Disney’s Dream Weddings
Persuasive Writing: Advertising and Fundraising
April 11, 2007
INTRODUCTION
Walt Disney World currently has multiple options for weddings in a program called
Disney’s Fairytale Weddings and Honeymoons, but all of these weddings are either
customized with extremely expensive price tags or standardized with very little room
for couples to add their personal touches. This project offers a new collection of
Disney’s Fairytale Weddings and Honeymoons. With Disney’s Dream Weddings, younger
couples will have the options of the expensive, customized weddings at the cost of the
less-expensive weddings.
Each couple that has decided to plan a wedding with Disney’s Dream Weddings will be
assigned a wedding planner at their initial meeting. This planner will be with the
couple from the first stages of planning until the couple exits their reception. The job of
the wedding planner is to make each couple feel like royalty throughout the entire
planning process and to make it as effortless as possible for the couple. Couples will be
asked to develop a line item budget for their ceremony and reception ahead of time that
will be finalized during the first meeting with their Disney Wedding Planner. Since all
of the couples using Disney’s Dream Weddings are on a budget, the initial budget
decided upon at the first meeting must be strictly followed. The job of the wedding
planner in this case is to make sure that the bride and groom are aware of how much
money is left in each part of their budget so they do not exceed their intended budget
total. Therefore, customer service and attention to detail is a flagship of this program.
CREATIVE STRATEGY
My goal through this campaign is to open younger couples’ eyes to the possibilities of
having an affordable wedding at Walt Disney World. The overall cost of adding
another branch of Disney’s Fairytale Weddings and Honeymoons would not be very
substantial. This program would entail very few costs—only printing and producing
these various pieces of advertising and marketing in addition to running them on a
regular basis. Disney’s Dream Weddings might also want to consider hiring a few more
planners on Disney’s Wedding Team if the program becomes very popular so each
planner could spend more time with his/her clients. In this case, training new wedding
planners would be an additional cost to the program.
Target Audience
All seven design pieces in this campaign are aimed at younger, 20-30 year old, engaged
couples who are planning a wedding in the near future and would like to get married at
Walt Disney World, but are concerned about the high costs. There is a specific
emphasis on brides-to-be in these pieces as well. I chose this specified audience because
I assume the brides-to-be will be making most of the plans in the wedding planning
process.
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Message
I created all of the slogans used in this campaign including “Your dream wedding is
only a wish away” and “…make your wedding a magical moment in time.” The tone of
these slogans ties in with one of Disney’s main goals— making magic happen and
wishes come true for all of their guests on a daily basis (Walt Disney World).
Sources
For this campaign, I used Disney’s current website, www.DisneyWeddings.com as my
primary source. I chose to use this site because my assumption while creating this
project is that I am Disney’s Dream Weddings Coordinator and an employee of the Walt
Disney Company. As secondary sources, I used the websites of couples who have
previously been married at Walt Disney World for photographs of their ceremonies and
receptions as well as ideas on how to make the original Disney’s Fairytale Weddings and
Honeymoons even better for a more diverse audience (couples websites). I also
researched additions to Disney Weddings that Disney does not currently offer, such as
Disney inspired wedding gowns made by designer Kristie Kelly (“Would You
Dress…”) and included them throughout this campaign. These additions are also used
as my secondary sources.
Constraints
Finding pictures of all the elements in Disney weddings was a challenge in itself.
Disney shows all of these items on their website, but because this program is
copyrighted, people visiting the site are not able to use most of the photographs for
their own purposes. Another problem I faced was the lack of space in a lot of my
design pieces. Due to the large amount of information I wanted to present, I sometimes
had to pick and choose what information I wanted to include, and then cut that down
again. This whole process was very challenging.
CREATIVE EXECUTION
I tried to keep a constant theme in the pieces I designed. The clouds used as the
background for most of the pieces are an image I wanted to carry out throughout the
campaign. When some people think of dreams, they think of clouds, tying into the
theme of magical weddings couples can have with Disney’s Dream Weddings.
I quickly realized that the cloud background would not work for all of the pieces
because the background would be too busy and take away from the information being
presented. This was an issue in the multi-page documents, the booklet and brochure.
For these pieces, I chose to use the color purple as the background. Purple is associated
with royalty which links to the goals of Disney’s Dream Weddings. This specific shade
of purple has an elegant look to it, which ties in well with the scripted font used as titles
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and headlines throughout the campaign. Purple backgrounds also coordinate well with
the blue text that is used throughout the various pieces.
Wedding Planning Book
The wedding planning book is the key to making weddings affordable for younger
couples. Disney’s Dream Weddings Planning Book would be classified as a
combination between an impressor and tell-all mix due to its presentation and level of
detail. Because of the way the book is structured, with its user-friendly, personal
checklists and detailed information, couples planning a wedding with Disney’s Dream
Weddings will not have to make any trips to the facilities in Orlando prior to their
wedding. A halfway point trip is recommended to finalize locations, choose flowers
and sample dinner menus and cakes, but is not a necessity. None of these plans could
be finalized in the days prior to the wedding when the couple arrives, so the halfway
point trip becomes a very useful tool for both the wedding planner and the couple to be
married. Other options instead of taking a halfway point trip are outlined in the
booklet itself.
The cloud theme and the shade of purple continue throughout this book. Cloud
pictures used were the same as those in the poster, which will be discussed later. I also
used more pictures from my personal collection, photographs from
DisneyMooners.com and MagicTrips.com, couples websites of Amanda and Scott’s
Fairytale Wedding, Our Fairytale Disney Wedding and Karen and Jason’s Wedding
Website to create the pages in the book. This book allowed me to go into a lot more
detail about each of the topics because the overall size was larger and each section could
have more room than in the other mediums. Pictures showcasing various elements of
the wedding plans were also not limited to one small photo, allowing for more of a
variety for couples to see in print and compare. Use of the internet will also be
integrated into this book, with specific links couples should go to in order to see 360°
views of locations, flower arrangements and table settings in addition to suggestions for
musical entertainment and sample reception dinner menus.
Print Magazine Advertisement
This advertisement is a one-page ad. Ads like this would be placed in large, national
magazines targeting young females such as InStyle, Cosmopolitan and Marie Claire as
well as travel magazines. These ads would also be placed in bridal magazines such as
Modern Bride and The Knot for brides to refer to while planning a wedding.
Females will be the targeted audience for the print ad because I want to appeal to the
young girl in most females who wants to be a princess and live a fairy tale life with her
prince starting with her wedding. Males are not targeted as the primary audience in
this ad because grooms-to-be generally do not care about specific plans for their
weddings such as shades of a color and fabrics for decorations; all aspects that go into
the planning of a wedding.
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The cloud design of the ad catches the reader’s attention first and makes that reader
want to continue reading about what her dream wedding can be like. I found the
Mickey Mouse cloud pictures on Disney World’s website while the cloud background
came from The Department of Computer Science and Information Engineering at the
National Taiwan University (“Cloud Background”). I also found the castle sitting in the
clouds on an Adobe Photoshop Contest website (“Castle in Clouds”). Copy length is
longer in this piece because readers will spend more time reading magazines if they are
interested in the topic. The information is more trusted and is also available for a
longer time than most other forms of media (“Print”). This allows brides to refer back
to this ad when selecting a location for a wedding.
Poster
The second form of media Disney’s Dream Weddings would use is a poster. This poster
would be placed at various locations at Walt Disney World such as theme parks and
other places on Disney property where posters already exist. One specific location for
this type of poster would be when entering the Magic Kingdom, in the courtyard by the
train station.
Vacationers at Walt Disney World are a captive audience, especially in the theme parks,
so these posters would need to be strategically placed to attract the most attention
possible. Seeing a poster for weddings at Walt Disney World while couples are already
on vacation there could create a desire to want to be married at Disney World in the
future because their current vacation has been so memorable.
The design of this poster is very similar to the print ad. It was very easy to integrate the
cloud design into the background of this poster. The Mickey cloud and cloud
background pictures were the same as those used in the Print Magazine Advertisement
while the picture of Cinderella’s Coach came from Disney’s wedding website.
Television Commercial
Although at first glance this television commercial may seem cheesy, I feel that its point
will clearly be made: weddings can be magical or elegant on any budget at Walt Disney
World. One of the many reasons for this is that potential consumers can see as many
pictures of locations and weddings at Walt Disney World as they desire, but an actual
video backing up that information gives a new perspective to the whole situation. This
television commercial uses some of the techniques for good TV commercials that we
discussed in class including association with a place, “The Lovely Payoff” principle and
an improvement from before (“TV and Radio”).
Disney’s Dream Weddings commercial would air on national networks such as E! and
Style Network during complementary shows such as Who’s Wedding is it Anyway? and
Married Away as well as during programming for women, such as daytime soap operas
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on any of the standard networks. Lifetime Television, which specializes in women’s
television programming, would also carry the commercial.
Internet Banner Ad and Contest
Since 41 percent of Americans use the Internet, the targeted audience would have a
great chance to view this ad (“Internet”). The ad would also be inexpensive to create
and could be used more than once. This banner ad would be placed on wedding
websites such as Brides.com as well as style and entertainment websites like
Eonline.com and StyleNetwork.com because those television stations carry wedding
planning shows and cater to a mostly female audience. The banner ad would also
appear on travel sites like Expedia.com and Travelocity.com to attract potential
consumers while they are planning a trip for their wedding or a vacation prior to their
wedding. Various other sites catering to females like iVillage.com and
Cosmopolitan.com would also carry the banner ad.
The banner ad would link to a website where couples could enter to win their
personalized dream wedding from Disney’s Dream Weddings. All expenses for the
wedding would be paid for by the Walt Disney Company, except for travel for the bride
and groom and their guests. Specific details about what the dream wedding entails and
the maximum cost would appear in small print at the bottom of the contest page. The
web page containing the contest itself would be a page linked from
DisneyWeddings.com, with links to take visitors back to the main page to see what kind
of weddings Disney’s Dream Weddings can provide. After a couple enters to win the
contest, they would be directed back to the Disney’s Dream Weddings website, which
will also carry the banner ad.
The cloud pictures for this ad were the same ones used in the poster, while the castle
picture was taken from my personal collection of Disney pictures that I photographed.
Illuminated Sign
I designed this illuminated sign to look like a billboard, but with more detail. The
reason for this design choice is while people are looking at an illuminated sign (which is
considered a new form of media) in an airport, they will have more time to read the
details of the sign and process the information than they would if they were driving
down a major roadway and passing a billboard (“All That Other Stuff”). The text is
large enough that it catches the intended audience’s attention, but still small enough
that it is not distracting and hard to read. Pictures used were the same as in the poster.
This sign would be found in major airports such as Pittsburgh, Orlando, Chicago,
Boston, Atlanta, Los Angeles and New York. The sign would appear in terminals near
baggage claim so people could walk around their new destination looking at signs for
attractions in the area, or as another place to visit, depending on their current location.
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The sign would also appear in hallways to and from gates so people could also look at
this sign while they are waiting for their planes to depart.
Informational Brochure
I intended this brochure to be available at different locations throughout Walt Disney
World and even at the other Disney parks including Disneyland in California or
Disneyland Paris in France. The brochure could also be available at Disney Stores, such
as the one in New York City on Fifth Avenue. Couples vacationing at Walt Disney
World who have seen the illuminated signs in the airport or the poster at the Magic
Kingdom could contact Disney’s Dream Weddings to have a brochure sent to their hotel
room. Finally, brochures would be available at Disney’s Dream Weddings office for
personal pick up by interested couples after a brief tour of the facilities by a wedding
planner.
One reason that I chose to depart from the standard cloud background in this piece is
because the text needs to be smaller so a lot of information can be covered. If the cloud
background was used in this piece, the text would be very hard to read and the
background might draw the reader’s attention away from the material being presented.
The cloud theme does appear in the brochure in some of the photographs as feathered
edges and pictures of Cinderella’s Castle with clouds as its backdrop. The pictures I
used in this brochure were the same cloud pictures in the poster, pictures from my
personal collection of Disney photographs and also from Disney’s wedding website.
This brochure could be described as a specific project or teaser brochure because the
information only deals with Disney’s Dream Weddings and allows the intended target
audience to want more information so they can begin to plan their dream wedding
(“All That Other Stuff”). The brochure also uses a personal tone and specific details in
its language and reads like a story guiding the reader from one section to another (“All
That Other Stuff”).
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EVALUATION
Overall, I am very pleased with the outcome of this project. When I first started
working on it, I wondered what I had gotten myself into because of the large workload.
I also had in mind exactly what I wanted each of these pieces to look like, but I did not
know if I would be able to physically make them, based on my limited knowledge of
computer design programs.
One place I think I could have done better was working on the design of individual
pieces. While similarity can be a good thing, I think these pieces are too similar. I
would attribute this flaw to the fact that I do not know enough about page design to
create completely different looking pieces with the same general theme. This is
something I want to look into learning in the future. I also want to become more
familiar with the program I used in creating these pieces, Adobe InDesign. I think that
once I become more familiar with the program, the design elements will come through
in pieces I create.
Something I did not think of initially that might be a good addition to this campaign
would be to integrate the internet contest and television contest into one, teaming up
with one of the networks, such as Lifetime Television. A television commercial could be
created that invites people to access the internet site to enter the contest. This way the
contest would be seen by a larger portion of the targeted audience because not everyone
in the targeted audience would necessarily see the banner ad.
I chose to add some elements to Disney’s Dream Weddings that Disney does not
currently offer through their wedding planning programs at Walt Disney World
because I felt these services would be a huge asset to the Walt Disney Company. My
feeling is that if people love Disney enough to have a wedding on site, they probably
want little details to reflect their choice of location. Wedding gowns based on
princesses and wedding rings featuring Mickey Mouse would fall into this category.
I did change some things from my initial letter of intent when creating the final project.
I chose to slightly tweak the target market to include younger males, but still focus on
younger females to widen the possibility that younger brides would hear of Disney’s
Dream Weddings and choose to plan their wedding with them. The brochure’s purpose
changed from being a source of information for couples to look at after expressing an
interest in Disney’s Dream Weddings to being a general form of information for couples
who would like more information. I also chose not to contact wedding planners in the
Pittsburgh area because I found, after doing some research on Disney’s current
wedding program that Disney has a team of wedding planners and do not allow
outsiders to plan weddings on their property. I feel that these changes were pertinent
to the success of my final project.
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Works Cited
Amanda and Michael’s Fairytale Wedding. 2005. Amanda & Michael. 6 March 2007.
< http://www.amandaandmichaelsfairytale.com/index.htm>
“Bouquet Styles.” 2007. Walt Disney Company. 2 March 2007.
<http://disneyweddings.go.com/site/wed/cus/cer/floral.jsp>
“Cinderella’s Castle.” 2005. Personal Collection.
DestinationFlorida.com. Disney Cruise Clouds. 8 March 2007.
<http://www.destinationsinflorida.com/disneycruiselines/disney_cruise
_clouds.jpg>
Disney’s Fairytale Weddings and Honeymoons Error Page. 2007. Walt Disney
Company. 7 March 2007. <http://disneyweddings.go.com/site/error>
Disney’s Fairytale Weddings and Honeymoons. 2007. Walt Disney Company.
7 March 2007.
<http://www.disneyweddings.go.com/site/gate/index.jsp>
DisneyMooners.com. 2006. MouseMooners.com. 8 March 2007.
< http://www.disneyweddings.go.com/site/gate/index.jsp>
gremlenhunter. “La La La Disney Castle in Clouds”. 24 Feb 2007.
< http://www.worth1000.com/emailthis.asp?entry=164802>
Karen and Jason’s Wedding Website. 2007. WeddingChannel.com. 13 March 2007.
<http://couples.weddingchannel.com/wedding_websites/
PersonalWebsite.action?view=home&occ=567431720>
O’Brien, Pamela. “All That Other Stuff.” University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh,
PA. 14 March 2007.
O’Brien, Pamela. “Internet Advertising.” University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh,
PA. 19 March 2007.
O’Brien, Pamela. “Print.” University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA. 24 Jan. 2007.
O’Brien, Pamela. “Radio and TV.” University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA.
28 Feb. 2007.
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Our Disney Fairy Tale Wedding. 2006. LindyandScott.com. 10 March 2007.
< http://www.lindyandscott.com/disneywedding/index.html>
The Secret World of Kany. “Cloud.Background.” 2 March 2007.
<http://www.csie.ntu.edu.tw/~ntucs82/PEOPLE/b2506044/Myself/
STAR/cloud.background.jpg>
Tokyo Disney Resort Weddings. 2007. Walt Disney Company. 7 March 2007.
< http://www.disneyweddingsjapan.com/index_e.html>
Walt Disney World. 2007. Walt Disney Company. 17 March 2007.
<http://disneyworld.disney.go.com/wdw/index>
Walt Disney World Fairytale Weddings. 2006. MagicTrips.com. 12 March 2007.
<http://www.magictrips.com/beyond/weddings.shtml>
“Would You Dress Like A Disney Princess For Your Wedding?" 2007. 4 March
2007. < http://www.styledash.com/2007/02/23/would-you-dress-like-adisney-princess-for-your-wedding/>
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