Female emPOWERED: Winning in Business & Life

Episode 309: How to Build a Website That Attracts Clients: SEO & Design Tips with Jessica Freeman

• Christa Gurka

Share episode

In this episode of Female emPOWERED, Christa sits down with website designer and SEO expert Jess Freeman, the creative behind both the Pilates in the Grove and Christa Gurka websites. Together, they unpack exactly what makes a boutique fitness or wellness website stand out in 2025—and what you need to prioritize to attract more clients and rank higher on Google.

Jess shares her proven process for stress-free website builds, her favorite platforms for service-based businesses, and her expert insights into SEO for local studios, clinics, and wellness professionals.

If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by the thought of redoing your website or confused by SEO jargon, this episode will simplify it all and help you take actionable steps to improve your online visibility.

🔍 What You’ll Learn

  • How Jess created a seamless, client-friendly website process
  • The must-have elements of a modern health and wellness website (2025 & beyond)
  • Non-verbal ways to show your brand personality through fonts, colors, and shapes
  • Local SEO basics: how to optimize for your city or neighborhood
  • Why including your location on every page matters
  • How to write strong copy that converts—without keyword stuffing
  • The truth about photo alt text and how to use it correctly
  • Why blogging is still the #1 SEO tool for small businesses
  • The best website platforms for service providers: Squarespace vs. WordPress vs. Kajabi
  • Common website mistakes that hurt your visibility (and how to fix them fast)

📲 Connect with Jess

Check out her portfolio for examples of boutique wellness websites, including Pilates in the Grove and Christa Gurka.

👩‍💼 Connect with Christa

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Hey there everyone. Welcome back to another episode of the Female Empowered Podcast. I'm your host, Christa Gurka, and I have a guest episode today, and I was just talking to her pre-show. I have Jess Freeman from just creatives with me who built my website for Pilates in the Grove and Christa Gurka, and I was just saying, I was like, I can't believe I haven't had you on my. Podcast yet. Kind of crazy.

Jessica Freeman:

I know.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

I'm very, very excited to have you here, Jess. And so would you take a moment, just introduce yourself, kind of to our, since you haven't been on the show before, introduce yourself to our audience, who you are, who you serve, and what it is that you do.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. I'm glad we get to chat. I'm Jess. I run Jess Creative. I've been in business for 14 years and I specialize in doing websites and SEO for. Health and fitness business owners, physical therapists, private practice owners, all that kind of fun stuff. and I really, the meat of what I do is rebuild your entire website and optimize it. Or if you already have a website and you're like, Hmm, I don't really have good SEO, I can just hop in and help you get more visible in search and in AI search results as well.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

That's so, so cool. I'm definitely gonna ask you about the AI part too.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

it's new. Were for a lot of people, more mainstream now. So, Jess, we are actually in the process of redoing the Christa Gurka

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

I think we're gonna probably by the time of this recording, we'll be in, by the time it airs, we'll be like. So

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

for that. Jess also built out our, Pilates and Grove our, the last one that's still in existence after I sold, on Squarespace. And one of the things I really like about working with you as a service provider myself, your pro process to work with you was really streamlined and on point. And as a busy business owner, I really. Appreciate that. So before we kind of get into the nitty gritty of website design and SEO, how did your, how did you come to have that process? Because I think rebuilding websites or even building a website for people is just so daunting.'cause they're well, I don't, it's kind of all in my head, but your process was just so good and it made my vision totally come to life. How did that come to be?

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah, to be totally honest, it started with the very first course I ever took. As a business owner, which was all about systems and streamlining, and it was pretty basic thinking back to, I mean this was literally 13 years ago that I took this course. It was$129 and that gave me a very strong foundation and I'm very type A. And as I've gone on in business, I've just built upon those initial questionnaires and that kind of stuff, and especially using a CRM that allows me to kind of automate emails and that kind of thing. and I just found that. Anytime clients would have questions or I noticed Hmm, all of my clients are bringing up this topic. I would either think about, okay, is this something I should just work into the calls? Is this something that I should make into an email? Into a video? And think about the best way to get that information to the client and. Something that I notice, being a web designer and I notice a lot of other web designers often complain about oh, clients don't have this ready. They don't have that ready, or whatever. And I was I never have this problem. maybe not, never, but it is rarely an issue that I have that that problem, waiting on clients or clients not being prepared. And that's because I am trying to preemptively help. Like I'm going in anticipating what my clients need because I don't expect you as the client to know. What you need on a website or what I need from you, why would I expect you to know even if you have hired a designer before, it's probably been a long time. We might have different processes. And I just am trying to always anticipate how can I make this easier for you and for me? And then is there a way I can automate this? And I truly not to toot my own horn, but I get a lot of compliments on my process. People are like.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

so good.

Jessica Freeman:

It's just, you make it so easy.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

You really do.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah. So that's

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

and especially, speaking from health and fitness people it's just not how our brain works

Jessica Freeman:

mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

So we just work in a different, not to say that. We we're not creatives, but most of us are very left-brained people we're very

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

and system driven. And so to have it's hard sometimes for us. We kind of know when we see it, but we can't articulate it a lot of

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

just commend you. I mean, I tell everyone, her process was so great and it was so easy, and then it really turned out well. so let's transition into. You built out a process to get people to understand what should go on a

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

what, and, and you know, speaking in your wheelhouse of health and fitness. Okay.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

What are some things that we are seeing now today, because this landscape does change

Jessica Freeman:

Yes.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

So 2025, moving into 2026, what are must haves a website?

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah. So I wanna go kind of broader picture, you can. You can DM me or Google it or whatever if you want Uber specific, but big picture things that I think are really important. One, outlining your approach or philosophy because you know, you talk to any dietician, they all have different philosophies. You talk to physical therapists, they might have different approaches or different methodologies so people wanna know. Are you going to try and push me to do this? Are you gonna try and do this? they want to know kind of what is your approach before I sign up? think about with personal trainers, some personal trainers are very you cannot eat this. You have to do this. And we're gonna go super hard for an hour. Others are more intuitive and light and kind of like what works for you. outlining that is number one. Number two is your credentials, experience, and the authority that you have in your space, because there's a lot of misinformation out there. We know there's a lot of voices, a lot of influencers that are teaching things they shouldn't teach. we really wanna position you as the expert and show that you have the credentials and the experience. if you're able, talking about some of the results you've gotten, people and that kind of thing. Really showing that and demonstrating that. usually through your copy and social proof and testimonials. And then last your personality and your brand. this is one of the biggest things I am seeing. A health website, whatever it is, dietician, physical therapist, whatever, with stock photos and just very bland copy is not going to convert. People want to know that they can trust you. They want to see who is this person that I'm going to be working with on a weekly or biweekly or whatever basis? Am I going to, for lack of a better term, am I gonna vibe with them?

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Yeah,

Jessica Freeman:

Don't be afraid to show some of that personality and how much you show and how much you incorporate that is totally up to you. But the days of looking like a corporate, Hmm, this is our office, are long gone. people are Hmm, I do not wanna go here. if you wanna rebrand and go neon colors, go for it. If that fits your personality, if you're like, okay, well I'm not. I'm not neon, but maybe you are really nerdy and love all the science behind it and you love to break that down, lean into that nerdiness, make it part of your brand. and even just outside of business also incorporating those things into your website and into your marketing, social media. You would be surprised how often people connect with me because. I talk about Gilmore girls. and when I say I talk about it, I'm not doing breakdowns on my Instagram stories or anything, but it's I, oh, starting my fall rewatch of Gilmore Girls or something, and I drink a lot of diet Dr. Pepper and people know that they send me memes about it. they just, it's in my reels. It's in my brand photos. It's a very subtle thing, but I show it enough that they think about me when they see diet Dr. Pepper and I have made friends over that I have so even just those little personality things I find are just as important as the authority and making sure that we can actually trust you because part of that personality is. That's helping build trust.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Right, and it's, you're absolutely right, the vibe, do I connect

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

person? Do they feel they would be someone I would vibe with Exactly that? So that's got me thinking. Okay, so there's. Words that you actually say that would be I'm expert

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

a design perspective, which is another thing that I think you're very skilled at. How can we have nonverbal, right? non-word ways that show our personality. maybe colors, Rounded edges versus square edges, fonts. can you kind of describe, it just made me think when you were talking about show your personality, there's non vocabulary ways that you can also show your personality. Right.

Jessica Freeman:

Yes, a hundred percent. And it really goes to, what you just mentioned, the fonts that you use. it is giving a totally different personality vibe if you are using Playfair Display versus Montserrat or Times New Roman versus Helvetica. I actually did an Instagram series, it's been probably two years now where I. Redesigned, lightly redesigned some big brands like Applebee's and QuickTrip and just funny and was like, what would it look like if QuickTrip used comic sands? And kind of just demonstrating. It looks, this is how much fonts matter. I did, it was a very short series, but it was just fun to oh, you can totally change the vibe of a brand if you use totally different colors. So colors are a big part of it. the fonts that you choose. And then yes, even subtle things like rounded edges on photos. So if my client. Has once a more friendly, soft, approachable vibe, I'm probably gonna round the corners of photos. if they want more of a luxury high-end vibe, it's gonna be all straight edges. if they want something a little fun, contemporary, modern, they wanna be really eccentric. I might do where some, edges are rounded, so it might be like three of the corners rounded and one's not. you describing this on a podcast is sometimes difficult'cause people are like, what do you mean you're only doing three? That doesn't make sense, but you've probably seen it on a website.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Yeah.

Jessica Freeman:

it can also be even like the shapes that go into the background images. you've probably seen. Websites. even if you just go to Pinterest and search, like website inspiration, look at the different ways that people use dividers in between sections. Some use like waves or scallops, and that can be really fun and vibrant. Others use diagonal lines and they're trying to be more edgy and modern. and it can also be graphics. I know a lot of brands, this is a little bit trendy, right now, but some brands of online business owners are really leaning into the fun, younger almost vibe I wanna say. And it's like they have some, for lack of a better term, like clip art kind of, on their website. So it's like little flowers, and little illustrations and drawings. And if you really wanna lean into that, that would be something you could do. And so it really comes down to kind of. Depending on the vibe that you want, you can incorporate different things. And it's not to say that, a luxury brand probably wouldn't have illustrations necessarily. prob maybe a few, but not the super fun illustrations. But even a physical therapy office can have a fun vibe. and it doesn't have to mean. Your colors are pink and green and yellow, and you have flowers all over it. It could be just a brighter palette and choosing a slightly more rounded font, maybe a few illustrations, there's definitely ways you can lean that direction without hopping all the way in.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Yeah. I do think it's a great way to show your personality a little bit in, in non. It would be nonverbal

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

written

Jessica Freeman:

Yes. Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

bring that out and someone working with a professional you helps, I think the owner or the business really bring that to, to life

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

in different ways. so now, SEO search engine optimization is, is really important, especially for local service providers.

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

SEO is also one of those things similar to marketing, where it's this huge umbrella and. There's a lot of people out there that sell these huge packages of this is what we can do for your SEO. a lot of it is great and valid, but some stuff we as business owners can do ourselves. Right. what are some things that. That you think are really non-negotiables and, and let's talk specifically about local service providers, so brick and mortar establishments that are really trying to use SEO for local businesses. What are some non-negotiables that you really encourage business owners to include on their website?

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah, for local people, one of the easiest things you can do and a mistake that I often see is you need to have the location mentioned. Probably on every single page.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Yeah.

Jessica Freeman:

Not that you have to list the address, but you want to say Atlanta's Premier Physical Therapy office or something like that. You would be surprised how often I go to websites and I'm where is your location?

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Yeah, I am. I'm not surprised because I see it all, I, yes, I am in agreement with

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah. I did SEO for a spa, kind of wellness center last year, and I scoured all the pages and I finally had to email the owner and I was what, what town are you in? I don't even know what town you're in. it's not you. They listed, just the mall that they're in. the plaza, but there wasn't. A actual name of the town listed or even a street address, it just said we're in the mall of whatever. And one, I think that is definitely building the website with the assumption of people who come to this are going, going to know already who we are a little bit, or know that we're local. And if you are. Only linking that website in your Chamber of Commerce

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Right.

Jessica Freeman:

or you're driving Facebook ads or something, but you have to assume someone might be landing on this website. They might be from the next town over, or maybe they're moving to the area They may not have any idea who you are. So. To say listing your city or area of town if you're in a very large city on most pages, is going to be really, really helpful. and listing literally what you do. Because that's another part of the SEOI often see, I go to a physical therapy website and it might say something we help, this is really bad off the cuff copy idea, but we help your arms and legs. And it's what? What is that?

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

What does that mean?

Jessica Freeman:

What does that mean?

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Yep.

Jessica Freeman:

so for SEO purposes, in its simplest form, SEO is just what do you want to be known for? What do you wanna show up and search for? Put those words on your website. So if you wanna show up under Atlanta Physical Therapist, then you need to have some variation of that. On your website. Now it doesn't, that heading doesn't need to be on every single page. That would be redundant. But you want to incorporate this in your copy across different pages. Different word, you know, might be physical therapists in Atlanta. Atlanta Physical Therapy. And things that just come some variations of the phrases, but that is one of the most important parts. And then if you are someone who has multiple locations, I am about to work with a therapist who has two locations and in the same city, so they're five minutes from each other. we are creating a separate page for each of those locations. yes, it's the same city, but. Most cities, there's kind of neighborhoods or areas of town, and we are going to optimize for those areas of town for that office. So you can, even, depending on the size of the city you're in, you can even optimize really, really small scale the area that you're in.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Yeah.

Jessica Freeman:

Not just, oh, Dallas, but what part of Dallas? And that can really help. and then kind of outside of the website, making sure you have your Google Business profile set up and connected to your website is also important. I don't do anything with Google Business profiles. That's out of my lane, but it is important and it is part of SEO.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

yes.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

actually, if you have separate locations, each location

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Business profile. So we actually optimized for each of our locations on our website. On our main homepage, we, we did Miami's premier Pilates studio

Jessica Freeman:

Yep.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

we did two, I can't remember what the words are right now, but award-winning locations. And then we had each location and then we optimized for individual landing pages.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

did things Small group reformer classes, right? those kind of keywords, right?

Jessica Freeman:

Yes.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

What are your feelings on meta tags, on the photos that you use on your website? And what I mean by meditechs for people that don't understand, you can name. The

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

that you have on there, and that, if I'm not mistaken, that also helps with SEO, is that correct

Jessica Freeman:

Yes, it does. there's kind of two ways you can optimize your photos. I will say this is helpful to do. I haven't necessarily seen for clients that it's a game changer.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

page right.

Jessica Freeman:

If you have millions of photos or something, don't feel like you have to go redo all of them right now. but what you wanna do is when the photo, the photo's still on your desktop or on your computer, you wanna change it to reformer pilates, miami dot jpeg.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Yep.

Jessica Freeman:

you name, use your key words. The file name, then you upload it to the website, put it on the page, and then depending on your platform, I'm pretty sure almost every platform should give you the option to add alt text. Now, this is helpful for SEO, but it's also for accessibility, people who use screen readers and are navigating your website, You don't want to just spam this section with a list of keywords. That's a mistake that a lot of people, they would be reformer Pilates, comma Miami Pilates, comma, that's not what you wanna do. You would say lady sitting on reformer Pilates machine in Miami. Now you could leave off, be like,

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

showing in the

Jessica Freeman:

yes, you wanna describe the picture and then if you can. Kind of include some key words if it's possible. the, when I said in Miami, well, you can't really tell she's in Miami, but you're just adding that for the sake of the keyword. You could also say Miami lady sitting on former or Pilates machine or something like that. But the alt text is really describing what is in the photo. So if it's a headshot of you, you might put physical therapist Miami or whatever your title and location is. And then the alt text might say physical therapist, Jess Freeman, headshot of Jess Freeman, a physical therapist or something like that. Where you're still kind of including those key words.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Yeah, and I agree that none of these things in itself are game changers, but they're free

Jessica Freeman:

Yes.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

can do them ourselves. And

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Why not do every little thing in our power, especially for, those of us businesses that don't have a huge marketing budget? Why not make every little thing as the, the best it

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

be?

Jessica Freeman:

Yes. Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

In terms of, other SEO things on our websites, what are your feelings nowadays about blogging for SEO purposes?

Jessica Freeman:

blogging is my number one tip for SEO and business owners don't love to hear that from me because they're like

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

I'm

Jessica Freeman:

I,

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

that to hear you still say that because I do see that it's still effective, especially organic.

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

I'm ha I'm happy to hear you hear you say that. And this is what I say to business owners when they're like, oh, I don't wanna do that. I'm like, well, successful business owners do the stuff that other people are not willing to do, and that's why they're successful. So

Jessica Freeman:

Yes.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

2

Jessica Freeman:

And part of part of why I still recommend it.'cause some people are like, will their blogs dead? Do blogs still work? They do, yes. There's also video, there's also podcasts. You could also do that if, and then put those podcasts and videos on your website as well. And I would recommend that. But the thing is, the last. Several Google algorithm updates have prioritized helpful content. They literally name their updates and they have, Google has called them the helpful content update and they, they are prioritizing websites that are actually helpful. For people because they want to be a good resource for people.'cause I always give this example of imagine you are Googling best pizza restaurant near me and it only shows you Mexican restaurants or hardware stores or something like that would really frustrate you and you would stop using Google. it's kind of like when people go to chat GBT and they're like, well, I don't get good results. I'm not gonna use it anymore, So you want to help Google like you more. And I, I also, another analogy I like to use is think about if someone is wanting towork with a physical therapist and Google's like, okay, we wanna show the best experts, the best websites to help people. And you go to you go into the library and you're like, I need some help, physical therapy. And the lady hands you a brochure and you're like, okay, well that is not very much information. That is equivalent to you having a five page website with no blog. It's not very helpful. Yes, I learn about your services, but I'm not really getting anything else from you. Versus if you go to a library and you're like, Hey, I wanna learn about this subject, and they hand you a 500 page book. Well, that now I'm going to learn quite a bit. I always clarify, this does not mean you literally have to have 500 blog posts that this is just an example. I feel like I scare people when I say that. I'm like, it's just, it's, I'm just saying it's a very large book. you want to demonstrate your expertise to Google. even if you can do a weekly blog post for. Three months and then move to a monthly blog post that could help your SEO. don't feel like you have to blog every single week for the rest of your life. You can also take seasons off. So okay, I'll blog for three months and then move to once a month, I'm not gonna blog over the summer. that's fine. Google is. Much more lenient compared to Instagram. You know, a lot of people are I took two weeks off Instagram and no one, now no one sees my content at all. Google is not like that. So you have a little bit of leeway.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Yeah. I do. I do encourage Bloggings as well, I'm glad to hear that it's still, it's not like dead,

Jessica Freeman:

Nope.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

okay, let's get into a little bit of website platforms.'cause this is a big question I get from a lot of people. And I do think people have analysis paralysis on this, sometimes I'm just, just pick one and, and move, move on.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

in terms of, let's, what are the big maybe three that you see? I, I use Kajabi, but I would say most of my audience probably doesn't use Kajabi.'cause they're not really selling courses

Jessica Freeman:

Right.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

it could be not Kajabi. I would assume maybe Squarespace, WordPress like, but what are you seeing as the big kind of three in terms of website platforms?

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah, for sure WordPress, and to clarify wordpress.org, which is different from wordpress.com

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Oh.

Jessica Freeman:

it's very confusing. I hate that they did that, but wordpress.org. And Squarespace are the big two players. Showit is also popular. I don't know if it's necessarily necessary or a good fit for this industry. It's really great for creatives who want a very pretty and aesthetic vibe. maybe a spa, it might be okay. Not to say you can't have an ordinary website, but if you want something super, super custom. You could go to show em and then Shopify. But really Shopify is geared towards product based businesses. I mean, so unless you are heavy on the product side or like, even if it's just part of your business along with services, otherwise I wouldn't really recommend Shopify. now there are definitely others out there. Wix and Weebly, I do not recommend. I know they're popular. My reasoning behind that, I should do a whole episode about that. But basically, they kind of lock you in and it's very difficult. Now, WordPress and Squarespace, I can literally download a file, go to the other platform and upload and have all the pages and the post. Wix and Weebly do not give you that option. Honestly, neither does Kajabi, and that's part of why I don't need Kajabi. But, so it just means you would have to move manually. So going back to the blogging, if you start blogging and you're on Wix, then you're gonna have to manually copy and paste all these posts. From one platform to the other. so I don't love that. And Wix, they didn't use to be fully responsive. Now their new editor is, but why in the year 2025 are we having to pay more for a responsive website than if you get their basic editor that? I do not. I do not love, we should just have that built in and not have to pay extra for it. So, But Squarespace very, very, in my opinion, easy to use. Some people find it very confusing. I, I think it honestly kind of comes down to your personality.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

agreed.

Jessica Freeman:

most of my clients find it very easy to use, but I know there are people out there who find it. Difficult. WordPress can be easy or it can be difficult. It really depends on the theme that your designer uses, how many plugins you're dealing with, and are you having, doing membership stuff? Are you, you know, that kind of thing. But I, I use a drag and drop editor, so it's easy for people. They don't have to be going in there thinking, okay, I'm gonna have to cope my website. it's, it's drag and drop. So those are my platform recommendations.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

I've been on both. WordPress, but it was more from a coding, it was a long time ago.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

it was a little challenging on the backend for me to just go in and fix a spelling error.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

then you redid our website on Squarespace, which I really loved. I thought it was pretty. friendly. I really did. I don't know that I would build out an entire page myself. I probably could learn how to do it, but that's not my forte. So why not just let the experts do it? But I could duplicate a page, I could update copy in there. I could change dates, I could, you know,

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

of that nature, where I could understand my analytics through there. So I think Squarespace and I think it's very reasonable and affordable. I think they have great templates.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

perspective, I think it's really, they're really nice. So I usually now am recommending Squarespace to people.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

and I know people like you that are I'm really comfortable with Squarespace, and why not use it?

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

I do know some people that still do u use WordPress. but, and again. I was very close to transitioning to Squarespace and just using Kajabi as my, my, product suite basically. But now Kajabi just raise its prices and I was oh, do I wanna pay for Squarespace and the expensive Kajabi? But anyways, that's for a story of a different time. But, in turn, we talked about having your. Location. Prominent on your website? Preferably on the homepage, H one header, and then SS spread out throughout

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

What is there, do you know if there's the map, if you have a map, a map of on the contact page, is that. Just aesthetic design. Is that beneficial? Does that link into any type of SEO from Google Maps or Apple Maps?

Jessica Freeman:

it doesn't, it doesn't really tie in in any way. The only kind of benefit,'cause Google their robots are smart enough to scan a page and see what's in there. So in that sense it's like, oh, it's helpful. There's a map. But it's not Google's like, ooh. This site has a map, boost them in, in the rankings. it's really not an SEO benefit per se, or very, very little SEO benefit.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Okay, and what are your thoughts on. Copy.

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

the words on your website, let's talk first just about, I'm as assuming you're gonna say that the words are important. let's talk first about the words themselves and then let's talk about how the words are put together in terms of. Too much copy, not enough copy. What's overwhelming to the reader. So let's just fir first talk about the importance of the actual words that are on your website.

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah, this is very important. There's multiple bullet bullet points I could, I could cover here. The words do matter. like I was talking about earlier, Atlanta physical therapy. You don't need to include that in every single paragraph or anything. if you want a really bad example of overdone, SEO, you could likely pull up any of your dentists in your area.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Okay.

Jessica Freeman:

Dentists have, if there's any dentists listening, I'm sorry, but. Dentists and their SEO, the agencies that do them. it's hello, welcome to Atlanta Dentistry. We serve people in Atlanta, so if you live in Atlanta and you need a dentist, we are your Atlanta dentist. And it's like, okay, that's. Okay, did the robot write this? what is going on? So do not sound like that. You do not need to overdo it, but you want to make sure you are using your keywords and related keywords. what that you don't have to even look up related keywords. It literally just means being specific in your copy.'cause Google wants to make sure, okay, this site says. They are all about physical therapy or whatever, you know, your office does. But if we go, if they scan your homepage or about page, whatever, and you're like, I don't know, they're talking about vanilla cupcakes and landscapes and feeling good. they're like, what? I don't understand what this site is about. But if they see words like rehab and. muscles and, you know, like injuries. They're seeing all these related key words that is just going to help them say okay, okay, this place is legit. They're not spam. and so they're just looking for context clues. And so anytime you can just be a little bit more specific and you can just use any of the terms in your industry without too much jargon,

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Right, grade language I used to

Jessica Freeman:

Yes. Yeah, talking to maybe like grade school, high school level, we don't need the super sciencey terms, but just using any of that is going to help. If it's all fluffy language, that's just talking about feeling better in your body what it, and it's just you're not. Being specific, that's not going to help with SEO. It's also not going to help with actually converting people to becoming customers. And so, the amount of copy Google doesn't have necessarily okay, you have to have 555 words on a page, or else we won't rank you. But I always tell people. Google again, wants to show helpful content. They need enough context about your business to rank you for the keyword you're trying to reach. And so if you only have 200 words on a page, that's not a lot of context for Google. They're not going to know very much about you. My general recommendation is usually a minimum of 700 words on a page. Now, if you're at 600. You've covered everything. Don't just go add fluffy a hundred words,

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Yeah.

Jessica Freeman:

for the sake of it. But that's my baseline recommendation for clients, just so we have enough copy, enough chances to use the keywords and related keywords. but yeah, that's the starting point and that that number applies to pages and blog post.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Great. That's great. That's

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

super helpful information. if people wanted to. out to you or learn more about you or learn all about your Gilmore Girls and your diet Dr. Pepper, fads. Where, where can they find you?

Jessica Freeman:

Yes. I'm pretty easy to find just creatives with an S on the end.com, and then I'm basically everywhere on social media at just creatives.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Great. if anyone's interested in seeing, I know she has, a gallery on her website, the Pilates in the Grove. Website currently, as we speak at the time of this recording, I can't say what's gonna happen. I don't know what's going down over there, but if you wanna look at Pilates in the grove.com, you can see a Squarespace website

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

if you check out christagurka.com, probably by December,

Jessica Freeman:

Yes. Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Thanksgiving, you'll see a Kajabi rebuild

Jessica Freeman:

Mm-hmm.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

she, she, you have done some updates on my Kajabi

Jessica Freeman:

Yes. Yeah.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

trying to go with a new template. and again, I agree with you, Kajabi, from a website perspective, it, it's, that's not its primary action, but the bandwidth in my head to navigate two websites is

Jessica Freeman:

Yeah, it's a lot.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

get

Jessica Freeman:

It's a lot.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

but check her out. Check out her. She's great with design. and again, your process is super, super, super easy. So if you're thinking of rebuilding your website, she works with our industry health and fitness. check her out, give her a call and see, you know, see if she can help you. I highly recommend.

Jessica Freeman:

Well, thank you.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

10 outta 10 recommend.

Jessica Freeman:

you. I appreciate that.

Christa Gurka | Fit Biz Strategies:

Well, thank you so much, Jess, for joining us and until next time my friends, bye for now.