SEO for Tattoo Studios
Your work is on Instagram, where the people who already know you can see it. This is about the person who has just decided they want a tattoo and has no idea you exist.
Nobody searches for a tattoo studio in the abstract. They search for a style, an artist, a cover-up, a piercing or laser removal, almost always with their town attached. Most studio websites are a homepage, a gallery and a contact form, which gives Google nothing to rank. We build a page for each thing people are actually looking for.
This is not a choice between Google and Instagram
Instagram is where tattoo studios live, rightly so. It is visual, it is where artists build a following and it is where the culture of the trade actually happens. None of that is in question. The problem is what Instagram cannot do. Studios rarely notice the gap because the people falling through it never get in touch to say so.
- Reaches people who already follow you
- Brilliant for showing work and building a following
- Where artists build personal reputation
- Requires them to find you first, somehow
- The algorithm decides who sees it
- Reaches people who do not know you exist
- Catches somebody at the moment they decide
- New to the area or their usual artist is booked out
- They are searching, so intent is already there
- You own the ranking rather than renting reach
The full comparison is in SEO vs Instagram for tattoo studios. Short version: keep doing Instagram, add the other one.
What people actually search for
These are separate searches made by quite separate people. Somebody booking laser removal and somebody booking a full back piece have almost nothing in common, so one page cannot serve both. Each gets its own.
Style searches
Fine line, traditional, blackwork, realism, floral, script. People search by the style they want long before they pick a studio, which is where a specialist wins over a generalist.
See the guide → Highest valueCustom design work
The bigger, longer, better-paid pieces. A customer looking for custom work is choosing on portfolio and on trust rather than on price or convenience.
See the guide → Big demandLaser tattoo removal
A completely different customer with a completely different need, searching very deliberately. If you offer it and have no page for it, you are invisible for it.
See the guide → Steady footfallPiercing
Its own search, its own customer and often a much younger one who becomes a tattoo client later. Frequently the quiet earner studios forget to market.
See the guide → UnderusedArtist bio pages
People search for artists by name after seeing work elsewhere. With no page on your site, Google sends them to Instagram or nowhere. A bio page each keeps the booking with you.
See the guide → Your best assetPortfolio pages
You produce beautiful images constantly and index almost none of them. Properly named, tagged and structured, your portfolio is the strongest content you own.
See the guide → Punching upCompeting with bigger studios
Where a smaller or newer studio can genuinely beat an established one, plus which searches are not worth the fight.
See the guide → Start hereThe complete guide
The whole picture in one place. What it costs, how long it takes, why most studio sites are invisible and how to fix it.
Read the guide →How many people search for a tattoo studio near you
These are real monthly search numbers for tattoo studios across the UK. Every one is somebody deciding where to get tattooed. The only question is whose name comes up, because most of them are not on Instagram looking at your work first.
Figures are rounded monthly UK search volumes for generic tattoo studio searches in each area. Individual studios' brand searches are excluded so the numbers show open demand rather than existing reputation. Edinburgh is left out entirely, because searches there are dominated by the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo rather than the trade. Want your own town pulled? We will do it free.
Searches you are not showing up for yet
What is included
You do not need to buy SEO, a website person, a maps person and a social person separately. It is all one job to us, on one monthly fee. Tap through to see what each part does for a studio.
Local SEO
The core of it. A page for each style you specialise in, each service you offer and each artist working with you, all linked into a structure Google can follow. That is how you turn up for fine line in your town rather than for nothing at all.
Google Maps
The map pack sits above the normal results. For a studio it is where a lot of walk-in and near-me traffic starts. We set up and work your Google Business Profile properly, including your opening hours, your services and your reviews.
Website management
Most studio sites are a homepage, a gallery and a contact form. We build the pages that are missing, keep artist information current as your team changes and make booking obvious rather than buried.
Your portfolio
The biggest underused asset in this trade. You photograph beautiful work constantly and almost none of it is indexed. Named, tagged and structured properly, those images become searchable and they sell better than any copy we could write.
AI optimisation
People now ask AI assistants for a good studio in their area or for an artist who does a particular style. We structure your content so those tools can read your studio and recommend it. Almost nobody in this trade is doing it yet.
Two posts a week, working alongside what your artists already do rather than replacing it. Your feed stays active on the weeks the studio is too busy to think about it.
Two posts a week. Older demographic than Instagram, often the ones booking cover-ups and memorial pieces, plus a lot of local recommendation still happens there.
Four steps, then we keep going
We learn the studio
Which styles you actually want more of, which artists want building up and which services are underbooked. Then what people near you are searching for.
We build the pages
A page per style, per service and per artist. Portfolio work indexed properly. Google Business Profile sorted.
We make booking obvious
Clear calls to action, artist availability where it helps and enquiry routes that do not depend on somebody remembering to check a direct message.
We keep at it
An update every three weeks and a full audit every quarter, including keeping artist pages current as your team changes.
What could more visibility be worth
Drag the sliders to your own numbers. A couple of extra day sessions a month usually covers the fee comfortably. This is a rough illustration to think with, not a promise of results.
Illustration only. Real results depend on your area, your competition and your artists' availability. We do not guarantee figures.
Three ways studios handle this
Instagram only
- Reaches your existing followers well
- Invisible to anybody who has not found you
- The algorithm decides your reach, not you
- Artists who leave take their following with them
A website nobody updates
- Homepage, gallery, contact form, done in 2019
- No pages for styles, services or artists
- Images unnamed and unindexed
- Ranks for your studio name and nothing else
Both, working together
- Instagram keeps doing what it is good at
- Google catches everybody Instagram cannot reach
- A page per style, service and artist
- Your portfolio finally working as content
One clear monthly fee
No setup fee and nothing billed separately, including when you add an artist and need a new page building.
- One service area
- A page per style, service and artist
- Local SEO and Google Maps
- Portfolio indexed properly
- Website management and AI optimisation
- Quarterly audits and monthly reporting
- Everything in Local SEO
- Several areas covered
- More competitive style terms
- Wider content programme
- For studios building a wider reputation
- Everything in Growth
- National reach
- For destination studios
- Artists who travel and guest spots
- Priority support
Worth comparing against what local SEO typically costs before you decide.
Be found by the people who have not found you.
Keep doing what you do on Instagram. We will handle everybody who is searching Google right now with no idea your studio exists.
Everything included in your plan:
One clear retainer. No setup fee.