huntersdad wrote in post #15957226
I typed up a very professional email and sent it to the youth minister. She then sent it out to all seniors and upcoming seniors and their parents. The email specifically stated that the shoot would be free and all images would be edited and given to the student. Our YM vouched for me as, obviously, most people didn't know me. Neither she nor I got any response this was 4 months ago. She recently resent the email out to our upcoming seniors about 4 weeks ago. Again, nothing.
Hence why I volunteered to go out and do some work for them this weekend and will be doing a bigger event in a couple weeks.
...I think everyone here has touched on great points. And I think that this one:
charro callado wrote:
In terms of the things most important for building a client base I would put the color of your website somewhere between the kind of pants you wear and your middle school math grades.
is both hilarious and most accurate. To just make his point clearer: he isn't saying your website and branding isn't important: it very much is. But ultimately its a symptom, not a cause of your problems. Your business is a rudderless ship: there is no clear direction and the state of your website simply reflects that. You could spend the next three months redesigning your website, rewriting your web copy, and making your website look spectacular but if no-one is visiting you still won't get any business.
My advice is to start at the end. Forget about what sort of photographer you are right now. Forget about the images you are currently producing. Take some time out to start planning your business. You started your business late last year and you have got no business: if you take a month or two off to prepare a business/marketing plan/shoot your portfolio it won't hurt your business at all. You are making money with your wildlife stuff: put resources into that for the time being while you rebuild your portrait business.
I'm just guessing here but I bet your in a rut right now. Before you start preparing your business plan you need to start changing your daily habits and shaking things up. Start a daily to-do list. Make weekly goals, set targets. Make everything time sensitive. Figure out ways to break up your routine. Come to the realization that what you are doing is not working: so its time to try something very different and to keep on doing different things until things start to come together.
Figure out your market. Who will buy your images? Make a "person" profile of the type of person that would buy your services. Look at where these people are currently spending their money. Go out and talk to them. Don't take this the wrong way but send your wife out to talk to them as well. Again forgive me for being blunt: but how big a supporter of your business is your wife? (Please don't answer that here in public) She needs to be your biggest champion. She needs to be in your corner. She needs to believe in you.
Forget comparing yourself to craigslist: if you want to be a professional photographer then you need to be looking at the professional photographers in your area. Look at how they present themselves. Look at their images. Count how many words are on their website. Look at their prices.
Figure out what sort of photographer you want to be and what kind of images you want to produce. Go look at websites and images you love and figure out what it is you like about them and figure out how they were shot. Note everything you like, look at the backgrounds, look at the lighting, look at the colours, look at the colour temperatures, look at the angles you are shooting. I'm not going to critique your work: but your images aren't "popping" for me. Go look at images that sell. Deconstruct them. Work backwards. Forget about who you are. Figure out who you want to be.
Get your current work critiqued in person. Find a photographer who isn't competition to you (maybe in another town or at a local photo school) and ask them to give you a formal critique. Listen to that critique, don't respond, take it on board, and work to fix it.
Come up with a plan to completely strip down all of your current work and replace it with new portfolio stuff. For example: after a year in business this year I did a re-assessment of what I did right and what I did wrong. One of the things I determined was that I needed to diversify my product range and needed to build from scratch a strong commercial portfolio. I started a new portfolio project: Project 50, teamed up with a model agency and am working with a prop company, and after eleven weeks of the project (and with 39 weeks to go) I've got enough images to build my commercial portfolio book and in a month I start to shop it around. Shoot with your portfolio in mind. Start with a goal of ten "show stopper" images of ten different people/groups. Plan how you are going to get these photos: be deliberate.
Talk to people. Lots of people. Do you have a comfort zone? Then get out of it.
If you haven't written a business plan already: then write one. If you have got one already then throw it out and start again because its clearly not doing you any favours. The business plan becomes your handbook on how to run your business. If circumstances change then update the handbook. (If you want to see mine: send me a PM, as long as you promise to keep it confidential.) Once you've got a plan in place the direction in which to take your business will be much, much clearer. Good luck.
