[▶️] Photography website user experience
I was recently invited for a live Facebook event (hosted by Julie Christie from Togs in Business) where I shared some insights into what photographers like you should be thinking about when it comes to photography website user experience.
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The importance of WordPress maintenance: what types of problems you can have if you don’t care for your WP site
WordPress' popularity leads to complexity as well. Combining this with poor hosting services, improper management, security attacks and negligence, and you get a slew of possible errors. The solution is prevention: properly manage your WordPress site to avoid security and functionality problems down the line.
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In-depth guide: Photography website planning guide: find the clarity you need before building a strong online business
It's important to dedicate some time to do research and to strategize before building a new photo website. Follow these guidelines to gain more clarity.
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Organizing your images into galleries & collections to help people navigate your archive
How you structure your galleries will help users navigate your site more easily. For a small portfolio site, just a few galleries and you're done. But with a large image archive, creating (nested) collections is important.
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DPI & PPI are irrelevant, only pixel dimensions matter on your website
With everything related to your photography website, only image pixel dimensions matter. You can ignore DPI/PPI, that's just a piece of metadata, only relevant for printing and scanning.
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Custom website case-study: unique WordPress design for award-winning photographer Chris Dei
See what website design you can achieve if you use the right WP theme and if you let yourself be creative along the way. When the type of photography you shoot demands something special, it's OK to step outside of the norm and creating something unique to showcase it online.
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In-depth guide: Image SEO essentials: How to optimize for Google Image search to drive more traffic to your photography website
Image SEO guidelines for ranking in Google Image search, along with explanations of why you'd want to rank in Google Image search, how it different from regular SEO, how to track your image SEO results and what the future brings.
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Q&A #11: website caching, WordPress hosting, paid links and image sizes
Answering your questions about website caching, good WP hosting providers, paid/affiliate links and how to size images on your site (for good performance).
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Google Chrome to show security warnings on your site if you don’t have a SSL certificate
Google is really making a push towards HTTPS recently, and this is just the next step. You should really take some time to get an SSL certificate and move your site to HTTPS.
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Single-page websites: when are they a good idea for your photography business?
If you just want an "online business" card (a bio, a short portfolio, some info about your services, and your contact info), then a single-page website might be a great fit for you. But you have to learn their pros and cons first.
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In-depth guide: You need a photography business plan, not just a website
Start thinking like a business owner and let go of the "build it and they will come" mentality. You need to work hard on all aspects of your photography business to differentiate yourself.
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Q&A #10: Portfolio tools SEO, domain name tips, blog vs portfolio pages, WP plugin performance
Answering your questions about SEO-shortcomings of portfolio tools, tips for choosing your domain name, differences between blog & portfolio pages, and how WordPress plugins don't slow down your site.
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Optimize your photography website for repeat visitors to convert them into clients
After you've clarified your site for first-time visitors, make sure that repeat visitors have good reasons to come back to the site. And when they do, that they can find what they're looking for very quickly.
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Website makeover case study: using the power of CSS to improve an existing PhotoShelter site
You can bring new life into your existing photography website by adding custom CSS code and doing minor template tweaks. An improved online presence will grow your business as a result.
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In-depth guide: Clarify your photography website for first-time visitors to help drive more business
Most of your website visitors are there for the first time. They're probably a bit confused and they need your guidance. Optimize your website to turn them into repeat visitors (and eventually into clients).
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Using call-to-action buttons to guide people through your photography website
One of the most under-utilized ways of improving your photography website, call-to-action buttons can encourage visitors to perform the actions you want them to take on your site (whether that's contacting you, booking a photo shoot, viewing your portfolio, etc.)
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12 ways to make your photography website more trustworthy
Follow these user-experience guidelines to differentiate your photography website, attract more clients, and show that you truly care about your work.
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Exciting changes to the ForegroundWeb site (access the new Subscriber Area)
The relaunch of foregroundweb.com comes with many design improvements and, most importantly, with many more web-design articles and resources.
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The 4 types of thumbnail grids: what’s the best way to display thumbs on your photography website?
A comparison of the most common ways to display photo thumbnails (along with examples and recommended plugins).
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Q&A #7: building a new site, image sizes, newsletter automation and optin plugins
This Q&A covers structuring and building a new site, recommended image sizes, newsletter automation and optin plugins.
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In-depth guide: 60+ photography website mistakes – the complete guide to finding and fixing your website problems
With straight-forward ideas and many examples & resources, this guide will get your site on the right track. Fix as many mistakes as possible to achieve photo website mastery! All ideas are short and come with their own resources and solutions to help you eliminate any website problems.
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A quick overview of integrating a blog into your photography website
Your options for integrating a blog into your existing site and combining different platforms into a hybrid photo website.
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In-depth guide: The process of selecting images for a strong & coherent portfolio
Properly choosing your portfolio images is important, but also very difficult. This article includes guidelines for building a better (online & offline) photography portfolio, and a curated selection of resources to learn more.
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Common web-design worries expressed by photographers
A round-up of answers given by photographers (looking to build a website) when asked what they're worried about.
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