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beccalush
Joined: 04 Feb 2007
Posts: 10
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 Post subject: Websites v paper invitations |
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Hi all - we decided to design a website for our wedding rather than sending out lots of paper / card invitations. We did this for green reasons, but it also saved us a whole lot of money too. People have absolutely loved it! A friend did it for us (we wrote the text and gave ideas for design, and she built the site) and this was her wedding present to us!
We did the front page with scrolled writing like a 'proper' invite, and had photos of us both all over it. It also has cornflowers all over it too and looks really gorgeous. We have different pages for each aspect of the wedding - directions and transport, accommodation, ethos, (no) presents, etc...
We then emailed out the link to people, asking people to email back to RSVP. It has more or less worked, although you do wonder if spam filters have blocked the invitation when you don't hear back from people (although you would have the same "oh my god, it's got lost in the post" thoughts with paper invites too).
There were about ten relatives with no email, and so we printed off the pages of the website for them.
Our wedding hasn't happened yet, so I don't want to publish the link yet, for privacy reasons. But will let you all have a look when our wedding has happened.
Becca x |
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Thu Mar 22, 2007 11:08 pm
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Jen
Joined: 12 Jun 2006
Posts: 16
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Hi Becca
That's a really interesting idea! Did you find most people replied? I'm just aware that a lot fo our friends are a bit rubbish about replying to emails or following links and are much mre reliable when faced with a bit of paper! Was the response good?
I'd love to save all that paper. We are planning a website for all the supplementary info like directions, times etc, but I hadn't thought of actually putting the wedding invitation on there.
Jen X |
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Thu Apr 12, 2007 7:17 am
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beccalush
Joined: 04 Feb 2007
Posts: 10
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Most replied immediately, really excited... I kept a record of who replied and who didn't, and then sent a more personal follow up reminder a month later to individuals. Have had 100% response now (most of the late ones very sheepish!).
Doing a website invitation is less personal somehow than getting a nice thick bit of card in the post, but we made a real effort to make the website look beautiful, so it didn't lose the 'wow factor' when people opened it up. The front page looked just like an invite, with beautiful scrolled writing saying "you are warmly invited to the wedding of Doron and Rebecca" etc... |
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Thu Apr 12, 2007 10:06 am
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ruthemily
Joined: 03 Apr 2008
Posts: 9
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Last edited by ruthemily on Thu Jul 08, 2010 11:25 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Thu Apr 03, 2008 8:01 pm
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SamK
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Joined: 27 Aug 2008
Posts: 5
Location: Birmingham
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How exactly do you make a website??!! Please excuse the stupidity, but have no idea where to start...
Sam |
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Mon Oct 06, 2008 7:27 pm
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Waveney
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Joined: 18 Jun 2008
Posts: 22
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Has anyone tried making a website? We're planning the same as ruthemily, and are about to start designing ours but don't know how to put it together and on the web! Tips would be greatly appreciated! (Maybe we'll just have to find a techie friend to do it for us...?) Suggestions please!
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Mon Dec 22, 2008 10:12 pm
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vikkymax
Joined: 14 Dec 2008
Posts: 4
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| this idea is very new to me & sounds good if anybody of you have done practically than do let me know i want to know the response of this. |
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Fri Dec 26, 2008 11:11 am
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vikkymax
Joined: 14 Dec 2008
Posts: 4
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| So what i presume nobody liked this idea or nobody ever tried this before. |
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Mon Dec 29, 2008 6:51 pm
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Katie
Site Admin
Joined: 18 May 2006
Posts: 112
Location: Hove
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Tue Dec 30, 2008 2:06 pm
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Waveney
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Joined: 18 Jun 2008
Posts: 22
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Thanks for that, we'll give it a try! Using a blog to make a website is a good idea, we'll have to report back on how well it works. Once we've got the website up we can sort out invites too...! 
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Mon Jan 05, 2009 3:04 pm
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Eddie
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Joined: 28 Feb 2009
Posts: 9
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I am pretty lucky since I make websites as a hobby and I must say that one of the things I have enjoyed most so far is creating our website.
I will agree with Katie, get yourself a blog with one of the standard blogger sites (free of charge of course) and then choose one of their themes that suit you.
I personally use wordpress for my blogs (5 and counting) and for the wedding site I found this nice theme (type: "master suite theme" into Google).
I will share a couple of the things I have been doing on my website:
I haven't put the invitations up there since my sister really loves making cards and invitations and has done a wonderful job with them. I did however make a login for each family and put that together with the website address and a request that the guests actually check the website before the wedding.
We sent out save-the-date emails and have also requested that the guests RSVP preferably via email. I am very aware that there will be some of the grooms family especially who will not be comfortable with emails and websites but we have gone with the idea that they just have to ask their children or grandchildren to help them.
The greatest aspect of our wedding website is the opportunity to put the wedding list up there. Amazon are absolutely fantastic when it comes to this. We have registered with Amazon since they have almost everything we wanted in great kitchen designs and recycled glass ware. They have a perfectly good service you can use there but if you are a bit more adventurous and you have a blog or website you are hosting yourself you can add your wedding list to your website (if you are making a website and you want to know how just send me an message).
We also found other lovely items that we wanted like organic cotton towels and sheets on other websites so I had too create a non-amazon wedding list also (oh well it was all fun).
I have put up a gallery of me and my fiancee and even got him to write a bit about how we meet and stuff.
I made a page introducing our wedding party and a page about accommodation for the out of town people.
Finally, there is also a blog where I regularly post stuff about the wedding both to keep people update but also because I find it fun. I told them when I had got a dress, I wrote about our green ideas, I told them about our theme and colours and how to get to the ceremony.
I am sorry that I can't share the site with you all as it is only accessible with a login. And here I think I will give a little word of warning. Be careful if you have a website which does not need a login, at least to comment. It can be horribly upsetting having to delete spam and other obscene and sometimes extremely mean comments.
I hope this can help or inspire someone to make or get someone to make a wedding website for them. |
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Sat Feb 28, 2009 6:43 pm
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niki
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Joined: 14 May 2007
Posts: 6
Location: London
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Wedding websites are getting more popular. When I got married in 2006 it was a fairly new thing and so we just adapted an idea to make it work for us.
Since then I have set-up weddingnotebook.co.uk which is a wedding website with gift list organiser and other wedding panning tools all rolled into one - saving time and money in planning.
Most people use it to have all the wedding info on and still send out a simple invite - just a postcard style is sufficient - directing people to the website where they can find all the directions, information and gift list.
There is an example site on weddingnotebook.co.uk so you can get the idea of what you can use it for.
There are other similar website builders around, it just depends what you want it to be able to do...some have just the gift list, and others have just the website template.
I hope that helps! |
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Thu Aug 19, 2010 1:02 pm
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