5 Ways to Effectively Communicate with Vendors

Wedding vendors are vital throughout the planning process – so knowing the best methods to stay in touch with them is important. Maintain a positive and productive relationship with your wedding professionals by following these simple tips:

Stay Organized

Email is one of the main ways to communicate with your vendors, but it is easy to become disorganized. We recommend keeping your wedding related emails filed by vendor in individual folders within your inbox. Be proactive in checking your email regularly, responding and filing communication often. You’ll want to save your emails so you can refer back on them later – especially when decisions are communicated digitally.

Understand Expectations

In today’s day and age, we value instant feedback. However, remember that vendors have several clients that they need to be attentive to. Always be sure to ask your vendors their preferred methods of communication and what their usual response time is, as well as the best and worst times to reach out to them. For example, weddings typically occur on weekends so receiving a response from a vendor on a Saturday might be tough. Also, if you send a vendor an email before office hours, you will most likely get a response later in the morning as they go through emails as they were received from the end of the previous working day. Remember, your response time is important too – the general rule of thumb is to respond within two days if possible.

Be Brief and Honest

When it comes to reaching out to your vendors, be concise and direct to the point. Instead of sending five or six emails in a short amount of time, attempt to condense everything into one communication. Also, your vendors want to make your wedding a success, so it’s important to give them a heads-up about any unique circumstances so that there aren’t any surprises during the crunch-time of your wedding. Being honest about the wedding you visualize is important.

Show and Tell

Using clear and effective language will always be important. Especially when it deals with creating a wedding. Putting requests and concerns in writing allows you the documentation your vendor and you will need to be sure that your expectations are met. When working with creative professionals such as florists, hair stylists or cake design, it’s always a good idea to provide photos to help them visualize the look you’re after.

Choose a Point of Contact

Assigning a single point of contact is incredibly helpful when you’re planning your wedding with your future spouse, your mother and your future in-laws. It’s possible they will all want to contact your vendor with different requests, but by having multiple people contacting your vendor with multiple requests – it is possible for something important to be missed. Having a single point of contact is extremely helpful in communicating necessary information and making important decisions.

Trust the Professionals

Your wedding vendors are there to help you create the wedding of your dreams and to make the process easier for you, not more difficult. Manage your communications with ease by following these simple tips to effectively stay in contact with each of your vendors. .