The groom matters | Columbia wedding photographer
For those of us who work in the wedding industry, there is a resounding belief.
It's all about the bride.
When I first started my business I fell into this trap. My current website speaks to only women in a couple of places, my Facebook ads were catered to only women, I have a bridal guide completely geared to only the bride... I am basically saying there is only one person in this marriage that I care about. Why is this happening! I sometimes struggled to even remember the groom's NAME at an engagement session because I had put 100% of my focus on the bride and never communicated to her with him in mind. And this is totally normal for wedding photographers because this idea is just the nature of this business. We send guides to the bride, we send gifts with USB's that have bath salts and other things really only for the bride like the bride is our only client. The longer I'm working in this industry, realizing "its all about the bride" couldn't be far from the truth. It's a disservice to our couples, but it's also a disservice to us as photographers and the opportunities we miss.
The most important person to the bride? The groom.
If our most important person is our bride, we can't just stop our focus there. Because her most important person... is him. What does he think about the pricing guide. How did he feel about the consult if he came. What does he want out of his photos. What does he think about vendor choices and budgeting for photography. What's important to HIM out of all of this. Take Matthew for example. Matthew rocked his engagement session with Amanda, he was super affectionate and natural and it was perfect. That's always a win! On their wedding day, I knew I could take a second that night to off camera light an image of them in front of their Camaro SS. Is that necessarily my style? The bride's style? A light bright wide aperture wedding style? No it's like 180 exact opposite of me but it's not about what I want all day long. The groom matters.
All forms of praise are good for your business
Everyone knows I love all things feminine and that shows in my work. There are a lot of florals.. a lot. Candles, tons of dress shots, light bright pretty airy pastel pallets. Things that generally guys may not be drawn to, but that car photo that I shot made Matthew SO happy that he ended up publicly sharing my image from my business Facebook page, tagging me in a post, and saying wonderful things about his experience. To who? The hundreds and hundreds of Facebook friends that he has, in the area that I market to, in the age range I market to, who are probably dating and going to put a ring on it eventually. Hundreds of people who didn't know I existed do because THE GROOM was happy. That's the marketing I wasn't thinking about before! Matthew saying "WE got what WE wanted" inspires this for me because every groom should feel like this!
Two is always better than one
Making two people happy is WAY better than putting all of your focus on the bride. My new challenge for every wedding is to think about what I can give to the groom, not just the bride and the bride style shots that we all love, but what thing I could give to each particular groom. What could make him feel equally as taken care of and appreciated and understood as her? I feel so inspired right now. When we speak about weddings we tend to speak so much about brides, bridal guides, making sure we are taking care of "our brides", and I'm not sure why we can't do that with "our couples". I'm inspired, I'm changing my mindset, and if you've had a lightbulb moment in this post, let me know if you are too!