When it comes to wedding planning, it’s vital to clearly communicate with guests, efficiently deliver key information and answer any questions that might arise surrounding the big day. Thankfully, having a comprehensive wedding website accomplishes all of this — in a beautifully captivating way.
From sharing essential details to creating a memorable digital showcase, wedding websites have proved themselves to be a crucial tool in the overall wedding experience. They’re also a place for couples to show off their personal style, share their love story and offer helpful, creative tips to get everyone that much more excited for the special day. Still on the fence? Keep reading for 15 reasons you really need a wedding website.
1. Simplifies Wedding Planning for Couples
One of the biggest perks of a wedding website? You get to avoid sorting through piles of RSVP cards, manually keeping track of dates and times, and constantly updating your guest list — among other time-consuming activities. A wedding website streamlines the wedding planning process by providing a one-stop-shop for all the tools you need to plan your amazing wedding.
It also prevents your phone and inbox from being flooded with messages from confused guests, as it provides them with everything they need to know in one place.
2. Facilitates Easy Access to Key Information — For Free
Wedding websites not only allow couples to easily and efficiently share important information with their guests, but do so in a cost-effective way. Most wedding website builders on the market, like Joy, are completely free and deliver immense value. They act as a digital hub where your guests can find each and every key detail they need to know for the big day — with a beautiful customized design to boot.
Tip: While a free wedding website does map out all details guests need, consider opting for an exciting upgrade. For a small fee, you’ll be able to have a more memorable, custom URL that guests can easily type into any browser.
3. Provides a Schedule of Events for Guests
Instead of guests having to track down your various wedding events, a wedding website lets them easily access all the information for the events to which they’re invited — all on one page. You can then refer guests to the wedding website when or if they reach out with questions about anything from the wedding date to the rehearsal dinner start time. You can also create custom schedules for guests depending on which festivities they’re included in, eliminating any confusion about who’s invited to what event.
Tip: We highly recommend you password protect your site if you’d like to keep your schedule of events hidden from those who didn’t make your guest list.
4. Share Your Social Media Policies or Hashtags
A wedding website can also be the perfect place to outline your specific requests on social media usage at the wedding. Are you asking guests to use a custom hashtag or are you enforcing a blanket ban? This information is frequently placed on an FAQ page, but if you’re asking guests to be social, a hashtag can also be displayed prominently on the home page.
5. Matches Your Wedding Invitations
Who doesn’t want to create a seamless look across your physical invites and digital presence? Many wedding website builders offer coordinating wedding invitation suites available in both print and digital versions. E-invites are eco-friendly and perfect for festivities like your engagement party or even save the dates, while printed wedding stationery is customary for your actual invitation. Joy offers dozens of beautiful designs for both to keep things cohesive!
6. Helps You Organize Your Guest List
When you’re hosting a welcome party, rehearsal and rehearsal dinner, ceremony and reception, and post-wedding brunch, it can be a major headache if you have to keep track of invitations and responses for each of your wedding events. A wedding website makes it easy for you, the couple, to easily create a digital invite for each gathering and check off the guests who are invited to each.
Joy’s wedding website builder allows you to organize your guest list by couples, family members, guests with children, the wedding party, and any other categories you wish. It also allows you to set whether each guest can bring a plus one and discover if they’ve opened their invites and submitted an RSVP.
7. Provides Online RSVP Options
Besides allowing you to collect digital RSVPs for your wedding events and helping you access an up-to-date count of who is coming to each gathering, you can also ask guests to answer a variety of questions when they RSVP.
When guests RSVP for the ceremony and reception, for example, you can ask about dietary preferences and restrictions and if they plan to bring a plus one.
If you’re planning a destination wedding, it may be wise to ask when guests will arrive and depart and where they plan on staying.
8. Introduces Your Wedding Party
Help your wedding party feel extra special by featuring them on your wedding website. With this feature, you can upload their photos and add their name, title, bios, their relationship to you, and even a fun story about how you met.
9. Lets You Answer FAQs
To avoid fielding a stream of questions about dress code, food, transportation, plus ones, childcare and more, most website templates include a FAQ page. This is where you can answer common wedding questions and create customized queries for guests that are specific to your special day.
10. Creates a seamless way to share your gift registry
The best wedding websites help to share your gift registry information with tact and grace. Not only does it efficiently explain all the necessary details about your wish list, but does so while upholding best practices for etiquette when it comes to sharing registry information with guests.
For example, you’d never want to include registry details on your invitation, and relying solely on word of mouth may put an unwanted burden on your family and wedding party. By including a link in your navigation menu, it’s a subtle hint that you have registered. From there, guests can access direct links to your registry items and get more info about how to purchase the gifts.
11. Pools Your Wedding Registries
It’s very common to register at more than one store and/or set up cash funds for your wedding gift registry. For this reason, having the functionality to combine your various wedding registries into one place is an incredibly convenient tool.
However many wedding registries you have, a wedding website provides a page where guests can explore where you’re registered, contribute to your honeymoon fund, and purchase that blender or china set you’ve been salivating over.
Tip: Joy’s universal registry is an easy way to collect registries all in one place, and it’s seamlessly integrated into your site if you’re using Joy’s wedding website builder.
12. Helps Guests Find Great Deals On Lodging
Expecting out-of-town guests for the wedding? When you ask folks to travel for your big day, they’ll want to know the best areas to stay in and where to find reasonably priced accommodations. A wedding website can be a helpful tool to guide visitors with information about lodging deals, including your favorite hotel recommendations and any room blocks you’ve reserved with special discount codes. (This can be especially beneficial for a destination wedding where all guests will need to book lodging!)
13. Allows You to Provide Travel Tips
A wedding website helps you ensure out-of-town guests have an amazing time between all the festivities. You can provide insights into travel requirements and local customs as well as tips for transportation, restaurants and entertainment.
Tip: Looking for more ways to make travel easier for your loved ones? Check out these tips for helping guests, from suggesting activities to providing souvenirs.
14. Expresses Your Preferred Contact Method
If guests have questions regarding the big day, it’s important to express your preferred contact method to ensure effective communication. You can explain how they can best reach you (or the wedding planner), whether that’s through a contact form where guests can submit their inquiries, or directly through your email or phone number. If it’s password-protected, your wedding website can also be a great place to provide a way to reach your day-of contact well in advance so you won’t be expected to field calls or texts as you’re getting ready to say “I do.”
15. Gets Guests Excited About Your Big Day
Do you want guests to connect with your love story and get pumped up for the upcoming festivities? A wedding website, like Joy, is an excellent way to do that.
Not only can you include a wedding countdown on the homepage, but you can also create a section to share the story of how you and your partner met, fell in love, and got engaged. This can be a written story or even a video. You can also share your engagement photos and other images in a photo gallery that helps chronicle your journey.
Creating an immersive, personalized wedding website is the perfect way to build anticipation and get your guests that much more excited for the wedding day.
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