The 2023 WeddingPro Benchmarking Report offers a comprehensive look into the current state of the American wedding industry, focusing on the challenges and strategies wedding professionals use to grow their businesses.
It’s important to note that this report is designed to reaffirm and encourage advertising and listing with Wedding Wire, but regardless, there’s always something to learn.
Here’s a summary, highlighting key points relevant to Australian wedding celebrants:
Challenges highlighted in the report
- Experienced Professionals are better at converting new leads into bookings: The report found that experienced professionals tend to have higher conversion rates, so this indicates the importance of communicating your experience and your commitment to continual learning and professional development. "Pros with 10+ years of experience generate 28% of their business from referrals, while those with >4 years of experience see 19% of business being generated from referrals."
- Finding new customers continues to be a challenge: A universal challenge across the industry but especially for celebrants. 25% of leads are coming from enquiries, 23% from advertising, 18% from SEO/website, 13% from social media.
Take aways from the report
- Importance of Presence: Having an online presence across various platforms is essential to build credibility and capture couples at different stages of their decision-making process. Most businesses surveyed had seven presences on different websites, and paid for two.
- Impact of Reviews: Featuring reviews prominently boosts credibility. Encouraging couples to leave reviews is beneficial.
- Understanding Lead Sources: Knowing where leads come from helps optimise strategies. Continuously asking couples how they found out about your service is crucial.
- Quality over Quantity: When paying for advertising, the quality of leads is more important than volume. Target platforms where couples have a high intent to book.
- Gen-Z and Social Media: With the rise of Gen-Z getting married, platforms like YouTube and TikTok are becoming more relevant. It’s important to adapt marketing strategies to include user-generated video content.
Actionable tips
- Focus on Conversion: Invest in education and strategies to improve your lead conversion rates.
- Enhance Online Presence: Ensure visibility across various online platforms, including wedding directories and social media plus your own website. Make sure the branding, logos, colours, messaging, is consistent and strong.
- Leverage Reviews: Encourage past clients to leave reviews to boost credibility.
- Understand Your Audience: Tailor your advertising and marketing efforts to target platforms where your ideal clients are most active.
- Evaluate Advertising ROI: Continuously assess the effectiveness of your advertising spend across different channels.
- Adapt to Changing Trends: Stay informed about emerging social media trends and preferences, especially as new generations start planning their weddings.
Download the report here.
Originally published on the Celebrant Institute: https://celebrant.institute/marketing/learn-from-weddingwires-annual-report-weddingpro-report/.