I know when I say blogging, it’s just like a collective groan that goes across all of you guys.

I totally understand, but I’m hoping that this episode is going to inspire you and get excited about blogging and everything that it can do for your business! While right now it might kind of feel like something that is sucking up a lot of time and not getting you a lot of results, it’s my hope that when you see these five ways to use your website and your blog to book high-paying clients, you’re gonna be like, “Oh, actually, blogging really can make sense for my business and it doesn’t have to be this long, drawn out, difficult process that I procrastinate and try to make perfect and avoid.”

4 Effective Ways to Use Your Website to Book More High Paying Clients

1. Consistent blogging Helps Your SEO

See, as photographers, we all want to be found by potential clients who are looking for our specific specialty. And one of the best ways to do that is through organic search traffic.

Imagine if every time someone searched for a newborn photographer in your city, your name and website popped up on the first page of Google. That’s the power of SEO and consistent blogging!

But, unfortunately, many photographers make the mistake of keyword stuffing their client sessions and hoping Google will like it.

What is keyword stuffing? Keyword stuffing is where you’re like, “Okay, I want to rank for ‘Newborn Photographer Oklahoma City.’ And you just randomly put that phrase in your content where it doesn’t make sense. (Some people even put it on their blog post in white lettering, so you can’t see it!)

Google is smart. When you’re stuffing keywords, they know what you’re doing at this point. This is not 2007, Google knows what good content is and what is not.

A lot of photographers are still kind of going with this old school SEO mindset or they write (sorry) boring, generic posts that share their client’s session that no one, except their client’s mom, wants to read.

What ends up happening is photographers stop blogging all together because it’s not getting them anywhere and it takes a lot of time and effort. As a result, their Google rankings lower & they’ll be harder to find on search.

WHAT YOU CAN DO:

Focus on using less-searched keywords.

Think about it like hashtags. If someone searched “Oklahoma birth photographer” or “Oklahoma City birth photographer” or even a specific hospital like “Mercy Hospital in OKC birthphotographer,” I am WAY more likely to pop up in those hashtag search results.

The more specific we are, the less people are searching for that. But the more likely you are to pop up in those hashtag results. Less searched keywords work the same way.

These long-tail keywords are less competitive and can help you rank higher on search engines.

So instead of just using the keyword “newborn photography”, you can use “lifestyle newborn photography” or “studio newborn photography for OKC couples”.

So, if you want to increase your organic search traffic and reach potential clients, make sure to consistently blog (that makes Google happy and when Google is happy they’re likely to rank your website higher) and pay attention to your keywords.

Organic search traffic is such a powerful and passive way to get ideal clients to book with you! If you need help creating the actual blog content that Google AND your audience likes, check out my new membership for photographers called the Content Club – where I’ll give you prewritten blog posts every month to save you tons of time!

2. Take that blog post or a core piece of content and turn it into other smaller pieces of content and drive traffic back to the blog post

THIS one makes me really excited y’all so if your mind is wondering, come back to this one.

As photographers, we all want to be seen and heard by our potential clients. And one of the best ways to do that is by consistently posting on social media or creating content for an email newsletter.

But, the mistake many of us make is focusing on the instant gratification of social media likes and comments, instead of investing time in something that will continue to work for us long after we post it.

This is kind of a sidenote, but I mention it just about anytime I can – It’s important to remember that while social media is a great way to connect with potential clients, we don’t own those platforms. We don’t control the algorithms or the rules.

Remember when IG was down for an entire day last year? I do! What if it went away longer than that? Or your account got shut down and you lost your followers?

Good news is – we do own our website and the content on it.

When you start with blogging as your base piece of content and make social posts and email newsletters from it – you don’t have to start from scratch every time you need to write a post for Instagram.

It’s like the difference between buying eggs at the store and buying chickens. Blogging is like buying a chicken – It’s a little more work up front, but before you know it, you have eggs (or smaller pieces of content) without a whole lot of effort on your part.

WHAT YOU CAN DO:

So, how can we take a blog post or piece of content we’ve already written and break it down into simple social media posts? There are so many ways do use this:

• social media captions
• topics for FB OR IG lives
• email newsletters
• even a podcast!

By creating core content through blogging and then repurposing it for other platforms, you’ll save time and effort while reaching more potential clients.

3. Use your blog to build vendor connections

You and I both know that vendors play a crucial role in our business. For baby photographers, they can be.

So what do I mean by vendors for baby photographers? These are midwives, doulas, doctors, prenatal massage therapists – anybody that serves pregnant women.

Sometimes these vendors can feel out of reach to create a partnership with to get those referrals. They may be really well-known and maybe you’re not yet, or they already have a partnership with another photographer, and maybe you just don’t know what to say to get the relationship started.

WHAT CAN YOU DO:

Did you know that by asking to highlight them and interview them for your blog, you can get an instant connection and foot in the door with them?

By featuring them on your blog, you are showing them that you value their work and that you are interested in working with them.

These relationships are so important, and usually, it’s getting the relationship started that’s the hardest part. And if you don’t fix this, you could miss out on incredible opportunities and partnerships.

I’ll give you an example of how I did this with Dawn, a local midwife. I reached out to her and asked if I could interview her for my blog. I also included some headshots of her and photos of the spaces she had decorated. This resulted in a great working relationship and many referral clients for me.

If you need help with this or don’t know what questions to ask, come check out Content Club for Photographers. We’ll give you two pre-written blog posts every month with prompts and questions for you to customize the posts to fit your brand and voice.

Blogging is a great way to connect with vendors and create valuable partnerships for your photography business. So, start reaching out and start building those relationships today!

4. Use your website to make your content consistent and quality so you build trust with your audience and position yourself as an expert

Trust is critical in this industry and consistent, quality blogging is one of the best ways to establish that trust. But, many photographers make the mistake of showing up inconsistently and producing mediocre content. And when someone does click over to their blog, they probably won’t click over again.

If this happens over and over to the potential client, that will break the trust that photographer, and that’s something that’s hard to regain.

That’s why I created Content Club. I saw my students struggling to do all the things and I thought, what if I just do it for you? The content is all specific to baby and birth photographers and it really takes all the guesswork out of what to post and what to say.

And here’s the thing, I actually love creating content. But, it can still be a struggle for me sometimes to think about new things to talk about or how to present the topics. So, I totally get the struggle.

But, many years ago in my photography business and even today, I realized how important it is for me to show up. For example, on the podcast every single Monday morning, because my audience expects me here.

And you can absolutely be that for your audience too!

By consistently and regularly blogging, you’ll build trust with your audience and position yourself as the expert in your field.

If you need help with this, check out Content Club for Photographers, where we’ll give you the tools and resources to create high-quality content that will connect you with your audience and help you grow your business.

Summary

4 Effective Ways to Use Your Website to Book More High Paying Clients

1. Blog specifically for SEO to rank on page one of Google
2. Take your blog post or big piece of content and break it up into smaller pieces to post on social media and drive that traffic back to your website that you own
3. Use your blog to connect with vendors and do those vendor highlight posts
4. Consistently blog quality posts that connect to your ideal client to make you the no-brainer option in their mind to hire as their photographer

I hope that you have some really solid takeaways from this episode that you can implement to start effectively using your website to book more high paying clients, because these are things that I have done that worked wonders in my business to help me reach organic people that were searching for my website, as well as build that trust in the community whenever people saw me continuously showing up and building that trust so that they knew that they could rely on me as their photographer.

Thank you again for being here. And remember my friend, if you have a passion, it’s not an accident. Not everyone loves the thing that you love, so whatever your passion is, it’s there for a reason. I hope that you will get out there this week and make it happen.

Have a great week!