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Wedding Style Collective: A Year On

We catch up with Wedding Style Collective a year after its launch to find out more about how the platform has developed over the last 12 months.

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This time last year, Bridal Buyer Magazine featured an article about Ocean Media’s latest product, Wedding Style Collective (WSC). So, a year on, how has the platform been received by the industry? We’ve caught up with Marketing and Partnerships Executive, Alex Oxley to find out more.

Read More: What is the Wedding Style Collective?

Wedding Style Collective (WSC) has been designed to connect retailers with local brides-to-be who are looking to buy their wedding dress.

The online platform was created to champion the traditional wedding dress shopping experience by allowing a bride-to-be to find a dress she loves, see which boutiques stock it (or at the very least stock the designer) and then make an appointment to try it on directly, all in one place.

The website, that was in development for well over a year, promotes the personal and unique experience of shopping in an independent bridal boutique. But, ultimately, for retailers, it’s about being able to generate more enquiries, more footfall and more revenue, alongside building brand awareness.

So how has Wedding Style Collective evolved over the last year? Marketing and Partnership Executive, Alex Oxley says, “Since launching last year, we have seen great success. We already have a total of 64 stunning collections from the likes of Enzoani, Justin Alexander and Maggie Sottero. A key moment for us this year was securing leading global luxury bridal company, Pronovias.”

“Alongside this, we have over 130 retailers at the moment, with many of them upgrading their listings since joining. We’ve had a remarkable amount of traffic to the site within the last year and August was one of our busiest months with bookings. Bridal boutique, ‘All About Eve Bridal’ received four bookings that month alone,” adds Alex.

Read More: Ocean Media Changes Face of Bridal

A key element of Wedding Style Collective’s offering is their partnership with retail management system, BridalLive. The online software allows online appointment bookings along with customer, inventory and order management, with automated workflows and marketing features.

Tracy Ashton, owner of Bliss Bridal Gowns in Nansledan, Newquay has seen first-hand the benefits of Wedding Style Collective. She says, “As an owner of a small bridal boutique business, which I run solely by myself, I was quite unsure of Wedding Style Collective and BridalLive at the beginning. I was uncertain of the benefits it would give me, but how wrong was I!"

“The software has literally changed the way I do things! It has not only given me back valuable time that I would have spent on admin tasks and emails to brides but has also significantly enhanced my customer’s experience. The support that comes with it is just as fantastic – there are videos to watch for guidance, a help centre for any extra support and a dedicated account manager to contact for additional assistance including demos when needed."

However, the support doesn’t stop there as Wedding Style Collective also offers extensive exposure with their marketing programme. Explaining more, Alex Oxley says, “Each and every retailer that joins WSC is given our marketing checklist which explains how to make the most of their listing. This marketing checklist explains things like adding badges to their website and changing their email signature to link back to the Wedding Style Collective website.”

“We also encourage our retailers to get in touch with any news or updates,” adds Alex. “Any news of trunk shows, anniversaries or new designers can all be announced in our biweekly consumer newsletter which is distributed to over 33,000 people. The potential here is incredible and we encourage all of our retailers to utilise it to its full possibility.”

Read More: BrideLux and Confetti Join Ocean Media Group

So what does 2020 look like for Wedding Style Collective? Well, the platform is continuing its partnership with BridalLive after it’s great success this past year. Offering an unbeatable price, the first year of membership for a platinum listing is still £350 plus VAT and includes 12 months sponsored BridalLive software which would usually cost around £120 per month if direct.

Alongside this, the platform will also be rolling out a price range feature. “We’ve dived into the online shopping habits of female shoppers on consumer websites and found that this is something brides are looking for. Therefore, next year we will be showing the price range for each collection so customers can have an idea of the cost when searching for their dream dress.”

“We are looking forward to taking Wedding Style Collective to the next stage in 2020 and are just as excited to welcome a range of new designers and retailers to the platform. We will continue to support our current retailers and are eager to see the results they get with us within the next year,” says Alex.

If you want to find out more, head over to Wedding Style Collective and sign up – or come and see the team at London Bridal Week 2020! To chat to a member of the team, drop them a line on enquiry@weddingstylecollective.co.uk

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