Evaluating their on-line presence

National Wedding Show

Websites: 'They are utilised as marketing communication tools to disseminate booking information as well as direct opportunities for ticket sales'

Innovative Marketing Communications, Masterman & Wood (2006)

‘The art of obtaining natural listings on search engines or search engine optimisation (SEO) has become a business in its own right with agencies specializing in web-site design that makes use of the various ways search engines search and generate results list.’

Innovative Marketing Communications, Masterman & Wood (2006)

Websites in general are part of what attracts people to these events. For the National Wedding Show when typed exactly so in the search engine it is the first within in the list which shows good search engine optimisation.

Another indication that the wedding show has good search engine optimisation is even if the wording has changed it is still first in the results list, for example simply typing in ‘wedding show’ or ‘wedding exhibition’ came with the national wedding shows official website.

Once clicking onto the website the first image that attracts the viewers attention is the national wedding show banner as well as the dates of these shows in both London and Birmingham, also showing that this exclusive event is only on for a selected amount of days in both places until again the following year. As well as this once the page has been opened a video on the page automatically plays talking about the wedding show and giving the audience a sneak peek into previous shows and what to expect on the day.

Another attraction to entice visitors is the announcement in the ‘Lastest News’ that tickets for the spring show are now on sale and the fact that you can save money when booking in advanced. This is especially attracting to their target audience who are mainly women as they can save money which is especially needed as weddings in general cost a lot and this money saved can be used at the event itself.

The website needs to be informative and easy to use as this is one of the first point of access for potential attendees to visit. The navigation on the website is straight forward and the main points are highlighted, an extra bonus the site provides is the chance to sign up to the newsletter for updates as well as an on-going blog. This shows that the website is interactive with its potential attendees and people interested in the event, with its interactive approach the website also has links to other social networking pages like facebook and twitter giving people more options on how to follow the progress of the event and maintaining the interest towards the event.

Not only is the website promoting the event, the website also encourages people to continually visit the page by adding advice, articles, online coaching, design ideas and cake ideas.