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- [00:00]
A
When you think about showing up on Google, you probably think about the SEO of your website, your blog, maybe your, you know, links from Instagram or Pinterest. But what if they told you that the most powerful part of being able to be found on Google isn't your website at all? It's probably something that you've claimed, maybe you've half filled it out, and if you're anything like me, then you promptly forgot it. And that is your Google Business Profile. Now, I recognize that this is not exactly the sexiest of topics, but hear me out. In 2025, your Google business Profile might just be the most important marketing tool in your entire business. Because your business profile is the first impression that a Google user has when it comes to seeing your business, right? They get photos, they get social proof, they get information about your location and the services that you offer. And now, thanks to some major updates from Google, including the rise of AI overviews, which are those little AI generated answer boxes that now appear at the very top of search results, your Google Business Profile is doing a lot more heavy lifting than it used to. And this is good news because if you're smart about it, you can get in on the ground floor of being found ahead of people who have been in business longer and have more traditional SEO juice behind their websites. In today's episode, I am once again joined by Lydia Fine. She is a photographer and a digital marketing Pro with over 20 years of experience. And Lydia is borderline obsessed with helping small businesses get found on Google. So we are talking through what these AI overviews are, why they matter, and how photographers can optimize their Google Business profiles to help them rise above the rest of their competition and get featured right there at the top of the search inbox. And before we dive in, at the very end of our conversation, after we had stopped recording, Lydia remembered that she had forgotten to share a free resource. This is we talk a lot in the end of the conversation about Google reviews and getting Google reviews. And she has a free step by step guide to getting high quality Google reviews plus not you know, what, you can't do, what you shouldn't do so that you don't get flagged or ignored by Google. You want to get those reviews and you want them to work for you. So you'll find the link to that freebie in the show notes. And in the meantime, let's dive in. Welcome to this Can't Be that Hard. My name is Annemie Tonkin and I help photographers run profitable, sustainable businesses that they love each Week on the podcast, I cover simple, actionable strategies and systems that photographers at every level of experience can use to earn more money in a more sustainable way. Running a photography business doesn't have to be that hard. You can do it and I can show you how. Lydia Fine. Welcome back to this Can't Be that Hard. I cannot believe that it has been years said two years since we had our last conversation. Where is the time going? It's so good to see you.
- [03:21]
B
It's great to see you too. Yes. I have no idea where the time goes.
- [03:24]
A
Oh my gosh. And here we are. And what we're talking about today is completely different. Last time you came on, we were talking about part time photography and the sort of ins and outs of all of that, which is always a hot topic around here. And one of the things that I feel like people lose sight of when they think about what it means to be part time is the fact that actually part time, small business owners in general, it doesn't, it's not limited to photography. It's like they need to be more on top of it, more organized, more automated, more sort of in the know when it comes to getting their name out there and all that sort of stuff. All because they have so many fewer hours during the week to, to devote to that. And so I love how that kind of serves up today's topics, or topic rather, which is all about getting found. Before we dive in, let me give you the opportunity to introduce yourself, talk a little bit about what you do, where you are and then we can just jump right in.
- [04:26]
B
Oh, the dreaded tell me about yourself questions.
- [04:28]
A
Tell me about yourselves like a job interview.
- [04:30]
B
Okay, so I'm Lydia Fine. I am a family, senior and newborn photographer located in North Liberty, Iowa, which is just outside Iowa City. Go Hawkeyes. And I have a, I still maintain a day job as a marketing strategist on top of running a photography business which I started in 2020. And I have a marketing degree and an MBA both from the University of Iowa and a whole lot a couple of decades. Gosh, I'm old of marketing background that has served me very well with my part time photography business and has helped me grow really quickly. So now I also coach and mentor other photographers on how to get the back end of their business in order to so they can charge more, be more profitable and spend less time on their business.
- [05:10]
A
Love it. And I love the fact that you've got this quote unquote day job as a marketing strategist. I mean what a perfect compliment to running a small business and being able to catapult past all of the issues that we all have. But you know, when it comes to being found. Right. There's a thousand different ways that we can have that conversation. But these days you really are talking about, or one really is when you say, you know, how can my business be found? We're really talking about on the Internet. Obviously there are ways to go out and meet people in person and that is great and wonderful and I highly recommend it. But being visible and found when someone is actively searching for, you know, Iowa city photographer, Liberty Iowa family photographer, whatever, that is one of the main drivers, I think, for most of us when it comes to inquiries. And so that's kind of what we're talking about today. And specifically that's changing. I'm going to shut my mouth and I'm going to let you talk a little bit about how that's changing.
- [06:15]
B
Yeah. So SEO, right? Everybody's heard this term and we all spend a lot of time worrying about SEO, working on SEO, trying to figure out the thousand tiny puzzle pieces that work together to create a website that can be easily found on Google. However, now we have this new kind of wrench thrown into the equation that is AI overviews. And if you haven't stumbled across these yet, you might be living under a rock.
- [06:38]
A
You haven't been Googling anything.
- [06:40]
B
Yeah, exactly. You haven't been Googling anything because just a couple of weeks ago Google announced that AI overviews are now the default search experience and they are going to show up with almost every search. There are certain searches where it can tell that you're looking for a specific search business or a specific entity and you won't see an AI overview then. The rest of the time though, AI overviews are going to be the default family photographer near me, newborn photographer in City X. That's when your AI overviews are going to appear and you want to be part of those. And it turns out that the rules for appearing in the AI overview are different. Different than appearing at the top of the. Of the search engine results page or the serpent. Right. So we've always. Yeah, of course they are. So we've all been working so hard to get to the top of the serp and now there's this new thing that's above the serp and now the rules to get there are, are slightly different. Now there's definitely overlap in that, in that Venn diagram, but there are some different rules. So now suddenly we kind of have to do a little bit of a pivot. Pay attention to some things that maybe we weren't paying as close attention to before.
- [07:45]
A
Okay, so just in case we do have any people under rocks, I mean, it's, you know, the end of summer, obviously, maybe you've been on vacation somewhere wonderful and you haven't been googling. An AI overview is basically that like gray box at the top when your results come in. That is AI generated content that tries to answer your question. Right.
- [08:06]
B
Is that a good summary in paragraph form, like in conversational format?
- [08:10]
A
Yes. Okay, so good clarification. And it says at the top like this information can be wrong, blah, blah, blah. Like there's that little disclaimer. In theory, it's a great way to. Without requiring that person to then go click on a bunch of links. Maybe they can just get their question answered. So if I type in, you know, best local newborn photographer, tell me a little bit about what that might then return.
- [08:38]
B
Yeah, right. So actually I did a test on this somewhat recently just to see what happened. You know, best family photographer in North Liberty. And the very first thing that Google says is best is, is subjective. Right. And best means something different to everybody because it does kind of matter what you're looking for. However, then, then Google went on to say, however, some photographers that are commonly mentioned as great family photographers in North Liberty include. And then it proceeded to list another photographer. It proceeded to list me. Woo hoo. A little ego boost there.
- [09:12]
A
Yeah.
- [09:13]
B
And. And then a third photographer. And then in down below that there were three detail paragraphs. Three like breakout paragraphs, one for each of the three photographers mentioned.
- [09:22]
A
Oh wow.
- [09:23]
B
That went into more detail about each one, specifically mentioning what they're known for, what were the services that we provide, and a little bit about what people have said about us. So yeah, wow, it gets very detailed.
- [09:39]
A
And as far as I know, you can't at this point pay to get Google to feature you in that. So talk a little bit about, you know, how does Google decide what to include or who to include in an AI overview? Like what signals is it looking for?
- [09:57]
B
Yeah, so some of the same signals apply as with regular, like ending up at the top of the search results. So that's going to be how well you've optimized your site for SEO. SEO. It's going to be looking for alignment between what the person typed into search and what it can. What it knows about your business. Right. And this kind of leads us into our next kind of detailed topic, which is Google business profiles. But it's going to look at Lots of different signals from around the web. So distance, how far you are located from the person who's doing the searching. Because it's always going to look local for a service like photography. It's going to look for relevance. Again, that's how closely aligned your business and your services are with what they typed into the search. And the third thing it's going to look for is what's called prominence. And that's how trustworthy and well known your business is on the web according to a couple of different factors including, you know, your website SEO again, kind of how you rank the number and quality of reviews that it can find for your business, both in your Google review, your Google business profile and elsewhere, as well as the quality and quantity of your backlinks and the consistency of the information about your business. So there's a lot to unpack there. There's a lot that makes up the prominence score and it's not a score we can see because it's inside the black box of the Google algorithm, but there's some different pieces of that that you can absolutely, you know, put a little effort into and work on increasing your prominence.
- [11:27]
A
Amazing. I am all about figuring out where to start with these kinds of things because it's like oh great, another thing to worry about. But I, I do always feel like when you dive into any of these things, there are some like quick actions that you can take. So I guess maybe we should start with the Google Business profile because I know that plenty of people have this set up and semi optimized but there are probably plenty of people listening who are like, what are we talking about? Exactly.
- [11:56]
B
Yep. So I mentioned there are three pieces, right? Distance, relevance and prominence. So let's just talk first and foremost about the first one which is distance. So how is Google supposed to know where you're located? First of all, we know that there's this problem where a lot of people don't put anywhere on their website where they're located or it's buried deep in the contact page or someplace difficult to find. So here's where your Google Business profile can, can begin serving you.
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A
Right.
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B
You provide a location for your Google Business profile and let me just say, let me dispel a myth right now which is that a lot of people believe if you have a Google business profile for a home based business, if you're like me and you don't have a studio and you work out of your home and you go on location, you don't have to put your home address out there, for the public. Google business profiles allow you to provide an address that helps you verify that you are who you say you are and you are the business that you say you are. But after that, you can turn a little toggle on that says do not show address to the public.
- [12:56]
A
Right.
- [12:57]
B
Yeah. And instead you define a service area, which is essentially like a little polygon on a map. Sure. That says these are the zip codes and the cities that I serve. And you choose essentially an area just around your local location. And Google uses that information combined with the location of the person doing the search to figure out the distance between you and that person searching. Smart.
- [13:22]
A
Yeah.
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B
Yeah.
- [13:23]
A
And if. Let's say that what is on your website is somewhat different. Okay. So for instance, I tell everybody I live in Chapel Hill. I actually live in a teeny tiny town called Carboro, which is like, attached to Chapel Hill, but nobody knows what, you know, where that. Anybody who doesn't live right here doesn't know what that is. Very few people are using that to search. So on my website and everything else, I just talk about, I'm in Chapel Hill or I'm in Durham, whatever. That's my general region. But Google, when I have my actual address in there, will see that it's Carrboro. Which one do they pay more attention to? Do they pay attention to what's on my website or are they paying attention to that Google business profile?
- [14:06]
B
They're going to be looking at the service area as well as your website. So if you know Chapel Hill is the search term, Chapel Hill Photographer is a search term with more volume. Volume. You've optimized your Google profile to include Chapel Hill in your service area. And your website has Chapel Hill photographer all over it. So it's going to read the consistency of those. Those multiple different sources of information. And understand that even though your home address is Carrboro, that you are a Chapel Hill photographer both through your service area and your website. Got it.
- [14:39]
A
Okay, cool. All right. So somebody out there is listening. They're like, it's cool. I have a website. It tells them where I am. I'm on Instagram. They can figure out. They, meaning humans, can figure out where I'm located. Does that person not need to think so much about their business profile? They're specifically their Google business profile. Or is that still important, Relevant? Hang on, guys. I have a quick message for you. Let's take a minute to talk about marketing. If you need more clients or you need better clients, or if you just struggle to keep up with the marketing that you're already doing. I want you to check out the Consistency Club. This isn't just another course to watch, it's not a workbook to fill out. Each month our club members get a done for you marketing plan with email and social templates that take the guesswork out of nurturing your current clients and connecting with new ones. So instead of staring at a blank screen wondering what on earth you're supposed to say or do, you'll have practical tools that help you get your marketing done in a fraction of the time. We've also just launched our new AI powered blog builder tool Inside the Membership, which is blowing everyone's minds. Whether you've never touched AI, have been disappointed by the generic robotic sounding copy that you've gotten in the past, or you have a custom GPT trained up to actually do a pretty good job for you, I would love to show you what this blog builder is capable of. And now is the time to give it a go because along with some exciting new features, our prices are going to be increasing in the new year. Go to thiscan't bethard.comclub to try it out for a month. You've got nothing to lose and a whole lot of new booked clients to gain.
- [16:32]
B
So the way I like to explain the value of a Google business profile is okay, so we're creating websites with the hope that Google indexes all of our pages by index, meaning it reads them and decides to put them into the Google search results. We want Google to read our site and understand everything about us, right? We're asking Google to do a lot of inferring because we're not feeding it every single detail. We're asking it to put together a human story, even though it's a computer. But imagine that Google doesn't have to try to figure out or infer or decipher who you are and what you do, where you're located, what communities you serve. Imagine if magically you could tell Google all of this information about your business in Google's language. You could speak computer to Google about your business and not make Google have to go jump through hoops and index all the pages and read through every single word to try to figure it out. If you could speak Google to Google, why wouldn't you? And that is what your Google business profile does.
- [17:32]
A
Amazing. So walk us through that, not only getting that sort of set up and started, but then maybe we can also get into the particular tips that will help optimizing for that AI overview.
- [17:47]
B
So right off the bat, the first thing you want to do is either claim your Google business profile if one already exists. Sometimes Google will create one for your business even without your knowledge. But if one does not exist at all, then you can simply create one just by going just literally Google, Google my business. And it'll bring up a page that says start now. So start now. It'll ask you to verify some information about your business. And you will have to provide you can either do it via mail. I believe that's still an option to get a postcard in the mail and type in a code more often now people are verifying using video. You would have to on a single video without edits, show documentation, let's say a utility bill or anything on paper. An insurance policy for your business. Things that connect the address where you live you and your business altogether. You show this proof, you upload it to your Google Business profile as part of your verification and boom, you're verified and you're off and running. So that's kind of how to get started if you're at step zero. Okay, so once you get in past the verification process and you're ready to start optimizing your profile, the next piece that you really need to keep in mind is that Google loves name, address and phone number consistency. This nap consistency is the acronym for it. There's so many acronyms and what Google wants to see is a consistent name, address and phone number for your business all over the web. So think about all the places where your business might be listed. Maybe you long ago created a Yelp profile for yourself or maybe you're on nextdoor, your local nextdoor site as a business. Maybe you put yourself in some directory for your community for newborn photographers a long time ago and you don't even remember. These are all pieces that will contribute to your nap consistency. So you need to make sure that they are all the same. And if they are not, you need to go do the legwork to update all of the ones that are out of date so that there's consistency across the board and then make sure your website matches it too.
- [19:49]
A
Right?
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B
And, and I want to take a quick second to just really hammer home how important it is that you put a phone number on your Google Business profile because there are people and you may not be one of them and that's okay. Who still like to do business over the phone.
- [20:05]
A
Right?
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B
And I hear a lot how frustrating it is that they see a business. They immediately want to connect with you. They immediately want to get you on the phone and start talking to and get Excited about working with you for their photos and they run into this brick wall of like, okay, you have to wait a few hours minimum to hear from me because you have to fill out a form and then wait, give them a phone number. You don't have to put your personal cell phone number, just go get a free Google voice number, right. It costs you nothing. It routes right to your regular cell phone and then you have a business phone number that you can put in all of these other places as well as your website. And again that further contributes to your name, address and phone number consistency.
- [20:43]
A
Yeah, that has totally been my thing from the start is that I've had a Google number and I hate using it honestly, like I can't stand the interface. But I do like the fact that it's not my personal cell phone number that's out there all over the place and I know when someone's calling me what you know, which number they're calling. So I can decide based on that whether I'm in a place to answer the phone. So yep. So good. And if that name, address and phone number bit, if you're keeping your personal address hidden on your Google profile and presumably you wouldn't put like your home address on your website, how does that contribute? Does it just get taken out of the equation? Do you know?
- [21:26]
B
That's a great question. So any place that if you are again a studio based photographer then it's easy to do the address consistency because it's just your studio. But if you are home based then I think the best thing to do is to align your website terminology with your service area. So for example, in the footer of my website and I use Iowa City because it's a larger metro, North Liberty is like, like Carrboro a suburb.
- [21:49]
A
Yeah, sure.
- [21:50]
B
So a lot more search volume around Iowa City. So in my footer, you know, it says Iowa City area photographer. And then underneath that I have serving, you know, North Liberty, Tiffin, Coralville, Solon Ely, Swisher, Cedar Rapids. I listen all the rest of the cities in my service area and surrounding areas.
- [22:08]
A
Right.
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B
So that kind of consistency where it's, it's seeing the same terminology over and over again, that is the part that would contribute to the address piece of your nap consistency. If you are a home based business.
- [22:20]
A
Love that. So you've got your name, address, your phone number, you've claimed your Google profile. What else can you do in there to start building that trust and authority that then says of all the businesses in this area, Google's going to pull me out to feature in that AI little summary at the top.
- [22:41]
B
So one thing that I always recommend is to look at your Google Business profile as a front door to your website. So imagine that you could give people a taste of your website and a taste of you before they ever click outside of Google, which is really valuable, Right. We don't want them to have to wait to get to our website or take that extra step to start understanding who we are. So there's a space in your Google Business profile to write a description. Make sure this is a well written description. Use ChatGPT if you need to, but explain who you are, what you do and where you work. Like that's. There you go. And if you know, for example, I kind of use this language in lots of different places where I talk about wall worthy photos for ultra busy people.
- [23:24]
A
Right.
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B
If you, if you have a kind of a spiel that you commonly use, put it in that description. You can upload photos to your Google Business profile and a lot of people are like, oh, what photos do I use? Guess what, we're photographers, we have all the photos.
- [23:36]
A
Right?
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B
So yay, upload photos and continue to upload photos. Add new ones regularly. That's a really big way to make Google happy to see that you're an engaged, active business. Google loves that. It absolutely does. So constantly loading additional photos, taking ones off that maybe don't match your editing style any longer, keeping your photos updated and looking good, that's another great way because people will flip through those photos before they ever click through to your website.
- [24:04]
A
Right. And is there a number of photos that are allowed in your Google Business profile? Is it like 20 or can you just upload as many as you want?
- [24:15]
B
I actually don't know the limit because it's a big number.
- [24:18]
A
That's a big number.
- [24:18]
B
It's a lot. It's a lot because imagine a restaurant that would upload a photo of every dish. That absolutely happens. So you can add a logo image and a cover image and again choose, choose your cover image carefully because it's going to be the biggest one. And then you can upload like a multitude of other images that reflect again your style and the different types of work that you do.
- [24:39]
A
So it should probably align pretty closely with your current portfolio page on your website.
- [24:46]
B
Exactly.
- [24:46]
A
Yeah.
- [24:47]
B
Yes. You do not want somebody to see a bunch of pictures there and then click through and feel like this is completely different photographer. These pictures don't look anything the same. And then yeah, so absolutely spend some time curating the photos on your Google business profile and making sure that they show the best of your work and that they're. They are consistent with your portfolio and consistent with each other. But, you know, the importance of a consistent portfolio is kind of table stakes.
- [25:11]
A
Another. Another topic for another day for sure.
- [25:13]
B
Cool.
- [25:14]
A
Okay, so you've got that information, and then let's talk about reviews. Because I feel like Google reviews, in my mind are the number one place that I am pushing people. You know, after I work with them, I'm like, please write a review, do this. You know, I have a whole song and dance to try and get reviews written. How does that factor into Google's concept of who you are?
- [25:38]
B
Yeah, so that was actually the very next thing on my list that people should focus on after you've loaded your photos to your profile. Now it's time to start building the social proof portion. Because the AI overview that I mentioned earlier, where I said, who's, you know, the best family photographer in my city, the breakdown paragraph that talked about my business, pulled quotes, not quotes, paraphrased my reviews to tell people, hey, this is what Apollo and Ivy photography is really good at.
- [26:07]
A
Wow.
- [26:07]
B
She's well known for being a fantastic communicator, customizing her senior sessions to the hobbies and likes of her seniors. Like all of that was. That language is not on my website. It's in my reviews. So I have a lot of guidance about. About how to get Google reviews, how to start priming your clients early on to leave you a Google review because of how important they are. Now, interestingly, AI overviews also love to see that you have reviews on other platforms as well. Oh, I know it's that you would think that they would favor only their own. It's probably an antitrust thing, but Yelp is probably the next best option for photographers there. There's the knot, I think does reviews as well. I don't do weddings, but I know there are a few other places depending on your genre of photography. But for family, newborn, senior, it's kind of Google reviews and Yelp. It doesn't seem like Facebook reviews are really prioritized all that much, but again, if you can sort of distribute your reviews across multiple platforms. But I primarily focus on Google. Because you really want to build that one up first. Sure. That's where Google is going to first look. And as well as outside of what Google says about the number of reviews you have, I guarantee we've all been shopping on Google's search results, looking at different businesses and being like, okay, these three all have a 4.9 rating. This one has two reviews. This one has seven reviews. This one has 65. Right, okay.
- [27:35]
A
Right.
- [27:35]
B
Like you're immediately going to gravitate toward the one with more reviews.
- [27:39]
A
So I can imagine listening to this as a newer photographer or as someone who has never set up their Google Business profile in the past and thinking, great, here is one more way that I am never going to get found. There are so many people in my area who have been in business for so much longer and they, you know, they're just going to get top billing on this. Is that true? I mean, is it basically one of those things where, like, the longer you've been around, you're just going to get prioritized? Or is there a way that someone who is new and intentional about sort of optimizing all of this can help move themselves up the list?
- [28:17]
B
You know, it is true that down in the search results, Google favors older pages. However, that's not really the way that the Local Pack works because it really is all about how well Google can match. And the Local Pack. Let me back up. I haven't used that term before. Sure. When you are searching for a business, before AI overviews were a thing, there was also a set of Google Business Profile listings that came up in a little box with a map that showed their locations. That's the Local Pack.
- [28:47]
A
Okay.
- [28:47]
B
You, you want to be at the Local Pack. The Local Pack is still there. I was gonna say.
- [28:52]
A
Did they take, did they take that down?
- [28:54]
B
No, it's still there. It's absolutely there. But it appears in general under the AI overviews. Okay. So it's still a way of appearing at the top of the search results. So being really active on your Google Business Profile really like detailed, really comprehensive information about your business in your Google Business Profile. And there's all kinds of information we haven't even touched on yet that you can continue to add to tell Google who you are and what you do. Just really diving into that and spending time on it, keeping your photos, adding new photos. There's a place where you can do like updates, which is sort of like a post, sort of like a post you would do on social. You can do that on your Google Business Profile. You can put promotions that you're doing on your Google Business profile. Google loves these things.
- [29:36]
A
Right.
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B
And this, you do not have to have the longevity in order to show up at the top of the Local Pack. I'm. I'm near the top of the Local Pack in my community and I started my business in 2020. And there are people far below me that have been around for a decade longer. It's just all about the. This piece is all about the effort that you put into your Google business profile in general. How you do your SEO is part of that equation. But you can gain a lot of ground just simply by working on your Google business profile.
- [30:03]
A
Yeah. I'll be completely honest and say that when it comes to my photography business in particular, I am resting largely on the laurels of the fact that I have a membership full of people who hire me over and over again, so I don't have to find new people all the time. And that SEO, because I blogged for several years at the very beginning of my business, starting in 2010, and I've been in business for all this time. I just get like, Google trusts me, basically. But man, my Google Business profile. I remember the first time that somebody suggested that I set that up and I did, and it was like nine years ago probably. And I'm not sure that the photos have been updated since then. And it's. I say that in large part to say I am totally not taking advantage of the new features and all of these things, the way that the algorithm has changed. And I imagine that that's probably true for a lot of really established businesses as well. So I almost feel like the advantage is somebody who's out there paying attention to, like, how can I leapfrog past everybody? Because, I mean, now I know, so I'm probably going to go update it.
- [31:15]
B
But no, you're absolutely right. And the AI Overviews piece absolutely prioritizes business with businesses with recent Google reviews. So not only are getting reviews important, but continuing to get reviews. So making it, like you said, part of your process and just working it in. And this just does not mean sending an email once a year to all of your clients, asking them, begging them to leave you a Google review. Because actually Google hates that. And if it sees a barrage of reviews all at once, it could suspend your profile, it could hide those reviews and send them into the Google review ether. And your clients think, well, I left a review. I can see it. But you can't and nobody else can.
- [31:56]
A
Oh yeah.
- [31:57]
B
So there's so many ways that people have tried to game the system that Google, Google recognizes. So it's. It's really not worth trying to cheat the Google Beast. It knows all the tricks at this point. Yeah.
- [32:08]
A
And I think based on what you're saying about the fact that they want you to have reviews on multiple sites, I think I am going to add into my own process. Like I think it's really important to ask people for one specific review. Like here's a link, please go fill out a Google review. I think that that's good practice because if you just say review me on your favorite place to review, people never going to, they're going to be like where? I don't know. And then they have to hunt that down. They won't do it. So I think the link is really good. But there is no reason that if someone leaves you a Google review and it's let's say March 1st that you can't set up an automation in your system that three or six months later comes back and says you're the best. I super appreciate you for leaving that review six months ago. Would you mind taking two minutes right now? Here's the review and you can like auto populate that in. Can you copy and paste that into. Would you mind copying and sharing that to Yelp as well? You know and then you can make some disclaimer about like I know this is seems silly, but this is what Google wants. And I feel like our clients always, you know when someone loves working with you and they love supporting your small business, asking them for some sort of, you know, you're not asking them for money, you're not even really asking them to think up a new review. Just like, hey, could you, could you take this and put it in another place? They're usually happy to do that sort of thing.
- [33:32]
B
And the best part is and because I'm a huge automations nerd, I have my Google business reviews as they come in, I use Zapier to shoot them into airtable.
- [33:42]
A
Yes.
- [33:42]
B
And then I use AI to categorize them. Oh, this one mentions seniors and communication and preparation. And then I code them all so that when I'm like, oh, I could really use a review in this spot on my website that talks about I can just go find it.
- [33:57]
A
Love, love. Nerd alert. I don't. That's super interesting that you have AI categorize it. I do my own categorizing, but yes, all about having it zapped into one place that's searchable and organizable in a whole bunch of different ways. That's awesome.
- [34:12]
B
Yeah, yeah. So the automation you just talked about where you could like go back a week later and say, hey, you know this amazing review. Here it is. Yeah, here's a link to go. Leave me a review on Yelp. And in case folks don't know that when you set up your Google Business profile. It gives you a link that you can share with your clients that they can just, in one click leave you a review. So that makes it really easy. But definitely don't ask for review without giving somebody the exact way to go. Leave it for you because they're, they're not going to take those extra steps. They're maybe, maybe your mom or your sibling will do that for you, but your average client is just way too busy.
- [34:43]
A
Yeah. And it's not because they don't love you.
- [34:45]
B
Right.
- [34:46]
A
Lydia, this has been an amazing conversation and I imagine it could just keep going on and on. Is there anything that we have missed that we want to tuck in here toward the end?
- [34:55]
B
Yeah, there's one piece and you're right. This is, we barely scratched the surface on this topic. But if somebody is devoting time to really making their Google Business profile work for them, another piece that, that you really want to make sure you spend time on is, is the services portion of your Google Business profile. This is a massive list of different services and Google creates this list using what people search for. So you might find both newborn photography and baby photography in this list. So you want to go in there and just spend a lot of time typing all sorts of variations and seeing if you find a match and yep, okay, there we go. That's a service I offer. Check, add that to my profile. Check, add that to my profile. This is another way that Google figures out that relevance between your services, your business and what somebody's searching for. Because if somebody's having their first child, they might not realize that it's called newborn photography. Or they might not realize that they have a high school senior that it's called senior pictures versus high school graduate photography. So if you can put all of that in your Google business profile because that language is not on your website, how else is Google going to connect you? Again, we're making it so Google doesn't have to do the work and you can add a description under every single service. Now it's tedious to write every single one of those descriptions, but holy moly, is it a huge return on your time invested if you're willing to go out there and just put a sentence under each of the services that you add to your profile and check this list regularly because Google adds things without your knowledge or permission. So you might suddenly log into your Google business profile and see that you've been added as a wedding photographer. But you don't do weddings, so take it off. You also need to be Checking your profile regularly because people can suggest changes. Not that long ago someone suggested that my business name be changed to Apollo. And Ivy like took the word photography, just took it off. I'm like well no.
- [36:47]
A
Kind of important. Yeah.
- [36:49]
B
And a funny story I'm going to wrap. I'll wrap this up real quick but this one just made me laugh. At some point last year, middle and high school students realized that they could suggest changes to their school's Google business profiles.
- [37:01]
A
Oh wow.
- [37:02]
B
And as a result, at one point when you googled hawk to a high school or Hoktua middle school there were magically hundreds of them all over 100. They rolled that back really quickly I'm sure. But still everybody learned a valuable lesson about how the public can make suggestions and Google will sometimes approve those without you even knowing. So check it often.
- [37:25]
A
Right. Interesting. Oh that's so crazy. And children, they are just the best little deers at all times.
- [37:32]
B
Middle schoolers.
- [37:36]
A
So good. Well Lydia, tell everyone where they can connect with you, find you. I know that you offer some one on one help with this kind of thing, is that right?
- [37:44]
B
That's true. Yes I do mentoring and coaching for photographers on all things business related on the business side of your photo business. Everything that isn't related to the clickety click of the camera I do. So Google business profiles are part of that. Helping get set up and optimizing your Google business profile helping you through issues with it. And you can find me my website is Apollo like the Greek God and Ivy like the plant. So Apollo and Ivy.com youm can find me on Instagram. My photographer's Instagram is actually lydiafine Underscore for photographers. That's a mouthful. Sorry about that. Where I just share business tips for photographers and then my actual photography business. This one is LydiaApolloAndivy. So I'll send you all those links.
- [38:26]
A
For the show notes and we'll put em Yep, we'll put em all right below wherever it is that you're listening to this. So you can just go click and end up right there. But this has been lovely. It was great reconnecting with you. I love that we have had a completely different conversation than we did the first time and equally good. Potentially even more valuable for a wider swath of people. So thank you so much for sharing your time and expertise.
- [38:49]
B
No problem. I'm always happy to be here.
- [38:51]
A
Have a great day. That's it for this week's episode of this can't be that Hard. I'll be back same time, same place next week. If you like the show, be sure to check out thiscan'tbethard.com to explore all the resources we have for photographers. And of course, it would mean the world to me if you would leave a review of the show on itunes or Spotify. As always, thanks so much for joining me. I hope you have a fantastic week.