{"id":5187,"date":"2012-02-21T21:37:16","date_gmt":"2012-02-21T10:37:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.alexwisephotography.net\/blog\/?p=5187"},"modified":"2012-02-25T18:48:48","modified_gmt":"2012-02-25T07:48:48","slug":"seo-tips-for-photographers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.alexwisephotography.net\/blog\/2012\/02\/21\/seo-tips-for-photographers\/","title":{"rendered":"SEO Tips for Photographers"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’m by no means an expert at Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and if anything, still very much an amateur. But nevertheless I find SEO an interesting topic and have benefited from optimising my content over the years to develop a consistent stream and rise of traffic to my blog<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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SEO Tips for Photographers<\/h1>\n

This is my step by step guide for developing content, identifying competitive keywords and marketing the article via social networks. The guide has been developed for long-term use and isn’t for those expecting quick short-term gains. It’s by no means the only way to market your content but if you have any suggestions on how you would do things differently, I’d love to hear.<\/p>\n

Your Base Platform<\/h2>\n

This article is focussed on developing content and how to best promote it but I still feel it’s important to quickly touch on your base platform. I’m not going to spend too much time discussing the ins and outs of various blogging platforms and which is better. I personally like WordPress <\/a>as it’s super easy to use, can be optimised well for SEO, good availability of plugins and most importantly, it can be made to look good<\/a>. If you’re after a nice looking WordPress photography theme and happy to pay $30-45~, I’d suggest Theme Forest<\/a> (I’m using a theme off there for my blog). There’s a huge collection and bound to be something that appeals to everyone. Below is a couple of examples of what’s available.<\/p>\n

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WordPress and most themes now come well optimised for SEO. I’d suggest going one step further and using the All in One SEO Pack<\/a> and Google XML Sitemaps<\/a> plugins just to mention a couple. Google XML Sitemaps is a useful tool that compiles your sitemaps and notifies major search engines when updated. Some argue that there is less need for this plugin now that search engines have advanced but I’d still recommend it.<\/p>\n

All in One SEO is also a useful plugin that allows you to better optimise your blog for SEO. One particular feature I like about All in One SEO is the ability to define your meta descriptions when creating a new post. For those that aren’t familiar, your meta description is the description that appears when you search for a website. Just like below<\/p>\n

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\n<\/a>This is your sales pitch that entices people to click and view your content. Without having a pre-defined meta description this results in Google (in this case) pulling the first few words from the article and using it as your meta description. Instead I recommend using the meta description component of All in One SEO to your advantage and developing something that explains the purpose of your article in a way which entices the user into wanting to read more.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>As you’re only working with a maximum of 160 characters for the description, a few points for developing a meta description that will catch the attention of viewers:<\/p>\n