Marketing
So every once and awhile i'll ramble on to people about how I market. I really don't mind giving away my secrets if that's what you can call it. If i'm giving away my secrets and someone copies me then that only means I have to get better which I always welcome. Anyways here's some of my marketing plans that I usually work with.
Okay, I probably don’t know that much about this… or do I. I may be a marketing genius or maybe just incredibly lucky when it comes to getting business. I really favor the later in this but i’ll tell you some of what I do to market myself anyways. This is a blog post for photographers or other people in similar businesses.
First of all I really suggest being yourself. You’ll never have to put on an act or be someone who you’re not. I am myself when I go through my day, my week. If there’s a chance to do good I do it, sometimes people are watching. First off, everyone is going to want to throw a nice guy some work. I also don’t mind doing charity either, it makes me feel good and helps other people as well as karma brownie points. People pay attention when you’re consistently doing the right thing, the honorable thing and helping out where you can.
Another strange thing is following your passion. PEOPLE NOTICE! If you’re into candles and constantly posting about new candle making techniques or a new fragrance you made and how excited you are people may think you’re strange but they know you’re genuine. If you dig something, if you’re over the top in it for the passion then the money will come. I’ve never made my focus about the money, it’s really just a nice symptom of having a passion for photography. I’ve also turned down money as well which I suggest once and awhile, pay it back. You never know when that person who you hooked up is going to have an even better way to hook you up. Quick story, this year I had a call from a waitress who said I took her photo seven years ago. I was at place on Shrewsbury Street in Worcester (basically forty restaurants within a mile stretch), I was hanging with my friend and I was taking photos of my food and then I asked to take a photo of this waitress. I asked for her e-mail and sent her the photo. She called me up this past December and booked me for a wedding in January. Another story just for an example. I was shooting a wedding a few years back and took the time to chat with one of the guests about cameras and then handed off my very expensive camera and let them try it out for a few minutes… he booked me for a wedding last year. So by being friendly and sharing my passion I’ve landed work.
So now the more practical things you can do for marketing. Post about what you’re up to on social media and act excited about it, hey maybe you are? Maybe post on Instagram or Google+ because there are sects of people that still use these platforms. If you post on Google+ then you might get featured as a news article when people search for certain keywords which essentially draws people back to you. Instagram I use to post my best of the best photos. I don’t post any chum there, it’s all my processed work or things that I’m proud to share. Instagram isn’t for my photos of Starbuck Mochas or cell phone photos. Everyone treats Instagram a little bit different and some people even go as far as to color grade against everything they already have up there. A big thing is following a theme, at least thats what I hear. Myself I post what I’m really into, travel, weddings, food, abandoned buildings, building facades. There’s a lot of people who will have the best ways to gain followers and how to make the best Instagram, but I believe you can do it just for you.
Okay i’ve started a new paragraph so this must be a pretty good topic. USE FACEBOOK! Use Facebook for the free advertising of you and your brand. Your friends may know someone who’s looking for someone just like you. You can also maintain a business page as well as your personal page. I’m sure we’re all over posting about what we do on a minute to minute basis but why not include a little bit of business in with that pleasure, right? I also use Facebook as a tool get to know my clients. I can figure out their personality a bit and hopefully fit in better with them at the wedding after we share a few dozen memes. I also encourage my friends to share the posts that I really need them to, such as information about my business or deals I might be having.
One more thing on Facebook which i’ll give away to you. I only share all this information in the hopes that some of you will get really good and force me to up my game even more. So Facebook has that awesome algorithm that fits all you most important friends in and if a new person comes into your life you might start noticing them more on Facebook as well. Facebook judges how long you look at someone’s posts or how quick you scroll over someones post, if you’ve clicked on their page or their post. Facebook will now think that they should include more information in your newsfeed about this particular person, get it. So if I’m out there posting photos of abandoned buildings or amazing photos of cupcakes then I bet some of you may slow down or even click on my posts. This means you’re more likely to see my future posts, my future posts about my wedding photography business.
Another one of my tricks is simply posting all the photos that I really like, Europe, traveling, food, abandoned buildings, hiking, cityscapes, landscapes and then peppering in wedding photography. This works wonderfully with Instagram and Facebook. So start doing it. People notice when you have a passion. I know this because I continually get told this by brides.
You can market yourself like a bad ass but the question is if you can keep it up for years. I do this non stop. Day and night, vacation or laying in bed I think about how to get my business even bigger and better. There's a lot of times when I make a purchase and i'm thinking if it will benefit my photography. Even when I buy food i'm thinking if I could take an awesome photo of it.
I don’t always look at what everyone else is doing, I look at what they're not doing and then I see if I can fill that gap. One of the biggest things i’ve had to deal with and figure out was not listening to other people. I’ve listed to too many people who had ideas about my business who in all actuality knew nothing about my business. Other photographers have told me how they do things and what has really helped is to be different from them. I’ve gone in the wrong directions way too many times from people telling me that “it won’t work”, “you can’t do it like that”, “the way you’re suppose to do it is…” and a million other negative or non helpful comments. When you’re starting out you have the freedom to throw it all against the wall and see what sticks. I still change the way I do things regularly, be adaptive, don’t have a set policy on anything. If your customers are all asking for something or expecting something a certain way then go with the flow.
So I don’t want to give away anymore of my secrets but I hope this helps you. I help a lot of people out with other businesses because some of this marketing advice really can translate to other fields. Feel free to leave me a comment.
Business cards and why mine is the best.
So I posted the design of my new business card and everyone had great feedback on it. I wanted to write about my design choices a bit more and explain myself and not have it get lost within the thread. So here's some of my marketing choices and design choices wrapped up together. This blog has cost me two Venti Cafe Mochas from Starbucks btw.
Here's a few business cards i've put together. You can see the evolution of my design.
Brace yourself for a long winded rant about my business cards. You kinda asked for it... those were a lot of Facebook comments.
So Zazzle who I typically use for my business card had a little bit of a trimming mishap when producing my cards. They upgraded some of their behind the scenes editing software and it ended up pushing some of my text outside the cut lines. So this mishap meant they took care of me with credit and that allowed me to go back and readjust the cards. Additionally the thickness or weight of the card was so thick that during the cutting process the sheets shifted slightly. I had text very close to the edge and it showed any slight deviation. I only noticed it while dropping off a set of business cards.
I do want to preface this all with Zazzle is awesome. I've used other companies and I really have had good experiences with this company. The customer service is always top shelf. There has been times where I've made a mistake and other times where they've made a mistake. They have humans who work there and it turns out humans can make an occasional mistake, totally okay with that. I've had soo many people message with me various other companies that they use and I have to decline the help because I really do love this company and the fact that I have everything all ready and designed for print here. So with this current mishap Zazzle took care of me and just recently sent me an additional box of cards which was done unpressured and just a show of appreciation. So I ended up with double the amount of cards. I've been using Zazzle since I started my photography business and it's nice to have a steady supplier like them.
So I've put this out to my friends on Facebook, the designing of my card. I was mostly looking for feedback on my red hat that I want to include. I've spent a lot of time designing my card to stand apart from everyone else. Typically everyone does the same exact thing. Name, Phone, E-mail, logo and maybe a slogan. Think about how many business cards look exactly the same.
The design of my business card has been the same with minor adjustments over the past five years. One side is always a large image of my logo, large enough to read if it's on the ground or a table. I've chosen the chubby size cards instead of the standard for two reasons, it stands out and doesn't fit behind other cards nicely. The second reason is it's different, it's usually been a tear-proof material which is always an interesting challenge to my clients to tear it up.
So I appreciate everyones input for the cards. Some of the advice I totally understand. Use a beautiful image you've shot, use this font, why is the phone number so big. This is not a card which I've put together quickly. It's been made to stand out from the pack. A thousand cards will probably last me most of the year. Brides and grooms who typically end up with my card end up with it because they are in my office. Most people are finding me on Google, Facebook, Instagram or a random phone call. If these were being used for a wedding expo I would probably have something a bit different.
One of the biggest things with photographer is everyone happens to use a camera aperture for a logo (myself included, guilty). So I changed my logo a year or two back to something a littler bit more reflective of who and what. It now includes the words wedding which is my focus. I also have the dot come in the logo as well so now I don't have to do any additional dot come references elsewhere in the card. The main goal of my card is for it to stand apart from everyones no matter what business's card it's next to. My business name was believe it or not an AIM handle back in 1996 which was unity1818. Unity is an Operation Ivy song, not a Queen Latifah jam. It ended up as a placeholder for my website because I eventually needed one. Unity happens to work as a name for a business name but unity photography is actually taken by another photographer named Ken who I've actually met in real life. Anyways the reason I mention this is logos are hard and also very much essential to pull together a website, business card and any branding you may want to do. I didn't get to do anything cute like Two cranes photography or jumping cat photo. I based mine off a teenage Aol Instant Messenger name.
The giant phone number is something that takes people a second to grasp sometimes. I've had lots of people pick it up and say what is this and then it clicks. Then I have a few different sentences fit above, in-between and below the giant phone number. So whoever has already picked up my card because they don't understand the giant numbers at first and now they're reading all these sentences i've put on my card which is done is a very small font. So they've spent anywhere from fifteen seconds to twenty seconds reading this side of my business card. I just times myself doing it from picking it up and skimming through everything.
TEXT LISTED CURRENTLY ON MY BUSINESS CARD
Follow me on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Google+ and Facebook. Visit my website to find all my social media links.
Wow, this is a very impressive business card. Thank you, I agree. If you find this impressive then wait until you see my photos.
The number on this card is my phone number. Please visit my website to send me a more formal message.
Don't lose this card. Int has your future wedding photographer's contact info on it.
There is a rhyme to my reason.... is that even a saying?
So think about how long it takes for you to usually comprehend information on anyones business card. You look at a logo, an address maybe, hours possibly, phone and e-mail. I've already gotten almost twenty seconds of someones time. I've told them where they can find my social media links. I've directed them to my website to send me a message. I personally don't like a random e-mail from someone with a simple sentence "HOW MUCH" "WHAT ARE YOUR PACKAGES". So I love to direct people to my website where I have a proper contact form and more importantly all the information. I've also included a little bit of my humor by saying how impressive the business card is. If you didn't get what the numbers were or skipped over the numbers in favor for a full sentence then it's explained here with the above text. I've also told them how important the card is and not to lose it, it has your future wedding photographers info on it. Okay, that last sentence is a little cocky but it's cool, I know I rock.
So if you found this card and and saw all this information you would be able to get a quick snippet of who I am, personality wise possibly. As a wedding photographer i'm the person you'll have the most contact with during a wedding day. I'm literally with a bride all day long give or take some distance. The big thing I try to convey when I meet a bride and groom is the attitude of easy going. I'm very easy going, in fact most of my meetings i'm wearing that red hat and a hoodie. More meetings happen in the winter time. I'm also friending all of my brides and grooms on Facebook at some point. Since i'm spending the entire day with someone it totally benefits me to keep them in a good, relaxed and happy mood. Some of that comes from the informality of most of my approaches. I have brides contact me at eleven at night with a simple question or on Facebook on a Sunday afternoon. I'm very accessible and I make sure the bridal couple knows this. My goal is to have it feel like a friend is shooting your wedding.
With my current design i've chosen to remove some of the text to focus more on branding myself with my favorite object, a red hat. Affectionally worn for the past six years solid or so. I'm regularly recognized everywhere for this hat. Currently it's a red winter hat from American Eagle but i've also had many other variations of this red hat. I can't really wear baseball caps when I shoot outdoors and fedoras or these winter caps have always hung around me. I've actually gotten to meet a lot of my Facebook friends in public because they spot me somewhere in Worcester, Boston, NYC. It's a very bold color and my attire doesn't really have to match the hat. What i'm doing by including the red hat with my business cards are training anyone who ends up with this card to eventually be able to spot that exact red hat. Think about it. You have this random card with a red hat, phone, name, wedding photographer and you see a random photographer with the same exact hat. Chances are you are going to come up and say hi and tell me about how you ended up with the card.
I'm going to meander a bit, follow along.
So beyond wedding photography I actually do a number of things. One of those things being web design. When I meet someone who asks for photos or video the first thing I ask is what it's being used for. They tell me they want to put it on their website or Facebook. The next question I ask is to see their website and from there I see their website is angelfire or geocities hosted (antiquated reference, totally worth googling). So from there I talk to them about web design in addition to photos. So I can put togethers someone website pretty easily with a few photos and rearranging information. Here's the other thing I do, consulting work.
What is consulting work as it applies to you? Okay, thats a question being asked to me if that didn't make sense there. What I do is interview a business owner and pull out content to add to their website. Often times while explaining things it leads to other questions which inadvenrtuly conclude with a change in their own business's infrastructure. One of the best questions you can ask someone is "What would this look like if it were easy". It's a question you can ask any business owner. It helps them identify a problem area and provide the easiest solution and then we can work on the actual route to getting there. I also will call out an weak areas in their dealings and suggestions I may have to changing routine.
So I deal with many different businesses and these owners all happen to be around Worcester and Boston and every once and awhile I get recognized in a Starbucks or while on the job shooting somewhere. I'm training everyone as well as brides, grooms to recognize and associate the red hat with Michael Hendrickson, wedding photographer.
I have time.
So hopefully everyone will understand my reasoning a little bit better now. It's not simply a harsh design choice. I've slowly evolved it from the very simple to the more complex. My goal with my cards are to stand apart from everyone and I fear being similar to everyone else will make me blend a little too much. I've spent a few minutes to design some of what everyone's asked for in a business card just to appease some.
I've made a few quick mock-ups of what some think would make a good business card. I've also reverted the size back to a standard business card size. This is not a dig on anyone. This is suggestions i've gotten on the initial thread on Facebook as well as in private messages.
Okay. So here's my final design. I did put some thought into this. If you've read this entire blog then hopefully you've fell on my side of the wall.