Dolly DeLong: Hi, welcome back to another episode of the systems and workflow magic podcast. I am your systems workflow and launching BFF guide, Dolly DeLong. I am so excited to have you all here again, um, that you hit play that you are wanting to learn more, just a little bit more advanced tips and tricks all about systems and workflows to apply to the back end of your business. And it is my absolute honor, um, To have you here. And it’s also an honor to have a repeat guest on the podcast. I have Christy Hunter on the podcast. I’m going to let her do a little introduction, but you all, she is going to bring some great S E O that search engine optimization tips and strategies for you to apply to the backend of your business. So I want you to listen to this episode and take notes and apply these tips. So Christy, I’m going to let you do a little introduction.
Christy Hunter: Sure. Thanks, Dolly. I’m glad to be back on the podcast. It’s always fun to chit chat with you and to get to nerd out about SEO. I feel like for us creatives, there’s usually two camps of people. There’s people that are very familiar with SEO and maybe, or maybe not have taken action on it. And then there’s people that just have no idea that you can actually control how you show up on Google. So glad to be here to be able to chat about it.
Dolly DeLong: I’m glad you’re here and, I would love for you to set the stage for this conversation and explain to people, one, why you’re so passionate about SEO, just in case people are brand new to the podcast, cause you have a really I think a really great, I like a testimony is like such a strong word, but it’s true. Like you have a strong story as to the power of SEO and how it’s helped your business and how it’s impacted the way you teach others. So do you mind sharing a little bit about your story and what got you started with SEO?
Christy Hunter: Of course. so I am a military spouse. My husband is about to retire from the army after 25 and a half years of service. And when I met him, um, back in Tennessee, I had just started my photography business. It hadn’t been up and running for too long. Then he and I got together, you know, dated all those good things, got married. And then he took me away from Tennessee and I had to relocate, which meant that I had to start my business over again. And we were moving to Arizona where we had no friends, no family, no connections of any kind. And so I knew that Google was going to be very important in helping me get established. and so at that time I sold my home and I invested. Over 10, 000 into a custom rebrand, a new website, all of those sorts of things to really amplify that sort of, display of my business online. And I was told at the time that SEO would be taking care of for me. And I didn’t really know what SEO was. I just knew SEO equals Google. And that was about it. uh, I get to, Arizona. We’re settling in. We have no house, no nothing yet. We’re living in a hotel and I’m just like, okay, my website’s launched. I’m so excited. And I go to Google and I look for my business for the keyword that I wanted to show up for, which was Tucson wedding photographer. And I just kept scrolling and scrolling. And I was Invisible. I could not find myself at all. and I just remember sitting there thinking I was at like one of those little desks inside of the hotel, you know, surrounded by boxes and suitcases. I was like, How does SEO even work? Like, I don’t, there’s gotta be something to it. And that’s when I realized that this big new website that I had paid for didn’t really have any SEO done to it at all. and so, other than being frustrated and upset that that was the case, I just said, well, okay, this is what I need. I’ve got to get this thing going. And so I just. I just became obsessed and very, very focused on that while I was living in a hotel with nothing else to do. and I started implementing and my business just completely transformed. I had relocated right before COVID, so there was a little bit of a lull when I first moved anyway. But within about the first six months of me implementing SEO, I was on page one for Tucson Wedding Photographer. And by the time things started picking up after the pandemic, my business tripled in comparison to what I was doing before I had relocated.
Dolly DeLong: Wow. That’s just, like a testimony to like you’re like, okay, this didn’t go the way I am pictured and you still went ahead and you’re like,how can I fix this? How, how can I make this better? Instead of you like, kind of giving up or attacking that, I don’t know, sending angry emails to that past designer or whoever, like, that does feel like a gut punch, like. 000. that’s a big investment. I just am very impressed that you continue to merge ahead and you didn’t play like the victim. Cause a lot of people do that.
Christy Hunter: I, and it was very tempting at that point, but I think another driving factor was the fact that where I lived, I was in very, very Southern Arizona and there was no wedding industry to speak of in the little town that I lived. I had to work in Tucson, which was an hour and a half away at minimum from where I lived. And so I was just like the idea of going in person and networking and doing all of those things. The time commitment to be able to do that was just overwhelming. And I was like, well, it’s now or never, like this is, this has just got to happen. and so it was, it was really fun. I enjoyed it after I finished being upset and angry and going through my contract and saying, what did they say they were going to do? And then of course I realized there was no real outline of what they. The SEO was supposed to be and I was like, well, I can’t do anything about it. So time to learn it on my own but it was just it was a fun challenge. I enjoyed trying to figure out the puzzle of making all of these things come together and then when I started to see the results it just It started to just become addictive and like, okay, well, how much more can I move up? What else can I do? What other strategy can I implement? and it was really fun when it came time for me to leave Arizona. That’s when I started to transition into doing SEO professionally. I had a friend come up to me that said, okay. Now that you’re leaving, you’re not my competition. Can you show me how to do this thing? and that’s, that’s kind of how it kicked off. We spent over seven hours, uh, in her home one day and I was just showing her all sorts of things and I still had more to say. And I was like, well, there’s a lot more to this and there’s a lot more people that need my help. And I’m just so glad that I’m now able to help other people and hopefully prevent them from going through those lulls. And to prevent them from just being, I don’t want to say taken advantage of, but being unaware. If you just don’t know what you don’t know, it’s hard to put that trust that someone else is going to do the right thing and take care of it for you. If you literally have no idea what you’re looking for.
Dolly DeLong: Yeah. Yeah. I love that. Well, thank you so much again for sharing that story. I know you’ve shared it before on the podcast, but in the event I have new listeners, new audiences. So I wanted you to do like, The quick introduction to you. so listeners, you all know we are doing lead up, I guess, to the family photographer advanced blueprint summit, it’s coming up in March. And I am really excited about this summit because it is a free photography based summit. It’s not teaching editing. It’s not teaching posing. It’s not teaching the basics of running a family photography business. This is for more advanced family photographers who are established in their businesses. They have their editing style down. They have their posing down. They know who they’re talking to. Now they need help with more advanced systems, workflows, SOPs. They want to like grow their business on the back end. And because let’s be honest, I know a lot of family photographers, I make fun of the word art, but like really we call it art. Their art, their posing style, everything is so nailed in. It’s so gorgeous. It’s so beautiful. But then on the back end is a mess. there’s no system. It’s just like, it’s like throwing spaghetti at the wall sometimes. And I’ve seen it in person and it’s just very, it’s messy. So I was like, I want to help family photographers merge their family photography business with systems and workflows and let them know, like, it is possible to like merge these two together. And so, Christy has sent me. So graciously agreed to be the resident expert for SEO. And so she’s going to be diving deeper into more advanced SEO strategies for family photographers. Um, but today we’re going to do kind of like a little appetizer to her teaching style. And when she sent me this, I was like, Christie, this is amazing. We had to condense it even more. Cause I was like, we’re going to end up talking like three hours if we talked about all this. but so if you are A service based business center. This will still apply to you, but we’re, we’re just going to be using family photography as an example. So I don’t want you to tune us out quite yet. You can still apply this to your business. So Christy’s going to be talking about the purpose of a great service page and how it plays in with your SEO. So now that I’ve set this up, everyone Christy, why is a well crafted service page so important for family photographers?
Christy Hunter: Well, like you said, we’re going to be giving a lot of family photography examples, but this applies to any business owner that has a website. Your website is meant to sell your services for you. It’s meant to really make sure that those people that are interested in working with you, that they get the information that they’re looking for and know that I have got to book Dolly. This is, this is the person that is right for me. She has provided me all of the information that I would be expecting to get on the front end. And now I’m ready to inquire a really well crafted service page is going to make your potential clients that are reaching out to you much more confident in booking you in general. and it tends to lead to better qualified leads. Assuming that you’re providing the right information up front. So the likelihood of being ghosted, all of those things tend to drop because they’re just more well informed and they’re not having to reach out to you, uncertain of, you know, whether or not you’re the right fit for them.
Dolly DeLong: I’m going to just play devil’s advocate here, even though I’m being cheeky as I watch a lot of bluey, by the way, I’m a mom, everyone. So bluey says cheeky a lot. So therefore my son says cheeky a lot. And now I say cheeky a lot. So I’m going to put, be a little cheeky and say, well, what does SEO have anything to do with a well crafted service page? Like how does those two go hand in hand?
Christy Hunter: There’s a lot that I can unpack there, but, uh, in, in terms of the, in terms of the podcast, trying to keep this short and sweet. Ultimately, Google likes to see that you are providing helpful content to its users, and it likes to see that people are spending time on your website. If you have a detailed service page that’s giving them lots of information that they need ahead of time, not going into the weeds with a lot of stuff, but giving them a general idea of the information they need, they’re spending more time on your site. They’re scrolling around, they’re clicking through to other pages. Whereas if you just say, These are the services I offer. Reach out to book today. That’s a, that’s a two second scroll on your site. That’s not someone actually spending time there. And Google can see how long people are spending on your site. So the more engaged you can have people when they’re there, the more likely you are to perform better in Google search and in your SEO, strategy.
Dolly DeLong: Awesome. So let’s talk about these elements then, because I know that there are so many elements, as we were crafting out this episode, we had, I don’t even know how many elements, but there was a lot of elements to a services page. so Christy like narrowed down to six elements that you as a business owner should definitely have. But just note, these are not. All of them. This is just like the juicy ones that she recommends for SEO. So, and these are not in any particular order either. This is just like what notes we were taking, but,let’s start with pricing and information because I feel like when I’m a lot of people are searching for a family photographer, a lot of them are looking for the price and information. And I am in the camp of. I do not show all of my prices on my website. I just put starting at, and then when they inquire and they contact me, they get my full pricing guide. But what are your thoughts on pricing and information?
Christy Hunter: kind of with you in that same sort of camp. Now I will say instead of, it depends on the, on the service that we’re talking about. So for example, for family photographers, if you have a starting price, More than likely, your starting price isn’t going to be, probably, unless you’re doing lots of prints and products, it’s not going to be thousands of dollars more to do the higher end version of what you offer. Whereas for weddings, I mean, you could be talking about a 2, 000 package and a 10, 000 package. You can have a very substantial price difference. So I’m definitely in the market of making sure that you’re not gatekeeping this information altogether. I like the idea of putting on that average pricing as opposed to excessive amounts of details. and that’s for a couple of different reasons, but I guess if I, if I were to really try and narrow this down, when it comes to pricing, if you completely negate it from your website, if you do not have it on there whatsoever, People are going to either get annoyed that it’s not there and feel like, well, they can’t even provide me a rough estimate. So I don’t want to reach out or they may start to have that self doubt of. Look at that work. It’s beautiful. There’s no way I can afford that photographer and they will just disqualify themselves as opposed to reaching out to you at all. and another option that you or another situation you may run into as the business owner is maybe you get lots of inquiries and 80 percent of them are nowhere close to the price point that you are and they’re just not a good fit. If you’re able to at least provide some sort of average pricing, starting pricing, They can feel confident about inquiring and they can self qualify themselves and make the back end of running your business a lot more efficient.
Dolly DeLong: I love that so much. So, I don’t know if this is something that you teach on, but I have divided up my different services or like packages on different pages. I’m sure, I think we’re gonna probably talk about this. I’m probably jumping ahead, but if they want a very specific Let’s say they, they want to know only about newborn photography, not about family photography, not about maternity photography, but newborn. I have that hyperlinked on my services page, and then they can go specifically to Nashville newborn photography, and they will get the specific price for that starting at price. So there’s no confusion. Is that good as I’m like, always like trying. I, I’m always trying to apply SEO to my business. And I’m like, I’ve heard that we should keep the services separate for SEO purposes.
Christy Hunter: So you hit the nail right on the head. that is exactly what you should be doing.
Dolly DeLong: Great. You guys, I get a gold star from Christy.
Christy Hunter: It is it is not just for the convenience of not confusing the person coming to your website But it is very very much so based in SEO strategy and that is Spoiler alert. That is exactly what I’m talking about. during our training for the, uh, family photography summit that you’re putting on. so the problem that a lot of people run into is that they put everything on one page or they’re using combination keywords. Google doesn’t understand those things. and so we’re going to be really digging into the strategy of, keyword research and implementing that into the overall structure of your website and being strategic with the way that you’re outlining your information. Because if you’re putting everything of, you know, here’s my newborn maternity and family packages, and this is my process, but my process might be different for this one versus this one. And, you know, the pricing, there’s very different price points and you’re trying to put all of that on one page. Not only is the user going to be extremely confused, but then Google can’t understand what in the world you’re trying to actually rank for in the
Dolly DeLong: Yeah. Yeah. That’s so confusing. Okay. Well, good. That was a good little lead into like, Hey, this is what I’m talking about. Summit. So, okay. So going back to like the element, so you recommend having some sort of pricing and information structure on the elements of your services page, what would be another element you recommend? Hmm.
Christy Hunter: So I think this is sort of a given when it comes to photographers, but we want to make sure that we are showing some of your recent work or what you consider like a curated portfolio. The best of the best images that you have to share. and that’s where some of this plays into part into a service page. You are going to be separating this out for newborns and separating this out for maternity and families. We want to make sure that you are speaking directly to that, that client that you’re trying to book through those images that you’re showing. so making sure that you are curating down not only the best of the best work, but also the specialty that you’re focusing on. but obviously we, we should be using photos throughout our website, but I want to make sure that it’s not just a couple of scattered images. Have a sliding gallery, have something that’s got, you know, 10 to 20 images that are really going to blow them away when they scroll through and they just can’t help but continue to scroll. I’m usually a proponent of the sliding gallery versus like a tiled gallery, simply because a tiled gallery is going to take up significantly more space on the page. And eventually if people are just scrolling, they’re just going to start scrolling much faster and not pay as close of attention.
Dolly DeLong: gotcha. And can I hit up on more like SEO technicalities about share your recent work, last year I had shared with you and like the listeners that I had separated my photography website from my education. Cause it was all under one roof and it was confusing everyone. Like families were coming to my website. They’re like. We don’t need launching education. We just want family photos. And then my clients would come over. They’re like, is she taking pictures of us like while we launch, like I’m so confused. So I finally bit the bullet, separated both and I’m seeing the fruits of Better SEO results for both. But now I’m kind of going back and I’m like, this is why a lot of people don’t want to work on the SEO because it takes a long time. it’s lots of technical tasks that you’d have to repeat. so right now when I’m working on is optimizing images by making sure that there’s like, Condensed, they’re web optimized, they are alt text, and that the loading time doesn’t take Over two or three seconds. Like they load fast. Cause I know that has to do with SEO. Like your SEO score will be reflective. So I just wanted to remind photographers while you are uploading your recent work, don’t forget to optimize those images. Don’t forget to make them web optimized. Don’t forget to alt text them. And don’t forget to also make sure that you do some sort of speed test for the mobile side and also the desktop side.
Christy Hunter: Yeah, that’s exactly right. People are very impatient nowadays, and we we have a very high expectation of how website should operate. And if your website is slow to load because you’re using straight out of camera high resolution images, you’re not resizing them, it’s going to get really frustrating very fast. And conveniently, I’ve got a blog post on my website all about image optimization. So if people have no idea how to properly write out an image file name or what in the world alt text is, they can There is a blog post there on my site and it walks you through several examples towards the bottom of the post of what an image title versus an alt text setting would look like. They’re very similar, but written in very different ways.
Dolly DeLong: I love that. You all know, I will put this in the show notes. Don’t worry.
Dolly DeLong: So going on with another element, is there, um, I know we’re going to be talking about, Oh, this is the one that I’m really excited about you hitting on differentiating factors to help you stand out from your competitors. Because let me tell you, Christie, I don’t know if you felt this, but I feel it, I feel like everybody is a photographer, everybody. So like, how can we. Make ourselves stand out on the services page. When my neighbor is not literally my neighbor is not a photographer, but in this example, let’s say my neighbor is a photographer, so, and we both have cameras and we both are family photographers. So like, how can I differentiate myself on my services page?
Christy Hunter: mean, there are lots of things that you can talk about. It just doesn’t necessarily come natural for some people to discuss these things because I feel like it’s, there’s, there’s a whole, whole lot of unpacking there when it comes to self development and personal growth. But if you are not one of those people, if you’re, if you’re more introverted, like I am, you’re going to have some self doubt and there’s going to come a point where you’re going to say, People don’t care. They don’t want to hear what makes me different from someone else because I’m not any different than anyone else. And so it’s, some of that requires some, some personal overcoming, but every photographer is different in their own way. I am, I have a lot of self deprecating humor when I work with people. I make fun of myself. I love making people laugh. and I’m, I’m very nerdy. And so that. comes into what I do and it comes into how I interact with people. if you are someone who is It is extremely proper. just very straightforward. Please. And thank you. Yes, sir. No, ma’am. kind of thing. You and I might not work extremely well together. I don’t want to say I’m going to offend anyone, but the, the relationship is going to be different. And when it comes to photography, especially family photographers, the stress, the added stress of having children in pictures, trying to get them to cooperate. The level of personality that you have is extremely important in the overall images that you produce for your clients. So if you’re able to talk about why you have a personal connection to family photography, why it matters to you. Why you take the approach that you do when you photograph families, maybe you are, maybe you’d much rather follow them on a hike and take some very natural photos, or maybe you’re the person who has a studio and you really enjoy those kind of more posed in control images. All of that matters to the end result that someone’s going to get when they book with you. And as much as we like to think that the images that we show on our website convey those things, doesn’t hurt to just talk about it. so that people can say, Oh yeah, like Christy’s going to be making me crack up all day. That’s going to be so much fun. where someone else could read a statement about, you know, how I interact with people and say, Oh, that seems like it’s just going to be a lot. Like, I just want to get this over with in and out in two seconds. I don’t care about, you know, giggling. It’s fine. Uh, we want to make sure, exactly. We want to make sure that we are trying to speak. and then we’re going to speak to the clients that we really connect with as much as possible. So they know a little bit more about what to expect. It’s not just the final image. It’s all of that lead up and the experience of working with us that creates that final product.
Dolly DeLong: I love that so much. And then can I also speak to the fact, Of the importance of knowing your brand voice. I actually just got off of another podcast interview with McKenna Delaney. You all probably, I don’t know, like I’m in podcast batching mode, everyone, you all know, I love batching. So I just ironically got off of a great podcast call with McKenna Delaney, and she spoke about the power of having a brand voice guide and how that helps you differentiate yourself from the oversaturated feeling of, why would other people choose me to be their family photographer when the same person kind of does the same service? And so, you can convey your values and who you are and who you like to serve. Through your copy and so that is another like cogwheel with your SEO and it’s all working together. I call it a well oiled machine, but you’ve got to put the work in. You’ve got to put the work in! Another element I should lead into this. Another element that you want to share is guides and resources for your specific target client showing your expertise. So I know what this means, but for listeners like, well, wouldn’t my guide and resource be my photos?what, what do you mean by that for your services page?
Christy Hunter: And again, this is very subject to what sort of service we’re working on. But if we’re talking about family photography, There is a lot that goes into preparing someone for a session, for example, and you’re going to have maybe different tips, tricks, things that you like to do prior to a session that might be different from another photographer. If you’re able to provide even just potential clients who haven’t decided to inquire with you, if you’re able to pass on some of that education and confidence and making sure that they feel They, they know when they book with you, you can make this happen for them. You can repeat these images that they’re falling in love with on their website with their own family, no matter how crazy and chaotic they feel like their family is. And all of that comes from experience, but. It’s hard to convey that experience if you’re just talking about a couple paragraphs of copy on your website. If you’re able to then take them to blog post content, walking them through, here’s how you, you know, pick out some outfits. Here’s how you color coordinate everyone working together without just doing. White t shirts and blue jeans, you know, here’s how we can choose a location that works best for the size of family, maybe depending on the age of the children, like some, some locations may be harder for young ones to be able to walk. So it might not be a good fit for them to be able to provide that education. Not only is going to make them more confident in themselves and knowing that they’re going to be happy with the photos, but confident in you as the photographer, knowing that you have got their back every step of the way.
Dolly DeLong: I love that. Another thing I was just thinking that about is. When you link those resources, those blogs as resources, that also helps with, internal linking, is that the right word, or ba ba like, I don’t know if I’m saying the right term, but linking within your website. And it’s also keeping them on your website longer to read your blog, which Google sees. The robots, they see you all. I’m probably mispronouncing that. pronouncing everything with Google, but Google sees that if they’re engaged on your website, which really helps the SEO juices. I can’t believe I just said SEO juices. I hate the word juice. So
Christy Hunter: No, but you’re, you’re completely right. I mean, it helps people stay on your website longer. They’re more engaged. They’re spending more time. Maybe they even bookmark a post. They come back to your website later. and not only does internal linking allow people to stay on your website longer, but it also allows Google to more easily discover the content on your website. Because we can’t link. Every single piece of blog content from our main navigation, right? That that would be ginormous and ridiculous and not helpful whatsoever. But if we can internally link to those really helpful pieces of content that we’ve created throughout our website, Google can then follow those links and say, Oh, look, there’s a family photographer. Oh, and then on this page, they’re linking to a blog post about choosing the best locations in their town. Let’s go follow this link and read that new content. as opposed to you not linking to it from anywhere, that’s something referred to as orphaned, orphaned content. I know it sounds really dramatic. It sounds, sounds sad, right? but essentially that’s when you have created this piece of content. That Google could not really discover on its own because it has, it has no companion. It has no friend that you are linking internally throughout.
Dolly DeLong: Listener, why would you do that? Don’t create orphans. Orphan content. Oh, man. Okay, well, I just learned something new. That’s really good to know. Another thing I thought in like, offering guides and resources. This is a really great opportunity for you to also grow your email list. And you all know how much I love talking about email list growth. Um, so you can also, if you have a guide for families, especially like the biggest thing that I can think of how family photographers grow out their email list is how a session portrait guide, like what to wear for different seasons. Um, so if you have a freebie. That aligns with your services that would serve your audience. Like would answer that question. Why not insert, Hey, grab this link. And this also grows your email list. And then your nurture sequence on the backend is nurturing them. And it’s reminding them again, to check out your website, to go back and check out. So that would be. My argument for also putting in, inserting your email list growth for guides and resources. I’m kind of going to jump ahead to another element for testimonials or client success stories. Cause this is juicier than the last point. So, element, cause like the last element, you all will hear it and be like, Oh yes, this is obvious. Or, Oh, I didn’t know.so, but I really wanted Chris. It’s a great opportunity for you to just unpack why people should share, like why you consider a key element being testimonials or client success stories, why best on their services page?
Christy Hunter: Well, I mean, I think anyone who does any sort of online shopping whatsoever has seen the importance of reading reviews, right? We are very well informed now. Most people don’t just make very quick decisions without doing their due diligence beforehand, especially the higher the price point you are. It’s more of an investment for some people. They want to make sure they’re doing everything they can to protect their investment. And so if we’re able to show them that other people have taken the time, taken time to leave us a review, to rave about working with us, rave about their photos, whatever it is that they want to touch on, That adds so much trust to you as the photographer. And not to mention, if they can then see the faces of the people that are leaving those reviews, that ups that trustworthy factor. So, what I really encourage people to do, you can use testimonials all throughout your website. Your homepage, your service page, your contact page, wherever. You can even have them just as maybe a little one liner blurb with the name of the person who left the review. That’s totally fine. But make sure you also have sections of testimonials that show the people who’ve left the review and not just, you know, a little mobile phone selfie of them, but the final product that you delivered to that person, um, because we can say that we’re trustworthy. We can say that we have X number of years experience and we’ve serviced this many people. And we’ve established a price range of, you know, a certain dollar amount. But until people read those reviews and see that you’ve actually worked with people that were happy with the end result of what you provided, there’s just going to be a certain level of doubt lingering in their minds. So if we can get rid of that by letting other people brag about what we do, the better off you’ll be.
Dolly DeLong: I love that. And I actually highly recommend listeners to dig in further and see how you can use your client testimonials in other ways to like attract people. So like, I had Taylor Cusick Coleman on the podcast and she gave this great quote that us as photographers, or even us as business owners, we sit on this data and we don’t do a lot with it. And it’s. It’s client testimonials and, she gave this, like, I’m literally going to do this. it’s on my to do list this month or next month, but taking all of the reviews I’ve received so far in my family photography business and aggregating it into chat GPT for me to see. What are the main, talking points or how are people describing me? Because I can describe myself one way, but what are they saying? And then taking that copy and Inserting it into my copy on my website, because that’s another really cool. Like if your clients, ideal clients are, start seeing the words that other ideal clients are using about you, there could also be a connection point. So aggregating that data, like really doing more than just putting it in one place, make sure you have a plan to put a system down for how you’re going to use it in different areas of your website and marketing.
Christy Hunter: It’s a wonderful way to do like voice of customer research where you don’t, they’ve already taken the time to leave a review. You don’t need to send them a separate email or a Google form to fill out some sort of questionnaire. Just start looking at the words that they’ve chosen to type into their review and look for those, those recurring themes.
Dolly DeLong: Yeah. Oh, okay. I know you have so many other elements, but since we’re already almost at 40 minutes and I don’t want to like take over all of your day, Christy, do you mind sharing one more element with the listener of what you highly recommend they put on their services page and listener, I will say this, this may seem obvious, but it’s also something that, you know, Other people have dropped the ball on not just family photographers, but other service based business owners have dropped the ball on and it’s this I’ll let, I’ll let Christy share.
Christy Hunter: Yeah, I told Dolly, uh, before we started recording today that I feel like this is obvious, but at the same time when, if I don’t take the time to say it, there’s going to be people that are missing this. and this is going to be putting a call to action to contact you. At the end of your service page, you can even have multiple calls to action to contact you throughout your service page, depending on how long your page becomes. and that’s because the whole point of this service page is to get them excited and ready to book and eager to reach out. If you don’t provide them an easy way to do that, they might just be like, Oh, Well, I’ll go find her contact page here, you know, in just a minute. I’m going to, you know, close this tab. I’ll come back to it later.
Dolly DeLong: can close that loop and just say, Hey, if you’re ready to go ahead and move forward right now, go ahead and reach out to me via my contact page. and you can just provide a little button that takes them right to where they go.
Christy Hunter: Now there is another option. You could. Create like a little mini contact form on your, on your page as well. that’s, that’s another option. You can craft mini contact forms specific to each service that you’re reaching out. Then they don’t even have to go to a new page. It’s right there. The only caveat I will add to that is if you are someone who is very dependent on extremely well oiled systems and workflows. if you’re one of those podcast listeners for Dolly, you should all be in that mindset. If you are someone who, who uses a CRM and you use a CRM contact form to collect your inquiries, that ultimately is, I don’t want to say it’s, it’s slowing down your website, but it can, it’s putting a sort of tax on the speed of your website because it’s having to pull data from one platform to an, into another platform. And so my recommendation is, is if you use a CRM. Then just use that contact form on your dedicated contact page. And at the end of your service page, just take them to your contact page. What I wouldn’t encourage people to do is if they use a CRM contact form on their website, to then implant it on multiple pages of their site. Especially for a page that may already be getting longer.
Dolly DeLong: And I’ve noticed this too, like, business owners who are like, Oh, we are creating a system with like HoneyBook or Dubsado, I’ll use Dubsado cause I love Dubsado, so I’ve been on the backend of Dubsado and there’s like this is a exaggerated number, like 10, 000 forms that can essentially just be. One form, and then on the, they can self select on that one form, and then that could take them on the specific journey. And so that’s what I’ve done for myself, like, anytime somebody lands on, let’s say, a maternity session page, They click contact me and it takes them to my one contact page and then they can fill out my contact form, self select maternity, and then it will take them to the appropriate client journey. But yeah, it gets really messy and scattered on the back end of your CRM when you have like. Thousands of forms. And then you forget, Oh, which form is connected to which page. It’s just confusing for you. So just simplify, keep things simple for yourself and just like do one main contact form, and then you can like create like. Their own customer journey from their self selection. Awesome. Well, Christy, I’m so excited that, you came and shared these key elements. I know that you shared a little bit about what you’re going to be talking about at the, family photographer, advanced blueprint summit, but can you share maybe with the listener, if they’re listening and they’re like, Oh my gosh, I have to have Christie Hunter in my life right now. How can they work with you? Find you, contact you, connect with you. I know that you have a wait list of people who need like you all. Christie is the real deal when it comes to SEO. So if you really want to hone in on SEO for your business, please contact her. Um, She’s as smart as a whip and, and I think you’re fun to talk with. I love that humor you have. Um, so, cause I’m very much the same way. I do a lot of self deprecating humor too. so I, I would love for you to share with my listeners how they can find you. You
Christy Hunter: Hopefully I don’t disappoint in the humor department whenever I, whenever I talk with people. but my obviously the best place to find my information is on my website. I have a very detailed service page that outlines all of the different things that I offer, that then have their own dedicated pages so that you can really start to get into the nitty gritty on what might be best for you. But I offer A DIY option where you can go through the SEO basics course and learn what SEO actually is and how to implement it yourself. Every module has tutorials that you can follow along with, so that you can not only learn the education, but then implement it yourself. So that’s a great option if someone just wants to kind of go at their own pace, but then if you’re that type of person that says, Listen, I need a little bit more one on one help here. I’ve tried to do this before in the past. I just got overwhelmed. I’m not sure if I’m doing things right. There are one on one options available for me to go through your website and do some audits. I do discovery calls before every single client that I end up working with, simply because I want to make sure that I’m giving you the right recommendation, because depending on, you know, How old your website is, how long it’s been around, the type of content that you’ve created, you might have certain priorities, as opposed to others. So I want to make sure that I’m giving you the best recommendation, possible, but like Dolly said, I am, I’m currently booked out through the end of May. As of this recording, I am very used to, from the, from the wedding photography part of my business, being Booking my calendar out in advanced and blocking time off. So I’m not opposed to doing that with people. And initially I told Dolly, I thought it was going to be an issue where I was going to have people that were worried about that delay of starting. And what ends up happening is people are going through this mentorship program with me and they’re diving into the education. They’re coming with questions. They’re starting to get excited and confident about SEO. Then we dig into the one on one work of me going physically into their website and unpacking all of these things. and they come to it and get so much more out of it, as opposed to just feeling like I want to outsource and I want to pay someone to do it. And I don’t want to look at it again. You’re not going to see SEO success. If you feel All you can do is outsource. You’re never going to learn those foundations. You’ll be in, in Dolly’s shoes where you’re separating your website or trying to make these big changes. And if you don’t understand what you’re doing, you’re just going to feel that much more lost and overwhelmed.
Dolly DeLong: Wow. Well, everyone, you all know this. You all know the drill. I will be sure to put all of, how to contact Christy in the show notes. Um, did you share your Instagram handle? are you on Instagram?
Christy Hunter: So I do, I have Instagram. I am not as active on there as I probably should have simply because I focus primarily On my website and contact people that way. Right. Like, That, that’s what I focus on. If you contact me on Instagram, uh, fair warning, you will probably get a voice memo from me. it’s just so much easier for me to speak to people and talk about things, and get that personality across through my voice memos. So you can absolutely DM me. You will probably get a voice memo back.
Dolly DeLong: I love it. Um, can you share your handle too?
Christy Hunter: Yeah. So it’s just at SEO coaching for creatives. My website as well as SEO coaching for creatives. com. and then I’ve got for anyone who accesses the course or does the mentorship program with me, that includes the education. I have a private Facebook group. Only for core students so that not only can you get the education, but then you can have that connection with other people that are in your shoes, but also have a way for me to continue to support you as you’re going through your SEO journey.
Dolly DeLong: Oh, I’m so excited. You all know, I will put all the links mentioned in the show notes. I really, whenever I invite, Like experts on the show, like Christy, I want, I do this listeners because I want you to be connected with an expert who’s going to help you out with one aspect of a system to help you create a better SOP workflow system, marketing plan for your business. So please take advantage of like getting connected with the, all of these amazing guests. So anyways, I will talk to you all next week with a brand new systems and workflow magic podcast. You all know this until then say streamlined and magical. You amazing muggle you, and I will talk to you all next week. Bye.
