WeddingWire had a great time at the 2009 Wedding MBA Convention, the world’s biggest convention dedicated to teaching you how to make money in the wedding business, last week in Las Vegas. WeddingWire’s CEO, Timothy Chi, and CMO, Sonny Ganguly, had the opportunity to educate attendees in a two part ‘Pimp My Marketing’ series on the latest trends to help increase online exposure and further reach to today’s engaged couples. We have had such a great response on the material we discussed that we decided to share the information with the entire WeddingWire Community.
Again, we had a great time meeting all the attendees at this year’s convention. We hope to see everyone at the 2010 WMBA Convention, which will be in Las Vegas again!
Each month we will highlight some of our favorite sites on the web and show how they can help you run your business more efficiently. This month we feature Animoto, Issuu and Mint.
- Animoto: Animoto is one of our favorite new sites on the internet. It is the easiest way to make professionally produced videos from your existing images, and it does it automatically. Simply upload some of your photos, add some copy, and pick a song. Animoto does the rest! Within a couple minutes the site will create a professional quality video for your business using ‘Cinematic Artificial Intelligence.’ Animoto videos have “the visual energy of a music video and the emotional impact of a movie trailer.” We love the quality of the videos, they look great on your WeddingWire storefront, and you can get started for free!
- Issuu: Do you have a presentation coming up? Looking to create a wow factor with your next client? Issuu is an online publisher that allows you to publish your presentations, documents, sales kits, brochures, magazines and more online. You can send a link to potential clients and they can flip through the contents just like reading a book. Issuu allows you to create a free account and is a great way to showcase your portfolio. Simply add a link to your work in your email footers.
- Mint: Mint claims to be ‘the best Free way to manage your money,’ and so far we think they may be right. The site allows you to link all your accounts in one place, from checking and savings accounts, to credit cards, mortgages, auto loans and more. Mint makes it easy to track your spending and provides detailed breakdowns by various categories. Even better, the site sends a notice any time an upcoming payment is coming up or if any of your accounts are hit with unwanted fees. Mint is like having a personal money manager on your staff that doesn’t get paid!
WeddingWire has teamed up with Meebo, one of the largest social media companies on the web, to provide a new real-time vendor to vendor chat feature within your WeddingWire account. Now you can ask questions, get feedback, or simply communicate with vendors you know from anywhere across the country. Whether you are updating your Storefront or perusing the Vendor Education Center, the chat feature will be visible in the lower right hand corner of your account so that you can easily connect with other vendors.
Don’t see any buddies on your list? Simply connect with other vendors through the Vendors I Know tool, located in the “My Community” section. Once the connection is approved by the other vendors, their names will show up on your buddy list.
The new Meebo feature also allows you to gather all of your friends on a single buddy list from within your WeddingWire account, so you can communicate in real-time across different IM platforms and social networks, including AIM, Twitter, and Facebook Chat. All you have to do is log-in to your Meebo account from within the new vendor chat bar to access your accounts. And if you don’t have a Meebo account, you can easily register for an account and then connect with your various IM and social network accounts straight from the new vendor chat bar.
Log-in to your WeddingWire account and check it out today!
Check out our new WeddingWire commercial to see why over 100,000 vendors have joined the WeddingWire Network.
There are millions of sites on the web, and hundreds of new ones popping up each day. Which sites should you care about? Which can help you grow your business? Each month we will highlight some of our favorite sites on the web and show how they can help you run your business more efficiently. This month we feature Mashable, iStock Photo and Wufoo.
- Mashable: Wondering how Twitter appeared out of nowhere? Or maybe what new online sites can help you grow your business? Are you looking to keep up with the latest trends on the internet? Mashable is one of the largest blogs dedicated to social media and it is one of our favorite sites to stay on top of today’s online trends. You’ll find the latest news about Facebook, Twitter, Google, YouTube, the iPhone and much more. Mashable allows you to easily become a tech guru!
- iStock Photo: Are you looking to find high quality wedding photos? Want to make sure you own the rights to the photos? iStock Photo is the largest royalty-free stock photo destination on the internet. The site boasts over 4 million different images, and each file can be purchased for as little as $1 and then used as often as you’d like. If you’re looking to update marketing materials or any of your bridal images, take a look at the variety of images iStock Photo has to offer.
- WuFoo: Don’t let the funny name fool you, Wufoo is one of the easiest ways to collect information over the internet. The site allows you to easily create contact forms, online surveys and invitations so that you can collect data, registrations and even online payments. What’s best, is that you don’t need to be a web developer to create the forms! So whether you have an upcoming event or want to do some market research, Wufoo allows you to create forms easily and the first 3 are free.
You may have heard the buzz surrounding Microsoft’s recently launched search engine, Bing. Bing is the long-awaited site which many are already calling a worthy competitor to Google, the search engine phenomenon. Developers refer to Bing as a ‘decision engine,’ rather than a ‘search engine.’ Why? Because Bing is intended to help you make better decisions rather than to simply provide you with a wealth of information which may or may not answer to your needs.
What is Bing?
Bing is essentially a search engine. It was created and recently launched by Microsoft in order to compete with Google. Here are some of the main features of Bing developed to help improve the user search engine experience:
- Explorer Pane: A pane on the left-hand side where you can not only see your results organized in categories but also related searches.
- Related Searches: A section that produces more organized and relevant results, as compared to the way Google currently showcases them.
- Users have the ability to preview site content on search results, so you don’t click on sites you don’t need.
- Preview a video without clicking on it simply by holding your mouse over it.
- Track and store your previous searches in your search history, which is accessible in the explorer pane.
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Searching for an easier way to manage your business Twitter account (s)? Here at WeddingWire we are big fans of HootSuite. HootSuite is a great Twitter toolbox, in which you can manage multiple Twitter profiles, add numerous editors, track your success and even schedule tweets in advance - all from one easy-to-use interface. It’s a great way to stay on top of your Twitter accounts, allow multiple staff members to contribute as editors, and stay up-to-date on your tweets even on your busiest days. When using Twitter for a business, it’s important to see what captures the interest of your followers. In using the HootSuite ow.ly URL shortener, you can track click-throughs on your tweeted links, which will help you monitor messages and see which capture the interest of your followers.
Sign-up is simple. Create your free HootSuite account, add a profile for each Twitter account you have, and start managing.
And that’s not all…HootSuite offers users the option to add the HootSuite Hootlet to your bookmark toolbar so that you can quickly tweet the pages you are browsing. When using the Hootlet, the page title, the name of the site, and the ow.ly shortened link is automatically created in a pop-up window for you. From here you can submit the tweet or schedule it for later. Its features like this that really help simplify the overall Twitter process!
Visit www.HootSuite.com today to get started!
Staying up-to-date with business and marketing trends is critical to any company, but especially in an industry like weddings where most marketing happens online these days. But information doesn’t just fall from the sky, it means we have to do some homework. Finding time to learn something new everyday might not fit into your schedule, but carving out an hour or so a few days a week should be a priority, after all your clients expect you stay current with today’s trends.
Keeping current with wedding trends is probably easy as you know where and how to find that information, but what about search engine marketing trends? Or Search Engine Optimization tactics? Or web design best practices?
To start, you’ll need a RSS reader account. I’ll suggest using Google Reader as it’s free and easy to setup. Below are a few of the websites I follow regularly:
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In today’s wired world, engaging in social media is a powerful way to help increase your brand awareness and reach potential clients. Just take a look at the recent results of surveys conducted by Nielsen Online:
- Over 67 percent of online users are engaging in “Member Communities”, which includes social networks and blogs, making it more popular than personal email.
- Twitter continues as the fastest growing social networking site, growing in popularity as not only a means of communication between friends, but as an essential part of brand marketing.
- While topping the charts for the number of unique visitors, Facebook also leads the way for stickiness, with the average user spending 3 hours and 16 minutes on the site. The average Twitter user sticks around for about 12 minutes.
Top 5 Social Networking Sites
It is evident in these results that social networking has become an essential part of today’s online experience. At WeddingWire, we are committed to educating and connecting you with numerous social networks in order to extend your reach to today’s wired brides.
Facebook fan Page is a public profile you can create and personalize to showcase your business and services to Facebook users. With over 200 million registered users, creating a Facebook Page is one way to help reach your customers and potential clients. The best part is it’s completely free!
Creating a Page is easy. Simply visit Facebook Pages, click on “Create a Page” and let the fun begin.
- Step 1: Pick Category & Name
Choose a category that best fits the services you provide. Please note that you will not be able to change your category once you choose, so pick the closest match. Next, choose a name for your Page. Since this Page is for your business, you should use your business name. This will help extend your brand awareness. Click “Create Page.”
- Step 2: Picture Time
Click “Upload a Picture” at the top of your Page and upload a photo. A logo or a picture that represents your business is the best choice.
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LinkedIn has been beefing up their advertising platform to bring it more in line with Facebook recently and today on the LinkedIn Blog, they announced that their DirectAds advertising platform has been updated to include CPC (cost per click) ads. Previously, they were just offering impression based ad packages which isn’t ideal to small businesses with smaller marketing budgets. Now that CPC ads are an option, why not try LinkedIn advertising. Many of you have tried Google Ads by now and some even Facebook ads. While LinkedIn doesn’t have the same user base and web traffic as either of those two sites (only about 37 million members), many will fall into the typical age range of engaged couples. As the internet space becomes more crowded, branching out and trying different marketing avenues is a must.
When will Twitter release a CPC ad platform?
What is the foundation of social media? A simple question with multiple ways to respond, but I found a great post this morning that discusses the 5 C’s that make up the foundation of social media marketing.
- Conversation: Go where the conversations are taking place - Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, YouTube, etc. Establish accounts and create your identity. Stay up-to-date with your accounts and participate often. Really get to know your followers and audience so you can actively participate.
- Community: Seize the opportunity to not only join and participate in conversations, but add your own value. This is how you create a community, which you must work to maintain and earn the trust of your followers. A good site for community building (in addition to the ones mentioned above) is Ning. Ning allows its users to create their own social websites and social networks. It’s a good place to create a form or community around your product, which in return can produce useful user feedback.
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