Coming Up Today 12:00 EST - Your Website, Blog & Self-Promotion

UPDATE: Murphey's Law used to be "If anything can go wrong it will." Murphey's 2nd Law is "Murphey was an optimist!" Unavoidable tech problems have delayed today's SPTV show and moved the start time to 1:30 PM EST. Sorry everybody - just a day of dealing with gremlins!

Click to go directly to SPTV

 ​We just got back from a few days in Denver. I was there specifically to record today's marketing program for SPTV, but there was also time to catch up with good friends and just play tourist.

In terms of the program coming up, it starts TODAY at 12:00 pm EST. After a little of my background, I'll be talking about ideas to help photographers clean up their websites. Next, came blog challenges, followed by some quick ideas on self-promotion and finishing with a section on some short critiques of a few websites.  The website section was a lot harder to do than I thought, simply because my time was so limited.

One thing I did notice on several websites - there was no way to find the name of the photographer! I've never noticed that before. Even when a photographer had a bio in their about section, there was no reference to who they were. Often, not even a headshot. In fact, twice I went to review a site, because I was trying to do this with a sense of improv, and we stopped taping because I couldn't find the name of the artist.

I have no idea what purpose it serves to be invisible. So, look at your website and make sure you identify yourself. Give people a name, a personality and a little piece of your heart. Give them every possible way to reach you. I can understand if you don't want to include an address if you work out of your home, but at least give them a phone number!

---

Meanwhile, on Sunday we took a ride out to Red Rocks. I remember an old video of Stevie Nicks playing Red Rocks from the 80's, but in all honesty, until you've been there you have no idea how amazing the place is. It'll never win any photography awards, but even a grab shot with the self-timer on the FZ1000 was a fun to get. After all, we were standing in the middle of one of the greatest concert "halls" in the country.

I was playing with some of the in-camera presets and had left it in the "Impressive Art Mode". Sandy Puc wanted to get a shot of me on the set, but didn't know how the camera was set up. While it's not something I'd use for portraiture, it does have sort of a bizarre illustrative look to it.

---

A BIG thanks to Sandy, Rob and Amanda for all their help in putting together today's show. An even bigger thanks to the sponsors, Marathon Press, Panasonic Lumix, Tamron and Photodex. You'll see a lot from each of these terrific companies throughout the show.

​See you at noon EST today!