How To Create A Website That Makes Brides Fall In Love | Part 1. The Homepage
May 25
This post is part of the series, The Ultimate Guide To Being A Wedding Photographer — advice for running a successful wedding photography biz. Click here to view a list of all the posts in this series.
Oh my goodness… this is the first post for my series, How To Create A Website That Makes Visitors Fall In Love — which is part of my bigger series, The Ultimate Guide To Being A Wedding Photographer.
Whaaaaat — A series, within a series???
Yes!!!
Are you so excited? Well, I am.
Let’s dive in!
Up until now, I’ve been talking a lot about how important your brand experience is. I’ve also shared a lot of info about how to successfully use your blog to grow your wedding photography (or any creative) business.
You really need to be driving traffic to your website and blog (from your social media posts, business cards and printed material, etc.) because your website is your “Brand HQ!” This is your virtual real estate, where you have the potential to make visitors fall in love — and have to book you!
Your website (with your blog) is one of the most vital pieces of your brand experience. It can make or break your business.
But lucky for you, my superpower is designing websites that take creative female entrepreneurs’ brands to the next level. So I’m going to share some of my secrets!
I offer two website design options for my clients: Single page scrolling, or 5-page designs. (You can click here to get the details)
But they are both broken into the same 5 key sections (or pages). Over the next five days I’ll be going over each section (page) and explain why they’re so important, and what you need to have to make them work.
Today, we’re starting with your website homepage
Your Website Homepage
Your homepage is typically the first page visitors land on when they come to your site. So that makes it incredibly valuable real estate.
You need to grab your visitors’ attention right away.
Otherwise they’ll click away and visit someone else’s site.
To do this, I have three suggestions:
one. | Introduce Yourself
If a potential client is bouncing around the interwebs, looking for their dream photographer, chances are, they’re landing on a lot of websites that look the same.
What do these sites have in common? Wedding photos!
Well, that’s good because they’re looking for a wedding photographer. But it’s bad, because all those sites start to look the same.
I don’t care how great your photo skills are — to a potential client, it all starts to look the same.
So, instead, I suggest my clients use this valuable real estate to introduce themselves!
Just put yourself in that bride’s shoes for a second… she’s going from website to website, looking for HER photographer, but it’s just becoming a blur of other brides in white dresses…
Then she lands on your site, and instead, sees YOU. Yes, a photo of you, the photographer, and a quick into to let her know she’s in the right place (or in the wrong place if she’s not your Ideal Client). Either way…
#winning
two. | Get To The Point
Like I said, this is valuable real estate, and your visitors aren’t going to waste their time. So let them know they’re in the right place.
Tell them:
- who you are
- what you do
- why you do it
- where you’re located
Be concise. The point of the home page is to get them to dig deeper into your website. Which brings me to my next suggestion…
three. | Have A Teaser Section
Like I said, the point of your homepage is to let Ideal Clients know they’ve landed in the right place, and entice them to continue through your website (get more info).
So, for my 5-page website clients, I like to create a “teaser” section… something to draw visitors in…
This could be a few of your most popular blog posts, some featured weddings, a peek into you client experience, or if you have an email opt-in — this is the perfect place!
Again, Homepage = very valuable real estate!! So, don’t waste it.
Think of what is most important to your brand and brand experience, and use your “teaser” section to share it!
Well, what do you think of my little “series-within-a-series???” Do you love it? I’m super excited to drop some serious knowledge on you, for a winning website!
Be sure to come back tomorrow to read Part 2 | Your Website About Page!
And girl, if you’re getting sick of the DIY-game (if your website is being held together with metaphorical duct tape….) and you’re ready to invest in yourself, give me a shout!
