Search engine optimisation, or SEO, is the work of making your website useful, understandable and discoverable when people search for the services, subjects or information you provide.
SEO cannot guarantee a particular ranking. The goal is to build clear pages that serve the right audience, give search engines enough context to understand them and make it easy for visitors to take the next step.
Start with the people you want to reach
Before thinking about keywords, decide who the page is for and what they are trying to find.
For example, someone may be searching for:
- a family photographer in a particular location;
- information about planning a newborn session;
- school photography for a local school or daycare;
- wedding albums and album design;
- landscape prints from a recognisable place; or
- guidance on choosing wall art for a room.
A useful page should answer a real question or explain a real service. Avoid creating many nearly identical pages solely to target slight variations of the same phrase.
Give each page one clear purpose
A focused page is easier for visitors and search engines to understand. Use separate pages where the subjects genuinely need different information—for example, weddings, family portraits and commercial photography—but do not split one useful topic into several thin pages unnecessarily.
Make important pages reachable through your navigation and link related pages together where the connection helps the reader.
Write a clear page title
The page title should accurately describe the content. Include the service, subject or location when it is genuinely relevant.
For example, Family photography in Christchurch is more informative than Memories. Keep the wording natural and make sure the page itself supports what the title promises.
Write a useful Meta Description
The Meta Description summarises the page in search information. Explain what the visitor will find and why it may be useful in one or two natural sentences.
A search engine may show different text from the page when it believes another passage better answers the search, so treat the description as a helpful summary rather than something you can force it to display.
Meta Keywords may still appear as a field in some Workspace content editors, but major search engines do not use that field as a ranking target. Put your effort into the visible page title, headings, writing and links.
Use descriptive headings and natural language
Use headings to organise the page and help someone scan it. Write in the words your clients understand, and include relevant terms when they belong naturally in the explanation.
There is no useful target keyword density. Repeating a phrase to reach a percentage can make the page worse for readers and may look like keyword stuffing.
Create genuinely useful content
Useful content can include:
- clear service and product explanations;
- answers to questions clients regularly ask;
- guidance on preparing for a session;
- stories that add context to a body of work;
- location or venue information based on real experience;
- comparisons that help someone choose; and
- current information about process, availability and next steps.
Write from your own knowledge and keep factual information current. A smaller collection of strong pages is more valuable than a large archive of repetitive or unfinished material.
Use images well
Choose images that support the purpose of the page and prepare web-ready files so the page is not unnecessarily heavy.
Where alternative text is available, describe the useful visual information briefly for accessibility. Do not turn alternative text into a list of search terms. Decorative images may not require a description.
Build useful internal links
Link to related services, galleries, blog posts, enquiry forms and booking pages when they provide a sensible next step. Use link wording that explains the destination, such as view our family photography portfolio, rather than repeatedly using click here.
Do not change an established public URL without considering links that already point to it.
Earn relevant links and mentions
Links from other reputable websites can help people and search engines discover your work. Useful opportunities may come from genuine relationships with venues, suppliers, professional associations, local organisations, publications or businesses you have collaborated with.
Avoid buying bulk backlinks, joining unrelated link schemes or placing repetitive promotional links in communities where they do not belong.
Consider local search
If you meet clients at a physical location or work with them in a defined service area, an eligible Google Business Profile can help your business appear on Google Search and Maps.
- Use accurate business and service-area information.
- Keep your name, contact details, website and opening information current.
- Add representative photographs.
- Encourage genuine customer reviews without offering misleading incentives.
- Respond to reviews professionally.
Online-only businesses may not be eligible for a Google Business Profile, so check Google's current eligibility requirements before creating one.
Provide a good page experience
Your site should work well for the visitor as well as the search engine.
- Review every important page on a phone.
- Keep navigation understandable.
- Use readable headings and text.
- Avoid unnecessarily large images and excessive embedded content.
- Make buttons, forms and booking actions easy to use.
- Check that the public site loads securely and that important links work.
Page speed and Core Web Vitals are useful measures of experience, but no single score guarantees a search ranking.
Understand the technical boundary in Workspace
Workspace provides the website hosting and public-page structure. Concentrate on the settings you can manage: page titles, URL slugs, Meta Descriptions, visible content, alternative text where available, navigation, internal links, mobile presentation and your connected domain.
Workspace creates and manages the XML sitemap and robots.txt file for your website. These help search engines discover eligible public content and understand which areas should not be crawled. You do not need to create or maintain these files yourself.
Measure useful progress
SEO usually develops over time. If you use Google Search Console or analytics tools, review trends rather than reacting to one day or one search:
- which searches and pages bring relevant visitors;
- whether important pages are being discovered;
- which pages lead to enquiries, bookings or purchases;
- questions visitors still cannot answer; and
- content that is outdated or no longer supports the business.
Traffic alone is not the goal. A smaller number of well-matched visitors who understand the offer and take a useful next step can be more valuable than a larger amount of irrelevant traffic.
Apply this in Workspace
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