June 3, 2025 • 37 mins
In this episode, Alora interviews Jesse from Ink Pot Creative to discuss the intricacies of SEO and blogging for wedding photographers. Jesse provides invaluable tips on keyword research, crafting compelling blog content, and leveraging venue-specific posts to attract ideal clients. The conversation also explores common misconceptions about SEO, the balance between visuals and text in blog posts, and the importance of creating long-term, impactful content. Whether you're new to blogging or looking to refine your strategy, this episode offers actionable insights to improve your online presence.
00:00 Introduction and Guest Welcome
00:21 Rapid Fire Questions
01:23 Favorite Business Book and Travel Dreams
03:33 Non-Negotiable Life and Business Rules
05:44 Dealing with Stress and Client Feedback
07:59 The Journey of Ink Pot Creative
12:08 The Power of Blogging for Business
12:45 Common Misconceptions About Blogging
17:35 The Importance of Keywords in Blogging
17:56 Weak vs. Strong Keywords for Photographers
18:33 Choosing the Right Venue for Your Wedding
19:23 Balancing Personal Stories with SEO
20:41 The Importance of Venue-Focused Content
22:20 SEO Strategies for Photographers
23:23 Getting Started with SEO and Blogging
26:30 Effective Blogging Techniques
33:52 Final Tips and Encouragement
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Alora (00:00):
Well, today I have on half of Ink Pot Creative.
It's KP and Jesse.
But I have Jesse on the podcast.
Jesse, welcome.
I'm so excited for you to talkabout all things SEO and
blogging for weddingphotographers.
Jessie (she/her) (00:13):
I am so excited too.
We love talking about this, sothank you so much for having me
on.
Alora (00:17):
Yay.
Okay.
Let's start with some rapid firequestions because I just thought
this would be fun.
I did prepare you ahead of time,so you kind of gotta cheat a
little bit, but we'll see howthis goes.
So what is your drink of choicecurrently right now?
Jessie (she/her) (00:32):
Hands down ice.
Caramel macchiato.
I cannot get out of bed without.
We have two espresso machines.
I'm obsessed with it.
It's all I drink.
Alora (00:41):
Oh, that sounds good.
I think I've had that since likecollege, that's a classic,
right?
Jessie (she/her) (00:47):
Yeah, it was my like, go-to Starbucks order,
and then we were finally like,okay, we're spending too much
money on coffee, so we got somenice espresso machines and just
make our own every morning.
But it's, I love it.
I'm obsessed with them.
Alora (00:58):
Girl, same like when you're spending eight to$10 on
coffee a day, it's like,
Jessie (she/her) (01:02):
it gets expensive.
Alora (01:04):
It racks up really quickly.
Okay, cool.
Yeah.
Mine personally, like at leastaround that time was, was it the
caramel frappuccino?
Do you remember the Frappuccinodays
Jessie (she/her) (01:14):
Yeah, I used to have those all the time.
Alora (01:16):
I mean, maybe people still have them, but I don't
know if it was like as big of adeal as it was back then.
So tell me about maybe yourfavorite business book you've
ever read.
Jessie (she/her) (01:25):
I would have to say unreasonable hospitality.
It gives an interesting lookinto basically if you're in a
service, client experience islike a big part of it.
And so like in a way,everybody's in the hospitality
industry and it's also toldthrough the lens of a New York
restaurant.
So it's not like the businessbook where it's like just
(01:45):
talking about business the wholetime.
So it's a interesting reading.
It gives you a lot to thinkabout, about what the experience
you're actually giving people isand how important that is to
whatever service it is thatyou're actually doing.
Alora (01:56):
I like the perspective of building more of a client first
based in terms of being ofservice versus always trying to
make money
Jessie (she/her) (02:03):
Yeah,
Alora (02:04):
way, when you change the perspective, we're actually here
to help people, not just to makemoney.
Jessie (she/her) (02:08):
Exactly.
Alora (02:10):
So if you could go anywhere, all expense paid,
which like, what a dream, wherewould it be?
Jessie (she/her) (02:17):
I love this.
We're huge into travel, so we'vebeen a lot of places.
One of the places I am dying togo would have to be Japan.
I think first of all, it's alittle expensive to just get
over to Japan, so I think thatwould be great for all expenses
paid, but a hundred percentJapan, Iceland is a close
second.
But I would love to go aroundJapan and eat all the food.
(02:38):
That's all.
I just want to eat all the food.
That's all I want to do.
Alora (02:41):
Oh my gosh.
I love that.
My husband's dream is also to goto Japan, but I wanna go to
Korea, so it's kind of like, canwe just take the ferry from
Japan to Korea?
Do both.
Jessie (she/her) (02:50):
Korea was very close.
We were trying to decide if wecould do one bigger trip this
year, and it was Japan and SouthKorea were two that we were
going back and forth between,but that's definitely high up
there on my list too.
Alora (03:01):
Honestly, I love Korean food, but I like Japanese food
too.
Didn't Ramen kind of come from?
Where'd it come from?
Jessie (she/her) (03:07):
I am pretty I'm 90% sure it's Japanese.
I think everyone now has theirown version of it, but I feel
like you can definitely get goodRamen in Japan.
Alora (03:17):
I'm having a feeling when I would look it up, it's always
Japanese Ramen, like when I seeit, so that makes
Jessie (she/her) (03:22):
Yeah.
Alora (03:23):
Okay.
Well I guess I do like Japanesefood.
What is your non-negotiablelife?
First business rule, somethingyou're not gonna apologize for
that keeps you from hustling,working too much or at all.
Jessie (she/her) (03:36):
So one of the things that I always tell myself
is, if it is not going to affectyour life in five years, don't
let it affect yourself for morethan five minutes.
You can get very bogged down inwhat people say or like clients
coming back with feedback oranything that's going on that I
feel like we get very stressedabout.
So I try to, think about it andif things come up, be like,
(03:57):
okay, is this really gonnaaffect me in the long term?
If not, like I can sit in it fora couple minutes but then move
on and I feel like it helps keepme lower stressed, then I
probably would be.
Because things are alwayschanging.
It's inevitable when you're.
In business and doing your ownthing.
So that's never gonna change.
But my mindset of how I actuallyapproach it can.
And so that's something thatI've always tried to embody as
(04:18):
much as I can.
Sometimes it's easier thanothers, but I always try to.
Alora (04:22):
Yeah, no, it's good to have something to keep you
grounded.
Like, you know, in the chaos.
I kind of like that'cause it'strue, like you can't control
what happens around you, but youcan try to control what you
think about View it.
So is this like your, I canfreak out for five minutes and
then I have to move on?
Is that like your take on.
Jessie (she/her) (04:38):
Yeah.
So I can sit in it and I can belike, okay, I'm a little
stressed.
This is like whatever it is.
Whether it's somethingunexpected that came up or
someone's not happy withsomething, like I can
acknowledge that it's notnecessarily what I wanted to do
today or what I was planning ondoing, or what I want to deal
with and like have my littlemini freak out or my little mini
stress session.
But then.
I think for a long time Icarried that with me for way too
(05:00):
long and it was just like all Ithought about and that is when I
got bogged down and everythingand then I wasn't able to think
clearly or move on or doanything else.
So I think that's my, if Iruminate on it too long, I just
don't get anything done.
And if it's something as smallas, an email or feedback or
something that popped up, oddsare it's not a major life
changing thing or somethingthat's gonna alter the course of
(05:22):
the business.
I don't need to sit here and besuper uber stressed out about
it.
Alora (05:26):
Hmm.
I like that.
And as a mindset, girly, I dohave a question for you about
this.
What would you.
It feel like you would do ifsomething really does stress you
out?
Do you feel like it's like stuckon the hamster wheel and you
feel paralyzed and don't takeaction?
Or do you just complain, youknow, there's like one or the
other you are like,
Jessie (she/her) (05:43):
Yeah, I feel like it is a little bit of both.
Alora (05:48):
mm-hmm.
Jessie (she/her) (05:49):
working with KP and having each other right
here and like in the same space.
It's nice because we can go backand forth and just walk into the
other room and be like, okay,this came up.
I'm stressed out.
Let's talk through it.
Which is like really nice tohave that.
But I think there's also thelike almost second guessing like
everything that you do or likethinking about.
The next time you work withsomeone like second guessing
(06:10):
that same thing that someoneelse said, even though like it
wasn't that big of a deal.
And so I feel like you fall intothe like rumination in that part
of just going over and over.
So I try to not do that.
And I think being able to talkit through and then also I feel
kP and I balance each other outwell, where we're like, okay,
that's not what they meant.
(06:31):
Or they're not it didn't, it'scoming off a little rude because
it's email, but it's notactually that rude and they just
have a question and like we cananswer it and move forward and
everybody's happy, we're good.
Like I feel like there's a lotof little things like that.
Yeah.
This is not like they don't hateus.
I feel like that's always thelike hard thing to be like, does
my client now hate me?
They don't hate us.
So I feel being able to go backand forth and talk to each other
(06:51):
and talk through things has beenreally helpful, and I feel like
that's the big thing.
If I try to internalize thingsand not voice them, then I end
up on that.
It's never going outta my headand I'm constantly thinking
about it.
But the second I'm like, okay,this happened, walk through it,
figure out what the, next stepis and like just move forward
with it.
(07:12):
It like gets me out of that wayfaster.
Alora (07:15):
Yeah, and to validate you for a second, I feel like a lot
of times some emails do soundrude.
I'm like.
Can you put this through ChattyBee really quick?
Because this could have been alittle bit nicer.
Jessie (she/her) (07:28):
Yeah, I know you're not trying to be like I,
I have met you at leastvirtually.
I know you're not trying to bemean, but like sometimes it
probably happens on our end too.
You're busy, you're just likeshooting off an email.
You send it off and then you'relike, Ooh, I could have been a
little bit warmer in that email.
Alora (07:44):
So tell us a little bit about your business.
You guys are graphic designersturn bloggers and SEO
specialists.
And how that eventually got youinto blogging as a marketing
medium.
Jessie (she/her) (07:57):
So originally KP started Ink Pot Creative.
She started it back in 2020.
Ironically, it actually startedas a social media management
agency because I feel likeeveryone started as that.
She very quickly realized thatshe didn't love that.
And she had her degree ingraphic design from college
initially had planned on goingto book publishing'cause she
(08:19):
loved the like layout design andall of that.
And it fell into web design andit's been a great fit because it
is that like same layout designbut more interactive and on a
screen instead of on a book.
So she fell into web design andbranding with that and.
Switched everything more towardsbrand and web design.
(08:40):
Eventually we found that all ofthe people that we loved working
with were photographers and wewere like, okay, this is a sign.
Maybe we should just work goodphotographers.
So we, eventually niched down tophotographers about a year or
two ago.
But when it comes to blogging,this has always been something
that's like kind of an outsidething.
KP actually started a book blogback in 2012 when it was like
(09:02):
journaling and everyone likejust basically talked about it.
So she had that for a long timeand then morphed that into a
travel blog.
And when we were studying abroadin college, we did a ton of
travel and so we morphed it intothat and started building that
up and actually got that prettyhigh up and had a good amount of
viewers and people, coming to itevery single month and looking
(09:25):
at things and being able to putads on it and all of that stuff.
So as we were doing that, wewere like, okay, if this works
for this, like why can't it workfor business?
Like people aren't just lookingfor travel advice and recipes,
like they're asking questionson.
Every single thing that you canimagine.
So maybe this will work forbusiness and we can morph it.
(09:45):
So we started playing aroundwith it on, our own website and
it's been nice that we've hadthese other outside.
Technically we have.
three or four different blogsthat we have on a couple of
different topics.
But it was nice'cause we got toalmost play around and test
things out on our own contentand our own stuff.
And then eventually started withInk Pot and started blogging on
our website.
And then we're like, okay.
(10:06):
We can do this for other peopleand started offering blogging as
a service for our clients.
And it's been really cool to seethat transition into, working
with these mostly photographers.
But we have done blogging for agroup of other people as well.
But seeing how it transitionsand like still able to attract
ideal clients, it's somethingthat.
(10:27):
One is long term.
I know everybody it's hard tonot be on social media, but
social media can be very shortterm and it can feel really
exhausting.
So on the flip side, we haveblogging where like we've
written blog posts for clientsthat have been up for two years
and they're still gettingtraffic and they're still
getting inquiries and like theyhaven't touched it in two years.
And that like long-term stuff isinvaluable, especially when you
(10:50):
are.
So busy doing, like everythingelse it's hard to always show
up.
We know it, we know our clientsare like, it's so like you're
out photographing for, theentire weekend or 10 hour
weddings or whatever it might belike, that's exhausting.
And then you're editing all thephotos and you're having all
these client meetings.
Like sometimes it's just hard tomarket.
So this is something that we arelike, okay, it's much more long
term.
(11:10):
You can attract the people thatyou want to attract instead of
relying on algorithms tohopefully find.
The right people.
'cause sometimes it works andsometimes it goes very wrong.
So this is you're veryspecifically trying to attract
the people that you want toattract and, that kind of drew
us in and gave us a bigger lookinto what, marketing could be
(11:32):
and how it could work.
And then.
It transformed for us intoblogging, became our long form
piece of marketing that we thenused to do like everything else
and repurposing and one blogpost can be used on literally
everything.
So it made even like socialmedia marketing really easy
because we already had contentand we weren't like, constantly
grasping for things.
It was very quick and easy.
Alora (11:53):
Wow, when it comes to blogging, because I know it's
either like people really knowthey want it and need it, or
you're probably trying toconvince people why they need
it.
What do you feel like are commonmisconceptions people have about
blogging as a long-termstrategy, which I believe that
you have to have that set upfirst, at least before you
decide to do other things.
Because how many times hasInstagram been down?
(12:15):
Too many?
Right?
At least you own your blog.
'cause your website, right?
So yeah.
What are common things that youdeal with when people are like,
okay, do I really need this?
Why do I really need this?
And how is this gonna help me inthe long term?
Jessie (she/her) (12:30):
I feel like the two biggest things that we
hear are like SEO is too likecomplicated and difficult to
understand.
And the other thing is that I'mtoo like niched and nobody's
gonna be looking for the type ofcontent that I do, Looking at,
it's too difficult tounderstand.
We totally under, there are somany resources out there that
can make SEO feel reallycomplicated, and the reality of
(12:53):
it is that it isn't.
When you break it down, it'sreally not that overwhelming.
At the core of it, it's likejust figuring out what people
are searching for and like thelanguage that they're using.
I feel like that's sometimeswhere people get caught up
because.
It's very interesting when yougo on like keyword research
tools and stuff.
Even something as simple as, ifwe're looking at web design,
(13:17):
show it versus Squarespace andSquarespace versus show.
It can have very differenttraffic results and like people
actually searching it and it isthe same exact topic that is the
same exact thing.
You're comparing the two things,but you could have, a hundred
people searching one of those amonth and 2000 people searching
the other one.
And so sometimes I think we getcaught up on the actually
(13:39):
finding keywords that we don'tdo that, and then just end up
writing something.
But at that point, you end upwasting your time because you
don't know, like you're justguessing.
You're like throwing somethingat the wall and hoping that it
sticks and you're not reallybeing intentional about it.
And I think that's where thefrustration comes, because
you're like I've put out allthese blog posts and I'm not
seeing anything.
(14:00):
But if you had, switched aroundyour wordings or.
Added this one thing in, you gofrom nobody searching that topic
to everyone searching thattopic.
And that can be thedifferentiator between it.
So I feel like it can be alittle overwhelming to think of
it at first because there is somuch stuff out there.
But I think the biggest thing islike breaking it down.
(14:22):
Really simple to start off with.
Starting with like justkeywords.
Just focus on that and you canbuild everything up after that.
But that's what a lot of ourclients run into Like we have
found that there is nothing.
Basically that we've come acrossthat is too niche.
We had one of our blog clientswas a pet wedding attendant.
Like literally watched your dogat your wedding and there were
(14:45):
blog topics and we increased hertraffic on her website of people
looking for that.
So she was able to book it, likeliterally people will search.
Anything.
And the good thing is like themore niche you can get, the
better it actually works becauseyou're getting very direct
traffic from people who wantexactly what you are looking
(15:07):
for.
And that's what we want.
We don't want, it's the thingwhere you put it on Instagram
and like anybody can find it, itmight show up on anybody's page
or you like post a TikTok andwho knows who's for you Page is
gonna show up on, right?
But when you're posting a veryspecific blog post about.
a topic or an era you're in orwhatever it is, like only people
searching for that specificthing are going to be looking
(15:29):
for it.
So it's the very specific typeof client that you want, which
is the balance of do we want awhole bunch of traffic with some
people who actually want thattopic or less traffic, but it's
more.
In line with what we actuallywant.
So we found that our clients whoget super, super specific have
(15:49):
had great results and book, allof the ideal clients that they
want.
We have one who was in SanFrancisco and they booked out
like half their year beforeJanuary hit just from the blog
post that, people are findingthat are looking for these
specific topics.
So everyone's I'm too niche.
I do something that's sodifferent.
No one's looking for if you'redoing it and you're booking
clients, people are looking forit.
(16:09):
So
Alora (16:09):
Hmm.
Jessie (she/her) (16:10):
lean into that and that's the people that you
wanna try in.
And that's the, questions thatyou want to answer.
Everything like that.
Alora (16:16):
That's insane because to think that two niche actually is
good for SEO and blogging, thattakes, all the pressure off of
feeling like you have toeverybody with every single
post.
And I think that's why peopleget overwhelmed is like, just
pick one.
Jessie (she/her) (16:30):
Yeah.
Alora (16:30):
mean, a pet attendant, I.
in a million years would I haveever searched for that.
But if my friend wanted a petflower dog or something, I
probably would've, I'd be like,someone watch PET for a wedding
And see what comes up.
I mean, that's genius.
Jessie (she/her) (16:46):
Exactly.
Yeah.
The more niche you can get, thebetter because it is, it's that
direct traffic, it's the exactpeople that you want to work
with.
Alora (16:55):
Mm-hmm.
Jessie (she/her) (16:55):
targeting them.
That's all you're doing.
So it's not, other people mightfind it and that's great and
they might connect with it.
But on a more like broad sense,you're connecting with the exact
people that you wanna connectwith and.
That's the point of marketing.
It's like finding the exactpeople that you wanna work with.
So why not actually just leaninto that?
Alora (17:13):
Yeah.
Oh my gosh.
Why is it so simple, but like itmakes so much sense.
Okay, so you were talking aboutkeywords earlier.
Me an example of a weak keywordversus a strong keyword?
Because I hear about keywordsall the time, keywords
everywhere, keyword tools,plugins.
But like, what is an example?
If somebody comes to you being,can you make this blog look and
sound better?
(17:33):
And you're like, well, thiskeyword is terrible what would
that look like?
Jessie (she/her) (17:38):
The biggest thing that we see with
photographers and weddingphotographers specifically is
when it comes to things likewedding features.
We know that photographers loveto like feature weddings and
blog about them and likeabsolutely.
It's amazing.
But the biggest thing that wesee is it'll be like Jack and
Jill's wedding, and that will bewhat they focus on.
(17:59):
That'll be the title, that'll bethe keyword.
And.
That's great, but literally noone knows who Jack and Jill is,
and they could care less abouttheir wedding.
On the other hand, what they docare about is the venue that
they had their wedding at,because that might be a venue
that they're looking at.
If we're out in Las Vegas, somaybe it's Seven Magic
Mountains.
It could be Jack and Jill'swedding at Seven Magic Mountains
(18:21):
or Seven Magic Mountainswedding.
That is something that peopleare gonna be searching for.
You can still talk about thecouple and like their day and
what they did.
A lot of different venues have,different getting ready spaces
or different places that you canchoose for your ceremony.
Different places that you canchoose for your reception.
So talking about what thatcouple did, where they actually
(18:42):
had it.
Anything special about thevenue, other features of the
venue, all of that stuff.
Like you can still focus on thecouple and infuse their
information, talk about theirday.
But making it not specificallyhere's this couple that you know
nothing about, that you don'tcare about.
No one, like they might look atthat post.
Their friends and family mightlook at that post, but it's not
(19:03):
gonna show up on Google in theway that you want it to.
So finding a way to, in anythingthat you're writing.
Finding the kind of broadertopic of what question can I
answer for people?
What question would they wantanswered in this post?
It's gonna be, what does thisvenue look like?
What would my wedding at thisvenue look like?
What spaces could I find, wherecan I go take my engagement
(19:25):
photos in this city?
Like those kind of specificthings or what people are
actually gonna be searching forversus you just showing off the
photos.
So that's like the balance that,that we've seen.
That's been the biggest thingwith photographers of we wanna
show off the photos, we wannatalk about, the experience that
you've had there, because Googleloves, personal experiences and
(19:46):
any anecdotes and any, insiderinformation you can give.
But we also need to acknowledgethat when people are coming to
the blog, they're coming to geta question answered, and we need
to actually answer thatquestion.
Alora (19:58):
Mm.
Shifting the narrative of let memake this post about my couple
versus thinking about, let mehave a nod to the couple what
they did, where the wedding wasat, but also answer any
objections that future coupleswho are looking Blog post, it's
gonna be like, oh, is this thephotographer for me?
Let me show you how your weddingcould kind of look like this.
Jessie (she/her) (20:18):
Yeah.
And there's a lot of stuff thatcan, go into it.
And the biggest thing too iswhen you switch it to things
like, venues are something thatwe found has worked really well
for photographers.
'cause obviously you're alwaysat these venues.
You have venues that you love tobe at that you, would wanna keep
going back to venues that youwant to go to, areas that you
want to be in, anything likethat.
So you are able to show off yourwork, show off your expertise.
(20:40):
Show off how you made anothercouple's wedding, happen there
and how great it looked and allof that stuff.
But you're also getting thepeople who are just googling
that venue as in do I wanna havemy wedding here?
And the reason we say venues arereally great is that's, when
you're looking at weddingphotography and weddings in
general, the couple might hire awedding planner and a venue
(21:01):
before they hire a photographer.
So if we are hitting them at thevenues, odds are nine times
outta 10.
They haven't hired aphotographer yet.
So you're giving theminformation about the venue
that's really helpful to themand it's giving them valuable
things on where they are in theprocess right now.
But you're also being like, I'malso a photographer who has shop
weddings here and can do all ofthis, and here's everything I
(21:23):
can do and here's my work.
So you're answering nextquestion, the next step in the
process.
And that can be super, supervaluable.
So that's why we always, love,when clients are like, Hey, can
we blog about this venue?
Absolutely, it's gonna be great.
We had one client who we bloggedabout a venue like a year ago,
and I now have a lot of weddingshere that can we do some other
ones so I be at venue for entireyear.
(21:44):
Because now so many weddingshere that everything is the
same.
So it works both ways being ableto show off your work obviously
that's what we do.
We show off the work, but alsohitting them before they're
actually at the, I am lookingfor a wedding photographer can
be really valuable.
Alora (21:59):
Yeah.
Oh, this is so good.
I feel like I've heard a lotabout the SEO and it's kind of
like up and coming'cause peopleare getting tired of social
media or.
You know, the algorithm and weInstagram algorithm, like that's
a whole nother episode.
Right.
But I feel like people are like,okay, my eggs were in one
basket.
I built my entire house onInstagram, I also heard that
Facebook is making a comebackwith wedding and queries too,
(22:20):
but like knowing that she'slike, mm-hmm.
I don't know what that's about.
Like I don't even go onFacebook.
Okay.
But.
I've also think that people arestarting to be like, okay, wait
a minute.
Like SEO is such a long-termstrategy and Results from, like
you said, older posts.
People are getting results fromlike year old blog posts, and I
(22:40):
mean, that, that's insane.
Like how one post done right canserve you for the rest of your
business.
Good, right?
You're set.
If somebody wants to get startedright now with like SEO and
blogging, what is it that theyneed to know?
Jessie (she/her) (22:53):
I would say first, first step is keywords.
Find a keyword research toolthat you can use.
We personally love Key Search.
That's the one that we use.
Uber Suggests is also a reallypopular one, and you get like a
couple of free searches a day onthat one.
Key search is a paid one, butit's gonna completely change how
you approach it because you're,it's taking that guesswork out.
(23:14):
You can literally see.
Who is ranking, how many, peopleare searching for it.
So you're not putting outcontent that nobody's actually
looking for.
you put weddings in front ofthe, location instead of after
it.
And that changes everything,like those little things.
But it also gives you insightinto like other things that
people are ranking, like whoelse is ranking for that?
(23:36):
So you're making sure that whatyou're writing about actually
matches what.
People are looking for that.
Like search intent is superimportant because you don't
wanna write a post and be like,actually that's not what people
are searching for when theyactually look for that.
So keywords are definitely a bigthing that we, stress.
It's not worth it to start goingand post all this content
without it.
(23:57):
The other thing that we wouldsay is we run into, a lot of
people are like, I don't knowwhat to write about, which like,
fair, totally valid.
The best place to start is firstlooking at any venues that you
love to work at.
If you've been to a venue thatyou've loved, you wanted to go
there more.
Blog about that venue.
You can also think about ifthere's like your area
specifically doing any sort oflike roundup posts of the best
(24:19):
venues in your area.
You write a little blurb abouteach of them on the kind of
roundup post.
You then have seven individualposts that you can write about
each of those venues.
So that's eight posts rightthere.
That you just came up with in 30seconds of thinking about where
you like to work.
So it doesn't have to be supercomplicated.
The other thing that you canlook at is any questions that
you get asked frequently by yourclients.
(24:41):
If they're asking you thequestions, odds are people are
typing into Google.
So think about anything thatyou're giving them, any
resources that you're givingthem.
All of that stuff can be reallygreat for, starting off and
thinking about those posts andwhat you wanna do.
And then you can go look it upin the.
Keyword research tool, make sureyou're finding the right words
before you actually start towrite it.
So that kind of keyword researchand thinking about your topics
(25:02):
and then just sitting down andwriting.
I know it can feel reallyoverwhelming, but just getting
started, giving yourself maybe agoal of I wanna post two posts a
month and trying to stick tothat.
It doesn't have to be absolutelyperfect, but just getting the
content out there.
And we like to think ofconsistency as a strategy.
It's not necessarily.
(25:24):
You have to post every otherFriday and you have to stick to
that schedule, but just continueto get content out there
whenever you can.
It's gonna help because it'salso more pages that people can
find you through Google and it'salso showing Google that you're
like updating the content,positioning you as the expert,
giving you all that kind of,confidence that people are gonna
(25:44):
wanna see when they're, lookingto hire someone.
Alora (25:47):
What is the bare minimum amount of words or keywords that
they need to have for a blog toeven count?
Because doesn't Google need aminimum before it even thinks
about ranking you.
Jessie (she/her) (25:59):
So you definitely wanna make sure that
you have a little bit of contentin there.
We don't wanna have a post thathas two paragraphs and then like
a bunch of photos.
That's not gonna be great.
Generally, we try to say thatyou should have more words than
photos.
Which I know super, superdifficult for photographers
means not necessarily puttingthe entire gallery on the blog
post.
We can, pick specific photos toshow it off.
(26:21):
If people wanna see more, theycan always reach out to you and
ask to see more.
They can go to your portfolio,they can go to other blog posts,
like it's not the end of theworld, but you wanna try to have
more words than.
Photos.
However, we also wanna make surewe're not just putting in a
bunch of filler content.
Like we want everything to servea purpose in the post.
So there's some posts that youcan get away with, 600 words,
(26:43):
800 words.
There's some posts that, we'vewritten some that have been like
2,500 normally with our blogsand our clients.
We're in the range of a thousandto 1500.
That normally is a good spaceto.
It seems like a lot, but Ipromise once you sit down and
you're like, okay, I have beento this venue before I shot this
wedding here.
I was the person who was here.
(27:03):
I know all the information.
So when you're looking at it andyou're writing it, you're just
thinking back on that day andwriting your experience and like
what you saw and the things thatyou loved or where they were.
So it'll flow out a lot fasterthan you think it will, and
you'll be able to fill it out alot more.
But generally maybe 700 words.
(27:26):
Is it good to try and hit if wecan, get a little higher, but
you wanna make sure that youhave more words than photos and
you're actually answering thequestion that somebody would be
asking.
So if it's a venue feature, youwanna make sure you're actually
talking.
About the venue and like thespaces that are there or what
you can do or what's great aboutit, what you loved, secret spots
that you found, whatever itmight be, so that people are
(27:47):
getting valuable information outof it and not just looking at a
post and being like, I justwasted five minutes reading this
and nothing has changed in mymind.
Alora (27:57):
I have done so many portfolio reviews, website
reviews, and most people useblog posts as a gallery, you
know?
So you're saying don't do that.
Jessie (she/her) (28:06):
Yeah it's a balance.
'cause we definitely want thephotos in there.
Absolutely.
You wanna be able to show itoff.
Especially if you can walkthrough, like if you're talking
about the different spaces inthe venue, have photos of the
spaces that you're talkingabout.
If you're walking through theirday and like where they got
ready and then their first look,and then the ceremony, and the
cocktail and the reception.
Put photos of each of thoseunder the heading.
(28:28):
I think that's the big thingtoo.
We see.
A lot of people will just have achunk of text and then have a
hundred photos in a galleryunderneath.
People aren't necessarily gonnascroll through all of those
photos, so instead picking thebest photos from the day and
putting it inside of the articleso it breaks up the text.
They're not looking at a wall oftext, but then they're also
(28:48):
getting that show and tell.
You're talking about it, andthen you're showing them what it
actually looks like and givingthat, specific visual
indicators.
That is super, super powerful.
But I know it's.
It's definitely somewhere whereyou wanna show off the photos.
You just wanna make sure you'renot overpowering it, where
people either don't actuallyscroll to the bottom to get to
your last CTA or get to otherpages or read out other articles
(29:11):
and you're not putting so muchphotos in between the text that
they're like, is there any morecontent to this blog post?
And like exit out before theyactually make it through the
whole thing.
Oh my gosh.
Okay.
First of all, while you'retalking, I thought of the title
of this episode, like your blogpost as a POV or your blog.
As a POV.
'cause basically you're justtaking them behind the scenes,
Absolutely.
Alora (29:31):
and telling them, okay, I get it now it makes sense.
So you said not too many photos.
What?
Maximum what?
Jessie (she/her) (29:41):
Generally for us, we like to look at it based
on the different headings forthe post.
So first of all, you wanna makesure that you're breaking up
your post, but like differentheadings, because it's gonna be
really great for people who areskimming and want to just pull
out the important information.
So for us, we normally look atevery single heading.
We'll put anywhere from.
(30:02):
Three to six photos in a likelittle gallery.
Most blogs, you can put a littlegallery feature in it.
So we'll put three to six photosin a gallery underneath each
heading, so you get a lot,especially if you have six
headings throughout your entirepost.
You put six there, that's 36photos.
You can show off a lot of thewedding and a lot of the
different aspects of thewedding.
Your favorite things about it in36 photos, and it's not an
(30:25):
overwhelming amount that peopleare gonna be like.
I'm only looking at photos orI'm not getting to, this is the
one specific thing I wanted toknow, and now I feel like I'm
scrolling forever to actuallyget to it.
I would say, in general, 50would probably be the max that
we would say to put on a blogpost which is still on the high
end a little bit, so that's themax that we would want to go.
(30:48):
But having it, broken up byevery heading and putting, a
smaller gallery under everyheading is what we tend to do.
And what we've seen has workedwell.
You can show the variety, butit's not super overwhelming.
And you also have to think of ifpeople are looking on their
phones, because most people aregonna look on their phones.
If you have a hundred photos ina gallery on your phone, the
amount of time it takes peopleto scroll.
(31:09):
Through those a hundred photosis so long.
So we have to think about themobile experience because a lot
of people are gonna be lookingon their phone and so that's why
we also like, breaking up thetext, not having super long
walls of texts, having thephotos in between, but then not
putting so many that they'relike, okay, I've been scrolling
for five seconds and I stillhaven't hit more text.
So maybe this is the end of theblog post.
Alora (31:29):
No, that makes sense.
I honestly thought you weremeaning like maximum 10 and I
usually say 25 because I feellike after that it's just
redundant, you know?
Jessie (she/her) (31:38):
Yeah.
Alora (31:39):
Yeah.
Jessie (she/her) (31:39):
that's the thing too.
It's hard sometimes to pullyourself out and be like, all of
these photos are great and theyall show different things, but
then when you have an outsideperspective, you're like, yes.
But these are all detailedphotos.
And as someone who doesn't knowphotography and understand the
intricacies of it, like theseare both just flat lays so we
can show one and it shows off.
Everything that you can do anddifferent things that you can do
(32:00):
without.
Feeling like we're showing, likepeople are looking at it and
they're like, okay, these areall just a picture of, portraits
of the couple.
In a field, they might lookcompletely like when you look at
it, you're like, these arecompletely different photos.
They show off different things.
We're, doing this, that and theother.
But to someone who doesn't knowthat, they're like, okay, I want
to see more variety.
So having smaller amounts thatwe can show and like being
(32:22):
intentional about what you'reactually, I don't know how that
always happens.
The amount of things that I doon these, I set fireworks off.
I'm doing thumbs up.
I don't,
Alora (32:33):
Sorry, A thumbs up.
Just showed up at her scream andI was like, oh, great.
She's doing
Jessie (she/her) (32:38):
I, it just, it doesn't, it always does it to
me.
But yeah having that variety,being able to show off the
different parts of the day isway more valuable than having
the entire gallery on therebecause again, these people
like.
Random people visiting your blogdon't know who this couple is.
They're not gonna care to seeevery single photo from their
wedding day.
They wanna know that you cancapture all of the different
parts so that when youphotograph theirs, they're
(32:58):
confident that they're gonna getwhat they want to get out of it.
Alora (33:01):
Mm-hmm.
I mean, I feel like you havegiven the people an SEO blog
masterclass, so I was gonna say,what advice do you have?
But I'm just like, you've givenall of the advice so know what
to do, how to do it, when to doit.
So tell us, you know, where, howwe can find you and if you have
any lingering thoughts or advicefor people.
'cause I feel like they shouldalready know, they need to get
(33:22):
on with SEO.
There's no reason not to.
But if they still have like, oh,I just, how do I start?
How can I write a blog because Ihate writing X, Y, Z?
What should they do?
Jessie (she/her) (33:35):
Our biggest thing is just start.
It doesn't have to be perfect.
Alora (33:38):
Mm-hmm.
Jessie (she/her) (33:39):
like one of the things that we posted
recently was like, you're not achef, but you still make dinner
every day.
You don't have to be a writer towrite blog.
It is your content, yourknowledge, your experience.
So just sit down, write it.
It can be in your voice.
You can write it exactly how youtalk, because that's how you're
gonna interact with your couplesanyway.
So it's not gonna be this, bigthing.
(33:59):
It's not high school Englishclass where you have to have the
perfect format and you have tosound super, like no, write how
you talk.
Put it out there.
Eventually it'll be easier andeasier, but don't stress about
all of the little details, giveyourself an hour, set a timer,
sit down for an hour, and justbrain dump and put it all out
there.
We love starting with outlineswhere we can get like the
(34:20):
headings or specific points youwant to talk about.
I know that sounds super highschool of outlining your essay
before you actually started, butdo an outline.
Give yourself the, the headingsthat you wanna do or the
specific points that you want totouch on.
And then when you sit down, justlet it flow and just write.
You can always go back and editanything, but don't get so
caught up on feeling like it hasto be perfect because no one is
(34:42):
going to your blog expecting itto be like the next great
American work of fiction It is ablog, and they know that you are
a photographer.
You are not a writer.
So they're not expecting awriter.
They're expecting to get someknowledge that they didn't have
before.
So don't put too much pressureon yourself.
Just relax and you have all theinformation.
You know what you're talkingabout.
So just put that on the page,and that's all you have to do.
(35:04):
But that's our biggest piece ofadvice.
Just don't put too much stresson your shoulder.
Getting it done is better thanlike feeling like it has to be
quote unquote perfect.
It's never gonna be perfect.
I think everyone has learnedthat, like nothing's ever gonna
be perfect.
So just getting it out there,you'll start to see the benefits
and you'll feel more and moreconfident every single time step
up to actually write a post andput something out.
Alora (35:27):
I love that.
Thank you so much, Jesse, forcoming on the podcast.
This was so, so good.
And I'm gonna put all the linksto work with you in the show
notes Of course.
But how can people find you, andthen how can people also work
with you?
Jessie (she/her) (35:42):
So you can find us at Inpo Creative on
basically every social mediaplatform or inpo creative.com is
our website, and we have a donefor you blogging service that if
you are like, I know I need todo this, but I just don't have
time we have a service calledBack Pocket Blogger.
Where we'll write the two blogposts a month for you.
(36:03):
You'll get feedback on it, butwe will write it, edit it,
upload it, publish it, all ofthe things that you don't want
to do.
So you come to us with a littleidea, we'll write it and get it.
Totally great for you toactually publish on your blog.
So if that's somethinginterested.
That is the, all theinformation's on our website,
but if you have any questions,we're always down to talk about
(36:24):
blogging and geek out about it,so feel free to DM us.
We will 100% answer anythingthat you have questions about.
Alora (36:31):
Yay.
Well we're gonna go hop on yourpodcast now, Jesse and everybody
else.
Thanks for tuning in and I willsee you next week.
Bye.
Well, today I have on half of Ink Pot Creative.
It's KP and Jesse.
But I have Jesse on the podcast.
Jesse, welcome.
I'm so excited for you to talkabout all things SEO and
blogging for weddingphotographers.
Jessie (she/her) (00:13):
I am so excited too.
We love talking about this, sothank you so much for having me
on.
Alora (00:17):
Yay.
Okay.
Let's start with some rapid firequestions because I just thought
this would be fun.
I did prepare you ahead of time,so you kind of gotta cheat a
little bit, but we'll see howthis goes.
So what is your drink of choicecurrently right now?
Jessie (she/her) (00:32):
Hands down ice.
Caramel macchiato.
I cannot get out of bed without.
We have two espresso machines.
I'm obsessed with it.
It's all I drink.
Alora (00:41):
Oh, that sounds good.
I think I've had that since likecollege, that's a classic,
right?
Jessie (she/her) (00:47):
Yeah, it was my like, go-to Starbucks order,
and then we were finally like,okay, we're spending too much
money on coffee, so we got somenice espresso machines and just
make our own every morning.
But it's, I love it.
I'm obsessed with them.
Alora (00:58):
Girl, same like when you're spending eight to$10 on
coffee a day, it's like,
Jessie (she/her) (01:02):
it gets expensive.
Alora (01:04):
It racks up really quickly.
Okay, cool.
Yeah.
Mine personally, like at leastaround that time was, was it the
caramel frappuccino?
Do you remember the Frappuccinodays
Jessie (she/her) (01:14):
Yeah, I used to have those all the time.
Alora (01:16):
I mean, maybe people still have them, but I don't
know if it was like as big of adeal as it was back then.
So tell me about maybe yourfavorite business book you've
ever read.
Jessie (she/her) (01:25):
I would have to say unreasonable hospitality.
It gives an interesting lookinto basically if you're in a
service, client experience islike a big part of it.
And so like in a way,everybody's in the hospitality
industry and it's also toldthrough the lens of a New York
restaurant.
So it's not like the businessbook where it's like just
(01:45):
talking about business the wholetime.
So it's a interesting reading.
It gives you a lot to thinkabout, about what the experience
you're actually giving people isand how important that is to
whatever service it is thatyou're actually doing.
Alora (01:56):
I like the perspective of building more of a client first
based in terms of being ofservice versus always trying to
make money
Jessie (she/her) (02:03):
Yeah,
Alora (02:04):
way, when you change the perspective, we're actually here
to help people, not just to makemoney.
Jessie (she/her) (02:08):
Exactly.
Alora (02:10):
So if you could go anywhere, all expense paid,
which like, what a dream, wherewould it be?
Jessie (she/her) (02:17):
I love this.
We're huge into travel, so we'vebeen a lot of places.
One of the places I am dying togo would have to be Japan.
I think first of all, it's alittle expensive to just get
over to Japan, so I think thatwould be great for all expenses
paid, but a hundred percentJapan, Iceland is a close
second.
But I would love to go aroundJapan and eat all the food.
(02:38):
That's all.
I just want to eat all the food.
That's all I want to do.
Alora (02:41):
Oh my gosh.
I love that.
My husband's dream is also to goto Japan, but I wanna go to
Korea, so it's kind of like, canwe just take the ferry from
Japan to Korea?
Do both.
Jessie (she/her) (02:50):
Korea was very close.
We were trying to decide if wecould do one bigger trip this
year, and it was Japan and SouthKorea were two that we were
going back and forth between,but that's definitely high up
there on my list too.
Alora (03:01):
Honestly, I love Korean food, but I like Japanese food
too.
Didn't Ramen kind of come from?
Where'd it come from?
Jessie (she/her) (03:07):
I am pretty I'm 90% sure it's Japanese.
I think everyone now has theirown version of it, but I feel
like you can definitely get goodRamen in Japan.
Alora (03:17):
I'm having a feeling when I would look it up, it's always
Japanese Ramen, like when I seeit, so that makes
Jessie (she/her) (03:22):
Yeah.
Alora (03:23):
Okay.
Well I guess I do like Japanesefood.
What is your non-negotiablelife?
First business rule, somethingyou're not gonna apologize for
that keeps you from hustling,working too much or at all.
Jessie (she/her) (03:36):
So one of the things that I always tell myself
is, if it is not going to affectyour life in five years, don't
let it affect yourself for morethan five minutes.
You can get very bogged down inwhat people say or like clients
coming back with feedback oranything that's going on that I
feel like we get very stressedabout.
So I try to, think about it andif things come up, be like,
(03:57):
okay, is this really gonnaaffect me in the long term?
If not, like I can sit in it fora couple minutes but then move
on and I feel like it helps keepme lower stressed, then I
probably would be.
Because things are alwayschanging.
It's inevitable when you're.
In business and doing your ownthing.
So that's never gonna change.
But my mindset of how I actuallyapproach it can.
And so that's something thatI've always tried to embody as
(04:18):
much as I can.
Sometimes it's easier thanothers, but I always try to.
Alora (04:22):
Yeah, no, it's good to have something to keep you
grounded.
Like, you know, in the chaos.
I kind of like that'cause it'strue, like you can't control
what happens around you, but youcan try to control what you
think about View it.
So is this like your, I canfreak out for five minutes and
then I have to move on?
Is that like your take on.
Jessie (she/her) (04:38):
Yeah.
So I can sit in it and I can belike, okay, I'm a little
stressed.
This is like whatever it is.
Whether it's somethingunexpected that came up or
someone's not happy withsomething, like I can
acknowledge that it's notnecessarily what I wanted to do
today or what I was planning ondoing, or what I want to deal
with and like have my littlemini freak out or my little mini
stress session.
But then.
I think for a long time Icarried that with me for way too
(05:00):
long and it was just like all Ithought about and that is when I
got bogged down and everythingand then I wasn't able to think
clearly or move on or doanything else.
So I think that's my, if Iruminate on it too long, I just
don't get anything done.
And if it's something as smallas, an email or feedback or
something that popped up, oddsare it's not a major life
changing thing or somethingthat's gonna alter the course of
(05:22):
the business.
I don't need to sit here and besuper uber stressed out about
it.
Alora (05:26):
Hmm.
I like that.
And as a mindset, girly, I dohave a question for you about
this.
What would you.
It feel like you would do ifsomething really does stress you
out?
Do you feel like it's like stuckon the hamster wheel and you
feel paralyzed and don't takeaction?
Or do you just complain, youknow, there's like one or the
other you are like,
Jessie (she/her) (05:43):
Yeah, I feel like it is a little bit of both.
Alora (05:48):
mm-hmm.
Jessie (she/her) (05:49):
working with KP and having each other right
here and like in the same space.
It's nice because we can go backand forth and just walk into the
other room and be like, okay,this came up.
I'm stressed out.
Let's talk through it.
Which is like really nice tohave that.
But I think there's also thelike almost second guessing like
everything that you do or likethinking about.
The next time you work withsomeone like second guessing
(06:10):
that same thing that someoneelse said, even though like it
wasn't that big of a deal.
And so I feel like you fall intothe like rumination in that part
of just going over and over.
So I try to not do that.
And I think being able to talkit through and then also I feel
kP and I balance each other outwell, where we're like, okay,
that's not what they meant.
(06:31):
Or they're not it didn't, it'scoming off a little rude because
it's email, but it's notactually that rude and they just
have a question and like we cananswer it and move forward and
everybody's happy, we're good.
Like I feel like there's a lotof little things like that.
Yeah.
This is not like they don't hateus.
I feel like that's always thelike hard thing to be like, does
my client now hate me?
They don't hate us.
So I feel being able to go backand forth and talk to each other
(06:51):
and talk through things has beenreally helpful, and I feel like
that's the big thing.
If I try to internalize thingsand not voice them, then I end
up on that.
It's never going outta my headand I'm constantly thinking
about it.
But the second I'm like, okay,this happened, walk through it,
figure out what the, next stepis and like just move forward
with it.
(07:12):
It like gets me out of that wayfaster.
Alora (07:15):
Yeah, and to validate you for a second, I feel like a lot
of times some emails do soundrude.
I'm like.
Can you put this through ChattyBee really quick?
Because this could have been alittle bit nicer.
Jessie (she/her) (07:28):
Yeah, I know you're not trying to be like I,
I have met you at leastvirtually.
I know you're not trying to bemean, but like sometimes it
probably happens on our end too.
You're busy, you're just likeshooting off an email.
You send it off and then you'relike, Ooh, I could have been a
little bit warmer in that email.
Alora (07:44):
So tell us a little bit about your business.
You guys are graphic designersturn bloggers and SEO
specialists.
And how that eventually got youinto blogging as a marketing
medium.
Jessie (she/her) (07:57):
So originally KP started Ink Pot Creative.
She started it back in 2020.
Ironically, it actually startedas a social media management
agency because I feel likeeveryone started as that.
She very quickly realized thatshe didn't love that.
And she had her degree ingraphic design from college
initially had planned on goingto book publishing'cause she
(08:19):
loved the like layout design andall of that.
And it fell into web design andit's been a great fit because it
is that like same layout designbut more interactive and on a
screen instead of on a book.
So she fell into web design andbranding with that and.
Switched everything more towardsbrand and web design.
(08:40):
Eventually we found that all ofthe people that we loved working
with were photographers and wewere like, okay, this is a sign.
Maybe we should just work goodphotographers.
So we, eventually niched down tophotographers about a year or
two ago.
But when it comes to blogging,this has always been something
that's like kind of an outsidething.
KP actually started a book blogback in 2012 when it was like
(09:02):
journaling and everyone likejust basically talked about it.
So she had that for a long timeand then morphed that into a
travel blog.
And when we were studying abroadin college, we did a ton of
travel and so we morphed it intothat and started building that
up and actually got that prettyhigh up and had a good amount of
viewers and people, coming to itevery single month and looking
(09:25):
at things and being able to putads on it and all of that stuff.
So as we were doing that, wewere like, okay, if this works
for this, like why can't it workfor business?
Like people aren't just lookingfor travel advice and recipes,
like they're asking questionson.
Every single thing that you canimagine.
So maybe this will work forbusiness and we can morph it.
(09:45):
So we started playing aroundwith it on, our own website and
it's been nice that we've hadthese other outside.
Technically we have.
three or four different blogsthat we have on a couple of
different topics.
But it was nice'cause we got toalmost play around and test
things out on our own contentand our own stuff.
And then eventually started withInk Pot and started blogging on
our website.
And then we're like, okay.
(10:06):
We can do this for other peopleand started offering blogging as
a service for our clients.
And it's been really cool to seethat transition into, working
with these mostly photographers.
But we have done blogging for agroup of other people as well.
But seeing how it transitionsand like still able to attract
ideal clients, it's somethingthat.
(10:27):
One is long term.
I know everybody it's hard tonot be on social media, but
social media can be very shortterm and it can feel really
exhausting.
So on the flip side, we haveblogging where like we've
written blog posts for clientsthat have been up for two years
and they're still gettingtraffic and they're still
getting inquiries and like theyhaven't touched it in two years.
And that like long-term stuff isinvaluable, especially when you
(10:50):
are.
So busy doing, like everythingelse it's hard to always show
up.
We know it, we know our clientsare like, it's so like you're
out photographing for, theentire weekend or 10 hour
weddings or whatever it might belike, that's exhausting.
And then you're editing all thephotos and you're having all
these client meetings.
Like sometimes it's just hard tomarket.
So this is something that we arelike, okay, it's much more long
term.
(11:10):
You can attract the people thatyou want to attract instead of
relying on algorithms tohopefully find.
The right people.
'cause sometimes it works andsometimes it goes very wrong.
So this is you're veryspecifically trying to attract
the people that you want toattract and, that kind of drew
us in and gave us a bigger lookinto what, marketing could be
(11:32):
and how it could work.
And then.
It transformed for us intoblogging, became our long form
piece of marketing that we thenused to do like everything else
and repurposing and one blogpost can be used on literally
everything.
So it made even like socialmedia marketing really easy
because we already had contentand we weren't like, constantly
grasping for things.
It was very quick and easy.
Alora (11:53):
Wow, when it comes to blogging, because I know it's
either like people really knowthey want it and need it, or
you're probably trying toconvince people why they need
it.
What do you feel like are commonmisconceptions people have about
blogging as a long-termstrategy, which I believe that
you have to have that set upfirst, at least before you
decide to do other things.
Because how many times hasInstagram been down?
(12:15):
Too many?
Right?
At least you own your blog.
'cause your website, right?
So yeah.
What are common things that youdeal with when people are like,
okay, do I really need this?
Why do I really need this?
And how is this gonna help me inthe long term?
Jessie (she/her) (12:30):
I feel like the two biggest things that we
hear are like SEO is too likecomplicated and difficult to
understand.
And the other thing is that I'mtoo like niched and nobody's
gonna be looking for the type ofcontent that I do, Looking at,
it's too difficult tounderstand.
We totally under, there are somany resources out there that
can make SEO feel reallycomplicated, and the reality of
(12:53):
it is that it isn't.
When you break it down, it'sreally not that overwhelming.
At the core of it, it's likejust figuring out what people
are searching for and like thelanguage that they're using.
I feel like that's sometimeswhere people get caught up
because.
It's very interesting when yougo on like keyword research
tools and stuff.
Even something as simple as, ifwe're looking at web design,
(13:17):
show it versus Squarespace andSquarespace versus show.
It can have very differenttraffic results and like people
actually searching it and it isthe same exact topic that is the
same exact thing.
You're comparing the two things,but you could have, a hundred
people searching one of those amonth and 2000 people searching
the other one.
And so sometimes I think we getcaught up on the actually
(13:39):
finding keywords that we don'tdo that, and then just end up
writing something.
But at that point, you end upwasting your time because you
don't know, like you're justguessing.
You're like throwing somethingat the wall and hoping that it
sticks and you're not reallybeing intentional about it.
And I think that's where thefrustration comes, because
you're like I've put out allthese blog posts and I'm not
seeing anything.
(14:00):
But if you had, switched aroundyour wordings or.
Added this one thing in, you gofrom nobody searching that topic
to everyone searching thattopic.
And that can be thedifferentiator between it.
So I feel like it can be alittle overwhelming to think of
it at first because there is somuch stuff out there.
But I think the biggest thing islike breaking it down.
(14:22):
Really simple to start off with.
Starting with like justkeywords.
Just focus on that and you canbuild everything up after that.
But that's what a lot of ourclients run into Like we have
found that there is nothing.
Basically that we've come acrossthat is too niche.
We had one of our blog clientswas a pet wedding attendant.
Like literally watched your dogat your wedding and there were
(14:45):
blog topics and we increased hertraffic on her website of people
looking for that.
So she was able to book it, likeliterally people will search.
Anything.
And the good thing is like themore niche you can get, the
better it actually works becauseyou're getting very direct
traffic from people who wantexactly what you are looking
(15:07):
for.
And that's what we want.
We don't want, it's the thingwhere you put it on Instagram
and like anybody can find it, itmight show up on anybody's page
or you like post a TikTok andwho knows who's for you Page is
gonna show up on, right?
But when you're posting a veryspecific blog post about.
a topic or an era you're in orwhatever it is, like only people
searching for that specificthing are going to be looking
(15:29):
for it.
So it's the very specific typeof client that you want, which
is the balance of do we want awhole bunch of traffic with some
people who actually want thattopic or less traffic, but it's
more.
In line with what we actuallywant.
So we found that our clients whoget super, super specific have
(15:49):
had great results and book, allof the ideal clients that they
want.
We have one who was in SanFrancisco and they booked out
like half their year beforeJanuary hit just from the blog
post that, people are findingthat are looking for these
specific topics.
So everyone's I'm too niche.
I do something that's sodifferent.
No one's looking for if you'redoing it and you're booking
clients, people are looking forit.
(16:09):
So
Alora (16:09):
Hmm.
Jessie (she/her) (16:10):
lean into that and that's the people that you
wanna try in.
And that's the, questions thatyou want to answer.
Everything like that.
Alora (16:16):
That's insane because to think that two niche actually is
good for SEO and blogging, thattakes, all the pressure off of
feeling like you have toeverybody with every single
post.
And I think that's why peopleget overwhelmed is like, just
pick one.
Jessie (she/her) (16:30):
Yeah.
Alora (16:30):
mean, a pet attendant, I.
in a million years would I haveever searched for that.
But if my friend wanted a petflower dog or something, I
probably would've, I'd be like,someone watch PET for a wedding
And see what comes up.
I mean, that's genius.
Jessie (she/her) (16:46):
Exactly.
Yeah.
The more niche you can get, thebetter because it is, it's that
direct traffic, it's the exactpeople that you want to work
with.
Alora (16:55):
Mm-hmm.
Jessie (she/her) (16:55):
targeting them.
That's all you're doing.
So it's not, other people mightfind it and that's great and
they might connect with it.
But on a more like broad sense,you're connecting with the exact
people that you wanna connectwith and.
That's the point of marketing.
It's like finding the exactpeople that you wanna work with.
So why not actually just leaninto that?
Alora (17:13):
Yeah.
Oh my gosh.
Why is it so simple, but like itmakes so much sense.
Okay, so you were talking aboutkeywords earlier.
Me an example of a weak keywordversus a strong keyword?
Because I hear about keywordsall the time, keywords
everywhere, keyword tools,plugins.
But like, what is an example?
If somebody comes to you being,can you make this blog look and
sound better?
(17:33):
And you're like, well, thiskeyword is terrible what would
that look like?
Jessie (she/her) (17:38):
The biggest thing that we see with
photographers and weddingphotographers specifically is
when it comes to things likewedding features.
We know that photographers loveto like feature weddings and
blog about them and likeabsolutely.
It's amazing.
But the biggest thing that wesee is it'll be like Jack and
Jill's wedding, and that will bewhat they focus on.
(17:59):
That'll be the title, that'll bethe keyword.
And.
That's great, but literally noone knows who Jack and Jill is,
and they could care less abouttheir wedding.
On the other hand, what they docare about is the venue that
they had their wedding at,because that might be a venue
that they're looking at.
If we're out in Las Vegas, somaybe it's Seven Magic
Mountains.
It could be Jack and Jill'swedding at Seven Magic Mountains
(18:21):
or Seven Magic Mountainswedding.
That is something that peopleare gonna be searching for.
You can still talk about thecouple and like their day and
what they did.
A lot of different venues have,different getting ready spaces
or different places that you canchoose for your ceremony.
Different places that you canchoose for your reception.
So talking about what thatcouple did, where they actually
(18:42):
had it.
Anything special about thevenue, other features of the
venue, all of that stuff.
Like you can still focus on thecouple and infuse their
information, talk about theirday.
But making it not specificallyhere's this couple that you know
nothing about, that you don'tcare about.
No one, like they might look atthat post.
Their friends and family mightlook at that post, but it's not
(19:03):
gonna show up on Google in theway that you want it to.
So finding a way to, in anythingthat you're writing.
Finding the kind of broadertopic of what question can I
answer for people?
What question would they wantanswered in this post?
It's gonna be, what does thisvenue look like?
What would my wedding at thisvenue look like?
What spaces could I find, wherecan I go take my engagement
(19:25):
photos in this city?
Like those kind of specificthings or what people are
actually gonna be searching forversus you just showing off the
photos.
So that's like the balance that,that we've seen.
That's been the biggest thingwith photographers of we wanna
show off the photos, we wannatalk about, the experience that
you've had there, because Googleloves, personal experiences and
(19:46):
any anecdotes and any, insiderinformation you can give.
But we also need to acknowledgethat when people are coming to
the blog, they're coming to geta question answered, and we need
to actually answer thatquestion.
Alora (19:58):
Mm.
Shifting the narrative of let memake this post about my couple
versus thinking about, let mehave a nod to the couple what
they did, where the wedding wasat, but also answer any
objections that future coupleswho are looking Blog post, it's
gonna be like, oh, is this thephotographer for me?
Let me show you how your weddingcould kind of look like this.
Jessie (she/her) (20:18):
Yeah.
And there's a lot of stuff thatcan, go into it.
And the biggest thing too iswhen you switch it to things
like, venues are something thatwe found has worked really well
for photographers.
'cause obviously you're alwaysat these venues.
You have venues that you love tobe at that you, would wanna keep
going back to venues that youwant to go to, areas that you
want to be in, anything likethat.
So you are able to show off yourwork, show off your expertise.
(20:40):
Show off how you made anothercouple's wedding, happen there
and how great it looked and allof that stuff.
But you're also getting thepeople who are just googling
that venue as in do I wanna havemy wedding here?
And the reason we say venues arereally great is that's, when
you're looking at weddingphotography and weddings in
general, the couple might hire awedding planner and a venue
(21:01):
before they hire a photographer.
So if we are hitting them at thevenues, odds are nine times
outta 10.
They haven't hired aphotographer yet.
So you're giving theminformation about the venue
that's really helpful to themand it's giving them valuable
things on where they are in theprocess right now.
But you're also being like, I'malso a photographer who has shop
weddings here and can do all ofthis, and here's everything I
(21:23):
can do and here's my work.
So you're answering nextquestion, the next step in the
process.
And that can be super, supervaluable.
So that's why we always, love,when clients are like, Hey, can
we blog about this venue?
Absolutely, it's gonna be great.
We had one client who we bloggedabout a venue like a year ago,
and I now have a lot of weddingshere that can we do some other
ones so I be at venue for entireyear.
(21:44):
Because now so many weddingshere that everything is the
same.
So it works both ways being ableto show off your work obviously
that's what we do.
We show off the work, but alsohitting them before they're
actually at the, I am lookingfor a wedding photographer can
be really valuable.
Alora (21:59):
Yeah.
Oh, this is so good.
I feel like I've heard a lotabout the SEO and it's kind of
like up and coming'cause peopleare getting tired of social
media or.
You know, the algorithm and weInstagram algorithm, like that's
a whole nother episode.
Right.
But I feel like people are like,okay, my eggs were in one
basket.
I built my entire house onInstagram, I also heard that
Facebook is making a comebackwith wedding and queries too,
(22:20):
but like knowing that she'slike, mm-hmm.
I don't know what that's about.
Like I don't even go onFacebook.
Okay.
But.
I've also think that people arestarting to be like, okay, wait
a minute.
Like SEO is such a long-termstrategy and Results from, like
you said, older posts.
People are getting results fromlike year old blog posts, and I
(22:40):
mean, that, that's insane.
Like how one post done right canserve you for the rest of your
business.
Good, right?
You're set.
If somebody wants to get startedright now with like SEO and
blogging, what is it that theyneed to know?
Jessie (she/her) (22:53):
I would say first, first step is keywords.
Find a keyword research toolthat you can use.
We personally love Key Search.
That's the one that we use.
Uber Suggests is also a reallypopular one, and you get like a
couple of free searches a day onthat one.
Key search is a paid one, butit's gonna completely change how
you approach it because you're,it's taking that guesswork out.
(23:14):
You can literally see.
Who is ranking, how many, peopleare searching for it.
So you're not putting outcontent that nobody's actually
looking for.
you put weddings in front ofthe, location instead of after
it.
And that changes everything,like those little things.
But it also gives you insightinto like other things that
people are ranking, like whoelse is ranking for that?
(23:36):
So you're making sure that whatyou're writing about actually
matches what.
People are looking for that.
Like search intent is superimportant because you don't
wanna write a post and be like,actually that's not what people
are searching for when theyactually look for that.
So keywords are definitely a bigthing that we, stress.
It's not worth it to start goingand post all this content
without it.
(23:57):
The other thing that we wouldsay is we run into, a lot of
people are like, I don't knowwhat to write about, which like,
fair, totally valid.
The best place to start is firstlooking at any venues that you
love to work at.
If you've been to a venue thatyou've loved, you wanted to go
there more.
Blog about that venue.
You can also think about ifthere's like your area
specifically doing any sort oflike roundup posts of the best
(24:19):
venues in your area.
You write a little blurb abouteach of them on the kind of
roundup post.
You then have seven individualposts that you can write about
each of those venues.
So that's eight posts rightthere.
That you just came up with in 30seconds of thinking about where
you like to work.
So it doesn't have to be supercomplicated.
The other thing that you canlook at is any questions that
you get asked frequently by yourclients.
(24:41):
If they're asking you thequestions, odds are people are
typing into Google.
So think about anything thatyou're giving them, any
resources that you're givingthem.
All of that stuff can be reallygreat for, starting off and
thinking about those posts andwhat you wanna do.
And then you can go look it upin the.
Keyword research tool, make sureyou're finding the right words
before you actually start towrite it.
So that kind of keyword researchand thinking about your topics
(25:02):
and then just sitting down andwriting.
I know it can feel reallyoverwhelming, but just getting
started, giving yourself maybe agoal of I wanna post two posts a
month and trying to stick tothat.
It doesn't have to be absolutelyperfect, but just getting the
content out there.
And we like to think ofconsistency as a strategy.
It's not necessarily.
(25:24):
You have to post every otherFriday and you have to stick to
that schedule, but just continueto get content out there
whenever you can.
It's gonna help because it'salso more pages that people can
find you through Google and it'salso showing Google that you're
like updating the content,positioning you as the expert,
giving you all that kind of,confidence that people are gonna
(25:44):
wanna see when they're, lookingto hire someone.
Alora (25:47):
What is the bare minimum amount of words or keywords that
they need to have for a blog toeven count?
Because doesn't Google need aminimum before it even thinks
about ranking you.
Jessie (she/her) (25:59):
So you definitely wanna make sure that
you have a little bit of contentin there.
We don't wanna have a post thathas two paragraphs and then like
a bunch of photos.
That's not gonna be great.
Generally, we try to say thatyou should have more words than
photos.
Which I know super, superdifficult for photographers
means not necessarily puttingthe entire gallery on the blog
post.
We can, pick specific photos toshow it off.
(26:21):
If people wanna see more, theycan always reach out to you and
ask to see more.
They can go to your portfolio,they can go to other blog posts,
like it's not the end of theworld, but you wanna try to have
more words than.
Photos.
However, we also wanna make surewe're not just putting in a
bunch of filler content.
Like we want everything to servea purpose in the post.
So there's some posts that youcan get away with, 600 words,
(26:43):
800 words.
There's some posts that, we'vewritten some that have been like
2,500 normally with our blogsand our clients.
We're in the range of a thousandto 1500.
That normally is a good spaceto.
It seems like a lot, but Ipromise once you sit down and
you're like, okay, I have beento this venue before I shot this
wedding here.
I was the person who was here.
(27:03):
I know all the information.
So when you're looking at it andyou're writing it, you're just
thinking back on that day andwriting your experience and like
what you saw and the things thatyou loved or where they were.
So it'll flow out a lot fasterthan you think it will, and
you'll be able to fill it out alot more.
But generally maybe 700 words.
(27:26):
Is it good to try and hit if wecan, get a little higher, but
you wanna make sure that youhave more words than photos and
you're actually answering thequestion that somebody would be
asking.
So if it's a venue feature, youwanna make sure you're actually
talking.
About the venue and like thespaces that are there or what
you can do or what's great aboutit, what you loved, secret spots
that you found, whatever itmight be, so that people are
(27:47):
getting valuable information outof it and not just looking at a
post and being like, I justwasted five minutes reading this
and nothing has changed in mymind.
Alora (27:57):
I have done so many portfolio reviews, website
reviews, and most people useblog posts as a gallery, you
know?
So you're saying don't do that.
Jessie (she/her) (28:06):
Yeah it's a balance.
'cause we definitely want thephotos in there.
Absolutely.
You wanna be able to show itoff.
Especially if you can walkthrough, like if you're talking
about the different spaces inthe venue, have photos of the
spaces that you're talkingabout.
If you're walking through theirday and like where they got
ready and then their first look,and then the ceremony, and the
cocktail and the reception.
Put photos of each of thoseunder the heading.
(28:28):
I think that's the big thingtoo.
We see.
A lot of people will just have achunk of text and then have a
hundred photos in a galleryunderneath.
People aren't necessarily gonnascroll through all of those
photos, so instead picking thebest photos from the day and
putting it inside of the articleso it breaks up the text.
They're not looking at a wall oftext, but then they're also
(28:48):
getting that show and tell.
You're talking about it, andthen you're showing them what it
actually looks like and givingthat, specific visual
indicators.
That is super, super powerful.
But I know it's.
It's definitely somewhere whereyou wanna show off the photos.
You just wanna make sure you'renot overpowering it, where
people either don't actuallyscroll to the bottom to get to
your last CTA or get to otherpages or read out other articles
(29:11):
and you're not putting so muchphotos in between the text that
they're like, is there any morecontent to this blog post?
And like exit out before theyactually make it through the
whole thing.
Oh my gosh.
Okay.
First of all, while you'retalking, I thought of the title
of this episode, like your blogpost as a POV or your blog.
As a POV.
'cause basically you're justtaking them behind the scenes,
Absolutely.
Alora (29:31):
and telling them, okay, I get it now it makes sense.
So you said not too many photos.
What?
Maximum what?
Jessie (she/her) (29:41):
Generally for us, we like to look at it based
on the different headings forthe post.
So first of all, you wanna makesure that you're breaking up
your post, but like differentheadings, because it's gonna be
really great for people who areskimming and want to just pull
out the important information.
So for us, we normally look atevery single heading.
We'll put anywhere from.
(30:02):
Three to six photos in a likelittle gallery.
Most blogs, you can put a littlegallery feature in it.
So we'll put three to six photosin a gallery underneath each
heading, so you get a lot,especially if you have six
headings throughout your entirepost.
You put six there, that's 36photos.
You can show off a lot of thewedding and a lot of the
different aspects of thewedding.
Your favorite things about it in36 photos, and it's not an
(30:25):
overwhelming amount that peopleare gonna be like.
I'm only looking at photos orI'm not getting to, this is the
one specific thing I wanted toknow, and now I feel like I'm
scrolling forever to actuallyget to it.
I would say, in general, 50would probably be the max that
we would say to put on a blogpost which is still on the high
end a little bit, so that's themax that we would want to go.
(30:48):
But having it, broken up byevery heading and putting, a
smaller gallery under everyheading is what we tend to do.
And what we've seen has workedwell.
You can show the variety, butit's not super overwhelming.
And you also have to think of ifpeople are looking on their
phones, because most people aregonna look on their phones.
If you have a hundred photos ina gallery on your phone, the
amount of time it takes peopleto scroll.
(31:09):
Through those a hundred photosis so long.
So we have to think about themobile experience because a lot
of people are gonna be lookingon their phone and so that's why
we also like, breaking up thetext, not having super long
walls of texts, having thephotos in between, but then not
putting so many that they'relike, okay, I've been scrolling
for five seconds and I stillhaven't hit more text.
So maybe this is the end of theblog post.
Alora (31:29):
No, that makes sense.
I honestly thought you weremeaning like maximum 10 and I
usually say 25 because I feellike after that it's just
redundant, you know?
Jessie (she/her) (31:38):
Yeah.
Alora (31:39):
Yeah.
Jessie (she/her) (31:39):
that's the thing too.
It's hard sometimes to pullyourself out and be like, all of
these photos are great and theyall show different things, but
then when you have an outsideperspective, you're like, yes.
But these are all detailedphotos.
And as someone who doesn't knowphotography and understand the
intricacies of it, like theseare both just flat lays so we
can show one and it shows off.
Everything that you can do anddifferent things that you can do
(32:00):
without.
Feeling like we're showing, likepeople are looking at it and
they're like, okay, these areall just a picture of, portraits
of the couple.
In a field, they might lookcompletely like when you look at
it, you're like, these arecompletely different photos.
They show off different things.
We're, doing this, that and theother.
But to someone who doesn't knowthat, they're like, okay, I want
to see more variety.
So having smaller amounts thatwe can show and like being
(32:22):
intentional about what you'reactually, I don't know how that
always happens.
The amount of things that I doon these, I set fireworks off.
I'm doing thumbs up.
I don't,
Alora (32:33):
Sorry, A thumbs up.
Just showed up at her scream andI was like, oh, great.
She's doing
Jessie (she/her) (32:38):
I, it just, it doesn't, it always does it to
me.
But yeah having that variety,being able to show off the
different parts of the day isway more valuable than having
the entire gallery on therebecause again, these people
like.
Random people visiting your blogdon't know who this couple is.
They're not gonna care to seeevery single photo from their
wedding day.
They wanna know that you cancapture all of the different
parts so that when youphotograph theirs, they're
(32:58):
confident that they're gonna getwhat they want to get out of it.
Alora (33:01):
Mm-hmm.
I mean, I feel like you havegiven the people an SEO blog
masterclass, so I was gonna say,what advice do you have?
But I'm just like, you've givenall of the advice so know what
to do, how to do it, when to doit.
So tell us, you know, where, howwe can find you and if you have
any lingering thoughts or advicefor people.
'cause I feel like they shouldalready know, they need to get
(33:22):
on with SEO.
There's no reason not to.
But if they still have like, oh,I just, how do I start?
How can I write a blog because Ihate writing X, Y, Z?
What should they do?
Jessie (she/her) (33:35):
Our biggest thing is just start.
It doesn't have to be perfect.
Alora (33:38):
Mm-hmm.
Jessie (she/her) (33:39):
like one of the things that we posted
recently was like, you're not achef, but you still make dinner
every day.
You don't have to be a writer towrite blog.
It is your content, yourknowledge, your experience.
So just sit down, write it.
It can be in your voice.
You can write it exactly how youtalk, because that's how you're
gonna interact with your couplesanyway.
So it's not gonna be this, bigthing.
(33:59):
It's not high school Englishclass where you have to have the
perfect format and you have tosound super, like no, write how
you talk.
Put it out there.
Eventually it'll be easier andeasier, but don't stress about
all of the little details, giveyourself an hour, set a timer,
sit down for an hour, and justbrain dump and put it all out
there.
We love starting with outlineswhere we can get like the
(34:20):
headings or specific points youwant to talk about.
I know that sounds super highschool of outlining your essay
before you actually started, butdo an outline.
Give yourself the, the headingsthat you wanna do or the
specific points that you want totouch on.
And then when you sit down, justlet it flow and just write.
You can always go back and editanything, but don't get so
caught up on feeling like it hasto be perfect because no one is
(34:42):
going to your blog expecting itto be like the next great
American work of fiction It is ablog, and they know that you are
a photographer.
You are not a writer.
So they're not expecting awriter.
They're expecting to get someknowledge that they didn't have
before.
So don't put too much pressureon yourself.
Just relax and you have all theinformation.
You know what you're talkingabout.
So just put that on the page,and that's all you have to do.
(35:04):
But that's our biggest piece ofadvice.
Just don't put too much stresson your shoulder.
Getting it done is better thanlike feeling like it has to be
quote unquote perfect.
It's never gonna be perfect.
I think everyone has learnedthat, like nothing's ever gonna
be perfect.
So just getting it out there,you'll start to see the benefits
and you'll feel more and moreconfident every single time step
up to actually write a post andput something out.
Alora (35:27):
I love that.
Thank you so much, Jesse, forcoming on the podcast.
This was so, so good.
And I'm gonna put all the linksto work with you in the show
notes Of course.
But how can people find you, andthen how can people also work
with you?
Jessie (she/her) (35:42):
So you can find us at Inpo Creative on
basically every social mediaplatform or inpo creative.com is
our website, and we have a donefor you blogging service that if
you are like, I know I need todo this, but I just don't have
time we have a service calledBack Pocket Blogger.
Where we'll write the two blogposts a month for you.
(36:03):
You'll get feedback on it, butwe will write it, edit it,
upload it, publish it, all ofthe things that you don't want
to do.
So you come to us with a littleidea, we'll write it and get it.
Totally great for you toactually publish on your blog.
So if that's somethinginterested.
That is the, all theinformation's on our website,
but if you have any questions,we're always down to talk about
(36:24):
blogging and geek out about it,so feel free to DM us.
We will 100% answer anythingthat you have questions about.
Alora (36:31):
Yay.
Well we're gonna go hop on yourpodcast now, Jesse and everybody
else.
Thanks for tuning in and I willsee you next week.
Bye.
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