Photographer Marketing

Photography is a field with unique benefits in terms of digital media. But there is also severe disadvantages that come with the advent of the digital age. Anyone and everyone has access to digital platform after platform providing photos from all walks of life. The internet is saturated with photos, meaning your efforts as a professional must be to the highest standards in order to stand out.

The statistics are clear, photos fill up the internet by the millions per day. Instagram sees over 95 million photos and videos shared a day (Instagram, 2016) while Snapchat has 8,795 photos shared per second (CEWE Photoworld, 2016). In order to stick out from the crowd you will need to understand modern day marketing trends. Your website will also need to reflect your ability to better adapt to a modern environment. SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is the way to make sure that digital media will benefit you.

2018 Photography Marketing Trends

Your presence online is dependent on your usage of digital media to its fullest. There over a billion websites online but the most popular ones are what you need to focus on. By taking advantage of the currently trending marketing tools your photography marketing has a far better chance at making an impression on your aimed demographic. Clients only spend a few moments deciding where their interests will take them, make sure that it takes them to your site.

Photography and Social Media

Over ⅓ of the world is on social media (eMarketer, 2016), and the platforms available have pretty much become marketing hubs. By having your social media pages link back to your photography website the benefits are incredibly rewarding. Exposure is critical to a photographer and 90% of all marketers stated that their social media efforts generated more exposure for their businesses (Social Media Examiner, 2015).

You should also encourage user activity through the use of social sharing buttons. By including social sharing buttons on the pages of your web page you push for a more connected format. With sites such as FaceBook, Pinterest, and Twitter becoming instant platforms to display your photography work through multiple profiles. You not only further cement the interest of visitors, but expand your domain of influence via their input.

There are also social media links to consider. The use of social media links is useful in raising awareness of your social media channels. Social media profile links should be added to your homepage and about page for maximum effectiveness. Getting the most out of every one of your internet resources is crucial to getting the return on investment, or ROI, that your photography business need.

Website Content Creation for Photographers

A static photography website stagnates, and stagnation losses clients. Providing content is what keeps the traffic coming, and it does not only need to be photos. There are a variety of ways to engage an audience and keep them informed on the changes and marketing your company offers. Frequency of posts is a large priority for search engines and blogging has been shown to be a popular way of engaging an audience for photographers worldwide.

• 53% of marketers have made blog content creation for their websites a top priority (HubSpot, 2017)
• 1/10 blog posts increase their traffic over time, these type of blog posts generate 38% of overall blog traffic (HubSpot, 2016)
• Companies that publish more 16 or more blog posts a month receive around 3 ½ times more traffic than companies that publish 4 or less monthly blog posts (HubSpot, 2015)

ROI Expectations on your Photography Marketing Campaign

ROI is dependent on your marketing efforts, SEO and the efficiency of your site. With realistic expectations you will see a steady increase in your search engine rank and increase in revenue. But the process is not simple, not is it easy. Cost effective ROI results from a marketing campaign that takes your assets and makes the most use out of them.,

Time Frame for Marketing Campaign for Photographers

When working on a website from the ground up, the expected time frame generally comes out at around 2-3 months. For already established sites the time frame change around depending on a variety of factors. A website’s age, the condition it is in, already existing content, and prior SEO efforts all alter the estimated amount of time it will take to fully bring out your website’s potential. The process is made gradual and careful in order to prevent the problems rushing will have caused.

Local Photographer Digital Marketing

Photography is a field that has followed the local search trend in a big way. Search engine result pages, or SERPs, are displaying location based results more and more. In fact 30% of mobile searches relate a location (Google, 2016), while 8 out of 10 marketers worldwide use target locations for mobile advertising (eMarketer, 2015). The local components of your business are very much dependent on search engines, and search engines pay attention to websites with an SEO advantage.

Photographer Digital Marketing Assets

We here at On The Map Marketing focus on providing information and resources valuable to you. Whether you need to have a better grasp of our plans for website development, or you need to better understand our SEO strategy, the information is readily available for access. Our pricing for services is quickly surveyed as well. Our pay-per-click and social media services being offered at affordable rates.

Digital Media Marketing and your Photographer Marketing Needs

Traditional marketing has taken a downturn in use during recent years, clearly as a result of the many benefits digital media has to offer. Ease of use and scope of range in terms of domain simply overpower any traditional means of marketing you will find. Photographers are but one of many professionals who have found the benefits of digital media to suit their needs. Photography specifically has its advantages in terms of displaying your work and advertising to a specific clientele.

A Constant Audience

Depending on how you approach digital media, the opportunities for reaching clients is considered nearly limitless. Digital media marketing is unrestrained by the hindrances traditional marketing has had to face for the better part of a century. Photos are in huge demand for online content as well, with 71% of online marketers using visual assets in social media marketing (Social Media Examiner 2015). The statistics show that photography and visual content has its place firmly secured as a boon for marketing online.

1. Visual content is 40 times more likely to be shared than other content on social media. (Buffer, 2014)
2. An image every 78-100 words in articles cause double the number of social media shares. (Buzzsumo, 2015)
3. There is an 80% increase of willingness to read articles with colored visuals. (Xerox, 2014)

Scale to the Size of your Business

Photography is a business that relies on the personal work ethic you bring to it, but over time the idea of expansion will crop up. A focused photographer must be careful in deciding the direction they want their business to go, and any obstacles could severely affect this path. Digital media provides a scalable platform that grows according to your desires and reflects your company’s growth. Digital marketing is created to suit the size and scale that your business is at, bringing out the marketing potential your website has.

Interact with Customers

Consumers who feel involved in how they approach your photography business are consumers who give your site attention. An interactive site with involvement in the greater web is practically a requisite in the digital age. Social media has insured that clientele are accustomed to consistent control and certain degrees of interaction with their site. Digital media as a whole has created an environment for a more involved audience and invested customer base.

Photography ROI Increase

When you focus on SEO, you in turn also improve your potential ROI. Making the most with the resources you have ensures that no potential advantage is wasted. Photography is an art form, and like all art forms there is a need to make sure that every moment spent working makes an equitable return to allow your practice to continue. Digital media has eased the process of receiving an agreeable ROI, but the advantages must be seized in order to benefit appropriately.

Tracking Your Photography Marketing Campaign

In order to capitalize on the advantages a marketing campaign provides tracking your progress is obligatory. Development is hindered when you do not know how far you have come, otherwise there is no real way of understanding where your company is able to go or how fast it is capable of growing. There are programs made to solve this particular issue and On The Map Marketing is able to provide them in order to better help you see how our aid helps you advance. Depending on your needs knowing where your company stands is capable of being seen through a variety of means.

Google Tracking Tools:

• Google Analytics: A free tool installed to actively track website traffic. It also allows tracking of website applications such as:
  • Flash
  • Video
  • Social networking sites
• Sitemap: A tool that bundles all of your web pages together so that search engines are able to better crawl through your website.
• Search Console: A tool that tracks your visitor count, makes sure that Google is able to access your content, you control the content you want seen, and your website is maintained with minimized disruption to search performance.

Reports:

• Ranking: The progress of your ranking on search engines is determined and outlined for use and benefit.
• Traffic: Website traffic is monitored and recorded for your benefit in several ways. Including:
  • Site usage
  • Page rank
  • Page view summary
  • Page overview
  • Visit summary
  • Visitor summary

Tracking:

• Via Call: Allows you to listen to your customers firsthand and record any useful information, products or employees.
• Via Form: Records and numbers are transferred into an easily accessed and viewable form.
  

Unlocking Your Photography Company’s Money Making Potential with SEO

Digital marketing benefits from SEO, which follows two separate venues of website improvement. On-site is the improvement of the website itself and all that applies. Off-site is where outside factors are considered and your connection to the larger web is improved. In conjunction the two work in-sync to make sure your SEO is as effective and smooth as possible.

On-Site SEO includes:

1. Keyword Selection: Relevant keywords are based on what it is being searched for and the words that competitors have in use.
2. Web Page Structuring: Relevant information is made to better serve visitors and ease their ability to find what it is that they are looking for.
3. Content Review: Your content is built up to feature necessary elements to capture the attention of search engines and visitors. Changes to the pages include:
   1. Headings
   2. Title tags
   3. Meta descriptions
   4. Custom articles
   5. Website speed
   6. Security

Off-Site SEO Includes:

1. Relevant Links: Viewers must know that the links provided will lead to pages relevant to their interests. Quality and authority play a large role in judgment of your links and this reflects back to your own site. Internal site links are able to also be added as a way to increase traffic to different areas of your own website.
2. Directory Listings: A directory will quickly and efficiently lead customers to you immediately. But just like the websites they lead to, directories have different qualities as well. By being listed in a reputable, trusted directory your site is able to see a reliable increase in traffic.
3. Link Profile: By having a link profile in your SEO there are many benefits to be had. Your trustworthiness will be solidified and your authority better verified.
   

Take a Snapshot of a Brighter Future for Your Photography Company

In order to keep up with today’s trends, you will need to drive traffic through your site with the aid of SEO, social media, and PPC. By using the resources and analytics available to you there is a much better chance at reaching your business goals. Designing and developing a high converting website is no easy task, it is a process that requires hard work and time. But with our help, we will work together to bring your website up to the standards needed by the digital age.