What got your business going?

As in, how did you start getting clients? Word of mouth? Website with fantastic SEO? etc...

I started with word of mouth. Now people that know others refer them to my web site.

I was an intern at an automotive magazine in the marketing department when the editorial guys saw me 'hanging out' and shooting at a car show. They asked to see my photos the next week to see what I came up with and liked a few of my shots. Once my first shots got published, it was easier to get additional gigs.

Most of my clients were people I literally bumped into shooting alongside at events or introduced to via other contacts who knew I would be covering events that the clients needed images at. For the specific racing circuit I cover most, I became known as the guy who is either at every event, or has a guy at every event.

7 years later, I've had quite a stable second income from the circuit I follow.

Knocking on the doors of all the advertising agencies in town and showing a portfolio.

Sounds kind of old fashioned, I know.

Doing a little foot work doesn't hurt. I handed out business cards to dress shops and flower shops all over town. Even when I saw competition business cards. I gave them more.

Im a glamour/Bikini photog..I do beauty and anything sexy. 99.8% of my clients are females. SO....I placed cards in beauty shops, nails salons etc. ALSO...you might laugh but I would go to Hooters, WingHouse, etc (similar establishments)...and I would pick out the hottest waitress there. Id offer a free shoot. Give her the edited photos (2/3), she's show her co-workers and BAAAAMMMM...My phone is ringing..LOL..
And Im sure alot of you wont agree but I did the same thing at strip clubs. (hey, I dont judge, all money is green.)
Remember, women always wanna out do another woman. Facebook has been amazing for young ladies all wanting sexy shots. And once their friends seen the work they'd all call me Wanting sexy shoots too

Finally, I did some work for WILD94.1, the #1 Hip Hop station in the Tampa Bay area. Once I shot the morning show, the program director and even Carlos Dias (from EXTRA, HLN, The morning show with Robin Meade) things really started up. I was blessed. Now they throw me a shout out on the radio every now and then and that REALLY REALLY helps.

Financially Im not doing photography 100%. Kids, home, car note etc...to much to handle. PLUS I ONLY shoot glam work. I dont shoot kids, weddings etc so the income isnt enough but its perfect for a fun life!

Taking lots of notes here. These are some great tips =)

Honestly, I just kept showing people my work. I know this sounds super simple, but I kept replying to ad's, agencies, needs, craigslist, classifieds, and I currently work for a Lexus dealership, doing what I love to do.

behindtheglass wrote in post #15211615
Honestly, I just kept showing people my work. I know this sounds super simple, but I kept replying to ad's, agencies, needs, craigslist, classifieds, and I currently work for a Lexus dealership, doing what I love to do.

How long have you been working at Lexus? I have an idea of teaming up with a high end car dealership and a few of their sales people and offering them gift certificates to their best customers that covers a complimentary portrait session worth a couple hundred and makes them look good to their customers, and I get access to some new customers that dont mind paying for quality. They just pay for what they want from the session, with the cheapest item on the price list being a 11x14 wall portrait that will cover my time.

Any feedback on the idea?

ATP wrote in post #15186436
Im a glamour/Bikini photog..I do beauty and anything sexy. 99.8% of my clients are females. SO....I placed cards in beauty shops, nails salons etc. ALSO...you might laugh but I would go to Hooters, WingHouse, etc (similar establishments)...and I would pick out the hottest waitress there. Id offer a free shoot. Give her the edited photos (2/3), she's show her co-workers and BAAAAMMMM...My phone is ringing..LOL.

Interesting idea of leaving cards at nail salons, etc. What size of cards do you normally leave behind? Also an interesting idea about hooters, etc.

People put FAR too much emphasis on websites and facewaste these days.

Nothing but nothing beats the old concept of B2B. Belly to belly with your clients.

I started a new business this year that will net well over $100K by Calendar years end. I haven't got a website or gone near faceache but have picked up work for more than the next 6 moths in addition to the last 8 months totally from getting on the phone, making appointments and going to show people what I can do. In some cases I have spent 55 min out of an hour talking to them about whatever and only spoken about my work for the last 5 min.

I got good work from this because the 55 min wasn't wasted, it was building a rapport that meant the clients wouldn't go to anyone else after having got to " know" me.

I'm also picking up work now purely from referals so much so that I think from here on in I can just work on those leads and not have to do any cold calling at all.

Faceache and websites work no doubt BUT, nothing beats getting in front of your clients and talking to them face to face.

GerryDavid wrote in post #15212235
I have an idea of teaming up with a high end car dealership and a few of their sales people and offering them gift certificates to their best customers that covers a complimentary portrait session worth a couple hundred and makes them look good to their customers, and I get access to some new customers that dont mind paying for quality. They just pay for what they want from the session, with the cheapest item on the price list being a 11x14 wall portrait that will cover my time.

Any feedback on the idea?

You must come up with another new idea every single week!

From what I read, you just keep re-hashing the same concept with different clients.
The giveaway that people have to spend money to get I think is a bit tired and done now and people are pretty much over it. IF something is worth the money, people will just buy it straight out. At least my clients seem to. I think to get in with someone like a stealership, You are going to have to do better than that.

Also from what I read you don't seem to be having much success with this Concept. If you were I expect you'd be just targeting one specific area where it worked, not trying to hock it all over the place.

If that's incorrect, I'd be interested to hear how the last 5 ideas went as far as hours, investment and profit.
If I'm right, perhaps you should try to think of a totally new and different approach?

Weren't you trying to do dance pictures about this time last year?
From what I recall that didn't turn out as you hoped but having the benefit of previous experience, could you not fine tune your approach to eliminate the errors you discovered and give it another go with the majority of the potholes eliminated?

I'm changing my approach in what I do all the time. Every new client is exciting because I know I have eliminated the last lot of impediments to maximum profit from last time.
I think I have it pretty good now but If I read or hear of a better idea, I'm always ready to steal and adopt it at a moments notice.

I really think you need a fresh outlook and some new ideas as well as a broader outlook on the work you are prepared to do.
It's bloody difficult to get out of a rut I know but once you do, you go from trying to figure out where to find work to being overwhelmed by all the opportunities that you see leaping out at you.

I do art reproduction, printing, framing, the whole thing, as far as my pro photography goes. Artists comes in with their painting, leave with two identical ones, or a file for use in a catalog or such (I can also make pamphlets and booklets). If the art is expensive, in a museum, and not to be moved, I can always shoot on location.

When you get into something this niche, people tend to find you, even without much advertising; I have 1TB worth of artworks in my archives after just 2 years of work.

Just in case of accidental introductions, I always have a nice selection of my work with me on my iPad, something that's already come in handy quite a few times. Fact: The retina screen sells.


P.S. That said, I don't earn my income doing just this, as it's fairly unpredictable, otherwise I'd drop the dSLR and go medium format.

glumpy wrote in post #15212870
You must come up with another new idea every single week!

From what I read, you just keep re-hashing the same concept with different clients.
The giveaway that people have to spend money to get I think is a bit tired and done now and people are pretty much over it. IF something is worth the money, people will just buy it straight out. At least my clients seem to. I think to get in with someone like a stealership, You are going to have to do better than that.

Also from what I read you don't seem to be having much success with this Concept. If you were I expect you'd be just targeting one specific area where it worked, not trying to hock it all over the place.

If that's incorrect, I'd be interested to hear how the last 5 ideas went as far as hours, investment and profit.
If I'm right, perhaps you should try to think of a totally new and different approach?

Weren't you trying to do dance pictures about this time last year?
From what I recall that didn't turn out as you hoped but having the benefit of previous experience, could you not fine tune your approach to eliminate the errors you discovered and give it another go with the majority of the potholes eliminated?

I'm changing my approach in what I do all the time. Every new client is exciting because I know I have eliminated the last lot of impediments to maximum profit from last time.
I think I have it pretty good now but If I read or hear of a better idea, I'm always ready to steal and adopt it at a moments notice.

I really think you need a fresh outlook and some new ideas as well as a broader outlook on the work you are prepared to do.
It's bloody difficult to get out of a rut I know but once you do, you go from trying to figure out where to find work to being overwhelmed by all the opportunities that you see leaping out at you.

The gift certificate voucher is a proven method to get your brand in front of new customers that are prequalified to spend what you charge. My target market for the beauty portraits are women over 21 that dont mind spending money on quality items. So I am looking for the places that this market spends their money to get their attention. I thought this is what you are suppose to do? Identify your target market and learn about them. From the customers point of view, its not free, its a complimentary portrait session given by the restaurant owner, the car salesman, high end hair salon, posh jewelery store, etc, that values them as a customer. And that for all they know was paid for just for them. I have been planning to team up with these local businesses for my beauty portraits for a while Im a bit behind schedule because its taken longer to schedule the portfolio sessions with the hair and makeup artists and the models to get the new pieces I want to use in advertising. Ive learned a few things along the way that has cost me some delays that I know what not to do next time. Live and learn. I did pretty well at the high school reunion in terms of group portrait sales. Better than I had hoped based on initial attendance expectations. The portraits of the couples didn't go as expected though, but that is due to lack of promotion. But Ive learned from this experience and next time I know not to depend on the event people as much to promote me and I will put printed material on every table/seat next time that explains how to order and where to find me for the pictures, etc. I didnt print on site, but that didnt hurt the group portrait sales. I just charged $5 more for shipping. Reunions are not my main income goal and I dont see why I should pass on that chance because its not my goal. Its something I enjoy and its relatively easy work. I just have to find out a better way to find the people that organize these things before they hire a photographer. By the time I usually find out about it that planning stage is taken care of. It seems each year reunion has a random set of people organizing it. Most of the dance studios in the area have a photographer that they are loyal to. but there is a dance and a cheer gym in the area that im talking to about getting something scheduled. One thing I need to work on is getting things organized faster, I get distracted by my main portrait work that is paying the bills currently. Again dance isnt my main goal but its something I enjoy and will do when I get the gigs. My main goal is seniors in the summer *doing well with that* and beauty portraits year round, work in progress.

and for some reason the above post lost its paragraph formatting, fun.

glumpy wrote in post #15212699
People put FAR too much emphasis on websites and facewaste these days.

Nothing but nothing beats the old concept of B2B. Belly to belly with your clients.

I started a new business this year that will net well over $100K by Calendar years end. I haven't got a website or gone near faceache but have picked up work for more than the next 6 moths in addition to the last 8 months totally from getting on the phone, making appointments and going to show people what I can do. In some cases I have spent 55 min out of an hour talking to them about whatever and only spoken about my work for the last 5 min.

I got good work from this because the 55 min wasn't wasted, it was building a rapport that meant the clients wouldn't go to anyone else after having got to " know" me.

I'm also picking up work now purely from referals so much so that I think from here on in I can just work on those leads and not have to do any cold calling at all.

Faceache and websites work no doubt BUT, nothing beats getting in front of your clients and talking to them face to face.

I agree, I don't do much wedding photography any more, but that's close to how I did it. I went to where there was a need of my services, and then kept it growing by pushing, and working hard.

Face to face time with the actual client, and meeting their needs, and above all putting their needs first is the most important thing when it comes to business.

GerryDavid wrote in post #15212235
How long have you been working at Lexus? I have an idea of teaming up with a high end car dealership and a few of their sales people and offering them gift certificates to their best customers that covers a complimentary portrait session worth a couple hundred and makes them look good to their customers, and I get access to some new customers that dont mind paying for quality. They just pay for what they want from the session, with the cheapest item on the price list being a 11x14 wall portrait that will cover my time.

Any feedback on the idea?

I've been here for a while now (a year and 2 months to be exact), and I'm just going to be honest and blunt (so please do not take this offensively), it won't work with our clientele, because they're here for cars, and not a photo session.

Thank you for your idea though.