Wedding Wire losing Support and Dollars

Posted on May 17, 2012 Written by 2 Comments

By Paul Pannone

Ongoing coverage of the battle between Samantha Goldberg and Wedding Wire has attracted national attention to the issues surrounding what many say is a flawed rating and review system of vendors. Goldberg has been very vocal and delivered four-letter descriptors towards Wedding Wire that would make the most seasoned hooker blush. But not everyone is cringing, in fact, Goldberg’s use of the F-bomb assault enhances the passionate feelings surrounding scammed brides that trusted the services of Wedding Wire and find themselves  victims of unscrupulous people using the website as a cover for their practices.

In response, Wedding Wire’s Sonny Ganguly was forced to deliver a canned, corporate response, infuriating eWedNewz readers and paying, featured participants of the website.

 

Reverend Will Mercer has ended a long-standing relationship with Wedding Wire, feeling their rating system is difficult to understand.

 

Reverend Will Mercer is one long-time supporter of Wedding Wire that came forward to denounce their current rating system. He  issued the following statement to eWedNewz:

“I just read the (eWedNewz) post on Google + regarding the Wedding Wire rating system. I’ve just told WW that I will end all of my advertising with them at the earliest possible date because their review system has allowed 5 imperfect reviews to destroy my work in obtaining 82 perfect reviews.

I had one crazy couple right after I had surgery for gall bladder last summer that decided to take me to task for nothing other than their lousy attitude. My work has never warranted a “1.7″. I replied to the review but had to live with it. In addition to that one I have 4 other reviews in the 4.2 to 4.8 category — in some measure due to the mistakes made by reviewers in marking the form. Nonetheless, I hung in with a 5.0 average for publication purposes until April when I had a well-meaning lesbian couple give me a 4.2 (even though their comments warranted a higher score). That shot my entire average to a 4.9.

I have since garnered another six perfect scores and still cannot reactive that average I have held ever since I began with WW more than 2.5 years ago. They keep telling me to get more reviews and have now told me I will need 7 more perfect scores to overcome the situation I am in.

I spend a lot on WW. I am their highest ranking officiant in Manhattan from the number of reviews I have. I pay to be a featured vendor and a spotlight vendor as well, and for this they let me swing in the wind because of one unbalanced couple that decided they could take a totally unfair shot at me and make it stick.

I’m done with them. If you want to talk about this at any point, I’d be happy to do so. Other systems in businesses far more important than WW allow the vendor at least the benefit of the doubt in one situation here or there. I offered to sacrifice three of my perfect scores to have them remove my lowest single score. No willingness to even discuss the matter.

I don’t need to pay them in excess of $2,000 per year to be held in such contempt by them as a business partner,” according to Rev. Will.

 

A current offer from Wedding Wire, seen as an attempt to replace some of the revenue they’re losing to unhappy customers, expires at the end of the month.

eWedNewz continues our investigation and coverage of this story and welcomes your thoughts.

eWedNewz

All Rights Reserved

2012

Filed Under: Advertising and Marketing, Anti Fairy Dust, bridal, General News, Officiants, Ongoing Story Coverage, Ongoing Story Investigation, Social Media, The Internet, wedding industry, Wedding planners, wedding websites Tagged: , , , , , ,
  • Detroit Film Diva

    I understand these articles have been centered around WeddingWire because of what happened between WeddingWire and Samantha Goldberg, but people need to realize it’s not just WeddingWire that’s a problem.  WeddingChannel and all the directories it’s reviews feed is just as bad regarding the rating system.  “Verified” reviewer means nothing on WeddingChannel – it doesn’t mean the reviewer was an actual bride or client of the company it’s reviewing.  We’ve found out that anyone can become a verified reviewer just by responding to the eMail address they used when they signed up.  We, as a legitimate wedding business with satisfied customers for over 11 years, found this out the hard way when a completely fabricated, negative review was posted for us on WeddingChannel earlier this year.  We suspect it was posted from a competitor who is angry we won a large event contract they lost.  The “person” who left the review is definitely not one of our customers and we can prove it, yet WeddingChannel will NOT remove the review.  We suspect it’s because our listing is free and not a paid listing/ad on their site.  We are not one of their advertisers, nor have we ever been, so they don’t want to bother researching if the person who left the fake review is a real person or if we actually provided service to them (which we didn’t).  We’ve tried for months to have the fake review removed but to no avail, and we can definitely see a difference in the (lower) amount of wedding inquiries we receive since the fake post was published. These sites definitely don’t take into account vendictive competitors who can log on, pretend to be real brides, and leave negative comments to tear down their competition and bolster their own reputation and bottom line.

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