A new approach to on-line marketing

It's time. John's Photography needs to grow. After hours of bookreading and internet jockeying, I'm ready to build a website.

A few months ago, I made my first attempt at putting my biz on the web by creating johnsphotographysd.blogspot.com. Yes, that's (John's Photography - ' + sd.) It's a tough domain even for me to remember, it's a free blog based on a free template and it's what I like to call a "one-page wonder." If professional photography sites are Cadillacs, this thing is a tricycle. I'm gonna do something about it.

Like any aspiring amateur, I've got ideas. Where do they come from? They derive mostly from caffienated daydreams or from frequent wanderings of the internet. Today, I was in the middle of one of those random internet wanderings and I found a goldmine of inspiration for my future website. This is gonna happen.

Many books on photo business say that many photographers fail because they focus on the wrong things (pardon the pun). I know it sounds cliche, but the most successful photographers run customer-centric businesses that actually give a rip about who buys their stuff. John's Photography is focused on the customers in every way.

Sure, I could create the flashiest, intricately-designed, most interactive theme-park of a web experience for my potential clients, or I could simply and elegantly communicate to them exactly what they want to know.

What questions does the customer silently ask while visiting my website? (my best guesses):

- Does John actually take good photos? (portfolio)

- Who/how/where/what is John? (biography page)

- How does John offer his business? (packages, prices, business model)

- Why should I choose John to take my photos?

- What do I want from my photography? (from the customer's perspective)

- Is John going to be a pain to work with? (a well-designed page of text summed up as "No.")

- How do I pick a photographer in the Brookings area? (I'm gonna help the customer help themselves. Yes, I might actually link to my fellow photogs' websites to give my prospective customers some flavors to taste. This is an (possibly crazy) idea I have to keep me on my toes.)

I want to communicate the above things in a seriously convenient and easy way. I don't want to miss the point with this thing. Getting carried away on my website would create an unwanted effect on the nature and attitude of my photography career. One thing I really don't want my website to refect is the mild narcisism which I've developed through the use of this blog, Facebook and Twitter. After all, unlike those three things, my photography is about the person on the other side of the camera, not me.

By the end of the summer, I hope to have a clean, scalable, simple, effective, informative, satisfying, slick, impressive website for you and your friends to enjoy and re-visit often.

Please feel free to share any ideas, examples, links or comments as I go about renovating the online presence of John's Photography. I can definitely use the help.

Thanks!
John