Photography Minute

From the Archives – Posing Meerkat at Fort Worth Zoo

I wanted to share a photo this evening and saw this Meerkat that I captured at the Fort Worth Zoo a few years ago.

Captured with my old Canon 40D and Canon 100-400mm L.

Field Sparrow – Birding in Dallas TX

This little Field Sparrow is another capture from the Spring Creek Forest Preserve in Garland TX. Captured with Canon 7D and Canon 500mm.

SEO Tips for Photographers: On-page optimization

In this installment of my Marketing for Photographers series, I’m going to follow up the last article, titled “Search Engine Optimization Tips for Photographers“, and talk (or more appropriately, write) a little bit about different methods of SEO.

When you read through SEO websites and “how-to’s”, you might see terms like “on-page SEO” and “off-page SEO”.   Both of these SEO methods are extremely important for anyone wishing to be found on the web.

In this post, I’ll talk a bit about ‘On-page’ optimization…look for a future post about ‘Off-page’ optimization.

On-page Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

On-page SEO refers to the many different things you can do on your web page(s) to improve find-ability and search-ability. When looking at on-page SEO, you’ll be thinking about things like page titles, URL’s, keywords and the structure of your web-pages.

According to many SEO experts, the most powerful item on your web page is the page title.    The page title receives the most ‘value’ from Google when the search engine indexes your web page, therefore you need to spend a considerable amount of time thinking about your page title.

So…with the page title being one of the most important pieces of your web page, you’ve got to be sure to include your keywords in the title.  For more info on choosing keywords, jump back to my Search Engine Optimization Tips for Photographers article for more info.

You know your keywords.  You know your audience too.  Creating a valuable page title should be pretty easy right?  Actually…it is!

Let’s look at an example:

Supposed you’re a wedding photographer in Dallas.  Based on research you’ve performed, you know that you want to target the following keywords:

• Dallas Wedding Photographer
• Dallas Bridal Photographer
• Dallas Engagement Photographer

With these targeted keywords in mind, when you’re building web pages and/or writing a post for your blog, you want to ensure you include these keywords on your web page and specifically within your page title if possible.

While creating each page, spend time crafting the title so that your keywords are included as early as possible in your title.

Let’s look at an example:

You want to create a web page about your wedding photography services.  Which title would you use?

1. Wedding Photography Services
2. Dallas Wedding Photographer – Services
3. Services – Dallas Wedding Photographer

Based on the previous information, I hope you’d choose #2 – Dallas Wedding Photographer – Services.   By selecting this title for your page, you’ve put your keywords at the beginning of the page title and given Google (and other search engines) an excellent idea of what your page is about.

Ok…you’ve got your page title…now what?  Try to weave in your other keywords and keyword terms into your page.  The more you use your keywords (in context), the more the search engines will understand what your web page is about. Note that i added “in context” to this.  You’ve got to write your pages to be readable and easily understood by your visitors.      If you try to just cram keywords into your web page, you’ll likely end up hurting yourself more than helping.

Back to our example:

You’ve got your title of Dallas Wedding Photographer – Services.  Now, let’s create a few paragraphs of text (I’ve used my wife’s information as an example).

Page: Title: Dallas Wedding Photographer – Services

Subtitle: On-location wedding, bridal and engagement services

Body:

Tracie Brown, the owner of a moment to keep photography, is an on-location wedding, bridal and engagement photographer covering the Dallas and Fort Worth metroplex. Tracie captures your precious moments and creates ever-lasting memories.

Each client and session are different and special – Give us a call today to talk more about how we can help make your wedding memorable – Contact a moment to keep photography today for more information about our Wedding Photography services in the Dallas /Fort Worth Metroplex.

Notice that I didn’t overload the page with my keywords and I made the copy readable.

You’ll also notice that I use links within the text of the page. You’ll want to do the same on your web pages.   Make sure to link to other pages on your website to increase the number of links as well as improve relevancy of those pages using the proper anchor text.

Now you’ve got your page built and your keywords on your page….now what? Wait for the traffic to roll in…right?  Wrong.

While on-page SEO is extremely important, you’ve still got to get links back to your web page/site.  Google uses pointers/links to your site to help determine relevancy and those links are what will drive traffic to your web page.  Those links are also what you’ll want to spend a considerable amount of your time building.

How do you get those quality links back to your site? Check back next week for my article on ‘Off-page’ Search Engine Optimization article in my Marketing for Photographers series.

There’s much more to SEO than I have time (or space) to cover here….if you have questions about ‘On-page’ SEO, feel free to contact me with questions.