry to establish your customer requirements and then build an advanced customer focused site aimed at delivering results to you, the business owner.
If you want to find out more about wedding website design then please either visit the main Evolution site or alternatively call us on 0870 300 4971. Alternatively, if you already have a website which you want to improve yourself then the Evolution Programme can walk you through the steps that will take your site from being an also ran to an industry leader quickly and easily and in a cost effective manner.
General Marketing
Your wedding website is the key to the success of your business and will be the hub of all your marketing activity. For 95% of brides that you reach, the first port of call after seeing your name, advert or leaflets is to check out your website. This means that if your website is poor, your enquiries will be as well!
Don’t worry though, here are 10 things which your wedding website must have for you to check and improve:
- Clear Design and Layout
- Easy Navigation
- Customer Focused Headlines
- Optimised Page Titles
- Focused Keywords
- Custom Descriptions
- Useful Content
- A Blog
- Calls to Action
- Contact Details or an Enquiry Form on Every Page
Whatever your business, your website should be returning at least 10 enquiries per week on average, if its not then one or more of the points above need to be addressed. For a full review of your wedding website you may be interested in our Website Review Service for Wedding websites.
To address any issues you find when looking at the 10 points above we recommend that you join the Evolution Programme where you can find all the information you ned to make your website a bridal trap!
General Marketing, Websites
