Notes:
Well this video marks the end of the series on starting your photography business! I’d love to hear from you on how this series has helped in any way – whether it helped you to decide to start a business or not! It’s not for everyone, that’s for sure. The main point of this last video is to give you some encouragement for the road ahead and to let you know what your job is as a photographer-for-hire.
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Video Notes: Portfolio building IS: Collecting the types of images you want to take professionally so you have something to show prospective clients Creating a body of work to show what you do A great time to practice without great amounts of client expectations/pressure Creating visual content for your website Portfolio building ISN’T: Working until you think you’re ‘good enough’ to be a ‘professional’ to be used as a bait-and-switch marketing tactic Meant to last years Going to grow your business. Your portfolio ‘clients’ probably won’t follow you once you’re charging. The purpose of the ‘portfolio building stage’ of.. - Continue Reading
Video Notes: Who: Pricing is for everyone no matter what stage you're at in your business. Why: Because business is all about money! In order to set your prices you’ll need to... 1. Identify your target market 2. Your volume of clients {work all day or once a week?} 3. How much do you need to make to cover overhead? 4. Identify your business overhead: 5. Online subscriptions 6. Storage 7. Bills 8. Hard costs vs soft costs: a. hard = products b. soft = services 9. Then you have your time, education, equipment, software, marketing Do you want to.. - Continue Reading
In this post, Elizabeth discusses your web presence! She starts off discussing the who, what, when, where and why of your web presence and the difference between flash and blog based websites. Then, there's an interview with Zach Prez who you know from his wonderful Web Marketing for Photographer eBook among others. Enjoy!
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In this video, Elizabeth starts out explaining the concept of branding in her own way and then goes into a Skype discussion with Michelle Cormack from A Girl Named Fred. And in that interview, Elizabeth got quite an education about why a few of the ideas she had about branding weren't completely correct. So this week is an important learning experience for everyone on the subject of your visual identity.
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Video notes: Insurance for your business is SO IMPORTANT! Don't take a penny before insuring yourself. There are three types of insurance you need: Equipment - the most obvious no-brainer is that you need your equipment to be insured. This protects you against breakage, theft or loss. Some policies allow your equipment to be insured out of the country and others don't. Read your small print before you travel or lend it out! Liability - liability insurance protects you in the event you get sued for physical harm resulting from your involvement as a photographer. I've had people knock over large lighting.. - Continue Reading
Video Notes: Can you have small business? Yes. But what are you comparing it to? In this video, we're discussing the concept of establishing yourself as a small business, operating 'on the side'. Some call these photographers the 'weekend warriors' and even look down on them for their small time aspirations. There's nothing wrong with wanting your photography busienss to be a small one to supplement your usual income. But it's important to know what goes into running a business big or small and you might be surprised the the jump from small to big really isn't that huge. Things.. - Continue Reading
Video Notes: Can you get a camera and go straight into business? Yes and no. Can you start a business as a beginner? Yes and no. Thinking about business is the very first step of starting one. If you were to get a camera tomorrow purely for the purpose of going into business, then just thinking about business is the first step. Some trades/careers where people go into the trade purely for the purpose of business: Bricklayer Physicians Filmmakers You may be in the thinking stage of starting your business for years before ever beginning to shoot for money. And.. - Continue Reading
by Elizabeth Halford This is week 2 and in this second video, Elizabeth will be discussing the #1 thing you need before charging money for your services. And that's consistency! Elizabeth says: Before taking anyone's money, you absolutely need to be able to consistently produce the same level of work over and over again. So many photographers are guilty of displaying happy accidents on their website which they aren't able to recreate and this will snowball into a whole lotta different problems. If you're going to be charging for your services, it's not going to be that simple and you.. - Continue Reading
by Elizabeth Halford Hello and welcome to our 10 part vlog series for photographers! Over the next ten weeks, we're going to be discussing just a few of the different things you need to look into when deciding if you're ready to venture into charging for your photography and becoming a 'professional'. In this first video, Elizabeth be defining what she means when she uses the word 'professional' and looking at the argument from a few different points of view. We'll be keeping my eye on the comments for this blog post if you want to chat about these videos!.. - Continue Reading
