What is a “Scroll-to-Sale” website, and how can photographers use this modern strategy to move away from portfolio-style sites and bring in even more ideal clients? In today’s episode of the Getting Noticed Series, I’m going in-depth with this question alongside the photographers’ mentor, Jeff Brown. Our conversation includes extremely actionable advice for photographers who are ready to realize the best marketing potential possible for their websites and for their business.
The Focused Photographers Podcast was created based on the idea that the most incredible tool for learning is a deep dive into any given topic from multiple perspectives. Join us every other week as we explore important topics, with host Daniel Moyer and a variety of guests offering different perspectives! Make sure you’ve hit that follow or subscribe button on your favorite podcast player to get notified each week as we air new episodes!
Subscribe on Your Favorite Podcast Player
REVIEW THE SHOW NOTES:
Catching up with Jeff Brown (5:28)
Modern ways of utilizing a website: the concept behind scroll-to-sale (8:52)
Crafting a website for your clients, not other photographers (14:14)
The components of a Scroll-to-a-Sale website (18:03)
Delete your testimonials page (36:16)
The role of Google in your website strategy (40:43)
The purpose of your website (46:46)
Why you need to be blogging (50:34)
Where to get your copies of Jeff’s books (53:22)
MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:
Jeff Brown: The Ambitious Photographer’s Journal
Jeff Brown: The Photographer’s Missing “Link”edIn
Jeff Brown: Help!! My Photography Website Needs More Customers
CONNECT WITH JEFF BROWN
CONNECT WITH DANIEL MOYER
Website: WWW.DANIELMOYERPHOTOGRAPHY.COM
Wedding Instagram: @DANIELMOYERPHOTO
Business Instagram: @GETFOCUSEDPHOTOGRAPHERS
REVIEW IN APPLE PODCASTS
This podcast is about giving others in knowledge, joy, insight, and (hopefully) humor. You can help too! The more reviews and ratings in Apple Podcasts, the higher the Focused Photographers Podcast will rank, and ultimately the more people will listen to it. So if you’re getting value from this podcast, will you consider leaving a rating on Apple Podcasts? Just click below!
LEAVE A RATING IN APPLE PODCASTS!
Thank you!
-Dan
Review the Transcript:
Dan Moyer
Hello, dear photographer, friends, thank you so much for tuning into this episode of the focus photographers podcast where photographers gather. I’m your host, Dan Moyer. And I’m so thankful that you’re here with me today. But before we jump into today’s episode, let me push the pause button and send some affirmation your way. Because if you’ve not heard this today, or this week, or this month, or this year, let me be the person that pauses and says that you are awesome. And I say that because if you are here with me which you are here with me, because you’re listening to this, that you are putting the time and effort into growing yourself and growing your business, and I see you and I know how hard it is. So I just want to send a little love and a little affirmation in your way. Because I feel an enormous responsibility to providing you value. And I’m so thankful that I get to interview these photographers and share my thoughts with you. But I feel an enormous amount of responsibility towards providing the value. And if you are brand new here, or even if you’ve been here for a long time, but you’ve never heard me talk about this, let me share that I release episodes in basically two ways. In my soul episodes, I share topics that are near and dear to me that that are on my heart. And on my mind, I am most passionate about work life balance and and how to tie these things together. Because you and I both know that business and personal is tied very closely together. Because we wear a lot of hats, and we try to balance a lot of things. So I’m really interested in exploring that sort of work life harmony aspect of things. I’m also very interested in exploring mental health, my original passion topic was client experience, because my client experience is on point. And that’s the reason why I’ve been so busy for over a decade. And then a sort of a newfound topic that I’m very passionate about is finances and how sort of money mindset affects our ability to make money and, and how we spend it and all that kind of stuff. So those are my personal topics and my soul episodes. And hopefully, you know, if you go back into the archives, we’re coming up on 50 episodes, you’ll hear lots more, and I’ve got lots more coming up too. So outside of my soul episodes, I also release episodes in a specific topic or a series format, like marketing, or creativity, or the series that you’re in right now on getting noticed. The idea is that we all have different strengths. And we all optimize our businesses very differently. But we do things all very differently. And I invite photographers on to discuss their approach towards a given topic. And what ends up happening is, you have this sort of mini, you know, mini course of this mini deep dive that gives you a well rounded, robust view of this topic from a variety of different perspectives. So the episode you’re listening to now is the second in a series on getting noticed. And what I mean by getting noticed is that we all want to get people into our business and get people into our digital doorway, so to speak. And there’s lots of ways to do that. But you know, that you can be an amazing photographer have the most beautiful photographs. But if you’re a terrible marketer, nobody’s ever gonna see them on the opposite end is that you could be sort of a mediocre photographer and an amazing marketer, and amazing networker, and you’ll have people beating down your door every single day. But this series is all about how we get people into our world, to get them to take that leap to say I want to work with you, I want to hire you. And so that’s what this episode on getting noticed is all about. So with all of that out of the way, let me talk about today’s episode, and that my guest today is this amazing, UK based photography mentor who has who has coached and mentored 1000s of photographers from all over the world. His name’s Jeff Brown, this is actually the second time he’s on the podcast. He’s the first person that I’ve had on two times. He’s got three books out now he’s a serial entrepreneur, he’s got a ton of websites. But in this episode, we specifically talk about this idea of a scroll to sale website, and how he thinks it’s time for photographers to start moving away from the portfolio style website towards something that’s more action oriented or to use a buzzword, you know, a funnel, but also empathizes with our clients and shows them a lot of value, not just letting our photo speak for us, but also does things like displaying our price on our website and allows people to move from cold to warm to taking a jump very quickly. This podcast is extremely thorough, and Jeff did a masterful job of describing how applicable this is and how to really do it. He has got so much knowledge and lays it all out there in this podcast, even everything from how Google responds to it and so much more. So without further ado, please welcome my friend Jeff Brown.
Dan Moyer
You and Jeff Brown. So fun fact, before we like really dive into this thing, you are the first guest that I’m having on for a second time. So I know, I know all of your accolades like this is just another thing to add to after your name your long list of accolades, but this probably puts you high up there. It makes you feel really good. Doesn’t it?
Jeff Brown
Certainly does. Anything else.
Dan Moyer
Yeah, so last time since last time, we talked I think, which was end of 2021, I think is when it came out. You’ve been very busy you I see lots of walks with Charlie pretty awesome. But it kidding aside, you’ve got two new books out right one was the website book that we’re gonna talk about a lot today. And you because you have a What about the photographer like a journal for photographers or something
Jeff Brown
go sit in the ambitious photographers journal, which is basically a you know, these like self help journals and stuff. Well, this is written healing for photographers, and it’s all about, it’s like a 52 week, journal on how to set your goals, how to achieve eagles, how to keep up your productivity and bonus, banish procrastination. So So that’s three books now. So I’ve had three best selling books. And I’ve also launched a website company as well. So I’ve had quite a busy year and a lot of speaking events and podcasts. So it’s been good.
Dan Moyer
When you’ve been really busy. Tell me i We’re obviously going to get into what this other book is about. But give me the 500 foot view of this, you know, help my my website sucks book.
Jeff Brown
So, to be honest, this is something I’ve been wanting to write for for years, because I know, you know, obviously my background about you know, I was military photographer, then I had a, you’ll find very successful photography businesses. I’ve shot over 750 Weddings myself, so you know, I know a lot of your listeners are wedding photographers. I work with photographers in 20 different countries around the world. You know, when they come on board, my training program, one of the first things he goes Jeff on has helped me website out because photographers are obsessed by websites. And but most photographers websites aren’t very good websites, their portfolios, their galleries, they’re not lead generating websites. You know, we’re the only industry that believes that if we put some pretty pictures up. That’s all we have to do. People will come flocking to us now and up and they will come. Yeah, and it doesn’t happen you know, if you if you went to a car dealerships website, and all they had were pictures of cars, no opening times, no prices, no features of what the car has, would you buy, if you went to a hotel or website and they just had pictures of the hotel and the rooms, you didn’t know what time breakfast was served, how much the rooms were, what facilities they have, where the dogs were allowed? Would you book? Of course you wouldn’t. How frustrating is that as a consumer, but photographers we like I’ll put loads of pictures up and we’ll put a contact page on and then press
Dan Moyer
itself.
Jeff Brown
And it doesn’t work, you know, so I was like, right, I’m gonna write a book on how to create a website that works using this format that I call the scroll to a sale. So I started writing the book. And then when I started writing the book and mentor like chapter one, I’m like, hang on a minute, I’m talking about brand. And I’m using the word brand a lot. photographers don’t understand brand either because most photographers think brand is a logo, right? I’ve got my logo done, that’s my brand sword, and it’s not brand is everything your clients think feel and believe about you the message you want to portray it your colors, your fonts, everything, because if you if you want to charge a premium price, you’ve got to have a premium brand. So like right, scrap that back to square one, I’m gonna write in four chapters on brand, which will allow people to understand brand within creating a website. And then I went on to write in the book on on website. So it’s now two books in one actually,
Dan Moyer
oh, my goodness, that sounds like it’s quite value packed. You like you burn through some stuff there. And so I want to go back to some of the things you said in the beginning where it’s, you know, so many of us, I think, get into photography, because we say, you know, we start out we’re a hobbyist and we take some pretty pictures and then somebody eventually comes along says Wow, you’re actually good at taking pictures, you should do this as a business. And if you are any sort of self reflective or or realize that like putting a website up doesn’t mean that you’re gonna get anything. Just because you’re good at taking pictures doesn’t mean you’re good at running a business or or that even if you’re the best photographer in the world that anyone’s even gonna see those pictures. So how does this like website of scroll to what does it scroll to sales? What you call it? To a sale? Yeah, scroll to a sale? How is it just like fundamentally different than a portfolio site? Because you would you would think like, oh, well, you need to have some pictures of like a wedding gallery or something like that. So so how do they how do they differ?
Jeff Brown
Well, to understand this, you got to understand the behavior has changed massively. So I built my first ever wedding photography website back in 2002. And two, I was still in, in the military of serving in the military, doing weddings on weekends. And I remember sitting there with my ex business partner who was another military photographer, and we were in The, in our, in our mess in my mess on Dreamweaver creating this website and it had to and it had to fit perfectly into the screen of a computer. And across the top was, you know home about weddings, prices, packages, all that loads and loads of tabs across the top. Now, you know, then all of a sudden 2000 And was it 2012 or 2000 You know, the iPhone was launched. And this and then social media, you know, social media would start to come along, the iPhone was launched smartphones, people started scrolling, our behavior on mobile phones have changed. We like that finger up and just scroll. And navigation has now changed. And if you look at a lot of websites, and funnily enough, I’ve just been looking for undecided, I’d love to get back into motorbiking again. So I’ve decided booked a holiday with some friends we’re going to go we’re in May on motorbikes only problem is that don’t actually have a motorbike. So I’ve been looking at like you know a triumph Royal Enfield moto goosey, all these websites, they’re all school to sale websites. So basically, they devised for our new way of utilizing a website we like everything they have on the homepage. So when we land on the homepage, we want to know, who are you? What do you do? What can you do for us? How much is it roughly going to cost me to do business or the minimum amount of money I’ve got to spend to do business with me? And what do you want me to do next? Now when I go and look at Triumph websites, triumphs website is Buka test drive. So try isn’t trying to sell me a bike for 12 14,000 pounds on the website, they’re trying to get me to take a test drive because they know once I go for a test ride, then I’d be like, Oh my God, I want this bike, you know, so they’re selling the next easiest step. From there, you know, so as wedding photographers, you’re not selling wedding packages you’re selling. Check your data available and book a free wedding planning consultation. So we’ll talk about how we’re going to do your big day. So when people land on your website, the behavior has changed in the fact that we’re so impatient now, they reckon that the the average hang about on a website, if people haven’t connected and got the message is in under 10 seconds. So you need to have a banner there that communicates and then you need to go straight in the first bit of text, needs to empathize and talk to the customer so that as soon as they start reading that bit of text, it’s not about you, it’s not about when you first got your camera at 16. And how you love to play in in the darkroom. They don’t give a toss about that. It’s about them. So you start talking in their language, so that they’re like, well hang on a minute, this sounds like my cup of tea, I’m going to read a bit more. And then as you get and further down the school, you bring in the mill. So I’ve I’ve broken this website down into seven actual components. And that’s, that’s a school to a sale website is
Dan Moyer
this is fascinating, because I just did a pretty significant update on my coaching website focused photographers.com. And I also did a big update on my Washington, the update on my wedding photography, business one was pretty recent, but I’ve had, I went from just having photos on my Dannemora photography website for a long time, it was just that, and I started adding some other texts and stuff on the way down. But it was it was when I added this block of text on top of the photos on my wedding photography business website, that I really saw a game changer. And it was because I’m a hyper emotional person, super emotional photographer, that’s what I’m looking for. And on each thing on each photograph, as it changes, there’s another phrase and it’s, you know, only four pictures, whatever. But it says when you’re lost in the thick of it all bottles popping in the morning, you know, your ring slotting on your finger, the roar of the crowd as you enter the dance floor, it’s a good thing, you have a photographer who’s just as excited to be there as you are. And since I put that up there, my website has converted way more than when I didn’t have it, or at least and I tried it for a while because I was like, Oh, I’m just gonna go back to the really clean. No, you know, photos only. And I realized how many people don’t have photographers don’t use text right away on their website to say this is what I’m different. This is what I’m about or whatever, right?
Jeff Brown
Yeah, yeah, I mean and text. Obviously, we’ll come to that in a bit because I know we’re going to talk about the Google’s new algorithm, which is so important when it comes to text but you think of it what you got to do is like an essay this way to photographers create websites to sell to other photographers, because that’s basically what we do. We create and websites that are galleries as if we’re trying to sell to other photographers trying to impress them. Now our clients when they come to our website, especially with wedding clients, they’re not going oh my god, I love the lead in lines and look at the depth of field on that and the way I use different issues differential focus on that the flowers are in focus and she’s out of focus. They’re not because they can’t see that all they can see is pretty pictures, which they would probably think is just as nice as your competitors. What they were looking at was the old Roll colors and fonts, so the feel. So the brand itself has to look premium and communicate. And it also has to be very similar to that industry. So if you look at, you know, bridal magazines, some of the top wedding venues, dress shops, they all tend to same use very similar colors and very similar font and it does have feminine feel to it, a feminine touch to it. So your brand needs to position you at a certain level, like a really high level. So that when you do put your price in there your price, actually even if your price is quite expensive, if you’ve brand looks even more expensive, than it doesn’t matter what the price is, the first thing that’s going to put somebody else off is not your price is your brand, if your brand looks cheap, and crap, even if your price is cheap, people just gonna add it looks cheap. So your brand needs to communicate first, and then your message needs to appeal to them. Now give you an example. Right if if I was going to learn to drive, you’d go to loads of driving school websites, and they’ll all be gone, you know, are we guarantee you pass, you know, 95% pass rate, blah, blah, blah. So they’re all talking about themselves. Now if I’m a 1617 year old here in the UK to learn to drive, I’m going to be nervous, I’m going to be worried I’m going to be oh, what happens if he shouts or does you know, I’m terrified. I’ve never gotten a car before. So if you start your empathy section, which is the first section I say, after the banner, on your website, if you start there with a bit of empathy, so I’ll say we know it’s an exciting time that learning to drive but it can also be quite frustrating. And you can be quite nervous, but don’t worry, our instructors all care and you know, we, your people make mistakes we allow for that we’re gonna put you at ease. So then you go, Oh, God, they’re talking my language. So you know, as, as photographers, we need to communicate to our clients who are brides and grooms who might not like the idea of having a camera in the face all the time and might be quite worried about the, you know, being the center of attention when it comes to getting their photograph taken. They might worry that they might not have time to spend with all their their family and loved ones because they’re getting dragged from pillar to post by a photographer. So think of all the things that they’re worried about, and empathize and say no, that’s not how I do it. I do it like this, I’m here for you, you know, to your wedding is your day we shoot the way you want it
Dan Moyer
that is I think groundbreaking for probably for a lot of people because photography is inherently very egocentric. Think about like, how do most of us talk about photographs. It’s my work. It’s my portfolio. It’s my this right? And so it’s very easy to step into the well this is how surely, you’re gonna you’re going to talk about how, you know you want to say who you are or something like that. But But I think leading with this is what I do for you empathizing with that person stepping into their shoes, and understanding like where they’re at, and they’re their wedding journey is gonna get you way further than when a lot of photographers start off with, you know, I love flowers have been holding a camera since I was 14 Blah, blah, right? Like, like, that’s so interesting that that’s so that that’s the second thing like that you scroll to is an empathy section.
Jeff Brown
Yeah, so we got I mean, I’ll tell you the the actual steps, maybe too much to cover on just the one podcast, but the step is obviously the attention grabbing banner with a headline that straightaway people can see what you are and what you do, you know, so you could say, like, New York wedding photographer, shooting the weddings, shooting your big day the way you want it. So that is the banner image at the top, a banner image at the top, really attention grabbing image, that text next to the banner, your logo should be really small, you know, you see these ones with logos, huge big logos on the header. You’re not in like you know McDonald’s, you know Starbucks, the logo doesn’t mean anything to the client. Right? That wording does though, you know, it’s the banner has to say what you do for the client with
Dan Moyer
with that banner, are you trying to evoke like an emotion response or something like that, like,
Jeff Brown
totally so you’ve kind of let them know what you do for them what makes you different, but also a big, you know, I saw this from years of doing Facebook ads and also doing wedding fairs as well and looking to see brides expressions you know, as I say 750 weddings have done whenever I use the an image that I thought was technically one of my most favorite images. When I use that on a Facebook ad when I use that in an album. Brides just push past it. Every bride and groom standing against a beautiful castle in the in the borders of Scotland and fireworks going off in the background. Nothing you know any Facebook ads very minimum. If you got a pitcher and it might be the best pitcher in the world. It’s just a grab shot. There’s a telegraph pole there but there’s the bride and groom laughing their heads off loads of people flinging confetti, it’s a motion and the bride looks at that picture and thinks that’s how I want my day to be. So whenever you see an image that shows tears of joy, laughter You know people having fun those the images that you need at the band lather, really, because the bride to be like that, Oh My Dear Abby. So you start with your banner, then you empathize then the next section, you come down to his benefits, and you sell the benefits of what you do. Now, as a wedding photographer, you could say, you know, there’s no rules, there’s nothing I won’t do. It’s your big day. If you want larger groups, I’ll do it to groups if you don’t want groups who don’t want any,
Dan Moyer
but you want to specialize, right? Yeah, yeah.
Jeff Brown
But you say like, you know, it’s all about your, your wedding the way you want it. So you have your own style, but you do it, it’s all about them, you know, so you don’t say, Well, I don’t do this, I don’t do that, you know, I tell them my wedding package to all my wedding day photography to what your needs want. But then you could also say like, you know, full day coverage from from, from the bridal preparations right up to the the nighttime party images delivered within 14 days, or 30 days, or 21 day, because how many photographers, it’s a big thing in the UK, you know, you brighten up and we went three months, six months, my wedding photographs, you could you could say that, that is another benefit, you know, and images are full resolution for you to do what you want, you can share with them with your friends, you can print with them, you know. So you put your benefits of what you offer next or at empathy benefits. And then what we come down to is the About You section. Now the About You section is where you talk about yourself, as in from an authoritative standpoint. So you’ve got remember, on a website, you’ll have an about you pet section, but you also have your about EU page and the about EU pages where you can talk a little bit more about yourself and how you got into photography, when you were 16. And you love cake and you love to climb mountains and you’ve got a dog or whatever. on your on your homepage, you need just a few paragraphs of text, two or three lines with a text to show your authority. So you could say something, you know, I’m one of New York’s premier photographers, and my work has been featured in bride magazine, blah, blah, blah, blah, I’ve shot it, venues including blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So, you know, I have photographed over 250 weddings in the past 10 years, with over 205 Star testimonials on my Google My Business page. Last year I won, such and such Wedding Photographer of the Year award. So all that does is that short paragraph shows your authority and your position. So they’ve they’ve empathy, you’ve empathized with them, you’ve sold them the benefits, then it comes to the bit about you. You’re like, oh wow, this is the guy. Now if you haven’t got a lot of experience, then try and talk about similarities between you and your ideal client. And because what you want them to do is respect you or really like you. You don’t want to be talking about what camera you got when you got into photography, what lenses you use, and that is of interest. You know, people buy from people who they know like and trust.
Dan Moyer
So this is a this is a place that you either if you’ve got the credentials you you write those out, or you try to find common ground with your person, right so like my a friend of mine, Matt, I kept saying like he’s really big into the Philadelphia 70 Sixers and a lot of the couples the shoots are in this like area around him. And I kept saying you need to put something about the Sixers on your site and I’m pretty sure like he put it in there I call it I call it caveman words like I love using them on my website where it’s like we have a text like a paragraph of text that’s about you and what you like and you know your awards and all that stuff I love like this like father husband, weddings, Sixers family or whatever it is like just boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And then you can have your testimony that just something to grab people easily. And he had somebody mentioned it almost immediately after they reached out like oh we love the Sixers too or I get people who say my couples always say like oh we love Harry Potter as well. Like and it just get that common ground so all right after the about us section. Is there a price tell me prices coming up or something prices? I’m really curious to
Jeff Brown
know is are photographers at load? I mean there’s a big swing with this isn’t it you know some marketing people say no you shouldn’t have you shouldn’t have a price on your website because what you do is you don’t put a price in you get them to call you then you get them on and you do the hard sell and as long as people want yeah and and we are consumers you’re a consumer I’m a consumer your listeners are consumers right when we bought How do you feel if you go to a website and it says Book a free consultation call with no price nothing then you think hang on a minute. I’m just scouting about at the moment I just now like I said before, brand if your brand is is premium, and the price is high, that’s totally fine. Your brand will marry with your price and look, it’ll be perfect. It will work and people go oh yeah, but there’s people in my area charging $500 for a wedding doesn’t matter. They’re not your competitors. They will serve other people they will serve the tire kickers and the freebie hunters Let those deal with those people. Now, if people bought bought on price alone, we would see 25 30% of the brands in the world just vanish, right? BMW, Mercedes Jaguar. Yeah, Lexus, all those car brands would vanish. Hilton Hotels, Kempinski hotels, and Marriott Hotels, they would all vanish, you would just be left with the premier inns and your cheap, you know, a Tiffany’s would haemodynamics, Ralph, Ralph Lauren would vanish all the clothing companies that are premium, people do not buy on price people buy on what is called perceived value. So perceived price if to understand perceived value, you’ve got to understand price. And price is actually what somebody agrees is a fair exchange for what they believe is the perceived value of the products and services that you supply. Now, perceived value is normally created by external factors. So say for instance, I’ve got a brand new BMW on my drive. I don’t know anything about it, other than a bought into the badge, and it looks nice. I’ve never lifted the bonnet up. I don’t know anything about engineering, I couldn’t tell you whether it’s actually got a better engine than afford or not. But it’s the perceived value that I’m buying something that is more reliable, more, more Premier, quality made. Yeah, yeah. So you know, if I were of affluent t shirt, which is like 125 pounds, compared to one from next, which is 2500, both look pretty much the same in the booth free latest in cotton. I’m not a tailor, I can’t tell you whether it’s any better. And then funnily enough, when I look this up, right, I found that valve for when t shirts are actually made in China and Sri Lanka. So the probably made in this. These other ones, yeah. But it’s the perceived value we have in that Ralph Lauren brand and logo. So if you can create a high perceived value for your, your business, and that is on the external factors, the colors, the font in your overall message and connection, then price doesn’t become an issue, price would only become an issue, if you had a high perceived value, price would only become an issue if your price was cheap, because people will go Oh, hang on a minute, that looks really high end, but the price is cheap, that’s got to be something the matter with it for some time. And sometimes the biggest friction with price is price. If the price isn’t high enough to match your brand, then it creates a problem as well. So people want to have a rough idea. So if you want to push people towards booking a consultation call to find out you know, a bouquet resume or meeting with them to find out more about their special day, you could just say, you know, you’ve given all the benefits. And then using my wedding packages, I’m now taking bookings for 2023 2024 I only shoot 30 Weddings per year. So what you want to do is you limit the quantity and the limit in the office you create and that you know increased demands, you’ve connected with them you’ve empathized with them, you’ve sold the benefits, you’ve given them your authority, then you’ve limited the availability, which increases the demand and you’ve limited limited the timescale as well. So you only do 30 and 12 month, so you’ve limited the mountain in a timescale. If you have a budget of $2,500 or more, then I’d love to speak to you. So you’ve just now every time you get an email, you know that that person has pre qualified to two and a half grand. You know, if you don’t want to put your core packages on there, you just, it’s a price qualifier. And like I said, as a consumer that, you know, they’re more likely to book that call with you than get on a call with you if you don’t have a price on the other thing is nothing, you know, if you have if all your call to action is to book a call, and you end up doing five calls a day, and for them had a budget of $500 and you spent half an hour with each one and you’re like, I’m too expensive. You know, that’s gonna that’s gonna have a knock on for you, it’s gonna, it’s gonna, you’re gonna have start having self doubts, because you haven’t weeded out the tire kickers in your funnel, your brand should put a few off anyway, because they’ll be like, Oh, that looks expensive. We want a cheapy and then you’ve got your price qualifier.
Dan Moyer
There was somewhere I read recently, I cannot remember where but it was, um, they said your brand should be putting off just as many people’s is bringing in that like, if you’re, if your niche down enough, if you’re sort of focused enough, there’s only a small amount, small, quote unquote, amount of people who will get through that, but when they get through it, they will be ready to book you and it sounds like like, that’s what this whole entire goal of this website is, is that you’re not automating it. It’s just that you’re creating this, this seive of like people who are coming in the top and as they get lower and lower into the site. They’re going to realize really quick whether or not you’re a good fit or not. And then the final, you know, test is you know, you hop on a call with them or whatever but pretty good chance that when they hop on a call with you that it’s going to be good to go.
Jeff Brown
I mean, the other thing is, well, you’ve got to think about you know, you’ve you’ve, you’ve grabbed them with an attention grabbing banner, you’ve told them what you do you, you empathize with them. So you’re like, Oh, we’re speaking the same language. So the benefits that you’ve given them your authority, by the time you come down to price, right, if you get if you get this right, and you’ve really connected, how many of these websites I’ve been looking at for new motorbikes lately, and I did that when I got my car as well. You know, we all start off with budgets, in our mind, but the thing when things tick boxes, you know, like looking for a car, oh, well, like this, oh, does this, it has these seats or as these, then you’re on well, because it’s what I want, I’ll spit spend a bit. So they might have come to your website with a $1,500 budget. But you’ve empathize, you speak their language, they like you, they like your brand, was two and a half 1000. But he sounds perfect. So if you can get the sound perfect bit, then then there will potentially at you know, consumers always do it will check the difference on the credit card, you know, Will. So that is it, you can that you can stretch people’s budget, if you become there, he sounds perfect, or she sounds perfect for me. person. And that’s what you want to be you your brand is, your brand is not about you, it’s about your ideal client and you want to be perfect for them. Because when you’re perfect, we’ll spend a lot more.
Dan Moyer
This is literally what I just went through. When I picked out a new watch. I had a Fitbit, my little I like my like my little Fitbit, it’s good. But like, it is not for it’s a very it’s very beginner, it’s very basic. It’s a fitness tracker, right, like, you know a Fitbit is and I was like this is I need more than this, I need maps, I need like directions on a watch, I want all the things. And while I should say I didn’t know I wanted all the things I just wanted like a watch that did a little bit more than a fit that I wanted one that was like done, it took serious as a runner. And I was expecting me to go on the Garmin website and to buy one for like 150 bucks, you know, around there. And I started looking and then like this one up here does this thing. And this one up here does this thing. And this one here. Like when I wake up, it gives me a personalized morning report on you know, my body battery and my the weather for the day. And you know how my heart rate variability was an oh crap, it turns out that was 400 bucks. And I was expecting to spend 150. And I was like, I like went back and forth. I read watch reviews. And I was like, You know what? I’m gonna buy it. Because it was exactly what I what I didn’t know that I needed. And
Jeff Brown
yeah, yeah, that’s it. You know, that’s one of the things with the benefits because you give people something that didn’t have a need. So like, if you communicate, you know, we deliver your wedding pitches within 21 days. Because, you know, photographers don’t. Yeah, that would be brilliant. And then, you know, we’ll have to, you know, X number of followers on social media the very next day, so you can share, like and share them with your friends, you know, so you start giving them loads of stuff that they didn’t realize they needed. And, you know, the benefit is, you know, we give you 2020 Great photos the next day, so you can like and share them with your friends. You know, the benefit is you get into create that excitement with friends and family. So you sell them the benefit. So when you can put stuff like that in then then people are well this other guy doesn’t do this, but then does it? Yeah. So then they start comparing everybody else to you because you sell them more benefits. You know, funnily enough. I remember my the car I had before the one I’ve got they had a Jaguar and I went to Jaguar dealership and he was going with this car you get like a connection to the you can start your car up from your phone. Why don’t want to start my car. Then when he sold me the benefit, and he says right imagine it’s December you get up it’s there’s two inches of snow outside. It’s absolutely freezing. You don’t want to be standing there with your credit card trying to scrape your windscreen. He says you start your car from me formed, you warm up your seats and you put on the defrost while you drink any coffee. And then you go out and get in a warm car and drive straight off. And I’m like, Oh my God, I need this. Yeah, he’s now suddenly something that I didn’t realize that I needed. But he the way he sold it. I didn’t need a car that could start up from a phone. But I needed warm seats and clear windscreen while I’m sitting having a coffee. All the benefits, you know,
Dan Moyer
it’s so funny because sometimes like it’s like, you know, sometimes you can have be sold the benefits so much where it’s like yeah, that would be nice to have. And you never end up using it. But you know that the options there? So it’s good that you have it right like yeah, that’s fascinating. All right, so So banner is the top one empathy section next to the sort of features and benefits then the about section, then pricing. Is that the bottom of sort of the list or did I miss you
Jeff Brown
have your price qualify then what you can do at the very bottom is what I call a final call to action. So your final call to action should be quite often the final call actually can be seasonal. So you could have like we’re now doing our spring bookings for braids, you know if you’re getting or we have a special winter offer or we have ex military or veterans offer or something like that. So you can put an offer at the very bottom. And again, if you go into offers, limit the number and limit the availability and limit the time the offer lasts for. So you could see we now too, we now have got 10 of these particular packages that offer this much discount. But you’ve got to apply by the 20th of February. So show them the discount, limit the number, and then limit the time so get people to get it or will better get in touch now. And again, this is all these things that I tell you about a stuff that pretty much most of the industries use. Apart from the photography industry,
Dan Moyer
you know, yeah, we really need to look outside of our industry.
Jeff Brown
Yeah, yeah. And it’s, it’s, and the thing is, this stuff isn’t isn’t something that’s just brand new and completely different. This stuff was used in magazine advertising 50 years ago, it’s just the medium of communication has changed. And now we’re like on one page of a magazine, but it’s on a mobile phone on a school, you know, because they would have a headline, they would empathize, they would sell the benefit, then they will maybe mention a bit about the company, which is the authority bit, then they would give the price and a call to action. Right? Get it now buy it now. No, this used to be all communicate on a whole page of a magazine. So one
Dan Moyer
question I’m trying to figure out here is like, do you if you have this like, sort of one long page? Are there other pages on the site? Like, is there a separate About Me page? That’s more about you, or yes, okay, totally.
Jeff Brown
So what you got to think is now I looked at it, you can have a look at your own website stats. And I looked at my website stats, I’ve got three websites, one from a web development company and two from our mentoring business, and they all hover around the same, that the 90% of the traffic comes in through the homepage and leaves to the home page, with the other pages getting hardly any traction whatsoever. You know, maybe four or five 6% Now one big thing I say to clients is and it usually causes a bit of controversy, I say right, if you got a Testimonials page, delete it. Because Tell me
Dan Moyer
more. I’m ready to make Jeff Tell me. So
Jeff Brown
I’ve just told you that like 90% your traffic is going to come into your homepage and leave through your homepage, right? Certain amount of your traffic could be gone in 10 seconds if you don’t get their their attention. Right. So why the hell have you got your testimonials which are like gold, it’s it’s people selling you to everybody else selling how amazing you are, how great your services are, why have you got them locked around a page that’s only going to get 5% of your traffic. Now if you look at again, other industries, other than photographers, you will see go to hotels, you will see TripAdvisor reviews and five stars and stuff like that all the way down the homepage, right and not be locked away. You know, so get your testimonials, offer Testimonials page and scatter them throughout your homepage. You can have those testimonial sliders that go across words, you know, I would put one underneath the benefits. So we’ve got the empathy benefits, then it’s then a block of testimonials. And then when you come down to price, put some underneath so just as somebody’s looking at the price, then they’re seeing other people commenting about how amazing you are, you know, and then what you can do is you can ask people to comment in their testimonial. One of the big things so if you get that, you know, your clients are worried about getting their photographs taken. They want it to be fun and relaxed and they’re not always you know, they can be quite camera shy. Then you can say to them so you got a couple who’s been married you can see it. Hi Sarah. I just wonder if you could give me a little testimony. I know that you said you were going to be quite nervous on the day but you said that you know at the end of it you were so relaxed, it felt great. Nothing, nothing. Nothing was a bother we got more images than you ever expected. You know so much of so many big surprises. And it was exactly the way you imagined you will live your breathing in your mind. If you put that out as a as a request to them to ask for a testimony and you say this, you will get a mirror of back version for that. So if you put something like that, you know saying you know I know that you said you know wedding was the wedding photography was so important to you. And this was the best investment you’d you leave made for your wedding day budget. You will get a testimonial back saying that it’s the best investment we ever made out of our entire wedding budget. You stick that underneath the price. right you’ve got a testimonial that backs up your price underneath. And when you put your testimonials don’t just put Maggie in debt for Sarah and Kim. I sent him an app put their full names so it could be you know seven Kim Brown from Buffalo, New York, married out and then put the venue because it makes it more believable. Other other brides to be will see the venue and go, oh god, that’s our venue or all the photograph there, there must be quite good. And the other thing on your testimonials, stick five stars next to it because we become thanks to Amazon, we’ve become obsessed with looking for five stars that are super smart, every testimonial put five gold five stars on there. Because that’s what people are looking they’re looking for, you know, they might not think they are. But when they see it, they get that, oh, that’s a five star as a five star. And they
Dan Moyer
automatically see that it’s review right away, like the five stars automatically makes you think like, I guess, you know, people would say like, Oh, you have the little like circle picture of the person or whatever. But five star speaks review right away. Okay, so there’s this other thing, small thing that like we probably have to talk about a little bit. And that’s how Google plays into all this just a little, just a little thing.
Jeff Brown
Yeah. So unfortunately, for photographers who’ve got portfolios on our website, you’re gonna see a massive drop in your rankings. And this is not me saying this. This is Google CNS. So if you go over to Google, and you type in the Google helpful content update, type that into Google the helpful content update, or what is Google helpful content update all about? You’ll find out that back in August, August, at August 18 2002 22, Google developed a helpful content update. And Google, in their own words have said, they want to be known as the website that gives results that provides websites with high quality content that help customers on a journey or visitors on a journey to become a customer or to answer their problems. It it’s all about content, and wet. And so it’s basically said websites with low value content. So poor content, or content that’s being created by bots, or website, that very, very small amount of content, and just images will unfortunately start to rank much lower in Google’s algorithm. And it is even said it’s going to put less focus on SEO and backlinks and more focused on the quality of the content. And the reason being they’re doing this now is that the algorithm is that advanced, they can go to your homepage, and you can read every single word on your homepage and understand it, and then match that to searches. ideal criteria, so that it looks like Oh, hang on a minute, this, this person it talks about the benefits are waiting for. So there’s a lot of FAQs here as well on the homepage down the bottom. Now, here’s another tip. If you’re going to have an FAQ, stick some FAQs on your homepage right at the very bottom. But write your FAQs, not for people who have landed on your homepage, right, your FAQs for people who are in Google. So to me, so you can understand this better, right? So if you have on your homepage FAQs, how much are your packages? Or what do your packages start from? Or what do our packages start from? That could be a question. packages of what packages of m&ms personal training packages, holiday vacation packages, right? So when people are if you go to Google, right, and you type in how much is how much is the average wedding photographer in Austin, Texas, or something like that. Google will bring up some answers. And it also say halfway down, people also ask the following questions. Google is looking for answers to questions. So instead of saying how much are packages, you could say something like, how much do your wedding photography packages start from? Or how much is it to hire a wedding photographer to cover our big day? Instead of saying, you know, how long will it take for my photos to arrive? You can write how long will it take for me to receive my wedding photographs after my wedding. So Google is looking for answers to these questions that people are typing in the search engine and buying your website as it on the homepage that is producing high value content, you become trusted. And Google is utilizing the thing called E. Right so it’s in acronym. Yeah. So E and then E A T. Okay. And it stands for see if I remember this. experience, expertise, authority and trust. That is what Google it hasn’t exactly said how it’s looking for it. But it’s give you a few examples. So FAQs, that goes with experience and and expertise. You know, you’re answering people’s questions and authority, that about section where we’re talking about how many weddings you photograph, what venues you’ve been at trust. Have you got to guarantee if you’ve got a guarantee, stick it on the homepage of your website. Have you got testimonials, five star testimonials. That’s trust. So that’s what it’s looking for. Google wants to give people who searched in its search engine websites that A trusted, authoritative, answer people’s questions plus as a as a consumer and somebody who will lands on that website, that’s perfect. That’s what you want. Because you got to also remember that somebody who comes to your website may never ever seen you before, you’ve you’re, you’re just a link in the Google search. So if you, if you made a great connection, if they trust you, they like you, you’re empathizing with them, they can see reviews and guarantees and testimonials, and you’re answering their questions. How much value is that website that I had, this guy really knows his stuff is, you know, it’s, it’s you sharp window to the world, and it’s communicating the right thing.
Dan Moyer
Oh, my gosh, I feel like I just had a lightbulb moment where, like, I realized that I don’t like you’re gonna have to click on anywhere on websites, right. Like, we all have to do work. And, and I’ve been spending a lot of time refining my process. For when somebody inquires with me, all the way through the wedding day, or all the way through to when they booked me to make as, as minimal Decisions have to do as minimal work as possible, right, all the way down to just like, you know, creating one package, right, like, you know, an automated Calendly link, you know, and all that stuff. But that’s only from when somebody inquires with me, there’s this whole other world of before they inquire me with me, which is my website. And I feel like after listening to this, that I’m making people do so much work on my website by having all these things to look at places to click on and like they have to go to multiple pages to do all these things. When everything you’re saying is like I can picture exactly what I would say for empathy, exactly what I would say for features and benefits exactly what I would say for my about me, huge lightbulb moment for me, right?
Jeff Brown
If you think about it, your website should have one purpose, one sole purpose, you decide what the purpose of that is. I think with most wedding photographers, you really have two purposes, actually, you have the major purpose, and then you have the backup purpose. So you made your purpose is to book a consultation. Now, if you are a studio photographer, if you do high school seniors and stuff like that, it it might be slightly different. You’re a few special for your headshot photography, your main call to action might be book now because you charge $200 for headshots or 300 pounds for a studio headshot. If you charge $3,000 $4,000 for wedding, people aren’t going to book you now. They’re not going to spend $1,000 without first speaking to you. So you need a consultation or a meeting or a call is your main call to action because you can’t get somebody you can’t jump. That is why BMW and these motorbikes I’ve been looking at are asking me, they’re not saying buy a motorbike today for 20,000 pounds or 15,000 pounds and book a test drive because that is the the least friction a person has to do on their journey to becoming a client. Now the second thing you want to do is try and get their email address because you want. So what you do is have a pop up, but you have your pop up set for about 45 seconds. Because once somebody’s been on your website for 45 seconds, they’re probably down to need the price area anyway, they’re quite well invested in you, if the pop up comes up in the first three or four seconds. It’s annoying, it’s really irritating. So then you have a pop up that might say, Get $100 Voucher of any of our album packages when you leave here, because what you want to do is if they’re not ready to book that call yet, you at least want their email address, so you can remark it to them. Because if you think about it, when somebody comes to your website, there’s only four things somebody can do when they come to anybody’s website, they can make a direct purchase through like a book now sort of button, they can schedule a consultation call or they can schedule a studio session, they can phone you using the phone number that you have on display, they can leave their email address in exchange for something like a voucher and don’t say sign up to my newsletter because that’s not very exciting. Make them sign up to something like Oh my You know, my mom or my brides VIP club or you know, give them an incentive to leave their email address. But the fifth thing that somebody can do when they come to the website is the thing that you do want them to do and that is hit the back button without doing one or the other for and the back button is actually the most used button on the internet because people come up Yeah, it’s not for me back. Now it’s not for me back you know the because it’s so easy answers and alternatives are at the touch of our fingers so easy now we don’t have to you know, we’re not jumping in cars drive into studios and looking for different photographers we we want to connect we want to be we want people to empathize with us. We want to see the benefits because people buy benefits. We want to get over a five year price and then we want to take the next action. Then when they get on a phone call or they do a zoom with with Dan. Dan turns on his charm. They’re like oh my god get my check.
Dan Moyer
So that’s how I sell charm and basically, pretty damn close. Goodness gracious, I feel like you hammered on some serious, really actionable nugget not even nuggets just like dropping bombs everywhere. Like to actually, I don’t take a lot of notes. But I took a lot of notes from this. And I feel like this is not inspirational this is this will if you implement this, this is going to make some serious changes in your in how you can run your business and the people who come through it and all that. So as we start to sort of wrap up here, is there any final thoughts and then share a little bit about where people can check out your books and follow you and work with you and all that stuff?
Jeff Brown
Yeah, so one final thought one little takeaway. And obviously, this is all in the book as well. So if you want to go and grab the book, please do and then let me know you’ve got a copy, you know, connect with me on social media and stuff. But you’ve got all this done together, right? So you can have the best website in the world. But if your website isn’t getting found, it’s not going to work. Right. So creating that content that’s good for your client is going to be a good way of getting your website found and the SEO. The other big thing that you need to do is start blogging, you need to be writing a blog because you have two types of search intent to website direct search intent and indirect direct people coming to your homepage and they’re typing in wedding photographer in Austin wedding photographer in London wedding photographer in Paris, right? So they’re ready to buy. They’re looking for a wedding photographer, that is direct search intent, indirect search intent of people typing in best wedding venues in America. How much is a wedding photo? Photographer wedding trends for 2024. So that is indirect these people who haven’t booked their wedding yet are considering booking a wedding. So how can you get in front of these people by writing blogs, so you don’t create a blog called blog and then just upload pictures of the brides that you’ve done. Your Blog becomes a hub of all information for brides and grooms right for couples getting married. You talk about the latest trends, you can do reviews on some of the best wedding venues in your area. Go along, take some pictures, give the pitches to the venue keeps you them on side, write an honest review about it and what you like and oh great, beautiful staircase, the food’s really nice, amazing grounds. So write all these reviews. And then start creating blogs about them. You know, top tips for having a stress free wedding morning. Uncover trends for 2023 for planning your wedding. So you’re in you’ve probably read that book called The ask you answer by Marcus Sheridan. Amazing. It’s an amazing book. And he built like a huge business by answering customers questions who were planning on getting a swimming pool. So his blog became all about do I get a pool? Or do we get a spa you know, and he answered people’s questions people were landing on there hadn’t they were considering it. So he was getting them right at the start of the journey. So your blog becomes aware of tracting people who haven’t yet started. And obviously if you start giving them loads of advice, and you helping them, they’re like, oh, this this, this photographer, this dumb guy is really nice. You know, he’s going to have interesting content. In fact, he’s going to be the first photographer, I gotta get a price off, because he’s helping me along the journey.
Dan Moyer
Okay, so where can people pick up your books?
Jeff Brown
So if you go to Amazon, and obviously, I’ve got three books. So there’s the ambitious photographers journal, which is my goal setting journal. There’s my LinkedIn book called The photographer’s missing link. And then the latest one is called help. My photography website needs more customers.
Dan Moyer
Every website sucks. Okay. Got it a little more classy. Got it? Yeah, that’s
Jeff Brown
the British version. The American version is called out my photography website.
Dan Moyer
Okay, and then your, your website that people can work with you and check out more about you and all that stuff.
Jeff Brown
Yeah, so my own personal website for mentoring is photographers mentor.com And then everything that I’ve discussed about websites, I’ve created a company last year called the photographer’s suite Su i te photographer suite, and we build custom scroll to a sale websites with amazing branding because we do branding calls with you and find out the colors and fonts and design or the brand palette. We create these amazing websites from just 499 pounds. I want photographers to have affordable websites. And then we do all the hosting and email and maintenance and backup from 25 pounds per month for fixed 25 pounds month the same as Squarespace. So we offer a done for you solution. If you if you buy the book and then you’re like, ah, I’d rather have somebody do it. Head over to our website at photographers suite.com and check it out. Oh,
Dan Moyer
that is amazing, Jeff, I, I feel like I need to like, go back and listen to this and take my own notes to it because there’s so much so much very robust conversation about like really taking a website overhaul. So before we started this episode, you know, you said, you were that you were all we’re discussing, you know, books and writing books and all that. And he said, I’m a huge fan of putting it all out there right of, of adding value and just and having, you know, just helping photographers. And yeah, I think people will pay a lot of lip service to that. But you really went above and beyond and shared very clear, precise instructions for how to do this. And I can’t, if that’s what you’re giving me here, I can’t wait to see what’s in the book.
Jeff Brown
fantastic thing. And then that’s the way you know, I’ve been doing this now for six, seven years as a mentor. And I’ve always said, you know, to be authentic to give, give, give, and never sell it’s very, very rarely I put a sales post out. Yeah, I’m always busy. Sometimes my program has a waiting list for people to join. And I think it’s because when you give things comes your way anyway, and people believe in you more, and I’ve and I even say, Well, if you can’t afford me, ask me a question. And I always help you know, I spend a lot of time answering messages via Facebook Messenger for people who just were they’re all photographers. I’m a photographer as well, you know, and if I’m putting good out for the industry. That’s great. That’s what I love to do.
Dan Moyer
Heck, yeah, man. Thank you so much for being here. I’m looking forward to the third time say same time, maybe a year and a half from now.
Jeff Brown
Yeah, brilliant. Brilliant. My next books. Sounds good brother. All right. Thanks a lot. Cheers, Dan.
+ show Comments
- Hide Comments
add a comment