The Overwhelm of Starting Your Photography Business
When I first decided to pursue photography as my career it was little more than an idea and a dream. I didn't know if I could make a success of it, I didn't know the first thing about running a business and I wasn't even sure that people would actually pay me to take photos.
If that sounds anything at all like you then trust me, you aren't alone.
There are a lot of moving parts to opening your own photography business, probably a lot more than people realise and it can feel overwhelming at the very beginning.
You have to learn about pricing, products, social media for business, marketing and advertising, booking clients, running the actual photo shoots, perfecting your editing process, branding, partner marketing, blogging, getting your name out there and of course all the myriad of daily tasks that come up too.
It's a lot of work. Don't let anyone else tell you differently. I think a lot of people believe that starting a photography business is going to be easy as they are only looking at it from the photography side.
From the photography side of things you rock up to a session, snap some pictures for an hour or two and then go home to edit them. You're probably thinking that the whole process might take anywhere from 1-4 hours max. And you are right, the actual session hardly takes any time and if you are super fast at editing (I'm not), than that 1-4 hours should cover the session and editing.
But what most people don't consider is everything else.
What about the travel time it took you to get to and from the session? The amount of time spent corresponding with your client, by phone or email. How about the all the time you spend with them at their ordering appointment, helping them pick out their products, or designing an album for them?
Add to that cost factors such as petrol (gas, to the Americans reading this) going to and from the session and ordering appointment. Do you use any proofing galleries and how much do they cost? What about your subscription costs for Photoshop and Lightroom, and your cost for the internet? And those are just a small portion of costs.
You then need to consider things like taxes, GST (sales tax for the Americans), business and liability insurance, domain and website hosting. Savings for retirement, money to go back into your business, money for marketing, new photography equipment etc etc. You get the idea. There are a lot of costs involved that most people don't consider when they dream of turning their passion for photography into a business that actually makes them money.
So with that in mind, here are the 4 things you should consider when contemplating opening a photography business.
1. Do you really want to turn this into a business or would you be happier keeping it a hobby?
Sometimes when you try to make a dream a reality, you can turn the thing that you are most passionate about into something that you hate. Running a business takes a lot of work and time. It's hard to see upfront exactly what a commitment it is and determine whether it's worth it for your life. Only you can decide whether it's worth it for you.
As creatives we understandably love the creative aspect of photography. We love to compose the perfect photo, capture a moment that would otherwise be lost, make someone feel beautiful and see themselves that way for the first time. There's joy in what we do and having that artistic control over our craft can be an amazing experience.
When you're a photographer you tend to see the world in photos and light. When I watch a movie you can be sure I'm checking out the lighting and time of day they were filming. When I walk down the street I've often been known to go off on a complete tangent to get a shot that I've seen. And if the picture isn't quite what I've pictured in my head, I'll wait and I'll try again and again until I get it the way that I'm envisioning.
It gives us a purpose and fills our lives with joy. I can honestly say that I love photography and even if it wasn’t my business I would still be shooting.
These are all things that I'm sure many photographers feel but when you add the business aspect to photography sometimes the love of photography wans a little in the face of everything else we have to do and keep up with.
Dealing with clients, marketing, editing, social media, accounting, blogging. The list goes on. It's no longer just the pureness of you and a camera and if you don't appreciate and like the ‘business’ part of your business sometimes it's best to keep your love pure and keep photography as something you do for the pure joy in it.
You need to decide for yourself whether you want to go for it fully or not and there's no shame either way. It's what's right for you.
2. Do you want this to be your full time income or a side hustle?
What I mean by this is you need to decide whether this is a business you want to run full time, relying on it exclusively for your income or will this be your side hustle as you work a full time job?
Perhaps it’s your side hustle for now with the hope that you can turn it into your full time income later on down the road. None of these answers is right or wrong. It depends entirely on you and your situation.
Knowing where you want to go in your business will help you plan and stay on track when you get into the swing of things. It's so easy to focus on the day to day tasks of running a business when you are in the trenches. Make sure you take the time to plan out exactly what you want so that you know where you are going and have a plan in place to get you there.
3. Are you prepared to learn about all the other aspects that go into running a small business (and probably tear your hair out in the process)?
Learning everything you need to in order to turn your passion into a career can be daunting. There's so much to learn and so much to do that it's very easy to be overwhelmed. You need to be prepared for the steep learning curve that comes from opening up shop.
Suddenly you'll be expected to know about all the aspects of your business and it can be like diving into the deep end and learning how to swim once you're in there.
4. Do you have a plan? Are you prepared to set aside some time and come up with a business plan, work out your CODB and your COGs to see if this is a possible reality for you?
As creatives we tend to focus on things like how our portfolio looks, our website design and logo or the business cards we need designed and I'm not saying these things aren't important. They are. But before you do any of that you need to create a business plan. Your business plan is your guide in all of these matters.
Now, I can see all of you roll your eyes at this point, but bare with me. Your business plan sets out your goals, your finances and your target market among other things. These topics help you plan your other 'more artistic' ventures.
How are you meant to design your website if you don't know who your target market is? You could spend all your time creating a beautiful, girly, floral designed website for wedding photography but you realise that your target market is actually classic, modern women who appreciate simplicity in design. Now you've spent all of your time designing a site that will have the exact opposite effect of what you want and repel your ideal client.
Or you've chosen a bold blue and gold for you font and business card but once you've written your business plan and done your competitor analysis you realise that someone else in your area has chosen the exact same colours and now it looks like you've stolen from them. Not to mention that you want to shoot more whimsical family portraiture and you realise that your ideal clients would prefer a more natural look with pastels and earth tones with a pop of pastel pink.
You can avoid all of these issues if you sit down beforehand and do the work.
Set aside some time and work your way through your business plan.It doesn't have to be written all in one go either. It's ok if it takes you a week or two, with you adding to it piece by piece until you've finished.
You can also come back and change something later. This isn't a static document. You need to be changing and adding to it as you get to know your business better and where you want to take it in the future.
So reflect on these points and make sure to ask yourself the tough questions about your business. They'll help you narrow down your focus so you don't feel as overwhelmed anymore.
You should also break everything you need to do into bite sized chunks and do a bit at a time. Staring at a huge task you have to do, like build your website can seem very intimidating. But if you break it into more manageable tasks suddenly it doesn't seem insurmountable.
Building your website can then be broken down into:
Design homepage
Design logo for website
Create about page
Create contact page and FAQs
Take photos for portfolio and my headshot
Add photos to portfolio page
Work out pricing
Add pricing to Pricing page
The list goes on. Breaking down big tasks into smaller bite sized tasks will help you and combat the overwhelmed feeling you have.
My best advice is beat the overwhelmed feeling - first create your plan, then take it one step at a time, one task at a time and soon you’ll be on your way.
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