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Photography is a Luxury Business, Not a Discount Store

Photography is one of the worst types of businesses start if you’re simply looking to make some extra money.

It’s based on your time, which is limited, so your potential income is limited. Even if you start a studio and hire additional photographers, you’re not truly scaling your business very far.

There’s a low barrier to entry as the cost of equipment comes down and there’s no special schools or trainings required, causing market saturation (and high competition for clients) in almost all areas.

You also build very little equity, so if you decide to retire and sell the business, you won’t make much compared to other businesses and you may not even be able to sell the business at all.

On top of all that, it’s a creative service so its value is hard to quantify.

I’m not trying to depress you with these facts, and I’m certainly not saying you can’t have a profitable business.

If you want to have a successful photography business and really make money with photography, there’s one very important thing that you need to know and live by. [Click to read more]

How To Use Contests To Market Your Photography Business

Contests can be an amazing way to spread the word about your business and get new clients.

I’m currently running a contest on my Madison Wedding Photography site, and I thought I’d talk you through how I’m doing it and how you can run a successful contest as well.

In the video below, you’ll learn:

The Rules about running a contest and using Facebook
A breakdown of my current contest and how you can do something similar
One simple entry tip for encouraging more new visitors to check out your site

You’ll also learn that I like to talk with my hands and see the unfortunate thumbnail that YouTube decided to give me for the video.

(I give you full permission to mock me and laugh at me. Bonus points to the person who does a video response parody of me and posts it on YouTube.)
[Click to read more]

What to Blog About When Your Photography Business Is Slow

If you want to attract new clients online, it’s absolutely essential that you blog regularly.

Search engines like Google will lower your rankings in their results if your website isn’t being updated regularly.

But what do you blog about when you’ve already blogged all your client work and don’t have anything to blog about.

Please don’t blog post after post of your own kids. People notice. And certainly do NOT try to make it look like they aren’t your kids or that it was for some paying client. A post here and there is fine, but when you’re doing it to “pad” your blog, it sticks out like a sore thumb.

So what do you write about?

Here’s a list of several topics you can blog about when your photography business is slow. [Click to read more]

Best of the Rest: Seriously Helpful Resources From Around the Web

It’s time for another “Best of the Rest” where I sort through all the fluff on the web for the best photography-related articles that will help you grow your business and be a better photographer.

I’m just going to dive right in because there’s so much awesome stuff to share today. [Click to read more]

Why Giveaways Fail And How To Rock Your Next One

Giveaways are a great way to market your business.

It can spread the word about your business, get you new clients, and build rapport with your followers.

However, many giveaways are epic failures.

You offer an amazing prize, but then you only get a few people to enter and they never spread the word.

It can be especially deflating if you’ve offered up your services for free and hardly anyone bites. It made me wonder if my photography was so bad that people didn’t even want it for free.

But that’s not the case.

Giveaways fail is because the word about it never spread or because it was too hard to enter.

There’s a ridiculously easy and free tool that takes care of both of these problems, and I’m about to tell you about it. [Click to read more]

Black Friday Deals for Photographers From Around The Web

Black Friday.

If you aren’t familiar with it, it’s the start of holiday shopping for the United States that gets a bit crazy.

There are crazy 1-day sales that are lower than anything you’ve ever seen for the rest of the year, so it’s a great time to pick up some of the things you’ve been thinking about at insanely low prices.

Here’s a list of Black Friday Sales for Photographers that I’ve found around the web or heard of from other photographers.

I haven’t used all the companies, so this list is not an endorsement but is simply a reference to see what’s out there. A few of the links are affiliate links, but the majority of them are not.

If you know of something going on that’s not on the list, leave a comment with the details and a link! [Click to read more]

Giveaway! Get Super Photo Editing or Awesome Album Design Skills From Photography Concentrate

If you’ve been reading this site for awhile, you’ll have seen a number of links to Photography Concentrate, another amazing site with photography tips that I highly recommend.

“Learn Photography Faster” is their tagline, and they’re serious about it.

Lauren and Rob were kind enough to give me a copy of both their Super Photo Editing Skills and Awesome Album Design Skills tutorials to check out and review, and they’ll be giving away your choice of one of them to a winner (see entry info below).

I’ve been using Lightroom and InDesign for editing and album design for a few years now, so I was pretty sure it’d all be review for me.

Boy was I wrong. [Click to read more]

How To Create Photography Packages That Sell

Creating photography packages is one of the most popular ways to present your services to your clients.

As I have been helping photographers with their pricing and packaging, I’ve seen a number of common mistakes over and over again that are easy to avoid and will help boost your sales.

Before making packages, however, make sure you’ve worked through the Photographer’s Pricing Guide to determine how much money you need to be making on average per shoot. We’ll use this information in setting up your packages.

So let’s jump right in! [Click to read more]

How to Stay Productive When You’re Burned Out

Are you as exhausted as I am?

My wedding season just finished up, but I’ve got a backlog of editing to do, orders to fulfill, gear to get fixed, and clients to consult with. That’s just the start of the list and doesn’t include the blogging, marketing, networking, or other activities I do to promote the business and keep growing it.

On top of that, we’ve had a lot of personal things on the calendar lately, our dryer decided to stop working correctly, and it feels like there’s just too many things to do that all need to be done now. Plus I’d like to spend more time with my family.

With everything I’m juggling right now, I’m feeling serious burn out.

It seems like every year when I get to this point, I tend to shut down or lose effectiveness for awhile. I think I just get stressed about everything I have to do, and overwhelm myself a bit trying to keep on task and really get things done.

I jump from one thing to the next, not always finishing the first one, and I stress that I’m choosing wrong and should be doing something else more important instead.

But this week I had a breakthrough.

This week has been one of the most productive weeks I’ve had in awhile, so I thought I’d share what made all the difference. [Click to read more]

Don’t Be an Uncle Bob: The Photographer’s Guide to Being a Good Wedding Guest

wedding guest in professional photographer's way — Photo credit (used with permission)

So, you’ve been invited to attend a wedding as a guest.

For whatever reason (good or bad) the couple has decided to hire someone else to do the professional photos.

Should you bring your good camera or leave it at home entirely? What is okay to do and what isn’t?

We are wedding photographers who were recently invited to a wedding as guests, so we had to wrestle with these questions as well. The last thing we wanted was to be a hindrance to the main photographer and to be considered an annoying Uncle Bob.

We thought we’d help make the process easier for you. Here’s the Photographer’s Guide to Being a Good Wedding Guest from The Modern Tog.
[Click to read more]

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