The photos you get from your wedding will last a lifetime and likely end up containing some of your all-time most cherished images—but what can you do with them afterwards? From encouraging people to engage with your photos on social media to giving them a proper life offline, how can you ensure your wedding photos achieve their maximum impact?
We’ve scoured the internet to find these 8 fun ways to make any image you put on social media pop. Use these strategies to collect, organize, and display the photos taken at your wedding to great effect.
1. Get Creative with Your Wedding Hashtag
Before you can plan out what to do with all the photos that will be taken at your wedding, you have to get people to take them—and make sure you can track them easily. Your wedding hashtag will come in handy for both purposes.
For those not in the know, a wedding hashtag is just what it sounds like: a hashtag you’ll create and tell your guests to use whenever they post a photo from your big day. Normally, the best wedding hashtags are concise and catchy but also involve some clever wordplay to make them fun and memorable. It’s not uncommon for them to be a play on words involving the name of the bride, groom, or both (i.e. #HappiLeeEverAfter, #WilsonYouMarryMe, etc.).
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2. Have a Wedding Photo Caption Contest
Assuming you’ve chosen a clever wedding hashtag and promoted it well, the photos from your big day should come pouring in for days or weeks afterward. The next step is to make sure your guests (and other friends) engage with those photos.
Select a few photos you really like, then hold a caption contest via social media and give away a small prize to the winner. The only thing people love more than a chance to prove how clever they are is something to win in the attempt—and you’ll benefit from the deluge of comments the contest brings in.
3. Include the Photos in Your e-Newsletter
Extend the life of your social media wedding photos by including them in an e-blast after the event. It’s become quite customary to send out a newsletter via email to thank wedding guests for taking part in your big day—and what better place to include a few of your favorite wedding snapshots?
Go one further by making the images in your email clickable—and have them link back to the social media posts they came from. This will drive friends who receive the newsletter but haven’t yet engaged with your posts another opportunity to interact.
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4. Sync Your Social Media Photos to a Photobook
Getting the most from your wedding photos means finding ways to make them pop off social media as well. That’s where photobook services can come in handy. For example, this Instagram Photobook lets you take the best images from your Instagram feed and get them printed in a book. This can be especially fun if you find some great shots of notable guests (family, etc.) and a way to share the memories with those you love.
5. Collect the Photos on Your Wedding Website
It goes without saying that you’ll want to create an online gallery exclusively for your wedding photos—so you should definitely include a section for them on your wedding website. Adding a gallery on WordPress or Squarespace is pretty easy to do—and once you’ve done so, you can even make the images clickable so they link back to your social media profile. More places to find your photos means more engagement from your audience and a bigger social following for your wedding.
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6. Print Mini-Albums as Belated Wedding Favors
Of course, creating physical copies of your best social media wedding photos is important, too—that way, if images get deleted or permissions get changed, you and your guests will still have precious memories you can literally hang on to.
Using a photobook service like the one we mentioned above allows you to print albums in various sizes—and some of the smaller options can make wonderful wedding favors for the wedding party and other close friends.
7. Create Gorgeous Wedding Photo Collages
There are also plenty of free online tools that can let you combine multiple photos into a single collage—Canva and Photopea both offer tools that can help you do this without spending a single cent.
What can you do with a collage of social media photos from your wedding? We’re glad you asked—check out the next item on our list.
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8. Print Custom Wedding Posters
Most local printers should have the technology to do large-scale, high-resolution prints of your images (assuming the photo quality is high enough to begin with). Once you’ve created a print-ready PDF of your photo (or photos), sending it to a print shop and having custom posters made of your favorite moments can ensure those memories stay larger than life for years to come.
Get More from Your Memories
Simply posting a few pictures from your wedding online won’t necessarily make the impact you want, but it’s not hard to make a bigger splash if your put your mind to it. Use the tips and tricks above to maximize engagement on the photos from your special day, and check out our list of the best websites for wedding photo inspiration as well.