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“Show Notes”
Want to get more photography clients through the door? This week, we’re talking about how to turn Google Maps and Google Business into powerful tools for getting more leads and growing your business growth. Learn how to improve your local marketing and get found by the right people, all without spending a penny.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
- Why the name you’ve chosen for your photography business could be holding you back and what you can do about it to get more leads.
The one thing you must do to get to the top of Google Maps and why reviews are absolutely vital for your marketing.
How to craft your Google Business profile to get more clients, and why you should be posting on it regularly.
“Show Transcription”
Marcus: Well, hello there. It’s Marcus and you’re listening to Shoot to the Top. Sam, how are you doing?
Sam: Very good, Marcus. Excellent. Yes, you?
Marcus: I’m really well, thank you. Very well indeed. And yeah, looking forward to another marketing tip from yourself today, Sam. I believe you could be talking about Google, my business, is that correct?
Sam: Yeah, Google Business, Google Maps, whatever you want to call it. Google My Business, they changed the name a little while ago. So yeah, it’s all the same thing really. So I think people get confused with the term. So Google Maps is the map function where people search on a map for stuff. So the reason it’s really great photography is because photographers need local business. So yeah, if I want my haircut and I’m in a new place, I’ll go to Google Maps, I’ll type in hairdresser and bang, they all come up and the same will be for photographer or no else. So that is maps. And the way maps gets information about businesses is a system called Google Business. It’s a free system and you can just register and then your business gets fed into maps and you also get, you know, when you do a search Marcus and then sometimes on the right hand side, if you’re on a desktop, like a little bit of extra information comes up, you get that too. It’s kind of a small part of the package. But so yeah, I kind of probably use Google Business and maps interchangeably. But I think what’s important for photographers really is maps, because yeah, most photographers, some photographers work all around the country and then it’s not relevant. But for most photographers, most of the clients they use and want are local to them. And that is what maps is useful for. One of the important things when you think about Google services is what does Google doing it for? What’s it want out of it? And what’s Google saying is right, you’re a person stood on a street, you want a service, you look on Google Maps, and it finds you the nearest and best one. So you’ve got to kind of think of it from that point of view. What’s it delivering to the user? So yeah, so for most photographers, it is amazingly, amazingly useful. It can get you lots and lots of local business if you do it right. So the first thing is get on it. It’s totally free. Just search for Google business, enter your business.
And then we’re gonna talk a little bit about what you want to put in there and how you want to add the information and so on. Okay.
Marcus: Yeah, so I use Google Maps, Sam. I think you are. I think it’s a really good one. Now we have covered this before, haven’t we? A little bit. So you can sort of touch on it.
Sam: Yeah, so we’re just gonna talk about maps now to get found on maps, because it is just such, if you get this nailed and every time people search photography in your area, you come up, you’re just gonna get the and they just keep coming. So, you know, it’s worth spending the time and getting it right. So it just delivers brilliant return. So it’s definitely worth doing.
Marcus: As you said, it’s as you said, Sam, it’s free.
Sam: Yeah, it’s free. That’s it. Now, there’s a few things to think about when you first set up. And I think one of the most important is your location. So for 99% of photographers, I would say their location is the house. A few have a studio, but not many most their location is your house. Now weather value is the best location for you on Google Maps depends on where you live. If you live in the middle of an urban area like Marcus who’s in Bristol, and there’s a lot of accommodate a lot of businesses and houses around him, it’s great because location is one of the key things. If you live in the sticks, and there’s frankly, nobody nearby, that’s not as good because one of the biggest search factors in Google Maps is your location. So I would think before you register, think carefully about your location. And if your location isn’t right for Google Maps, there’s two options in my view, one is don’t use it. But it’s really great for leads to his pay for an address. So accountants use addresses, you know, you can go to lots of co working spaces will give you an address, pay for an address and have a virtual address and use that as your address somewhere near you, you know, it can’t be malware, it’s got to be somewhere you can go and take photos. But if you’re kind of a bit out in the sticks, and there’s a city nearby, get a virtual address in the city, you don’t need like a bang in the center, but you know, because you’d pay a lot pay one a bit further out maybe, but get it doesn’t really work if you’re not near anybody. Yeah, you know, there’s nobody going to be sat on the top of a Lakeland fell thinking what I need now is a brand photographer.
Marcus: So are these people are these addresses quite these by addresses quite easy to find?
Sam: Yeah, you know, just find a I mean, offices, you know, offices will often have a real office also for virtual office service, you know, you post can go there, you know, and you can register with HMRC there and that sort of thing. So yeah, loads of places have a kind of register your office, most if you ask your accountant, loads of accountants do it. So often your accountant will do it for you as well. And if it’s your accountant, it could be part of your fee anyway. So that can work. So yeah, think about your location. Also think about your name. So I was looking at this for the photographer recently, if your name has photography in it, I’ll be honest, that’s really going to help. If your name is like something completely weird, so you know, you’re kind of gone a bit off the wall, you know, what do you think you’re going to do forestry shutters? And that’s lovely, but people probably think you’re doing blinds. You know, put photography is one of your keywords, you know, Marcus Ahmed photography, it kind of gives it to the people and to Google.
Marcus: That’s understood by people. I mean, it’s very nice. And it’s lovely to think of a name for your business. But really, you’re right. It’s just a pain in the bum, isn’t it?
Sam: Yeah, I mean, it doesn’t have to be your name. But I really suggest ask photography in the title. And if you’re or you know, if you’re a specialist, wedding photographer, whatever else, you know, make it really obvious what you do. Yeah, okay. That’s really important.
And then you think about categories. So Google Maps gives you categories, and you have main categories and subcategories. And you need to think about which is your main category and which is your subcategory. Clearly, if you’re a photographer, and you loads of things, photography is your main category. While if you’re a wedding photographer, you might want wedding photographers, your main categories, photographers, the subcategory, you’ve got to think about which way around you want to do it. And only put categories in there that you actually do. And the other thing, not all types of photography are a category that exists on maps. So you can’t have brand photography markets, it just doesn’t exist. So you’d probably end up with photography. So you’ve got to work it out. But think carefully, lots of people just like tick, tick, tick. Think, which makes sense being my top ones, which makes sense being my sub ones. That’s really important. Okay, so that’s the first thing to set when you set up name, location, categories, think carefully, get them in there. The next thing is one of the most important things on there are reviews, get customers to leave you reviews on Google Maps. It’s absolutely vital. It’s part of your SEO, it’s part of your social proofing. So you can say, you know, when people are searching you online, look, here is Fred blogs, photography, and look, the last person said, Oh my god, it was the best shoot photo shoot ever. I was so nervous when I went in and came out so relaxed and I love my photos. Wow, isn’t that great? Yeah, so that’s great for people and it’s great for Google. If you’re constantly getting reviews, Google does a couple of things. One, it will move you up the maps so that you’ll get found on the maps near the top until it knows your business is still going and people do. If your last review was two years ago, I’m going to be a bit if you’re still in business, even if you’ve got loads of reviews back then, you haven’t got any now. So get reviews. I think I’ve said this in loads of shows, constantly get Google reviews, pester all your customers, don’t ask them once, don’t ask them twice, keep asking them until they give you a bloody Google review, just keep going.
Marcus: Yeah, agreed. I mean, people are used to giving reviews these days.
Sam: They are. And they do take two, three, four prods and they don’t mind. They are probably thinking about it and probably saying, I’m going to give Marcus review, but I’ve not just quite got time now and they will forget about it. So do keep prodding them. They don’t mind. You do need to do it. Okay, but they are absolutely vital. And if you look at the people are appearing, if you do a look in maps and search for photographer where you are, you will see the people near the top. By and large, other people with lots of reviews that makes a massive difference.
Marcus: Yes.
Sam: Oh, and the other thing is, just be a bit careful because what a lot of people do is they sit in their office where they are registered on Google Maps. And they search for photographer and they come to the top and they go, wow, I’m top for photographer in my area. And you’re top because you’re sat on your own office. So you’re the nearest one. Yeah, just be a little bit aware of that. Go somewhere else and do the same.
Marcus: What areas? It’s a guidelines about what area that covers because I’ve often thought, yeah, does somebody in say, North Bristol say 10 miles from me, see me coming up?
Sam: Yeah, it depends. It depends on all sorts of things. You generally won’t go outside your kind of local urban area. So like your city, you definitely won’t go outside. So it doesn’t go out to county wide and regional like how far you’re found. It depends on all sorts of things kind of how how many other people are offering those services locally, how good your profile is. So if it’s a bit better, you will reach out further. If there’s a lot more people doing it, you will probably be closer in. So it’s kind of, you know, there’s all sorts of things in the mix. But yeah, kind of, you’re never going to reach it for that local audience. You’re never going to reach out to the county and regional area. It’s going to be your city, an area of your city if maybe you’re starting out. That’s the kind of area. The other thing you can add into well, there’s lots of things you can add. One of the things you can add into Google Maps is services. Now this is really important because basically you can put lots of content in here, which is really great to talk about your services. So it has a services section. So you need to add all your services. You know, if you’re a wedding photographer or you try and break it down, don’t just put wedding photography job done. You know, think about, okay, I’ll do a maybe bronze package wedding and I’ll do maybe a luxury wedding package and weddings abroad. Try and, you know, break down and get as many services as you can. And then you’ve got a column, but it’s like a thousand words or something about each service. So use them and write about that service, write about what’s great about it and you’re getting more and more content in there which helps Google and helps people when you’re looking for. So use those services. You can add as many as you want. You know, don’t go mental, don’t have a hundred. But, you know, get at least five, six, seven services in there. Even if you’re just one type of photography, you could break down what you do. You know, brand photography, I could, you know, put in their headshot sessions. I could put in, you know, a recurring service where you come back every three months. I could put in a one day photo shoot. There’s all sorts of different things. Try and think of different services you could put in there.
Marcus: In fact, I was just looking online just then and exactly what you’re saying, Sam, and I put in Bristol photographers and it came up very differently to if I put in Bristol brand photographers. for example.
Sam: So yeah, you don’t normally need the location in Maps because it’s just it focuses on wherever the map is. Okay. Yeah, then you can also obviously can have photos as well.
So did I, if photographers add photos to there, you know, and unlike in other shows, we’ve said, you know, you don’t want to have loads of photographs and not just text, but add a load of photographs because it will only show relevant ones. So add as many as you like. Just add time.
Marcus: It changes around, but I must admit it’s very hard to remove photos.
Sam: Yeah, if you’ve added them, you can usually, but yeah, it’s not the easiest. It’s not usually better to flood them out with other ones. You also get a description of your business. So again, use that. Think carefully about the sort of audience you want, what you want to say to them, what keywords you want to be found for. So craft your description carefully and use all the words you’ve given. If you’re allowed a thousand words, don’t write four or a hundred. Write a thousand or, you know, 946, but use those words and talk. You know, we’ve got loads of shows about what to write, so we’re not getting into that now, but think carefully about what you write. Don’t just like bung anything down in your descriptions. And then another thing you can do on there is post, which is a bit odd, isn’t it? It’s like social. You can post, and lots of people go, it’s bloody weird and scratch the head. And lots of people post a bit and they go, well, nobody’s liking this or commenting on this. So this is a bloody waste of time. It’s not a bloody waste of time. So posting on there is really useful. It doesn’t matter. You’re not going to get any likes and you’re not going to any comments because frankly, you’re not OK, but when people find you, so that person who stood on the street thinking, I want to portrait me, go on his phone, goes to the map and goes, portrait photographer, bang, you come up and you’ve just got something that’s new and relevant there. It will help. You move to the top of the map search because there’s new content on there and you’ve constantly been adding content and it will mean that, you know, they’re going, oh, you know, there’s something, yeah, he did this last week and you can see, oh, you’re talking about a portrait you did last week and somebody you worked with. So, yes, it’s one of those…
Marcus: So just to interrupt you there, sorry. I just want to clarify that, Sam. So if you want to get to the top in maps, A, have lots of reviews and B, you’re saying if you post regularly, it’s going to affect just like SEO does. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Does it really?
Sam: I mean, maps, SEO, it’s a thing. Getting to the top of maps is really, really useful. Yeah, that’s interesting.
Marcus: And it’s not difficult to do that, Sam, because all you’ve got to do is cross-platform it from your Facebook posts or LinkedIn posts.
Sam: Yeah, it doesn’t matter. Yeah, that’s it. Exactly. I would recommend exactly that to most people. Once a week, one of you post your post your post, just bung it on there. Yeah, I don’t think it needs a lot of effort. And the other thing to do, don’t tell the other photographers, look at the other photographers locally and you’ll find most of them are not doing this stuff. So all you’ve got to do is do it better than the other local ones and you’re going to start to move up. They have momentum on their side because whoever’s at the top, even if they’re doing it really badly, because they’re at the top, they keep getting visitors to Google to keep thinking they’re good. So you’ve got that momentum to fight against. But if you see what other people are doing and you look at these areas and go, I’m going to add more services. I’m going to add more reviews. I’m going to think more about all of these things. You will start to outrank them.
Marcus: OK, Sam, I’ve got a Google Maps. I call it UI. I’d not recall it. I just want to call it anymore.
Sam: Maps, business, whatever.
Marcus: I’ve got two. I’ve got one for my education side and one for my branding photography side. And every month for whatever it is, I get sent from Google information about how many people have searched, clicked on it, messaged me, or asked for directions, whatever. I’ve got two different accounts. How believable is that information, Sam? Because I found it very suspicious that they’re both very similar.
Sam: No, the data is spot on. They’re not trying to coin you with that. The data is completely bang on. Yeah, they are. If one thing you can rely on, Google for, it’s data. Their data will be absolutely bang on.
Marcus: Well, if it’s true then, if it’s true what they’re saying, yeah, you’ve got to have a Google Map business account, because it really does work. People are really, if it’s true, they’re generally clicking on you and asking for and coming up in people’s feeds.
Sam: Yeah, no, 100%. It is a really, really useful thing. And not only for when people are in maps, but actually when you do a Google search, you know, yes, it will show websites, but it will also, if it’s a local search, it will show up Google Maps. And so you being at the top of Google Maps will actually mean you’re showing up top in a Google search too, pretty much.
So yeah, it’s kind of a way into, into Google search as well as just the map search.
Marcus: And also, Sam, I’ve got to say to you, I’ve not really heard many people talk about Google Maps. So I recommend you for talking about it. Maybe, and it’s such good information and so easy to do and is free. You maybe, maybe you put a little download together or something that we can work on for our listeners that they can download.
Sam: Well, have a look. There are there’s blogs about it on the, my website for photographers website. So you can go there and yeah, there’s, there’s blogs about it there that kind of goes into into more detail. Yeah. And I’ve run reports on people which are useful. So I would report to people and it like compares them to the top three people so you can really see what am I doing? What are they doing? Then you can really see what you need to do to get to where they are.
Marcus: Oh, can you do a report for me?
Sam: Yes, Marcus. I’ll invoice you later. I’ll, I’ll talk to you about that later. Yeah. They’re only there.
Marcus: Well, that’s nice. Isn’t it? No, you mate.
Sam: So I’ll talk to you about it later, Marcus.
Marcus: 50, 50 shows you’ve done together Sam, 50 shows.
Sam: Cool. So yes.
Marcus: Okay. Sorry.
Sam: So yeah, basically, Map is a really untapped thing. Loads of people don’t use it, ignore it, or just if they use it, they’ve kind of thrown stuff away. But if you just put a bit of effort in, it is a way you can get, as long as I say you’re not in the middle of blood, you know, where you can get, you know, consistent queries. And once you put the work in, as long as you then just get in the reviews and prints and posts on, they keep coming, they just keep coming in.
Marcus: Yeah, fantastic. Sam, that was excellent. I really, really enjoyed that. And I really hope our listeners have enjoyed it as well. And if you’re a new listener, please go to our website and subscribe to our newsletter. And then you’ll be able to get even more information about the show. We give little tips out and stuff and so on and so forth.
Sam: It is. And what is the website, Marcus?
Marcus: Oh, yes. It’s www.shoottothetop.com. Yes, that’s right. A lot easier for me to say than the old one. Yeah, so you can go there. And if you are a regular listener, thank you very much for being a regular listener. But oh, we’d love a review because what a review does, if not only makes us feel good, it gives us better ranking so more and more people get into the show and we can spread all this lovely goodness of information to everybody in the whole wide world.
Sam: Brilliant. Thank you, Marcus. Right. I’ll see you next week, Marcus.
Marcus: See you next week.
Sam: Take care.
