1. Thoroughly look at the blogs that are out there! There are MANY of them, some have a huge national following, and some are more geared towards weddings in their area. If a blog that you'd like to feature your work ONLY posts local weddings, don't send them one from somewhere else. It is just as important to match the right wedding with the right blog as it is to carefully select the images you submit.
2. Take a GOOD HARD LOOK at the images you are submitting! Are you selecting lots of details and decor images? Great! That's going to give you a much better chance of being published. I don't think there is ever a reason to submit family photos when submitting for publishing on a blog. Blogs (and other brides) really don't care about formal portraits of someone else's family. They care about details and ideas they can show and use for inspiration of their own. Those portraits of the couple together are great to send too, but most bloggers would take a wedding with LOTS of unique, unusual, or beautiful details to share 9 times our of 10. It's all about inspiration: What might inspire the blogger, and what might inspire the bride looking at that particular site.
3. Don't submit to more than one blog at a time. It is annoying to editors when you send weddings out to multiple sites and they find themselves duplicated posting a wedding that's already been shown elsewhere. The most important thing for bloggers is FRESH, uncirculated content. Some of the don't mind if it is on your own blog first, and some prefer that you not post it until the same time as they do, but the ALL agree that they wouldn't want other style blog posting the same content. It's embarrassing and will also reflect poorly on you. So make sure that you know the policies of each blog you submit to (and if you don't know, just ask!)
4. Once you have chosen the blog you want to submit to, take another look at the wedding or shoot you are considering. Does it look like the other photos that particular blogger shows? Bloggers, like photographers, have a point of view on what wedding photos (and weddings) should be! Some blogs prefer a vintage style in the photography and decor. Some might prefer all natural light weddings that are in fields of flowers. Spend some time really looking at what a blogger is posting regularly and submit shoots that would fit in! Just like you wouldn't wear jeans to a black tie wedding, don't submit a country wedding with lots of DIY details to a blog that features over the top, lavish, ballroom weddings! There is a blog for almost every kind of wedding nowadays, it's just important to realistically look at what you've got and send the right photos to the right place.
5. Use TWO BRIGHT LIGHTS to submit! Two Bright Lights is a fabulous editorial submission tool that HUNDREDS of blogs and magazines are a part of. It's simple to use: You set up an account and start uploading weddings. Once you have a wedding uploaded, you can tag all the vendors associated with it so that they can see the photos too! Then, you can create inspiration boards to submit to any blog or magazine you choose. It will even tell you the status of where your submission is (has it been looked at? Is it accepted? Rejected?) No matter what the outcome, at least you'll know and can then submit it elsewhere! It's a site that has already changed the way submissions are done by centralizing the way editors can see your images.
I hope this has been helpful, and I can't wait to see many more of you being published soon!!
And because everyone knows posts are boring without photos, here's a photo of my favorite little detail from a recent wedding, some desert-appropriate boutonnieres!
No comments:
Post a Comment