5 Things to Include on a Wedding Website
As a wedding guest, what is one of the biggest things that makes a wedding less enjoyable? Some may say it’s cold food, terrible music, a cash bar, etc. For many, however, the answer would be lack of direction. No guest likes to feel lost and confused during a wedding weekend and it’s our job to ensure that our clients’ guests never feel this way. One of the first steps we take in that endeavor is to create a custom wedding website.
When our clients hire us, we create a custom site that hosts all the information a guest will need to know prior-to and during the wedding weekend. So what exactly do we include other than the date and time of the wedding? Here are five elements we always make sure to include:
1. A Wedding Weekend Timeline
The best way to ensure guests don’t feel lost during the wedding weekend is to provide them with details for where they need to be at any given time for the whole weekend…not just the ceremony and reception! We include any scheduled pre-wedding activities like hikes, catch-up lunches or late-night s’mores. We also make sure to include welcome parties, farewell brunches and rehearsal dinners. If any events include a more intimate subset of the guest list (such as a rehearsal dinner that only includes immediate family and wedding party members), we share details more minimally and indicate that they are invitation-only.
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2. Hotel and Transportation Information
For a destination wedding, this content is essential, but even if most of your guests are local, you likely have at least a few out-of-town guests who need a place to stay! Prior to save the dates and/or invitations being mailed, we make sure that any special hotel block rates and reservation linksare included on the wedding website so that guests can easily secure their accommodations as soon possible.
Most often, we have secured and arranged transportation for our clients and their guests, so we list pertinent details. Listing shuttle times, pick-up and drop-off points is essential to making sure everybody is on-time! Depending on the transportation situation, it may also be worthwhile to provide links to Uber, Lyft or contacts for local private car services or taxis.
3. Directions, Directions, Directions!
While we are certainly Google Maps fans, there are usually at least a couple guests at each wedding who are not as technologically savvy. It can be helpful to supply general directions for the important wedding weekend locations. For example: how to get from the hotel to the ceremony location, from the ceremony location to the reception, and back to the hotel. While it is tedious, it does prevent calls from guests prior to the wedding weekend!
4. Registry Information
We want our clients’ wedding website to be an easy source of information for everything regarding the wedding weekend and this includes gifts, of course! The wedding website is the perfect location to link any and all registries. This is also an ideal way to notify guests about any charitable organizations that are near and dear to your heart if you desire them to make a donation in lieu of purchasing a gift for you.
5. FAQs
This section of the wedding website is a perfect catch-all for any and all remaining guest questions. We utilize this section if there are questions our clients want to avoid getting calls or texts about. This could include additional information about the proper attire for all weekend events, details on an “unplugged” ceremony, if it will be a child-free celebration, etc. We use this section to ensure that the guests’ expectations are set and that they have any additional information they could need prior to the wedding weekend.
While there are additional elements that can be fun to add to the wedding website, such as an “Our Story” section, photos and more, these five our elements are our essentials. Anything else is an added bonus!
