Ready to attract your dream photography clients? I mean, sounds pretty nice, doesn’t it? Well, then it’s time to learn how to make a photography blog that actually helps you work towards that goal.
Maybe you’re newer to the photography industry and you want to fill your schedule. Maybe you’re a professional photographer and you’re tired of settling for clients and gigs that don’t light you the heck up. Or maybe you’re pretty happy with how things are going in your biz but you want to implement more strategic marketing efforts to free up some of your time and energy.
No matter which stage your photography business is at, there are a shit ton of reasons why you start a photography blog.
But if you want your photography blog to attract your ideal clients to your website, it’s important to make sure you’re doing it properly and with a strategy in mind.
At Meet Pepper, we’ve worked with hundreds of photographers, often helping them write blogs that grow their biz. So in this article, we’re going to break down how to make a photography blog that actually helps your business rather than just wasting your precious time and resources. Because those things are not infinite, and they are valuable as hell!
How to make a photography blog that actually works
Here are some steps to take if you want to start a great photography blog.
- Get to know your ideal clients
- Make sure your photography branding is dialed in
- Have a well-built photography website
- Choose some great blog photography topics
- Make a plan
- Learn SEO and other blogging best practices
- Share your photography blogs
1. Get to know your target audience and ideal photography clients
Before you start writing photography blogs, you need to figure out who you’re speaking to.
How to figure out who your ideal photography client is
If you’re not sure who your ideal client is, you can create a “client avatar”. Here are some exercises to help you out.
Spot the common traits of your favourite clients
- Make a list of your favourite clients you’ve ever worked with.
- Make a list of the traits they have in common, from personality to hobbies to career to family and so on.
- Use those traits to help create your ideal client avatar.
If you haven’t worked with many clients yet, just spend some time visualizing what you think your ideal photography sessions and clients would be like.
Questions to ask about your dream clients
Now that you have a better idea of who your target audience is, ask yourself these questions:
- What do they care about?
- What interests them?
- What questions do they have that I can answer?
- How can I offer them something of value?
- What are they searching for online?
- How can I connect with them in a way that also promotes my services?
2. Have your photography brand dialed in
Before you can build something strong and sustainable, you need to start with a solid foundation.
In the case of any marketing efforts, it’s important to have a strong grasp of your photography brand before really diving in.
Your brand includes the visual elements you use to represent your business, like your logo, colours, fonts, etc.
But it also includes the language you use, the experience you offer, your values, your purpose, and how you want to be perceived in the world. It’s your business’ whole vibe; it’s how you make others feel and the impression you leave.
Of course, you want your brand to appeal to your target audience and dream clients.
Having a deep understanding of your brand is also going to help you make sooo many important decisions about your business, marketing, and the direction you want to go—including your photography blogging efforts.
Here are some questions you can ask yourself to see if your current photography brand is on point or if it needs some work:
- Put yourself in the shoes of a potential client who has never met or worked with you before. What vibe would they get from your brand? Think about if they visited your website or social media pages. Write down the first few words that come to mind.
- Now, switch into the shoes of someone who has worked with you before. How do you think they would describe your vibe?
- Now, think about your ideal brand. What vibe do you want your business to exude?
- Where are the differences, and why? What can you do to start working towards your ideal brand vibe?
Answer these questions to dial your photography brand in even further:
- What is the big WHY behind my business?
- What are the core values and beliefs behind my brand?
- What makes my business unique?
- Why should my ideal clients want to work with me?
- What does my brand voice sound like? How do I want to communicate and come across to others?
3. Create a great photography website
For the purposes of this article, we aren’t going too in-depth about how to create a photography website. We’re focusing more on the creation of the actual blogs.
But, of course, you need somewhere to host those blogs. It’s important to have a photography business website that properly represents you, your work, and your brand. It should be easy to navigate, look dang good, and be optimized for search engines.
4. Figure out what to write about in your photography blog
Now that you have a better idea of what your dream clients are searching for online, and you have your brand and website ready to go, it’s time to start brainstorming some kickass photography blog ideas!
When it comes to what to write about in a photography blog, it’s important to find the intersection of what your ideal clients care about and what you have to offer.
Here are some other tips for coming up with great photography blog topics:
- Include your location to attract clients in your area.
- Consider your niche and what makes you unique.
- Ask yourself: What are my ideal clients looking for on Google?
- Use keyword research for SEO to come up with blog topics—more on this later.
- Share your expertise.
5. Create a blogging strategy and content calendar
Once you have a list of awesome photography blog ideas that appeal to your target audience, it’s time to make a plan.
Create a blogging strategy to help you see the bigger picture and stay on track.
Something important to note about blogging is that it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Photography blogs are a long-term strategy and it can take a few months to a year to really start seeing results. But stick with it and be consistent and it’ll pay off!
But it’s got to be realistic. So start by determining how often you can actually create and publish new blogs and add them to your calendar. Set reminders if you need to.
Many marketers use content calendars to help put marketing strategies into action. You can also use it to outline your post-blog workflow to help you maximize your blog efforts—more on that later.
How often should you blog? Well, as often as you realistically can. There isn’t really one right answer to this because it depends on your capacity and goals. But typically, the more, the merrier!
A great goal to aim for is to publish one well-made blog each month.
If that sounds out of reach, you can also consider outsourcing your photography blogs to an expert.
6. Learn how to write a photography blog that converts
Now, the moment we’ve all been waiting for—writing the damn thing!
This is where things get a little more technical. First, you need to decide if you’re writing your photography blog for SEO (search engine optimization).
Writing a photography blog for SEO
Implementing SEO for photographers is arguably the best way to increase your website traffic.
Long story short, the better your website SEO is, the more likely you are to pop up in search results when people Google stuff relevant to your business. Big win.
And blogging is one of the best ways to boost your website’s SEO and get more traffic.
By blogging for SEO and with your ideal clients in mind, you are increasing the chances that those people will come across your website on Google. Heck yes.
If you plan on blogging for SEO, you will want to make sure that you’re following important SEO best practices when writing and uploading your blog:
- Do keyword research to make sure you’re choosing topics you can rank for.
- Implement your keywords and synonyms throughout your blog, including the title, first paragraph, some headings, some alt text, and conclusion.
- Layout your blog in a way that is organized and easy to read, usually with headings and lists.
- Provide great value to your readers and make sure the blog is giving them what they want.
- Fill out a proper SEO title, meta description, and SLUG.
- Add internal and external links throughout your blog.
- Make sure your images are properly sized for web use, geotagged, and have alt text.
- Make sure your blog can be indexed by search engines.
These are just a few things you can do to boost your blog’s SEO. We know it can be a lot to remember, so download our free SEO cheat sheet here and keep it handy!
Here are some other helpful blogging tips for photographers:
- Showcase your beautiful work! Include your own images, anywhere from 10-50 of them depending on how image-focused or word-heavy you want your blog to be.
- List and link out to any vendors, venues, hair and makeup artists, or other businesses involved in the shoot. Let them know about it after and encourage them to share!
- Let your personality shine through. It’s one of the reasons people will want to work with you!
- Include at least one call to action with links to let people know what you want them to do next (ie. contact me to book a session, check out my portfolio, follow me on Instagram…).
- Choose a blog title that describes what the blog is about while also capturing interest.
If all this has you feeling preeeettty overwhelmed, don’t worry! You also don’t have to take all of this on alone. There is absolutely no shame in outsourcing some of your marketing tasks, blogging included.
7. Where to share your photography blogs
Now that your blog is published, it’s time to get some extra eyes on those bad boys!
If you’re wondering where to share your photography blog, here are some ideas:
SHARE YOUR BLOG ON SOCIAL MEDIA
- Add it to your link in bio on Instagram and/or TikTok and direct people there in your Posts/Reels.
- Share it with a direct link to your Instagram Stories
- Share your blog directly to your Facebook page
- Share the link in Facebook groups where you think it could be helpful
- Share your blog on LinkedIn
- Share your blog on Twitter
SHARE YOUR BLOG ON PINTEREST
- Create Static Pins, Idea Pins, Video Pins, Rich Pins and Collection Pins that highlight and link back to your blog
- Take images from your blog and share them to Pinterest with a link
- Create graphics out of tips from your blog to share
SHARE YOUR BLOG IN YOUR NEWSLETTER
- Add a short description, image, and link to your blog in your monthly newsletter
- Send out a newsletter specifically about the blog with a few interesting tidbits and link to learn more
- Use the blog in email marketing funnels to build trust with potential clients
SHARE YOUR BLOG ON GOOGLE BUSINESS PROFILE
- Share a few paragraphs and images from your blog as a post on your Google Business Profile and link back to it
SHARE YOUR BLOG WITH CLIENTS AND VENDORS
- If you mention specific clients, vendors, venues, or other businesses in your blog, send it to them in a personalized email and encourage them to share it.
- Tag those people and businesses on social media when you share the blog.
More Blogging Help for Photographers
Phew, that was a lot! But don’t let it intimidate you. Blogging really is one of the best marketing tactics for photographers in 2023, and we freaking believe in you!
You can also follow us on Instagram and TikTok for more blogging tips for photographers, and check out our other free blogging resources:
- Free SEO cheat sheet
- Learn about the different types of blogs for photographers
- 9 ways that blogging can help your photography business
Kayleigh Zinger
Rockstar Content Creator
Pepper – Your Badass Business BFF Inc.
