Cosmopolitan is building upon the success of its wedding-related content over the past year to create a section dedicated to bridal content.
The vertical launches online today, in tandem with the start of New York Fashion Week: Bridal. Content for the site will be managed by current Cosmo staffers, including members of the social media and editorial teams, with contributors from the lifestyle, beauty and fashion beats. In addition to wedding content, the platform will feature photos and imagery from the runway, similar to Vogue Runway, which houses real-time fashion week coverage.
As part of the launch, Cosmo is sharing Instagram Live videos and Instagram Stories from the NYFW: Bridal shows. There will also be a wedding-themed takeover on Cosmo’s existing Snapchat Discover channel.
The Hearst-owned publication is calling the success of its wedding content over the past year the inspiration for the vertical. Cosmopolitan.com has seen an uptick in web traffic to bridal stories.Online editor Amy Odell said a deeper dive into audience demographics unveiled that readers were particularly interested in wedding content. According to Comscore data, 51 percent of Cosmo.com’s readers are more likely to be engaged than the average American, and 10 percent of all engaged Americans have visited the site.
For Cosmo, which has long held a tradition of dishing out relationship advice and sex tips, advancing its wedding content seems like a natural fit, particularly as more and more brides look for planning guidance online. Currently fellow Hearst publication Town & Country has a wedding vertical, and increasing wedding content may help bolster traffic and compete with publications like Condé Nast’s Brides magazine and popular sites like The Knot.
Odell said what will set Cosmo apart from other online wedding content will be its tone. Stories for its launch include a roundup of bridal makeup strategies, a behind-the-scenes look at popular TV weddings, including one from “Grey’s Anatomy,” and a first-person account of a woman who let her fiancé handle wedding planning independently for a week. The vertical will continue to share daily wedding content after NYFW: Bridal.
“We have a really distinct voice. That humor and pithiness is what’s going to translate through the wedding content,” she said. “The same intelligence and wisdom will reflect in our bridal content.”
Video will also be a priority: The vertical will kick off with footage of “Pretty Little Liars” star Sasha Pieterse testing out wedding hair styles at home in Los Angeles. The site will also feature a video series with Rachel Zoe providing style tips like how to style one dress for multiple weddings.
