By: Alex Karas, Executive Director
For wedding businesses to stay ahead of the proverbial “curve” amongst their competition a re-thinking and re-innovation must occur. Today’s prospective NJ wedding customers are not just looking for a good price for the service but they are looking for your company to work around them and their busy schedule. Therefore, re-tooling your company is a must to stay in the driver’s seat of the industry. Here are a few simple (and cost-effective) things you can do your make your wedding business more customer centered..
1. Offer Flexible Payment Plan: For example, for a multi facet wedding company that offers a variety of services it would be not common for a customer’s price tag to be over $5000. Rather than making clients pay upfront or 1/3 or 1/2 down you can start to offer 0.0% financing. Just take the wedding package price and divide it by how many months it is till the wedding. So the deposit is low and so are the monthly payments.
2. Offer Online Programs: Today’s prospective customers are post GEN-X and are very tech-savvy. For almost every wedding service there is a reciprocal web-based application that normally is not expensive but will let your customers feel empowered. For example, wedding photographers can use online proofing and ordering systems that is linked directly into the their lab. Consequently, the clients and their guests can log-on to view every picture from the wedding and more importantly – order it. The more efficient labs have sample day processing and shipping. Thus, if a customer order is before 3PM it will get printed and shipped that same day! Also, you get the web order commission check on a monthly bases.
3. Offer Customer Service: As a NJ bridal show veteran I see a great sampling of NJ wedding companies and their respective products but very few offer customer service as a product. Sure DJs offer extensive music libraries and the chicken dance for the day of the wedding but they don’t remind the potential customer that the wedding is only one day and they have to answer the phone for those 12 months before the wedding answering questions they may have. Remember, you are the expert and you are here to alleviate any concerns your customer may have via phone, email, or text message. Make sure your clients know you are here for them, if your not, somebody else will.
The wedding industry is a tough industry for business because just about anyone can buy a laptop and speakers or a DSLR camera and show up at a bridal show or buy a phone book ad. Unfortunately, for the serious companies those individuals create the horror stories that give the veterans a bad name. So if you do own a wedding business especially in NJ who wants to be the best in NJ make your business a customer centered one.
About the Author:
Alex Karas is a full-time wedding industry entrepreneur in Manahawkin, NJ. He is the owner/operator of a wedding services company, Enchanted Celebrations. To learn more about wedding planning and tips you can visit his website at https://www.enchantedcelebrations.com or contact him directly at alex@enchantedcelebrations.com.