Forbes recently ran this piece that caught my eye: “Four Luxurious Venues For A Paradise Wedding in Uluwatu, Bali.”

Not Four Luxurious Venues In Indonesia, or even Four Luxurious Venues In Bali, but Four Luxurious Venues in a particular neighborhood in Bali.

This, in a nutshell, exemplifies how hard it can be to come up with original content. It’s even a problem for a relatively mainstream publication like Forbes.

By which I mean, such hyper-specificity is a necessary evil when it comes to original content creation.

We’ve all heard of Bali, but what percentage of Forbes readership has heard of Uluwatu?
I hadn’t, and I’m, like, this big geography nerd.

That said, destination weddings are likely to be part of your future as a wedding professional, if they aren’t already a part of your past. There are specific tips involved in getting the most out of marketing yourself for destination weddings, and in negotiating and executing them.

We’ll get to those in my next column. But first: you already know you need fresh and informative information, all the time, for your wedding-pro website. But how?

Here’s how:

1. Can You Be More Specific?

Here’s where you can take a page out of Forbes’ book.

One reason they might have concentrated on Uluwatu is because that opens up listicles for other neighborhoods of Bali, too.

Boom. New content. New articles for a bunch of different neighborhoods, by not writing just stopping at a “Bali” one.

Any time you can drill down more on your content than you originally intended, you can similarly repurpose the discarded bits later, the same way.

2. Utilize Other Wedding Pros

Chances are, you know a bunch of wedding professionals.

You can interview them for your website. Chances are good your industry colleagues will do you that solid, because people love talking about themselves.

It can be about anything wedding-related: Their story in the industry, advice aimed either at other pros or at customers, or even funny/weird on-the-job stories.

Not only does that give you fresh content with a lot of supply, but paves the way for cross-promotional opportunities.

That venue booker you interviewed will probably link your video/article/whatever on their website. It’s a very organic way to expand your network and customer base.

3. Keep The Pitches Suuuuper-Subtle, Quick, Or Non-Existent

Content is what keeps visitors coming. Sales pitches turn people off; you have to be very selective about when and where to pitch.

Here’s where you should not emulate the Forbes Model.

Let me quote the general manager of one of those luxury Uluwatu wedding venues that Forbes interviewed for their story.

“Every wedding at The Edge boasts our award-winning view as the backdrop, I am amazed by some of the jaw-dropping transformations that have taken place in our venues. Everything from cherry blossom ‘forests’, to Tuscan castles and opulent marquees dripping with chandeliers. Our outdoor venues are so flexible, the sky is literally the limit.”

Ugggggh.

People presumably read Forbes to be informed and/or entertainment, but instead, here they get brazenly pitched.

Christ, he even said “boasts.” No one says “boasts” in real life. That was a prepared statement if I ever read one.

It throws the whole article in doubt. One wonders if some sort of Uluwatu chamber of commerce-type body commissioned the story.

I smell a rat bigger than Chuck E. Cheese.

Look, I get it. You aren’t creating or curating original content for fun, or at best, that’s a side benefit.

But marketing yourself effectively takes subtlety and a gentle hand, and a sledgehammer like this just drives people away. It doesn’t work.

To augment this to my #2 point: if your interviewee wants to give a brief pitch about their business, let them. But don’t pretend that pitch is actually something else, like Forbes did here.

It makes me think a little less of the venue and WAY less of Forbes.

It will make your customers think that way, too.

What types of content have worked best on your site? Share in the comments below!