According to The WeddingWire, the millennial segment makes up 80 percent of today’s marrying couples, resulting in a total transformation of wedding traditions and how these events are planned. But not only are millennials changing the way weddings are done, they are changing the way venues are shopped for (check out our post, How Millennials Shop for Wedding Venues, to learn more). And one of their biggest resources that informs their buying decision: Instagram. It’s not just being used for wedding inspiration but scoping out venue experiences (notice we said, experiences, not just settings).
What this means for your wedding venue? That your social media marketing strategy should be primed to capture their attention. Because it’s often the first (and potentially only) touchpoint they’ll have with you online. So, to help inspire your strategy or re-evaluate your content pillars and what you’re posting, we vetted various wedding venue Instagram accounts to bring you these select five that are ingeniously interwoven with smart marketing features that encourage conversion.
Use the Highlights Feature to Provide a Virtual Tour of Your Venue
Example: @rancholaslomas
Especially given the recent pandemic, couples want to be able to scope out your venue before touring the grounds in-person. Rancho Las Lomas, a private resort and zoological garden in Southern California’s Lawrence Canyon, gives them just that by exclusively using their story highlights section to provide a virtual tour of the property, as well as virtual tours of each of the separate on-site venues. So couples don’t just get a great sense of the spaces, but specific past video examples of how each specific space had been used, decorated, and enhanced by other couples – offering a value that couples wouldn’t glean from an on-site grounds tour. Especially if professional videography to showcase your property is out of the budget, this is a great alternative to deliver similar value.
Focus on More Than Just Your Venue Spaces – But Amenities – In Your Feed
Example: @terrain_events
Yes, like our previous paragraph pointed out, seeing your various property spaces is numero uno. But, remember, millennials tend to value experiences over material things – and their weddings are evolving into bigger and better ways to create amazing experiences for their guests (especially now, with micro-weddings being mainstream, which leaves more opportunity for couples to use their budget on ways to lavish their guests). Terrain Events, with two event venues located outside of Philadelphia, does a great job at it hitting home how they offer more than just picturesque horticultural settings, but that they build the amazing farm-to-table dining experiences to accompany them. And the way they do it is by being sure they have a good balance of drool-worthy examples of the kinds of amazing event cuisine they serve in their permanent Instagram feed. Moral of the story: Don’t forget to showcase the various unique experiential amenities couples will only and additionally receive if they book your venue.
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Showcasing Real Couples & Real Weddings in Scrollable Posts
Example: @allenbrookefarms
Millennials have birthed something of an “age of authenticity,” – essentially, they value “real and organic” over “perfect and packaged.” So, sure, there’s no harm in showing a model-perfect bride and groom in perfectly posed positions, but examples of real couples in real moments – moments that matter – have more weight with this generation. Leveraging this fact, Allenbrooke Farms, nestled in the hills south of Nashville, Tennessee, spotlights a different couple and their past wedding each Wednesday for their “Wedding Wednesday” posts. Sure, there are detail shots of cakes and stationary in the mix, but what you’ll see most are honest, experience-evoking images of couples sharing candid moments with friends, family, and each other. No, they’re not always perfect, but that, in its own right, is very much what makes it so perfect.
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Serviceable Posts that Build You as a Wedding Expert
Example: @dewsall.court
Rather than just simply trying to sell couples on the gorgeousness of your venue, serviceable bits of wedding planning content sprinkled throughout your feed help to establish you as an expert in weddings. Therefore, they will be more likely to check back to your account for tips as they go through the wedding planning process…and look at your venue as more than just a place, but a resource they need to help guide them through this process. Dewsall Court, a venue tucked away in Herefordshire, UK, does this regularly within their account. For example, a recent November 11 scrollable post shared examples of bridal looks incorporating fur, leather, wraps, and jackets for brides not looking to wear long-sleeve gowns during the coming cold months.
- TIP Another popular topic to focus serviceable posts around right now are micro weddings. As couples find themselves trying to reimagine quintessential wedding elements as they plan (or re-plan) to meet social-distancing regulations, showcasing creative ways to do smaller weddings – in terms of arranging the ceremony or reception, creative ways to do the food, virtual guestbooks, satellite dance floors or bars, etc. – are invaluable pieces of content. And they showcase how a micro wedding can beautifully be done and beautifully done at your specific venue.
Consistency in the Overarching Feed, But Not Necessarily in Your Type of Posts
Example: @vanderwendeacres
Millennials won’t spend too much time on an account that feels messy or redundant in nature. They want a carefully curated variety of content. So, while we know the above post types – when mixed together – won’t mean the photos all naturally go together, you should still try to retain an overarching photo grid that feels consistent.
Vanderwende Acres, a premier Delaware wedding venue, achieves consistency and variety in an uncanny way in its Instagram account. As you scroll down through their feed, you’ll see the color scheme – utilizing the venue’s branded color palette – evolve over the course of the year. A series of inspirational quotes, backed by a color block, are what establish the shift in color and all subsequent and surrounding images feature correlating colors.
While we know this level of curation sounds complicated (something tells us that a designer is in charge of this account), creating a similar cohesive vibe can be as simple as picking a filter that feels like your brand and applying it to each image you post.
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