How much do you know about SEO??

<p>I'm kicking around an idea in my head. How much do you know about SEO? Is your website ranked where you want it to be?<br>

I've had my source code and text stolen several times from new area photographers, I'm sure it's because I place very high on most of my keywords and they want a bit of the action.;) I'm beginning to wonder if I should just help them all with it.<br>

I can't decide. I know quite a bit about the subject, but I know I don't know everything. And the information is out there if you look for it. I just don't know how it would all play out if I train every other joe shmoe who decides they want to be a photographer how to get their websites right on top.<br>

What would you do? I'm tired of people stealing my stuff. Can't we all just get along??? :)</p>

<p>What was your question again?</p>

<p>If you don't want your stuff stolen, then don't put it online..there is no way around it...</p>

<p>them stealing ur text won't do them any good if their work sucks. if u want to start charging people to do their seo, i guess there is no harm there, it's just another source of income ( just not sure how many uncle bob would pay for that ).</p>

<p>as for placing high on the list, i think only 1 of our brides found us from a web search..so i'm not sure if seo helps photographers as much.. i'm sure there are some that swears by them, but i still believe that word of mouth is the most effective way in the wedding photography business.</p>

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<p>As far as I'm concerned, many of the newcomers know more about websites than they do about photography and weddings......suggest you let them pay their dues. BTW, IMO offering the training doesn't necessarily translate to anyone taking advantage of it or appreciating the value behind your efforts.</p>

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<p>as for placing high on the list, i think only 1 of our brides found us from a web search..so i'm not sure if seo helps photographers as much</p>

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<p>This is a backwards way to look at it. If you are successful with a web site and SEO, you get more customers from it, not less. You don't even have your web link here and this site ranks very high in Google. Just putting a web site on your profile here (and your location in your name) is doing SEO that works.</p>

<p>Interestingly enough, I've been asked regularly to help people with choosing a wedding photographer and it is always based on what they found on the web, and what the web sites look like and what they say. SEO really does work, the problem with it is that really good SEO is a lot more work than what you read about on the web. It involves site structure and URL breakdown, not something most people pay attention to.</p>

<p>"If you are <a href="../wedding-photography-forum/00W5rz" target="_blank">successful</a> with a web site and SEO, you get more customers from it"<br /> Jeff, I think it's more accurate to say that you would get more hits, not customers from proper SEO. And definitely more inquiries from a well- done site. But I'm not sure if either of these alone translates into more bookings. There's a lot more to booking a wedding than a fancy site and good SEO.</p>

<p>I guess I should have been clearer.. What I meant was that from all the customers we get, we only get 1 that found us via random web search, not enough to warrant me to take a look at seo. we get our bulk from word of mouth and that is enough for us.</p>

 

<p >Ha Ha, senor I like your "link-pun". I fell for it and I opened it. I will look more carefully next time, before clicking . . .</p>

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<p >I think if one has a website predominately driving the Marketing and Advertising for a Wedding Photography Business, then it should be updated, optimized and worked hard, with peripheral Blogs and Twitters at the least and a management strategy to accommodate issues such as those Nestle have found on some Social Comment forums. . . or for example, to address the issues such as factually wrong information and / or poor commentary being unleashed, with a link, in Specialist Forums which are widely read by Potential Customers and / or Competition and Associated Industries. </p>

<p > </p>

<p >I make the point that the Power of Loading stuff on the on the WWW is a two way street and that Website Risk Minimization, is (here) a growing Industry for Medium to Large businesses. </p>

<p > </p>

<p >Moderate cost Website Risk Minimization analysis and vetting is within the grasp of a $100,000 T/O business, which is basically a good Weekend Wedding Shooter. </p>

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<p >I think it is an entirely different question (and business decision) to consider driving a Wedding Photography Business without any High Web Presence. </p>

<p > </p>

<p >I think it is a third (and another different question) as to which is the most profitable method in NET terms, after considering: All Costs and also all potential Liabilities or Losses.</p>

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WW</p>

<p>I should have known better than to post something like this in here...<br>

Thanks for your comment David. :)</p>

<p>Colleen, I believe that meta tag keywords do not play a role in SEO these days as they are ingnored. They used to, but no longer. I am not an expert, but the fact that your site ranks highly is not down to your keywords alone. For one, the amount on non-reciprocal inbound links is very important.</p>

<p>How do you get your website to the top? Does anyone have an article about it? I know nothing about SEO :(</p>

<p>Missy, have you tried doing a search here at P-net, it comes up pretty frequently. There is also a relatively new forum just for website creation here at P-net. You could also try to just google SEO.</p>

<p>Email me if you want some help Missy. It's a bunch of seemingly little things that all work together.</p>

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<p>we only get 1 that found us via random web search, not enough to warrant me to take a look at seo</p>

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<p>That's the point. You haven't done anything to attract people with the web. That's why nobody found you. You do SEO to fix that problem. Where's your web site, that might give some more insight?</p>

 

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<p>I think it's more accurate to say that you would get more hits, not customers from proper SEO</p>

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<p>While that's true, it's what's called "lead generation." There is usually some sort of relationship between leads and customers, assuming you have a good web site and a good product in the right market. </p>

<p>Hi Colleen,<br>

It is nice you bring out SEO topic, I'm a new comer on web site therefore SEO was new to me until I did some research on youtube SEO. I always believe my work need to be shown in Richmond and Vancouver BC before the potential knows I do exist and I do my art work as a unique style. I work on my SEO whenever I can and again so much to learn, what work and won't is a trial errors. If people think SEO is not important either they already have their business well establish and for the new business need to market their work SEO is the only way. <br>

Thanks</p>

<p><strong>Moderator Note:</strong> Images not connected to the thread, but merely serve as signatures for the person posting are against guidelines on photo.net. Sorry...</p>

<p>SOE is not as simple as copying the source code, and thinking it works, most new website creators think meta keywords are the sum of high rankings, I wish it was that easy! Google has a very complex algorithm and to rank highly you have quite a bit to think about, below are 3 sites that will help you.<br>

This is Google related as Google dominates the South African search, so it is what a concentrate on, but i bet if you apply what you read you will increase your rankings <br>

<a href="http://www.seomoz.org/">http://www.seomoz.org/</a><br>

<a href="http://www.seomoz.org/"></a> <a href="http://www.seochat.com/">http://www.seochat.com/</a><br>

<a href="http://www.googlerankings.com/ultimate_seo_tool.php">http://www.googlerankings.com/ultimate_seo_tool.php</a></p>

<p>I've been trying forever to get myself higher on the Google listings for "chicago wedding photographer". No luck. But for some strange reason I come up 2nd on the list if you google "boudoir photography chicago", which my wife doesn't really care for. Goes to show it's somewhat random. Missy, from what I remember, you're in New York, which I can only imagine is about 10 times more saturated. There are companies that will help you fix up your site and promise to improve your google rankings, but they can be costly and the results vary.</p>

<p>The biggest thing that will make your site rank higher is external references. To get external references you need content on your site that is information based. And you need a whole bunch of references from satisfied clients who are prepared to be named and have their photos in a gallery on your Web Site. If you can get mutual links from related vendors that is going to help, so talk to the hotels, caterers, car hire and other associated vendors and see what you can do. Best of luck. Jim</p>

<p>Short answer for you all:<br>

Google ranks your site via content that matches a searchers request (there are many variables here).<br>

That content is essentially keywords and phrases, ideally the keywords you target need to make up 10 to 15 % of your sites content excluding flash and graphics. (google ignores flash and graphics)<br>

Then the keyword in your URL is a huge plus, "wedding photographer" is a well searched phrase so you having the domain wedding-photographer.com and that phrase in 10 t0 15% of your content will automatically rank you high.<br>

Next is Back links, but they need to be quality links, in other words the sites you link to also need to target the same keywords, and it needs to be a 2 way link. Avoid link farms, best way is to manually look for quality links and link to those sites.<br>

Just a hint a group of photographers could register a domain with the keywords you want to target in the domain name, then every one links to that site, and the new site links back to them. The target keywords need to exist on all the sites as well.<br>

to test the sites linking to you in your web browser type:<br>

link:www.yoursite.com, this will show you who links to you </p>

<p>There is tons more to it, all listed in the 3 sites i posted</p>