Your potential prospects are most likely searching for wedding photography services that you offer on Google.
If you want to attract new clients to grow your business, you will want to be on the first page of Google. We will cover the basics and what you need to do in order to get there!
What We Will Cover in This How-To Guide
Local SEO
Potential clients in your area will come across two types of search results when searching for “wedding photographers” on Google, namely: Organic and the Map Pack. You can rank high in both sections making your business highly visible to the user by showing up twice. This will exponentially improve your traffic and sales.
In order to rank organically on Google, you will need to optimize your website for the search engines with SEO. This guide covers that more in depth below.
For your business to appear on the “Map Pack”, you will need to set up a Google My Business profile. Optimize this profile in order to appear in the Map Pack section. A major benefit for optimizing your GMB profile is that the “Map Pack” appears above the organic results in Google search which is limited to 3 spots.
You can expand on this in the maps section but being in these top 3 spots is most beneficial. Users will generally click on the first set of results.
How to Get Started and Properly Set up Your GMB Profile
- Create an account: Head over to Google My Business and set up your profile. If you do not have a Google account, set one up first then you will be able to access the GMB page.
You will need to verify your business if this is the first time setting up your profile. Google will send you a postcard with the code with which you will need to enter it in order to finalize your profile. If you already have this set up, great. - Optimize your profile: Enter your business details with your name, address, telephone number as you have it registered with your business. In order for people to find your business, your address will appear on the maps with directions from their location. Include the photography services that you offer, operating hours and the areas that you service.
- Add images: Upload your business logo, and various images of your business and the work that you have done. This is a great way to show off your portfolio and the services that you offer. I highly recommend renaming some of these images with the location of where the photos where captured… for ex: “wedding-photography-boston”, “niagara-on-the-lake-wine-estate-wedding”. This will give your profile a nice little boost.
- Create posts: GMB has a section for announcements, upcoming events and posts. Create posts, events etc, with links pointing back to your website.
- Add a FAQ section: This is a hidden gem for GMB profiles. People a searching and looking for answers. If you can provide answers on your profile to the most frequently asked questions, you will be ahead of your competition.
- Ask you clients for reviews: Once you have you profile set up, ask clients that have used your services and that were extremely satisfied to leave their honest review on your profile. This will help move your GMB profile up the rankings.
Keyword Research
Keyword research is the most important step for website optimization. This notifies Google what your business is about and how it should rank your web page and / or services for a search term that the user has entered in the search.
As people will not only be typing “wedding photographers” as their search term, you will want to plan your keywords around your main target keyword. Think of what other terms users could possibly enter. Are they looking for engagement photography or a pre wedding shoot? Does the bride and groom to be want to plan a shoot around their bridesmaids and best men leading up to the big occasion or even a honeymoon shoot to document the incredible new journey?
If you are not ranking for these keywords, you will be missing out on potential visitors and customers.
A good keyword planner tool like The Hoth will help you find wedding related photography services and search phrases that people are searching for. It will help you plan around your primary keyword giving you ideas for other phrases that you can cluster around your main service. Tools like these will give you an idea about the search volume, various keyword phrases and other SEO metrics that you can plan your strategy around.
How to get started with keyword research
- Start with your primary keyword: In this example, we are using “wedding photography” as our target keyword as that is the service that we are offering. From the image below, you will be able to see at least 5 different keyword phrases that you can build around with search volume / intent, results and other metrics such as CPC cost and competition.
- Build out your keyword list: Search for other wedding service related keyword phrases such as “engagement photography”, “pre wedding photoshoot” and you will get a list similar to the above image with other keyword ideas that you can build around.
- Target your city as one of the main keywords: A very good starting point is to target your own city and surrounding areas. For this example we are using the keyword phrase “Boston wedding photographers”. People in the city of Boston who are searching for photographers will usually start looking for local services. Expand this search to 5 to 10 cities / towns within the vicinity using “city wedding photographers” as your target keyword phrase. This is an excellent way to find easy to win keywords that you can rank on page 1 of Google.
- Save your list of keywords: Once you have determined your primary keyword phrase and other keyword phrase ideas, create a list in a spreadsheet with the Keywords | Search Volume | CPC | Competition. This will give you a better understanding and you will now be able to plan your content around these keyword phrases.
On-page optimization
Optimizing your website and pages is an important indicator for Google and other search engines. This explains what your business and services are about and how they will value the information that you are providing for the end user. Keep in mind, that people are looking for a solution to a problem and if your web pages are optimized correctly, you will most likely show up in the search results.
How to optimize your website
- Titles: All the pages on your website have titles and these should be optimized with your primary keywords.
Ex.: “Professional Wedding Photographers in Boston” - Descriptions: Include a compelling description to your pages based on your keyword phrase with a call to action.
Ex.: “Are you looking for professional photographer to capture the most magical day of your life? Give us a call to today to discuss how we can make this possible”. Create curiosity with a question, and add a call to action. - Images: When using images on your website, rename them with your primary and target keywords. Your images may appear in the Images tab of Google.
- Sub headings: Use sub headings in your content as information sections
- Content: Use a variety of different words around your primary keyword and make sure that your content is written as natural as possible. DO NOT stuff your primary keyword phrase as this will appear as spammy in Google’s eyes.
- Internal links: When adding content to your website, be sure to link to other important pages. Pages such as Services, Request a Quote or even an important blog post that may be useful to the visitor.
Content Creation
In order to expand your reach and visibility for terms that people are searching for, you will need to create pages to target those terms. Your home page will provide an overview of what you do and what your business offers, but it is highly unlikely that you rank for all your targeted keywords.
You will rank for search terms such as “wedding photographers” or “wedding photographers in Boston” but if you want to rank for “how much is a wedding photographer”, you will need to create a page for this keyword phrase.
A good strategy to cover search terms
- Create landing pages for services that you offer: Wedding photography, engagement photography, honeymoon photography, etc.
- Create blog posts to answer questions: Frequently asked question can be useful for topics to write about. For example: how much does a wedding photographer cost or tips on how to create the perfect setting or how to plan for a wedding shoot.
Content creation serves as a powerful medium for wedding photographers to showcase their expertise, unique style, and creative vision. Through blog posts, photo galleries, and videos, photographers can narrate their journey, share insights into their creative process, and provide tips to couples preparing for their big day.
By presenting themselves as knowledgeable professionals, photographers can build trust with potential clients, reassuring them that their special moments will be captured by someone who understands the nuances of wedding photography. The ability to articulate their approach and philosophy through content not only attracts couples seeking their specific style but also positions photographers as thought leaders in the industry.
By being an authority in the industry will set you up for success with page 1 rankings and increased visibility.
Regularly updated blogs, captivating images, and informative videos contribute to a dynamic website that attracts search engine traffic. As search engines reward websites with fresh and relevant content, photographers who consistently produce content are more likely to appear higher in search engine results.
Link Building
Once you have your website fully optimized and a steady flow of blog posts being written, you will want to start building up your backlink profile.
What are backlinks?
Backlinks are clickable links from one website to another with anchor text as the link. These anchor text links will be your targeted keywords. Here is a good article on 3 simple SEO tasks that you can do for your business in order to build up your backlink profile.
In order to rank on page 1 of Google for competitive keywords, you will need backlinks from high authority websites pointing back to your website to achieve this. The more quality backlinks that you have, the better position you will be in. Unfortunately building backlinks can be a challenging aspects of SEO. You will want to do this right.
How to start building backlinks
- Create online blog properties: Websites such as wordpress.com, Wix, Strikingly, Tumblr etc are great for building up your backlink profile and your branding. Set up an account on each property such as these and create blog posts pointing back to your website with anchor text such as brand name, website URL or general words such as “click here” or “visit our website”. This will create a nice diversity of backlinks and anchor text links.
- Share on social media: When writing your blog posts, share them on your social media accounts with a link to the article in the post.
- Create high quality backlinks: A service like The Hoth can provide you with high quality backlinks that will be important for your website rankings. These do come with a price as there is quite a bit involved in creating a high quality article and posting this on the right websites.
Once you start building your backlink profile up, you will start to see the fruits of your labour. Your rankings will start to climb, some keywords may be faster than others, depending on difficulty. Backlink building needs to be a continuous process in order to achieve high rankings and to maintain it. There will be competitors that will be doing the same.
If you would like a reputable SEO specialist like us to handle this for you, visit our SEO for Wedding Photographers service page for more details and to schedule a call. We look forward to hearing from you, all the best :).