Blair Staky: SEO for Artists, Easy Tips to Make a Big Impact, Dos and Don’ts, How to Optimize Your Site for Google

In this podcast episode, Blair Staky, a web designer and SEO expert, shares her expertise on how artists and creatives can improve their website's SEO and increase their online presence. She emphasizes the importance of using relevant keywords, optimizing images, and creating high-quality content. Blair also discusses the benefits of using Pinterest as a visual search engine and provides tips on how to put together a website for artists. Finally, she shares her resources for artists interested in improving their website and SEO. Overall, the episode provides valuable insights and practical tips for artists and creatives looking to grow their business.

Learn more about Blair through her site and Instagram.
Shop her Ebook on SEO here.
Shop her SEO course here.

Thank you to our sponsor Shelter.


Importance of SEO [00:02:10]
Tips for Improving SEO [00:06:19]
Keyword Research [00:07:13]
Content and Headers [00:08:34]
Blogging for Artists [00:11:09]
Importance of SEO for artists [00:14:24]
Finding and using keywords [00:16:34]
Pinterest as a search engine [00:20:29]
Using Pinterest for SEO [00:21:39]
AI Tools for Content Creation [00:23:17]
Batching Content Creation [00:27:02]
Choosing the Right E-commerce Platform [00:27:59]
Building an Artist Website [00:31:29]
Being Honest About Pricing [00:34:11]
Tips for Website Design [00:35:42]
Resources for artists interested in SEO and web design [00:44:05] *
The power of email marketing [00:47:00] *

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Transcript

Hayley Price (00:00:00) - So introduce yourself and tell everyone a little bit of background on you and kind of the story of how all of your different businesses evolved.

Blair Staky (00:00:08) - Yeah. Uh, so I started, like after I graduated from college I was working for my dad's business, um, which was men's clothing. So not the most exciting thing for me. And then I started doing websites on the side. So that's kind of was like my first introduction to web design. And I really started liking blogging. I had some friends that were blogging and I was like, oh, let me redo your site. So I ended up, that was kind of my first foray until a real web design business was doing websites for fashion and lifestyle bloggers for the most part. And I started a blog partially cuz I, I, I had had a blog in college where I've shared, you know, recipes and terrible photos and anyway, so I thought it was like an interesting cool world. It was kind of like up and coming at the time.

Blair Staky (00:00:46) - So that's kind of where I started. And then I had a blog so that started growing a ton, which was really exciting. And then I kind of hit this point with web design where admittedly looking back I'm like I didn't have any good processes in place. I had not a lot of structure projects would go on for too long. People wouldn't pay me. And I kind of hit a wall where I was just like, you know what? I think I need a break . So I took a break and then um, I think within like three to six months I was making more from my blog than I was monthly from web design. So I was like, okay, I'm just gonna do this for a bit. So for like the next five years I was a fashion lifestyle blogger and then we had kids and that threw a whole nother wrench into the thing where I was like, I just like, I'd go through like periods where I was really into it and then I would just be like, oh my God, I do not wanna show up on social media.

Blair Staky (00:01:31) - I don't wanna write a blog post. I also started doubting like, is this important work? You know, like all these kind of existential crisis or something. So yeah, about a year and a half ago I was like, I think I'm done. So I just went back to web design, it was like what I knew and I'd found a new platform that I really enjoyed designing on called Show It. And so that is kind of what I've been doing the past year and a half. And then because of blogging I have a ton of SEO experience that was really where I was like, oh okay. Like I kind of can control, you know, how much traffic I get based on like what I'm writing, how I'm writing my post-its what keywords I'm using and all that stuff. And I just found that to be like really, really interesting and nerdy, but cool . Yeah,

Hayley Price (00:02:10) - No, definitely. And I think since I, I mean I took your course which we were talking about before the call. Yeah. I think since taking it and learning about seo, I, you know, I feel like I used to hear about it and I was like, eh, not for me. I don't need it. But I feel like since I've learned it and just seen what it can do, I'm like, oh this is something I need to know. And it's not like you have to know a ton. Yeah,

Blair Staky (00:02:29) - Yeah. I always am like you don't have to know everything about seo. Like you just need to know kind of a few things to like make it work for you.

Hayley Price (00:02:35) - Right. Well kind of maybe before we jump into some other stuff, like can you just explain what SEO is for people that maybe don't? Yeah,

Blair Staky (00:02:41) - Sure. I know I kinda forget sometimes people are like, what the heck is seo? Um, so it stands for search Engine optimization and it's basically the practice of putting keywords on your website so that you can get found more easily by people who are probably already searching for what you have. So it just kind of gives you that like leg up when someone's searching if you have, you know, good keywords on your website that you will actually show up um, in the rankings. And you were just saying that you, what was the key word that you were saying you came up for now?

Hayley Price (00:03:07) - Art business coach. I'm like the number one on Google. Um, it's for my old website and so I'm trying to get my new website to rank as high to rank. Yeah, it still, you know, my old website links to my new website so I don't really can, yeah, art business coach, business coach for artists, art coaching, all of that. I'm on the first page so That's so cool. It's really made a huge difference. I mean that's like Yeah

Blair Staky (00:03:29) - And it's so cool when you start seeing it work. Cause I think a lot of times people think, we were talking about this earlier that like you put a keyword on your website and they're like, oh well I'm not showing up. I'm like, well it's been a week. Like  SEO takes time. It has like Google has to like, you know, compare you against other sites with that same keyword and see who's providing the best, you know, most relevant content. Um, are people visiting your site? How long are they staying on your site? So all that kind of stuff. But I love would people have that moment of like, oh my gosh, I'm on page one. It's amazing. .

Hayley Price (00:03:57) - Yeah and I think, so I have the scouted studio gallery and that SEO has been working for years, but I opened my new website, I finished it in November of last year. So I'm just now starting to see the results of some of the stuff and I'm still like putting up new blogs and all of that. But it is cool to see like something I put up, you know, five months ago finally getting a hit on Google cuz I use, you know, some trackers and stuff and it's like right, they're getting more views from this and it's really exciting cuz it feels like at least the work I did, it's paying off. It's not just Instagram. I can't rely on Instagram for leads and if I can find people through Google or Google, people can find me through Google. That would be huge.

Blair Staky (00:04:36) - Yeah, it just like is one of those kind of things like I know people say this all the time, like you know, if Instagram was to go away tomorrow, like what would you do for like finding new clients and stuff and like let's be real, I don't think Instagram's going anywhere, but we also don't know like what's gonna happen with the algorithm. And technically yes Google has like its own algorithm but like it's designed to help you get the content that you want. It's not like gate keeping the content until you pay me to like do something. So it really is just like, it's a different algorithm, like a different way I think a more positive one. .

Hayley Price (00:05:06) - Yeah. Well I feel like it's, the way I think about it is the Instagram Instagram algorithm I don't really understand but then Google it's like they want to give the best content to the people searching for their questions or people would switch from Google to Yelp or banks something else.

Blair Staky (00:05:22) - So

Hayley Price (00:05:22) - Yeah, they want to provide the best content so if you can just provide the best answers, like you will get ranked. So,

Blair Staky (00:05:28) - And like you were saying like that it, this post you wrote like six months ago is now, you know, like gaining traction. That's the thing I always tell people is so cool. Like you post on Instagram and it's like gone within, you know, maybe 48 hours is like the longest it's gonna live, right? And then you're like okay back to the, I call it like the hamster wheel, like back on the constant content creation hamster wheel. Just like creating more stuff and like, yes with content you do have to create more but you can like once you have like a pretty good handful, you can kind of get to a place where you're like, okay, I'm like feeling pretty good about my traffic. I have enough leads, my business is busy. And then you can kind of like hit pause on writing new content if you want. And I always tell people you can go back and like update old content to make it more relevant and re-share it. And Google loves that too. So there's like tweak tweaks you can make, but it's not like okay I have to create a whole new idea. It's like brand new thing, which can just be so exhausting.

Hayley Price (00:06:19) - Well maybe walk through what are some of the little things that people can do now, especially like creatives and artists that are gonna be listening to this that they can implement on their website that aren't reinventing the wheel but that might make a big difference on their site.

Blair Staky (00:06:33) - Yeah, so um, I think obviously like adding metadata, if you don't know what that is, that's the things, you know, if you search on Google and you're those listings that come up. So the top thing is like the meta title or the SEO title. So whatever pulls into that information, you can actually set that in all these different website platforms. There's, you know, I know they're all slightly different, but they all have a way for you to set the meta metadata for each, you know, either listing or page and listings can be, we'll talk about that in a second cuz I have thoughts on that. But yeah, you can definitely add context to that, add keywords to that. And I always recommend don't just guess at a keyword but actually do the research. So I had an example, I was like looking, cause I was like, I know we're gonna be talking about this.

Blair Staky (00:07:13) - Let's say you're like a landscape painter and you're like, okay, landscape painting is my keyword. Okay, well if you actually do the research on that landscape painting gets over 33,000 hits a month. Which might be like, oh wow, so many people are searching for this. But like the chances of, you know, like little old me by myself's coming up on page one for that are pretty slim. But if you scroll down in the research it shows, um, what was it, landscape paintings with acrylics we only had 3,600 searches a month. So it's like not as many people are searching for it, but it's more specific and you're more likely to rank for that. And so if using those smaller keywords, you know, it's gonna give you a lot higher chance of actually ranking. So doing the keyword research, I always suggest people do that and I think a lot of people get hung out.

Blair Staky (00:07:54) - They're like, oh I'm just gonna say like, you know, be like me being like Denver website design, like how many potential, you know, Denver website designers could there be? So just getting kind of more specific I think with your keywords, figuring those out, using them in the metadata and then also within the page copy. And one thing I feel like I see people, whether it's art artist, creatives, I work with a lot of health and wellness entrepreneurs too. People just don't have enough copy on their site. And if there's not enough copy for Google to come through and crawl and figure out what your site is about, it doesn't, it's not gonna show your website to anything. Cause there's no context for it to be like, oh this is an artist. So if you have a webpage with you know, beautiful photos of your art but no copy, you're not gonna rank.

Blair Staky (00:08:34) - So it was just like kinda like plain and simple, maybe a little harsh, but you gotta have some copy on there. And then using headers within your copy as well. And headers are basically like a lot of uh, website platforms, you just essentially like highlight the copy and like click, I want this to be a header. You add those and that kind of again, gives more context to Google and it's like, okay, this, you know, header want, this means this is the most important thing on the website. So it just kind of is like helping Google feed the right content to the people that you want to see it. Right.

Hayley Price (00:09:02) - What do you recommend artists do on their sites? Because I know you rank per page, it's not like your whole website ranks. So it's not like you have the flood, your homepage, let's say with like paragraphs and paragraphs of text. Right. How do you recommend someone that's like selling artwork, get content on their website without feeling like I just have to write paragraphs on every page?

Blair Staky (00:09:26) - Yeah, typically each page needs about 500 words to potentially rank. So if there's less than that, it can be a little tricky. Obviously I know that's hard when you're like, oh I have a product page. How much, you know, copy do I really wanna put on here? Not that much. So that's when blog posts really become the main driver of traffic because most blog posts are gonna be at least 500 words. You know, I even recommend typically like 800 is a minimum because the, the longer the post, the more like in depth it's gonna be, the more you're gonna rank. But again, I think just focusing on like one keyword per page is really the smart way to start. And you know, you can add things to the footer. I know a lot of times on pages you'll see like let's say you have a product page of you know, my, my latest works or whatever.

Blair Staky (00:10:06) - And then you have all your things at the bottom. People will have a paragraph or two. So it's kind, it's on the page but it's a little bit more hidden. It's not just all this copy at the top. So it's kind of like a tricky way to like have the content there but get around the visual ugliness,  of having like massive blocks of text. And then if you have like a homepage where there's different sections you can obviously break up copy with, you know, bullet points, um, headers, you know, just different sections of stuff. So you know, as a web designer that's what I'm trying to do is make things look as nice as possible but also still work. So.

Hayley Price (00:10:36) - Right. That's

Blair Staky (00:10:37) - Always nice. Yeah.

Hayley Price (00:10:39) - What, okay, we were talking about this earlier mm-hmm  with blogging, I think that scares a lot of people. People either be like, they just need to do it. They're like, I just

Blair Staky (00:10:47) - Like you blogging, I'm definitely not gonna do that. So

Hayley Price (00:10:50) - Yeah, they're, I feel like the two responses I get from artists are either like, I feel like I should do a blog cause everyone else is doing it, but I don't know why. Or I don't really like writing, do I have to do this every day? Do I have to do this every week? Yeah.

Blair Staky (00:11:01) - Can you explain

Hayley Price (00:11:02) - A little bit about how, you know, maybe a blog can be functional but also doesn't have to be something that you devote your life to if you're not like a blogger?

Blair Staky (00:11:09) - Right. And that's the thing, you know, so many websites have hidden blogs. My dad owns a men's clothing store and I worked with the marketing team that does his blogs and stuff in the past. And the blog is not even like, you can't go to the website and link to the blog. There's nothing out there. But he's like, we get so much traffic to the website from these blog posts cuz they're super targeted. Um, you know, like on ran random men's clothing topics or whatever, but it's not like an outward facing thing. So you can even do it that way where it's not something that's forward facing. Um, something that's kind of little, little bit more like behind the scenes but helps drive traffic to your site. And I liked, I always tell people don't think of it as now I'm a blogger or an influencer or something because it's, the whole point here is not just turning out content, it's writing really specific niche content for your audience.

Blair Staky (00:11:55) - You know, so like you're talking about the landscape, you know, paintings with acrylics, you could do like a post on how to find the best, you know, frames or you know, like just anything that relates to your audience or people who would be buying art or your type of work, which is just a great place to start. But yeah, you can work on those posts. You can have a handful, like let's say you have 20 and you're kinda like, okay, I'm seeing good traffic. Maybe you kinda wanna take a pause. I'm not blog anymore. That's totally fine. It's not something you have to do consistently every day. The only time I say you should blog consistently is if you are literally like blogging for your job, which these people  are listening to this today I'm sure are not doing that. Um, but that's just having that content on your site. The more content you have, like it's well-written, good quality content, the more traffic you're gonna get. Because like you said, each page, your, your website doesn't rank as a whole. Each page ranks individually. So each page you create and a page can also be a post gives just, it's like opening like another avenue to your home. You know, just all these different pathways to get to you. And so the more there are, you know, in theory the more traffic you get.

Hayley Price (00:12:57) - Right. And that's where I think blogs can be useful but less daunting. And I think it also takes the pressure off feeling like you have to optimize like every product page and every picture and all. It's like that some of that stuff doesn't have to rank because odds are you might sell a painting before it ranks. Yeah, . Cause we can talk about this, it takes like, I think it, I read like three to six months, but I mean I've seen it takes a while for SEO to kick in and so it makes more sense to go the blog or route and just get the traffic to your site for something,

Blair Staky (00:13:28) - Right? Cause you're not gonna delete the blog post, right. And you can always go back and update the blog post, which keeps it like fresh. So that's what I wanted to talk about with listings because so many people obviously are selling like one of a kind work. And to me spending a ton of time optimizing one of a kind pieces like listings for that just doesn't make sense. Like if you wanna go for it, great, but like you said, chances are your piece is probably gonna sell before the SEO kicks in. So when I, for listings, at least the things I would focus my attention on would be things like, let's say you sold prints, focus on your SEO for those prints, work on those pages. Um, or if you sold, I don't know, like mugs or notebooks with your art on it, you know, I know a lot of artists have different types of products. So anywhere that you're gonna have inventory that's gonna like not, you know, expire really quickly or sell out immediately, those are where I would focus my attention for a listings page. But for one of a kind pieces, I just, I kind of feel like it's a lot of work for probably not much return.

Hayley Price (00:14:24) - Right. I had a lot of artists ask about that specifically, like a lot of questions about the photos and the descriptions and all and the title. And I was kind of like, from my knowledge, I understand that it probably wouldn't be worth it. But I also wanna address, because I'm sure my listeners are probably like shoes don't asking any of our questions. Yeah. . But that's why, and it's, I think it's better because then it's like you can put your work up, you can name it what you wanna name it. The description doesn't need to be paragraphs long, but you could write a blog post on landscape paintings and acrylic Yes. Six months before. And if you always, you know, you do landscape paintings, theoretically you're gonna come to your site over time and continually, you know, in search of that and then continually see the work you're putting up.

Blair Staky (00:15:06) - And that's what I would say. I was like talking, I had kind of like thought about all this in my head before, if you do always do landscape paintings, let's say you have that blog post that's like landscape paintings with acrylics. So anytime you come out with a new collection or anything like that, I would go into that blog post, update the photos with some of like, you know, anything that's sold out. Take the photo out, put the new one in, put new links in, you know, maybe add like a new sentence or two or update it just so it feels like fresh and then change the publish date to like, you know, the day that it is now. So it feels like a new post and you republish it. And Google loves to see content updated because they look at that and go, oh, this content is still relevant.

Blair Staky (00:15:42) - They're still keeping up with it. Like, we're gonna show this to more people. And so the more you do that, you know, the more it just kind of boosts your post up. That's also true if you have a post that was ranking and it starts to like fall off. I had a post that was like, how to make an Instagram reel. Somehow I managed to like get on page one for this. I'm like, I don't even know that much about Instagram reels. But anyway, it was ranking and then it dropped off and I went into the post, added a few more sentences, maybe a, a photo that was kind of like a demonstration and then republished it and within a week it was back on page one. So it is really cool to see that like you have the power to boost your own rankings by making little tweaks like that. But that's where I would say for one of a kind pieces create a blog post that's kind of like, okay, this is gonna be this all-encompassing thing. It's like a great keyword that I wanna rank for. It's competitive, but not too competitive and just focus on like creating or updating that post over and over again.

Hayley Price (00:16:34) - Yeah. When it comes to the keywords themselves, um, we talked a little bit about how they rank, but how do you recommend people find them? I mean, I know there's some websites and stuff out there, but what are the resources to find them and then how do you know if it's good or not? Good or

Blair Staky (00:16:48) - Bad? . Yeah. Yeah. Um, so there's tons of different websites out there. Like if you search like, you know, keyword research tool, you're gonna get a ton of feedback because guess what? They're all really good at seo. So the one I personally like is Uber suggests I've used S cm Rush in the past, which is also a really great tool. It's just a lot more expensive. So I find that for small business owners, it's just like, I'm not paying $99 a month for this. And Uber suggest I think is like 39 maybe. I don't know. It's, it's affordable I think, um, for, for all the information you get and does the tracking and you can, you know, get updates on keywords and stuff. Um, so that's my favorite tool. And then when you're searching for keywords, I typically tell people this is always kind of like people, people are like, wait, don't we want like more people to be searching for it? And it's like, yes, that's good, but it also can really mean that like there's so much competition for that keyword that you ranking for. It's like probably not gonna happen unless you're like some massive company. I say you want searches between around like a thousand to 5,000 I think are good. I mean I've even used keywords that are like up to 10,000 or 20,000. Um, but just the chances of me ranking for them are probably less likely.

Hayley Price (00:17:54) - Yeah, no, I think that makes sense. And it's, it's kinda like hashtags on Instagram, which I don't even know if people really use hashtags as much anymore, but it's like you, you're not gonna really show up if it's a million people looking at it. Right.

Blair Staky (00:18:05) - I'm always looking for hashtags with like less than like, you know, I don't know, I don't really look that hard, but . But like I'm not gonna sign up for one's like 1 billion, you know, people have used this or something. I'm like, yeah, I'm probably not gonna show up in that one. So yeah, no, it's exact same thing, like putting yourself in like a smaller pond makes it easier for people to find you.

Hayley Price (00:18:24) - When it comes to the keyword itself, like obviously some are keywords can be chained, so it can be like four words. Yeah. So for example, land, let's say it's like landscape painter, uh, landscape acrylic painter. So it's like a couple words when you're using that in a blog post, do you have to use those exact words in that exact order to rank or not?

Blair Staky (00:18:48) - So a lot of times when you do keyword research, if you search something like that, you'll see kind of different variations of that. I try to use like this, the exact one and maybe also another couple variations of it just because it gives more context and obviously, um, I'm forgetting like the term for it, but uh, it's basically like a semantic thing. Like obviously people say things differently, so mm-hmm.  Google takes that into consideration. So I'm not sure if you don't use exactly what it says, like you're not frank, but I'm not sure how much that, like how much difference there can be. So I typically do try to use it pretty specifically to the keyword. And I had worked with an SEO company back when I was blogging and they were like, would send me like, these are the keywords you need to use. And some of 'em were like kind of awkward to use, right? Like yeah, you're like, it makes sense for a search, but it doesn't make sense for me to type it into a paragraph this way. So finding like the ones that make more sense obviously help because then when people are reading the content it doesn't sound weird.

Hayley Price (00:19:43) - Right. Well that's the key too. I mean I've definitely tried to implement some into blog posts and I'm like, this just isn't gonna work because it sounds like a robot wrote it, it just

Blair Staky (00:19:52) - Doesn't Yeah. Sometimes they just don't. Right.

Hayley Price (00:19:54) - And it's like, if I don't rank for this one, that's fine, but like it doesn't need to. Yeah.

Blair Staky (00:19:58) - No, but I mean clearly like obviously when people search those things and that are awkward to write in a paragraph, like things come up Right. And so it's our, it is gonna pull things that are like close to that. So I think it probably would, I just don't know like how, how close to the topic, you know, like I don't know how specific Google gets in with that stuff.

Hayley Price (00:20:16) - Yeah. What do you think about other sources of getting like a blog out there or your work out there like Pinterest? What are your thoughts on Pinterest? I feel like, yeah, a lot of artists are interested in it but maybe don't really know how to use it.

Blair Staky (00:20:29) - Yeah. I mean I love Pinterest. I used to be a blogger, so Pinterest was like Pinterest and Google were my two biggest sources of traffic, which was really cool. And also love to point that out because people are like, you know, feel this need to get on Instagram every day. And I'm like, you know, I had one point like 75,000 followers. I've lost quite a few since I like changed from blogging to web design, but whatever. That's right. But I was always surprised that even with that many people following on Instagram, my traffic from Instagram was never more than 1% of my total website traffic, which always blew my mind. I was like, oh my gosh, I've spent so much time here and it's not doing anything. But yeah, it just really goes to show that like Pinterest and Google really do count and they also, once you do the work there, like you're not having to show up every single day, which is what I love about 'em.

Hayley Price (00:21:12) - Right. Pinterest

Blair Staky (00:21:14) - Is great. Oh, sorry, go ahead.

Hayley Price (00:21:15) - I was gonna say Pinterest is a search engine too. Yeah. I think that's what people, the disconnect is they assume it's like another social platform,

Blair Staky (00:21:22) - Right? It's, but it's absolutely a search engine. .

Hayley Price (00:21:24) - Yeah. Like I have my Pinterest that I've had since the scouted studio very first started and I'm still ranking for art that like for random posts from like six years ago. And I'm like, well, but art sold. But if it's getting people to my site, then like they get people

Blair Staky (00:21:39) - To your site and then they can find other things. So I think it's still a great tool to get more traffic to your site and get just people just more eyeballs looking around on it. Um, so yeah, I definitely, it is a, a visual search engine. So for artists I think it's an incredible tool because obviously artists very visual and people wanna see this stuff. Um, obviously I know Pinterest is a lot of like DIY stuff, so people might be saving your art because like they want to DIY something that looks similar, which can be frustrating. But also, you know, whatever it is, you can't control what white people are saving things for. But I think if you're not using Pinterest, you should definitely be, especially like, you know, just going through and pinning all your different listings that are current. Um, and like you said, even if they sell out they're l they'll land on your site and you know, be able to poke around

Hayley Price (00:22:23) - And there's great tools. Uh, I've mentioned Tailwind a ton, like on this podcast in my blog. Yeah. People are tired of hearing about it, but you can use it for Instagram, which is great, but I actually, it's the only, it's the only thing I've ever used for Pinterest. And you can schedule your pins and you can pin, I have the, what's it called, like the Chrome extension and so I can just mm-hmm.  pin stuff directly from my site. So it, I mean I'll edit it and maybe add some like keywords or something in there, but sometimes I'm like, if I get a new artist I'll just like pin all of their new listings and it takes five seconds. Yeah. Because I can just use the extension.

Blair Staky (00:22:55) - I know. And that's the thing I think they're like, oh, it's gonna be so much work. And you know, one thing if you have photos and they have alt text on 'em, which is just another little kind of SEO hack, you can add alt text to images. Um, if you have that text that will pull in as a description on Pinterest. Mm-hmm. . But Tailwind just added this feature. I don't know if you've played around with it, but it's their ghost writer, their AI tool.

Hayley Price (00:23:17) - Oh yeah. I haven't played around it yet. What do you think about it? Yeah,

Blair Staky (00:23:20) - I just like used it the other day and I was like actually pretty impressed. Cause sometimes I'm like, oh God, like I don't know what to say. I don't have to write. Right. But it actually says if you wanna add specific keywords to it, you can add that. And I kind of read through a few of them and I was like, is this like pretty spot on because I'm feeding it my blog post link. So that scans my blog post. Mm-hmm.  knows what it's about and then it writes it. I'm like, oh my gosh, this is so much easier.

Hayley Price (00:23:40) - . Yeah. The AI stuff time save. Yeah. I've experimented with AI stuff a lot. I actually used Uber suggests new AI like tool and I just played around with it one day just to see if it could write a blog post. It definitely wasn't like in my voice, but it yeah. Was like kind of accurate and I was like, this is a little crazy. It's

Blair Staky (00:24:01) - Been an incredible thing. I think it's one of those things like I know everyone's like, oh my God, AI is taking you over the world. But as a, you know, small business owner marketer, when you're wearing all the hats, you're doing all the things and you don't have extra time to sit down and like write a blog post. Mm-hmm. , those AI tools are incredible. Like I used chat G P T A ton and I just, it's never like I copy and paste it directly and I'm like, blog post is done. Cuz like you said, it's never in my voice. I like to add, you know, personal little notes and stories here, but it can help you just so quickly create more content. So I feel like it's an amazing tool for anyone writing content because you're like, oh, I don't actually have to do all of the work. It can do a lot of the work for you and you can add your own kind of personal stuff to it. But, um, it's, it's an amazing tool. I think every marketer business owner should be utilizing it in some, some aspect.

Hayley Price (00:24:48) - Yeah. Well it's a great lead generator. Like sometimes I'm like, I just can't think of the first, the like title or the what the, you know, different, you know, you break up a blog post and it's like here are five steps, like what the five steps should be. Like what

Blair Staky (00:25:00) - Are the five steps? Yeah. .

Hayley Price (00:25:02) - Yeah. Like I just am like I just need to start and it can kind of get you there or at least get the ball rolling a little bit. Which, yeah, I'll tweak it And I never just like, like you said, I don't ever copy and paste anything from there. But I think playing around with it, I'm like, this is something that I think could help me get over the hump of starting. Because I don't really wanna like for sure do the initial research of like, what am I gonna write about? It's kind of like it can with

Blair Staky (00:25:22) - That, I mean you can literally be like, okay, I need to write a blog post for this type of business. You know, like what should I write about? Or like if you're like, I wanna write a post about framing, like what should I say? And it will like spit back ideas, which is just like, I don't know, it's, I think of it as like a, you know, like a super smart secretary or something like that. Yeah. And assistant that's just there to help you and can search the internet in record time. So it's an amazing tool.

Hayley Price (00:25:46) - Yeah, definitely something people should use if they Yeah,

Blair Staky (00:25:50) - For sure. I think it's amazing. And I've had friends that have been like, oh I haven't used it cuz they're like writers and then they were like, well I tested it out and they're like, I can't believe like how amazing it was. And they write their email newsletters with it and stuff like that. So there's so many uses for it. Basically anything you write, do you wanna write an Instagram caption? You're like, I just can't think of anything. They can do that too. So

Hayley Price (00:26:08) - Yeah, that's probably what I need to use it for. I've gotten so lazy with my captions, like I'll put a lot of effort into the visuals and then I get to the captions. I know you're

Blair Staky (00:26:16) - Like, I made this whole thing and then I'm done .

Hayley Price (00:26:18) - Yeah. And then I'm like, here it is like  period. Yeah. I'm

Blair Staky (00:26:21) - Just like, I'm too tired from creating it so now I just don't have anything else to say about it. Right.

Hayley Price (00:26:26) - And it's like, I know there should be a call to action and it should, you know, be a story. Yeah. You know, I'm like here's my two sentences. An emoji maybe like .

Blair Staky (00:26:34) - Yeah, I know. Go

Hayley Price (00:26:35) - To my bio.

Blair Staky (00:26:36) - Yeah. But it's nice if you can like sit down and batch content. That's what I always say with people when they're like a intimidated by blogging. I'm like, think, think of it as a marketing, you know, a piece of like marketing material and then like sit down and like take a day or not even a day, like a few hours and like batch, you know, four pieces of content and post one a week for you know, the month or whatever. And it doesn't take that long. Especially if you're using somebody's like AI tools to help you either get started or you know, really write big chunks of it. So. Right.

Hayley Price (00:27:02) - It's very helpful. Yeah, I've definitely tried to get more of a, I tried to get in a rhythm and it didn't work and then the other day I sat down and wrote like six blog posts and it's one of those like I think if you just sit down and do it's, you like be

Blair Staky (00:27:13) - In the mood too. . I know I've done that before and then I'm like holy cow. Like I always do it on planes, which is so weird. Cause I feel like now we have two kids and we don't fly that often . But I would like get on a flight and I would knock out like six blog posts and be like, holy cow, I can't believe I just did it. .

Hayley Price (00:27:29) - Yep. I always go to the airport early because I don't always like, I'll, I'll purposely not connect to the wifi so then I'm like, this is your time Hailey. The only thing you can do is write this. And then, yeah, then sometimes having,

Blair Staky (00:27:39) - Having non uh, like non distracted time is always so, so smart.

Hayley Price (00:27:44) - Yeah. Well, switching gears a little bit, you mentioned that you build templates for websites. Can you talk a little bit about that and if, you know, I was turning over and wanted to either improve my website or start a new one, kind of what is it that you offer?

Blair Staky (00:27:59) - Yeah, so I do custom web design on show it Shopify, Squarespace and WordPress. Um, my templates are just for show it right now. So for artists that's probably not quite the right platform cause it's not, it doesn't have e-commerce built in. You can do e-commerce but it would be, I would say it'd be too complicated on that platform if you have like ever-changing inventory. But yeah, Shopify and Squarespace, I've actually done more Shopify sites than Squarespace for e-commerce. Um, it's anyone who's used both of them, like I've used both and they're both wonderful. I think Shopify definitely has a lot more tools and a lot more just like power behind it than Squarespace. So if you're, you know, starting small Squarespace is fine. I think as you expand like Shopify's gonna give you so many more options and just like, they have like a huge, um, what was like a marketplace of different like, like add-on things, you know, like adding, you know, sign up for a wait list, , you know, whatever. So I definitely think Shopify is where I would recommend people. If you're starting an online shop, if you're on Squarespace and you're like hitting up to like, ah, I can't do this on here. It might be time to move to Shopify. But if you're just selling pretty basic stuff, Squarespace is is absolutely wonderful as well.

Hayley Price (00:29:07) - Yeah. I have used both and I know you Shopify, but I feel like I recommend Squarespace to a lot of people starting out because I'm like, it's a little easier. Well

Blair Staky (00:29:16) - It's just a little more straightforward. There's not as many things to pick from. I don't know, there's like collections and the way you tag products is I feel like a little bit different and just a little bit more complicated. So definitely a like there's a learning curve to it for sure. But yeah, it's really, it's a lovely platform. .

Hayley Price (00:29:31) - Yeah. I love Shopify. I feel like I've, I mean I've had it for five, four or five years now, I don't know. Mm-hmm.  and I feel like I get it but there was a while there that I'm like, this is, it's a lot to take in but I do think it's, it's great.

Blair Staky (00:29:43) - Yeah. And they have like a really wonderful template shop. So I, I work with a lot of people on doing total custom builds and I do the design and then I partner with a developer who actually codes 'em, which, which is nice cuz I'm not the coding  person. Yeah. But yeah, so that's, I do work with a lot of people on Shopify websites. If anyone was looking for someone to help on that. I, I do that. What else was I gonna say about Shopify? I just, I think it's such a great platform and yeah, not to say Squarespace is bad but just I think it's like, so everything's so integrated and

Hayley Price (00:30:14) - I kind of think because I had someone help me build mine out and I think if you're trying to DIY it and really do it all yourself, it's kind of easier to make it look good from the get-go with Squarespace. Yeah. Cause it's sort of drag and drop and this is just my experience. Yeah. I feel like Shopify is more you can do and it's, but it takes a little bit more finagling to get it to look the way you want. So you kind of, it's definitely like

Blair Staky (00:30:35) - A little more challenging to customize if you don't know CSS code or you know, anything like that. So that's for sure. Exactly.

Hayley Price (00:30:42) - So I'm kind of like if you find a

Blair Staky (00:30:43) - Template you love then it's like okay great, just drop everything in there .

Hayley Price (00:30:46) - Yeah. I feel like it's, if you're just starting out low budget, you're trying to like just put a website together, maybe start on Squarespace and then when you get to the point where you're ready to invest in some help Yeah. And you're kind of outgrowing shop Squarespace, that's when you switch, switch to

Blair Staky (00:31:01) - Shopify. Yeah. And that's so true. Like the budget thing too there like, uh, Squarespace is, I mean not that Shopify is like wildly expensive but it's definitely more expensive than Squarespace. So Yeah, if you're like brand new to this, you're like, I don't even know if anyone's gonna buy anything from me. Like Squarespace is a great place to get started.

Hayley Price (00:31:15) - Yeah. Well so you're an artist as well. Yes. How , just adding that on to all the things that you do, but how did you think about building your website when you decided to add that kind of branch to your business? Yeah,

Blair Staky (00:31:29) - Um, you know I of course my first thing when I'm starting like anything new I'm like, let me check some other artist websites who I like. And the one thing I feel like I was really surprised by was to be honest, like how terrible a lot of artist websites were. And I say that not to be like rude or harsh, but like they were just so rudimentary and like you land on the site and it's just super generic. You can barely find out how to shop things. You can't sign up for an email address. But to me they use, as a designer, the user experience is just not there. It's just so you're making your audience have to work so hard to find what they want. And that is number one, you, you gotta make things easy. And then also a lot of 'em were just a portfolio on the homepage.

Blair Staky (00:32:07) - So like the only text that was there were the links to the other pages. There was like no copy. So I'm like, you're not gonna be ranking for anything. So when I was doing my own site, I kind of very much like wanted to think about like who my audience was, who's buying my art, what it's going, what kind of images are going to spark them, is it gonna be like just an image of the art or is it gonna be like a lifestyle image? So just kind of like bringing more life to it. So I personally found myself drawn to websites or artists websites that were very much like showed you know, a living room and it was like, Ooh, I can totally see this in my home. It kind of like gave us more of an experience than just a cut, you know, piece of art where it's all you can see is the art, which is fine.

Blair Staky (00:32:44) - I think those are great to use in like listings where you're like, okay, I really wanna see this art up close. But having on the homepage that's kind of lifestyle images really bring the whole thing to life. Um, so yeah, I definitely looked at that. And then again I just really wanted to make the experience really easy. So I have both work that's neutral and colorful and I feel like people either gravitate towards one or the other. Mm-hmm . So I have, you know, underneath my kind of main call to action at the top it's like, you know, shop my latest collection. I had a section to sign up for my email and then I maybe my a few latest pieces and then a whole section on you know, shop colors, shop neutral shop smalls or prints, you know, whatever it is. Kind of calling out those main specific things that people are coming to me for.

Blair Staky (00:33:23) - So, you know, kind of just making the whole process easier for anyone who lands on your site I think is something that everyone should consider. I know a lot of times people are just like, oh I don't wanna do this . Yeah. But it is worth doing because I think it's just, it's gonna make it easier for people to make like say yes and be like, okay, I'm ready to purchase. And one other thing I was thinking about that drives me nuts about some artist websites is when it says like you want, you see a piece you love and you wanna know like the price of it and it says, you know, inquire for price. And I'm like, no. Okay. It's probably out of my price range if I have to inquire for the price. Mm-hmm . So as a small business owner, I, and like as a designer, like I have you know, design offerings that are expensive, but I want people to know when we get on the phone they've vetted themselves like yes I am willing to spend that much before I even get on the phone and like try to have to convince them.

Blair Staky (00:34:11) - Like that's just not fun to me. It's not how I like to do business. So I always recommend just being straightforward, honest. I think it makes people be like, okay, I can consider that now. You know, cuz I think a lot of people are just gonna automatically disqualify from themselves simply based on I'm gonna assume this is really expensive and I can't afford it and they're just

Hayley Price (00:34:31) - Don't. Oh absolutely. I mean I definitely do that if a price isn't listed, I kind of take a step back because I can't count them. Is that it's expensive.

Blair Staky (00:34:38) - Exactly. Yeah. And then

Hayley Price (00:34:40) - I, and then I also think it's, it's vetting the people for you. It's less in your inbox cuz like let's say they do reach out and then they don't want it. I mean especially for something like,

Blair Staky (00:34:50) - And they ghost to and you're like, they never emailed me back, you know,

Hayley Price (00:34:53) - , right. Like, I mean for, for coaching or for the membership or anything. I do, I mean I try to keep it affordable for artists but I also have prices everywhere because I don't want someone to get on the phone and then feel like they have to backtrack out of the conversation. Right. Cause that's uncomfortable for everyone and it's, I mean it's a waste of my time. It's a waste of their time. It's, yeah like

Blair Staky (00:35:10) - I don't wanna get on the call if you're like, oh I was gonna only spend, you know, I only wanted to buy art for a hundred dollars and yours is a thousand dollars. So like, you know, I think just being upfront and honest, I don't know makes it easier. And also like if, if it's someone, like I think about like there's plenty of artists that I follow and they're out of my price range now, but I'm like, I still follow them because you know, I'm, I want to eventually get to that point but I know kind of what that range is now versus just being like, well I guess one day when I feel rich I'll reach out to them. You know, I don't know .

Hayley Price (00:35:38) - Exactly. Yeah. So I

Blair Staky (00:35:39) - Think that is like one thing I always suggest people do.

Hayley Price (00:35:42) - I think that's a really good tip. Any other tips that you can think of just when it comes to putting your website together?

Blair Staky (00:35:48) - I know I think, I know Squarespace does this now and I know Shopify does it as well, but you can also do um, like financing kind of options. So where someone can break it into, you know, I think it's maybe four payments and you don't actually send out the artwork until it's been paid for. But again, I think that just is a cool option to have. I think it makes it, you know, more approachable for a lot of people who are like, I can't afford this but like I would rather not pay for it all, you know, in one fell swoop kind of thing. So I think that's really helpful. I think you know, creating some sort of branding for your site, you know, if you are someone who paints like really colorful stuff and like your whole website's kind of black and white, you know, maybe add some color in there. It doesn't have to be crazy cause I know we want the artwork to stand out but even something simple like a logo that's in a different, you know, shade or like with a really cool font, just something to kind of give your, your website that level of branding that looks more like fancy. Not just whatever Squarespace or Shopify's fonts got got on there. , you know,

Hayley Price (00:36:47) - I'll go to other artists' websites. Not even when I was designing my website, I made a whole list of all the sites I liked, what I liked about them, like colors, fonts, oh she had her signature as the logo, like all of that kind of stuff. And then I worked with someone so I had them help me, but I've also designed another website on my own. And when I designed it on my own, I just like went into Canva and like played around with, because Camba has a lot of starting points and I didn't use their stuff directly, but I could at least see like, oh these two fonts look good together. Or Yeah, that's a great color palette and you can use it as a starting point just to kind of get an idea before, you know, sometimes just staring at a blank website. Yeah.

Blair Staky (00:37:24) - It's like so intimidating to be like, where do I even start? I mean it's like as a web designer before I start any project, I have the client like put together a Pinterest inspiration board because Right. You know, I can come in and be like, I think this is what would be, you know, best for your brand. But they might be like, no, no this is kind of the direction I'm going. So like I can't decide that for you, you know, you know your brand better than I do and you know, they'll pin images that are kind of like in a certain aesthetic or you know, maybe they're really brightened Brighton airy or like really moody. So I'm kinda like, okay, I'm getting the vibe here . But yeah, that's a good practice too if you're kind of like stuck on like what is my vibe? Or you whatever. That's a good way to do it. And another great place for fonts that I love is creative market.com. They have incredible, beautiful fonts that are super unique and they're very cheap to make, or sorry, very cheap to purchase. Um, so if you wanted to find like a cool logo for your font, that is like my go-to spot.

Hayley Price (00:38:12) - Okay. That's great. Yeah. Good to know. Yeah.

Blair Staky (00:38:15) - With

Hayley Price (00:38:15) - Everything you're doing, cuz I feel like you always have lots going on. How do you stay organized? I'm sure a lot of people are listening to this and she's an artist, she does seo, she's like,

Blair Staky (00:38:24) - Yeah, I mean to, I mean back to the artist thing, I am not an artist. Probably like most of the people that are listening to this are whether it's like really like their full-time thing. Um, for me it's kind of something like when I, I do it when I feel inspired and I will literally go like months like I haven't painted, I started this one and then I kinda like stopped  so it's not my full-time gig by any means. So, um, I paint when I, when I feel like it, but I actually just kind of restructured my own business to take off a lot of things cuz I had a lot of random services that, you know, I think anytime you start a new business you try things and artists will do that too. Like they might try prints or different products or fabric, you know, and I think that's so smart.

Blair Staky (00:39:01) - I think it's so good to just test the waters and see what sticks because at the end of the day you just never know until, you know. So I had done that when I first started my web design business and I've since kind of like cut back a lot of my different services isn't really streamlined them. So, um, unless I'm like actively working on a project, my day-to-day is pretty free, which is lovely . So I focus a lot of my time on like marketing stuff. But yeah, I, it's taken a long time to get there where I'm not just

Hayley Price (00:39:26) - Right

Blair Staky (00:39:26) - So much stuff every single day. Well I

Hayley Price (00:39:28) - Think that's a good piece of advice is kind of put your feelers out and diversify your income while you can. And then once you figure out what's working really well to talk to people about this all the time, I'm like, no, what's working well? Like know your finances for artists. I'm like, know what's bringing the money and then when it you can scale back because I think a lot of artists go, go, go and then they like burn out because they're like, I'm doing all these things.

Blair Staky (00:39:51) - Things. Yeah.

Hayley Price (00:39:52) - But it's, you know, if you can figure it out and then kind of scale back to like, these are my, this is my bread and butter, like this is what I'm known for. Yeah. Then you can kinda like relax a little bit and do do less. Yeah. But what you're best at.

Blair Staky (00:40:04) - I think what's also really cool is just seeing different artists. Um, cause it's not about SEO at all, but just seeing how people create different products and you know, I think the one thing that, like I've said, I've had an online business for a long time. I'm always looking for opportunities that are more passive because there's only one me, I can only create so many websites, so that's why I have templates. But I was talking to an artist's friend and she does original painting. She has prints, she sells plastic cups with, you know, pieces of her art on it, fabric. She has like, she's tried so many different things and they've like, you know, I'm sure some of them have not been successful. We can get into it. Yeah. But it's been really cool to see that she's been able to create some of these passive streams for her business that don't require her. Like maybe it requires 10 minutes to go on and like, you know, order the fabric from the person who prints it or whatever. But you don't have to constantly be creating original works all the time. And I just think that's, any artist or any business owner should always be thinking of ways like, how can I increase my bottom line without having to physically do so much more work all the time? So I think that's been really cool to see different artists come out with different products and things like that.

Hayley Price (00:41:05) - Yeah. And I feel like that's what I'm trying to kind of use this platform for too. Like the podcast bring on so many different artists and industry experts like you, but people that can talk about that. So artists can say, I think a lot of artists feel stuck. They're like, I can paint and then what? But there's so many different outlets. It's just finding kinda what works for you.

Blair Staky (00:41:23) - Yeah, and I think I've, I kind of, when I first started painting, felt that way, I was like, well, you know, printing prints and paintings, like what else can I do? And then I started kind of looking around and seeing, you know, some artists I love, she was creating this like amazing fabric and then she, I was making pillows and comforters and now she has an entire line of home goods and I don't know, napkins and plates. Like, there's so many cool things that you can make and like I think a lot of times people get hung up on why wouldn't even know, you know, where to get started on like making that product. And that's, you know, honestly with a little like Googling, you can quickly find out that there's manufacturers all over the world that can create products for you for varying, you know, cheap prices. Not that it should be cheap, but probably more ible than people think. Yeah. It's like, oh, okay, this becomes like a reality now. So I think that's so fun to dig into, okay, how can I really make this into more than just I'm a painter.

Hayley Price (00:42:14) - Yeah. Well and I think it, it keeps the creative juices flowing a little bit too. Yeah. I mean it's easy to kind of get in your rhythm, but I think constantly like pushing ourselves to do the next thing, do something different, do something new and exciting. It also makes the whole process more fun too, you know?

Blair Staky (00:42:28) - Yeah. I also think too, like just having some, you know, if you have some of those more passive things, I think, at least for me, I know when I'm not on the crunch deadline all the time to like get new workout or whatever it, I feel like it makes you more creative because you already know, okay, I'm gonna hit my bottom line or like what I need through these products that are already kind of like providing for me and everything else can just be, you know, like extra or whatever. Or I don't have to create quite as much to like, you know, hit my budget every month or whatever. Right.

Hayley Price (00:42:56) - I talk to artists about that a lot. I'm like having building in kind of flexible creative time when you just create to create a knot to sell. And I mean I think that's important throughout any stage of the career, but I think it's easier to do when you do know, okay, like I have my work in this gallery, I know stuff will sell this month. I have my prints on my site, I know I'll make X amount this month. And it's like, then I only have to make this much for my original art so I can be flexible every Friday and just paint. Yeah.

Blair Staky (00:43:22) - Versus I think it totally takes you from like that like scarcity mentality to the like abundance mentality. And I feel like when you're in that flow, things just like, you know, it just comes so easily so Right.

Hayley Price (00:43:34) - It's the best work. It's like when it just comes out of you and it's quick. Yeah.

Blair Staky (00:43:37) - You're like, I don't even know where it came from. It's here .

Hayley Price (00:43:39) - Yeah. And then it's like when I'm trying really hard and it's a commission, it just looks terrible. .

Blair Staky (00:43:43) - I know. I feel like the God commissions are such a struggle because I'm like, oh they really liked that one piece and now I have to make it look exactly like that. And it just never works out though.

Hayley Price (00:43:51) - . I know. I feel like every artist I talk to has a love hate with commissions or not every artist, but a lot of people are like, we know it's great and it's guaranteed income, but it kind of sucks .

Blair Staky (00:43:59) - It's also tough. Yeah. I know it's challenging, but, oh well part of the business. I guess ,

Hayley Price (00:44:05) - Well kind of covering all of this, what resources do you have for artists that are interested in websites, s e o, kind of everything that we talked about today?

Blair Staky (00:44:14) - Yeah, so my website is Blair Steaky. It's S T A K y, Blair with no E probably should just spelled out the whole thing.com. But that's has everything, like all my different web design packages and that sort of thing. As for seo, I have two different things. Actually just came out with this SEO made simple guide that is kind of like the crash course of my actual full course where I go fully in depth, I'm showing you exactly how to do everything. The ebook is a little bit more of like, if you're can read instructions and like take action, it's gonna be great. Um, it doesn't go nearly as in depth as the course, but it's only $47. So I wanted people to have that kind of, you know, quick grab like I can take this and run with it and you know, be successful with SEO with just this very affordable thing because I think so many SEO like gurus and people out there are like, want you to pay them like thousands of dollars a month and they make it seem so hard and it's really not that hard as, as you now know .

Blair Staky (00:45:08) - Yeah. So yeah, I just wanted to make it really accessible to anyone with a small business. So, um, I have that and then I also have, like I said, the course, it's called Content That Converts and there is a really big focus on creating like that blog content and just growing your seo, you know, over time with really good pieces of content and how to like, not just write the content but then like get it out into the world as well.

Hayley Price (00:45:28) - Yeah. I took for everyone's reference cuz I've been talking about it, I took the course, but I think even, you know, if you're just starting into it, I think the e-book would be a great, it's an e-book, right? Yeah. Mm-hmm. . Yeah, I think the e-book, I said that and then I was like the e-book, A great stepping stone. I mean, even what we talked about today, I think you provided so much information that just helps people take those first steps and then if you are willing to jump in more, I mean the course, like I said, like allowed me to rank on the first page of Google, which

Blair Staky (00:45:57) - Yeah, I love hearing that. It's always like, oh my gosh, it works .

Hayley Price (00:46:00) - Yeah. And I think being in, I mean obviously it's helped me and I'm in a more client, one-on-one business. Mm-hmm. , but hearing that people in other countries just found me through Google always amazes me because I think in my head I was so focused on Instagram Yeah. And Instagram ads and like how are people gonna find me? But when you find that people just find you because of Google without knowing your name and knowing who you are, you're like, okay, wow, I can, I can escalate this. You know, this can be something bigger.

Blair Staky (00:46:25) - Yeah, I know. I think it just takes a lot of that like daily marketing work out and I never say like, ignore Instagram, especially for artists because Instagram is such a visual place and it's such a great place to like, you know, get discovered, but I never ever want anyone to put like all their eggs in one basket in that, you know, rare occasion that Instagram blows up or you know, and we, I think we've all probably had a friend who's like lost their account and you're like, oh my God, yeah. What if that's the only way to contact people and now you, they're gone. Right? So that's my kind of like, not to scare people about Instagram, but just to not only use Instagram.

Hayley Price (00:47:00) - Right. Well I push everyone to email too because I'm like, oh yeah, for that reason and just cuz I think email converts so well, but I think people are still hesitant about it and I'm like, it's really great. You can't put all your eggs in one basket.

Blair Staky (00:47:13) - Yeah. No email. I think like the stats on like the ROI for email, it's like 200% more. Yeah. Higher ROI for an email than Instagram. And so it's like, okay, just that, like that right there. Like my email list I think I have for my art account, like 1800 followers or something. Mm-hmm.  and my email is, has like 300, but I make more sales when I send an email versus posting something on Instagram. So Yeah. Just goes to show you it works.

Hayley Price (00:47:41) - No, I'm the exact same way, but this has all been so helpful. I feel like you provided so much information on SEO websites.

Blair Staky (00:47:48) - Good. I'm glad it

Hayley Price (00:47:49) - Broke it down. Like realistically, I mean I think it's a daunting task, but it's nice to know like you can just put up some blogs. It doesn't have to be, now you're an influencer. Like, it's like there's really easy stuff you can do that can make a really big difference.

Blair Staky (00:48:01) - Yeah. I think even too people get, can sometimes get hung up on like, like, oh my gosh, is this the right keyword? You know, like I kind of like stuck on those. Like, my answer is like, any keyword usage is better than none. So like, and you can always go back, like I said, an update post when you kind of like get a better hang for things and you're like, oh, okay, I realize I can, you know, add headers or maybe I should, you know, work in some more keywords here. So it's always just something you can improve upon without having to go in and create totally new content all the time. So yeah, I'm excited for all your artists and hopefully this helps a ton. ,  and uh, yeah, I'm here if people need help. .

Hayley Price (00:48:37) - Yeah, well I will link your website Instagram and then I can get the links to your course and your ebook too and sent, put that on the show notes and on my Instagram and stuff so that people, when this episode comes out can easily find all of your resources because this is something people ask me about all the time and I mean, I took your course, but I'm still like, you gotta learn from the expert .

Blair Staky (00:48:58) - I know. And I feel like, you know, a lot of, I've had like web designers take the course like so that they can use it for their clients too, which is like, um Right. Feels very, I'm like, okay, thank you , it makes me feel good, . Um, but yeah, no, it's, it's such a great skill to have and I think it just, you know, in a world of like, you know, praying something goes viral on Instagram, like this really puts a lot more power back into your hands. And I, for me at least I know, makes me feel so much more empowered to do marketing for my business knowing that I know like it's gonna work.

Hayley Price (00:49:26) - Right. Well thank you so much for taking the time to do this today. Yeah. I think this has been so helpful and insightful and I feel like I've learned even more so I Oh, good.

Blair Staky (00:49:35) - ,

Hayley Price (00:49:37) - It's been fun.

Blair Staky (00:49:38) - Well thank you so much for having me on and it was lovely chatting with all you guys.