Reviews and the Wedding

After this week’s class discussion on reviews, I reflected a lot on just how much reviews influenced my selection of wedding vendors.  My now husband (!) and I used Wedding Wire, Yelp and The Knot to widdle down our list of who we were considering and many times didn’t even visit a few we initially searched for due to bad reviews.  Additionally, we selected one caterer over another because of such poor service reviews for one we were considering.  
This is a personal example of the power of positive and negative reviews, but several recent studies validate the impact of reviews, especially their impact on local businesses.  BrightLocal’s 2013 Local Consumer Review Survey was particularly interesting, as it outlined just how much people are using reviews in their decision-making as well as how use of reviews has grown over the past few years.   One stat that was particularly interesting was that consumers are increasingly trusting online reviews as much as personal recommendations from friends and families.  

With so much potential impact, I’m surprised that more companies aren’t going to greater lengths to generate more positive reviews.  A recent Inc. article outlines the 7 Secrets to Getting Positive Online Reviews. These tips are helpful, but need to be backed up by a good product or service. 

For our wedding, our research paid off with a great day due in large part to careful selection of vendors based on online reviews.