A business blog, when done correctly, has the potential to drive a tremendous amount of organic traffic to an artist’s online gallery.
Whether you have been blogging for some time or learning how to blog, you are on the right track to grow your online business.
There are many benefits to blogging. Those blog benefits include better SEO, website visitors, positioning yourself as a leader, blog monetization, and increased sales.
To have an influential blog, you need to have a plan. Your blog plan should include the frequency at which you will publish new blog posts, what topics you will cover and who your blog audience is.
Your blog plan should be helpful to you and your target audience. One of the best blog plans we have seen online is How To Plan Your Content Marketing – Neil Patel.
Creating blog content that stands out from the blogosphere, has a high conversion rate, and is valuable is one of the primary keys to growing blog readership and loyal customers.
We put together a complete guide of blog best practices for artists to get you started.
Disclaimer: This post may contain affiliate links. If you make a purchase by clicking on an affiliate link, Nevue Fine Art Marketing may earn an affiliate commission at no additional cost to you. Affiliate relationships include, but are not limited to, Bluehost, Tailwind, Skimlinks, SareASale and StudioPress. To learn more visit Affiliate Link Disclosure Policy
Website Navigation
Successful blogs are designed to make it easy for potential customers to find what they are searching for quickly. Your visitors should find blog posts they are interested in reading, products, and services you offer.
How do you provide ease of interface navigation?
The best way is to have a menu at the top of every page.
Your blog menu should be displayed so that it’s easy for blog readers to access any blog post or products from anywhere on the blog. This can be done by separating topics into categories.
For example, your blog menu can be displayed as categories such as blog, original paintings, limited edition prints, and contact. People interested in reading your latest blog posts can click the blog menu link to find blog posts displayed in chronological order. At the same time, art lovers can click original paintings to view and purchase your paintings. The easiest way to get started is to write down all of the different categories you will have on your website. Next, think about what words new users might use to discover what they are searching for and create categories for each category.
To learn more about creating WordPress Categories, visit How To Add WooCommerce WordPress Categories.
Blog Tags
Tags are also an essential part of blog design that help readers find your blog posts in blog searches. Tags can be helpful when blog posts are related to each other.
For example, blog tags for painting tutorials might include digital paint tutorials, photoshop tutorials, or watercolor tutorials. The blog tags are placed at the bottom of blog posts so that people interested in reading blog posts can see what topics are covered.
Create 20-30 different tags related to the content you write to get started.
Blog Tags Best Practices
Stick to the list of tags you want to use for your website. Note, different spellings will create new tags (“painting” and “paintings” would be two separate tags).
Use tags that can be used in multiple tags (for example, “protect paintings” could connect every post showing readers how to care for their original paintings).
Use no more than 5 tags per post.
Audit tags. If you notice that a tag is only used for one or two posts, delete them.
Tags should be different than categories.
Note: tags will not affect search rankings, but they will make it a more pleasant experience for your readers, and it will inspire them to come back to your site.
Images in blog posts
Images in blog posts help bloggers build a stronger connection with blog readers through an emotional appeal that goes beyond words alone, and they break up the text making the content easier to digest.
Blog images also increase social shares, which help get new content in front of more people.
Blog Post Images Best Practices
- Choose a featured image for each blog post that compliments the article.
- Limit the number of images in a post. The more photos a blog post has, the slower it will load, which will harm your PageRank (where your post is displayed in search engines).
- Resize and compress larger images. The size of the image will also affect the speed of your site. Online tools like ShortPixel are free options for optimizing website images.
- Use keywords in the image name for better SEO.
- Include alt tags for each image. The proper use of alt tags ensures that search engine crawlers can adequately index an image. They give context to what the picture shows, informing search engine crawlers and allowing them to index it correctly. However, not only do alt text help search engine crawlers, but failing to apply them to your images may harm the rankings of your websites.
Search Engine Optimization
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a vital blog best practice that can help you rank your content higher on the search engine results page. Search engine optimization ensures that blog posts are indexed and ranked to display relevant blog posts for relevant topics.
Why is search engine optimization important?
With SEO, your blog can gain long-term traffic and blog readers because search engine crawlers can discover your blog posts, ensuring it is displayed in blog searches. The more blog posts you rank for, the higher your blog will appear in search engines, increasing blog readership over time. The higher your blog is ranked, the more traffic your website will receive.
For example, if you’re a wedding photographer blogging about flowers, there’s a good chance that a blog will appear in blog searches for blog posts about flowers. The blog post will also come up in blog search engines like Google and Bing because it’s been indexed when someone includes “flowers” in their blog search. With the right SEO, your blog will appear higher up in blog searches which means that blog readers interested in blog posts about flowers can easily find blog posts you’ve written.
How does SEO increase blog traffic?
Using keywords (preferably long-tail keywords) in blog posts, blog titles, blog descriptions, blog tags, and blog images will help search engine crawlers index your blog posts. It is essential to use keywords throughout all blog elements because it allows the crawler to identify what the content is about.
It is essential to optimize your content for SEO. However, you still want to write fr the reader.
Writing blog posts for readers, not search engines, means that you will be providing valuable information your target audience is interested in reading. Writing good content is as important as SEO.
Making blog posts easy to read will increase blog traffic because blog readers are drawn to blog posts that are inviting, well-organized, and engaging.
To optimize blog posts for search engines, make sure blog posts include the following:
Blog Post Tags (commonly known as keywords)
1. Include blog post tags that blog readers search for if they are looking for blog posts on your blog’s topic.
2. Include tags related to blogging post topics, trending blog posts, or have been popular with blog readers in the past.
3. Spend time on keyword research to find a specific topic your audience is searching for on Google. Tools like SEMRush will provide a list of high-ranking keywords.
Blog Title
1. Use words that blog readers commonly use when searching online.
2. Use blog post titles that are unique and inviting.
3. Place the main keywords you want to rank for in the front of the title of your post.
Blog Post Descriptions
1. Use blog post descriptions (meta description) to inform readers of your blog post topics, benefits, features, and any other key points you want readers to know about what your blog has to offer when they are scrolling through Google’s search results.
2. Use keywords in the meta description.
Blog Post Images
1. Search engines can’t read images, so use alt tags where blog readers can see them.
2. Use blog post images that blog readers would be interested in viewing or blog post images relevant to blog posts’ topics.
3. Include keywords in blog post image alt tags so blog readers can search for your blog post if they’re interested in learning more about the topic you wrote about.
5. Use blog image SEO tactics to help your blog posts appear in blog search engines that prioritize blog posts with pictures or blog posts using blog keywords in the description text. If you’re writing a blog post about flowers, make sure blog images include flowers and blog post titles include blog keywords about flowers.
Internal Linking
Internal links are links directing to another page you have on your website. An easy way to add value to your content is by adding links to other articles that support the topic you are writing about.
For example, if you write a post on how to hang a new oil painting, you will add value to the post if you add a link to a post that describes how to clean an oil painting. Providing as much information about a topic your readers are interested in will have you seen as a thought leader, and they will feel confident in purchasing products from you.
To learn more about SEO, visit:
- SEO Tips For Artists – Increase Website Traffic
- SEO Checklist for Artists Selling Art Online
- How to Use Keywords Effectively In Art Blog Posts
Frequency Of Publishing Blog Posts
There is no consensus about how often you should publish on your site in the blogging world. We recommend that artists create and publish high-quality, relevant, optimized-blog articles at least once or twice per week on the same day(s) each week.
Fresh material means that your site will be evaluated and indexed more frequently, which can improve your rankings. New blog posts provide a chance to collect a new long-tail keyword that may help you attract new organic consumers.
Keep in mind that search engines reward quality content with focus keywords and internal and external links.
Blog Topics
Art blog topics should be ideas that reflect the brand of your art business, when writing blog posts make sure that the content is relevant to your business.
Art blog topic ideas:
- How-to paint posts
- How to protect art
- How to hang art
For more blogging topics, visit 110 Art Blogging Ideas.
Key Takeaways
Blogging is a great way to create content for your website that blog readers will trust because it’s written through the eyes of another human being. Being intentional with blog post topics, writing high-quality content, using keywords, images, and SEO helps improve the site’s authority, ranking higher in the search results.
More Content Marketing Related Posts
Digital Content Marketing – What Artists Need to Know
How To Create A Digital Content Marketing Plan Are you becoming frustrated with the lack of traffic your artist website is generating? Have you heard the term digital content marketing, but you’re not quite sure what it is? In this article, I am going to share some easy digital content … [Read more…]
Best Content Marketing For Artists Strategy
Artist Guide For Developing A Content Marketing Strategy There are many layers involved with developing an effective art marketing plan that will build brand awareness. Posting images on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram is not enough for building an online art business. Creating a content … [Read more…]
How to Write a Content Marketing Plan For Artists
The internet has changed the way businesses conduct business and how people search for products and services. The days of catchy jingles and flashing signs have come and gone. Learn how to write a content marketing plan for artists will help you to build a striving art business. How to Write a … [Read more…]