This week we speak to Karen Julia, Wedding Photographer & SEO Consultant, about all things image optimisation.

Featured Resource: https://photoseolab.com/image-seo/

Where to find Karen:

Website: https://photoseolab.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karen-julia/

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Episode Sponsor

Massive shout out to NOVOS for sponsoring the full second season of WTSPodcast.

NOVOS, the London-based eCommerce SEO agency, has won multiple awards for their SEO campaigns including Best Global SEO Agency of The Year 2 years running. Trusted by over 150 global eCommerce brands including the likes of Bloom & Wild, Patch and Thread, NOVOS provides technical eCommerce SEO expertise with a creative edge by specialising across platforms like Shopify & Magento. They have been named as one of 2021's best workplaces in the UK and with a diverse, gender-balanced team are a culture-first agency.

Where to find Novos:

Website - https://thisisnovos.com/

LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/thisisnovos

Twitter - https://twitter.com/thisisnovos

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/thisisnovos/

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Episode Transcript:

Areej: Hey everyone! Welcome to a new episode of the Women in Tech SEO episode. I’m Areej and I’m the founder of Women in Tech SEO.  And today joining me is the brilliant Karen Julia, wedding photographer and SEO consultant. Hey Karen!

Karen: It's great to be here.

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This season is sponsored by NOVOS. NOVOS, the London-based eCommerce SEO agency, has won multiple awards for their SEO campaigns including Best Global SEO Agency of The Year 2 years running. Trusted by over 150 global eCommerce brands including the likes of Bloom & Wild, Patch and Thread, NOVOS provides technical eCommerce SEO expertise with a creative edge by specialising across platforms like Shopify & Magento. They have been named as one of 2021's best workplaces in the UK and with a diverse, gender-balanced team are a culture-first agency. Check them out on thisisnovos.com or follow on Linkedin @thisisnovos

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Areej: I'm so excited to have you on board. And I love that. I think from the very first time we ever spoke, I remember you telling me all about how you're a wedding photographer. Introduce yourself to everyone and let us know what you do in your world.

Karen: Awesome. Well, I'm a wedding photographer, as you've mentioned, and I'm also an SEO consultant as well.

The approach I have with SEO is to really kind of coach and empower and educate clients. So it's a little bit of a kind of random way that I got into this. I didn't really set out. Intending to do SEO, but I phoned from my own business. I wanted to be phoned more by the right client and Google, as we know, as a fantastic matchmaker.

So I started learning SEO back in 2007 and got my website ranking really well, and then went through all the trials and tribulations like Panda and penguin and Got banned from Google at one point. And it was purely accidental. It was not intended to be not. But I realized then that you can't really do SEO kind of half-heartedly, you know, it's kind of all or nothing because there's so many kinds of updates and changes and it's a constantly evolving kind of space really.

So I realized that I needed to improve my lack of resources as well in terms of where I was getting trusted information from. And that's when I started helping people in the community, the photography community that I'm in.

Areej: Do you help other wedding photographers optimize their websites?

Karen: I do. I have a client base of photographers around the world from the U S I've worked with clients and New Zealand, Australia, kind of, I'm thinking there's a couple of different African countries as well.

Europe. So I have an international client base and really the niche that I specialize in is wedding photography specifically. Yep.

Areej: And how do you currently split your time between the SEO consultancy and the wedding photography?

Karen: Well, wedding photography is quite seasonal in the UK, the wedding seasons, April to September.

So previously before I realized how much I love SEO and helping other photographers, I was shooting about 40 or 50 weddings a year, but with The kind of SEO consultancy work that I do now, I tend to split it more evenly. So in summer there's more of a focus on photographing weddings. So that's kind of April to September.

And then my main kind of SEO season, if you like, is October to March. So I still do a couple of weddings over season and I still do have SEL clients. I have my  as well. But with the pandemic, it's actually been quite helpful, I think, to have an alternative special specialism. So I have been working with more clients and students this summer than this year.

Areej: Yeah, I can imagine I have a really good friend of mine. Both her and her husband have a wedding photography business, and I know things have been really difficult and you know, not very obvious in terms of rules and regulations. So it must be really good to kind of have that balance between both and be able to juggle both.

Karen: I love the variety and I've always been the type of person that loves to learn a variety of different things. You know, I, I, I think variety's the spice of life and to be able to photograph weddings and be out on the weekends and kind of work in with big groups of people, but also the kind of educational side of what I do means that I get to speak to wonderful creative, talented photographers that are in the world.

And it's really kind of rewarding.

Areej: Yep. I love that. And I also am really, really thankful to how you're always on the Facebook group on Women in Tech SEO, and you're always answering people's questions. So, you know, as a brilliant woman, like what empowers you today and what empowers you to be, you know, juggling both those things at the same time.

Karen: Education is so powerful. And I think really, for me, I think. The kind of concept of maybe having limited access to knowledge can really have an influence in terms of holding people back or not being able to kind of truly shine. So I'm really passionate about education. It kind of drives everything out too. And with the clients that I work with or with the people in the community that I spend time supporting.

And so I kind of allocate a little bit of time every week to make sure That I've kind of spent a little bit of time, maybe supporting others in the community. I'm part of the mentorship program within Women in Tech SEO as well. You know, I think I'm, I'm really passionate about education. It's something that from quite a young age, I had to fight quite hard to be able to continue my own education on.

I just think that that shouldn't be a limit to anyone, you know, we're in a community, even amongst competitors. When we all kind of have the knowledge to be able to kind of truly be the best version of ourselves, then we're able to kind focus on other things, like what makes our business different or what are the unique things that we can bring, whether it's to market or to community or to any space, really.

So education and kind of empowerment is what really drives me.

Areej: Absolutely love that. And you know, for women who are listening, who are just starting off in the SEO industry, what advice would you give them?

Karen: I think really don't be afraid to niche down. The world needs more experts. There's lots of generalists out there, and there's nothing wrong with being a generalist at all.

But I think being an expert in a specific niche pervades. Almost less competition in a way, but also a better kind of experience for clients. And that's no bad thing, you know? So I think if there's something that you're really passionate about or that you care deeply about, then being able to create a kind of niche in that area is something that may kind of mean that you enjoy your job more and also your clients can benefit from all the kinds of subtle nuances within that specific niche.

So I think that would be my kind of initial, you know, if I was kind of starting over again right now and thinking about what maybe SEL area I wanted to focus on I think doing something that was maybe connected to like a hobby or an interest that you've got a little bit of background in that someone who wasn't involved in that area may not know.

I think that can actually be really beneficial. And I think the other thing is as well, you know, take, take part and they can have community options that are out there. I think the, the, the work that you have done in the industry and the SEO industry reach as I just continue to be impressed and. Just, just find your inspiration, to be honest in terms of everything that you've done for the community.

I think there's so many resources out there. So I would say that to anyone that is starting out, you know, don't be afraid to ask for help. There's lots of people that are more than happy to share resources and skills and knowledge. If you are maybe needing help getting started, then the mentorship program that women in tech SEO will do is fabulous.

You know, there's been lots of great feedback from previous cohorts and things. So I think that that's really, they're the key things, you know, focus on what you love and don't be afraid to ask for help. 

Areej: Yup. I absolutely love that. And you're completely right. And I think within not just our community, but within any community, you, you tend to find, you know, people who from our, from all stages and all walks of life, you know, some who have been doing this for over 10 years and others who are just starting out and everyone has something very valuable and very helpful to offer.

Karen: Absolutely. And it's the sort of industry where even if you've been in it a long time, like I've been SEO optimizing websites since 2007, really, but in a way we're all kind of quite new in terms of, you know, new updates. They're constantly changing, they have an equal system or kind of environment, really.

So I think that kinda keeps it exciting and it keeps it fresh and it means that. But even people that maybe haven't been in the industry that long, like I constantly learn new things all the time, you know? So just because someone's new doesn't necessarily mean that they're, they're either experienced or knowledgeable.

And I think it's a little bit different from other industries, you know, because of the constantly changing situation and the freshness of this kind of information.

Areej: Yup. Yup, absolutely love that. So today we are here to talk about all things, image optimization, which completely makes sense within your niche and your industry.

So maybe we can start off by just telling us a little bit about what, what is the importance of image optimization?

Karen: Really? There's a, there's a lot of different levels to this, so, well, optimized images are going to provide a better user experience just from the simple point of view of PGS. Been able to load faster.

So that's a key thing we know for our kind of user experience, especially in line with the core web vitals and then the overall page experience situation with giggles. There's also the kind of really allowing Google to play matchmaker with getting content in front of the right people. So there's a lot of different, little small things that you can do with images to really help Google understand them better.

And Help, I suppose, kind of be shortened for more of the right surface ALS. Yeah. And if you think that within you know text content, there's lots of different kinds of ways that you could write the one article and adapt in the ways of writing the article can help. With Google play matchmaker is a bit better.

Images are the same, but if you've got quite a lot of them in the page, then each one of those images has a little opportunity to just kind of spread in the net of who you could be shown to. So it's a really kind of powerful opportunity you know, in terms of making sure that they're optimized properly.

Areej: Yeah. And I guess with some people they can either be starting off a website completely from scratch, which then makes it a little bit easier to start thinking about that from the beginning. But with other folks, this is something they might be thinking of a few years down the line of having a website that already has tons of images.

So what, and at which point in the process, is this something to prioritize them to think about.

Karen: Well, ideally the time to kinda think about image optimization is before you even import images into the software that you're going to use to edit them. But there's a couple of different approaches that I take, I think if it's a client with a new website, then we can get those systems in place right off the bat.

And that's great when I'm working with clients who maybe have larger. Macy websites, which is more often the case, then it's a case of really kind of chosen. What's going to give us the best return for our time? Right now I'm starting to put things right. And the great situation at the moment is there's lots of different software out there to be able to see how things are performing, to see if we've got images.

Ryan can condensers. So. We can use that, get some kind of information and then make a decision strategically to kind of focus on the areas first. And it's just a case of chipping away at it. But aside from that, I think having the correct processes in place is so, so important. I'd highly recommend that everyone have a kind of set process or set range of steps.

For image optimization. And that ensures that you've kind of completed all the different potential opportunities that you can have for your photos. And that should really start at the kind of before you've even imported any photos.

Areej: Yeah. And I know that you've mentioned that you wanted to share a little bit about that process that you have in mind and what you tend to do with different clients.

Do you tend to start a certain way or are there different ways, depending on the website and the scale of, or how many images they've gone?

Karen: I mean, I tend to kind of personalize things to a specific client, but I think for the benefit of it or listeners, that process usually involves a bit of software called Adobe Lightroom.

Now I'm not sponsored or connected to them in any way. But I would kind of really highly recommend it because it enables tools to be optimized in a bulk tape way, which is. Awesome for team efficiency. I'm all about team efficiency and having processes and systems in place. So. Within Adobe lightroom.

When you import photos, you can apply a metadata preset, and really that's the first stage in terms of photo optimization. So when you've got a metadata preset, essentially what that does is add some X of data to the fail. And there's all sorts of valuable information that you can add on there. The copyright situation who took the full tool, where the photo was taken.

And so there's lots of opportunities right away before the photos have even gone near a website to get some valuable information there. And I know Google's been beta testing and showing image licensing. So that's something that's going to really provide useful information for Google to show if her photos are copyrighted or not.

So that that's usually where I would kind of start in that process. And one of the things that are found out that. It really doesn't seem to be common knowledge. I don't think Adobe Lightroom has a cloud version of the software. I typically use classic as to most of my photography clients, but the cloud version would be perfect for agencies because it means that you can have cloud level access, you know, from a bunch of different departments, remotely for optimized photos.

So that's something that you know, is going to be an efficiency and a time-saver.

Areej: Yep. That's really, really helpful. That's something I personally wasn't aware of. So I'm sure a lot of folks in the audience will find that very helpful. And what is some way that we can measure whether we can say, okay.

Yep. That's great. This is now considered optimized or no, there's more work that needs to be done on it.

Karen: I think SEO in general is an ongoing continual process. Certainly with all the various kinds of steps that you can take in terms of image optimization is something that should help an image be shortened.

And so the way that I usually would measure the success for that is. Using or analyzing the data within Google search console, we've got a whole wealth of data to show what terms are pages being shown for. But also H refs are really good for showing whether Sarah features have been shown for any given URL.

And that's something that I usually can refer to. To monitor the success of a campaign. I know that if the fails are named really well and they're sized in a, an appropriate way to be as kind of as fast logged in as possible and optimized really well. I know that that has a knock-on positive effect with increasing the chance of those falses being shown in search.

So I use eight Schrafft's to kind of monitor the success of that. But Google search console absolutely has its place.

Areej: Yep. And what about like, if a client shows up and, you know, they've got tens of thousands of these images, what kind of timeframe do you have in mind in order to work on that project and have actual things that come out your feet where, okay.

That's pretty much you're in a good state right now.

Karen: Well, I think if, if I'm working on a large website, which I've got quite a few at the moment, then the benefit of software lake Lightroom, as that you can just bulk import all the photos at once attach a metadata preset to the whole lot and ex export them all whilst.

Optimizing the fail names at the same time. So you could either do them in batches to have different file names, or you could have a sequential fail name situation. Often when I see websites that have maybe just the default fail them. Usually those websites don't have any images shown in syrups at all.

And those tend to be the ones that need the most work. So really, if you don't get the file names, right. I usually find that there's a lot of other things on there that aren't optimized either. So in those situations, you know, If that fits the situation with the website's performance, you can literally just import a model and one goal and improve the names and batches, and then export them to an optimal size.

So it's actually a fairly efficient process. If you work through the different steps late, the room has a map module as well. And that allows you to very easily and in a bulk type way at geotag and information. So adds in the location of different photos and reinforces the location information that might be mentioned in the alt text.

Then I know where you're going to get to accessibility in a minute. But I think I have the ability to do that in bulk. Just makes...

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