Dude, this is so soaked in lame sauce. My weddingwire.com account is officially getting dusted. I'm always nervous that I'll get a looney like this. My proposition is that every one with twitter on FM tweet the following:
@WeddingWire Why would you let a good photographer like Katie be treated so badly? I may deleting my account. That's bad service. please RT
Come on people. Show her some support. Image the Marketeer at wedding wire seeing that in their mentions column about 1000 times.
asparkes wrote:
Dude, this is so soaked in lame sauce. My weddingwire.com account is officially getting dusted. I'm always nervous that I'll get a looney like this. My proposition is that every one with twitter on FM tweet the following:
@WeddingWire Why would you let a good photographer like Katie be treated so badly? I may deleting my account. That's bad service. please RT
Come on people. Show her some support. Image the Marketeer at wedding wire seeing that in their mentions column about 1000 times.
I am doing it.
Thanks so much. It seems like the only way to get their attention may be through Twitter. The phone number I found online only goes to answering machines. And, obviously, the website only contains the general support email.
And...if you want my twitter name...it's @kdisimone
I paid them 1400 for first page placement for 1 year. Users of the site are funneled to use the smart match system and never even see my placement. I have gotten 1 refferal from it, which I booked, in the 7 months I've been on 1st page in my area. I have 6 outstanding reviews on there. The smart match system asks a bride to put in her zip and then it offers reviews to vendors both premium and free to pay for the lead. I only really get about 1 of these a month now, I used to get 1 a week and at first I would pay for them but was being undercut by the free vendors that also replied. There are hundreds of free vendors from my area on the site all with the same access to smart match as I have. My 1400 could have been a 35L. Big waste Live and learn. i signed up when weddingwire had a small but building buzz, which dissapearred as fast as it came. I do way better on CL even.
The sales girl from weddingwire that I deal with is not my favorite person in the world either. She was very condecending when I voiced displeasure with the smartmatch system. I feel that the premium vendors should be the only ones with access to smartmatch and the directory listing should be for everyone. There is no way I will renew premium for another year.
I would understand, if people wanted to be less direct. More like: " Hey, @WeddingWire. Give kdisimone a break, will ya?"
In any case, I did tweet. I hope it helps at all, Katie. That sort of thing is scary since most of us rely on our patience, demeanor and customer service so much to get business. In some ways, her calling the photos crumby would almost hurt less. At least with that, other potential clients can see the goods for themselves. Ya know?
katiedis wrote:
Weddingwire.com's dispute review process gives me no phone number to call. No way to further discuss with them. Their suggestion to me via the generic email? Get more positive reviews to even out the bad.
Domains are required to have a contact phone number registered with them. This may or may not be the specific person you need to talk to, but it is their phone number:
Domain Name: WEDDINGWIRE.COM
Administrative Contact, Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
WeddingWire Inc
Timothy Chi
7101 Wisconsin Ave
Bethesda, MD 20814
US
(301)231-9473 [email protected]
This is pretty sad indeed, and I'm sorry that you're having to go through with it. I would try to contact WW again and show them everything you posted here, along with responses from the many professionals here who agree that it was not your fault. Clearly, they do not understand how bridezillas work.
NotoriousPTG wrote:
I paid them 1400 for first page placement for 1 year. Users of the site are funneled to use the smart match system and never even see my placement. I have gotten 1 refferal from it, which I booked, in the 7 months I've been on 1st page in my area. I have 6 outstanding reviews on there. The smart match system asks a bride to put in her zip and then it offers reviews to vendors both premium and free to pay for the lead. I only really get about 1 of these a month now, I used to get 1 a week and at first I would pay for them but was being undercut by the free vendors that also replied. There are hundreds of free vendors from my area on the site all with the same access to smart match as I have. My 1400 could have been a 35L. Big waste Live and learn. i signed up when weddingwire had a small but building buzz, which dissapearred as fast as it came. I do way better on CL even.
The sales girl from weddingwire that I deal with is not my favorite person in the world either. She was very condecending when I voiced displeasure with the smartmatch system. I feel that the premium vendors should be the only ones with access to smartmatch and the directory listing should be for everyone. There is no way I will renew premium for another year....Show more →
good to know, I currently have the free listing and was debating about paying for something... but now that money feels better in my pocket.
I have a beef about those online reviews as well. ANYONE can write one on ANYONES page. And it doesn't take much to make you sound bad to anyone else, ie "everything was great, but...". Not to mention the 20 other sites that want you post reviews. I'm not asking a bride to go to 5 different sites and post a review for me, that's ridiculous.
I am an attorney (since I am not qualified to be a wedding photog), and I deal with these kinds of clients about once every year or so... it goes with the territory. I'm happy to hear that the same is true for the photography market.
With these kinds of people and companies, a sharply-worded "cease and desist or else" letter will often be enough to solve the problem. Depending on the legal market where you live, you might can get a lawyer to draw up such a document and serve it on this person for $200-300 tops. Good luck!
katiedis wrote:
i am not one to sue typically. but, this is about as tempted as i've ever been.
i am giving weddingwire.com an attempt to clear this up. fix their mistake. but, it may not be enough.
i have tweeted this post to them, in the hopes that it might reach a "real" person who can read, rather than an obviously generic automated response system.
@kdisimone Sorry to hear you had a bad experience. We take reviews very seriously and will follow-up tomorrow to ensure validity of review.
8:50 PM Oct 19th from Echofon in reply to kdisimone
ContagiousIdea wrote:
@kdisimone Sorry to hear you had a bad experience. We take reviews very seriously and will follow-up tomorrow to ensure validity of review.
8:50 PM Oct 19th from Echofon in reply to kdisimone
That was the 19th and still no word?
Yes...that was from the 19th. Still no word. Not a peep. Sent a tweet this morning to them after I posted this thread. Sent an email to the management and support email accounts this morning again. No respose to either.
And, not hearing from them at all during that "follow-up tomorrow" comment is why I finally decided to post this on a public forum. I cannot get resolution, contact, or follow-through from them.
What a pain in the ass. I hope it doesn't discourage you too much, I think we all encounter people like this at one point or another. It sounds like you did everything as best as you could and this bride just needs an attitude adjustment.
You really need to contact an attorney. I can almost guarantee you that a simple letter to the bride and to Wedding Wire would solve your problems. My husband is the client services director for a law firm, and drafts these types of letters regularly.
Well....I just saw that the Chief Marketing Officer for weddingwire has a twitter account.
I've now tried tweeting him directly @sonnyg
Let's see if this brings any response at all from them. Sigh...somehow I think they are deaf to their wedding vendors...oh but wait...
they did send me a mass email today asking if I wanted to sign up for an advertising special package. OMG...as if I would give them money right now? As if.
Not that I was going to sign up any way, but 20 minutes after reading this thread this afternoon, I got an email from weddingwire asking if I wanted the last featured spot
in the Bay Area listings. Sorry, I don't think so.
It's strange that in the wedding industry that online advertising companies don't seem to favor the people who pay them the money.
