115: Lukas Piatek – Destination Wedding Tips & SEO Made Simple!

February 28, 2024

“Don’t follow trends if you don’t have to!”

LUKAS PIATEK

Hey everyone! It’s Sally here, from Studio Ninja. Today’s episode is all about Lukas Piatek!

Lukas is a wedding photographer from Germany and the founder of the LOOKSLIKEFILM community. He specialises in Destination Weddings and educates via his Patreon community on Wedding Photography & SEO.

Check out some of the biggest points from Lukas’ interview below:

  • Lukas’ journey in the Photography Industry
  • How has the concept of destination weddings evolved in recent years

  • What are the most challenging aspects of planning and executing a destination wedding?

  • What emerging trends Lukas has noticed in 2024
  • What the most effective SEO strategies for photographers are

  • How AI can shape the future of wedding photography

  • AI Tools that Lukas recommends
  • How wedding photographers can leverage AI for better SEO results

  • Common SEO mistakes

  • The one thing that made a difference to Lukas’ business!

What are the most challenging aspects of shooting destination weddings?

 Um, I think the biggest challenge that I always have is like finding the best spots to take the photos. Um, I try to scout the location, uh, if possible, forehand if I arrive maybe 1 or 2 days earlier. But still, like, without me being there, it’s still kind of hard to like, have, like zoom calls with a couple and like, talk with them about, like, certain places we can go to. Right? Yeah. Um, I can check Google Maps and like, see, okay. Certain areas, like when there’s a sunset here, um, how does it look like. But it’s still different than than being there. And, um, so if possible, I try to like scout the area.

 If not, which is like make a like a rough plan where to go, and then we’ll just like be spontaneous because. I also like, kind of love, like, like going somewhere, like being here for the first time and just like, okay, like, this is kind of cool. Like, I love the light over here. Let’s do this, let’s do that. So, um, it’s kind of like. Not that easy, but also, like, kind of, uh, exciting, if that makes sense.

What is the best piece of advice that you can give to another photographer?

Don’t follow the trends if you don’t, don’t have to. There we go. If you don’t have to, like, be yourself and like, please stand out. Because if you follow the trends and do the same as everybody else is doing, um, you’re gonna basically just like, blend in and not stand out. So try like to do something different because if you like unique in your work, um, you will always have clients because you’re doing something that nobody else is doing.

If you’re just like copying other people, which I did in the past when I started out because I had no idea what I’m doing. Um, you’re going to be unhappy and it won’t work. So find that niche that you want to step into and do. It can be anything. Be creative. Um, and if you have to use AI tools to achieve that, go for it. Uh, don’t be afraid of AI. It’s a helpful tool or helpful tools, um, that can help you achieve, um, everything like so much quicker than if you would do it on your own. But please, like, don’t just like blindly copy and paste anything that you have as a result. Try to like make it your own as well. And maybe come up with a plan for blog posts or keyword or content that kind of like connects to what you want to achieve and share about it. Because, um, if you don’t share about anything, um, nothing will ever come back. So, um, um, yeah, if you don’t try, you’re not gonna make it.

So please just go out there and, like, trial. And if you fail, just try again. Right. So you just, like, uh, learn along the way.

How can photographers leverage AI to get better SEO results?

 I think in creating blog posts for now, I think that’s, uh, that has been the biggest challenge in the past because not everyone is the greatest writer. And, um, a lot of people are still not doing SEO. That’s what I feel. Um, they just kind of like rely on social media, which is fine. But I’ve been doing SEO for, yeah, probably eight years now, and it kind of helped me, like, elevate my business onto a different level and like, get me to different countries because I’ve been doing it, um, ever since.

It kind of like started and, uh, yeah, I mean, nowadays with ChatGPT, uh, if, you know, like what to ask for and, you know, like how to write a blog post, it can help, like help you so much in creating like. Content that is like really helpful for your clients and your customers because that’s what it matters, right? That’s the most important thing. Yeah. Uh, and uh, yeah, that’s how everybody should use it. Right. So find like topics that you want to talk, uh, write about, like find a keyword that is searched by a lot of people but doesn’t have, like, a lot of competition, um, and, like, use like a tool like ChatGPT or Bard or any other, um, large language model. Um, as a starting point to help you, like, should maybe take that wording like, maybe rephrase it a tiny bit, uh, and make it your own. But, uh, the amount of, like, stuff that you had to write before.

Was insane. And now it’s just like a click away and you can copy, paste and change some stuff and it’s good. It’s, uh, it’s good content.

Thank you!

Thanks again to you all for joining us and a huge thanks to Lukas for joining us on the show!

If you have any suggestions, comments or questions about this episode, please be sure to leave them below in the comment section of this post, and if you liked the episode, please share it using the social media buttons you see at the bottom of the post!

That’s it for me this week, I hope you all enjoyed this episode.

See you soon,

Sally

About Lukas Piatek

Lukas Piatek is a wedding photographer from Germany and the founder of the LOOKSLIKEFILM community. He specialises in Destination Weddings and educates via his Patreon community on Wedding Photography & SEO.