Marketing Advise. Thoughts Please
 

Im an up and coming wedding videographer, working on building my cliental so my prices are very low for the work I do. I plan on upping the price after I finish my highlight reel and update the site. I would like to know what are some good site where can advertise and help get leads. I got a quote for $900 for a year on mywedding.com, Please give me thoughts. Thank you.



www.imperial-video.com
www.imperial-wedding.com
Imperial Video Production and Motion Graphics

To be perfectly honest, I have tried a bunch of web ads over the past few years, and the only one that really worked for me is TheKnot.com

The Knot is very expensive (I was paying $3600 a year, although that included a 1/3 page ad in their magazine as well, but the magazine did nothing for me). They went Up in their prices to over $4,000 and I dumped them, but after trying other "cheaper" sites with no avail, I might go back to them next year.

I'm a part time videographer right now, and I was actually getting more leads than I could possibly work through the Knot, so while the ad was doing it's job well - I simply wasn't in a position where I could take full advantage of it at the time.

As far as your strategy to start your prices low and work your way up - be aware that once your labeled as the "cheap videographer" it is very hard to shed that label and increase prices without getting the "well you shot my friends wedding for $900 last year, why is it $1500 this year for mine? Can you give me that cheaper price?"

Ain't that the freakin' truth. If I had a dollar for every time I heard that, I'd never have to work again.

Vinny - what I do in lieu of paid advertising is sign up for a free listing on as many wedding portal sites as I can. The Knot doesn't offer free listings but many do. Some require you to insert a return link back to their site from your website. I still don't understand how this search engine stuff works ( who does) but one factor seems to be how well "linked" you are. I get a fair amount of leads from people who somehow find me on the web but I haven't yet done any serious analysis on where or how this is happening. Good luck!

Art

F A C E B O O K !!!


For anyone not using this as a marketing tool, you need to! It's been amazing for me and for driving people to my site. 95% of the couples I'm booking for weddings are on facebook now and 95% of their friends aren't married yet! ;-)


Matt

Matt - I've been researching this - can you share more details on how you are using? Are you maintaining a page on FB or are you just adding links from your site or blog?

Art

Art,

We have discussed Facebook advertising in the past. I have provided the link for you.

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/wedding-e...dvertsing.html

I just posted a new thread with all of things I do on facebook. Noel was right that it had been discussed, but a lot of the prior discussion is regarding the paid advertising that you can do. I don't do any of that, so here is my process.

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/wedding-e...marketing.html



Matt

Vinny:

It's very true that you will need a solid web presence but keep in mind that you need to network quite a bit. Build honest relationships with photographers, wedding planners, venues, etc. Look around and good quality work around you; what are they charging? If you are not doing that level of work yet then obviously you will need to be somewhere below what they are charging. If you are getting more work than you can handle then you need to look at and consider raising your prices.

Find all the free sites you can regardless if they lead directly to a booking. This will help drive traffic to your site, which will contribute to a better organic search result.