Social Media and Weddings
Does social media enhance or detract from the true meaning of a wedding day? Learn more about social media trends for weddings, and how to avoid letting it pressure or influence your wedding decisions.
Smartphones are absolutely ubiquitous in today’s world. It’s difficult to walk down the street in any city without encountering someone who’s using their phone in some way.
While many people are borderline obsessed with their phones, (aka can’t go an hour without checking social media) the other side despises constant connection with a device. So for a big occasion like a wedding, anti-device types may insist on as little use of technology as possible. But some couples feel that sharing their day on the interwebs is an essential part of their celebrations. #doitforthegram
These couples use social media in the run-up to the wedding to build excitement or to let people know about the date. They might even use social media posts as content for their wedding album. They simply love the attention that their wedding posts get from various social platforms such as Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, and Twitter.
Of course, this won’t be for everyone. But for couples who encourage social media use at their wedding celebration, they certainly won’t be short on memories to look back on. They’ll even gain access to elements and angles of their wedding that they could never have captured themselves.
In this post, we’ll take a look at the various ways social media can be used for a wedding. Let’s examine both the positives and negatives of including it in your day.
Social Media Use at Weddings
When it comes to incorporating social media into your wedding, there are several options of ways to do this.
Design a Custom Wedding Website
There are many free platforms to create your own wedding website, check out some of our favorites at The Best Places to Build a Cheap Wedding Website.
Creating and Using a Wedding Hashtag
Put your heads together and come up with a punny hashtag to represent your day. The benefits of creating a wedding hashtag include being able to easily view your guests photos (if they choose to use it.)
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Share a social save the date
Share your happy news with a digital “save the date” via social media. Create your own with Canva! Limit it to just the folks you actually intend to invite to your wedding by creating a custom audience on your Facebook, or only sharing it to “close friends” on Instagram.
Create a Custom Wedding Filter
Whether you do this for SnapChat or Instagram stories, you could create your own custom filter to add to the platform to be used by your guests at your wedding or related events.
Live-stream your wedding
With the restrictions put in place by the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s becoming more and more common for couples to livestream their wedding ceremonies. Livestreaming your ceremony for guests who are unable to attend is a great way to include everyone, regardless of restrictions.
Getting Wedding Inspiration from Social Media
If you’re looking for some wedding inspiration, there’s a plethora of places you can look via your mobile device.
From following wedding publications and inspiration accounts on Instagram, to browsing imagery on Pinterest, and more. There’s more sources to be inspired than ever before.
Want more wedding inspiration? Check out this post on Wedding Media for Your Smartphone.
The Dangerous Comparison Trap Created by Social Media Use
As our friends The Minimalists like to say, Scrolling is the new Smoking. Social Media is designed to be addictive and has resulted in some widespread negative mental health effects for people around the world. If you haven’t yet watched The Social Dilemma… we can’t recommend it enough.
Herer are a few things to note about heavy social media use:
It can be addictive. Social media platforms are designed to be addictive. They include features to bring you back to the app repeatedly throughout the day. Addiction to social media manifests in similar ways to substance addiction: being mentally preoccupied with it, opting out of other life experiences in favor of using it, hiding or downplaying your usage, or using it to produce a mood alteration you may be craving.
It can decrease actual social behavior. Maintaining a large number of “friends” online takes far less time investment than it does to maintain IRL connections. You may find yourself investing less time in your personal connections as a result of heavy social media use.
It can increase comparison of your life to others’. Social media can feel like taking a peek into someone else’s incredible life, since so many people only post their “highlight reel.” We don’t often see the difficult, emotional moments of people’s lives that happen in between the bright-eyed selfies and life milestone posts. It can be easy to think your life is harder than others’ as a result of what you see.
It can add pressure to “keep up with the Joneses.” Following people in a different financial bracket than you can lead to feelings of lack. Instead of being grateful for what you have, you may feel bitter that you can’t afford what others’ seemingly have. When you consume “wedding inspiration” that feature over-the-top details that fall outside your budget, it can lead you to feel lesser than if you can’t afford what seems to be the “norm.”
It can increase sadness and depression. Combine all these adverse effects above and you have a recipe for making people feel sad, depressed, bitter, lesser than, and anxious. Use social media for your life and wedding planning with care.
Setting Social Media Boundaries
Just like anything in life, social media is best used in moderation. If you can find a good balance to strike, you’ll have the right mixture of social media presence and mental presence to enjoy your big day. Here are some tips for setting boundaries with your social media use:
Take time to “unplug.” If you find yourself defaulting to checking your various apps several times per day, try to add some barriers or boundaries into place to keep it under control.
Limit your intake. Set up Screen Time limits for apps that trouble you and stick to those limits. If you need extra accountability, ask your partner to enter in the Screen Time passcode so you can’t get around your designated limits.
Prune your feed. If you find negative feelings or thoughts bubbling up when you use certain apps or see certain people’s content in your feed, use the unfollow button liberally. Remove accounts from your feed that trigger bad emotions.
Be intentional. Use your small amount of dedicated time to do what you need to do and then put the phone away. Enjoy your life! Enjoy the people around you!
Remember, we all have the same number of hours per day. And it’s not just a cliche– your wedding day will go by in a blink! How much of it do you want to waste scrolling other people’s posts on your phone? Wouldn’t you rather spend that time actually living life?!
Join us in the community to talk all things social media and weddings!
Related Reading:
- The Best Places to Build a Cheap Wedding Website
- The Simple + Free Way To Collect Photos from Your Wedding Guests
- How to Create Your Own Wedding Hashtags
- Having an Unplugged Wedding Day
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