Today I am chatting with Ciara Crossan, Founder of Wedding Pro and Wedding Dates. Each year they release an excellent wedding industry report that I LOVE. In today's episode we dive deep into the stats to see what you should be paying attention to in 2025.

Download the 2025 UK wedding pro by wedding dates report

Download the 2025 Ireland wedding pro by wedding dates report

Join the Wedding Pro Members Lounge

Time Stamps:

00:05 - The Importance of Virtual Tours in Wedding Planning

00:37 - Introduction to the 2025 Wedding Industry Report

11:08 - The Rise of Gen Z and Marketing Strategies

21:38 - The Impact of AI on Wedding Planning

33:23 - The Rise of Ghosting in Wedding Planning

37:37 - Understanding Ghosting in the Wedding Industry

Mentioned in this episode:

Wedding Pro members lounge

Find out more about the wedding pro members lounge: https://go.beccapountney.com/wedpro

30% of couples will not even inquire if they don't see prices on the website. Virtual tours are really important. 72% of couples said they like watching virtual tours again before they even inquire.

I'm Becca Pountney, wedding business marketing expert, speaker and blogger, and you're listening to the Wedding Pros who Are Ready to Grow podcast. I'm here to share with you actionable tips, strategies and real life examples to help you take your wedding business to the next level.

If you are an ambitious wedding business owner that wants to take your passion and use it to build a profitable, sustainable business doing what you love, then you're in the right place.

Thanks so much for having me back.

Becca, I'm thrilled to have you back. I love this industry report and you probably think I just say it to you for flattery, but I genuinely just really like it.

I love the stats that come out of it. I love the way that it's displayed. It is one of my absolute favorites and I was counting down until it came out.

So I'm thrilled to have you back because I love talking about it and who better to talk to about it than the person who created it? So yeah, thank you for your time. Thank you for coming back and talking to us about it. And I will put a link in the show notes.

I'll say that right from the start where people can go and grab their own copy of the report and there is a UK version of the report. There is also an Irish version of the report, but for the purposes of today we're going to be focusing on the UK report.

But if you would prefer to read the island report, you can go and download that as well.

So before we get into the report, I gave a very quick intro, but do you want to just give people who maybe didn't hear the first episode you were on a quick rundown about who you are and what you do?

Sure. So I started my business. I've been in the wedding industry for 17 years now. So pretty much a veteran, I would say, at this stage.

And of course I've seen a lot of changes and I suppose the industry evolve over that time, been through the recession, been through Covid. So, you know, definitely those things have impacted, impacted our industry and the trends.

So, yeah, we provide wedding software to, to hotels and wedding venues all over the UK and Ireland and even further afield. And It's a wedding CRM, effectively called WedPro.

And it helps those venues keep focused, keep streamlined, reduce all of that admin, I call it donkey work to free them up to do what they really love doing and what they're really good at, which is talking to couples and, you know, enjoying the wonderful world of weddings.

I'm sure you come across people all the time that still working off those Excel spreadsheets.

Yep, absolutely.

And look, you know, Excel has its place too, but I think nowadays when we're all so busy and there are brilliant tools out there to help streamline and save time and we've used a in Wed Pro to feed in inquiries from all different sources. So it's really just about reducing that manual admin and saving time and giving, you know, brilliant reports and data.

I'm obviously, as you know from the reports, I'm a total numbers junkie.

So I always believe that, you know, data is, is power and you can make really good, informed decisions when you've got the right reports and the right numbers in front of you.

Because as we'll see from the survey, from the data, we know that the next generation want things. They want it now, they want automation, they want this AI integrations, they want everything in one place. Like we have to service them.

And we cannot service people at that higher level when we're doing it manually because otherwise we'd be working ourselves into the ground.

And if we know that people want instant replies and contracts that they could digitally sign and all the rest of it, that's just not possible unless we use a system. So if you're listening to this and you're still not using a system and think that you can give an instant reply within 2 minutes yourself.

Then either you're working at some kind of crazy rate of knots or actually maybe you do need to look into some kind of CRM system. And again, I'll put the link to WED Pro and that in the show notes.

So talk to me about this survey then because I do love your survey and I know sometimes people can be a bit skeptical about surveys because obviously it's just a moment in time. It's a, it's a capture. Obviously some people may be skeptical about where the surveys come from.

So just give us a bit of background about how you design and put this together. What is the data set?

So every year we put it out there kind of end of December and into January because we know that's the time when a lot of couples obviously are newly engaged and they're all excited and of course they want to talk about their wedding plans. And we put this survey together. It's a really detailed survey. It has over 50 questions in it and we put it out there to the community.

So to couples on our database, on our social media, we run ads. We want to get it out there to the widest audience of engaged people as possible.

There's no way you would fill out a 50 person, 50 question survey if you weren't in that cohort. It's not a quick fill out this thing and you're into a prize. It's a really detailed survey.

So they are taking, you know, a chunk of time to fill it out. We're really proud to have such a large sample set. So we had over 700 couples respond to the survey this year.

So again, it's not 100, 200, it's a really, really decent size to get those insights, I suppose and see those trends. And you know, there are, you know, couples in Yorkshire don't behave the same as couples in WA or couples in London.

There are going to be regional differences and it's my dream in the future to be able to produce regional versions of this report because I think that would be amazing. But there is and anyone who has downloaded it and read it will see it's such a huge body of work. You know, we are a small business.

There's, you know, resource issues there to contend with and this is something that we produce for free. It's our gift to the industry.

We do it every year because we want to know, you know, the current, you know, the current landscape, I suppose what couples are want, what they don't want. It's really important for us to keep our finger on the pulse, but obviously it's really important for our clients as well.

So the venues that are out there and the suppliers that are listening to this, you know, knowing your couples and the kind of Personas, I suppose, and then tailoring your sales and marketing and strategy accordingly, I think it's, I mean, it's a no brainer for everyone in business. And you can only do that, you know, if, if you know them really, really well.

Now some people will be saying, well, I talk to couples all day long, I know what they want, I know what they don't want. And that's probably very, very true for people at the coal face.

But sometimes when you're working in a wedding business or in a wedding venue, it can be you're kind of isolated, you don't necessarily know what's going on.

The wider industry, that's why, you know, wedding networking, whether it's online or in person, is just so brilliant in our industry because people get to share ideas and is this happening to you or you know, you can kind of sanity check yourself. So this another great way to download it, read it and see. Yes, this is what we're experiencing. Yes, we're on the right track.

No, I'm not going completely insane. It's just a really good way to kind of benchmark yourself, I suppose, with what's going on in the wider industry.

Absolutely. And what I really like about it as well is that it's not just a whole load of stats.

I really like where you've got the stats, but often you pull into the report things that people have actually said or things that people have actually written and the way they've worded it. So it's not just a would you download this brochure with or without prices is yes or no? Yeah, we've got that stat.

But also there's little comments that people have made about why they don't trust things or and I think that is also a key insight that is goals and information.

Because yes, all these couples are different but there will be similarities and if one person's thinking it, there's probably a whole host of other people thinking it too.

Exactly.

And you know, we've been producing this report for 10 years, so what we have now looks radically different from what we had 10 years ago and back 10 years ago was just kind of a litany of stats. Right.

We've evolved the survey and we have included in the last couple of years a lot more open ended questions so that we can get those insights from couples. And you would be blown away by the amount of people that are filling out those, those open ended text boxes. Some of them are writing War and Peace.

You know, they really want to tell us what they feel. But you do tend to get just really, really good, rich insights from those things and then we can really start to see trends over time.

So we had this year the. And more people filled out those open ended comments than ever. I actually should go and count them now.

I'm just thinking about that now, see how many open ended comments we actually had. But I mean there was hundreds and hundreds and hundreds because it means, you know, 700 people responded to the survey.

So I mean God is not hundreds, thousands of open ended comments. So what we were able to do was we used AI ourselves to help us kind of bring the themes out of those.

We're able to upload the answers of all one question. Say for example, to chat and say what are the common themes threads coming through here? What are the common themes?

So to, to, to get that sense of, you know, that sentiment, I suppose from those specific answers.

But we've also peppered the report with direct quotes as you said as well to give, you know, hear it directly from the couples as well as the overarching themes.

I love it. And what's interesting for me and why I love it so much is obviously what I do is I'm trying to lead the way.

I'm trying to explain to people what's going on in the world of marketing. I should be a couple of steps ahead of the general person because that's what I'm here to do.

And at the end of last year, the beginning of this year, there certain themes that I was talking about a lot and I was saying this is coming, this is coming, this is coming.

And when I then read your report and it backs it all up with stats and like number one, that's great for me because I could go see, I do know what I'm talking about. I'm not just making it up. Here's some stats to prove. But also it's great for people to then have that to see. That's not just Becca's opinion.

That is actually what's going on out there and we've got something to hang our hat on.

And so when people go through the report and you know, we've been talking, we talked before we recorded about how a lot out there in the industry at the moment is talking about the right rise of Gen Z and how they're coming. And we know that in your survey, 94% of those respondents were Gen Z and millennials. So we know that already.

And what's going to happen over time is, yes, okay, maybe only the younger end of that bracket right now are Gen Z. But each year as we look at this report, we're going to see that grow and grow and grow. And I think that's helpful for people to understand.

Okay, well, right now, you know, a small percentage of our audience are this Gen Z demographic, but in five years time it's going to be the predominant force. So we need to get ahead now so that we're ready for them in five years time. So it's a fantastic.

So let's go into some of the details that you've seen come out of it. What are some of your key stats?

What are some of the key things you've seen come out in this year's report that you think would be interesting to the people listening?

Well, just to pick up directly from what you just said there, you know, about Gen Z and that younger age demographic coming through, you know, a couple of years ago, I think it was three or four years ago, we put TikTok into, as one of the answers in, you know, what's your social media of preference?

We put that in for the first time and I think it came out like, I don't know, 2% or something with it with viewing TikTok at the time, you know, it absolutely hadn't made its way into kind of the masses at all yet. But in three short years we have seen that increase to 34% of couples now said they're getting their wedding inspiration on TikTok.

So I mean, that in itself just shows, you know, I suppose, the emergence of that younger Gen Z demographic and how it actually is impacting and how venues and suppliers and vendors that are out there that are marketing to that audience, you know, they need to be aware of that, they need to be tuned into that.

I know we'd probably have a whole podcast ranting about TikTok separately, but I just wanted, I suppose pick that up as one example, I suppose, of how the age graph, demographic has changed.

And you know, in a lot of cases in venues that we work with, you know, the owners or the management are, you know, a much older profile and the coordinators, potentially the wedding planners that are dealing with the couple are that Gen Z themselves.

And so, you know, providing them with tools to do their job more efficiently and faster and I suppose giving them freedom, maybe show up on social media the way that they're very familiar with.

It might be a bit cringe to some of us older people in an older camp, but actually that is what 8 the people working in the venue or in the wedding business like to do. But it's also the kind of content that couples like to consume as well, especially that younger demographic.

But as you said, that that's going to be increasing over the next five years. So it's definitely something to be aware of.

I think as well.

What's really interesting and why we should look at the bigger picture, and that's why, again, why I love the data that you've got here is because actually if you look on the face of it and you just took out the stat like, where are most people looking on social media? Well, Instagram's huge. It's 62% is way up there.

And so we could say, well, we're on Instagram, we're doing great, 62% of people are there, and we don't need to worry.

But actually seeing the rise of TikTok, and I actually use that, that slide, obviously with you guys credited in almost every presentation I do at the moment, where it's got each of those years to say, yeah, okay, Instagram is number one on the whole with people coming to social media. But look at this growth.

And if this growth continues in that same direction, you are going to be left behind because Instagram is kind of plateauing out a little bit. And what will happen if things keep going on the same trajectory is that TikTok will take over.

So that's why it's good to see these reports not taking individual stats, but going and digesting the whole thing because actually different patterns emerge. So, yeah, TikTok, absolutely.

And I think it is a struggle in venues because often the younger people do have ideas and it's getting the older people, the people in charge, to agree and to give them a little bit of freedom. And that can be hard, can't it?

Yeah, it definitely can. And, you know, I get it. I'm a business owner as well.

We're, you know, protective of our brands and our, our, you know, what we're putting out there online.

But I think, you know, a massive theme that came through the survey right across, and not just related to social media, but right across the board, was transpar and authenticity. And that is something that is so, so important nowadays. It's so wanted by that Gen Z audience, but actually just by everyone.

I think in this world, this crazy world we're living in of like Fake news and you know, deep fakes and all of this kind of thing. People are craving that realness and that connection and that personalization. So that came, you know, right through so many threads of this report.

And you know, pricing transparency was massive, but also personal conn in terms of the responses in the follow ups, you know, what people are, why they ghost or don't ghost again, we'll talk about ghosting, I'm sure.

But you know, the personal connection and people actually really being genuine with them and showing a genuine interest and adding value, I suppose to their wedding planning were all things that actually made an impact for couples. We hear it all the time from venues and vendors. You know, if you talk to anyone in the wedding industry and say, well, what's your biggest challenge?

You know, a lot of times they'll say we just need more inquiries, just need more inquiries. We're not getting enough inquiries. But we know nowadays that couples are researching and shortlisting before they even inquire.

They're looking at you. It's not like they haven't seen you or they haven't, you know, you need to advertise more.

They are doing that research but they are doing you out before they even make the inquiry. And the reasons to do with that are, you know, pricing transparency. 30% of couples will not even inquire if they don't see pricing on the website.

Virtual tours are really important. 72% of couples said they like watching virtual tours again before they even inquire. Reviews are vital.

You know, I think it was 50, 56% of people said they want to read reviews before they will actually inquire.

So again, it's all of these things are painting that picture about that initial research and the transparency and kind of showing up online I suppose before people even make the inquiry. So just capturing that init inquiry is, is, is hard at the moment and doing those things will make a massive impact.

Yeah, absolutely.

I think pricing transparency, we need to touch on that a little bit more because I know I talk about it all the time, people who've been in my world from stage, on podcasts. I always talk about how important it is, but I think it's still an area that people struggle with.

There's an old school way of thinking that once I get them in the door then I can sell them something if it's, if there's prices there, they'll go for cheap. But we, I don't believe that is the case. We can see for the data set that you've got here that actually this is important.

People are telling us it's important.

I really like this thing that you've put in there where it says survey feedback indicates that hidden costs are frustrating and couples prefer clear upfront pricing, not to mention time consuming for them and you. So what are we seeing out there?

Are you still seeing that venues are resistant to this price transparency or do you think people are starting to realize, actually, this is quite important?

I think it's. It's a tale of two halves. Right. There are definitely people that have realized, yes, it's important. Put it out there, just publish the price. Prices.

We don't want to be busy fools ourselves. We want, you know, we want to be upfront with people. But they're absolutely, you know, I still hear from venues saying that, you know, they.

Exactly what you said at the beginning, let's get them through the door. Let's. We don't want to show the prices because they might think it's too expensive. But, you know, 30% of couples aren't inquiring.

They just aren't inquiring flat. You're not even getting the inquiry. Forget about getting them through the door. Not even get the inquiry.

If you don't have prices on your website, they're just immediately ruling you out. And I think a lot of them feel like, you know, maybe the venue might be hiding something, that it could be a waste of their time.

There might be an assumption that it's too expensive and it just kind of increases uncertainty for them and maybe, you know, dare I say it, anxiety. They just don't want to put themselves in that position. So, you know, there's plenty of, kind of plenty more efficient to see.

There's plenty of other vendors, there's plenty of other venues that are publishing their pricing. So they've just, they've just moved on. You know, they're looking for a way to cut you off the list.

Yeah, and I think it's sometimes as well, it's. They just don't want to be embarrassed. They don't want to go and see something and then actually have to say that they can't afford it again.

I thought it's a really interesting kind of quote in the report where it said it's disheartening when you find somewhere lovely, go through the time and effort of inquiring only to find out it's out of budget. And that, that just one sentence really spoke to me because I thought that's tough. Why are we making couples do that?

Because we're making them fall in Love, maybe we're giving them an amazing experience. We're showing them around, we're giving them Prosecco. They can see how amazing it is. They love it.

But then that's embarrassing and that's disheartening when they realize, but I can't afford it. That' just makes them feel small.

Exactly.

And I do think, you know, of course, in any kind of business transaction, there might be an opportunity to, you know, get a little bit more for people or get people on a higher package. If they do fall in love with it, they might be willing to spend more.

And I think in fairness to some of the businesses out there, you know, that might be their mindset. And I, I don't think that's incorrect. You know, I really do think that is the case.

But you have to give people at least a guideline, even just a range, so that they can say, okay, well, that's in my ballpark, at least. Even if I'm at the lower end. They might come, fall in love, and then they might find money elsewhere.

I often also see that couples are very fixated on budget at the beginning of the process, when they're touring venues, when they're selecting their venue.

But the closer it gets to the big day, the budget tends to go more and more out the window and they just start, you know, throwing, throwing money at it. So I think for a lot of venues, they're very fixated on kind of the initial price or the initial package that the couple have signed the contract on.

And they're actually not necessarily thinking enough about upselling opportunities as the, you know, it could be 12 months between signing the contract and the wedding day.

You know, there's a lot of opportunities there closer to the time to maybe upsell them to a higher package in a really nice value adding way, not in a smarmy, salesy way, because that was a big thing that came out from, from the survey as well, that people just didn't like pushy sales tactics or people that were like, you know, really too forceful. I suppose at that, at that decision stage, you know, get them locked in, there might be an opportunity to earn more from them down the line, I think.

I've been talking a lot recently about how I think the marketing funnel's dead. We're living in the age of the marketing theme park. There's lights, there's sounds, there's Flashing noises.

And so it's not anymore that I get engaged in my nice leafy village in Oxfordshire and then I go to the closest manor house wedding venue in Oxfordshire because it's close to me. And it's nice because I could go on TikTok and I can see manor house venues from across the entire world just by typing in a couple of things.

And so I pick and choice. And so we can't rely on, oh, we've got people down the road, they'll just come through the door. We have to give people more to go on.

And if we're not being transparent at price and they don't understand because why, why should they understand how much a wedding costs when they've never done it before? You will find that they either think you're too expensive when you're not, or they'll think that you're affordable when you're not.

And so everyone's just wasting a lot of time. So absolutely price transparency key that's come out and I think it's a key thing that people need to be paying attention to. AI.

I want to talk to you a little bit about AI because I think this is the first year that you've mention mentioned AI in your report. You obviously talked about using AI yourself in creating the report. What are we seeing from couples using it themselves?

So they're using it to do things like, you know, get the wording for their invitations, you know, drafting the content for their wedding website if they're doing one of them, and they're also using it for budgeting.

So they might, you know, ask ChatGPT for a sample wedding budget because again, just to pick up an earlier point that you made, you know, when couples are starting planning wedding, they have no idea how much wedding weddings cost. Like, ask an average person on the street, an average, you know, girl or guy in their mid to late 20s, you know, how much does a wedding cake cost?

How much does a wedding dress cost? How much does a wedding venue cost? They don't have a blue clue. They are completely in the dark. And often they're very shocked when they do find out.

But they, so they will ask, you know, chatgpt for kind of sample budgets and then they can kind of work off that.

You know, they might also ask for kind of a task list timeline, you know, again, things that people, you know, would have found in, in wedding blogs traditionally.

They're starting to find that on ChatGPT now and ask at these kind of, you know, have these over and back questions, you know, with, with Chat GPT again, you know, they might ask it for inspiration.

You know, Search GPT is really up and coming now as well and we're starting to talk to our venues about, you know, making themselves findable on, on Search GPT and to give people inspiration because, you know, they might not, they might not want, you know, to your earlier point, you know, the manor house in Oxfordshire, if they're from Oxfordshire, you know, they're looking for something a little bit more elevated, looking for that inspiration. So they are, you know, typing in these hashtags and you know, searching either on social media or asking and asking AI for ideas.

You know, again, we've, we've, we've been in this industry long enough, Beckett, to know that, you know, trends do change over time.

But a lot of kind of the way couples and the things that they want are very similar in terms of like most couples say, well, we want something different to what our friends had.

Now, you know, 90% of weddings follow the same format, you know, but people do start thinking they want something really different and you know, they're using things like social media and AI to get that inspiration.

Yeah. And I think the other thing is we don't need to panic about it because it is coming, but it is still quite small.

I think sometimes we can get in our head about it and think, ah, everyone's now using AI to search for things. And again, this is where the survey is helpful because you said only 6% percent are saying that they're using it at the moment.

So it's quite a small percentage. But I believe when we look at next year's report, a bit like tick tock, each year we're going to see that stat go up.

So it is important now you can be an early adopter of this and understand it now. So thinking about, okay, well how does this impact my business and how can I upskill myself?

So I don't think it's something to panic about, but I do think it's something we need to pay attention to.

And again, I've been talking about at the beginning of this year because a couple of people have said firsthand to me, my couples found me via ChatGPT because the next generation are searching ChatGPT or ideas tell me a wedding venue that's sustainable is within 25 miles of my house, has got 50 acres of ground because you can give it so many search terms and it will come back. But what's interesting is because a lot of people are using old versions of ChatGPT is it's actually at the moment favoring older content.

So old blog posts are being favored, old websites are being favored because if people are just using the free version of chat, GPT is not necessarily up to date. So I do think it's an interesting time.

It could be whole podcast episode in itself, but I do think we need to notice that it is making an appearance and it has made an appearance on your report for the first time.

Yes. And as you said that it's 6% this year, which I think was a relatively high percentage for the first time we ever asked this.

I mean, you know, my God, 18 months ago was people that chatgpt like that phrase wasn't even in the common lexicon of people, you know. So 6% is quite high for the first, for the first year of this making our report, it will definitely increase next year and the year after that.

So as you said, if people are early adopters, then just to be aware of it, you know.

Now the other thing that's appeared on your report, I think for the first time this year that I've also been talking about a lot this year was WhatsApp. I said that I think WhatsApp is going to get bigger and bigger. I think people are really favoring it as a method of communication.

And that did come out a little bit in the report as well, didn't it?

Yeah, it did.

And again, we're just seeing the rise and rise of, I mean, I suppose technically WhatsApp is a social media platform, even though I think, I think most of us think of it as a messaging platform more than social media.

But, you know, certainly it's on the rise and couples are more accepting of businesses communicating with them via WhatsApp now and this type of like over and back communication again, we see it in other businesses, right.

You know, you can, if you go on some Instagram pages that are selling things, you know, very small brands that are maybe selling, you know, handbags or shoes or like small, small that they don't have a full online shop. You're communicating with them one WhatsApp to buy the, to buy the item. I've done that, you know, for, for those very small sellers.

And we're seeing it with, communicating with other service providers, you know, our hairdressers, our dentists, our nail technicians, you know, they're communicating with us on WhatsApp or text message.

So it has become, you know, previously, you know, five plus years ago, you know, WhatsApp and text message very much would have been reserved for our friends and our family. And whereas now it has definitely become a lot more ubiquitous in the business world. You know, two factor authentication, all that brought that in.

You know, I have WhatsApps now from Yahoo and Google and different things like for these six digit codes. So we've become more accepting of those businesses being in our WhatsApp.

And as a result, you know, it's of course that's going to flow into the, to the wedding world as well. And with wedding businesses, I think it'll.

Be interesting as well to watch again the rise of it over the next couple of years because I've been having conversations with people in their early twenties who say things to me like, I don't even check my emails, I don't do anything on email. And I think it'll be interesting to see over the next decade where the email starts to go down as some of these instant messaging things come up.

And I think that can be quite terrifying for us as business owners to think about.

I think it's also an interesting one for people like you with these CRM systems because I think people will very soon be crying out and maybe it already exists.

Maybe you can tell me more for a CRM that does also let them integrate WhatsApp into it as part of their follow up process and part of their buying process because I think that's the way people are going. Actually I had a training session this week with a venue who asked me can we automate WhatsApp messages as part of a CRM?

And I was like, I don't know if you can yet, but I think it will come soon. So maybe it's something to come soon from you.

Yeah, absolutely. We're literally, it's on our development roadmap this year to build that into Wed Pro. So we're really excited about that.

We already have, you know, email nurture sequences, we call them wed mails. But we're building in WhatsApp and text messaging as well this year. So we're really excited about that because as you said, I just see it growing.

You know, the, and we do what you said about couples, you know, maybe, oh, I don't, I don't check my emails anymore.

Certain younger people, we do see couples setting up dedicated wedding email addresses just for their wedding communication because their own inbox boxes are so busy.

And I definitely find that with my own personal Gmail, like it's just, it's just overwhelming because of, you know, years of subscribing to different newsletters and your online shopping is mixed in with Messages from the kids school is mixed in with, you know, all sorts of things. So I, that's where they're using email with those dedicated couple, you know, wedding email addresses.

And, and I think one of the reasons why they like it is because nowadays I think we're all, you know, forgetful. We have the attention span of a fruit fly.

So people like that rich written record of like what was actually agreed just to keep, to keep them on track I guess themselves or just that there is that that written record. But people still do want to feel like they're communicating with a real person. So I think, you know, WhatsApp is a really lovely way to do that.

I also think it's a lovely way to communicate with couples between the wedding and the big day. Right. And particularly for upselling. I think this is like to me it's a no brainer.

If I was running a venue and I had a nice relationship with a couple and I was like trying to get them to higher package or trying to get them to add on something, you know, taking a photo of something that maybe another couple had, let's say a champagne tower or you know, some, something like that was more elevated and whatsapping it and saying, you know, our couple last week had this thought you'd be interested in checking it out.

I mean psychologically that's doing a few things like firstly it's turning on everybody's competitive nature like what somebody else had that I want it. So that's it. But also it's just a really nice subtle way of like kind of saw this and thought of you. You're not like attaching a photo to an email.

It's just like a quick little WhatsApp photo. I think that's a really. And it's a good reason I suppose that you would use WhatsApp in the first place is to send a photo.

And so I think that's a way that can be, it can be really utilized well to build that relationship as you know, in for those bookings but that the wedding hasn't happened yet and potentially use it for upselling.

I think practically as well. This does panic people. So I've been talking a lot about the practical elements of this because they see WhatsApp maybe is quite personal.

It's got a personal phone number. So I'm encouraging people to keep it separate, to have those boundaries. You can set up a business. WhatsApp is a separate app on a phone.

You can use a landline number. So if you've got a landline number for your venue. You can use that to set up your WhatsApp.

Also, you have to find a way to make this work in your business.

And you have to understand, because I sometimes still hear particularly higher up members of staff saying, well, I don't want my team on their phones, all of them the time.

Well, ultimately, if they're on their phones, but they're making sales and they're doing it because they're making TikToks and they've got a work phone that's in the Office with the WhatsApp on it, let's not look down on that. That doesn't mean they're wasting time. Actually, as long as they're getting results from that, we need to embrace it.

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And your recent video about how to set up WhatsApp, I actually sent that to one of my clients, by the way.

I DM did it to them on Instagram because she was asking me about how to set up a business WhatsApp. And then I was like, oh, I'm not actually sure. And then you like the day next day or something, you a video on how to do it. So I DM'd it to her.

So, you know, again, I wouldn't have been DMing my clients on Instagram 10 years ago, but now I am because it's just quick and easy. And, you know, we are all running our businesses from our phones. You know, I was away for a week's holidays and I didn't bring my work laptop.

You know, I just. Anything I needed to do quickly was on my phone and anything else could wait.

And we have to look at our own habits before judging our couples as well, because we are, we often say, oh, I can't believe they don't want to look at an email.

But actually, I know in my own business, if you want to talk to me and you want to talk to me directly coming into my DMs, you are much more likely to get a quicker response from me than if you send me a formal email. Because if you send me an email, I filter it and I think, oh, that's something serious.

And I need to think about that when I've got some headspace and I'm at my desk and I don't want to reply quickly on my phone.

But if you send me a quick voice note or a DM on Instagram, quite often I could be on the side of the football pitch and send you a little voice note back. So, you know, that's how we are as business owners operating, of course, our couples out there in the world are wanting to operate like that as well.

And we. We can't say, well, you can't do that, but I can. We have to look at our own habits and adapt with them. Okay, We've talked about TikTok.

We've talked about AI. We talked about price transparency. We talked about WhatsApp.

One of the other things you mentioned earlier that I'd like to talk a little bit about is ghosting, because you alluded to it earlier and you said, we'll talk more about it. So let's have a little bit more of a chat about ghosting now. What are we seeing in the world of ghosting? It's that word that wedding festivals hate.

I know, and I think. God, I'm thinking back to when I first met you, Becca.

It was in person and it was at a conference, and I think you were talking around the topic of ghosting. This is a good few years ago. And I mean, it's. It's not going anywhere. We are hearing it as a term more and more and more.

You know, venues are telling us and vendors are telling us all the time, you know, they're getting ghosted. They're getting ghosted how to reduce ghosting.

You know, both of us have done workshops on it and talks about it, but the really thing that blew me away from this report was when we asked couples if they Ghosted after inquiring, 74% of couples said they never ghosted. So I was like, what the hell? How are couples saying, like, 74% saying, no, not me. I've never ghosted anyone? And then venues saying.

And vendors saying, yeah, we get ghosted all the time. I'm like, there's this weird disconnect here that doesn't make sense to me.

You know, So I started thinking about it, and that's something, you know, you alluded to this at the beginning of the podcast. This report isn't just a load of stats. We look at the stats and we actually think about it and try to dig deeper. Well, what's this?

What's the stat actually telling us? So when I kind of, you know, marinated on that, because it wasn't what I was expecting, right?

I was expecting the couples to line up with what we were hearing and for me to say, yes, this is a thing now, you know, and it was like, complete opposite.

I was really thinking, and I really thought that what couples count as ghosting and what the venues and vendors are counting as ghosting are clearly different things. So the couple don't believe they're ghosting you if you sent them a generic response.

And that, oh my God, I've been saying don't use, don't give generic responses. I mean, I've been banging that drum for 17 years. But you, Becca. But clearly if couples aren't replying to them, they're not even believing that.

It's, they don't think of it as ghosting. And because it was just generic and they don't, they don't feel like it's deserving or warranting of a response.

And you know, couples said they, they, they replied out of courtesy, especially after a show round, you know, if they were genuinely interested in a venue reply and venues that were transparent with them, if they were professional, if they were engaging, all of, they were more likely to get a response. But we asked them, well, okay, why, if, if you had. If for the people who admitted to ghosting, we asked them why, why they did ghost.

And they said again, it came up, which we had a long chat about this earlier pricing issues, you know, it was too expensive, over budget, the pricing was unclear and some felt embarrassed, you know, that you said that earlier. You know, they're not going to reply or they're not going to inquire if they feel embarrassed about pricing.

So that was a big reason why they said they would ghost venues.

And again, another reason was if it was a generic response or robotic, if it was slow, if the quest, if their direct questions weren't answered again, they just felt like that didn't warrant a reply and they knocked. They're not in their heads, not counting that as ghosting. Some people told us that venues took weeks to respond or never responded at all.

And talked about this earlier as well. You know, couples are really put off by pushy sales tactics. So that was another reason that people ghosted.

If there was, you know, too many follow ups, if there was excessive calls, excessive emails, or if they felt a lot of pressure to book, then that was just giving them the ick. And then they're like, not your grand, I don't, I'm not going, you know, they, they again, didn't, didn't feel that they needed to reply.

And then finally, lack of a personal touch, you know, if they didn't feel special, they felt like just another inquiry or if they had a poor experience with staff, then, like, it didn't warrant a reply, they didn't deserve a response. That's kind of, shall we say, legitimizing ghosting in the couple's minds.

So I think when you hear all of that together, you can kind of put yourself in the couple's shoes. Shoes and think, yeah, fair enough. You know, whereas, you know, all of us in the industry think ghosting is an absolute cardinal sin.

But then when you flip it and try to put yourself in the shoes of the couples, you can kind of see where they're coming from.

Yeah. And it's interesting because I've really changed the way that I've been talking about this this year.

So again, like we said, you know, previously, we've been to lots of talks about how to see less ghosting and how to get less ghosting, and I do think there is still a place for that, and I do think there are things that we can do to avoid it. Absolutely.

I mean, I ghost some of my best friends sometimes, and they're my best friends, and I'm sure we all do because we're in the moment and we hold their message on unread. And I think I'll get back to that later. And then I think, well, I need to leave it on unread because otherwise I'll forget to reply to it later.

And then it stays on unread for three days.

And, you know, and I was talking to my friend yesterday at the spa and we were talking about text messaging and, well, if you ever replied to my messages, we laughed about it because, you know, that's the world that we live in. So, of course we're going to be ghosting, and of course we're going to be ghosting people who are trying to sell to us.

And I think the really important thing in what you said, which marries up with that is they don't think they're ghosting because they have asked for a brochure, for example, we have sent them the brochure. They don't feel the need to do anything else unless they want to. And actually they don't have time to do anything else.

And also, as things get easier, easier for the consumer.

So things like AI, you can say give me 10 wedding venues or some of the directories, they make it so easy for couples to inquire that within seconds they can inquire with 10, 15, 20 different venues. And so then when all those venues then send them an immediate reply back, now they've got 20 emails with 20 brochures already.

If you're number 15 on that list, they're probably not even opening the email, let alone replying to the email. And so I think we need to stop thinking, how can we stop ghosting? I think we need to accept it's going to happen.

Yes, there are best practices we can do, but we need to take it less personally and we need to just make sure that we are having automated systems and getting back to people quickly so that we can be number one in the inbox rather than number 15.

Exactly. And I think it's exactly that.

It's having that good process so that you're not taking it personally so you're, that you're not drafting these emails manually every time. And then it feels really frustrating and rude for somebody to not reply to you.

If you have a slick system in place that you know, you're transparently showing the pricing on the website, you have a lovely virtual tour on the website and you have loads of reviews, you know, you're giving them all that information upfront, then they're inquiring, you've got a nice immediate reply with the brochure back and then you have nice kind of nurturing follow up that those like actually adding value to couples, asking them really open ended questions, not just like what is your budget, you know, do you want to come in for a tour? But actually starting to build a rapport with them but in a nice automated sequence and a nice, there's a nice process there then. Exactly.

You will feel a lot less hurt by the ghosting. So like it's a fact of life. And you know what you just said about your friend there, Becca, you're not alone. I mean, guilty as charged.

You know, I think, and I think we all are and I, I'm, I do that unread thing as well. Just leave it there.

And then it's like the pressure builds but in my head I'm not ghosting them because I will reply, but it just might take me a week. They're in my mind. So again, it might be the same with couples too.

And it is probably the same with couples and they may be thinking, I'll leave you on unread. And then when I come back to this Email and I've got a week off next week.

Then I'm going to digest it, then I'm going to read through it and then I'm going to do something with it.

And so when we're guilty of it ourselves, we've got to stop pointing the finger at everyone else and saying these couples, today's generation are ghosting because we're just as bad and we need to self reflect and, and realize, yeah, this, we're just all doing this because we're all overwhelmed and we're all busy. So we need to give them a little bit more grace and have a system that works in that scenario.

Okay, we have covered so much ground, we're running out of time. But I wondered if there's any other key things that you wanted to highlight that we haven't covered yet.

I think, you know, the big thing that I always like to talk about and remind people about is I suppose couples are planning their wedding. It's such a big deal for them, it's such a big day for them. They're putting everything into it.

Whereas, you know, for us in our businesses, we're dealing with multiple cost couples and you know, it's, it's more of a business transaction. But 71% of couples told us that they don't feel special and that it just breaks my heart to read that, you know, 54% said nothing stands out to them.

17% said they felt like just another number. So it's just too many people, people that are just feeling that this is just a bit, they're in some sort of kind of washing machine.

Only one in four couples said they felt truly special.

And I think we should all be on a mission to improve that number and make more couples feel special, have a great experience and ultimately they are then going to book with you, they are going to spend more money with you, they are going to give you more positive reviews. So it's about making it a positive experience for the couples.

But also, let's face it, all of us in business, we don't want to come in, into work and butt heads with people all day long. We want to have positive experiences with the people we're dealing with.

So I think whatever energy you want to come back to you, you have to put it out there into the world.

So if you want couples to not ghost you and be really lovely and then that's what you have to put out there and it'll, it'll come back to you in the long run. So that's my mission is to help venues and vendors out there improve that number. Improve.

You know that more than one in four couples should be feeling special. Special, as you know, when they're inquiring, when they're going through their wedding planning process. So I think that's my final thought, really.

What you put out, hopefully will come back to you. And the law of averages and the stuff that doesn't just let it water off a duck's back. Don't take it personally, as you said.

Absolutely. And that stat every time, because there was a similar stat in last year's report as well. And I just. It just gets me right.

Then I think, how is this possible? We're meant to be giving people the best day of their lives. Why are they not feeling special?

But I also think there's a positive we can take from that as business owners, because actually, if you are the one that makes the effort to make people feel special, this is great news for you because you are going to stand out head and shoulders above everyone else, because clearly other people aren't doing it.

And actually, when you look at the crazy, overwhelming digital world we live in, sometimes it's the smallest touches that will make someone feel special. Like the last time someone sent you a postcard. I mean, you guys at wedding dates, you sent me some gifts after I'd been part of the online survey.

And that makes me feel special because not many people would notice that I was there and I posted about it on social media. Not many people would take the time to actually put something in the post and send it to me to my address.

And so, as suppliers, we can look at those opportunities and think, actually, I could just send them a postcard ahead of their venue tour, or I could just have their name on a sign when they arrive, or I could just give them something that they're not expecting. And that tiny little thing will have much more impact than you think.

Yeah, absolutely. It often is the tiny things. It doesn't have to be big discounts or anything like that. It's those little personal touches that make a huge difference.

And I think all of us in our businesses as. As good and all as we think we are.

And we, you know, I'm sure a lot of the people listening to this podcast are probably the best of the best, but all of us, I think, can reflect and improve and tweak. And, you know, ourselves in WedPro at the moment, we're doing a big project looking at our onboarding process.

We thought it was good, but, yes, it could be better. And we're trying to improve that. So it's a slicker, more seamless process for our clients that are onboarding into the software.

So, so that they have it, you know, that it is more seamless and they have a better experience and they're happier long term. And as I said, we already thought we were pretty good at it, but everything can be improved. And I think it is about that self reflection.

Absolutely. Kira, it has been so fun talking through this report with you. I knew that I would enjoy this episode. I absolutely have.

If you're listening to this and you've enjoyed today's episode, do go and grab the full copy of the report because there is tons more stuff we'd have talked about that is in there and it's well worth you going and inputting your email, getting a copy of that report and looking through it. Obviously, if you're using, use any of the stats that we talked about today in your own marketing, do make sure that you credit it.

Credit where credit's due because these guys have spent a long time putting together this information. And of course, if you want to find out more about Kieran, what they're doing over at WedPro and wedding dates, then do get in touch with her now.

Kira, I always end my podcast with the same question and I would have asked you this last time, but I don't remember your answer.

So it'd be interesting if there are any avid listeners, whether you say the same thing or something different, but I always end by asking, what's the one thing you wish you'd known sooner in business?

I don't remember my answer either. So I don't know if I'm going to completely contradict myself or repeat myself, but I suppose I've been in business for 17 years. It's a long time.

And I remember back at the early years, you know, I had to do everything myself. You know, I wore all the hats. Sales, marketing, customer support. I was, I was doing everything.

But I really, my business really started growing when I learned to delegate and it actually happened around the birth of my, my twin boys. They're 11 now, but they were born super premature and I was whipped out of the business. So I had no choice but to delegate.

But actually it was the best lesson ever. So, you know, I just trust my team now and let them.

I mean, the report that you love and the design and everything, I mean, Mizan on my team is the amazing designer behind all that. I just let her go, I let her off. You know, we discussed the results. We work on it together.

But, you know, she has, you know, does all of the design and, you know, has a huge, huge hand in that report.

So, you know, I used to think I was like a total control freak about that report in the past, whereas now I can step back and, you know, hiring the right people and letting go is just a game changer for me. And I just want to. I'm saying this almost to hold myself accountable, to be.

To remind myself to keep doing it, because sometimes we're always, you know, we can be put. Pulled back. So that's definitely been a thing that has really helped me grow and scale my business over the years. So.

Yeah, and you should take pride in the fact that you've led them to a place where they can go away and create something so beautiful and so easy to digest and so easy to read and be part of an amazing team.

And that also reflects well as you as the leader of that team, because I always think a good leader, a good CEO, attracts great people who give great results and everyone's a winner.

Yes. Well, I'm very lucky. We just celebrated three long service awards in the company. So Sarah has been with me for five years.

She's my head of operations. Alex, my head of sales, has been with me for eight years. And Chris, my lead developer, has been with me 10 years. So I think that says a lot.

I'm very, very lucky to have such a loyal team.

Amazing. Kira, I always love talking to you.

I hope that we cross paths somewhere again in person very soon so we can go go for another cheeky daytime Prosecco like we did when we crossed paths in Las Vegas. I'm sure we will, and I'm sure we'll work together again soon. Kira, thank you so much for your time. It's been great to chat to you.

Thanks a million, Becca.

What a fantastic episode. If you have enjoyed the stats as much as I have, then do make sure you go ahead and download the report.

I'll make sure all of the links are in the show notes so you can go ahead and get them, but it's well worth reading and saving on your computer. And remember, you can't just read the stats, you actually have to take action on them.