Four Hot Online Wedding Trends for the Cool Months Ahead

2014 may well be remembered as the year the wedding planning process moved online for good. With various wedding planning elements like online RSVPs, social media-infused wedding websites, online registry sites, and a zillion other new innovations, more and more brides and grooms are tossing away those old legal pads and Bic pens and moving to the web to plan their special day. While some of the new trends have been around long before 2014 rolled along, a few new ones have emerged that brides and grooms ought to take a look at before they wade into their own wedding planning process. We decided to highlight four of our favorite new trends in online wedding planning, to give you a sneak peak at some of the great ideas you could consider while staying warm inside and planning your special event over the next few months:

1. Honeyfund (Online gift registries) – The gift registry has long been one of the more important components of weddings, and especially in the case of weddings with monster guest lists. Trying to keep all those relatives in order, while making sure you and your bride/groom-to-be aren’t inundated with hundreds of pieces of the same silverware, used to be quite the ordeal. Now, however, sites like HoneyFund are offering the opportunity to deal with wedding registries (as well as other gifts like cash/gift cards etc) in one easy, digital space. Using accounts at digital registries like this allows people to direct their guests to a one-stop URL that can be included in their traditional or online wedding RSVP. Easiness and presents – who doesn’t like that combination?

2. Downloadable Wedding Labels – As any expectant bride and groom learn quickly, the myriad of small items and details of a wedding can cause the cost of a wedding to rise fast. Save yourself some time (and some of your parents’/in-laws’ money) by taking one element out of the equation. Popsugar.com now offers a variety of fun, creative, and more importantly downloadable labels that you can use to customize and organize anything that may come up. While some things look to be the same for quite awhile – flowers haven’t yet found a good digital option yet – downloading your wedding labels can help you cut back on printing costs and save money for the real necessities of the ceremony and reception.

3. Event Livestreams – One of the toughest situations for the family of a bride or groom is trying to make accommodations to make sure a relative with health/mobility issues is able to witness the upcoming special day. While in the past, this might require a ton of extra planning or a ton of extra money (or both), with the advent of streaming video this should no longer be such a headache for anyone planning a wedding. Whether you choose Google Hangout, Skype, or Youtube, or the many wedding-centric options now available for doing this very thing, you no longer need to go through the hassles of trying to tailor your plans to allow your sick grandmother to witness your event. Instead, allow her to be a part of your special day from the comfort of her own home, as long as someone can help her get her computer set up…

4. The Wedding Hashtag – When it first appeared, many were skeptical, and rightfully so. The idea of using a hashtag for your wedding to collect photos, videos, posts, and messages from your guests seemed like it would always be a bit too tacky for something as traditional as a wedding ceremony and reception. However, the logic of doing so makes too much sense. By sharing a special event hashtag with your guests (whether that be Instagram, Vine, Twitter etc.), you can turn your entire guest list into a bevy of amateur photographers and videographers, who will probably end up catching many more of the special (and embarrassing) moments that will make up your day. The basic rules of social media still should apply here (be wary of drunken bridesmaids/groomsmen with smartphones!), but with sites like WebPics on the rise and the easy accessibility of existing social media networks, why not let your guests shoulder some of the burden of capturing moments and memories that you can cherish down the road!