My Facebook news feed is being littered with photographers today announcing from their soap box that they won the 2012 Bride’s Choice Award thereby putting them in the Top 5% of their industry. Some may call it an award, I call it a deceptive marketing scheme.
According to their website, The WeddingWire Bride's Choice Awards™ recognizes the best local wedding vendors from the WeddingWire Network who demonstrate quality and service excellence within the wedding industry. Unlike other awards in which winners are selected by the organization, the WeddingWire Bride's Choice Awards™ are determined by the quality, quantity, recency, and consistency of reviews from over 1.2 million WeddingWire newlyweds. The 2012 award recipients represent the top five percent of WeddingWire's vendor community, which consists of over 200,000 wedding professionals throughout the US and Canada. “Every year, WeddingWire looks forward to celebrating the success of the top-rated Wedding Professionals within the WeddingWire Network,” said Timothy Chi, CEO, WeddingWire. “Now in its fifth installment, the Bride’s Choice Awards™ program continues to recognize the elite Wedding Professionals who exemplify quality service and professionalism. These vendors were chosen by our bridal community for their responsiveness and dedication to clients. We are honored to recognize the 2013 winners for their impressive achievements and unwavering commitment to providing quality service within the wedding industry.”
First, let me start by saying that when I first got started shooting weddings back in 2010 I saw photographers sharing they won the “Bride’s Choice Award” and I really wanted one. I decided I was going to do everything possible to earn one since I thought it would be great for my business. I’d click on the award banners displayed on photographer website and be promptly taken to the WeddingWire.com site. At first I was impressed. Lots of information, articles and links to wedding vendors. I immediately signed up as a vendor and after following the instructions given I became a recipient of the award in 2011. Excitedly I shared my award with my Facebook fans and just hoped they wouldn’t realize that practically every photographer in town was sharing the same thing.
In short, WeddingWire bills itself as the “Yelp of the Wedding Industry.” Their ultimate goal is to drive as much traffic as they can to their website so they can sell advertising. Which takes us right back to the “awards” they are giving out each year. Is this award based on skill? Nope. Is it based on a system of votes from industry peers? Nope. Is it based on the merits of the award winner? Nope. The way a person “wins” this “Bride’s Choice Award” is by getting 5 positive reviews on their vendor listing on the site. While the idea is that the reviews would come from brides, ultimately who would ever know if my mom, my sister, my aunt, my brother and my wife left me positive reviews.
I will admit the company is remarkably innovative in the way they are driving traffic to their site and for this innovation they have grown tremendously since starting up in 2007. Their business model is fantastic and not a week goes by that I don’t see a photographer in one of the many forums or groups that I belong to ask if they should purchase a marketing package from WeddingWire so they can have one of the better listings there. I applaud the company for their growth and service they are offering vendors and brides to connect.
However, to call a spade a spade this award is nothing more than WeddingWire driving traffic to their site and we all are their puppets excitedly posting their banners with links back to them all over our websites, blogs and Facebook. So tomorrow, January 9, 2013 when WeddingWire officially sends out the banners to this year's “award” winners and they get plastered in Facebook news feeds and thousands of blog posts of people patting themselves on the back, the one thing that will be certain is that WeddingWire will be receiving a record number of hits tomorrow on it’s website. Exactly what they planned for!
Let me tell you Trevor, I feel the same way. This was our first full year photographing weddings. We've had 7 or 8 reviews.. all good ones and some how I, too, received an award and felt how could this be right? Seriously? Then I started seeing all the other vendors (photographers included) giving shout outs to themselves for their award and I felt like it really minimized the value of what that award is SUPPOSED to represent. Then yesterday, I received a phone call and an email from my rep telling me how I could benefit further by signing an annual contract with them. It's no mistake this happens right in January. They're after annual bookings...it's definitely part of their marketing and promotions calendar. I wonder what the stats look like and how many new business clients they bring on as a result? If only the public really knew the actual value of that award I can't imagine it would hold much value in their eyes either.
Thank you for sharing this experience Kristi. You are absolutely right that they are on the phones in full force right now trying to book photographers up in their marketing packages. Great point!
They offer a free profile for those who don't know. It isn't soon after you are repeatedly solicited to be a paid vendor or advertiser. They do help you set up a professional looking profile. I see this being helpful if you are a vendor who decided not to pay to have a website built for you. Not too many years ago the price of being a featured vendor was $800 or $875 for a full year. Then it jumped (without announcement) to $1200.00 a year. I advertised with them on monthly terms for several months. I only had 3 inquires for DJ services with no signed contracts. I went to terminate services with my sales representative (believing that I was on a monthly lease for ad space) only to be handled unprofessionally. My initial contact said I could cancel at any time w/o liability. I only wanted to use the service for off season advertising leading up to the next season. My current sales person said that what the prior person had said was not true or that I was insinuating a situation out of thin air. When I stared mentioning first & last names it was resolved quickly. I was threatened with a lawsuit at first & told to read the online contract. But then we revert back to the verbal agreement, & the threats never came to fruition. It's just another online service. I told them several times to spend some of their profit on local advertising through radio & television to support their vendors locally & to announce who they are & what they do. They finally did some marketing with Google Ad Words. Don't break the bank there guys:) As far as the Bride's choice award goes. The digital award is free. It generally has code attached to it so when you post it to social media it 3rd parties you back to the wedding wire site. If your I.T. person doesn't catch it, the same will happen on your website. They have trophies & plaques also. You have to pay for them. Who pays for a presentation award? A award is just that! Yet another revenue generator for W.W....Keep your advertising dollars local. Get out locally & let locals know who you are & what services you provide. I took W.W.'s advertising dollars to a few more local bridal shows & the return on investment was ten fold:) If it don't make dollars, it don't make sense. Kudos Trevor on the article. Now I have to call my I.T. guy & tell him to pull down our 2012 award. LOL.
www.idjent.com
Just a comment about my observations: we got the award two years in a row, and we're told that in order to be considered for the award we needed at least 5 new reviews each year. In 2012 we got 6-7 reviews but didn't win the award for whatever reason (though we had tee two years before and this most recent year). They may favor new companies who have recently signed up and who may feel motivated by the award to sign up for a paid advertising plan with Weddingwire.
Also, the 5% number is collected by region. I haven't compared regions, but in my area the number of awards given out corresponds to 5% of the total registered vendors in that category. If 100 photographers are registered with Weddingwire, 5 awards are given.
Wow I would have to agree that this is an amazing mkting platform although the award is a joke and most of the vendors know it as it shows up all over the place in every category, how can so many pros have the same award you may be better received by showcasing your site on smaller sites like http://brides-book.com and popular wedding blogs that don't take on every vendor under the sun and the content on the site is a little more personal and won't end up costing you thousands of dollars a year to get a banner emblem and a job or two? I was in the catering business for over 20 years and word of mouth is by far the best form of advertisement so my advise would be to build friendships with sites that build lasting relationships with their viewers and membership not just the big boys where the competition pool is like an ocean.
At face value - the conversation concerning deceptive marketing practices on the part of WeddingWire's Bride's Choice Awards is a mute point, because they've done nothing wrong. In truth - the deceptiveness of it only comes full circle and becomes a question of integrity and legitimacy concern after "said winners" choose to post the propaganda in their marketing materials - as if beating everyone in the industry was impossible, but they managed to do it. What a fuking miracle that must have been.
As a passionate and consummate wedding photographer within the wedding industry, I agree with Trevor completely. I would add that accepting an award that isn't somehow based on merit, skill, technique or craft is morally questionable and although demoralizing to the skill less photographer, also a necessary evil for him in order to gain an advantage in an ever increasingly competitive marketplace. Although most are doing it, some of us like myself still think it's wrong to accept a meritless award. Unfortunately, until the day comes that the consumer becomes more aware - all we can do is continue to talk about it and write about it.
yours truly,
Steven Planck | <a href="http://www.blueskyphotographyny.com" rel="nofollow">Hudson Valley Wedding Photographer</a>
I was thinking of listing myself as a vender with WeddingWire.com until I read these reviews. Stay away from them. Big time scam.
http://www.sitejabber.com/reviews/www.weddingwire.com