Focus Range:
The Why
When I began writing Focus Range, I set out to create a blog that could both candidly document my life as a photographer and share my knowledge and experience to aid other photographers. Covering the entirety of my photography endeavors, between portraits, concerts, landscapes, and the editing and technical aspects, I share authentic stories detailing my unique perspective as a young photographer in the American Southwest pursuing a variety of fields, and sharing what I know for others.
Blog Posts:
Blog content and Design:
In making design decisions for Focus Range, I wanted to prioritize both a clean, photo centered visual language, alongside cohesion between the blog and the rest of my photo site. Opting for the familiar light and sharp aesthetic of my site allows photos to stand out, with mostly simple and clean sans serif fonts. Large clickable images go along with the photo-centered approach from a navigation standpoint, and they help promote a visual hierarchy using scale to indicate items moving down the page. Impression management remained a priority throughout all of these design choices, using eye-catching images and titles in an F-pattern to grab attention and encourage further reading.
Metadata and Keywords
Throughout the writing and website creation of Focus Range, the inclusion of metadata, SEO-oriented alt-text and image names, and relevant kewords and long tails has remained a priority.
For site metadata, the blog shares a domain with my business site and includes relevant descriptions with each of my chosen photography fields.
I used keywords and long tails that both cover the basic categories of photography I write about and include some of my more unique traits like "southern utah" for location specific posts, or "local music" for my niche within concert photography as examples.
Using descriptive alt-text that both accurately represents the images I use and aids SEO through using relevant terms was another decision made to boost search results.
I also made an effort to include image names that are relevant to both the photos and SEO.
Social Media Posts
In order of the photos above, the first was an instagram post designed for awareness. It features a striking photo and relevant hashtags with the intent of gaining reach and increasing awarness for my blog. Reach, visibility, and followers are the KPIs the post aims to support.
The second post is also for Instagram, but with a focus on engagement. The photo ties into a story on my blog, and engagment metrics like comments, likes, and link clicks are the most important for it.
The third post is for X, designed with the goal of engagement. Users engaging with the post itself and clicking the link to the story are the most relevant KPIs for the post.
The fourth post is for Facebook, optimized for engagement. By telling a story and sharing a photo, I hope to encourage readers to like or comment on the post, and click the link to engage with my content itself.
The linked video is a TikTok post for awareness, introducing a user who may see it to my photographic style and my account. KPIs to measure this are impressions and followers.
Podcast
This podcast episode detailed my adventure to Colorado this fall, including the landscape photography and other outdoor adventures I set off to do. It is based on one of my blog posts, and it features expanded versions of the stories that I touch on in the blog. I share how our group moved throughout the state, including the towns of Durango, Silverton, and Ouray, along with hiking in the Uncompahgre Wilderness and Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park.
Reflection:
Throughout the experience of managing Focus Range, I've learned valuable information and a variety of new skills for managing a brand online. I feel that I was able to find my personal brand identity and practice writing about my topic from a perspective that is uniquely my own. Gaining experience with thinking of new creative stories and ways to cover them, along with exploring the different mediums inolved was also very interesting. I was able to learn about and improve my web design and SEO skills, and I can see that being very helpful with reaching my audience in future work on my photography site, both for my business and blog. Being challenged by making content for social media was a great experience, especially for TikTok where I have previously struggled with putting myself out there. Overall, the excercise of building a brand, writing a blog, and promoting it through social media challenged what I thought I understood, and gave me an opportunity to gain confidence in sharing my perspective and brand online.