The Stackpile

In my excitement and anxiety for planning my wedding, I had thought that it made sense to register for a couple online wedding planning sites to help me stay on track. I also thought that these sites may provide to be valuable resources for local vendors or just for some ideas. But now, after only a few weeks of being registered, I am having some regrets.

Just to be clear, I am not getting married until next fall – October 2008. Which, is no secret to the wedding registry sites as this is one of the required fields. But clearly the vendors that have access to my profile are ignoring this rather important piece of information – the evening phone calls from photographers, and the weekly mailings from some companies have begun to test my nerves. Yes, I know, I should have anticipated this – right? Well, I did expect it, but with the wedding over a year away, I had thought that there would be a little bit of a grace period before being harassed, and not in such a terrible manner. First, don’t ask me when the wedding is when this is clearly part of the information provided through the online lead generation forms. Second, space out your mailings – if I am making a decision on a photographer in the next few weeks, I might hang on to your postcard, but not if you send me one once a week. Third, acknowledge some of the information that you have based on my profile – I am not going to use you as a vendor if your service requires meeting in-person and you are located hours away from my wedding location or home address.

So, for all of you lead generation marketers – READ the information that you receive through your lead generation tactics and use this information wisely when following up on requests or sending out any marketing materials. UNDERSTAND the request or submission and make the lead feel like the information that they provided was not a waste of time and personalize the response. More importantly, understand who this person is and what their purchasing habits and needs are. Lastly, RESPOND appropriately and make sure that you are providing them with useful information based on what you have learned about them.

Take it from me, there is nothing worse than ignoring your prospects’  needs and responding inappropriately. And for those of you that get leads from online wedding registries – make sure you at least look at the wedding date!

Posted by Christina on August 7th, 2007
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