Love Taking Pictures – Make Money at Your Passion!

By | Published: September 15, 2009

I know a number of amateur photographers who take great photos of landscapes, still life, weather and people but who would never think of running their own photography business.  With the ready availability of digital cameras and great online sources to print photos like Snapfish, Costco and Sam’s Club anyone with an eye for a good photo or portrait can make some extra money taking pictures.

One of the first things you need to do when starting a photography business is to write a photography business plan.  You can find numerous templates for business plans online and here are some simple steps to get you started.  The first part of your business plan should include the steps you will take to do business every single day.  The second section of your business plan should detail all of the equipment necessary to run your business efficiently – camera(s), flash, lighting, studio, back drops, scenery, props, transportation of equipment and power for remote shoots, storage solutions for the equipment, photo printers, computer equipment, etc.

The next section should detail the financial aspects of the company.  By detailing your operations and equipment in the photography business plan, this section should be easier to fill out.  Figure out how much you will need for day to day operations for the first year along with equipment acquisition costs.  How will your business be funded, personally, private sources, grants or loans?  The final portion of your business plan should be your location and where your market is going to be.  Are you going to run a studio out of your home (is the area zoned for a home business?); are you renting a retail space or buying your own building with a studio?

Once you have fleshed out your photography business plan with these sections you can get your business of the ground with a plan in mind.  If you are self financing and want to look at business loans or grants, you have to have a business plan to apply for either, so you are one step closer to the extra funding you may want.

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Have Enough Business? Don’t Read Any More!

By | Published: September 15, 2009

Photography is a passion that many people have and would like to be able to make money at.  In many cases the best way to get business in any trade is through word of mouth advertising.  However, there are a number of ways in this internet savvy world to get more people to view your services and products.  Advertising in the Yellow Pages used to be about the only way anyone could find a photographer.  Every school had a photographer that was recommended for school pictures and for senior pictures.

As a photographer who really enjoys their work, the last thing you want to do is spend a large amount of money on doing something that you are not even sure is going to get you more business than you usually get in a particular season.  If you enjoy sports photography you can check out your local youth sports leagues and see what kind of picture packages their current suppliers are running.  Do they offer plaques with team pictures; do they offer posters or laminated picture cards and calendars?

If you can offer similar or better products to the youth sports leagues along with donating some of the proceeds back to the league as a no brainer fund raiser you can many time lock up a school district’s youth sports leagues all year round.  Lifetouch has dedicated sales reps that contact schools to handle their school picture business and many times they offer similar services to the varsity sports teams as well.

Here in Canton, Ohio one particular photographer has the football, cheerleading and lacrosse youth sports business while another group handles game day photos that you can access and buy online for football.  Once you are in with a particular youth organization you can use that as a reference to go after neighboring youth leagues for more business.

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Getting Your Wedding Photography Business Off the Ground

By | Published: September 15, 2009

What are some of the best ways to get the word out about your wedding photography business?  Are you just starting out shooting weddings?  Do you have a lot of other photographic experience?  Part of marketing a wedding photography business is knowing your target market.  What times of the year are busier than others for weddings?  Are there arboretums and parks that are used for back drops for wedding pictures on a regular basis?  Do they have places for you to place business cards?

If you are new to the wedding photography business and do not have a portfolio of wedding shots (before, during and candid reception shots) the first thing you need to do is actually shoot a wedding.  If you are an accomplished photographer in general you can offer your services at a significant discount to a friend or relative to get the photos as part of your portfolio.  Once you have your portfolio for weddings set you need to get in touch with local wedding suppliers.  Getting on their referral list is another great way of marketing a wedding photography business.

Are there wedding and bridal shows in your area?  If so, securing a booth and setting it up with various nicely framed photos along with a couple of books with different wedding photos in it will help you get the word out about your business.  Networking with florists, rental companies, rental halls, churches, and other providers for weddings and receptions can get you the needed referrals to keep you busy most weekends throughout the year.  In this electronic age a website is a must.  Domain names are less than ten dollars and most hosting sites have templates that even a novice can use to create a professional looking website.

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How Do I Sell My Services?

By | Published: September 15, 2009

As a professional photographer you are constantly concerned with getting new customers, getting repeat business form existing customers and trying to find out why old customers never came back.  All three of these processes should be part of your photography marketing plan.  You should have different strategies aimed at each one of these types of target customers.

How can you find a photography marketing plan to base yours on?  There are a number of marketing sites not specific to photography that can help you with a variety of marketing ideas.  For decades the only choices you had were to advertise in the Yellow Pages of the markets you served or newspapers.  Radio advertising became more prevalent in the 1960s and 1970s.  Television advertising was very expensive and could not be done except in a large market way until the advent of local cable stations.

Coming up with what you should advertise, whether or not to use customer incentives like coupons or free product, which services or products to promote and what media to use for your photography marketing plan are all time consuming tasks.

To make a photography marketing plan you need to start with what is called an Executive Summary.  An Executive Summary consists of several parts.  The first thing is a core statement that gives the essence of what your business is about.  The second item is how your core statement addresses a need in the market.  Third is a statement of why other companies are not addressing things as you are.  Fourth is a list of steps you need to take to service the market properly and reasons why your company is better at this than other similar companies.

Properly put together with some samples of your photography will make a nice brochure as part of your photography marketing plan.

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Capturing the Event of a Lifetime!

By | Published: September 15, 2009

Every wedding has at least one professional photographer snapping photos before the wedding, during the wedding and at the reception.  Some times the photographer also has a video camera set up.   Some weddings have disposable cameras at the tables for guests to take candid photos for the bride and groom to augment the professional pictures they paid big bucks for.

Whatever the situation, if you want to get more of the wedding photography business running through your studio you will need to increase your wedding photography marketing.  There are any number of ways to add to your wedding photography marketing plans including coupons in a local “saver” magazine, postcards, Val-Pak, radio, cable TV and newspapers.

What will work for you may not work for a colleague in another city.  You need to understand your customer and what they are looking for now that they have less disposable income than they are used to having.  Couples plan to spend a great deal of money on wedding photos as they hope that this will be the only time they are going to get married.  As a result the couple looking for a wedding photographer has a few criteria they look for before making a final choice.  Knowing what those factors are and which ones are more important in your area are a key to your marketing strategy.

A major factor is choosing a wedding photographer is reliability.  Will the photographer show up on time with the necessary equipment?  Can they be available for the rehearsal dinner?  What is the quality of their work?  Good samples in a variety of settings go a long way with this factor.  Does the customer know anyone that the photographer has worked for in the past?  Word of mouth referral is the best marketing you can get.  Offering coupons for every person referred for future photography is a way to get more referrals.

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New Photography Business Owners Need Marketing Help!

By | Published: September 15, 2009

The average photographer that decides to go into business at the urging of their friends and family generally does not have a great deal of business or marketing experience before opening their studio.  How extensive your studio and services you offer will change the photo marketing ideas that will work for your business.

For example, if you offer wedding photography and videography it would be in your best interests to not only have a booth at any bridal and wedding shows in your market area, but you should also investigate all of the various suppliers to weddings including but not limited to florist, rental companies, caterers, rental halls, bridal shops, tux rental stores and more.  Once you have determined the top two or three companies in the various categories above you need to network with them to see if they will hand out your card to potential clients or at least have a place where their customers can see your advertisement of services.  If you do not offer wedding photography as one of your options then other photography marketing ideas would be a better choice for you.

No matter what your service menu looks like you should have a website that is linked to any local portals that help people find goods and services especially when they first move to an area.  Local.com and About.com are great places to have your photography studio listed for your area.  If your church has a business directory that shows what business are represented by church members make sure that you are listed in that as well.  Setting up a booth with a few books of your photos and the various services you offer – senior portraits, sports photography, team sports pictures, weddings, family portraits, baby pictures, etc. at county or state fairs is another photography marketing idea.

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Selling Photography in a Down Market

By | Published: September 15, 2009

When the economy is good you will not need to do much advertising to keep your photography business busy.  But in today’s economy you will need to develop a photography studio marketing plan to make the best use of your resources.  Do you currently have a website?  If not, check out the various sites like GoDaddy.com that sell domain names and see if your business name is available.  Most domain names cost less than ten dollars and many website hosting companies will give you templates to develop your own professional looking website without the need to contact someone with IT and programming experience to build you one.

Once you have a website you will need content with key words to get your site moved up in the search results when someone is looking for a photography studio.  If you are creative you can write several short (500 words or less) articles on various aspects of photography from subjects, to backgrounds to lighting to equipment and more.  The more you give your potential customers the more they will come to your studio.  You can also offer an email newsletter with photography tips and chances to win discounts or photo packages from your studio.  By gaining an electronic audience you can build a database to market future services and products to.

Asking satisfied clients for referrals is the most effective way to get new business for a photography studio.  Offering discounts to existing customers is another way of photo studio marketing to increase your repeat business.  Having a booth at various local fairs and bridal shows is a great way to get the name of your business into the community.  Other ways to market your studio is to sponsor a local camera and photography club with meetings at your studio.  Offer the studio to students and club members for their photography needs at reduced prices.

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