12. Get Discovered with Long-Term Marketing & SEO: Expert Strategies from Marketing Pro, Kara of The Kara Report

We're thrilled to be joined by Kara Duncan, founder of The Kara Report, a content marketing agency that serves women-owned service-based businesses. In this episode, we dive into the essentials of search engine optimization (SEO) and long-term marketing from the lens of calligraphers and wedding professionals!

Kara shares valuable insights into the differences between long-term and short-term marketing, practical SEO strategies, and how to effectively integrate blogging into your business. Tune in to learn about actionable steps you can take TODAY to improve your website's SEO, the importance of diversifying your marketing efforts, and how to use AI tools like ChatGPT for content creation. Kara truly blessed us with her expertise and after listening, we have no doubt that you'll be able to start optimizing your online presence for sustained growth!

If you're interested in working with Kara, she specializes in website copywriting and offers done-for-you marketing services to get your business found in a sustainable, search-driven way using Pinterest and blogging. She's worked with six and seven-figure businesses across a variety of industries, from wedding pros and course creators to fashion designers and more. You can learn more about her business at thekarareport.com.

🔗 Links to resources mentioned in this episode:

• Connect with Kara on instagram here!
• Learn more about Kara's offerings here!
• Listen to Kara's Podcast, The Kara Report
• Need a website hosting platform? 
  • Try Squarespace for free
  • Get a free month of ShowIt
• Free keyword research tool mentioned: Ubersuggest

Join Shaochen's Free Calligrapher Masterclass - 3 Steps to Booking Your Dream Wedding Clients 

Transcript

alane_2_06-18-2024_151639: 1:10

Hello and welcome back to Calligraphy Biz Corner. A couple of weeks ago, we put a poll up on our Instagram about topics that you would be interested in learning more about. And last episode, we talked about pricing, which was one of those poll choices. And today we are talking about another highly requested topic, which is SEO or search engine optimization and long term marketing.

shaochen_2_06-18-2024_131639: 1:36

I'm really excited about today's episode because this topic is one I feel like I'm always wanting a better understanding of, but also because I've been a fan of our guest today, Kara of the care report for a long time. I remember getting connected to her through you, Elaine. And then she launched her podcast and it's easily become one of my go to podcasts I listen to.

alane_2_06-18-2024_151639: 2:00

Yeah. Her podcasts it's called the carer report, and we'll be sure to link it in the show notes, but it's also become like one of my go tos. She shares just such. digestible, whether it's bite size or whether she has like a guest expert on but tips on marketing strategies for your business that feel really doable. Like they don't feel overwhelming, which is what I love the most about her podcast. But Karen and I actually connected like, I think it was back in 2020. we used to have a Hoboken creatives group in town. And like every couple months we'd have somebody come in and do like a guest, not a lecture, but you know, like a session on something specific. And she was doing Pinterest, but I. Don't think that I could go to that because I didn't actually connect with her then. It was after that, that I started following her. And then eventually I actually hired her to help me do all of my blogging, SEO and Pinterest management. And so we have been working together one on one for, I'm going to say going on four years now.

shaochen_2_06-18-2024_131639: 3:02

That's awesome. And I love that story because it goes to show that, like, Cara put herself out there and you weren't able to attend her session, but eventually became a client of hers. So like, you never know what's going to happen, what kind of connections you're going to make when you put yourself out there,

alane_2_06-18-2024_151639: 3:16

Yeah, it's so true. So Cara Duncan is the writer behind the Cara report, a content marketing agency, serving women owned service based businesses. She specializes in website copywriting, along with offering done for you marketing services to get your business found in a sustainable search driven way using Pinterest and blogging. She's worked with both six and seven figure businesses across a variety of industries from wedding pros. course creators, fashion designers, and more.

shaochen_2_06-18-2024_131639: 3:48

we're going to turn it over to our interview with Cara in just a second, but make sure you have your notebooks ready for this one. There actionable takeaways that we were even jotting down notes during our recording with her. So let's dive in.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 4:04

Welcome, Kara. It is so nice to meet you, especially after being Instagram friends for so long. Why don't we get started with a brief introduction about you and your business?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 4:16

Thank you guys so much for having me. I'm so excited to be on the podcast. My two second introduction is basically I started in the wedding industry. I actually started with a destination wedding planning blog when I was planning my own destination wedding, and then it kind of turned into a blog. business as a destination wedding travel agent and then planner. And it was like a whole lot of fun until 2020 and then boom, shut down. I'll let you guess why. And then when that happened, I was kind of like looking at what I wanted to do next. And I realized like one of the things that was working really well for me was like. So then I started offering it to other wedding professionals at first, and then I just like love the B2B industry and had a toddler. So travel was like a little more stressful and less like exciting and fun. And yeah, now, now we're here.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 5:09

Do you still, I'm just curious, do you still have your travel business in addition to your, your current business as well?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 5:16

Yeah, I do, but I have contractors that actually do the wedding planning, so I don't do any wedding planning. I do some of the marketing and like SEO on the back end for it, but I'm not actually involved in it other than

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 5:28

Wow,

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 5:29

I love how you've transformed it though to align with your priorities now and where your life is in this moment and what you really enjoy doing and have been able to like set things up so that it works really well for you. I also love your trajectory because I feel like it's such a testament to just like following what is of interest to you and things kind of just organically open up and change and you don't have to Stay set in one career path, like you can grow and change with it.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 5:56

And it's so funny. Like, I know you guys talk about this on the podcast too, but it's like, I would have never, like when I was a destination wedding planner, I thought like, this is the best thing ever. I can't imagine anything better than this. So it's just kind of crazy that it's like, you can think that something is for you in one season, but like, you don't need to be so attached to it. Right. Like something even better might be around the corner, which I think is cool.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 6:21

That that's such a good reminder.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 6:23

Okay. So let's dive into our episode. We are talking about long term marketing. So let's define a couple things first. Tell us about the difference between long term marketing and short term marketing. And also can you define SEO for us and what that stands for?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 6:39

Yeah, absolutely. So I think there's like so many buzzwords in the like marketing space, and it can be so tricky because everybody uses them a little bit differently, or they'll use this different words to describe the same thing. So kind of for the sake of our conversation, when I think of long term marketing, I think of like efforts you can make. At any time, maybe right now, maybe three months ago or whatever efforts you made to get in front of people when they're searching for you versus like short term marketing. I think of as like more active marketing, which means like, what can I do right now to get in front of people that are maybe looking for me and maybe not looking for me. So to give you an example, like Long term marketing would be something like blogging where you can batch four episodes at a time and then be found for like two years later at versus active marketing is like, I'm going to show up on Instagram stories and promote my offers. And then SEO, search engine optimization, which is basically like a fancy way of saying, like, how can I get on Google? Really any search engine, but usually people are thinking about Google and SEO is just kind of how we can show up there.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 7:47

I love that you said that you can start longterm marketing efforts now, and then it'll just kind of continue to pay off in the long run. And I feel like that's a really good way to kind of differentiate between the two or when you're thinking about your own marketing strategy of like, you know, What can you do that's longterm that will help people continuously find you versus what can you do today to help people find you today? So there's, there's a calligraphy business podcast. So we would love to know why we as calligraphers or even just creative business owners, wedding professionals in general should care about longterm marketing. Cause I feel like we do get very focused on. Showing up on Instagram, showing up on stories, trying Tik Tok, like all of those marketing channels that I do think are considered more short term. So why should we maybe put some of our efforts into long term marketing?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 8:39

Yeah, for sure. So right off the bat, I'm like, diversify, like with everything, right? Diversify your offers, diversify your money, all of those things. But the second main reason is time freedom, especially in the wedding industry. You see over and over again, how people like Burn themselves out over wedding season. And then when wedding season ends, they have to start all over again with booking season, it's really easy to get stuck in like a feast or famine mode. When you're like only marketing, when you need clients and it's really stressful because you're like reactivating a slow Instagram account again, or you've burned yourself out. And I think that's like one of the reasons we see a lot of wedding professionals. End up leaving the industry because it is so stressful to do it all. A lot of us started our businesses, which I know you guys talk about on the podcast all the time is that we want time freedom. And so long term marketing is kind of one of those ways to take the pressure off, always needing to show up, which I think is really cool. It will. It'll also kind of like nurture when we look at a blog post, it'll nurture those couples that are looking for you during wedding season in a time that you don't necessarily have to like connect with them. You know, in the Instagram DMs, you're not necessarily in there all day in wedding season, but you still have like content to help them connect with you. Like they're excited to just plan their wedding. Right. So it's kind of a way to fill your funnel, I guess on the backend, you would say.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 10:02

I like the idea of looking at your long term marketing and short term marketing as kind of having two different goals almost, right? Like long term marketing can maybe be more of that education positioning yourself as an expert. And while you can bring that into like Instagram. Or Tik TOK, or, you know, other social media platforms. It is more time consuming for sure to be showing up all the time. But I also think that sometimes people are just turning to those channels for a little more entertainment or to connect with like the person behind the brand, not necessarily get educated on, you know, what is the proper way to set up a seating chart or something like that.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 10:37

That's so true.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 10:38

I love that. I feel like people can actually find educational content when they're looking for it, versus like what you're saying, Elaine, where it just comes across their feed by chance.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 10:47

Right.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 10:48

All right. So I feel like there are so many different things you could do when it comes to SEO. When we had Susie of Lawson house on an episode nine, she basically mentioned that. There are a lot of things you could do that improve your SEO kind of almost like the more things you do, the better it gets. But knowing that we have limited time, I'd love to kind of narrow it down. If someone is looking to up their SEO game, what are like top three things that they can do to really make an impact?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 11:18

Yeah, so I think one of the ways I kind of like to look at it is, Pinterest has something like, a confidence score, which is like, how confident are they that you're going to be the best result? And I kind of think of Google as the same way when they're weighing two websites and one website is like very vague, no blog, one page, nothing wrong with that when you're like sending warmer traffic to it. But like, if you're asking Google, what are you going to do? Who am I going to like recommend as the answer to this problem? And they have this answer or they have like somebody who has had their website for five years, they have 200 blog posts or whatever, not that we can get there overnight, but it makes it a lot easier. So first, if I was looking at three things, I would say, make sure your location keyword or like most important keyword is on your website near the top. And then the second thing is. To fix your heading tags so that they match the order of priority. This is something that I see a lot, especially with show it websites, because show it kind of assigns and Squarespace assigns headings to like certain fonts. So a lot of times when people are designing their websites, they're looking at the heading tags. Only aesthetically like they're like, I want this big heading as my main heading, but you're the smaller heading on top that says like maybe New Jersey wedding calligrapher is smaller. And so show it is naturally going to make that an H3 or H2 tag, but what you want is really for that to be your H1 tag, but you can manually change it. It's just really easy to overlook when you're only looking at like the visual side. But Google isn't really looking at the visual side. Google is looking at like the data that you have. So that's a really good way and like easy way to be like, okay, if I have a heading that just says like services or like, hello, Elaine, or something like that I want to make that like H3 or like the least important heading on my page, because it's not telling Google anything about what my website is about. So I would say that's the second thing. And then the

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 13:18

wait, let's go. Let's dive into that. I need to learn more about this.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 13:22

Oh yeah, sure.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 13:24

okay. So I saw this in the notes and I was like, I need to talk to her about this, that um, so Google is basically using H one as the data that it's using to tell what's on your website. And is it ignoring the other headings or is it just not giving as much weight to the other ones?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 13:45

Not giving as much weight. Yeah. So I think of it like a pyramid, like they, so you should have one H one tag. And that is what Google thinks. Like this is the most important thing on the page. And then a couple H two tags or like, I'm not saying a couple is in two. I'm just saying less than. And then all the other headings should be like H3 or H4. I feel like it's not really not, it's not ignoring those headings, but between H3 and H4 is going to be like a small, smaller difference for sure.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 14:13

So when I actually go to. To fix this issue, which I definitely have on my website I would basically swap the styles so that my like, I

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 14:24

You don't have to change like the aesthetic of it, but like, are you on show it just to confirm.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 14:29

both. I have two

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 14:30

Okay, okay, so I don't know if you can change it on Squarespace, that's why I ask. Squarespace, you might just be like, not stuck, but kind of stuck with the aesthetic. I could be wrong about that, but show it. If you like, look at, like, kind of the font settings where you can change it, it will say like, Heading that'll be the aesthetic part But then lower in the next drop down it will say I think it says like title tag or something like that And that's where you change it So you can change it from h2 to h1 or something like that without ever adjusting the font So you can keep it aesthetically like however you want

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 15:05

okay. That's a great tip. It sounded cause I was thinking about how to actually fix it. I was like, that sounds so complicated. I'm going to have to redo everything.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 15:13

Yeah, and most of us don't necessarily like want only keywords as our like biggest heading on the page necessarily. So, but if you can fit it near the top, that's for sure better.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 15:27

Okay.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 15:27

I guess while we're talking about this, another thing I would add is, Let's say you have five pages on your website. Not all of them should be the same, like it shouldn't be like. New Jersey wedding calligrapher for all five pages. You need to choose different keywords. So like, it could be like wedding calligraphy portfolio on that portfolio page or wedding calligraphy packages or something on your services page, like you don't want it to necessarily include your location in all of them if You want. You just don't want it to be exactly the same.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 15:58

okay. That's super helpful.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 16:00

Yeah. And then, so my third thing that I would say is if you're trying to increase your SEO is just build a body of content. I know that this isn't necessarily like a super fast thing, but it is, I feel like one of the most impactful things. So it could be blogs. It could also be like reshared podcasts or YouTube videos or just something which like comes back to what I was talking about, like give like confidence to Google that you're the best option.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 16:25

That's super helpful. The idea of building content, I mean, does that also just come down to like, is it blog posts or is that like a portfolio page with images or, you know, different sections of like how you can work with me? Is it just like any kind of content or is it specifically blog content?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 16:43

Yeah, so the thing that I like about blogging is because each page can rank for each word. So if you have 20 blog posts, that's 20 potential keywords that you could rank for, which is great. When we look at like content on your like homepage, about page, services page, as a default, like, You basically need a minimum of 300 words as kind of like the benchmark per page to get it to rank on Google. So a lot of us don't necessarily have a hard time with that on our homepage, but you know, check your about page or something like that. I like to, for those main pages, I even like to kind of aim for like 600 to 900 words if I can. It's just like a stronger Like more content there and then for your portfolio page, if you're looking to optimize that for SEO, if you're linking like each portfolio to a different, like wedding, just like try to put 300 words at the top. I know it feels like a lot, but

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 17:36

But that could be like a description of the wedding, or like where it was taking place, what the other vendors were, what the vibe was, anything like that.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 17:44

yeah, exactly. It's just, I guess that's one of the things that I see people do is like, they'll just do like. All the photos and Google will very rarely rank a page of just photos I always like to think of like, if somebody landed on just this one page, would they know like what I do and how to hire me? And so that's another thing to include too. Like if you're like, this is a beautiful wedding at insert the venue that they're interested in. Also, I did the calligraphy. Like, hire me here. Or like, learn more here. Or like, some way to work it in.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 18:15

Right, right. I love that. That's a really good tip. So just to recap because these are really actionable strategies that I feel like people can literally do while they're listening to this episode if they want to. So the top three things that they can do today to rank better online would be to make sure your location keyword or the top keywords are on your website near the top. Correct.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 18:37

Yeah.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 18:38

Fix all of your heading tags. So maybe you spend, you know, set aside like 10 minutes each day to just go in and fix what you can, and then just start to build that body of content on your website through whether it's blog posts or pages getting, you know, body copy of these 300 words on there and starting to grow that to help you rank,

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 19:00

Yeah, and I would say like one more thing that when you're building a body of content if you are like struggling Try like guest post swapping with someone like we work with so many vendors in the wedding industry that if you're like Hey, and also we tend to find it easier to be like accountable to other people than ourselves So if it's like I'll write a guest post for you You write one for me and we'll like get it to each other next week or something like that It's like so would make it much easier. And also then they'll link to your website, you'll link to their website. Like we have so many vendor friends in the industry. It's so nice.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 19:32

That's

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 19:33

a really good tip. Okay. So now that we know the top three things that we can do today to improve our SEO, what is one of the biggest mistakes that you see calligraphers making when it comes to SEO on their websites?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 19:46

Yeah. Okay, so we talked about a little bit of it. But now I'm going to talk about images. Basically when it comes to images, I think a lot of us are just like throwing them up there Realistically and there's just like a few key things that you can do. So one reduce the file size It doesn't feel like it's going to slow down your website when it's like one image here one image there but I always think like As you can probably tell i'm always thinking long term and it really does slow down your website when you have Thousands and like it doesn't take as long to get to thousands of images as you think it will So like resize them rename them. So like put dashes into like in between the words, like wedding signage at venue or something like that. Rename them, resize them. And then when you upload them, just add alt text. So alt text is like something Google readers will read if somebody is like, can't see what's on the page. So I always like to think alt text should be helpful. Like it should be accurate. And then I like to include the keyword like 20 percent of the time.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 20:46

Some platforms like Squarespace, I think, will resize the images for you, right?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 20:51

Yeah, they do, but I always like to do it beforehand. Yeah, because I just don't always trust those. I don't know how good Squarespace is. It's hard because will they resize it to the size that they, that you want or the size that they think will be best. And sometimes like website platforms will resize it. Like I'm thinking of WordPress, which show it users will use WordPress. They'll resize it to basically the biggest that they'll accept that they think will not slow down your website. Whereas when I'm resizing it, I'm resizing it. Like this is the. Amount of pixels, like for width. I like to do like about 800 pixels for like a blog image to give you an idea. I'm like, I want it to be that size. Cause I think that's the size that is going to load on most people's screens. And I think off the top of my head, like just to give you an idea, WordPress will resize it as 1900 pixels.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 21:41

Which is much bigger

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 21:42

it's trying to maintain the quality. Right. So it's resizing it for you, but it's still trying to keep like the highest quality it can. But the problem is with Google, because Google is trying to load your page as fast as it can. It is looking at the size and then Google is resizing it for you, which slows it down.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 22:03

That's a really great tip though, because we are such a visual industry. And I feel like as calligraphers, we do have a ton of images on our website. And I'm like, I don't know if all of mine are race size. So I'm going to put that on my action item to do as well.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 22:18

Yeah, and it happens so fast, like where you think it's like just one or two images here and there, and then all of a sudden it's like, okay, 20 portfolios later.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 22:27

So you touched on how blogging helps with SEO. But obviously we also know we have like time constraints. We've got a lot of side hustlers in our audience and it can feel a little bit of like a hefty undertaking to start and maintain a blog. So what are some tips for making blogging easier and maybe like more sustainable, something that we can incorporate into our workflows?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 22:53

Yeah, for sure. So the first thing I always like, cause I hear this a lot. The first thing I always kind of like to say is like, blogging really is not as hard. We just need to like practice more. And we spend, when we look at our screen time on Instagram, we like have no problem just kind of ignoring that. And then our first blog takes eight hours and we're like, who has time for this? But the reality is like your first one takes eight hours. Your second one takes four hours. And then you're so much faster at it, right? Like it doesn't take very long to get good. And I would say it's also like we are entrepreneurs and like, we can try and be focused and like, keep the long game in mind as long as we want. But like, naturally we're people. So it's like, it can be discouraging that it is a slower. Slower burn strategy. Like I always tell people when I work with them, like three to nine months to start really ranking on Google. It's really only hard for the first six months, but once you see the momentum, it becomes so much easier to maintain. And Google's also a more forgiving platform. I would say then something like Instagram where let's take, say you take a few months off during the summer or whatever you're going to do, it's easier to come back to, and Google's not going to be like punishing you for like trying to revive a dead account, right? Like it's just kind of like, you don't have to stress about posting time. You don't have to stress about trending sounds. Like we're talking about work alignment always on this podcast, right? So you can blog whenever batch, whenever. And then also. If you are struggling to just kind of like get your blog posts out into the world, I have just like an easy framework. To back up when I think about like how long a blog post should be, which is another question I get for calligraphers, especially if you're only competing locally, you're fine at like 700 to 900 words. So it's not like super 2, 500 plus word blog posts every time. So. The first paragraph, I like to introduce the topic and a keyword. The second paragraph, I like to Introduce yourself and like where they can hire you. Again, we often write for people that we think already are familiar with us in our work, but often one of the best pieces of advice I got early on in my business was like, I would not be able to tell the difference between like your blogs and like the not or something like that, right. People are looking for information. They're finding information, make sure they know that they can hire you. So I like to use that as a second paragraph. The third paragraph can be the content. So like. Using wedding calligraphy as an example, if you're featuring a real wedding, it can be like describing the first look, describing the ceremony, describing the reception, and that can be your body. Or if you're doing, you know, a roundup of wedding signage, it's like boho signage, rustic signage, you know, whatever, different kinds of signage. I always say if you struggle with writing more tips or like more middle pieces means less writing per tip. If you're doing like three types of wedding signage, you're going to need to write more than Ten types of wedding signage in which case like you barely have to write it all And then the end just wrap up and remind them to work with you

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 25:57

that's a really, I feel like straightforward framework and you could literally just write down like, okay, you could create, I, Picturing somebody could create like a Google doc template and just put in those, you know, first, second, third, fourth, and then the wrap up or whatever it is, and like, just use that every single time, duplicate it, fill in the information. And then you have your blog posts and you can easily translate it from topic to topic. Which I feel like would make it feel way less overwhelming. do you have a recommendation? Or is there like a sweet spot of how often you should be posting? Or does that like, Like, does that, you know, you said three to nine months for, you know, starting to see rankings, results, et cetera. Is that like, if you're posting every single week or is it, you know, is it more like nine months if you're posting once per month, three months of your posting every single week, like how does that kind of work?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 26:51

Yeah, for sure So I would say like if you're blogging weekly you'll see results in like three months if it's every second week You're maybe like more to six to nine months if you're blogging once a month, then I would say You To be like brutally honest, blogging is not your strategy. Like you're not, to be honest, like it will eventually work for you, but it might take two years. Before you even have 24 blog posts, which is like not nothing, but like, let's say at the end of a year, you have 12 blog posts that someone did in three months. It's fine. Blogging serves another purpose to like nurture people. Sometimes people use blog posts to educate their own clients. But like, if you're using blogging as a strategy to get bookings, I would say minimum twice a month.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 27:36

Awesome. That's super helpful.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 27:38

And like I said, at least in the beginning, once you've established that body of content and you want to slow down, take it easy, power to you.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 27:46

Once we do decide to actually start a blog, what are some of your tips for coming up with blog topic ideas? I mean, I know that I personally ran into the issue of like having a ton of ideas. This also happens to me with like Instagram marketing, where I just and I just have all of these ideas and like, well, I don't know which one to focus on first, so I'm just not going to do any of them. Yeah.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 28:11

Or they're like me where they don't have any ideas.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 28:17

totally relate.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 28:19

So do you have any tips for number one, coming up with blog topic ideas if they're more like Xiao Chen and then number two, determining what is going to be the most impactful to blog about if they do have a ton of ideas.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 28:32

When people come to me in the beginning and they're like, I have so many ideas that I haven't had any time to write them. My first piece of advice is like, let's just start picking the ones that you're most excited about. Because like I said, in the beginning, you just want to build kind of that momentum like, and just focus on writing and getting them out of the world. Like it really doesn't matter as much about which one goes first or, you know, especially at the beginning. Okay. The second thing I would say is if you have a ton of ideas, try to sort them based on like seasons that you see in your business. So like in the wedding industry, we have very cyclical businesses. We know people are looking for like venues and first steps in January. We know that they're looking for more inspiration and stuff in the spring and summer. We know, you know, in the fall, sometimes we see like a September rise in inquiries because people enjoyed their summer and now they're back to serious wedding planning or whatever. So you can kind of like draw on your own experience to kind of think about it. And then the second thing for my more like data people is to do some keyword research. So Uber suggest is a free tool that you can use. And I think you get like three free searches a day or something and just type in your keyword. It will sometimes give you suggestions below it or like related keywords. I would say like I use Uber suggest for a very long time before upgrading to a paid tool, which are more expensive. Like they're about 150 a month. They're way better though. So it, and I was like, so resistant to paying. And that's why I like to mention that because I'm like, Oh, if I had known, How much easier this would be, I would have upgraded a lot sooner. So that's just something to keep in mind. I'm not saying you have to, but like Uber suggests you might be like looking at keywords. I'm really struggling to find ideas, not Uber suggests specifically, but just like free tools. And if you really want to dive into data, that can be like a great next step. And I, like I said, that's if you really want to dive into data, but I do want to just say best practice doesn't mean if you don't do this, you're not going to see any results. I really think I will, I would obviously tell you if you, if it was like you have to do everything perfectly, but mostly I just think getting things out in the world. Next, if you're looking for ideas, like if you have no ideas, I like to look at Pinterest trends or Google trends For some things that we see are changing in the industry is a good place to brainstorm. And honestly, even for ideas, I don't mind like asking chat GPT or something for ideas. Sometimes they're way off, but at least it usually gives you a starting place. If you're like staring at a blank screen, like I have no idea. Or like even just like looking at content other people are creating, not to say like. Read their blog and recreate it, but just like scanning like what is when you think of words You want to be found for under Google? Like let's say wedding signage like what is coming up and kind of look there and then how can you put your spin on it? And then also I can like run on sentence if you have blog posts that are like 10 types of signage or something Consider making each one of those points its own blog in the future, right? Google loves when sites internally link to each other. So anytime you can like reference the past blog posts too, that, that improves the health of both of those blog posts, which is why sometimes blogging takes such a long time to get started because you have blogs that. Aren't linking to each other, but the more content you create really, like the easier it is to get going. If you feel like you can't come up with like 10 ideas, let's say like, just come up with one and then you'll, you'll be surprised how it kind of compounds.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 32:26

So as you're talking, this kind of reminds me of repurposing content. Because I wanted to say like, all my good ideas go into the podcast. And then I'm like, what do I blog about? So if you have a podcast, for example, or you have You know, a blog and you have a newsletter and you've got your Instagram. Do you recommend kind of taking the same piece of content and adapting it for those different formats?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 32:54

Yeah, I think it's fine to repurpose, especially something like your blog and Instagram because it's really two different audiences and two different like mediums of content, right? So when I think of your Instagram, people saw whatever you posted. Like at a passing glance, most of the time versus like when they saw kind of the same content, I mean, you'll have to reformat it obviously, but they're like sitting, mostly sitting down on your computer and like reading, looking for something. So they're like in two different head spaces. So even if it's pretty similar, Like they're not going to think anything of it. Like, Oh my gosh, this is the same Instagram post. Or like with the podcast, I think there is such an opportunity for you to take the transcript. And even if you don't turn the transcript into like a blog post, you could take parts of it. Like if you're like, I want to cover the piece that Elaine and I were talking about here. Like that could be its own blog post, right? It doesn't have to be like one episode equals one blog post. Sometimes it can just be. Parts that you covered can be their own blog post.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 33:56

That's a really good tip because I feel like we're all about working smarter, not harder around here. And I know when you and I started working together on blog posts, like I loved that because we were coming up with the ideas together. You were handling the blogging for me and you still are handling my blogging for me. But then I now have that content that I can turn into Instagram, you know, A reel and a carousel and a post or I can use it on my email newsletter and it's nice because it cuts down on some of the like content creation that I need to do on my end too, like you're kind of giving me the framework with the blog posts and then I can break out like even smaller pieces out of the blog for digestible social media content.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 34:40

Yeah, that's exactly right. I think most of my clients take parts of the blog and repurpose it. Even old blogs, like, that's the nice thing. Once you have that kind of, like, stock of blog posts, like, you can reuse them forever.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 34:53

yeah. And the other thing is like the engagement aspect is different. Like this isn't exactly a blog, but I think it's a very similar idea. Like I wrote a newsletter once and I shared this, like, I guess it was kind of like an aha moment that I had with people and I thought it was like, you know, very insightful. And like nobody responded to the newsletter and then I took parts of it and I kind of like copied into like a couple stories, you know, and I got a bunch of responses and be like, thanks for sharing this. This is such a useful insight to like, think about where I'm at, stuff like that. And so I think it's the same with the blog posts too. you're kind of, you're Creating a conversation about that topic with people if you like bring it to Instagram, right?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 35:36

That's exactly right. Yeah, I would say that that's such a benefit. And then I would also say that's another thing that I like about blogging is it takes off the pressure. Whereas like if you post on Instagram, you're like, I hope this does well or like, Oh, this real flops. It's so embarrassing. Nobody liked this. Do you know what I mean? Whereas like, you don't have any of that pressure,

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 35:54

stats are more visible for sure on Instagram okay, so on episode 10, we talked about tech tools and we touched on chat GPT and Which is an artificial intelligence? Tool platform, and we're basically talked about how we're all learning how to incorporate AI into our businesses. So we wanted to ask you your perspective on using AI as it relates to blog posts. I

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 36:23

So I know a lot of people are like, can I use AI? Will I be penalized? It like seems like everyone's like one end or the other. I'm very like pro using AI as a starting place, like not copying pasting obviously. Because like quite frankly everyone is like, I just feel like Unless you are like a purist anti AI, which is fine. Everyone is like one of my favorite things to do is like look at big companies and I'll like copy and paste their blog into an AI checker just like purely for my own curiosity. And it's like everyone is you guys not that AI checkers are 100 percent accurate, but it's like. Everyone is I think as long as the content is still valuable, it is fine to use AI and in, especially in something like the wedding industry, adding your own personality and experience into it is going to be huge. Google value is kind of like unique and they say expertise based. Content so like they don't want like me to write about wedding calligraphy But if you are a wedding calligrapher and you have like a ton on your portfolio and your blog post You know chachi bt maybe wrote the outline but then you're editing it to be like and I really like this venue because of xyz Or like I always tell my couples xyz or something like that Like if you add your kind of like personality and like helpfulness into it It's It's a better user experience. So then Google will like it more because ultimately Google doesn't really care if it's written by AI. It just wants people to use its search engine. And so the only way that it can get people to use its search engine is by being really good at matching to the best results. So you just need to make sure whether you're using AI or not you just need to like create, I guess, the best results. So as an example, Asking ChatGPT to write a paragraph about how I always recommend couples add cocktail signs to their bar because of XYZ, like telling ChatGPT why you're recommending something, is always going to produce a better result than write a paragraph about cocktail slash bar signs. Right? Like you can feed AI a better prompt, and then it will help you. Like if you really hate writing, it'll help you infuse kind of that more expertise based things, and I also think that When we were talking about what like coming up with topics, for example, calligraphers have such an advantage that you're not usually the first vendor hired. So you have like a range of topics that you can talk about, which gives you an advantage that like. compared to like, let's say a wedding planner who is kind of writing about the same things all of the time because they have a very short window of like from couple getting engaged to couple hiring them and they have to keep the topics focused in that window. We have like a lot of freedom with calligraphy. I feel like when I know, Different couples are different, but generally it's a longer or like farther down the line, kind of higher. So that's kind of something to keep in mind too, when you're like feeding. Information into chat TPT, like, right. Yeah. Give them an example of if they haven't found a venue yet, or if they've already found a venue questions, ask their venue or something like that as a starting point. And then when you're looking at topics to like compete with all the AI generated content out there, try to do like less of. Quote unquote, how much does wedding envelope calligraphy costs and more like how to create a cohesive invitation suite that wows your guests or something like that. Like more like, you know, Like something that someone does not want an AI answer for.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 40:01

just love that perspective that being one of the vendors books later on actually gives us an advantage here. I never thought about it that way. I love that.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 40:10

I've used chat GPT to help me with Instagram captions or newsletters. And I kind of do like. I'll write out what it is that I'm want it to say, and then pop it in there just to kind of help like spice it up a little bit, or maybe think of like a metaphor or something like that, that I hadn't come up with on my own to help me think through that. And I actually feel like it's starting to improve my own personal writing a little bit, just like seeing how. Other things are written or different ways to phrase a sentence or to catch somebody's attention, you know, at the start of a caption or something like that. So I think it is a really interesting tool that we do have at our disposal, and I love the way that you are kind of guiding us and like how we can use it to benefit us with this long term marketing and blog writing.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 40:56

Yeah, it can be really helpful. Like, especially when you're like looking at a wedding, calligraphers are kind of, I would say like me where it's like, we weren't at the wedding. Right. So it's like, you get the photos back and you're like, okay, I'm writing a blog post to feature this wedding. Cause I want to show off my work wasn't really there. So it's like, write a paragraph about the first look. There was like. I saw it was at this venue. I saw that she had a first look with her dad and then her partner or whatever. And then after that they did portraits. You're like, okay, this is the content that I know happened. How do I make this into a paragraph without sounding really awkward? Chat GPT is so good at like segueing things and stuff like that in a way that is harder to do when we're like, these are the facts from the photos. How do I turn this into a story?

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 41:47

all. Probably could you write my blogs for me, but that's okay.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 41:51

you're looking at a wedding and you weren't there, you're like, okay.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 41:54

okay so we know, and we talk a lot about this on this podcast as well, that like metrics and looking at numbers are really important because it just helps you make more informed decisions in your business. Right. You know, if we are going to dedicate some time and some energy or some money into blogging and SEO, how can we measure if all of these long term marketing efforts that we're putting in are actually working for our business?

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 42:20

yeah. So the first thing I would say is set up Google search console. That's definitely the best measuring tool. Kind of tool that there is, but when you're getting started, I would really just challenge you set it up right away, ignore it for the first six months. I kind of like, when I think about this, I kind of think of it like Dave Ramsey's snowball effect where he says like pay off the lowest debt first or whatever, instead of highest interest. And it's like, it's less about like what makes sense data wise and more about like preserving the momentum. Whereas like, if you're checking your numbers every single week, It's so hard to keep it up for six months, even though, you know, in your head, it takes six months. Like, it's like, we need to like, keep that in mind. So like set it up, ignore it for six months. Then at two, two blog posts a month, let's say you hopefully have 12 blog posts six months later. And then what I would look at in Google search console, it's like top keywords you're being found for top pages that are ranking looking at impressions versus clicks. So Google search console will say like, you know, wedding calligraphy signage, you were clicked on, let's say like 12 times, but you were found, let's say like 20, 000 times. That means a lot of people are finding you. And very few people are thinking that you were offering what they're looking for. And there's a few reasons why that happens. It can be like they were searching for something. And yeah, they didn't think that you were the best solution, which could just be that you're ranking for a keyword. So like, to give you an example, in my wedding business, we rank for like. Destination wedding packages in Florida, but we actually don't do that. So we are found for that a lot, but we like rarely clicked on, but I don't necessarily care about that because we don't do that, right. But if it was something that you cared about, then you're like, okay, there's a problem here. How do I fix it? And the easiest way to fix it is to look at like your meta title and description that you have in your settings and make it more enticing is kind of the first step.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 44:21

Okay.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 44:22

then the next thing, not necessarily data, but I like to make sure that all the posts are getting indexed by Google. So like when you publish a post, you can copy and paste the URL into Google search console, hit enter. It'll say like page is not indexed. If you just published it right, you can request indexing. Then Google will, you know, do its little thing, say it's in the queue to be indexed. And then I like to check up on the blog posts, every like month or so and make sure that Google did in fact, index it. And if it didn't, and it says like discovered and not indexed, that means Google went to the page and was like, this is not going to rank for anything. Like we're not putting it in our directory, which is like. You know, it's fine. Like sometimes you take things personally, really? You just have to add more. Yeah, it's very hurtful. We just need to like add more to it, different images, like switch it up, adjust your settings. If you feel like you, you know, maybe half assed it, it's 90 percent chachi PT, whatever. Go in, fix it, request indexing again, and just keep an eye on that. And sometimes you don't even need to change anything and you just request indexing and it works like, you know, it's a robot checking your content. Right. So, so things happen. But that's a really good way to see too, if there's like a technical issue that is causing things to not rank. Oh,

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 45:42

or blog post of your podcast that was so helpful. I had no idea I could request indexing, and I actually realized that several of my webpages weren't showing up on Google, so that's fun.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 45:53

Yeah, and I would say, like, the more you blog, the more Google will check your site because it will be used to fresh content. Right? So that's why I say, like, if I request indexing for, like, somebody that blogs all the time, I can check back the next day and it's already indexed. Whereas, like, if somebody is, like, brand new, this is, like, their first blog post, it might take, like, a month.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 46:14

And it feels like we have to learn some, like, robot computer speak How does Google think? Yeah.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 46:22

One of the other things, like I started to do this when we started working together too, just to track it, but I would love to know your thoughts too of adding, like I added Google as a lead source on my contact form. So that way I would know if the couple actually found me and then I could connect it to whether or not those couples are booking. I mean, just like tracking my, you know, Instagram or the not, or like any of those other advertising marketing efforts. I kind of did the same with Google. I

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 46:53

like that for my clients. So that's why I forget about that. But that's a pretty big one. I'm glad you mentioned that.

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 46:59

Well, I am definitely going to need to replay this episode with my notebook so I can write down all of the things that I want to do. But thank you so much for sharing all of your wisdom and knowledge with us, Kara. We'd love to talk about how our listeners can connect with you, maybe work with you. Can you share a little bit about that? And

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 47:19

absolutely. So you can find all the details on my website at the care of report. com. For services I offer, obviously done for you, Pinterest and blogging management. And then I also have a blogging mini course. If you want to go more in detail of all of that. And also I have a weekly podcast called also called the care report. So I'm sharing marketing and business advice every week.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 47:41

It's so good. You definitely want to subscribe to her podcast.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 47:45

Thank you. I'm so glad to be on here today. Cause I love listening to your podcasts all the time. So,

shaochen_1_06-18-2024_121338: 47:51

all those links in the show notes so you guys can find those easily and connect with Kara on, on Instagram too, right? Did you already talk about your

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 47:58

Oh, sorry. Yeah. And my Instagram is at the carer report. I am active sometimes and sometimes not.

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 48:07

But you don't have to be all

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 48:08

date for this, but

alane_1_06-18-2024_141338: 48:09

term.

squadcaster-8521_1_06-18-2024_121339: 48:10

yeah, that's exactly right. I practice what I preach and I do not stress about Instagram.