Filling your calendar with holiday portrait sessions doesn’t have to be tricky. Use these SEO strategies to fill your studio for a more successful season.
All year we focus on bringing in new clients and optimizing our websites for SEO. But an overlooked and often-forgotten opportunity is holiday portrait session SEO. And, no, we’re not talking about writing a blog post!
Below you’ll find beginner and advanced techniques you can use to gain an advantage over other photographers to fill your holiday portrait sessions quickly and easily.
Holiday photography SEO checklist:
- Update studio hours on your website
- Update “Google My Business”
- Customize landing pages
- Get citations
- Pitch your local media
Update hours on your website.
Google and other search engines use info from your website to determine what service providers show up in a given search. For example, say someone in your area searches for “holiday card photographers near me” at 6 p.m. If your website has your hours listed, and you’re open until 7 or 8 p.m., there’s a better chance your website can be shown in the maps and local results.
Update your “Google My Business.”
If you don’t have a “Google My Business” account, now is the time to sign up. This is a free service Google offers, and it helps Google determine which businesses to show for local searches as well as on maps.
In a “Google My Business” listing, you can list your studio hours and also the services you offer (including holiday portraits). You can feature promotions and sales while also displaying a badge if you’re a minority-owned business. Minority-owned businesses can access unique badges to give your business listings an advantage.
The added benefit of “Google My Business” is that you can display your work to the world. As someone searches for “holiday portrait photography” in your town, not only can your business show up in the Google search, but examples of your work can be displayed in the search result to catch the interest of folks seeking out your services.
Customize landing pages.
Photographers thrive on standing out from the pack, and one great way to do this is to create a unique, themed landing page (or multiple!) for holiday portrait sessions.
You can have one for pets, one that’s non-denominational, a cross-over holiday with multiple symbols and outfits, not to mention traditional themes.
But remember, these pages should not compete with each other. Instead they should complement one another.
Make sure to have:
- Unique content that matches the theme. Look for keywords and phrases that connect to your intended audiences.
- Images that are named and themed to match the content.
- Title tags, headers, and calls to action that are unique.
And don’t forget to include your contact information like a phone number and a map so people can more easily reach you or find your studio if they’re lost or running late.
Get citations.
Citations are a link from a local or themed website pointing to your own website that references your business or service. Google values citations highly, especially when they come from trusted sources related to a person’s inquiry. The more Google trusts your website, the more often your website can show up for people looking for holiday photography services.
Citations to boost your holiday visibility could include links from:
- Local houses of worship
- Local directories
- News outlets
- Student groups and universities
Sometimes getting a citation is as simple as asking a local organization to list you on their website as a resource for photography services. You could even offer a discount for the organization’s members if they mention they found you on the group’s website.
Pitch your local media.
Local media is always looking for topics that will benefit their viewers. If you can come up with five or six “trending” topics for holiday family photo sessions, there’s a chance they’ll bring you in to talk about the trends. Or you could simply pitch answering questions for a DIY home session and cover lighting, posing, and basic editing.
Start by looking for journalists and reporters who have done similar features in prior years. Next, look for the producer’s contact information (LinkedIn is a great resource for this) and try reaching out. You can also use a media outlet’s “tip hotline” to submit your story idea with yourself as a subject-matter expert.
Local media links are normally trusted by search engines and may give you the tipping point to beat your competition.
Holiday SEO is a lot like regular SEO. The big difference is that holiday SEO is more about customizing your pages for holiday-specific searches and remembering to update each of the tools available to reflect you are a service provider for this season.
Related Article: Four Steps to improve your SEO on SmugMug.As a photographer, you also have an amazing opportunity to get featured in the media, which gives you more exposure and credibility to your local community.
Don’t have a photography website yet? Click here to try SmugMug risk free. You’ll get unlimited photo storage, and if you go SmugMug Pro, you’ll be able to set pricing and sell your clients their holiday portraits right from your account.
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