With over 87% of couples relying on online reviews to select vendors for their wedding, it’s vital you have as many positive online reviews as possible.

Whether you own a wedding rental company, wedding flower business, wedding photography business, or any other wedding-related business, you should work at getting reviews.

And what better way to collect reviews than from one of the most reputable wedding review sites—WeddingWire?

Why bother with WeddingWire?

As a wedding vendor, you must be on Google business, Facebook, and other platforms that allow you to collect online reviews that you are wondering, why bother to get reviews on WeddingWire?

It seems like too much work, and it’s like you are having too many iron heads on the fire, right?

Well, there is nothing wrong with having reviews from different platforms as long as they relate to your business. And as a wedding-related business owner, you should definitely have a profile on WeddingWire.

One reason for this is because this is where most couples come to find professionals in the wedding industry, so having many positive reviews here increases your chances of finding work.

Many couples also come here to interact with other couples and ask for advice, and in the event you are recommended, the first thing they do is to search your business name on the platform and check your reviews.

WeddingWire also:

• Makes it easy to compile your reviews, which comes in handy at building your online credibility.
• Having a WeddingWire profile makes you eligible for WeddingWire’s prestigious annual awards.

How to get WeddingWire Reviews

There is no magic to getting WeddingWire reviews. Like reviews from other sites, you simply need to ask.

To invite your clients to review your services, log in to your WeddingWire account and under the “Reviews” tab, click on “Review Collector.”

In the review collector, enter the client’s name and email address. If you want to collect reviews from multiple clients, enter your clients’ names and email addresses, then edit the message body or use the already created template.

Once you are done, click on the “Send” button, and WeddingWire will send the emails to your clients. To see the sent emails, go to “Review requests sent.”

When your clients leave a review, you can see the reviews by logging into your WeddingWire account and clicking on the “Reviews” tab in the top toolbar. You should then click the “Review Collector” in the left menu, and all of your collected reviews will be there.

Don’t be in a rush

To increase clients’ chances of responding to your request, be strategic about how you go about it.

A good rule of thumb is to avoid rushing to ask for a review. A good way to go about it is to wait for at least 2-3 weeks after the wedding to reach out to the couple and ask them for the review.

At this time, the couple will have come back from the honeymoon, and the wedding is still fresh in their mind so they can still remember the quality of services you provided.

Personalize the request

How many times have you got the message “Liked our services? Would you mind reviewing us?” While it’s an effort to collect reviews, the message isn’t compelling enough to make you take action.

Remember, the couple you served isn’t bound to provide you with a review—it’s up to you to push them to leave you a testimonial. And not just a testimonial, a good testimonial.

How do you do this?

Take your time to craft a personalized message for the couple. Right off the bat, address them by their names, then mention how much you loved being part of their big day.

To help them see you weren’t there just for business, refer to a personal gesture you made. For example, mention how you decorated the wedding tent to feature the family background.

Doing this will bring the couple closer to your business and increase the chances of them leaving a meaningful review and not just the usual cliché “Good working with them.”

Make the process easy.

Requesting the review isn’t enough—you have to make it easy for the couple to leave a review. Instead of requesting them to leave you a review on WeddingWire, give them a link to your WeddingWire profile.

Remember, when you ask the couple to leave a WeddingWire review, they have to go online and fish for the WeddingWire website, then find your profile. Some couples might find this too intimidating, complex, or time-consuming, and you miss out on valuable feedback.

Having an issue easing the review collection process? Score My Reviews makes the review collection process easy and flawless, so if you are looking to get WeddingWire reviews with a click of a button, see how Score My Reviews works.

Follow up but don’t nag.

There is a thin line between following up couples for reviews and nagging them. To avoid stepping over the edge, don’t follow up more than 3 times. Reach out for the first time 2-3 weeks after the wedding, then follow up a week later.

If there is no review, write to them asking them what the problem might be. Did they find the process too long and time-consuming? They couldn’t find your profile? Get to understand the issue at hand.

To nudge them, tell them how important the reviews are to your business and their role in bringing in more business your way.

If you did a good job, most of them will write back and tell you the issue they are facing. If the couple doesn’t know what to write, show them samples of reviews from other clients. Of course, the sample reviews should be positive.

These reviews will help the couple find words to use in your review and at the same time increase your chances of getting a positive review as the couple doesn’t want to be the only one to leave a nasty testimonial.

If you do this and it’s all crickets, set a reminder to ask the couple for a review on their 6-month or 1st anniversary.

Still no review after the third reach out? It’s not your lucky day. Let it go and focus your energy elsewhere.

Showoff the positive reviews

You don’t want your efforts to go unnoticed, do you? After collecting the raving reviews, it’s time to show them off. Thankfully, WeddingWire allows you to pin one review to the top of your reviews list, so if you have a review you are extremely proud of, you can add it to the top of your page so that couples coming to your profile read it first.

A little caveat, though. Ensure the review you pin isn’t too old. As a rule of thumb, don’t pin a review that is more than two years old.

To build up a reputation on your website, it’s important to show off the WeddingWire reviews there too. The beauty of it is that WeddingWire makes it ultra-easy.

Head to the “Reviews” tab in your account and click on “Reviews Widget” in the side menu. You should then choose the widget color and copy and paste the HTML code to your website.

The code will allow you to display the three most recent reviews for your website visitors.

Respond to negative reviews

It’s a fact that scolded clients are more likely to leave a review (often bad) than happy ones, so in your quest for reviews, be ready to face negative reviews. Most contractors simply ignore the negative testimonials but don’t do this. Instead, always give a clear and articulate response.

When crafting the response, acknowledge that the couple is unhappy, address the issue and explain what you did to save the situation.

For example, if you provided wedding chairs and they weren’t enough, mention how you moved with haste to add other seats.

Remember, you can’t change the opinion of the person who left the negative review, but your response will help future clients see what you did to salvage the situation, making you more attractive to future clients.

To avoid explaining yourself on WeddingWire and other online review sites, you can use review management platrom like Score My Reviews. The software sends a message to your customers asking them how likely they are to recommend your services.

If the customer responds they are less likely to recommend your business, they are directed to a private page where they are asked to give the reasons why they wouldn’t recommend your services and what they would like addressed.

This way, the negative review doesn’t reach the online review site, and you don’t have to craft a comeback and explain yourself.

After getting the message from the scorned client, reach out to them and iron things out.

How to get raving 5-star reviews on WeddingWire

It’s every contractor’s dream to get as many five-star reviews from every client they come across. And do you know what? It’s easy to get the reviews, and it starts from the time the couple enquires about your wedding services.

When the couple gets in touch, offer them first-class, high-quality customer service. Respond fast, give enough details about your services, be professional in your messages, and show that you not only care about the work they are giving you, but you also care about them.

For example, during your conversations, ask them about their idea of a perfect wedding. Also, get to understand their tastes and preferences.

If everything goes well and you are hired, bring out your A-game during the wedding day. Did the couple hire you to provide wedding tents? Ensure the tents are spotless, properly installed, and decorated.

Communicate professionally with the couple, friends, family, and everyone attending the event.

How to remove WeddingWire reviews

With negative reviews convincing up to 94% of consumers to avoid a business, having even one negative review isn’t something you should want for your business.

You should try responding to a negative review, but if you feel it’s harming your business, work on removing it. The cool thing is that it’s possible to remove a negative WeddingWire review.

According to WeddingWire, you can remove a negative review if:

• The review is from a person you have never worked with before
• The review contains vulgar, racist, profane, or adult content.
• The review contains personal information such as full name, date of birth, or address.
• You have gone to court and obtained a ruling to remove the review.
• The review on WeddingWire isn’t for a wedding or wedding-related event.
• The review is a duplicate of another review.

To dispute a review, log into your vendor’s WeddingWire account and click on “Reviews” in the top toolbar and left menu. You should then click on “Dispute” under the review you want to dispute then type the reason for the dispute. Once you are done, click on “Submit dispute.”

An automatic email is sent to the reviewer informing them about the dispute, and they are asked to remove the review.

You should note that even if you honestly messed up a wedding, and the couple left a negative review, you can still get the couple to remove the testimonial by genuinely explaining the circumstances that led to the mess up.

Sometimes it’s even better to offer a refund, and the couple removes the bad review.

Use WeddingWire reviews to grow your wedding business

Online reviews and ratings are vital in shaping your brand reputation, and they are the key way customers find your wedding business. That said, strive to get as many positive reviews as possible. Unfortunately, this doesn’t magically happen—you have to work for it.

Getting a raving 5-star review begins when your potential client contacts you for the first time. Offer top-notch customer service and when the wedding day comes, kill it by providing exemplary services.

When collecting reviews, make the process as easy as possible—don’t make your clients jump through hoops.

Finally, don’t follow up over three times as you will be nagging your clients. If the couple doesn’t leave a review after asking for it three times, let it go. You don’t want to be that guy made fun of in the email box, do you?