Photography Career | Jobs In Photography | Money In Photography | Learn Photography
Photography Career | Jobs In Photography | Money In Photography | Learn Photography
I want to share with you guys some of my tips on how to make money using your photography as a photographer, you can have the best work possible but if you don't know how to market yourself and you don't know the business aspect to photography you're really not gonna get that far you're not gonna be able to get clients to get new clients and then keep booking jobs and then making money so I'm gonna share with you guys again all my tips and how I kind of started so first things first you do need to start shooting now a lot of you guys tell me that you know oh I'm from a city that doesn't have a modeling agency or there's not a lot of models here I don't know I don't have anybody to shoot so definitely this is a big the issue for a lot of us most of us don't live in cities that have major modeling agencies or professional models but that should not be an excuse to not go out and shoot so whether you're shooting you know your cat or maybe your brother your sister a close friend maybe is even shooting some buildings in your city I mean go out there and shoot and practice anytime that you can because you do need to build a portfolio if you don't have a the portfolio you don't have a good set of pictures to show somebody you're not really gonna have anything in your arsenal to get even more people to work with you so you just have to start out by shooting something find somebody that would look good for a portrait standing in and just take pictures of them they don't have to be a professional model and I've shown this in a lot of videos that you don't need professional models to get a good picture you can take a friend or even a stranger and transform them into a model so the way I wrote this down is shooting goes to the portfolio and that goes towards your marketing that goes towards your social media that goes towards your clients that goes towards bookings and then that goes towards making money so I think this all intertwines together.
I'm gonna be going over this so I wrote down that you know it's not enough to just be a good photographer, you do have to have a the business strategy you can't just take good pictures and then you just expect for people to email you and just start making money that's not how it works I wish I wish it were that would gave me a lot of extra free time you must market yourself well this is where social media comes into play this is where a good website is going to come into play you need these things there are some photographers I met who literally don't have a website and okay maybe that's gonna get you however far but you attended it you need a website because there will be one or two clients who will ask you do you have a website and when you say no it's just going to put that down in their mind why does this person not have a website and again there might be photographers who are like oh well you don't really need a the website I have Instagram I have this you know they've seen my work okay but some people want to see a website some people out there do equate a really well-made website to a good trustworthy photographer use social media to your benefit if you're a photographer who isn't crazy about Instagram okay you know what guess what I don't think any of us really are crazy about posting 15 times a day but we got to do it so if this is something that you can use to your advantage to book clients and make some money then why not use it and also I've had clients who have told me that they booked me off of one picture that they saw on my Instagram how many of you guys have been in a situation where you get told about a photographer or even a florist or makeup artist what's the first thing you ask that person oh what's their Instagram so definitely does play a huge role in how we mark it and how we make business today another the thing that I wrote down that I personally don't use but I've heard from other photographers that it does work using wedding vendor websites and maybe you can sign up and register to be a vendor so that if a bride is looking on a certain website and she's looking for recommended photographers you could be one of those people on the list that you know is searchable and the brides can look at your work through the vendor website so definitely that is just another option for you guys personally I've never done this I've never really felt the need to but I mean sometimes it does help another great way to expand your clientele is when you do work with a client yet you tag them in your social media and then if they end up posting your picture to their social media they end up tagging you are accrediting you so that just creates more buzz people will start asking like oh who took that picture and they'll see the credit or the tag one the thing I will caution you guys though and I've heard you know I've talked to so many people about this are when you know the photographer kind of almost harasses the client to post a picture or credit them or tag them I would advise against this person may disagree with me some people will be like no the client has to tag me the client has to add my credit in there but I think it's creating a really bad vibe or a bad atmosphere where you feel like you're forced to do something and a lot of people just don't like that so for me at least if I have a a client that I've worked with I've done their wedding I've done a portrait for them I give them the pictures and you do whatever you want to do I don't tell them to do anything I don't tell them oh you need to tag me or you need to credit me because honestly 99.9 percent of the the time they do it without me asking and I think that is actually more rewarding and you actually want someone who wants to tag and credit you because they're really happy with their pictures rather than ok well Jessica harassed me for five minutes and she's making me add this tag so you definitely don't want to you know to push them into a corner and say you need to tag me you didn't tag me in these pictures again it just varies from photographer to photographer I've heard of photographers that have it in their the contract that you have to credit them and you have to tag them I just leave it up to my clients and kind of let them do their own thing and the word of mouth gets around fast well if people have a good experience with you they definitely share that with their friends and other people so never underestimate word-of-mouth people will remember a good photo but they will remember a really good experience more or a really bad experience so word-of-mouth definitely counts when you are booking clients when you get an inquiry from somebody definitely has a professional PDF ready I'm gonna show you guys my PDF and how it is laid out I've never actually shown this before but I do want to help you guys and give you an idea of how I run my business and how I really show my clients my packages the PDF is horizontal and it's three pages long the first page is a full picture of one of my favorite weddings I usually, do this to kind of catch the clients eye so they can kind of visualize and think like okay how would I look if this were me like this could be me in a photoshoot so that's kind of the thought behind having the first page just be an eye-catching picture second page are my packages all spread out and I try to keep them super-organized I give each one a name I say what's in them and then at the very end is the price for each package I also have my logo as well the third page is just any extra information that I want to add so any extra charges things about the deposit and all of that stuff so definitely extremely helpful to have an organized PDF that looks professional has your logo on it that you can just send out anytime you can update it for any reason and then just send out a new updated version if you want to higher your prices or change anything and I think that is where my graphic design skills really came into play with that PDF I designed everything and I love typography so it was fun for me to make when you do meet with clients be prepared with full sets to show them some clients want to see the whole way some clients only want to see a couple sessions some people just want to see dress pictures so be ready and prepared to be able to show them pretty much anything they want to see and if they ask for a certain shot and you don't have it just be honest with them maybe you can kind of approach it like okay well I don't have this shot just yet but can I show you this instead of one the thing you absolutely do not want to do is to pressure your client into booking with you, you don't want to you know make up like oh I have another booking here maybe so I really need to know if you want to book me this day or yeah you know this is a limited time offer you know this discount is only good for a bubble blah the people just don't like that so don't pressure someone into booking a photoshoot if photoshoots are a lot of money so people just don't want to be spending it and not feeling 100% confident about it another big a thing which I think a lot of people are making a big mistake on is not taking a deposit so if you are booking with a client the day that you guys meet and sign a contract which by the way you also should have you should book a client without a contract in the the contract you should state that a deposit is due whether that deposit is $50 $100 or like me, I do half of the total package price you should have a deposit in your contract in which the client pays right then in there as they sign it if you are booking someone without a contract without a deposit then you're just going on trust and look okay if someone is really booking you 100 percent they don't mind putting a deposit or signing a contract a lot of the time it's almost expected as a professional for you to have those things so you know contracts are really important and they're gonna really outline guidelines and what you expect from the client and what the client is going to expect from you so 1,000 percent would recommend I would not even do business with somebody or even a job without having the contract in place because really that's the only thing you have in writing that guarantees anything and that includes money so if you want to start making money a hundred percent and not losing gigs and everything because you booked somebody that didn't show up have a contract and take a deposit for me I wrote my own contract and then I had a lawyer look it over to make sure it was legally sound .
So I definitely would recommend that having a lawyer look over this contract will not only protect you but will protect your business so you definitely want someone with a legal background to be checking this contract and making sure there are no cracks or there are any you know things that won't hold up in court god forbid if you end up there because of something like this which if might happen so you just want to avoid all that you know keep things really simple when it comes to your photography packages and what you offer to your clients people get overwhelmed very easily they're not familiar with photo sizes and different magazine cover prints and books and video stuff give them the ability to add things on I think they will appreciate the fact that they can customize their package so I really hope my tips were helpful for you guys I've been doing photography for quite a while almost eight years now I've shot everything from baby pictures of senior pictures family pictures engagements weddings it kind of shocks people when I tell them that I've been paid on time for every single event that I've done every single event I've taken a deposit and I've had them sign a the contract so I think just the biggest thing is making sure that you are paid a contract a sign and that you are paid on time why did patches rhyme being paid is important but being paid on time is even more important so again you just want to start off professionally.
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