Website Strategy: Get More Clients With a Website You LOVE

Speaker 1: 0:03

Welcome to Tried and True with the Dash of Woo, where we're all about mixing tried and true strategies that actually work with the magic of manifestation and the science of programming your unconscious mind so that you walk away feeling integrated, inspired and aligned. I'm Renee Bowen, certified Life and Business Coach, professional Photographer, middle-aged Wife and Mom to now three grown kids. I've built two multiple six-figure businesses with zero business training by digging in and learning the methods, and now I'm here to pass them all on to you, from photography and business strategies to energy healing, human design and the basics of manifestation. We cover it all here. I'm here to help you embrace your multi-passionate brains and lean in to the fastest and most efficient ways to reach your goals, whatever they may be. Whether you're a season pro or just starting out, or maybe you're just here for the woo-woo let's dive in and explore all the exciting ways to take your life, business and self-improvement to the next level. Thanks for joining me and get ready to be inspired.

Speaker 1: 1:11

Have you fallen out of love with your website? Or maybe you know like it's on the back burner? You know that it needs a revamp, it needs a refresh, it needs something, and you just don't have the time, or it's just one of those things that's just kind of hanging over your head. This was kind of how I was earlier in this year actually last year at this time and it wasn't until, I think, february that I was able to carve out the time to actually pay attention to it. But I totally get it. I've been in business for a long time and my website it worked. It was fine, but I wasn't in love with it and I switched to Show it during that time and I was able to build a really beautiful site that I love on Show it. Well, today I have a treat for you guys, because if you are sort of in that place with your website or you know also that it's just not converting because, again, you could love your website, it could be real pretty, but it doesn't mean it's getting you clients, okay. So today I have KP and Jessie on the show and they are the dynamic duo behind the company called Inkpot Creative. They are a Show it website design studio for boundary pushing creatives who are the change makers of their industry. The studio focuses on custom creative website design, search engine optimization and blogging for businesses so that they can stand out and be found online by their dream clients.

Speaker 1: 2:33

Hello, you guys need to listen to this episode. We go into everything from what makes your website stand out, what is the easiest point of entry like how do you actually get your site to convert? We talk about SEO and we talk about blogging, all in ways that creatives can understand. We dive very deep into website strategy as well, as your brand strategy is important, but what is your website strategy? Really good stuff, guys. I know you're going to love this conversation, so let's just get right into it. Hey, kp and Jessie, thanks for joining me today. It's super fun having you guys here.

Speaker 1: 3:13

Yeah, we're so excited to be here. It's awesome. I want to get right into it. So I love your site, I love your branding, I love your vibe. I think it's a really really cool, really fresh, really new and very much needed in the industry, if I do say so myself. So I know that we hear a lot about brand strategy and things like that and I know you guys do some of that, but can you break down what website strategy actually means for the creative or the photographer and how you guys approach that?

Speaker 3: 3:49

Yeah, absolutely. Brand strategy is definitely one of those terms that is thrown around everywhere I feel like everybody has heard it but website strategy is one that we never really hear people talk about, and the easiest way that we like to explain website strategy is really just making sure that your website has one primary goal that you're trying to achieve, whether that's booking more clients maybe it's something like getting more people on your email list or selling a passive product it can really be a seasonal goal, because sometimes we're more booked out than other times and then making sure that everything on your site is designed in a way to help you reach that goal.

Speaker 1: 4:23

I kind of talk about that a lot with my clients. I find my coaching clients because I feel like, as creatives, we have these crazy brains right when it's all over the place, and we get into this website design, we're like I don't know what to do, and so it's very overwhelming, especially if you have a template or something and we get lost in all of that. We're like, well, we need to do this, we need to do that. So if you guys are listening to this, I want you to hear that it's crucial to have an actual main strategy. Where do you want your people to go ultimately?

Speaker 1: 4:55

And so when you approach it like this obviously I know you guys work with a lot of photographers, right? Is that the bulk of your? Yeah, okay, I thought so and I can tell. I can see why it's definitely it fits us, your style and your vibe. But when you do that so how does that all work? Like, when you sit down with somebody, what's the first thing you kind of want to go over with somebody, let's say, somebody like me who is a senior photographer, because I do have a lot of senior photographers in my audience, because that's who I am I do like seniors and branding. So, as a senior photographer, what would be one of the first couple questions you would sit down and ask the buddy?

Speaker 2: 5:37

So the first thing that we start with all of our clients kind of the baseline question is who your ideal audience is. And obviously this is going to change person to person and it can evolve as your business grows. Like you can start off offering smaller packages, but then we work with a lot of wedding photographers who are now trying to kind of break into the more high-end wedding market instead of the kind of middle wedding market. So it can be something that evolves over time. But who is your ideal client? And then we kind of build out on that with what would they want to see? So, for example, you as a senior photographer, like, is your ideal client actually the seniors or is it their parents who are going to be the ones looking for photographers to take their senior portraits? So you have to think about who that person is, what they're going to be looking for, what they would want to see, what's going to draw them in, how you can kind of tell a story and solve the issue or the problem that they're facing and give them real stories, real transformations, on how you've taken this person and shot their wedding or this senior and shown their whole growth through high school, through pictures or from kindergarten, 12th grade or whatever it might be, but the main thing is your ideal client.

Speaker 2: 6:56

And then we also like to ask about things that they like and don't like on websites. So we always ask our clients to make a list of a few websites that they love and a few websites that they don't. And then we actually go through and we're like, okay, what is it about this website? Do you like? What is it the layout? Is it you know, the pictures are really big and like the main focus of the site, or is it the layout of the text or the flow or whatever it is?

Speaker 2: 7:21

We ask what they like and then, the same thing, we ask what they don't like, because, at the end of the day, well, your website needs to be kind of garnered towards your ideal clients and what they would want to see. You also want a website that you like. No one wants to go to the website and be like I hate this. It looks bad, like I don't want to be embarrassed sending my website to someone, so we want to make sure that they like what they're getting and anything that they're like. I hate seeing this on a website. Every time I see it, I just like click out of it. Make sure that that's not on their site, but also that it's attracting those dream clients and speaking to them when they do land on the page.

Speaker 1: 7:55

Yeah, I love that and I have that conversation a lot with my clients because, yeah, as senior photographers, we're a little bit different, because we do have two, we do really have two clients and even though the parents are paying for it, it's really the seniors who are going to be probably more.

Speaker 1: 8:13

And, especially for me, I know that my client, who I'm really kind of speaking to mostly, is going to be that senior, at least to draw them in, because they're the ones kind of calling the shots on who gets to get hired, basically because more often than not, our younger clients or the parents are letting their kids take the lead. That wasn't the case when I started this business a million years ago and I was shooting millennials, but now I'm shooting Jen's ears and soon to be Jen Alpha, and so it's a whole different. It's a whole different ballgame, and I do think that we are very unique in the way that we have to be thinking about bridging that gap and marketing to both of them. So, is that possible? Do you think that you can kind of weave all that messaging into a website concisely and in a very direct way? That's gonna entice the senior and also get the parent to understand? This is why we should invest with this person, especially if they're like a higher end luxury photographer.

Speaker 2: 9:14

Yeah, I definitely think it is totally possible and it might just be kind of breaking down your website and thinking about who's going to necessarily visit each of the pages.

Speaker 2: 9:25

So, if you think about the seniors, the seniors probably aren't gonna go through and go that in depth into the service page where it lists out exactly what's included. They're probably gonna look at the homepage, they're probably gonna look at your portfolio to see other images of seniors, whereas the parents they're gonna care about that and they're gonna look at it, but they're also gonna wanna know okay, what am I gonna get out of this? What's the investment? What's the next steps? What does the process look like? Everything like that. So kind of breaking it down and thinking who is the I guess, quote, unquote client that's gonna be looking at each of these pages and what's going to draw them in the most and kind of show what the benefit is of the senior photography, the wedding photography, whatever it is that you're actually doing. So I think just kind of breaking it down and thinking like it in that lens can help bridge that gap and make sure that you have all of your bases covered with them.

Speaker 1: 10:19

Yeah for sure. So do you guys like help us photographers walk through Cause? Yeah, images are our thing, right, but we also still get really confused and overwhelmed about that too. Like we're like I don't know which ones to use. I hear that all the time. I don't know, I'm always talking about just show your best work, but we are our worst critics. We just really are as artists. We, after you look at an image, you could love it, and then all of a sudden, you're like I hate everything I do. It all fucking sucks. And so do you guys help us figure out, like okay, this is what you should put this when you think about that target client right. Like this is where really understanding and knowing who that target client is Okay from there, what images should I be using, as well as what copies? So do you guys create some guidance for us with?

Speaker 3: 11:08

all of that.

Speaker 3: 11:08

So photos is 100% one of the biggest things we get asked about all the time, and one of the things that we love to do, especially when we're designing websites for photographers, is to really make sure that we're not just throwing pictures up there.

Speaker 3: 11:18

To have pictures up there, you really want to be able to showcase the experience that your ideal client is looking for. So what we do is we have some clients who are like you know what? I know exactly what photos I want on my site. We have other ones who are like I have all of these photos, I don't know which ones are the best, like feel free to just pick and choose. So what we'll do is we'll go through and we'll kind of read through the specific copy that is on each page and we'll make sure that those photos are actually accentuating what's being said, because you don't just want a picture of someone crying next to someone or text that says something like the best day of your life. You know what I mean. You want to make sure everything's really matching up throughout the website. So that's definitely something that we help out with while we're designing.

Speaker 2: 11:58

And then when it comes to the copy side of it, it's an interesting mix because we're not copywriters so it's hard for us to be like, okay, here's the copy that you can write, but we have been in this photography space for long enough that we have a general idea of what works on each page, and like the different canvases and sections that you want to have on your homepage versus your about page or services page, everything like that. So we do. If clients don't hire copywriters because some of them will just hire a copywriter and it's awesome, but if they don't, we do have a copy guide that we give them. That kind of walks them through okay, this is what we would suggest having on your homepage, and it'll be basic things like your tagline at the top, like you should have a tagline that's gonna draw people in when they first land on your site, and then you want text that speaks to your visitor, and then you want portfolio images or a little bit about you and the business on the homepage, and then we'll go more in depth in the about page where you can put other stuff, but we'll give them a little document that kind of goes through that, just so that they have a general idea because across the board, with whoever we work with, copy is always the hardest thing and even on our site, copy is the hardest thing.

Speaker 2: 13:11

It's just. It's very difficult to write about yourself sometimes in your business. So we try to help as much as we can, not being copywriters ourselves, but the best if you're really struggling with it. Our best advice is to hire copywriters, because they are lifesavers and they are amazing and totally underrated and can really elevate your site to the next level.

Speaker 1: 13:32

I agree, and chat to UT can only get you so far. Yeah, so you do not want your site written by chat to UT? Don't do that. I'm all about using tech for like help, but you could use it to get you to an idea, but do not copy paste what chat to UT thinks it should do Exactly for your website. Copy right, and it is true, we're too close to it. You get too close to just like images. You get too close to the copy.

Speaker 1: 13:59

It's like it's really imperative to, like you said, hire people who are really good at what they do, and if that's not your strength and you know it's going to be a struggle, there are people who can help. So, but I like that you guys do have some guidelines for people who are like no, I can do this, I just need a little help. So that's really really good to know. So, in your process, I know that you guys do these custom sites and everything like that right, like is that the main thing? You would say that you like someone comes to you they need a website. You guys are just gonna it's built on, show it correct, like you guys are show it designers, which I love, which is awesome. Like I mean, I just switched this year to show it.

Speaker 1: 14:38

I don't know why it took me so long. I just I didn't have time to think about it and once I did, I was like, oh my God, this is amazing. So yeah, so show it. Yes, yes, and you guys build these custom sites for people. But I do want it to just throw something out there, because I know a lot of my listeners are like me, where we maybe purchased a template that we really love and we did it. We got it up. It looks fine, but it could look really, really awesome and we don't have the time or the capacity to even think about like fine tuning it, like it's all of those little fine tuning things. Like I'm looking at my website just recently and I really love it, but I'm like, oh my God, that could be so much better. I don't have time to deal with that at all. Do you guys do that kind of work as well? Sometimes?

Speaker 2: 15:25

Yes, so we definitely do work with templates and we can do one of two things. We can work on helping tweak little sections or add things in or add more personality and throughout the site, anything like that. Or we can take a template that's brand new and completely customize it for you. So if you've just purchased a template, we can take that, put in your brand, in your photography, your copy, kind of build it out from there. So it just depends on where you are in your business and kind of what it is that you're actually looking for.

Speaker 1: 15:58

Nice. I kind of wish I would have found you guys in January. Anyway, I'm still going to probably be calling you because, again, there's like these little small things that I know will make a big difference, but I just don't have the capacity to do it. And I saw today, too, on your Instagram that you guys are offering some branding stuff all in one too now, which I think is awesome, because I did it separate. Like I hired someone to rebrand me because I had been in business for a long, long time and I didn't want to completely change my branding, but I wanted to refresh it. I wanted to give it a whole different look, and I love it. I love what she did. But I think it's really cool that you guys are kind of like being, you know, you're able to like wrap that all sort of into this. So tell me a little bit about those services that you offer as well, because I think a lot of photographers could use your help. If I'm being honest, Absolutely.

Speaker 3: 16:51

So we do offer branding now, which we just like relaunched. We haven't offered it in like a year and a half but have kind of still been offering it like on the down, though like some photographers would come to us and still need a little bit of branding help, whether that was just picking colors or, you know, fixing the fonts or anything like that. So we were like you know what, we're just going to relaunch it as a branding and website package option and then you can also just book branding alone. So we kind of have like the opportunity as well to fully customize it to a photographer's needs. So if someone comes to us and is like you know what, I love my logo, I just need a refresh on my colors. Or you know, I love my colors and my logo, but I really just need a like refreshed fonts to use throughout the site so that it matches the strategy that we're going for, then that is now fully an option when anybody works with us. Sweet.

Speaker 1: 17:36

Really really cool. Ok, talk to me a little bit about SEO, because I don't want to. You know I didn't really want to focus SEO too much on this conversation because it is such a huge topic. I'm sure you guys get asked oh my God, SEO, Because a lot of photographers obviously are pretty clueless about it. I think we've gotten a lot better.

Speaker 1: 17:55

I've been trying over the years to really help people Like I'm, by no stretch of the imagination, an SEO expert, but I know enough to know what I need to know and I know what I need to do. But a lot of photographers especially newer photographers and especially ones who are either like just starting out and just kind of launching their real website they don't really know what they even need to be doing. And Shoaid does a good job of like at least helping you understand some of it, right, but at the end of the day, you don't know what you don't know. So do you guys sort of weave that service into your services as well and, if so, how do you sort of approach it? What is your kind of thoughts about it?

Speaker 2: 18:40

Yeah, so we definitely have options for it, depending on what you're looking for. So there's a few different things that we will do with SEO On all of our websites. We do kind of basic SEO, so we'll do alt text or text tags. So making sure everything's tagged is like h1, and h2, and paragraph and that stuff. But we do have more in-depth SEO options, like finding keywords for your actual website. So that's something that can be added on to any of our packages.

Speaker 2: 19:12

Or we do have a kind of bigger all-encompassing package called the intentional change maker experience. That includes the SEO. It also includes six SEO optimized blog posts so that it not only gets people or gives you a site that you're excited to send people, but it also gives people a way to find you through Google, which is a super great way to build traffic. And Google is way more reliable and long term than something like Instagram is, where it only lasts maybe 24 hours. So we do offer keywords either through that package or as an add-on to anyone.

Speaker 2: 19:51

We do alt text for all of the images we do show. It specifically has layering guidelines that they like, so we'll do that on our show at sites. We'll make sure all the text tags will write page titles and meta descriptions so that when someone finds your page on Google, it actually says something that makes sense and not just something random. And then, yeah, blogging is kind of the next tier of that and that's something that we always suggest anyone do and that's included in the change maker experience. But it's also something that we do monthly blog writing for a couple different, mainly photographers right now that to kind of help them boost their traffic and get them found through Google so they're not relying so much on social media or relying just on referrals, because that's another thing that can just kind of dry up one day.

Speaker 1: 20:40

Yeah, no, absolutely. That's really cool. So I love that you brought up blogging.

Speaker 1: 20:47

I think that there's this ongoing sort of debate that I see in all of the photography Facebook groups and even in my own.

Speaker 1: 20:55

There's a lot of people who are like oh, especially senior clients are not reading our blogs, and I was like it doesn't matter necessarily, in my opinion that, first of all, I think they are, but for different reasons I use my blog. I'll send them blog posts for inspiration on locations. If you have a question about locations, it's a fabulous way to get somebody to just see what a location could look like in five different ways, and so I think it's a really good opportunity to use your blog in that way with your clients. But it's there for SEO. At the end of the day, that's really what it's there for for you to get found. So I like that you guys kind of talk to speak to using blogging as that amplifier. Can you maybe share a case study where implementing these strategies led to significant traffic growth that you've seen with either a client of yours or a couple? That you've seen just as a group like yes, it works.

Speaker 3: 21:55

Absolutely so. About two years ago, actually, we started working with a wedding and lifestyle photographer based in Virginia and she actually booked us first just for her brand and website. And again, like that's one of those things that you really don't want to skip before you start doing that SEO, because you know your SEO can only do so much. Once those people are on your website, you really want to make sure your website is then speaking to them and like makes them actually want to hit contact, get in touch with you and book some. So with this client, we ended up also writing I think we're at about 15 blog posts.

Speaker 3: 22:25

She's one of our monthly blog clients and with our blogging alone she has been able to increase her website traffic 39% within just a few months of us writing those posts and like a big part of that was thanks to writing a lot of local posts. So that's one of our favorite tips If you can target keywords that are local to your area especially if you tend to photograph in the same like places very often, if you can target keywords that like have you know your specific location in them, you can really like see better results, mostly because they're a little bit easier to rank for and if you were to try to rank for something a lot more general, and again, thanks to that brand and website that we did, along with all of the SEO work and blogging work, she was able to also increase her inquiry to booking rate, which her mentors had said was a very high number of like that they had seen and they had worked with a lot of photographers and I believe she said it was at about like 90% after we worked with her Dang.

Speaker 1: 23:20

I know how overwhelming and paralyzing social media planning can be for creatives, so I really would love for you to check out a tool that I've been using for the past year and a half at least, and it makes it all so simple. Plus, they have everything you possibly could need, and then some. It's called Metricool and you could find it at Reneeio slash Metricool, so it's r-e-n-e-e dot i-o slash M-e-t-r-i-c-o-o -l Renee dot i-o slash Metricool. I love them because they're always adapting and changing and adding to it, so not only can you plan all your social media content across multiple platforms, you can also look at all your analytics, including your blog analytics. It's really, really amazing, saves me a lot of time, gives me a lot of insight, so I'd love for you to check them out and let me know what you think about them.

Speaker 1: 24:16

That's awesome, okay, so that's really cool. So you guys also, in addition to just like setting something up for people, you do monthly blogging for people. If they want to add that on, okay, yes, that's cool. That's really rad With the SEO in mind. Yes, yeah, yeah, right Now I think you also have a blogging course as well, so tell me a little bit about that.

Speaker 2: 24:41

Yes, we do have a course called blogging for business, and this is a great course if you want to kind of take blogging into your own hands, but do it in the best, the right way. Yeah, the right way. You can just say it and it's basically yeah, it really came out of the need for this to kind of be put out there, because KPE has actually been blogging since, I think, 2012 and really heavily started blogging in 2019, but didn't pay attention to SEO until 2021. So for two years it was a lot of posts and a lot of content, but they weren't SEO optimized. So that's where you went into the issue of having a lot of content out there that no one's ever going to find, no one's searching for. It's just kind of there but not doing you any good.

Speaker 2: 25:32

So blogging for business is a course that walks you through everything you need to know for blogging.

Speaker 2: 25:36

So it'll walk you through keywords, how to find them, what's important to look in a keyword, how to actually figure out what keywords you can rank for based on your specific site. It'll walk you through our process of creating outlines for the post, writing the post, everything you need to do to upload them and all of the SEO optimization things you need to do while uploading it and then also what to do after it. So repurposing it to the other content areas that you have social media, email, podcasts, tiktok, whatever it is and then update it in the future to make sure it stays relevant and you continue to kind of keep it higher in the rankings, because obviously if you write a post, it can continue to rank for you, but if you let it sit for four years without doing anything, that content might be outdated. Other people might have come along and kind of bumped out of the ranking. So teaching you how to continually update it and make sure that your content is still at the top and bringing in that traffic that you want to see.

Speaker 1: 26:37

Sweet. That's really needed. I think I need that. I have so much older content. No, truly. Or maybe I just need somebody else to do it. And that brings me to like that's something like let's say, I purchased this course from you guys. Can I have my virtual assistant learn how to do that for me? Is that a possibility? Like you can have a lot of clients do that kind of stuff too, where it's like I might not necessarily have the capacity to do it, but I want to know and I'd like to learn. Like I'd like to learn the actual stuff, but then actually implementing it is something that I mean a lot of us have issues with because we're so busy doing all the things. Is that something that people do as well? Like they can just kind of have it in their arsenal, let's say, and have their assistant or intern kind of help them with it.

Speaker 3: 27:27

Yeah, absolutely. So one of the things that we really made sure when we were making the course was that everything is extremely digestible. So if you were to hand it off to like a VA or another type of assistant, they can go in and just watch like the little bite size videos for the specific things that, like, they need to know as well, which makes it really easy for you to assign that as a task to somebody.

Speaker 1: 27:47

Okay, yeah, that's really what I was trying to get to, because I mean, you know, we have help and we have assistance, but sometimes they're not us, right, you know? I mean, and and it does have to be digestible even for us, because a lot of this does kind of go over most people's heads or I feel like there's kind of just this, this, this idea or this thought that it is going to go over your head and so you just kind of overthink it, when really it's not that hard. It's just that you haven't tried it, you haven't done it. Like that's a lot, a lot of the, let's say, you know, older creatives that I work with and I'm, you know, I'm older, I get it, but I'm also really techie, you know what I mean. Like I'm just kind of one of those people who I can pick up tech pretty pretty naturally, and a lot of my, my coaching clients are not, you know, and they and they really have a hard time. So it's good that it is easy to understand, digestible. You don't have to just sit there and, like you know, consume hours and hours and hours of content and make you feel like your your head's going to explode. So that's good. So I'll link to that in the show notes for you guys so you can check that out as well. You know, in addition to all the other stuff that you guys do, I think that's a really cool option that you do provide for people, because I think it is, it is very much needed. So I'm a really big believer in your why and your purpose, and I teach this in all my coaching. It doesn't matter, like, how new somebody is or if they've been in the business for a long time, like if they're coaching with me, we're we're diving into that first, because I really do believe that.

Speaker 1: 29:21

You know, like Simon Sinek says, people don't buy what you do. They buy why you do it, and especially in something like higher end photography, luxury photography you do. You got to give them another reason to purchase what you're doing. Right? There's so many photographers. So, first of all, what's going to help you stand out?

Speaker 1: 29:40

But how connected are you to this purpose? Because if you're not connected to it, you're not going to be able to explain it, right? So how can businesses like make sure that their why is clearly communicated in their website? Because one of the first things that I always say to people is like you're not going to put this on your website. Like when I make them write their why statement, like I make them go deep into it and we, like we go down that rabbit hole and I'm like I'm not going to make you put this on your website. And then they're like, but why am I doing it? How do I express it then on my website? So what do you suggest? People sort of like kind of do with that once they they get intentional about their why.

Speaker 3: 30:15

I love that. So, when it comes to your why, we like to kind of think of it almost like you're guiding star, like it's you know the reason behind everything that you're doing, basically. So we have a few suggestions on how to make sure that your why is really being communicated on your website. Of course, the easiest one that you probably already know about is just to make sure that it's mentioned somewhere on your about page. Of course, it doesn't need to be like right at the top and be like my mission is to I help you with like X, y, Z, like you don't need to be that like in your face about it, like you can add a little bit of your personality to it. You can like interweave it into your own story about why you started your business and everything like that.

Speaker 3: 30:47

Another way is to actually try to use case studies that connect with your why, to so you know, make sure that your portfolio is showing transformations and try to connect that back to your why, and be sure to use real stories. Another one is also to try to use strong visual elements throughout your site that are aligned with your purpose, and you can try to tell your why in a visual way as well, and this could also work with videos, or if you ever take like photo bursts, you can turn those into little gifts to use throughout your site to. And then, of course, our last one to was to create engaging content with your blogs that also revolve around your why, so trying to find keywords on topics that are again connected back to your why as well yeah, I love the, the reminder again to be cohesive in that messaging.

Speaker 1: 31:32

That's really something that I try and hammer home. That I'm glad you guys are. That's top of mind and if you're listening, that's all you get from today is that you really do need to be cohesive with your messaging. You can't be all over the place. Even if you're doing a whole bunch of different. You know genres and niches of photography. There are a lot of photographers who still are high end, but they're able to do a lot of different. You know types of photography. It's still really, really important.

Speaker 1: 32:01

What is that core messaging? What is it all about? And that's why the why is so important, because if you don't know what it is, it's not top of mind. You weren't intentional about outlining, highlighting it is what I like to say to my clients. If you're not intentional about highlighting it for yourself, your marketing is going to be all over the place, your copy is going to be all over the place and you're going to be really easily influenced by other photographers. So that that is what I want you guys to hear. Is that cohesion? What is everything about? Where is it all driving? And what is that core messaging and how can you just express it in a little bit different way, like on the blog and the pages. So very, very cool.

Speaker 1: 32:41

And I like the idea about the video and gifts as well, because I think we get stuck in the images as photographers Obviously like. This is what we do and I always say I'm not a videographer, I don't want to be a videographer, I have no desire to be a videographer, like, don't ask me to shoot video on my pro camera, but I have a killer iPhone and I you know it takes great video, so that's the video I use on my site. You know there's no excuse, right? So use what you have. How easily integrable just for those of those people out there who don't really know about show it or the platform or what you guys do how easy is it to implement some video to your site and how much video do you think you should have on your site.

Speaker 2: 33:28

So it kind of depends on what type of video you're looking at. So the best one that we use a lot on our client site and even on our site is backgrounds. So the background of the canvas is actually a video. Those are just going to be hosted on show it. So you will just upload the video, just like you would upload an image to your media library, and then you can select it as a background with that. They do have to be a little bit shorter because obviously show it, just like every other platform, has a limit on how big videos can be.

Speaker 2: 33:59

But it is a great option to add a little bit of movement and can kind of bring a little bit more of your personality into it as well. There's also integrations or embeds that you can do with Vimeo and YouTube. So if you have a video on either of those, if you are a videographer, if you work with a videographer and have video that you can put on the site, you can put a YouTube or Vimeo link into the site and so it's not hosted on site. It's not going to be uploading a 20 minute YouTube video to your site or anything like that. It's going to pull it right from there. So it really doesn't affect site speed that much, since it's not actually hosted on show it, but you can still show longer videos. It will just show up as a little YouTube play button and it will be super quick.

Speaker 2: 34:44

And then our last kind of suggestion if you do have shorter videos, we've taken videos and just turn them into seven or eight second gifts instead of putting the whole video on there, just to add a little bit of more movement, add a little bit of that personality and that you know, a little bit of extra own into the site without adding, you know, a whole bunch, or being able to put them in smaller sections of the site, not as a whole background or anything like that. So it's really easy to do. You just got to think about what you want to do. If you want to as background, if you want a whole video embedded, anything like that, yeah, cool.

Speaker 1: 35:17

Yeah, I love being able to do that and it was pretty easy. Just from my own experience, like on show it, trying to figure out how to do it. It was a little bit of a learning curve, but not too bad. But I do like that we can use them in back as backgrounds because it really gives people more of a feeling of what you're going to get, like you were talking about before, about you know how you express the why and how you express the experience, just like some really great BTS video as a background is a great way to do that, I think, because it gives people a little glimpse into what you're going to do.

Speaker 1: 35:51

And let's just be honest, our Gen Z clients, especially. You're not going to sit there and watch. You know a whole last five minute video of you talking about how awesome your business is anyway. So you got to be you know what I mean. Like you got to like use what you can and be quick about it. I'm sure you guys See that a lot too. You know what I mean. Like I think there's a time and a place for, like, a more flushed out Explanation video, but you also have to think about who you're. Who's gonna be watching that right, just like we were talking about before. So what do you think is you know, from your point of view, how do you guys measure the like, the success of a website strategy like? What KPIs should we be looking at? What? What's gonna tell us If our website's performing well? If it's, you know, obviously, if we're not getting any leads, we're probably not doing a very good job. That's probably number one. But what do you think?

Speaker 2: 36:46

Yeah, so I think there's a couple different things that we can look at, depending on what your goal is. So if your goal is traffic, most basic one is traffic increase, so you can look at that through Google Analytics. If you don't have Google Analytics set up already, highly recommend setting it up. It's super easy for the most part to set up, but it's really helpful when it comes to tracking all this stuff. So when you're in Google Analytics, you can also look at things like time spent on each page. So you can look at if they're clicking through Pages that you want them to sit and read or be on or has a lot of information that you want them to look at. They're clicking through them and your average time on that page is only five seconds. There might be something on that page that isn't connecting, so you can think about reworking it, maybe switching around the order, making it more easily digestible, putting the more important stuff at the top, anything like that. You can also look at the most visited pages to make sure that the page that you want them to visit is up there in that list. So, for example, if your home website goal is to get people to contact you, to reach out to you, but your contact page is your least visited page. Something. Something's going on and you want to. It might be as simple as you need to add more CTAs with links to your contact page. If you don't have any CTAs or if they're hard to find to actually get to your contact page, that can be an issue there, but that'll let you see if people are getting to the pages that you actually want them to get to.

Speaker 2: 38:11

And then a couple other things. You can Check the source of the traffic. If you're figuring, if you're focusing on SEO, so you can see where people are actually finding you, if they're finding you through social media or if they're actually coming from organic Google search. And that can kind of help you figure out if your SEO strategy and everything like that is working for you or if it's still all coming from outside sources and not Google quite yet. And then, along with that, you can check your keyword rankings. This you do want to give some time. You're not gonna put a post up and then, for the most, for the most part, you're not gonna put a post up and then see it ranking, you know, the next day and the next week or something like that. So rankings can take a year or so to actually settle and where they're gonna sit in Google. So give it time.

Speaker 2: 38:56

But after you know 12 months, 18 months or something like that, if you're not seeing that it's ranking where you want it to be, you can go back, look at that keyword, see if there's any changes you can make. Sometimes just flipping around the orders of a word can change the ranking. It can change the search volume from, you know, 10 searches a month to 200 searches a month and that can make a huge difference in your traffic. So definitely also check out your Keyword rankings to see what's kind of coming in from there. And then you can also ask people in your inquiry form where they found you from if they found you from social media, referral, google, anything like that to see if more people are finding you from Google as you start to implement more of these SEO practices and see if it's actually working that way.

Speaker 2: 39:38

And then, if you're not sort of focusing on Traffic, then you can also look at how well your new websites, new website changes, are either helping or hindering with reaching your goals. So are you getting more Podcast downloads? Are more people signing up for your email list. You know anything like that are you getting more people that just generally inquire, or whatever your goal is? If that's not happening, then you should go back, adjust, make sure that whatever again, whatever your goal is you have Everything on your site pointing towards that kind of going off that too.

Speaker 3: 40:12

If you want to specifically look at how well Design changes are working for you, there is a tool called hotjar and it is one of my favorite tools. There are paid versions of it, but I just use the free version and what it does is, once you connect it to your site, you can basically have screen recordings of people clicking around on your website and you can see heat maps of where people are clicking most and like. When I say screen recordings, it's literally like Netflix, but people scrolling around on your like website. It's really cool, whoa. I highly recommend you add that to your site, if you haven't, especially on your sales pages, like where you have like a lot of buttons and you never know, like maybe Switching like the placement of one button is going to make all the difference for people booking or not booking. So that's definitely a cool thing to look into.

Speaker 1: 40:53

Oh, that's a nice little hot tip. Thanks, I'm definitely gonna look into that. I love that. It's so creepy but so cool. But yeah, it's data. We got to look at that data, like you were saying, like it's just, you know, it's super important, okay, so I want to ask you guys because and and I won't answer this too At I use guys see a lot of websites, you know, and you see a lot of photographers, what, and you give maybe you have different answers to this but what is your the biggest like oh my god, don't do this that you've ever seen?

Speaker 1: 41:30

Right, like so, and you don't have to say names, but one of like I I told this story on a podcast when I Unrelated to a website, but I was just talking about the fact that you know, discover ability just getting found, and not only do Photographers not had to have their names in there, like Instagram bios, but I could not find Someone's name, their actual name, on their photography website ever at all. Like. I Spent a good five, six minutes, went to every single page, looked in the footer, everything. Don't know who she is, don't know her name. So I was like, oh my god, like you have to have your name and not just your business name, like who are you right? Okay, so tell me yours. I.

Speaker 2: 42:15

Think mine would probably be Sites that are just images. So, as a photographer, you absolutely need to have images and that is your work and people need to see that. But People also need to know basic information about you, basic information about your services. If you have an about page and there's one paragraph on it that doesn't really do anything for your visitors, you need to make sure that you supplement the images that you have with actual copy that's going to connect with them. And then also be Careful with how many photos you put for, like, the photographers have great photos and they take.

Speaker 2: 42:51

You know, especially, we work with wedding photographers a lot, so there can be weddings where they're, you know, giving galleries of 800 photos to the couple and that's awesome and those couples love it. But the rest of the world isn't gonna want to see a gallery of a hundred pictures of that couple. So, especially when it comes to your portfolio pages, realistically anything over 50 images, people are gonna stop scrolling. So we honestly suggest between 30 and 50. Anything over 50 people aren't looking at all of them, so it's just kind of a waste of time and effort to put that many in there. So way too many pictures and way too little text just doesn't do anything for you or your business.

Speaker 3: 43:32

Agree, I would say mine is. I feel so bad. I run into this issue all the time because I'm on my phone all the time, like I do all of egg pots, like Marketing, and I'm on Instagram all the time, but the amount of photographers who I go to their feed and their feed looks amazing, like you can really tell like the unique aesthetic, the style, everything like that. And then I go to the website and it's completely different, like a complete opposite vibe, like maybe they have like a really bold, colorful style on Instagram, and you go to the website and it's just like a white square space template with like a completely opposite. And I just get so confused. I agree, and if I feel that way, clients are gonna feel the same way too when they visit.

Speaker 1: 44:08

Very disjointed right, it's like what. It's like what you know and I get it like and I see it too a lot with photographers who have been around for a little while. Like you said, they have an established business, their work is really good on their feed on Instagram, let's say, and that's all fine and dandy, but then I click out and I go to their website and I'm like this is literally like you know, 2010, like and really bad user experience to like. It looks really bad on mobile. You know it's not fast and it just it just completely breaks down right there. Because, yeah, your, your clients might find you on social a lot especially your teen clients might find you in tiktok and Instagram but, like, if your website is that antiquated, it's not doing you any favors whatsoever. So, yeah, I'm glad you brought that up, because that's one of mine too.

Speaker 1: 45:01

Okay, so before we wrap up, I want to ask you guys First of all, like I said before, I love your vibe. I think it's super fun. What is your favorite part Each of your favorite parts About what you guys do like? What do you love about Doing this for your clients? Because it's obvious that you both love it. But I want to find out a little bit more about you and like what kind of lights you up? I would say for me.

Speaker 3: 45:27

It's the collaboration. So when we are, when I first started the business, I guess we were pretty much working with like anybody and I very quickly niche down into photographers, because every photographer client that I got I just loved the Collaboration that came out of it, because it's like working with more creatives just makes an even more beautiful outcome and it's just like the back and forth and like coming up with new ideas and sending you know drafts for feedback and then getting like all these new ideas sparked from like the feedback. I just yeah, that's definitely my favorite part. I would say love it.

Speaker 2: 45:56

I think mine is Helping create a sense of freedom and a little bit of, you know, less pressure when it comes to our clients.

Speaker 2: 46:07

We are both huge travelers. We love going out, seeing new things, hiking, going to national parks, like spending time away from the business and work, because it's it's so easy especially when you work from home, it's so easy to just get, yeah, completely engulfed in work. So I think my favorite part is helping to create that for clients. We've had a lot of clients that have come back and been like I'm booking more and I'm like booking out faster and I'm able to not have to be on social media 24-7 to try and book clients because my website is doing it for me. And like I was at a wedding and I got two inquiries while I was shooting and like now my you know, next three months are booked or whatever it is. So I think helping people create that sense of freedom that was why I wanted to kind of join Incpot and, you know, be my own boss. I guess you can say helping to create that for the clients is definitely my favorite part.

Speaker 1: 46:58

I love it. Yes, I'm a big believer in lever of freedom. That's why, you know, I think that's why we all kind of start our own businesses, right, and you know, and then we, like you said, it's easy to fall into the trap of working 24 seven and you know it's the lie. It's like oh yeah, but it's all about finding, you know, setting up systems and not being a slave to the business. But I think that we definitely. I can see why you like working with photographers too, because you know that creative input and you guys are creative, so I mean, it's in your name. So, anyway, all right, let's tell people where they can find you. Where do you guys like to connect with people? I know we're going to link your website and stuff and you can, you know, say that as well, but where do you also like people to reach out to you and connect with?

Speaker 3: 47:45

you. So I'd say the main place you can find us is on Instagram. We're at inkpot creative and you can also tune into our podcast. We are called the Unexpected Entrepreneur podcast just because I kind of stumbled into starting the business. But yeah, those are the main two places you can kind of keep up with us.

Speaker 1: 48:01

I love the name of the podcast. That's really really fun, really cool. Love it. All right, guys, thank you so so much for being here. This was really insightful, really helpful, great tips, and I'll put everything in the show notes for everybody to find you. Thank you so much, thank you, thank you. Okay, I hope you were taking notes because that was a really, really in depth episode about a lot of different things that you guys should be thinking about in terms of your website. So, first of all, I'm gonna put everything in the show notes.

Speaker 1: 48:28

You can get in touch with with KP and Jessie and, you know, inquire about their services. If you want someone to actually take the wheel and do this work for you, I highly recommend looking at their stuff. They are so good at what they do. But also that blogging for business course like come on, you guys, what a phenomenal idea, right, like you can actually take the course yourself and start building up your SEO or hand it off to a VA or someone else on your team if you don't have the capacity. But yes, blogging is still relevant for this for this reason. So definitely check out that link below and check out their course. I mean, it's only $97 right now, so I would jump on that for sure.

Speaker 1: 49:13

Some of the takeaways I think that you can walk away from this episode are blogging really works. First of all, right, I mean, your SEO is important and it takes a little while to build up, so you definitely want to get into a really good system, but it doesn't have to be complicated. Okay, we're the ones who make things complicated. Just keep it simple. Stick to what works for you. You definitely have to know who you're speaking to. That's A number one. But you need to be out there talking about it. You need to be talking about it on your website, and your copy definitely does matter as well. So if you struggle with that, reach out, find someone who can help you with that. Your voice needs to be heard on your website. When people at your website, they need to know that it's really you, your personality, and it's not just some persona that you put on right. The more you that you can be remember, I'm always talking about like what are you putting out there? What is your resonance, what is your vibe? That's gonna help attract your tribe.

Speaker 1: 50:06

Another takeaway is that it's really more important now than ever that your website does all the heavy lifting for you. We've moved out of this sort of timeframe of having a basic website is okay. I really don't think that it'll cut it anymore. Okay, we have way too many resources, way too many media resources, especially right now, and so that's why I love show it too is that you can build upon it with beautiful things like video and highlighting our images as photographers is awesome, but it's all done in a way that is eye catching, different, it's new, it's impactful. So you aren't going to just fit in in a sea of other photographers. You gotta be standing out. So that's a definite big takeaway. Is that? I want you to hear that again. How can I stand out? Right, if your competition is doing one thing, you wanna be doing the other? And, lastly, what is your website strategy? Along with your brand strategy, you need to know what your website strategy is and how that is going to fit in with your lifestyle. Is it really a good representation of who you are? Okay, go into it with intention, friends.

Speaker 1: 51:18

That wraps it up for today. Thank you so much again for joining me. I truly appreciate you being here with me, and I wanna tell you that I have a new community for us. It is a free community. If you vibe with this podcast, whether you're a photographer or not, I have a new community where we can all converge, commiserate and have really awesome discussions and deepen our awareness there. So that link is gonna be in the show notes and I'm excited to share that with you all.

Speaker 1: 51:46

I also wanna highlight another review that was just left for the show. You guys know how much I appreciate you rating and reviewing the show, and I've made it super easy. All you gotta do is go to ratethispodcastcom, slash Renee Bowen, and you can choose your platform and leave a review really easily from there. Okay, and so Kim left me this awesome, awesome review and I wanna share it and I'm gonna send you something for it too, kim.

Speaker 1: 52:11

So when I read your review live, I always send you a little gift. It says Renee does a wonderful job of showing how important mindset is, how to regulate your nervous system and the power of your thoughts. She backs it all up with solid tips and tricks for social media marketing and connecting with your target audience. As an entrepreneur, it's so important to realize and harness the power of your thoughts and to show up. Thank you for all that you do to provide education and value to the photography industry. Thank you so much for leaving that. I love, love, love your feedback. Guys, please go and leave me one and maybe I'll read it live on the air and you guys will get a little gift from me in your email. Thank you, thank you, have a really amazing week. I love you all, sending you so much love and light. Thank you.