Giving Credit Where Credit is Due

by Danielle Andrews, President of The Wedding Planners Institute of Canada Inc.

Weddings and Styled Shoots do not just happen, they take planning and an entire team to produce.  Just like every cylinder, valve, spark plug and piston of an engine is required in order to make a car run, every wedding professional contributes to the success of the event.  Their work needs to be acknowledged any time a photo of that work is shown.

Some wedding professionals seem to be confused as to the rules of posting photos, especially on Social Media.  Many newer companies like to post inspiration photos not realizing that they are misrepresenting themselves and other professionals’ hard work.  Here are a few tips to make sure that you are properly crediting the wedding professionals and creatives that worked on an event with you.

Did you take the photo?

No? Credit the photographer! Every time. Did you know that a photographer owns the copyright to every photo they take?  They must always be credited when you show their photo.

Who should I credit?

Everyone. Every single vendor that had anything to do with the Styled Shoot or Wedding.

• Photographer
• Wedding Planner
• Wedding & Event Designer
• Creative Director
• Videographer
• Venue
• Caterer
• Cake Designer
• Florist
• Decorator
• Dance Floor Covering
• Makeup Artist
• Hairstylist
• Stylist
• Dress Designer
• Tuxedo store or Menswear Designer
• Shoes
• Jewelery
• Accessories
• Furniture Rentals
• Tableware Rentals
• Linen Rentals
• Prop Rentals
• Stationery
• Caligrapher
• DJ
• Band
• Dance company or Entertainers
• Live Painter
• Party Starters
• Flair Bartenders
• Pyrotechnics
• Petsitting company
• Babysitting company

How do you Credit them?

On Social Media: use their handle, e.g. @WPICInc (For instagram, make sure you credit the vendor in the post and on the photo.)

In an on-line publication: provide their website, e.g. www.wpic.ca

In a print publication: Provide their business name, e.g. The Wedding Planners Institute of Canada Inc.

It will come back to you

The beautiful thing about tagging other wedding professionals is that they will receive a notification of being included in a social media post, and then they can in turn share that post and if you have properly tagged everyone, you will get mentioned in their post and gain exposure to all of their followers too. So there you have it, instant payback for practicing proper business etiquette!