Submissions

Thank you so much for your interest in sharing your work and/or your wedding with United With Love! We welcome submissions from all wedding professionals, and engaged or married couples in the Washington, DC area. Please read the full submission guidelines below before submitting your work or wedding for consideration. Submissions that do not meet the guidelines will not be accepted.

Before submitting, please look through the blog archive to ensure that your submission is in keeping with the content and geographical focus of the blog. United With Love reserves the right to reject any submission for any reason.

For the full editorial policy, visit our policies page. For information regarding advertising opportunities on United With Love, please visit our advertising page.

We personally review and respond to each submission. If you have not heard from us within two weeks of your submission, please contact us at hello (at) unitedwithlove.com to ensure that we received your submission.

GUIDELINES

  • Send all submissions and submission related questions to submissions (at) unitedwithlove.com.
  • Submissions should be related to weddings in the Washington, DC area and/or events and information that would be helpful to DC area couples. The DC area includes Baltimore, MD to Charlottesville, VA and anything in between.
  • United With Love is an exclusive local blog, which means that it will not publish weddings and events that have been featured on other local blogs and in local magazines. Events that have been featured nationally in print or online will be considered individually. When submitting, please indicate if your submission has been featured elsewhere.
  • It is good etiquette to submit to only one blog or magazine at a time.
  • If you are submitting photographs that you did not take, please ensure that you have written approval from the photographer prior to submission.
  • Submissions are limited to one wedding or event per email.
  • All submissions should include your contact information, a short description of the submission, and names and websites for any vendor involved. If it is a submission involves a real couple, like a real wedding or an engagement, please include the couple’s contact information.

ALL PHOTOGRAPHS must be:

  • Professional or professional quality
  • .jpg
  • 800 pixels wide, for both horizontal and vertical photos
  • 72 dpi, 500k or less per image (Please do not send large or print-quality images)
  • We prefer Dropbox links embedded into the email, please do not attach zip files, photos, or attachments to emails. (NOTE: the link must not expire, expired links will not be considered.)
  • Free of watermarks, brands, frames, borders or logos
  • Individual photographs, not matched pairs or collages
  • Photographs that do not meet the above guidelines will not be accepted.

REAL WEDDINGS

United With Love generally posts two real Washington DC area weddings per week. We are looking for unique and personal love stories that are a true reflection of the types of weddings that happen in the Washington DC area. This includes weddings in all budgets, styles and types, including weddings inside in hotel ballrooms and outside on farms and vineyards. Please browse the real wedding gallery to see some of the stories that we have featured.

Real wedding submissions must include a minimum of 50 photos (but no more than 100 photos) that are a good mix from throughout the entire day including getting ready, the ceremony and plenty of details from the reception. Please limit the number of dancing photos of guests at the reception. (These photos are great for the couple, but their guests probably wouldn’t want them on the Internet!) We try to show our readers the entire love story from start to finish. Submissions must include a short description of the event, email contact information for the couple, and a participating vendor list including websites.

If your submission is accepted, the couple will be contacted by United With Love and asked to fill out a questionnaire. If the couple does not respond to the questionnaire within one month or declines to be featured, the submission will not be published.

United With Love is looking for other wedding related events, such as bridal showers, elopements, surprise engagements and rehearsal dinners.

For videographers, real video submissions must include photographs. The video must be a highlight, short or trailer type of video (5 minutes or less).

ENGAGEMENTS

United With Love generally features one engagement photo session per week. We are looking for fun and romantic love stories that are unique, imaginative or have taken place in a location in the Washington DC area. We love seeing engagement session locations that we haven’t featured before! Submissions should include no less than 20 photos, but not more than 30 images, a short description of the couple and/or the session, and location. Please ensure that you have the couple’s expressed permission prior to submission.

STYLED SHOOTS

United With Love features ideas and inspirations that are practical and applicable to couples planning a wedding in the Washington DC area and therefore features a limited amount of styled shoots. Please keep in mind that we are looking for realistic inspiration and information on how the shoot is helpful to local couples. Styled shoot submissions should be 50-60 images, including a participating vendor list with websites, a detailed description of the idea or inspiration including the background of the shoot, and helpful advice for how couples can incorporate the ideas into their own DC area weddings. If there are any DIY elements involved, please include this in the submission, as we like to include instructions, printables and otherwise helpful information for readers.

TIPS/ADVICE GUEST POST

United With Love exists to help couples plan a wedding in the DC area, and to do so we like to feature locally specific and locally helpful wedding planning advice. If you are interested in writing a guest blog post with tips and/or advice for DC area couples, please contact United With Love at submissions (at) unitedwithlove.com with your idea(s) for a blog post topic. Please review our past tips and advice guest posts to ensure that we haven’t covered the topic before. The best advice guest posts are around 400 words and offering practical, helpful and locally specific advice that couples can’t find anywhere else.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

My submission was accepted, when will it run?
Because of the volume of submissions and the editorial schedule, it can take a few weeks or months for your submission to go live on the blog. Every effort will be made to give you a publication date estimate. We will also try to contact you prior to your submission running on the blog. You can always check in about the status of your submission at submissions (at) unitedwithlove.com. For real weddings, we contact the couple to fill out a questionnaire and their response time impacts publication.

What is your editorial schedule?
Staying on a consistent schedule is tough in the blogging world, but we do try to keep United With Love on an editorial routine each week. Per week, we generally post two real weddings (Monday and Wednesday), one advice guest post from a local wedding vendor (Tuesday), one inspirational feature or venue tour (Thursday), one engagement or other similar type session (Friday), and one helpful weekly link round-up (Friday). Every other week, we also publish an email blast that is separate from the content being featured on the blog.

May I post a real wedding on my business’ blog prior to it running on United With Love? What is your exclusivity policy?
Real weddings can be featured on the blog or website of a participating vendor prior to publishing on United With Love. United With Love does not publish real weddings that have been featured already in or on another professional Washington DC area website, blog or magazine.

I want to giveaway tickets to my event or my services, will United With Love post about it?
We love to give our readers a good discount now and again, but United With Love does not host giveaways very often. If your local business is running a discount, giveaway or event, we are happy to list it for free in on the upcoming events page. Please email us at submissions (at) unitedwithlove.com for more information or to offer a giveaway.

Will United With Love post about my event, show or sale?
United With Love rarely posts editorial coverage about specific events. Instead, there are other opportunities on the blog for getting the word out about your event, including a free listing the upcoming DC events page. Please email us at submissions (at) unitedwithlove.com for more information.

¨I have a wedding that wasn’t in the DC area, but it is really pretty. May I still submit it?¨
United With Love is focused on a local audience and helping the couples who are getting married in the Washington, DC area. Please only submit weddings or events that took place or would be helpful to couples in this area. The DC area includes anything in Baltimore to Charlottesville and everything in between.

I don’t have any real weddings to submit, how can I get my business featured?
There are lots of way to have your work and your local business featured on United With Love. We take pride in featuring the talent of many great, local vendors. Besides real weddings, you can write a guest blog post offering practical advice to our readers. You can let us know about new or exciting things that your company has going on. You can have your work featured in an inspirational post. You can follow us on social media where we often post if we are looking for something specific. You also can contact us to suggest an article or topic that would be of interest to our readers. Please email us at Please email us at submissions (at) unitedwithlove.com for more information for more information or to pitch an idea.

Do you have a badge I can post on my website?
Spread the love! United With Love would be so honored for you to share our badge on your website or blog. The badges are right here.

Do I have to be an advertiser to submit a feature?
United With Love is not a pay-for-play website and we gladly accept submissions from all vendors, regardless of their advertising status.¨ That said, we do love our advertisers very much and this blog would not be possible with out advertising support. Please contact us at hello (at) unitedwithlove.com if you are interested in advertising.

Who should inform the couple of a real wedding feature?¨
We make every effort to inform those that will be featured on the blog in advance of their feature. However, due to the volume of posts that we publish, sometimes we cannot do this in a timely manor. Please help us out and be helpful to your client by also informing your clients and other participating vendors of their feature on United With Love. We also strongly encourage you to share your feature on social media as much as possible!

I am a vendor and was not credited in a feature that I participated in?¨
We rely on the list of participating vendors that is provided to us by the submitter and/or the featured couple. If you or your business was involved in a feature, but was not properly credited, please let us know at submissions (at) unitedwithlove.com.

I don’t like how something was written, will you change it?¨
Once a blog post is published it cannot and will not be changed unless there is a typo or factual error.

Can I proof read a post before it goes live?¨
United With Love maintains editorial control over its content and we do not share content prior to publishing.

I see that United With Love featured my photograph, how did this happen?¨
Photographs that are submitted and/or published on the blog remain in the United With Love archives and may be used for features in the blog or in our email newsletters. Proper credit and a link to your company will be given.




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