If you want to book more weddings, you need to get FOUND by the couples who are searching for what you do.

SEO (search engine optimization) is the art of making sure your website gets found naturally in the search engines, no paid advertising required.  In other words, that’s free website traffic.

Unfortunately, getting “free” traffic costs time, money or both.

These tips for boosting your wedding SEO come from SEO, traffic and website design expert Kathy DalPra of Bride Appeal.

SEO Strategies For Poor (or Cheap) Wedding Pros

If you have no marketing budget to invest in your SEO, you’ll need to go the DIY route. Just like we tell our brides and grooms who take the Do It Yourself plunge, your results will vary based on your skill and experience. Use these tips to shave that learning curve.

1) Optimize (don’t over-optimize!) your website. Include the keywords that the brides and grooms in your local market are searching to find your type of service in your page titles, blog posts and website copy. Avoid the dangers of over-optimizing your website and don’t cram in as many keyword phrases as possible; make sure all the words you use are relevant and natural for real visitors.

2) Blog 2-3x per week about topics of interest to your target audience. If your wedding business is local, write about wedding-related subjects that include the names of wedding venues, cities, towns and regions. Warning: do not over-use keyword phrases or you will be penalized!

3) Guest blog for other wedding blogs and websites. Publishing your articles on other people’s websites can boost your traffic and your ranking because you’re exposed to a whole new audience and earning relevant backlinks for your site.

4) Spread your goodness on social media. Once you’ve created your awesome blog posts, share them with the world! Promote your articles on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google Plus. Build relationships with other wedding businesses and share their stuff first to get them to reciprocate.

5) Get published. Submit Real Wedding features on popular wedding blogs to get website traffic and visibility.

Bang For the Buck SEO Strategies

If you’re a wedding pro with some, but not much, marketing cash to spend, Kathy DalPra recommends choosing ONE type of advertising and optimizing it for maximum results. Once you’ve got that generating leads and bookings, you can invest in more marketing.

6) Google Adwords PPC – You may have Page 1 visibility on Google the “free” way, but you can pay to get your website in the #1 spot and attract more leads.

7) Facebook Ads – The best thing about Facebook ads is that you can target your ads by relationship status (Engaged), interests (My Fiance), age and geographic location down to the zip code. You can even upload bridal lead list emails and advertise to them exclusively!

8) Sponsored Blog Posts – Purchasing a sponsored blog post on the right wedding blog can give you prime visibility with your target audience that generates high quality leads.

SEO is not for the faint of heart! But never fear, our friend Kathy of Bride Appeal can help you determine if this the marketing strategy for you.