Website Optimization & Metadata

"The point is", the knowledgeable stock photographers at the Photometadata.org tour, told us last night at an APA/LA-sponsored event, "you set up a beautiful website and no one comes." (kinda like this blog so far... have to tell more people about it!).

What draws others to your site or blog is essential now in this not-so-new-anymore millennium. The point is - and we now have the means - to "attract INBOUND traffic," a great complement, if not becoming the substitute for, "outbound traffic," i.e., traditional marketing via our material sent to others who may not have requested it via email, postcard, calls. How we do that is through keywording of images and/or pages (for those not photographers who still want to attract others to their site) and SEO (Search Engine Optimization).

There are many tools, some of them overwhelming at first and some not so. Many can be found, even for non-photographers at photometadata.org or via the SEO COOKBOOK, provided for free by Photoshelter at http://pa.photoshelter.com/mkt/seo-kit-for-photographers.

Something I should have known but that surprised me: Keywording, although valuable for many other reasons, is NOT picked up by Google and other search engines. Think about what you say in your text on your website for that is what Google sees.