Recently, I was looking into hiring a local wedding planner for a possible vow renewal ceremony next year. I started my search on social media and had narrowed down my choices to three possible wedding planners. There was one in particular that I absolutely loved based on their social media presence alone, but when I went to their website to try to find more information about their pricing and what is included, I was shocked by how they appeared to have neglected their website. It was outdated, hard to navigate, and not user friendly at all. As a web designer, I was appalled and knew they were doing themselves a disservice. As a potential client, I was turned off and kept searching.
Common web design mistakes that wedding professionals tend to make include using poor use of stock photography, lack of user experience, inconsistent branding, a lack of transparency, and neglecting their SEO and website. Luckily, all of those are fixable! Continue reading for a breakdown of the most common mistakes that wedding professionals make on their website and solutions from a web designer to help fix them.
Common Mistakes & Solutions
Mistake #1: Stock Photography & Uninspired Visuals
Stock photography can be used by certain wedding professionals, such as wedding planners to showcase their intended design style, in the beginning stages of their business, but ultimately, professional quality photos of your actual work are always highly recommended. When it comes to using stock photography, you want to make sure that you are using it sparingly throughout your website and avoid using commonly used stock images. Stock photography from free websites like pexels and unsplash tend to be more frequently used.
Solution: Use high-quality, original photographs or invest in professional stock photos relevant to your business.
While using high-quality, original photographers is always best practice, investing in a professional photographer can sometimes be out of budget or not in the schedule. In that case, paid stock photography can be useful as long as it is relevant to your niche. Sourced Co is a paid stock photography membership that was created by wedding professionals for wedding professionals. Wedding photographers should always use their own work.
Mistake #2: Poor Navigation & User Experience
Some interesting statistics about the importance of user experience in web design are that 88% of online consumers are less likely to return to a site after a bad experience and businesses lose 35% of sales due to bad user experience. If your wedding business website isn’t designed with good user experience in mind, you’re likely losing potential clients without knowing it.
Some examples of poor user experience include confusing menus, slow loading times, lack of mobile optimization, and buttons that don’t work.
Solution: Implement a clear and simple website structure with easy-to-find information. Prioritize website speed and ensure mobile responsiveness for optimal user experience.
As of February 2024, 60% of all website traffic comes from mobile devices. It’s more important than ever to make sure your website is mobile friendly. 74% of visitors are likely to come back to your site if it provides a good user experience. Website speed, clear navigation, and mobile friendliness are three areas where you can ensure your website provides a good user experience.
Mistake #3: Inconsistent Branding & Messaging
Branding is what helps your business stand out from the competition and helps customers resonate with your business on a more personal level. Your branding is your business’ identity from your logo to your brand colors to fonts and tone of voice. Another common mistake that wedding professionals make is not using their branding consistently. Inconsistent use of branding can lead to confusion and makes an unprofessional impression. Some examples of inconsistent branding is mismatched fonts and unclear brand messaging.
Solution: Develop a cohesive brand style guide and ensure website design adheres to it. Craft compelling website copy that resonates with the target audience and reflects the vendor’s brand voice.
Hiring a professional brand designer will ensure that the rest of your online presence is consistent with your brand identity. A brand designer will provide you with a brand style guide that includes your logos, brand colors, fonts, patterns, and it also tells you when to use each. This brand style guide will guide web designers in creating your website according to your brand identity. Social media managers can also use it as a reference when creating social media posts.
A professional copywriter will take your brand identity and your target audience into consideration when writing your website copy. Words are just as important as the entire design.
Mistake #4: Lack of Transparency & Information
You wouldn’t expect to go into Walmart and put several things in your cart without knowing what the prices of the items are until you get to the register, right? Why would you expect potential clients to hire you without having an idea of what your prices are? You wouldn’t, but a lack of transparency and information about pricing, packages, and what services are included is a common mistake that wedding professionals make with their website.
Solution: Create dedicated pages for services, package details, and pricing information. Include clear call-to-actions (CTAs) throughout the website to encourage inquiries or consultations.
You should ensure that each service you offer has a dedicated page with the package details of what is included and pricing information. If your services are custom priced for each client, you can still include either a starting at price or a price range to help clients be informed.
You should also be sure to include clear call-to-actions throughout the website that make it easy for clients to book a consultation or inquire about hiring you.
Mistake #5: Neglecting SEO & Search Visibility
On March 7, 2024, Meta (company behind Facebook, Instagram, and Threads) went down for a few hours, accounts were logged out, and apps were not loading anything. Businesses that rely heavily on social media to drive traffic to their website were panicking. Meanwhile, businesses that focus strongly on search engine optimization to drive traffic to their website were not worried.
SEO is vital to the success of your wedding business. Yet it’s another mistake that I see wedding professionals making with their website. Either their website isn’t set up correctly for SEO best practices or they are not using enough relevant keywords to help Google know to send people to their website.
Solution: Implement basic SEO best practices (keyword research, meta descriptions) or consider collaborating with an SEO specialist for advanced strategies.
I will go over SEO more in depth in another post, but to keep it simple, SEO is made up of two main factors. On-page optimization, which involves making your website content relevant and informative, and off-page optimization, which involves building backlinks to your site from high-quality websites.
Other factors that affect SEO include site speed, image optimization, and mobile friendliness. A professional web design studio will ensure that your website follows SEO best practices, but for more advanced SEO support, consider hiring a SEO specialist.
Bonus Tip: Prioritize Mobile-Friendliness
Once again, ensuring that your website is mobile friendly is a something that wedding professionals often overlook. A mobile friendly website increases conversions, helps improve SEO, and plays an important role in user experience.
In this post, I went over the 5 common mistakes that wedding professionals make in their website and solutions on how to fix them. If you are ready to invest in a professional web design studio to elevate your website and attract more of your dream clients, contact Sophisticated Grace Studio for a free consultation.
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