The wedding industry was upended last year when the coronavirus changed or postponed the plans of scores of couples, who had to make snap decisions with very little information and thousands of dollars at stake. Vendors were also scrambling to stay afloat and also offer creative solutions. Through it all, The Knot Worldwide, the long-running wedding resource, has tried to help couples with purpose-driven marketing that provides advice and ideas.

“One of the first things we did at the Knot was set up opportunities for couples to talk to us as the experts,” says Kristen Maxwell Cooper, editor-in-chief of The Knot, on the latest episode of the “Marketer’s Brief” podcast, noting she and her colleagues were communicating with consumers via social media and The Knot’s forums. “We created 100 pieces of content just focused on COVID—how to talk to your vendors about it, how to set up a wedding website to make sure guests know exactly what’s happening, registry etiquette.”

Even though there is a vaccine rolling out, couples and vendors still need to prioritize health and safety, she says. “We can expect to continue to see masks and social distancing, those types of things,” says Maxwell Cooper, noting that weddings might start to return to the normalcy of 2019 in the back half of the year.

The Knot is also focusing on being more inclusive as a business, as it tries to meet the needs of its clients. As a result of customer demands, the Knot is rolling out filters for vendors to self-identify their businesses as Asian-owned, Black-owned, Hispanic- or Latinx-owned, LGBTQ+-owned, Native American-owned, veteran-owned and women-owned.

“These filters will help to encourage our couples to serve as allies for this community,” says Maxwell Cooper.