Last week while attending Sports Shooter Academy in Irvine, CA, I rented a car and occasionally I would caddy other students to and from the events that we shot. During one of those drives I ended up with three college students in my Jeep and the conversation migrated to talking about online marketing, something that I have done for 12 years now.
From 1999 to 2009 I was lucky to be the Internet Strategist/Director for a $5.5 billion company in Baltimore. To put that in perspective, when I started there, these kids in my car were around 10 years old? Needless to say, I had over a decade of watching the Internet evolve and watched the rise in use of search engines and then social marketing. Even today, I still strive to keep up with these ever changing online marketing landscapes as well as who is where in social.
Today, I remembered the conversation in the car where I said to the students "make sure your digital footprint is everywhere". A few of them were silent and it made me kind of think about what I meant and that is why I am writing this blog post.
Digital Footprint?
OK, I will admit, I just made that up. What it means in a nutshell, get your photos, your products, whatever, out there and everywhere. It means start and maintain a blog. Start and maintain a photo/blog or gallery. It means start a Facebook page for your photos and brand. It means start a Google + page. It means start Tweeting. It means create relevant content for search engines. See where I am going now? There is no limit to your options other than time and priorities.
Search and Be Found
I will date myself a bit but back in 2001 I attended one of the first ever Search Engine Strategies conference in Boston, MA. I learned so much at the time and became the self anointed "search czar" at our company. I will never forget the meeting (in the fishbowl) I called with our marketing leadership across the company, when I presented my own version of Danny Sullivan's presentation. It seemed to me at that time that they all had a new spark in their eyes, something fun and cool to work on. Afterall, they all had just started using Google and it was only three then. I worked for years to show return on search spend and when I left in 2009, the company was spending millions per year on search initiatives. I guess all the hard work paid off.
Even today, I continue to watch how search has evolved. I don't track conversions and rankings like I used to but I still keep it in mind with everything I do. Every page on my site has a reason. Every photo page on my site is "link bait". A great example came two weeks ago when I got a call out of the blue from a WVU football online web site that was looking for a photographer to cover the WVU-MD game. When the negotiations were over I asked him how he found me and his answer was simple, Google.
My advice, do some research, Google "Search Engine Optimization" and start trying it out. You would be surprised how many little things you can do on your own. Think about what words people would use to find the services you have or want to offer. Put a page out there with those words in the page title, make it relevant and see how it goes. Search algorithms are based off of relevance (at the simplest level), hence why I do not ever appear in Google for "Maryland Wedding Photographer".
Social
During our car ride I would have thought that my college friends would have been able to school me a bit on social media but that was not the case. I think that colleges these days still have not figured out how to incorporate social media curriculums into their marketing programs. One, because they are still so new. Two because they change so fast and three, because some are still teaching the marketing that they learned when they were in college, 10 or more years ago.
So that means that these kids graduate from college and have to learn how to take the social mediums they have been playing in for the last few years and turn them into a valid marketing arm of their business. I am going to touch a little bit on each of the following:
- Blog or Photo Blog
- Web Site
- Google +
- Photo Contests
Blog/Photo Blog
I have to admit, keeping up with a blog is tough and the return on investment (time) is hard to prove. However, it is a no brainer that it helps to improve your digital footprint. Keep in mind this blog you are reading as well as all of the others that I have written will end up in Google's index of pages. So maybe when a brand like Wilson is looking for a "professional tennis photographer" to freelance for them and they find my blog post about it, they will see my background with shooting tennis and contact me. Are you starting to see where I am going?
A blog is a great way to connect a human element to your brand. People like to connect with people. A good friend and photographer Patrick Smith does just that. He blogs about what he is doing, some on topic, some off topic. He includes photos as well and I must say he is an amazing photojournalist. Your photos are your resume, show them off everywhere and anywhere.
Facebook
In the short time Facebook has been around, I have seen so much change. From a marketing perspective it has opportunities for every brand, no matter what some marketing execs may say. As I write this post today, Facebook Pages are the best home for a photographer's brand. Create a page, promote it with friends, promote it with customers, promote it with potential customers, or promote it with photos. Use it to promote your web site, your blog and your photography skills.
Twitter
This is the hardest one for me to keep up with and they simplest to do, go figure? After all, you can only post 140 characters. Create a Twitter page for your brand, Tweet about your web site, what you are shooting this weekend, what you like, what photos you just posted on your photo gallery. You can use a great application like Tweet Deck and post to many of these mediums at one time.
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| A Screen Capture of my Web Site |
Do I really need to tell you to do this? You really need to start with this before you do all of these other distractions. You don't need to know HTML and can have something live in less than an hour. Think of your site like the "mother ship". Everything you do has to come back to it. After all, your web lead form and phone number is there! I would recommend using something with attractive, pre-built templates that you can customize. I know this may anger many of my nerdy friends that code and makes sites in their sleep but I pay $14 for hosting, site management and email and it just works. I would highly recommend companies like Photo Biz or Live Books to start.
LinkedIn
Another one I admit I may be behind the eight ball with but what a great place to park your brand, again, for free. Get out there, create a page and make sure everyone knows what you do. Connect with college friends, connect with peers in the industry, just connect.
Google +
Some of you may not even know what Plus is and I am still watching to see where it is going. I was the same way when Twitter came out and when I realized how great it was, I was probably a year behind the curve. Google+ for business has not been released yet and they say it will be by the end of the year. Start a profile and link it to your name/brand and see what happens. Remember, all of this Google stuff all comes back to the Google index and that is where you ultimately need to be.
Photo Contests
I regrettably have never entered in a sports photo contest. I need to and maybe I am afraid of failure but what better way to get your name out there than to be in the top three of the Sports Shooter monthly clip contest? Take a look around, find some free and some paid sites that do monthly contests and enter them. Just like the lottery, you can't win if you don't play.
In Conclusion
The digital footprint....I hope this makes more sense now? There is no right or wrong but until you give this a shot and try a few of these that I have mentioned, you will never know and I can promise you it will help an aspiring sports photographer to get noticed. Good luck.
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