It’s not surprising that couples spend about half of their wedding budget on the venue. Couples want the venue to be the perfect setting for their big day. Wedding venue marketing is essential for any business location’s plan. With so many venues all offering something different, there is stiff competition.
A solid marketing plan can help couples find their ideal venue, and it can also lead to a significant revenue increase for your property. Weddings are worth $100 billion in the U.S. every year. These special events account for up to 20% group business at hotels.
If you are just getting started in the wedding industry or you want to revamp your Marketing Strategy or you have a wedding venue that has been around for 25 years and a ballroom, then check out these tips on how to grow your business.
Discover 11 tips for marketing wedding venues to increase bookings and reach more couples:
1. Your wedding venue should be marketed around the preferences of couples.
Look at your plan from the perspective of those you are marketing to. Although you have planners as part of your target audience (more about that below), couples are the primary customer. This is a big change for hotels. The change can be intimidating, but it is a great opportunity to expand your audience.
2. Advertise on the channels that couples watch.
If you don’t target the right people, at the right time, your marketing efforts won’t be as successful. The majority of couples book their venue within two months after getting engaged. The window of opportunity to win their business is often quite small. Do not let the window close before you get your venue in front. Here are some ways you can do that.
- Target Facebook Ads: You can customize your ad campaign based on the user’s age, location and relationship status.
- Join Pinterest: According to the platform, 40 million people use Pinterest as a tool for wedding planning each year. Creating an advertising campaign that reaches couples is a great way to increase your reach.
- Attend live events: It’s important to promote your wedding venue in person. Attend bridal expos, and create a booth to make you stand out.
3. Update your website.
Your website should be the hub of all information about your location. Your website should list your wedding services clearly, and these should be easy-to-understand and navigate. As an example, let’s look at The Biltmore Miami. The top navigation bar displays six landing pages: weddings, meetings and events, dining, hotel and room suites. The hotel’s services are immediately made known to the user. By using “weddings”, as opposed to “events” followed by a subsection for “weddings”, for example, the user is not required to navigate any further.
The weddings page provides a wealth of visually appealing and user-friendly information. The page includes a brief description of the hotel’s wedding offerings. There are also buttons that allow you to follow the hotel via social media or request a proposal.
4. Make SEO a priority in your marketing strategy.
It doesn’t matter if your website is easy to navigate if you can’t find it. prioritizing SEO is a vital part of any venue’s marketing strategy. SEO will increase your exposure and generate more quality leads. Focus on these key areas:
- Keywords: These are the search engine terms that you would like your website to be ranked for. Use tools such as Google Keyword Planner to conduct keyword research. You can see historical data as well as average monthly searches and competition levels.
- Title Tags: This name is the title of a website. This is what appears on the tabs of users’ browsers, search engine results and social media. Avoid keyword stuffing. We uses the title tag “Luxury Washington DC wedding venue” on on its landing page, which is the only venue to rank on Google’s first page for that term.
- URLs: URLs are another way for Google to understand your website and the pages within it. Choose keywords that describe what the user can expect on each page. Contact information for the venue or reception area. Avoid long, keyword-filled URLs. Google suggests keeping them simple.
- Local Search Engine Optimization: This is simply a way to emphasize your location in order to attract search engines. Couples don’t just search “wedding venue”. They also want to find a location that suits their needs.
- Image optimization: Ensure photo file names include relevant keywords. Edit the alt text of an image once it is added to your website to reflect this keyword and subject. To speed up the loading time, you can also reduce the size of your image files. Tools such as Tiny PNG can help you achieve this without compromising on quality.
- User experience: Google announced recently that page ranking will soon be directly correlated with user experience. If a website’s user experience is poor, it will decrease its chances of ranking highly on a search results page. Page speed is a key element of user experience. Start analyzing your site/webpages with Google PageSpeed Insights.
5. Revamp your social media channels.
Not having a presence on social media is not enough. Hotels and event venues must now do more than ever to make themselves stand out across multiple social media platforms. Here are some tactics you can use:
- Post frequently: It will vary for each location, but set a regularity and stick with it. Remember: Do not post for the sake of posting.
- Use hashtags: Instagram posts with hashtags receive 12.6% more engagement. Don’t go overboard with hashtags, just as you wouldn’t want to overload your social media schedule or your keyword selection. Limit your hashtags to only a few relevant ones for each post.
- Prioritize engagement: High engagement (likes and comments) is not only important. is important for to increase the chances of conversion . However, social media interactions between people (i.e. Instagram accounts that respond to comments left on photos are great ways to build relationships and increase brand awareness.
- Work with vendors: You want everyone who is involved in the wedding at your venue to enjoy themselves. This also applies to the vendors. Tags in posts are a small gesture that can help promote the business. This also gives them the opportunity to do similar things.
- Update your bios: Make sure that each bio on social media links back to your site. Include links in your social media posts as well, particularly those that require more information.
6. Use testimonials and reviews to your advantage
A study by Wedding Wire found that reviews and photos were the two most important factors for couples to consider when choosing vendors. According to the study, approximately 80% couples find reviews “very important” and note that couples will be more likely to book with a vendor who has both positive reviews and negative reviews.
Providing excellent customer service and unforgettable experiences is undoubtedly the best way to get positive reviews. Positive reviews are the best way to get them. What about promoting positive reviews? What about the dreaded bad reviews? Make sure that you are listed on popular sites such as TripAdvisor and Yelp. Promote positive reviews via your website and other social media channels. Respond to negative reviews with a thoughtful response. Be understanding and offer a solution.
7. Use video footage and virtual tours to market your wedding venue.
A study published in 2015 predicts that by 2021, the average person will watch 100 minutes of online video per day. A recent study found that 89% marketers believe video has a positive ROI. Video also helps 83% with lead generation and 87% increase overall website traffic. Simply put: Video should be a part of your marketing. Here are some ideas:
- Make a promotional video using footage of past weddings. Place it prominently on your website, and spread it across all social media channels.
- Offer tours. These virtual tours aren’t meant to replace walkthroughs in person, but rather give couples the chance to see their options at home. As inspiration, use The Peninsula Chicago. Couples can tour six venues using 360-degree, high-definition virtual tour technology at the luxury hotel. Couples can walk around the desired area by clicking on it and walking through as if they were actually there.
- Remember the reviews and testimonials that we mentioned above? Create a video with couples, planners and vendors to highlight the positive experiences that people had at your venue. Share it on your site and social media, just like you did with the promo video.
- People love to see behind the scenes. Couples enjoy sharing a personal connection to anyone involved in their wedding. Consider creating a short video that showcases your amazing staff and the work they do to create a wedding.
8. Register your venue in the online venue directories.
Wedding spot for example processes over 200,000 requests each year. This gives venues an easy way to attract new business. The venue-only listing makes it easier for couples to locate you and provides them with all the information they need.
We said she was frustrated with other sites and used Wedding Spot to book her venue. “Through Wedding Spot I found the perfect venue which I had never heard before, and I had it reserved within a week.”
9. Publications that feature your work
Consider submitting your venue to publications, from local blogs and magazines to national news outlets. Dream big. Pitch story ideas to publications if you have a unique feature at your venue. A story published on a respected platform will increase brand awareness and exposure. This can boost your domain authority as well, provided that the article contains links to your site. Search engines view these links as a vote of confidence from one website to another.
10. Create relationships with planners.
Work with wedding planners to the fullest. Word of mouth marketing still has a place in the wedding industry, and planners are among those who have more influence. If a wedding planner or one of the couples they work with has a bad experience at your venue, their likelihood of recommending you to other couples will decrease significantly.
11. Consider viral marketing.
You can grow your business by creating a viral video that showcases the most touching moments of weddings at your venue. Due to COVID-19 the venue hosted 45 weddings for free in May 2020, giving couples an opportunity to get married during a tough time. The decision was widely publicized, and even featured in a long profile in The New York Times.
