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David, Jolene, and Stephani had their polyamorous triad wedding in Austin, TX. The three partners have been together for six years, functioning as an open triad. This means they have other partners, and they practice what’s known as kitchen table polyamory — the philosophy that all partners communicate openly, and that everyone could sit around a kitchen table and get along.
“We always have our other partners and other metamours together,” Stephani explained. (Kitchen table polyamory focuses on friendly communication between all parties, including your partner’s other partners, also known as metamours.)
The triad’s wedding was a celebration of these ideals, with a very special first look and a carefully designed ceremony…. And lots of butt grabbing!
How was it planning a polyamorous triad wedding? Stephani explains:
It was hard. You can’t just Google how to plan a polyamorous wedding. [ACTUALLY YOU CAN! -Ed] After I got past the “oh shit” how do I do it, it got better… I realized I could still plan a “regular” wedding by just adding a person!
How do you do a first look at a polyamorous triad wedding?
The triad’s photographer, Jenna Avery from Creatrix Photography, explains how she coordinated the first look photos:
In order to capture the magic of each separate relationship, each pairing had their own moments first. Stephanie with David, Stephanie and Jolene, and then Jolene with David. Finally, all three of them came together! The same was done for the “couples” portraits and how they planned the actual ceremony and first dances. As the photographer, I was very careful to honor each dynamic and shoot each pairing as uniquely as possible. As a wedding photographer with a strong polyamorous background, I knew that regardless of their own chosen dynamic, my job was to make sure I treated every relationship as equally as possible. It’s tricky, but it all worked out!!
Polyamorous triad wedding portraits
Polyamorous triad wedding ceremony
The triad put a lot of thought into their polyamorous wedding ceremony. Stephani explained:
How do you stand with three people and the person who is officiating? How can everyone see all of us while sitting? Where does the wedding party stand? Who walks down first? So many questions.
We decided to have three sections for the guests. My husband walked down first, then me, and finally our wife. We stood in a triangle with the officiate off to the side. The bridal party was mixed up and standing off to the sides. Little details like that stressed me out! Of course, by the end of the day, it didn’t matter.
Polyamorous triad wedding reception
There were jello shots and queso! When we asked Stephani if she had any advice to share with other polyamorous folks, here were thoughts on how to have a polyamorous triad wedding:
I would say, be open to all ideas. Focus on what you want and just make it happen. This doesn’t happen every day, people won’t know the difference. If you want a traditional feel, you can still have that. If you want the full wedding experience, hire the DJ, the photographer, the photo booth, and Bar. Just because it’s more than two people doesn’t make it less of a wedding.
We featured Caroline & Simen’s Star Wars proposalin 2019… now you get to see their wedding and hear about the ways COVID actually made this autistic bride’s life easier!
Our offbeat wedding at a glance: We’re both goths, and my favorite color (besides black) is purple, so I guess that was our theme. We just went with whatever we wanted, and everything else we threw out the window. The pandemic did of course affect our wedding a lot, dwindling the guest list down from 80 to 35 people. We had to have restrictions, but it was still wonderful. I can’t imagine it any other way. We got married with family and friends there, had a cemetery photoshoot, a bunch of fun details, great music, and a lot of laughs. What more can you ask for? Oh yes, nobody got sick! SUCCESS.
As an autistic bride, I feel like I need to have control over everything and plan out every single thing I do — that’s just how I live my life. So it was the same for wedding planning too! I probably read most of Offbeat Bride’s archive (I LOVE to do research, we autistics can really get obsessed with our special interests), and the Offbeat Bride timeline checklist was a LIFESAVER. I just picked out the things we wanted and wrote them down in a notebook.
I was a little nervous about having planned for 80 guests, and just in general about the day stressing me out so much that I would be exhausted for a week afterwards. But since COVID caused the guestlist to dwindle to 35 people, it made it much more manageable, so I can’t imagine how it would have been with 80!
Thanks to my smaller guestlist thanks to COVID, I also didn’t have to hug people, shake hands, or mingle a ton, which was greatfor me. I don’t really understand or like these social norms, and I hate small talk. The pandemic has been nice to us autistic brides that way!
Tell us about the ceremony: We did your typical courthouse style wedding — cause it was free (haha). Since half my family is Filipino, they couldn’t have made it to Norway pandemic or not, and since almost 50 people couldn’t make it because of the pandemic, we live-streamed the ceremony.
We were only allowed to be 10 people total in there. My sister used my phone to stream it on Facebook, and I even had some family standing outside watching! Plus friends around the world, of course. We still haven’t watched it back, but I think it’s gonna be nice to look back on.
We totally stole the show with our extravagant looks, we got so many compliments from people connected to the weddings before and after us, and the people inside the courthouse themselves!
I’ve never really understood why people think a courthouse wedding isn’t worth dressing up for. It’s still your wedding day!
Also, there are SO many wedding traditions that me as an autistic bride just react with “why” to and feel no obligation to follow. We question and see right through those things everybody does “just because that’s the way it’s done”. Which is why in local wedding groups when people ask “do I HAVE to do X?” I advocate for doing whatever the hell you want! It’s your wedding, you decide what is right for you.
Tell us about the reception: Originally I didn’t really want a set seating chart, maybe just group certain people, and after dinner they could mingle. Buut the pandemic changed that. We got hit with the second wave the month before, and luckily there was a dip in numbers around our wedding, so we decided to go ahead with the party.
We had a sweetheart table, and seven tables with about five people at each. Families got their own tables, and friends who would see each other otherwise got to sit together, but some had to sit about a meter apart. We bought SO many bottles of hand sanitizer that we put EVERYWHERE. In our invitation, we asked people not to hug and shake hands, and keep to other restrictions we had at the time.
We had a friend as toastmaster, who did a wonderful job.
For dinner we had a taco buffet, which everybody loved.
Our cake and cupcakes matched our theme of course, and I got the topper custom-made.
Cutting the cake was much more complicated affair than I imagined! I’m so glad my sister filmed it so we can laugh again and again at the clunky logistics of it.
We are all for gender role reversal, equality and feminism, so we took some hilarious photos! We also took each other’s surnames. His family’s surname is actually his mother’s, which I think is pretty cool.
What was the most important lesson you learned from your wedding? People told me that your wedding day will never be just like you planned it to be. It definitely wasn’t. A global pandemic and other factors left us with a huge drop in guests, it rained, and yeah. It was still a wonderful day.
I was surprised at how chill I was, I didn’t feel any stress at all, even though everyone around me did!
I only have two regrets, really:
Time went by so fast that I felt I didn’t take enough time to talk to every person (can you imagine if there were 80 guests?!)
The playlist I had made wasn’t put on until after dessert. So I will share it with you! It’s 100 songs and about 8 hours long, and features mostly goth, post-punk etc., but also metal, electronic and pop. Mostly love themed! The entire party cheer-pressured Simen into dancing with me, so we danced to “Love My Way” by The Psychedelic Furs. A pretty fitting song! It was just as awkward as first dances tend to be. It was mostly Simen taking super long steps and me trying to follow with my stubby legs. After a minute he stopped and said “Happy?” and I went “No wait! Dip me!” and made a dramatic pose. He did, and everyone cheered.
Bride’s dress: I purchased the dress from a Chinese dressmaker who I later learned had unscrupulous business practices, so I can’t recommend them even though the dress was lovely.
Don’t be Afraid, Digital Marketing Doesn’t Bite! I Promise.
Digital Marketing Strategy, three words that strike fear into a lot of small business owners. It may be difficult, deciding what needs to be done to successfully market your business in the digital age. Let’s take a quick look at what should be part of your strategy.
What does a Successful Digital Strategy Look Like?
Have you thought about what a successful Digital Marketing Strategy would be for your business? Are you unsure of what you need to do to promote your business?
Developing a Marketing Strategy that works for your business can be confusing since there are so many options available. What will your effective digital marketing strategy look like?
What’s Your Best Digital Strategy?
Choose Your Best Social Strategy
We all understand the need for a website and what that entails. Selecting the best Social Media choices to promote your business can be a more difficult decision. What is right for your business, do you need to have a presence on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram? Or are their other platforms better suited to spread your message.
Ascend2 did a survey, with 190 marketing pro’s participating. Their report provides valuable data which you can use to determine your digital marketing strategy and budget.
Let’s discuss a few of their findings to help you plan your digital marketing for the New Year.
Digital Marketing Budgets are Growing
In their study, Ascend2 found that 88% of marketing professionals plan to increase their digital marketing budget. If you want to meet your goals and compete with your competition, it’s important to increase the effectiveness of your Digital Marketing Strategy.
Marketing Must be Tactically Effective
To have a Tactically Effective Digital Marketing Strategy, there are 10 areas which need to be addressed for success. We will examine each area in the following paragraphs, read on to learn what it requires for you Digital Marketing Strategy.
Content Marketing Tops the Digital List
Which digital marketing tactics should you invest in? Content marketing is the most successful tactic for a 58% majority of marketing professionals, while search engine optimization and email marketing follow with 50% and 47% respectively.
Content Marketing Attracts Prospects
Content marketing attracts prospects and transforms prospects into customers by creating and sharing valuable free content. Content marketing helps companies create sustainable brand loyalty, and provides valuable information to consumers.
It also creates a willingness to purchase products from the company in the future. This relatively new form of marketing does not involve direct sales. Instead, it builds trust and rapport with the audience.
Content Marketing is Anticipating Needs
Unlike other forms of online marketing, content marketing relies on anticipating and meeting an existing customer need for information, rather than creating demand for a new need. As James O’Brien of Contently wrote on Mashable, “The idea central to content marketing is that a brand must give something valuable to get something valuable in return. Instead of the commercial, be the show. Instead of the banner ad, be the feature story.”
Content marketing requires continuous delivery of large amounts of content, preferably within a content marketing strategy. When businesses pursue content marketing, they focus on the needs of the prospect or customer.
Search Engine Optimization
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of affecting the online visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine’s organic or unpaid results.
Higher Rankings are Better
The earlier or higher ranked on the search results page, and more frequently a website appears in the search results list, the more visitors it should receive from the search engine’s users. The objective is for these visitors to be converted into customers.
Email Marketing is Huge
Email Marketing Defined
Every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing. It usually involves using email to send ads, request business, or solicit sales or donations, and is meant to build loyalty, trust, or brand awareness. Marketing emails can be sent to a purchased lead list or a current customer database.
The term usually refers to sending email messages with the purpose of developing a businesses relationship with current or previous customers, encouraging customer loyalty and repeat business, acquiring new customers or convincing current customers to purchase something immediately, and sharing third-party ads.
Opt-in Email Marketing
Opt-in email marketing, is often described as permission marketing, is advertising via email whereby the recipient of the advertisement has consented to receive it. A common example of permission marketing is a newsletter sent to an advertising firm’s customers.
Such newsletters inform customers of upcoming events or promotions, or new products. In this type of advertising, a company that wants to send a newsletter to their customers may ask them at the point of purchase if they would like to receive the newsletter.
With a foundation of opted-in contact information stored in their database, marketers can send out promotional materials automatically using autoresponders which is also known as drip marketing.
Social Media Marketing
Social media marketing is the use of social media platforms and websites to promote a product or service. Although the terms e-marketing and digital marketing are still popular, the term social media marketing is gaining in popular use.
Most social media platforms have built-in data analytics tools, which enable companies to track the progress, success, and engagement of ad campaigns. Companies address a range of stakeholders through social media marketing, including current and potential customers, current and potential employees, journalists, bloggers, and the public.
Establish Your Social Media Culture
Social media marketing includes the management of a marketing campaign, and the establishment of a firm’s desired social media “culture” and “tone.” When using social media marketing, firms can allow customers to post user-generated content, known as “earned media”.
Social Media is all about the conversations which you generate, the shares and likes are the gold you are looking for.
Landing Page Marketing
In online marketing a landing page, is a single web page that appears in response to clicking on a search engine optimized search result or an online ad. The landing page will usually display directed sales copy that is a logical extension of the advertisement, search result or link.
Landing pages are used for lead generation. Actions that a visitor takes on a landing page is what determines an advertiser’s conversion rate.
Landing pages are often linked to social media, e-mail campaigns or search engine marketing campaigns in order to enhance the effectiveness of the advertisements. The general goal of a landing page is to convert site visitors into sales or leads.
You Want Landing Page Sign-ups
If the goal is to obtain a lead, the landing page will include some method for the visitor to get into contact with the company, usually a phone number, or an inquiry form. If a sale is required, the landing page will usually have a link for the visitor to click, which will then send them to a shopping cart or a checkout area.
By analyzing activity generated by the linked URL, marketers can use click-through rates and the conversion rate to determine the success of an advertisement.
Super Charge your Marketing With Landing Pages
Landing Pages are the core of any successful Digital Marketing Strategy. Your Digital Marketing Strategy goal is to engage more potential customers and build your Email List. Relevant content is relevant to search queries and is the most important component of your Landing Pages.
Your goal is to increase your traffic with Landing Pages, then engage those visitors and convince them to subscribe through your Opt-In Email form and build your Email List.
Data Driven Marketing
Data driven marketing helps marketers gain insights and understand trends based on an analysis of the numbers. Data-driven marketing refers to building on insights pulled from the analysis of big data, collected through consumer interactions and engagements, to form predictions about future behavior.
This is accomplished by understanding the data already present, data that can be acquired, and how to organize, analyze, and apply that data to better marketing efforts. The intended goal is generally to enhance and personalize the customer experience. Market research allows for a comprehensive study of preferences.
Analytics Tools Help Understand the Data
Analytic tools allow for targeted and personalized marketing to the customer. Approaching an audience with a targeted campaign increases the chances of their conversion. Marketers can now understand customer behavior and make informed decisions based on the data, thus allowing for a relevant targeting.
Data Personalization
Data Personalization also called customization consists of tailoring a service or a product to accommodate specific individuals. This is sometimes tied to groups or segments of individuals.
Personalization Improves Satisfaction
A wide variety of organizations use personalization to improve customer satisfaction, digital sales conversion, marketing results, branding, and improved website metrics as well as for advertising. Personalization is a key element in social media and recommender systems.
Digital Marketing
Digital marketing is the marketing of products or services using digital technologies, mainly on the Internet, but also including mobile phones, display advertising, and any other digital medium.
Digital marketing’s development since the 1990s and 2000s has changed the way brands and businesses use technology for marketing. As digital platforms increasingly become part of marketing plans and everyday life they have gained acceptance.
As more people use digital devices to shop online instead of visiting physical shops, digital marketing campaigns are becoming more prevalent and efficient.
The Challenge is Content
Developing high-quality content, like original research, is the foundation of your content marketing. SEO, email marketing, paid advertising, personalization, and more round out the rest of your digital marketing strategy. As you plan for 2019, consider what content pieces you need to create to fuel your content marketing machine.
Your Strategic Priorities
Increase Prospects and Acquire Customers
Increasing sales prospects or leads, and acquiring more customers, will be top priorities for marketing professionals (64% and 55% respectively) in 2019. This emphasizes the importance of marketing’s support of and alignment with the sales process.
Your businesses life and survival depend on embracing digital marketing and putting into practice the elements discussed here. You can grow your business following the simple steps outlined here.
Challenging Barriers to Success
Engaging Customers Online and Measuring Results
Engaging customers online and measuring digital marketing results are challenging barriers to success for 49% and 47% of marketing professionals respectively. The sales-related goal of increasing customer acquisition is also a barrier to success for marketers.
How Digital Marketing Effectiveness is Changing
The good news is the effectiveness of online tactics is increasing for an impressive total of 89% of marketing professionals. So the investment that you make in digital marketing in 2019 is likely to provide results that you need to meet your goals.
It may seem like a daunting challenge to enact a Digital Marketing Strategy which will engage prospects and convert them into customers. The one thing you need to remember, doing nothing is not an option.
Take One Step at a Time
Enacting one step at a time, it is possible for anyone to embrace Digital Marketing and use it to build their reputation and their brand. Start today, select the one facet which you feel the most comfortable with, and begin.
Master that first step, continue and add another step to your Digital Marketing. You’ll see results and reap the rewards from your efforts.
Relinquishing all wedding day decisions and handing wedding planning duties off to a talented team of vendors can be difficult for some couples. For wedding giveaway winners Mariela and Gilberto, the risk paid off. Every detail—from the personalized ceremony script to the hand-crafted menu—of this iridescent color palettewedding was carefully crafted to authentically celebrate this nontraditional couple.
This emotional and intimate affair was full of tears, good food, and a view that will have couples dreaming of their own destination elopements. Though the El Pretexto venue spoke for itself, wedding planner Ana Maria Hernandez enhanced the space with tropical floral arrangements by STEM Events and a geometrical, iridescent ceremony backdrop—hand-crafted by Liliweds.
We can’t take our eyes off these precious moments captured by photographer Phosphilic. Grab your tissues and get ready to step outside the traditional wedding planning box while scrolling through these images.
Planner Ana Maria Hernandez On This Iridescent Color Palette Wedding
It all started with wanting to show a different style of wedding in Puerto Rico. A giveaway was created in hopes of creating a unique wedding for a real couple. The winning couple—Mariela Colón and Gilberto Rosario—had to fully trust the talented wedding vendors behind this magnificent event. This event was unique, creative, and created for the couple. It was also a look into the future of weddings after COVID—smaller, intimate, shorter, focused on experiences rather than traditions.
The Couple:
Mariela and Gilberto
The Wedding:
Cayey, Puerto Rico
Personalized Ceremony Surrounded By Loved Ones
The wedding ceremony was very emotional and special. We weren’t sure if some of our family members were going to be able to attend for health reasons, but they made it. Our ceremony was written for us by Ana Maria and she included part of our story. It was magical.
Every Detail A Work Of Art, Literally
It all felt like a dream, everything was so well thought out. Every detail blended so well with the next: the dress, the groom’s suit, the cake, the ceremony backdrop, even the menus were literally a work of art.
Working With Phosphilic
Our photographers, Rey and Natasha from Phosphilic were amazing! They made us feel so comfortable and they really outdid themselves capturing every detail and every moment of our wedding.
From the tropical decor to the colorful fashion, no aspect of this iridescent color palette wedding was traditional. It celebrated the couples uniqueness and proved that sometimes less is more. If you’re feeling inspired to ditch tradition or looking for fun, creative ways to set your wedding apart—like rocking a non-white wedding dress—check out this guide for planning a unique wedding.
Bold is an understatement when it comes to Badger and Jess’ Farmin’ Betty’s wedding. Top to bottom, their ceremony was drenched in unique details—disco balls, a retro movie sign, vintage chairs for the sweetheart table, and a cube-shaped altar arch! Even their wedding day fashion was bold. Jess wore a black and white print two-piece wedding gown paired with tall black cowboy boots. Badger opted for an emerald green suit—two colorful choices! Then, let’s pause to enjoy the perfectly mismatched wedding party looks.
We love what their photographer–and Junebug member–Erika Diaz Photography had to say about this day:
“Jess and Badgers’ boldness to embrace their personal styles and creating a day that highlighted something viewers will be excited and inspired by. I admire their willingness to infuse their wedding day with personal touches, fashion, and details that were completely unique to them.”
After being engaged for two and a half years, we made the decision early in the pandemic to become husband and wife on September 26—even if it was just us. We originally planned to have 250 guests, but after a series of COVID-19 restrictions forced us to reduce our guest list to 50 loved ones, we were left reimagining the entire day. We called each guest and vendor to discuss what we could do to make them feel safer in a COVID-19 environment. For example, we changed our formal sit-down dinner to a cocktail-style lounge space so guests could distance themselves based on comfort level.
Taking COVID Precautions
We often questioned whether having a wedding during a global pandemic was even the right thing to do. Though all vendors and guests remained safe and healthy after our nuptials, we were emotional wrecks waiting for the fourteen days to pass afterward. For couples who face similar decisions, we hope you can force yourself to see that the real magic of the wedding day is the commitment you make to one another through marriage. Any resemblance of a wedding after that is just icing on the cake.
Advice For Nearlyweds
Just do you! That’s our advice. Our wedding strayed from tradition in so many ways, making it hard for others to envision how our wedding day would turn out. There were countless times Jess would share her latest ideas, and they’d be met with raised eyebrows and well-intentioned skepticism. However, without trusting in our shared vision, we would’ve never had the things that made our day special, like including our fur babies in the ceremony or having our wedding party in mismatched attire.
A Farmin’ Betty’s Wedding
When we got engaged, the big question was where we would tie the knot since our families were not centrally located. Knowing that many of our guests would need to travel regardless of where we chose, we decided on a location that was special to us. In 2018, we purchased our first home together in Columbus, Wisconsin, and felt that this area was perfect to begin our union. Vintage Fields at Farmin’ Bettys had everything we needed and we instantly gravitated to their charming refinished barn nestled in the countryside. The beautiful outdoor space allowed us to hold our ceremony on the grounds before moving to the rustic barn to dance the night away!
Personalizing Everything
Badger is a romantic at heart and frequently writes creative short stories, so we knew right away that we would personalize our ceremony by writing our vows. The rest of the ceremony magic we really owe to our co-officiants, Jace and Mikaela—our college best friends. Since we went to different universities and didn’t meet until after our wild college years were over, Jace and Mikaela had the challenge of writing a wedding script together without ever meeting before. And they crushed it! There were so many tears, laughs, and even a well-placed Meatloaf song reference that had Badger commit that he would love Jess and would love her forever.
We had a sweetheart table, and seven tables with about five people at each. Families got their own tables, and friends who would see each other otherwise got to sit together, but some had to sit about a meter apart. We bought SO many bottles of hand sanitizer that we put EVERYWHERE. In our invitation, we asked people not to hug and shake hands, and keep to other restrictions we had at the time.
