INTRODUCTION

Updated on 26 December 2018

Backlink is a link one website gets from another website.
A mention of your site on another site.

I never thought backlinks are important, silly me.
I did a few link submissions on relevant web directories when I first bought my domain and then stopped.

Now, after 3 years I see the pink elephant in the room.

The number and quality of your backlinks, are the most important factors for ranking high in google search results. It represents the authority of your website.

The Dirty Truth

2 weeks ago, with the spare time in my possession I started digging left and right. Starting with YouTube videos continuing with articles by reputable backlink experts and finishing with SEO analysis tools like Seoprofiler and Semrush.

I started to check my competition , wedding photographers in Romania and the specific keywords for our business.

For the top ranking websites the majority of the backlinks is paid.

Simple as that, paid articles and sitewide backlinks on websites that have nothing to do with wedding photography.
Article with rich keywords , articles next to other paid different topics, spam comments and very few legit links.

How To Get Backlinks For Photographers, The Right Way

The truth about link building is the following, captain oblivious speaking :

You think that posting great weddings on your high quality blog, people will link to you.
Here’s is a cold shower for you, it will not.

If you want backlinks to your wedding site, you have to do hard work and promote it.

Here are some tips that work, starting from the easy backlinks with low impact on your website to the hard ones coming from high authority domains.

1.Submit Your Site To Web Directories

Yes, some selected high quality web directories that take real people to check and approve your submission or not, still counts as a valuable backlink.

There are some wedding directories that have dofollow backlinks and also make the possibility to showcase your portfolio and get real traffic from potential clients.
Submit to local and even international directories if you offer your photography services in other countries.

2.Write Comments

According to google nofollow links “generally” don’t count as a backlink.

You see what I did there?

Nofollow links in comments still have some weight in the eyes of google.
Writing legitimate comments will get you something even better than a noffolow link, visibility, noticed by other people, fellow photographers. On top of that, if you know where to look, there are places where you can get dofollow links.

3.Link Reclamation

Find use of your images without consent on other sites and request a link. It’s not always intended, and it’s relatively easy once you find them. For instance, you can look at the other vendors of weddings you photographed, florist, wedding planner, venue, videographer, etc.

4.Search For Your Name And Brand Online

From experience, when somebody uses your photography, usually writes in plain text your name or brand under the image.

That reference is going to generate a search result.

Once a month I’m doing an extensive search of my personal name and brand (I Google Myself). I look at all the 10 pages of search results for any sign of reference, both in my native language and English.

Use (brand or name -your website domain) to exclude your own website from search results.

Example: Toader Photography -toaderphotography.com or Daniel Toader -toaderphotography.com

Once you have found images without a hyperlink, contact the site owner and ask politely for a backlink. The legal and moral implication are pretty big, you will get de link, trust me.

My biggest catch until now is a DA65 dofollow backlink.

You can also use Mention for a more elegant approach. While less effective, gets most of the job done.

5.Use Google Reverse Image Search

This is not easy, but nevertheless Google Image Search is an extremely powerful tool for us photographers. A duplicate image from your portfolio found on another website equals to a nice juicy backlink.

Start with representative images you took and that are available on your blog.

Tip: other owners of blogs love to copy steal images from the search results. Details like flowers, shoes and rings are particularly attractive.

6.Search For Famous People Of Witch Wedding You Photographed

Photographing weddings of famous people will get you to the upper level, to the backlink stratosphere.

Search for their names in google, click images, and pray the gods to find your work on another website with high authority.

Find your images without consent and more importantly, without a dofollow backlink.

The rest its easy.

7.Team Up With Wedding Videographers

A backlink to a wedding videographer on my website ads value to my potential client.

And vice versa.

You get the idea.

8.Spy On Your Competition

You can use a free tool like Ahrefs Backlink Checker where you can see your opponent backlink profile and domain rating. Some links are easy to replicate, others not. But you will get the idea.

9.Get Featured On Wedding Blogs

Get backlinks on sites that are in the wedding inspiration category, the ones that have rich high quality content. Here you have to submit a real wedding together with a written story. Generally, the higher the domain authority, the harder it is to be approved.

It’s easy if you are normally photographing weddings in Iceland and other exotic places.

Make-It Relevant!

While extremely difficult, try hard to make-it relevant.

A backlink from a photography related website will weigh significantly more.

And remember the longer and harder a link is to get, the better it is likely to be.

What’s Next ?

Learn More About the magic of SEO for for photographers.