I'm going to share a secret with you: the only way to know if your wedding marketing and PR is working is to create and stick to plan for capturing your ROI. It's easy to assume something isn't working based simply on anecdotal evidence, so it's imperative implement the following strategies to ensure you know what works and what doesn't.
Web traffic analysis
Couples will find your website through several different avenues, from print and online advertising, to your press mentions and listings on other wedding vendor's websites. Google Analytics is a free and user-friendly tool that allows you to capture a great deal of information about your website visitors, including what sites are referring them, how long they stay on your site, and where they live. If you currently participate in online advertising for your wedding company, this is a great way to see how much traffic is being sent your way from their website.
The good news? Google Analytics allows you to set up scheduled reports that can be delivered to your inbox as often as you'd like. Additionally, if you are an iPhone user, Quicklytics is a fantastic way to capture your web analytics on the go with the help of Google Analytics.
Social Media analysis
If your blog is already included in your website, then the aforementioned wedding marketing tool is perfect. Facebook Fan Page administrators can rely on the program Insights to view metrics while Pinterest offers its own analytics for business users. More focused on Instagram these days? Then Iconosquare may be a perfect fit for you.
Prospective client database
When prospective couples contact you for the first time, it's a given that you will want to take down their names, wedding date, and the number of wedding guests they plan on inviting. Oftentimes, it's easy to forget to ask the most important question of all: How did you hear about us? Whether or not the couple books, take the time to learn if they saw your ad in a magazine or perhaps received a referral from a past or current client. A simple excel database will do the trick. It is fairly easy to recollect where the last three or four prospective clients have heard about you but it will be nearly impossible to remember the last year's worth of business.
For the wedding professional, the number of wedding marketing and PR opportunities seems endless. By implementing the above strategies to capture the metrics of your efforts, you'll soon be confident that you have selected the appropriate wedding marketing strategies to ensure you will book more clients.
Meghan Ely is the owner of wedding marketing and wedding PR firm OFD Consulting. She is a highly sought after industry speaker and serves as a Public Relations adjunct professor for Virginia Commonwealth University, specializing in PW writing and brand promotion.
