Wedding Websites: Pros and Cons
Pretty much everything is online nowadays, and wedding tools are no exception. We are forever seeking out ways that will make our lives easier and a wedding website can certainly aid this. The overall idea of creating your own wedding website is to have a place where all your guests can go to for information about your big day. There are of course many advantages to this, but there are also some aspects you should be aware of before making one. So here are my list of pros and cons to help you decide whether you should make one or not.
‘Beloved Floral’ template example from The Knot
Pros
It’s Free!
The majority of wedding websites are absolutely free and have a lot of features and personalisation. Lots of them also have an app version so you can design your website on the go, again for free.
It Can Make Your Life Easier
Not only can you store all your information in one place such as travel, accommodation and day-of info, but it can be a great way of making any announcements to your guests without having to call or email all of them individually. Also it should prevent guests from contacting you on the big day asking for directions etc as they will be able to find all that information on your site.
It Can Save You Money
With all the information about the wedding already on the wedding website, there is no need to print out an extra information card to go in with each invite, you can simply direct guests to your website instead. The same goes for RSVPs as most sites will enable guests to RSVP online too which will save you printing money and save your guests postage money.
It Can Be Helpful For Your Guests
Being able to RSVP online is a huge bonus for a lot of your guests and you will find that a lot more people will RSVP a lot quicker because of it. This is because it’s so much easier and quicker than posting an RSVP back to you. You can also let your guests know about any nearby accommodation which is always appreciated. Some websites even offer a guest forum, so your guests can meet each other and discuss plans before the big day.
Gift Registries and Honeymoon Funds
Most websites will enable you to set up an online gift registry and link it to whichever company you are using. For example if you use John Lewis for your gift registry, your website can embed your list from John Lewis into your site for you so guests can very easily browse the gifts you have requested. A lot of websites also offer honeymoon funds too with links to your bank account so guests can gift you money through your website.
‘Rustic’ template example from Getting Married
Cons
Privacy
Most wedding websites aren’t private when you first make one, so anyone could find you in a search engine and see all the details such as time and place of your wedding. The majority of the time this won’t be an issue, but it’s definitely something to consider. A lot of websites will enable you to change these settings so only guests can see the website, but this will normally require you to give them all a password to access it, which let’s be honest is a bit of a faff.
Be Aware Of Location
There are so many website builders out there so you might be tempted to just pick the first one you come across. Just be aware of the country the website is set to. For example we chose to create our wedding website through The Knot which is an American website, and it worked really well for us until we came to the gift registry. We couldn’t set up an online registry through the site because it only allowed you to use American companies and bank accounts. This also applied to the honeymoon fund part as well as the normal gift registry. So not the end of the world of course but definitely something to think about!
Be Aware Of Older Guests
A website might be useful for a lot of guests but there will always be those, particularly elderly guests, who struggle with technology or just don’t understand it. (And quite rightly so!) You might also have guests who just like to stick to tradition when it comes to RSVPing. In order to be fair to everyone you might end up having to print RSVP cards anyway, otherwise you may end up having to chase up those guests yourself. For our wedding, we made a both website and printed RSVP cards, and I found that most of our guests still replied via post, whilst some did both online and post!
You Can’t be Sure It’ll Be Used
Whilst it’s a great way for posting announcements for all your guests, you can’t be sure who actually sees it. Your guests might RSVP, have a look at all the information, then never go back to it again. If this is the case then they may miss any important announcements and you won’t know about it. Emailing each guest separately or using Facebook Messenger might be a lot of effort, but at least you will know that each guest has received the message!
Template example from With Joy
A Bit Of Inspiration
This is our wedding website below to give you an idea of what you can include on your own. Click on an image to expand it. We designed our website through The Knot using the ‘Naturally Stunning’ template. We included details about the running of the day, accommodation information, a photo gallery that guests can add to, and a honeymoon fund.
Hopefully this was helpful for you, and watch out for my next ‘Wedding Wednesday’ post. Happy planning!
