Commercial Photographer: Your Guide to Marketing, Creativity and Growth

This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here ⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠ ⁠01482 765871⁠ There are several different models for how to decide on a price for your services. We talk about some of the main ones in the show. 1. Charge per hour. With this approach you decide what you want to be paid per hour. Then work out how much time the whole process takes and work out a price accordingly.   2. Look at your competitors Look at your competitors websites. If you are feeling a little cheeky, phone another photographer and pretend to be a lead and get a price3. Value pricing What is the value of your work? This is hard to define. You have to think what value are you providing to someone with your service. For example what is the value of someone having that wedding album for the rest of their life and having had an amazing experience on the day.   4. Cost of business model For this approach out you work out for your business how much everything costs, including paying you the rate you want to be paid. Then work out how many jobs you will do a year. Then divide the total cost by the number of jobs and that is how much that photo-shoot costs.   Marcus mainly follows the value based system for his branding photography. But for event photography Marcus just charges on a per hour basis. And then on the rare occasion he does weddings he generally looks at others in the market and charges a similar amount. New businesses almost always charge too little. Almost all new businesses charge far too little for their services. Often new businesses can easily double their price and still have a good price. But when you do this you may initially lose customers as you move from the bottom end market into a higher level market. Sam suggests that almost everyone with a new business can increase their prices easily. Should you display your pricing? This is a big debate and everyone has a different view on this. Marcus uses the “My prices start from” approach. It is helpful that leads get a ballpark figure. Sam thinks if you have a subscription service these should always be clearly priced. He also suggests that having some packages and pricing them is a good idea. Just make sure your package is not really comparable to other photographers. That avoids direct price comparison.Subtly showing pricing The way your website and marketing look already gives subtle ideas about pricing. The customers shown the way it looks already gives leads an idea of how expensive you are. Stick to your guns If you give a price do not negotiate. Stick to the price you have offered. If it is too expensive for them offer them less for a lower price. But don’t just drop the price. If the price goes down what they get also needs to go down.Working for free Marcus suggests this is a good thing to do if there are specific things you need. For example you need photos for your portfolio if you have a new business. But ensure that if you do this you make it very clear what you want out of the process.

Allie used to lecture and the  decided to walk away when she had a photograph hanging in a gallery alongside work by Martin Parr. Allie started photography when she was 16 or 17 shooting black and white with film. But Allie had a difficult childhood and so felt she had to get a “sensible” degree so she did a degree in English literature. She then taught, until she felt she had been “bled dry”. When her daughter was in her teens Allie Crewe went to night school to study photography. Allie had already studied film and Italian at night school and loved learning.   Allie’s journey from night class to gallery was an interesting one. Her first tutor thought an image (you can see it here), the one hanging on Allie’s wall behind us as we record the podcast, had something about it. So her tutor sent it to a curator. wasn’t sure about it being sent, but her tutor sent it while Allie was taking a break in the loo. Her work was accepted and ended up in a gallery amongst lots of photographs by high calibre male photographers. She came home three mornings afterwards and decided that she would leave the security of teaching and move to being a photographer. It changed her life. From that initial success Allie has quickly enjoyed a lot of success. She had an exhibition about domestic violence that was opened by Queen Camilla. And that bought a lot of press and publicity.   Allie is unsure as to whether she could have managed this work when she was younger. All the work has been about her in some way. She has started her work thinking about herself and then connected to a group and the work then becomes about the group. One example of this was her work with trans women. Allie’s work has appeared in many national papers including the Guardian, the Telegraph and the Sun. She enjoys the social conscience work and making work that is relevant to people who want change. And she enjoys being authentic and becoming part of the group she is working with. Allie has won several awards including the BJP (British Journal of Photography) award. She got this with an image of Grace, a doctor. Allie feels that the award was a way of validating herself. Allie explained that this is a male dominated industry with a 40% pay gap. She felt this award made her feel validated and helped with imposter syndrome. But as well as the positives awards add pressure including pressure to get more. Allie also has an award from the RPS (Royal Photography Society). Allie is currently studying for her masters at Ulster and in her first year her tutor was Ken Grant. He is now with Donovan Wylie. She was with ken at Martin Parr’s studio for a few days. It was there she got asked to enter the RPS award. Sam and Allie discussed the idea that there are awards at every level that photographers can go for and these wards are great for your marketing. But equally this is not compulsory as a photographer. We can as photographers do work just for ourselves. Allies Instagram references Chris Killip who is a photographer she is drawn to. She found his recent exhibition very emotional. Allie has been careful in her masters to only reference female photographers, but personally she likes all sorts of photographers. Alessandra Sanguinetti has an amazing book called "Some say Ice". Alys Tomlinson is also an influence who Allie was looking at on the morning of our conversation. Allie still shots film, 35mm and medium format. She loves her Mamiya camera. Marcus asks Allie how people can get into shooting portraits for exhibitions magazines and books. Allie explains that for her she chose something than was personal and took it from there. She worked as an artist in residency with the help of her connections (ones she had worked hard to build). From that starting point she felt the artistic residency gave her the legitimacy she needed when showing her work or entering it for competitions.  

 Marcus talks through his customers' experienceMarcus’s customer journey Marcus likes to respond initial enquiries quickly, ideally within an hour. He then moves on to trying to setup a Zoom call. As photography is visual, having a visual call is really important. That call is all about listening not selling. Zoom also means ideas can be shared visually. After this Marcus will send out a quote, which is done automatically using his CRM. So Marcus doesn’t really talk much about pricing in that initial call, that comes in with the quote goes out. If the job goes ahead Marcus sets up another Zoom call before the shoot. This is a very creative call, talking about clothes, props and locations. It’s also a great way to get clients used to working you before you even meet.People don’t like being photographed.Marcus think in the UK people would prefer to go to the dentist than have their photograph taken. That means photographers need lots of... Techniques to relax people Chatting to themAsk them about what people do, what they did at the weekend etc. All the classic questions to try and engage people. Get people involved in the process Shooting tethered means subjects can see the results of the photographs on the screen. They can then engage much more actively with the photography.   Ask them about clothes, props and angles. Things Marcus does Observe Marcus observes people intently. He is looking for things they naturally do and then asks them to do those in the photos. It might be a way they hold their head or a way they hold their hands. Mirror This is either you showing them something and ask them to follow it. Or even better if you can quickly build rapport you can get them to just automatically copy you. So for example if you cross your arms they do it to. Direct This is the classic of the photographer telling the subject what to do. After the shoot Initially Marcus narrows the photos down to about forty or fifty photos that he sends to the client via an online platform. He has found sending more than this just confuses the client. These photos have had a light edit, but not much more.  From then what happens depends on the client. Some keep all the images, some make a selection.  

Lauren McWilliams is a Brand photographer and Strategist. Lauren works with ambitious service based entrepreneurs across the UK through photography and programmes. With a keen eye for capturing the essence of brands through photography and a knack for strategic thinking, she’s the go-to for those looking to make a lasting impact in their market.  Her passion for helping others can be seen and was recently recognised in the Great British Entrepreneur Awards 2022 as a finalist for Young Entrepreneur of the year.  Lauren's business story Lauren started her business in 2019 not long before the pandemic began. When she started she had no idea how to run a business. Photography had always been a passion, so when she burnt out from her 9 to 5 job, she setup a photography business. Lauren got lots of support from the local authority for her business. Lauren started saying yes to any work that came along, like almost all of us do when we start a business. She quickly realised that what she enjoyed most was working with businesses. When the pandemic hit she had no work, as with most photographers. So, she decided to launch a challenge to help keep businesses telling their story. After lockdown she was suddenly fully booked having run the challenge. As she worked more Lauren realised that customers didn’t know what to do with their photographs. Most of the photographs she gave to customers stayed hidden. So she started to learn more about marketing and then started to help her customers with this. Lauren ended up with a contract as a consultant to support businesses in the same way as she had received support at the beginning of her business journey. Where do Lauren's customers begin as photography or branding clients? Lauren is known mainly as a photographer and so her clients tend to come in for photography, but then they move on to also become brand strategy clients once they have their photographs. Lauren works with businesses over a long period of time and builds up a long term relationship with them, which she really values. She tells us the story of a recruitment business that she has documented over time. Initially it was just the CEO of the business on her own. Now she has a team of 20 or 30 with a new office. Lauren has documented those changes. What could photographers could do to add more value to clients. Lauren suggests building more of a relationship with the client. Ensuring realty careful panning happens before the photo shoot. As an example for a corporate photo shoot you could involve the people having their photo taken from the planning stage. Ask them for ideas so that they can become involved in the process and start to own it and enjoy it. Collaboration Lauren thinks it is really important as photographers to collaborate and learn from each other. When she started off she found some local photographers saw her as a threat and wouldn’t answer her questions. Later she found more supportive photographers. She is now using her skills and knowledge to help other photographers.  Shoot to the top Facebook Group We have launched a Facebook group for the podcast. You can find it here. Lauren, Sam and Marcus are there and you can ask them questions.  Sam asked Lauren how we can make content to show the person we are without making it to much “me,me,me”. She says the balance is that we show who we are but we balance that with sharing out networks and our clients success. Lauren suggests the simple things that photographers could do to improve their marketing is to practice what they preach. Photographers are usually telling clients to get out and be visible. But then many photographers then hide behind the camera and aren’t seen. You can contact Lauren here. lauren@foryouphotographer.com https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauren-mcwilliams-brand-photographer/ https://laurenmcwilliams.co.uk/

This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here ⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠ ⁠01482 765871⁠ In this episode Sam says we should talk much less about ourselves in our marketing. People are interested in themselves, not about you. So if your marketing is talking about you, the people receiving it are not very interested. They are more interested in themselves. SocialWho was your last social post about? Was it about you? If so how interesting is that for other people? Some people think that being on social media regularly means talking about yourself all the time. This is not engaging for other people. So what can you post about? Helping others. By doing this you are helping people, but subtly showing them you are an expert.    Ask a question. Ask others for their ideas and opinions. Commenting on other peoples posts. This is helping to build a community not just talking about yourself.   Websites Visitors come to your website because they have a problem and want to know if you can solve it. The general public don’t browse photographers websites for fun. They come to see if you can solve their problem. So are you talking about the visitor and their problems and how you can solve them.The "I" testLook at your website. How many times do you use the word "I"(or we) and how many times do you say the word "you". If you use "I", more than "you", then you need to re-focus your website to the visitor and away from "you". About me page You have to even make the about page not about you, but what you have done, how you have helped people, rather just your story from birth.Blogs, videos and testimonialsThese are a great way to show how great you are and how knowledgeable you are without you having to do it directly. Visitors reading your blogs will realise you are an expert over time as they read your blogs. NetworkingThis also applies to meeting people in networking meetings. Let the person you are meeting talk as much as possible. You will build great relationships as people will see you are interested in them. NewslettersThis principal again applies to the newsletter. A newsletter that just explains what happens in your office last week is not engaging. A newsletter should not be your news. It should be entertaining, informing and engaging. Promoting yourself is not the same as talking about yourself. You want other people to be talking about you and your brand, you don’t want to be doing this yourself. Pascalle Bergman is a person who puts this into practice perfectly. She is constantly helping people, not talking about herself. Find her here on LinkedIn  

In this show we talk to Colin D Smith who is an expert in listening. A skill we have talked about many times in the show.   Listening makes people feel needed and valued. It is something that can be learnt either through coaching in group settings or 121. Even though most people think they are good listeners in reality very few people have the skills to do it well. And this is reflected in society with a rise in loneliness and sadly suicide rates.   Colin goes on to say the importance of using open ended questions “how do you feel about that?” “ interesting, what more do you want to say about that?”   Sam poses the question of how can we use this in our business, in particular networking.   Good listening can results in building trust and be more likeable. So when dealing with customers get them to open up with open questions, exploring different options. And if you become a better listener your clients will in turn listen closer to you. It's a win win!   Colin believes deeper listening can be learnt. Clear away distractions, go in to your discussions with a settled mind and be more in the present. Avoid interrupting, stop trying to fix things, don’t be an eighteen second manager.   Colin goes on to re-enforce the quality of being present. Think along the lines of becoming a listener as to doing it.  Take a three second pause after the other person has finished speaking, observe their body movements. Listen for key phrases “I have never told this to someone before”   Marcus brings up non verbal conversations. Eye contact, facing people during conversations, equality of viewpoints all contribute to the effectiveness of listening.   In times where you have to get to know people quickly, head shots, for example, it is important to get yourself centered before and during the event. Keep a calm demeanor in spite of everything.   Good listening skills will make your clients feel that they have the right person on the job. You can contact Marcus colin.smith@dexteritysolutions.co.uk https://dexteritysolutions.co.uk/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/colindsmith1 07939-013651

Creativity and Rest Marcus takes us back to episode 12 and reminds us about the 5 Rs of creativity Rules Research Reflection Repetition Rest Today Marcus is going to talk more about the subject of rest. Marcus has been looking at the latest research into creativity. According to the research your brain works in two different modes 1.   “Default Mode Network” When you are not really thinking about anything. When you do something by habit. Like having a shower in the morning, or driving your car and you arrived without knowing how you got there. It is when your thoughts are going inwards 2.    “Executive Control Network” This is when you are really in the zone and doing focused activity. It’s been discovered that the Default mode network is linked to creativity.Taking the time  When Marcus wants to think about ideas he sits down in the evening with a glass of wine. Sam suggests then that meditation should be part of this process, which Marcus agrees with. It’s important to find that quiet space, and think about nothing and let the ideas come to you. It’s crucial this is in a quite space with nothing else going on. NotebookMarcus recommends always having a notebook to hand to write down your ideas as they come to you. But also Marcus says as you get better at getting creative ideas you can also train your brain to remember these ideas.How to startFor Marcus he says about 8pm he sits in quiet with a glass of wine and just sits, and thinks. And the more you try this the easier it becomes. There is lots of meditation help online, both in terms of techniques and calming sound tracks. Marcus recommends doing this every day. Finding that time can be very challenging. But it is worth that effort. For some people the day time is a better time, when the house is quiet. It’s important to try and schedule that quiet time into your day.   Long term This is a long term process and it will take time to get better at this. There is a great Netflix documentary about this            

This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here ⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠ ⁠01482 765871⁠ In this episode Marcus and Sam discuss the different platforms available for building a website. Sam grouped into three different broad groups. 1. The self build platforms – Wix, SquareSpace, Shopify and others 2. Content management system platforms. This is dominated by WordPress, but there are other platforms here like Joomla 3. Custom coding. This means someone builds a site for you using code.Self Build websitesThese are easy to use drag and drop website platforms. These make it very easy to get a website online. With some use of templates, dragging and dropping you can make something that looks quite good, quite quickly. They are easy to use  and deal with maintenance, security and hosting for you. This means it’s one simple monthly or annual payment and it covers everything. Once you chose one of these platforms you are locked into it. So if they dramatically increase your prices your only choice is to give up on that website, or pay the higher price. The speed and SEO for these platforms has improved dramatically in the last ten years, however they are behind the other types of website in these areas. Speed effects visitors experience and can also push you down the Google rankings. These platforms also have limits as to what they can do. They have quite a good range of functionality.  But if you want to go beyond the functionality they provide, you have to start again with a different platform. Sam explains there is a lot more to building a website than adding some text and images and making it look pretty. Take a listen to our back catalogue to get some ideas about this.WordPress and other CMS platformsThey talk about Wordpress here as it’s the dominant force. Sam explains that Wordpress is quite a basic platform (a bit like a new phone) but you can then add plugins (like apps on your phone) that can do all sorts of things. Some are free, some premium, some freemium. There are different ways to build a WordPress website, but many now use a visual editor so you can see what you are doing. But they are not drag and drop builders like Wix. When using WordPress you do need to think about your own security and updates. This isn’t that complicated, but does need thinking about. The most important thing is to keep all the software up to date.  Wordpress websites can move between website hosting. So if you have a problem with one web hosting service, you can move it to a different one. The number of plugins for websites is huge so there is a wide range of flexibility in what WordPress can do. Because these plugins are used by a wide range of users the cost of writing them is shared across hundreds or thousands of users, which keeps the cost down.Custom coded websiteThis means that a site is built just for you. There is no excess code here. It is a way to get a very fast efficient website. It can do a huge range of things. But it is very expensive as a coder writes it just for you. For a simple five page photography website, this would be very over the top. But if you want to do something more complex and you have the budget, it’s a great way to go.   Moving between platformsThink carefully before committing to a website platform as to leave you have to abandon the website and start again. But also don’t be afraid to let an old website go. For example maybe you built a Website on SquareSpace two years ago and you want to greatly improve it. Think carefully about whether you would be better to over onto another platform and start again, rather than stick to what you have.  Image sizesAs a sideline Sam and Marcus started chatting about photographers getting images onto their websites. Sam explained it’s important that photographers don’t add huge images to their websites.    

In this show Marcus tells us about style, what it is and how it can be used in your business. Marcus says having a style means that if someone looks at your work they can tell it’s your due to the style. Marcus gives these photographers as examples of photographers with a very unique style. Martin Schoeller Madame Yevonde   What makes a style? It could be a technique, it could be using black and white, using flash or your viewpoint, Another example is Edward Burtynsky who is a landscape photographer and uses ariel shots. The advantages of having a style If you have a particular style then customers know what to expect when they book you. It can mean you can command higher fees as you can become an expert in that look. But that can mean that you need to reach a wider audience so the relevant people who like your style can find you and work with you. Developing a styleHow can you develop your own style? Marcus recommends printing out some portfolio pieces, maybe your 100 favourites. Then lay them all out on the floor and start to arrange them to find common themes. In this way you can discover your own style through exploration. Another approach is reflecting deeply on your work. Reflection is important in all areas of business, and in life. And it’s important to make time for that. Another approach to developing your style is showing your work to others and discuss it with them. There are events where you can do this, take along your portfolio and talk to someone about your work. Developing a style is not an overnight thing, thing is something you develop over time, and never stop working on. Style versus brand How do you get the balance between your style and the style of the brand? If your style is too fixed does it mean you cannot with some clients? There is a balance here between your style and the brands style and how much you can adapt your style and how much you are willing and able to do this. Remember you don’t have to show work that’s not in your style (apart from the client you did the work for).

Fabienne is a property stylist who works with Airbnb owners. She loves to create an original, playful property. She helps their AirBnb stand out online. She loves to go crazy with paint and then build on the “fluff” from there. Fabienne has to think not just about the look of the property, but she also has to ensure it works. Once a visitor arrives it’s vital the property works for them. Fabienne is finding that AirBnb has got so competitive in the last year that property owners need to stand out much more than they needed to before. Even in the last year Liverpool Airbnb properties have more than doubled. Fabienne’s mission in life is to avoid the use of grey in these properties. For Fabienne the photography of the property is vital as that is what is used to get the property on AirBnb. Choosing the right photographer for this work is essential. Just seeing which photographer is available is not the way to go. Property investors need to choose the right photographer for them. Without the right photographs most of Fabienne’s work is wasted. Fabienne thinks that lots of photographers want the photographs to look clean and fresh, while Fabienne usually wants photographs to make the property look warm and welcoming. Marcus explains this would mean using natural light and lights in the room, rather than using large bright flash lighting. Fabienne has had some poor experience with photographers. For example the colours in the room being altered or almost lost. We discussed what is the best way for someone to choose a photographer in this case. She thinks a conversation with the photographer and being able to view their past work are key. She explains that also a great photographer amplified her work making it look amazing due to the photographers skill. Fabienne does have some clients using their phone not a professional photographer for the photographs, but this is quite unusual. Most do use a professional photographer. Properties for sale often use very wide lenses to make rooms look large. Fabienne thinks this can also work in an AirBnb. But it needs to not make the room look too big, as it has to match the reality for when visitors arrived. But, Fabienne said she has never seen a negative review where a visitor complained about the size of a room compared to the image. The wording used for the property is vital. The wording must include lots of feeling about the property. Fabienne explains that there are many property investment groups on Facebook and these are a great place for property photographers to be. Fabienne has her own group which you can find here. https://www.facebook.com/groups/propertystagingforinvestors But don’t just sell on these groups. Add value and help people.   You can connect with Fabienne here. https://fabienne-interiors.co.uk/ fabienne@fabienne-interiors.co.ukhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/fabienne-miler-%E2%98%80%EF%B8%8Fproperty-stylist-to-make-rooms-work-harder%E2%98%80%EF%B8%8F-0b35554/