There are a lot of ideas on how to approach social media and if blogging is what you should spend your time on or not. I am going to share my approach to these things and what I have learned over the years. I definitely think blogging is worth your time. Lots of people still go to the internet to search for things, like photographers and blogging helps people find you. I don't really see that changing anytime soon. Social media is also a popular searching platform that I don't see going away anytime soon either.
How to write blog posts
First off, I use the beginning of the year to think about what I want my focus to be in the year to come. What questions do I want to answer and how do I want to educate my people. I think about the people I serve and what type of answers they are looking for. I also think about the routine things I do in my business and if sharing that information would be helpful to my people/clients. I try to have at least one blog posted each month and I send that out about the same time each month. It is usually gets sent out the beginning of each month. (month, month, month...blah!)
After I have established the topics I want to cover, I come up with searchable titles to name each blog post. A really good way to see what those searchable titles are is searching them on google yourself. When you start typing in, let's say, "photography tips" a dropdown menu will appear with some guesses of what you might want to search. For example, the dropdown might have, "photography tips for beginners," "photography tips for kids," etc. This dropdown menu is really helpful, because it is google telling you what people are searching for. You want to make what people are searching for part of you main blog title.
When you have decided on a blog title the next thing you need to come up with are subtitles. Just like this blog post you are reading, I came up with a few main points in what I want to share in this blog post and made them the subtitles. It is also a great idea to make those subtitle helpful information. This way, people are more likely to read through the subtitles and decide if this is the blog post for them. You don't want to waste someone's time, plus you want to be helpful.
Lastly, when writing a blog post, you need to have content to follow each subtitle. This might seem like the super intimidating part, but trust me, if you can just start typing what you would normally talk about with others, you will be surprised on what you can come up with. As you can probably tell, I am not a fancy writer. Writing has never been one of my strong suits. I wouldn't say I am terrible, but I never thought it would be something I kind of enjoyed. If I can do this, you can do this. Your blog posts don't have to be super long either. They just have to answer real questions and be helpful/informational.
Use blog posts for social media posts
I have learned a lot of good things about writing blog posts from experience as well as from influential photographers. If you haven't heard of Sandra Coan, she is an amazing photographer and business woman who has a lot to share. One of the things she shared that really helped me look at marketing differently and doable was this recycling content system. Now, I don't do it exactly how she does, but it is the same idea and really does make things easier.
Basically, after I come up with a blog post, I use most of the paragraphs I write and copy and paste them into a social media post. I almost always have to tweak it a bit, but this totally takes the guess work out of what I am going to write about on social media. I already know I have a blog post to look through and use its contents. Then after a few months, if I want to or need to, I just reuse those social media posts in a new social media post. It is still helpful information, plus no one really even notices. Do remember what someone posted about three or four months ago? I sure don't.
Scheduling what you can
When you are writing up blog posts, then transferring them into social media posts, if you can schedule those posts, that is going to save you so much time and you will be more organized, leaving more time for your other photographer duties. Right now I am scheduling my social media posts out for about two months. Each month, I schedule another months worth, so I can stay on top of it. It is important to stay on top of it and keep it consistent. The SEO bots and social media bots really like to see consistency. There are several ways to schedule your social media posts. Hootsuite, Later and even Facebook let you schedule social media posts. Some, but not all websites allow you to schedule your blog posts too. Again, this is keeping blog posts consistent and will boost your SEO, making it easier for people to find you.
Alright, hope this information is helpful. Another thing to think about is this approach is a really healthy approach, but like all good things, it is going to be a long term approach. After a few months of blog posts, it is likely you will see a difference on where you show up on a google page. Remember, the longer you continue, the better it is going to get. Alright, good luck and let me know what questions you have.