5 Reasons You Need to Make a Wedding Website
We’ve talked about things that every bride needs to do after she’s gotten engaged, but one of the biggest things (aside from really taking it all in and enjoying the engagement pixie dust before it settles) she - and her partner - should handle is the wedding website. Yes, it’s basic and certainly something that’ll have you wondering if it’s even really that necessary, but we’re here to tell you that it SO IS. We wouldn’t go so far as to say that you can’t get married without one, butttt we’ve also said that you don’t HAVE to have a wedding registry, and we’ve proven ourselves wrong on that one, #youonlyliveoncegetthegifts.
Once you finally come around on the ‘yes, we should have a website’ thing, you truly don’t have to do too much to make it cute and helpful to your guests. There are tons of wedding website generators and templates out there to commission for your occasion - we have them too! So many of them and they’re all different and fun and modern and crafty, you can definitely spend a lot of time sending example links to your hubby or wife to be.
Yes, it CAN be annoying and tedious to fill in all the open fields - info about the two of you/where you met, how you fell in love/all the stuff that makes your relationship weird and adorable, bios/cast facts about your bridal crew, a play-by-play on how your proposal went down, what’s on tap for your wedding, etc. But it can be as simple as you want it to be. No one will be grading your wedding website game and if you haven’t figured out some of the details yet, then f*** it!! Fill them in when you have time and want to. Or enlist your most creative, wordsmithy friend to author up those sections on your site. ((If you’re no stranger to the online dating scene, you’ve probably asked one of your besties to help you fluff up your ‘about me’ summaries before - this is basically the same damn thing)). There’s no deadline here and you can work on your site for as long as you want to before sharing it with your VIPs (really, our websites don’t go ‘live’ without your blessing first - so finesse it till your heart’s content, and then head over to your website management page and enable the password function. Come up with a password and hit save, then share the URL and your password with guests, friends, whoever, whenever you want.
Truthfully, here are the main benefits to your website - because our designs are too cute, and you’ll like feeling like you’re now part of the #readytowed club, for sure, but in the grand scheme of things, you’re going to use it to disseminate information. It’s transactional, and it’s going to save you from all the questions your friends and fam have about X, Y, and Z, when you’re already stressed out beyond about A, B, and C.
You’ll be able to share the high-level haps in one place at one time.
Guarantee that your parents’ friends and co-workers (people who you probably wouldn’t invite to the wedding on your own, but have to because #respectingyourelders still applies) will be thirstyyyy for the scoop on how your bae got down on one knee. So, instead of having to explain in all, in painful detail, just send them the link to your website. They can get all the tea there. Same goes for any of your family members who you might not see on the regular, but who deserve to be in-the-know, too…
You can drop in your wedding date, where it’ll be (if you’ve booked the place already), a schedule of all the pre-during-and-post wedding events, accommodations for guests, things to do in the area. It’s basically a nuptials newsletter that anyone who has access to it can get their ducks in a row by perusing.
You’ll be able to brag about your BFFs.
This is the reason all of your friends are visiting your site, they want to see how you described them, how you cherish the relationship you two have, and what kind of photos you’re using for their mug. Do them all a solid and use nice words, pick flattering pics, they’re going to be there for you throughout this whole journey, so they’re entitled to an attractive introduction (especially if any of them are single and hoping for a little hookup action at the wedding… just sayin!).
You’ll be able to let everyone know about your registry.
We’ll get into our fabulous registry at a later time, but for now, just being able to have a place where your guests, friends of friends (who want to get you an engagement gift), family members who might not be able to make the wedding can come to see where you’re registered. It isn’t exactly proper etiquette to share this kind of info on other modes of correspondence - engagement party invites, wedding invites, etc. - so as soon as you know what you and your partner could use for your home/what types of experiences might be on your bucket list/etc. create your registry and pass along the link - parents of the bride+groom are great purveyors here…
You’ll have an opportunity to share where accommodations have been arranged.
Major. Major. Major. Just a few weeks ago, my husband and I were getting ready to send in our response card for our friends’ wedding in June in Rhode Island. We tallied our attendance, selected our meal choices (something that your guests can do on your website 👇), and sealed up our envelope - but knew we still needed to book a room for the night of the wedding. Our friends had a STUNNING wedding invite suite, but it didn’t include an accommodations card, so we were kind of at a loss for where lodging was supposed to be. TG we found a little * denoting ‘additional details’ on their wedding website. And as soon as we visited, we got an in-depth account of the local hotel options and group rates that were available for their party for the weekend. So! If you’ll be scaling back the number of cards you’ll include in your invitation suite or going paperless with everything, you can still point people in the right direction (of things to do, where to stay, what kind of transportation/shuttling will be in service) when they’re visiting your website.
And finally. You’ll be able to collect RSVPs and harass without actually harassing.
Something you’ll figure out once you’re about 40 or so days out from your wedding - people don’t turn in their response cards in a timely manner (or any manner, TBH). But if you have a wedding website - ours just happens to be boss, you can activate your RSVP/guest list ledger and allow guests to respond that way - with plus ones if they have one, with their meal choices - if your venue requests them in advance. We even have RSVP reminder messages that we can send to help nudge your guests along.
All you need to know about our RSVP resources 👉 How to Keep Track of Your Guests Easily and Pain-Free
You can even add any ‘last-minute’ notes, weather advisories/precautions/ceremony or reception site changes or further explanations on why you’ve decided to go ‘kids-free’ for your wedding (because you’re actually tired of having to reiterate why in person) if you want to! This is your wedding bulletin, be clear about anything you want to be clear about!
Want to keep your sanity? Get moving with your site. We try to make it as easy as possible, and we’ll even help you with some of the tough stuff - #customhashtaghelp? EMAIL US!!!