- Bonjour mesdames and messieurs,
in this video I want to show you the five mistakes
you should never do if you want
to do a photography portfolio.
(dramatic vocalizing)
Alright guys so this is I think the five worst mistake
that I have made and I've seen other people do
when they create their portfolio website.
Having a portfolio website is amazing.
I have done seven books and my work is in over 75 galleries
and I've sold to many agencies
and this entire business came from my portfolio.
Not from my Instagram, but from my portfolio
and from Google Images.
Especially Google Images.
Back in the day I used to use Google+ to basically do
some SEO search engine optimization of my images,
but now I use SlickPic.
I'm gonna show you how to use SlickPic to get an incredible
SEO on your images and it's just the website
that I use the most when it comes to do my portfolio.
This video is sponsored by SlickPic.
I'm actually an ambassador of their brand,
I am so happy I found them.
I've been looking for a solution for photographers
which basically builds website,
but really just for photographer
and that's what SlickPic is,
it's got so many mind-blowing features.
It's incredible.
And actually I, in the link below you'll see a video
where I actually build from scratch my website,
SergeRamelliphotos.com.
So I'm gonna give you five mistakes
and I'm gonna start by the most important ones,
and the biggest mistake is gonna come to the end,
so stay until the end because the last two are critical
if you want to get exposure on the web.
Mistake number one.
Bad file name.
So let me show you.
For a very long time when I used to load my photos on my
portfolio I used to basically load them like this,
like untitled 101 on title one nine seven
or 906 whatever this is a big mistake.
Because file name I found out is very important
in Google Image and again,
I got the whole deal on books because people found me
on Google Image.
So first thing first.
So this is like a photo of an ice cave in Iceland
so I'm gonna call this ice dash cave dash Iceland dot JPEG.
It might seem stupid, but it's vital.
This is portrait Barcelona gothic quarter.
Okay so basically the idea of the filename is
you have to think in terms of what people are searching for.
Okay and this one is going to be marina Dubai for example.
Okay so that's mistake number one.
Make sure every, before you load your photos,
you name them properly and you use dash
to create space between the words.
Mistake number two.
No title, no descriptions, no tag.
Now this is the really bad mistake so let me show you
I'm here on SlickPic and I took one of my photos,
that's one in my galleries and you can see here
the the photo does not have a title,
does not have a description, and it's got no tags.
So I'm gonna call this sunset Paris Montparnasse FL Tower.
Okay.
Description.
A beautiful view of the FL tower
from the tower Montparnasse.
Okay?
Save description.
Tags.
I'm gonna call this FL tower Paris sunset
tour tower Montparnasse.
Okay and that's very important because this is going to go
straight into Google Images.
Now one thing you need to realize is when you post photos
on Facebook and Instagram because Google and Facebook
in this realm are not very good friends they will not
get the same treatment,
that if you use a website like SlickPic.
SlickPic has an incredible SEO friendness,
meaning it's really connected to Google and Google Image
and this is going to go straight into Google
and it's gonna help to find this image.
Now if anybody typed these kind of keywords,
so it's very important.
Just to tell you a little story on how I got the book deal,
but I was about to sign a pretty decent deal with
Flammarion a French publisher 10 years ago
through the gallery of Yellow Korner
but on Google Image somebody named Hendrik teNeues,
amazing man, who on 40 passed away a few months ago
but changed my life forever found all my work
on Google Images.
He found my website, he called me up
and he said I want to do a book about Paris
with your photos and I said yeah but I'm already committed
to another publisher.
Long story short, he flew to Paris two days after
and convinced my gallery to sign with him instead
of the other publisher and I got an incredible deal,
on two books Paris and New York.
And all this because I had a good SEO on Google Image.
So I cannot underestimate the importance.
A lot of people, I got a 111,000 followers on Instagram,
this does not give me as much business as Google Image.
Google Image is still what gives me the most business.
Because when you look for photo of Paris,
there's a good chance you come to my portfolio
and you got to contact me.
So do the same thing with your images.
Mistake number three, know about or contact page.
Now this is something that I see a lot on website.
My about page is actually pretty long,
it tells my life story,
it gives all the important links of my social media.
It shows you know my progression in photography.
I even like you know I have things like what gear I use,
why I switch from Canon to Sony,
what books I read, what movies I watch,
I mean it's very, very, very complete.
And so, and the contact page is very straightforward.
It's just you know name, first name, address,
it's very important but I see a lot of website
that don't have that.
So spend the time to show your personality
on your about page and have a contact form, very important.
Simple interface.
Now that's really important.
If you've got a too complex interface,
it's not gonna fly.
So, I love the way SlickPic is doing my website,
and by the way I have an amazing deal for you
if you stay until the end,
SlickPic will actually design for a limited amount
of photographs your portfolio for you
so you don't have to worry about it.
For the price of about $15 per month,
which is like if you were to go for free like use WordPress
and host your own website,
it would cost you more money so for even less than a
hosting price, you can get a designer
to do your website for you.
So that is, the link is below this video if you want to
find out on this.
Now it's very important that there's nothing really fancy,
nothing really confusing,
and you know you come we come straight
to the different photos you know I made like,
I made my favorite categories here, Paris, Italy.
USA landscape, you know my movie, The Hollywouldn'ts,
you know want a simple video showing you
how you can do the same using SlickPic,
and by the way you can watch that video if you want there,
in my about page in contact,
just you know make your home page your best photography,
that's why I took my best photos of Paris
and they're directly on your own page.
It's very important, I see a lot of people having website
that are kind of confusing.
Okay, mistake number four having a few average photo.
Your website should be your best work.
You're very, very, very best work.
For example, this is my Instagram, you know I try to post
my favorite photo on Instagram,
but that doesn't mean they can qualify
to go to my portfolio.
For example, you know I would never post this photo
of the Griffith Park, it's like it's okay,
but the colors are whatever.
I would never post this photo for example,
because I know I've got a lot of others from that scene
in Iceland which are much better.
Or I would never post, I would never post this photo
from Dubai because it's like, the night,
it's not incredible subjects, just a tower.
So put your very best work.
For example I was coaching somebody this morning,
Thomas Speck, a German guy living in Paris
who has some incredible photos of Paris.
I was like blown away by some of his photos,
but like for example this little for me
is a little bit average.
It's winning the shot.
You will see, just wait for the last,
and you'll understand why this is important.
Or this photo for example,
I said why did you put this photo,
that lamp is like half cut here,
and some of his photo were spectacular
but having just like look at this,
this is like one of the nicest photo of ever seen
of the Arch de Triumph.
Thomas my respect.
But having just a couple of the average photos can ruin
your whole portfolio.
But you will understand more with the last tip,
tip number five.
Have very few photo and I gotta tell you this,
this is incredible story that happened to me,
I moved to Los Angeles about five years ago
and before I moved, actually six years ago,
before I moved, I came to check out Los Angeles.
The first day I arrived in Los Angeles I am,
a friend of mine gave me like literally four hours,
I'm in Los Angeles I tell him meet me at the Griffith Park
and I go to the Griffith Park it's one of the nicest view
of Los Angeles so I go there
and it's really hard to park and I look on my
left side and I see an incredible golden hour
and there was nobody in that street so I parked the car
in the middle of the street, I ran out,
I took one photo, came back in the car,
finally parked, met my friend and we spent
a very nice evening up at the Griffith Park.
I put the photo on my portfolio two weeks later
I get an email from Nike, the brand Nike
is saying that they were doing a special operation
called The Summer of Nike and they want to rent this photo
I just shot of Los Angeles for $2,500 for three weeks.
A small JPEG and they asked me if I wanted to become
an official Nike shooter.
It was like a 16 page contract I said for sure.
It was crazy to think that I just shot this photo
and so I asked him, I said how did you find out about me?
He says well I found the images because I was looking
for a summery image of Los Angeles
and I found it on Google Image and then I look at your
website and I was blown away by your website
and I said said oh cool.
And then we sort of talked and says he says you know what,
I'm gonna tell you a secret.
You know I know at Nike how we recruit photographers
and how we know somebody's a pro,
and somebody's amateur, I said no,
he says one-for-one amateurs have tons of photography
in their portfolio.
Tons.
You know some are spectacular, a lot are average.
You have very little photo,
which is the mark of a professional.
Every pro we working with have very small categories
and like maybe 10 to 15 photos per category.
This was a huge ha ha moment in my life
because I did it by instinct, you know,
and I remember Scott Kelby telling me the story
where on his website I think, he only puts 20 photo
per category and when he wants to add a new one he makes
a survey on social media to know which one
he's gonna take out before he puts one more,
so he never goes to 21 photos.
And I thought it was extreme,
but this is so brilliant and Scott is a good friend
and a brilliant man.
So this is a number one mistake I see people do.
I get about 45, to 50 portfolio to review per day.
I don't watch all of them that's how much on Instagram,
on DM, on YouTube and 95% of the time too much photos.
Too many photos, too confusing.
Just a few categories and a few photos is perfect.
So that's the five mistakes to avoid if you want
to build your portfolio.
Get the deal with SlickPic for about $15 per month,
which is the price of hosting a WordPress website,
you're gonna get a designer to redo your website,
you're gonna get a very functional website
and you're gonna have so many features that
only SlickPic does.
You know, I have worked with so many other companies,
I've never seen anything like SlickPic to make a portfolio.
Give them a chance, make your portfolio,
and get the exposure you needed.
If you follow this, if you don't make these five mistakes
you will see, you will attract a lot more attention.
I wish you the best of luck.