Graphic courtesy of Marry Me Productions, which has done some legwork finding a few (free) wedding websites. Check out their list!

Much like the decline of the newspaper industry, the bridal-magazine industry is feeling the effects of a change in advertsing, with advertisers choosing monthly plans for less money, and the pressure to adapt to a changing world that includes some pretty powerful social media. Blogs and online magazines come immediately to mind, but Facebook and Twitter are also playing a big role in how brides and certified wedding and event coordinators are planning weddings.

Says eWednews: “According to the study findings, 47% of businesses five years old or less are finding business better compared to 32% of businesses over 20 years old. The discussions rage on, as organizations like Conde Nast finally announce changes thanking past business models that served them welll but now look forward to the future. “Conde’s desire to follow a new business model focused around digital connectivity, technology development and consumer insight clearly speaks to the fact the time to change is long over due,” according to competitors and sources familiar with the intentions and storyline.”

EWed also finds that older, established businesses are having a harder time giving up The Way They’ve Always Done Things and adapting to a rapidly changing business climate, as compared with businesses that are only 5 years old or younger. All of this is direct proof that LWPI’s graduates have an immediate need to incorporate social media and technology into their business plans and marketing proposals. Facebook and Twitter are great ways to gather new business and show off the work you’ve already done, but it’s important that you keep your online life professional. Making connections on Facebook and Twitter is great, but you want to be sure that you follow up immediately with any complaints - preferably privately.

It’s hard to imagine a day when every bride you know doesn’t have a pile of dog-eared bridal magazines in her back seat or piled on her coffee table, and there is of course a chance that it will all turn around. But with an Internet full of easily searchable files, and blog writers who have made their name by identifying the top wedding trends each year, it’s possible that future brides will be more plugged in than ever. And that all means that, in turn, wedding and event coordinators have to be plugged in, too! LWPI believe that magazines still have a role to play, but our company is also ahead of the curve when it comes to incorporating the Internet into business and wedding planning, and our instructors pass on that information to our students, too.

We’d like to know: What are your favorite Internet tools for wedding and event planning?

In today’s wedding market it’s a given that to succeed you must utilize the Internet. With such social-networking sites as Facebook and Twitter growing in leaps and bounds, certified wedding and event coordinators have to not only be comfortable using these sites, but they must also figure out how to successfully fit them in to their business plans.

The Wedding Report estimates that online wedding sales will grow to $22.7 billion by 2013, with an estimated growth rate of 7 to 10%. It also found in a recent survey that 81% of couples use the Internet to plan their wedding because of the specific planning tools they find there. Their top reasons for using the Internet? Tips and ideas; photos of other weddings; creating a wedding website. The Wedding Report also says that the average age of a newly married person is about 27, which means that most of your bridal couples are part of a generation that is the most technologically advanced ever. It also means that for your wedding and event coordinating businesses to survive you must embrace technology. How can you do this? Here are a few ways:

1. You turned to your community college or local university to become a wedding planner, right? You may want to consider turning right back around to check out what kind of classes they have on Web design, online marketing and social networking.
2. Pick up copies of popular magazines that cover computers, marketing and networking. An afternoon spent at your local bookstore, coffee in one hand and magazine in the other, will be time well spent.
3. Integrate social networking into your business plan. Build a Twitter following by focusing on the wedding industry in the region you target. Start a Flickr page, and fill it will slideshows of the weddings and events you’ve planned. Start a blog, giving tips to brides, showing them how a coordinator can help alleviate their stress! And create a Facebook page to help guide users to your blog and other sites.
4. Keep all of your sites and information updated. Wedding and party trends ebb and flow, and you need to show possible customers that you’re up on the trends - and maybe even have a lot of great ideas of your own.

Getting out there, pounding the pavement, if you will, is definitely one way to grow your business. But to attract the Wired Generation you have to show them that your business is modern and growing. Being a successful wedding and event coordinator depends a lot on word of mouth, yes, but you want to attract business from every possible angle. And the Internet is an excellent place to begin.

As the Internet has matured over the past decade, more and more consumers, including your prospective bridal clients, are utilizing social networking, ecommerce, and application websites to research, compare, and share information on all manner of goods and services. What was unthinkable just a few years ago is now commonplace: brides and grooms are making wedding planning decisions and hiring wedding vendors based solely on information they received from cyberspace.

Highlighting this trend was the news last week that The Knot, the top-rated wedding-related website for 2008, has purchased WedSnap, a site aiming to be the future of weddings by engaging web-savvy brides. In addition to a web-based wedding budget planning application and a wedding website search feature, the acquisition also includes the most popular Facebook wedding application, Weddingbook.

Social Networking Sites

An example of a regional social network geared toward the wedding market is Seattle-based Avant Bride. Featuring a directory of over 1,000 local wedding businesses, this website encourages brides to read and write vendor reviews, share their experiences through blogging and forums, and attend events to meet vendors and each other.

The Wedding Report, a research company that tracks and forecasts wedding industry trends, estimates the 2008 online wedding market was worth over $16 billion and accounted for approximately 13% of the total ecommerce retail market. Future projections indicate that online wedding sales will experience growth rates between 7% and 10%, reaching almost $23 billion over the next four years.

For the Certified Wedding Planner, it is vital to understand that eight out of ten engaged couples use the Internet for some or all of their wedding planning needs. The following table details the top ten reasons brides and grooms go online:

With the majority of newlyweds under the age of 27, it is natural that the percentage of the wedding market business conducted online will continue to increase. Each subsequent generation of brides- and grooms-to-be are more comfortable and more adept at finding solutions on the net. To continue to succeed in this evolving marketplace, or to successfully learn how to become a wedding planner, today’s CWP must not only be aware of the trends, but incorporate the technology of those trends.

According to recent surveys conducted by The Wedding Report, one out of three couples today use a social network site to communicate wedding information to their friends and family. That percentage will rise to more than half participating over the next few years. It is predicted that within ten years, nearly three out of four engaged couples will use social networks to replace traditional methods of sharing wedding details.

Today’s Internet is called Web 2.0: the trend toward technology and design aimed to enhance creativity, communications, secure information sharing, collaboration, and functionality of the web that includes social networking, video sharing, wikis, and blogs.

Tim O’Reilly, founder of O’Reilly Media and creator of the Web 2.0 term and concept, defines it as “the business revolution in the computer industry caused by the move to the Internet as a platform, and an attempt to understand the rules for success on that new platform.”

Even as we seek to understand and incorporate the advances and opportunities of the integrated and interactive web, technology continues to march forward. Internet experts are currently debating the definition and structure of Web 3.0, sometimes called the Semantic Web. Most agree that the next generation of the web will center on a pervasive, dynamic usage of Web 2.0 designs across newly invented technologies.

If you are asking what this means for your business, Shane McMurray of The Wedding Report has an answer:

· If you are not sure what social networking is, learn it. Read articles, books, or take a class, it should be a vital part of your business model going forward.

· Figure out how you can use or integrate social networking into your business model.

· Look at ways to integrate technology with your business processes. Think about the communication gadgets the younger generation is using. How will they communicate with you? How will they buy your products or services?

· Get connected. Set up profiles on social networks, connect with others, and promote your business.

How will you incorporate Internet interactivity and engagement into your wedding planning business?

Types of Internet Engagement