How following up with your wedding leads can land you more business
How can you book more weddings? In this blog, we are focusing primarily on how following up with your wedding leads can land you more business. As a wedding professional in business, you need to invest more time into your business by putting more time and efforts into your marketing strategies, improving your social media strategies and increasing more sales.
Not following up on potential client is how most vendors tend to lose money . Why go out and find more clients, when you can not nurture the relationship you already have. Having a strong email follow up strategy will help boost your wedding booking.
When you receive an email from a potential client, make it your priority to follow up and your end goal should be for you book a consultation. You need to focus all your energy in creating a system that will get you a wedding consultation. If you are looking for wedding consultation forms, we have it set up for you here. Customize each form for the different businesses you are in.
Do you have a system in place to keep track of all your leads? If not, you should be looking into setting something up. We have a form you can use right here with a system you can easily maintain. This way you do not lose track of who you did not follow up with, who still needs to be contacted and who has not booked. Stay on top of your leads. If you get 25 leads per week, keep track of it. For those that do not book you, write down the reason and revisit this at a later stage (you might have to switch up your strategy).
The form is also helpful for the simple fact that you can note down where all your leads are coming from. This way when you market your business for the following year, you know exactly where you can spend your marketing dollars and efforts. Remember, don’t let that lead slip through the cracks. We will keep repeating this.
Are you a wedding vendor that expects leads to come knocking down your door? Don’t bet on it. You need to promote your wedding business and promote it more often. This means having a strong social media presence, advertising on social media, networking with vendors and creating great referral systems. Don’t sit back and expect the clients to come knocking down your door.
They are so many other awesome wedding professionals in your field. What is it that you are currently doing that is helping you stand apart from your wedding competition? You need to provide a wow factor to your client from the moment they contact you, right through to the last day of your time together!
As we mentioned, you need to wow your couples from the very start. So that would be in the very first email they get from you. PS. (We have some sample email templates in our online course that is guaranteed to get you a consultation booked with a potential client). Keep in mind as a bride, they are trying to book so many other vendors and they have probably already contacted a few other vendors. Can you imagine the number of responses they are getting?
Must read: How to get leads when you are new to the business
Oooh no! Where is that great email response you spent crafting out? Make your subject line response extremely irresistible that the client will just want to click it open. This way you are sure that they see and respond to your email. They will be going through so many, many other emails, deleting some if they book with the first vendors they felt attached to and they just might get so overwhelmed. My tip to you, is to do what ever it takes to really stand out.
Remember you will be one of 50 other vendors they are trying to set up meetings with before narrowing down their choices. So doing a frequent follow up email will ensure they see you, remember you and they might potentially reach out to you. I typically try to reach out until I hear a “no”, we booked someone else. That way I can wish them luck and ask them why they did not book with us. This is just for your records and will help with you marketing adjustments.
Our email template is designed to show the client why they should pick you by offering as much information as needed but by not overwhelming them. You are simply walking them through the process and simplifying their decision to book you over other wedding vendors.
Will the bride be annoyed by all the emails? Mmm if they get irritated, they will let you know and they may not have been serious about booking you after all. When my clients unsubscribe from my email list, I am typically happy as this shows me that they were not my ideal clients to start with. They are doing me a favour as I will focus more on those that need my services. So don’t fret.
Related: Here are 50 easy ways to market your business and start seeing results
When you want to purchase something from someone you would normally contact them to inquire, in return, you would want some sort of a response because you are serious about making a purchase. Now would you get mad if that person kept emailing you? Probably not. They are just reaching out in case you forgot or life happened. If your clients do not respond to your response or they simply just ignore you, then they are not serious and are definitely not the type of people you want to associate your name with.
You should be aiming all your efforts to getting a consultation and once you have a face to face meeting, you can really sale yourself and your services or products. Once you get a consultation your booking rates goes from 15-20% maybe to 70-80% maybe. And some wedding vendors are extremely great at booking and confirming a client right at the consultation. So that is a 100% yes for them.
How can you effectively follow up with your clients?
- Always respond to your potential client within 24 hours otherwise you will lose out.
- Add your consultation location and time to your email to ensure they get back to you asap and avoid the back and forth
- Give them about 2 days to get back to you. If you do not hear back respond with a link to your portfolio
- After a few days, after the initial emails follow up with a phone call if provided or another email. This could be 10-14 days after receiving the initial email.
Try to develop a system that works for you and stick to it.
Do you want results? Do you need more bookings? What are you doing to achieve this? Remember that the clients that make the first contact with you are the ones that may end up booking you. Spending money on other advertising option could be wasted if you have a perfectly great potential right in front of you. In other words, don’t go chasing clients when the ones that come to you want your services. Make the extra efforts to nurture and secure the booking or consultation.
Here are some actionable tips you can focus on:
- Respond to each bride within 24 hours.
- Use a tracking sheet to keep yourself organized
- Find a follow up system that works for you – Eg. 1. Contact within 24 hours, 2. 2 Days later, 3. 1 Email the following week and then phone call by the second week.
- Be clear about the fact that you are looking to book them in for a consultation – Give location and a time slot so she doesn’t sit there trying to find a date. Give her options and don’t give too many options
Get your tracking sheet right here!
Join our group of other wedding professionals in our “Wedding Professional Hive” an up coming Facebook group where we share marketing tips on a daily basis!
Happy Planning