Word of mouth advertising is great, but lets face it even if I here about you via word of mouth, I’m still going to go check out your website before I reach out to you. You know you would do the same thing too. So lets dive into why you need blog and how to get one.
Why every photographer needs a photography website / blog
Do I really need a blog? It doesn’t really help that much does it? Not another shiny object I have to add to my ever-growing to-do lists. Will a blog really bring me more clients? I’m sure there are just a few questions that you are asking yourself as you are reading this. I was before I got into the whole online thing years ago. But lets face it, if you are going to thrive as a photographer or business in todays’ world you have to have a presence online. No questions about it.
Blogging is by far the easiest way to do this. Even better it is worth its weight in gold if you do it right. Big G, Google, uses and algorithm to rank websites in their search engine and if you can get your website or blog to the front page or the top of the listings more and more potential clients are going to see you.
But how do you do that? Simple, Search Engine Optimization, SEO. Don’t’ worry stay calm I will show you in other articles exactly how to SEO your blog for specific keywords you want to rank for. Today we are just going to touch the surface on the main reasons to start your blog.
Photography Blog vs. Social Media
The only company that changes their algorithm every day, week, and month is Facebook. So if you are relying on social media only or particularly Facebook to grow your clientele I have bad news for you, it is way tougher than trying to get your blog ranked in Google. Not saying it isn’t important to stay active on Social Media, just stating with the same effort on a blog the results are way better.
What your blog is not
Here is what your photography blog is not used for, displaying pictures of your clients so they can see them online. Your photography website is not intended for your current clients, it is intended for your potential and future clients.
What your blog is
A photography blog is the easiest way to find and communicate with new clients and others. The sole purpose is to bring you more business. How does it do this? We could go on and on for days on this subject but I’ll keep it short.
- Increase foot traffic to your business
- Increase web traffic to your business
- Show Professionalism
- Develop Trust
- Build your Brand
- Provide Examples of your work
- Etc.
Every post, Every article you put on your blog is sent to Google and its million of Google bots. The more your write on your photography blog the more notes Google gets. The more notes Google gets the more opportunities you have to reach more customers. There is a specific science on how to cultivate the perfect blog post and what is needed to wreak all the benefits from Google, but more on that later. Now lets just focus on getting a writing schedule together to quickly cover the major aspects of your business.
Ranking your photo blog in Google
How hard is it to rank in Google? Put lightly, not that hard when you know what you want to rank for. For example, if you try to rank for “wedding photographer” chances are going to be slim to nil that you will get on page one, because that is such a broad term to go after with a lot of competition However if you go after a long tail keyword like “your city wedding photographer” or “your city suburb wedding photography” it will be much easier to rank. The idea is to write content around these keywords on your blog to help you rank for that specific term.
To make this process simpler we have included links to articles on how to find high search volume, low competition keywords for your blog.
Case Study
Here is a short story on the power of SEO Optimizing your blog. Recently we connected with a fellow local photographer over coffee one morning. That conversation quickly turned into a 2hour long discussion over her website and some actionable items she could take to help her get more clients. She went home that day and made some of the changes we recommended and guess what happened? The very next day her photography blog showed up on page one for that specific keyword. She was so happy that she bought us a cup of coffee the next time we ran into her.
Simply put if you can follow some quick actionable tips and navigate around your blog we can optimize site to get you fast results. All you have to do is follow our instructions.
How to get started
Sometimes it can be stressful thinking how to start a blog or website. There are a ton of free companies out there offering you a free website. Don’t sign up for one of those. It is like renting an apartment instead of purchasing your own home. If you already have a domain name, great we can build a blog on that domain or enhance your current website. If not then the first step is to secure your domain name. “Your business photography.com”
Next, most businesses and photographers choose to build their blogs with WordPress. Not wordpress.com, that is a free website apartment, a self-hosted wordpress.org website. You can get hosting cheap at Bluehost for around $6.00 a month or if you catch one of their sales you can get hosting as low as $3.00 month. After you get your hosting, you install the wordpress framework on your domain, its simply and usually takes less than five minutes. Lastly it is time to start building your website and blog.
One thing to note real quickly, the learning curve for wordpress web design is really steep. It looks simple in the beginning but can quickly become overwhelming. We recommend you don’t try to build your site yourself but hire a professional to help you with your wordpress website design.
There are web designers out there who specialize in photography blogs and websites and can get you a really professional looking site in no time. We do recommend going with the Genesis framework and themes or ProPhoto themes. They are super easy to work with and produce great looking blogs and websites. Most designers can also offer you a social media package too when building your site to help keep your brand congruent across all platforms.
Follow your passion
Congrats you have made it almost all the way through this post. After you get your website up and rocking do me a favor don’t just post to post. Don’t be one of those photographers who put up photos and a couple of paragraphs and call it a day. Readers can quickly see though posts that are not genuine and sincere. Write with the same passion that caused you to pursue a photography business in the first place. Do that with a little of SEO help from us and you will have a full schedule in no time. Thanks for reading this article and feel free to leave us a comment below!
source http://photographicblog.com/why-every-photographer-needs-a-photography-blog/
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