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If you’re making these six mistakes in your photography business, you need to stop it

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We often hear about mistakes in photography. Usually, they’re lists telling us to stop using selective colour or to stop shooting everything at f/1.4. But if photography is your business, there are potentially far greater mistakes that you might be making that while not necessarily detrimental to your photography can be very harmful to your business and your bottom line.

In this video, commercial photography Scott Choucino talks about the six biggest mistakes that he sees professional photographers making, why they’re such a big deal and how they can harm your business.

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10 images for the price of none?

Here is why (I think) you shouldn’t sell your files in bundles!

Doing IPS (In Person Sales) does not mean that you cannot sell your files – but it does mean you shouldn’t be giving them away as a Shoot and burn photographer (S&B). And now some of the S&B’ernes will object, they are not giving them away, they are selling them as an all inclusive package!

The S&B’s I know, are priced from 60-180£ (67€/70$-200€/220$) for a CD/USB/Download with 5-30 files included. And this is telling your clients that your images has almost no value. For the client it looks like they are only paying for your time, not the art you create.

If we break the numbers down, depending on your CODB (cost of doing business), best case scenario, you will make somewhere around 20-25£ pr image – worst case scenario – 2£ pr file (!!). Do you really, deep in your heart, believe your art should be sold that cheap?

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How I became to be one of Denmark’s most profitable wedding photographers

… and how you can do the same (no matter what country you are in)!

A little backstory: I have been a full time professional photographer for close to 9 years. My passion is weddings – I have done more than a 100 weddings, and I still cry when they say yes. For the first 7 years of my carrier I was a starving artist. I did lots of weddings (and families, and children, and events, and corporate, anything that came my way, really) – I worked worked and worked – always trying to book the next client – my portfolio was full, my calendar was full, I was a popular choice when people got married, had babies or having their family portraits done.

The truth is, however, I would have made more money working the cashier at the local fast food joint – and would even have worked less! So I decided I needed a change – I needed a fair pay for my work, I am a damn good photographer, why shouldn’t I get paid for my time and talent? So I started reading and stumbled across “In Person Sales” (IPS) for photographers. I saw people writing about making thousands – on a single client. I didn’t really believe in it – and yeah, maybe it worked in America – but here, in Denmark? No way! Everyone wants the CD (or if you are really trendy, the USB). I believed the same lie I have been telling clients for years; “You want the CD right?” WRONG!

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Tough message if you wanna Make it in the Industry

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When you are just starting out as a creative it can be pretty stressful and one of the main causes for that stress can be the shortage of money. Retoucher Pratik Naik of Solstice Retouch had a tough but very true message for ones looking to make it as full time creatives.

Being a full time creative is a mixing between passion and occupation. And mixing the two may not be easy when you start. Especially in the monetary sense. And Pratik gives the only real true definition of making it: “…success in this industry is being able to support yourself by creating. Everything after that is up for discussion”

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$500K High-Speed Trigger Project Funds. Pulls Back After A Year. Owner Is Taking Responsibility

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This is an interesting story about how your best dream coming true can turn into your worst nightmare. TriggerTrap who makes mobile camera triggers did the impossible and raised over £290,386 in their Ada kickstarter campaign, this is not trivial at all considering that high speed photography is a bit of a niche. Now a year after funding they are cancelling the project. I think it is a great story about what Kickstarter really is, why it takes so long to deliver a good product and how you handle (or should handle) such a massive fail.

You would think that funding half a million dollars would make almost anything impossible, right? Turns out that even that much money may not be enough when you are making a high-ended-complex product.

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Why “Do What You Love” Career Advice Leads To “I Live In A Van Down By the River” For Creative Professionals

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I have been thinking a lot recently about the direction that I want to take my photography business, and this week I came across two really interesting ways of looking at career advice for creative professionals.

First, there is the “do what you love” genre of career advice for creatives.  Then, there are statistics.

For the sake of this article, lets call them fantasy and reality.

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Why It Sucks To Be A Mid-Level Wedding Photographer

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Most photographers have been there at some point in their career – wedding photography.

Some of us move on to other things, like commercial photography.  Some actually enjoy wedding photography and make a career out of it.

But too many photographers are lured into wedding photography under the illusion of quick money, only to get stuck in the evil clutches of the mid-level wedding photography market forever (or until they give up and find a real job).

Lets be honest here.  Wedding photography can be fun with the right clients  – but it is always a colossal amount of hard work.

And life as a mid-level wedding photographer sucks.

In this article I am going to share the wedding photography business plan that is followed by the overwhelming majority of wedding photographers on the planet – and why it is not a sustainable way to make a living.

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