How long have you been in the photography business? One year? Twenty years? Or, are you just starting out and want to know how to be a professional photographer? Whether you’re new to the industry or a seasoned veteran, there’s one very important idea regarding success that you should be familiar with:

Success comes through the application of focused and determined persistence.

You’ve seen others succeed because of it, or you’re still in business because you’ve been persistent yourself; either way, this is a quality that nobody who is successful in business can be without!

If persistence is not in your nature, and you’re unable to get out of bed every day ready to take on the world and all its challenges (because, believe me, there will be many) then you might want to rethink your strategy of running your own small business…

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How To Be A Professional Photographer motivation, persistence in business, photography business, success

If the old adage of “you are what you eat” is true, and I have no reason to believe it isn’t at least partially true, then I would probably constitute a significant commercial source of chocolate ice cream. However, food is not the topic of this post, but rather the content of our own minds. So, putting our opening adage aside, one thing I do believe to be very true is this statement:

We are the sum total of what we feed into our mind…

Whether or not we realize it, our mind is a hungry beast indeed, feeding and digesting everything around it in a silent frenzy. Our subconscious mind, the one responsible for most of our inspiration, emotions, dreams, gut feelings, and (ultimately) our success or failure, never rests or sleeps.

Constantly at work, our subconscious mind has all the emotional sense of a computer, indiscriminately processing and analyzing both negative and positive data equally…

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How To Be A Professional Photographer inspiration, motivation, napoleon hill, positive attitude, success, think & grow rich

I’m very thankful for all the photographers who read this blog and my ebooks, listen to the interviews here, or even avail themselves of the opportunity to get coached on their business with me. However, just the other day, something happened that turned a light on in my own head, when a photographer said this to me during a coaching call:

I’m so tired of trying to get clients to hire me – when I talk to them on the phone, they seem all fired up about working with me, but then they never do for some reason…

I understood completely where she was coming from, and I totally sympathize with her feelings of disappointment – we’ve all been where she is right now.

So, we spent about 45 minutes discussing ways I could help, the things she could do, and then I asked her if she wanted to work with me to help her reach her goals. Despite her obvious need to seek help, and even though she acknowledged that she needed coaching, can you guess what she said?

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Photography Business Ideas business commitment, photography business, success

Let’s face it – you’re probably in the minority if you think your photography business isn’t having problems of some form or another. Most photographers these days are facing serious challenges and obstacles that are keeping them stuck or, worse, sending them closer to extinction.

But, there’s a key ingredient that most are seriously missing…

What Are You Going To Do About It?

This is the question we all have to face head on at some point or another, the main difference being that some deal with it sooner than others.

Through my coaching business I’ve talked to a lot of photographers about the state of their business, and I’ve noticed a disturbing pattern. The basic problems and symptoms vary from photographer to photographer, but a common factor is an unwillingness to take the necessary steps to solve those problems or to get the help needed to become unstuck.

In other words, there are photographers out there who are really struggling to make a living, who are dealing with issues they can’t solve on their own, yet are unwilling to make the decision to hire someone to help them navigate the challenges they’re facing. I really feel badly for these people, because I’ve been where they are in my own life. I know how it feels to worry constantly, to wonder where the next client is coming from, and to face the real possibility of having to quit a business that I love so much. Fortunately, it didn’t come to that, but I have stared it in the face, and it’s not pretty.

So what’s holding them back from taking action?

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Photography Business Coaching business breakthrough, business coaching, success

One of the common themes I encounter when working to help photographers with the challenges they face in their business is that they don’t fully understand what business coaching really means, so I thought it might be a good idea to present some thoughts on this to help clear up some of the confusion.

Some believe that a coach is there to provide them with an “out of the box” system that will fix their business for them. Others are of the opinion that a coach’s job is to tell them what to do.

Both of these scenarios are inaccurate, for different reasons, which I will go into in more detail below.

For now, here is my (very brief) definition of a business coach, and how I see myself helping others to find that much-desired peace of mind in their business:

A coach exists solely as a facilitator of change…

It’s really as simple and as complicated as that!

Why Do People Need A Coach At All?

This is a fair question, and one that really needs to be addressed. After all, most photographers are intelligent folk, able to think and behave creatively, so why is it that they need someone else to help them fix their business problems?

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Photography Business Coaching business coaching, photography business, success

Do you sometimes have a problem maintaining a positive outlook? Do the minutiae of day-to-day routines sap your creative energy? Do you find yourself feeling exhausted, drained and less than optimistic even when you aren’t busy or nothing much is happening? Are you often left with an inexplicable feeling of helplessness in your photography business?

You Are Not Alone!

If you answered “yes” to any of the above questions, then you might be experiencing what I’ve come to call “life in a vacuum”. This is that awful place we can find ourselves in where business & life seem to slow to an imperceptible crawl; we feel that nothing ever gets done, and the achievement of our goals seems far out of reach.

Life in a vacuum can result in feelings of depression, lack of energy, waning enthusiasm, or a sense of “what is this all for?” It’s not a pleasant place to be in.

Having found myself there many times in the past, sometimes for extended periods, I can speak from experience when I say that no one ever wants to be here, but it can be a very tough situation to break out of!

The good news is that you are not alone, and many of us feel exactly the same way from time to time. More importantly, there are ways to escape…

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Photography Business Ideas coping with negativity, motivation, positive attitude, success

This is another follow-on post from “12 Ingredients For A Magic Pill In Your Photography Business” (read Part I and Part II), focusing in more detail upon ingredient #3 – How Your Core Beliefs And Values Affect Your Business.

Before we begin, let me state that when I refer to core beliefs and values I don’t mean anything at all to do with your religious or spiritual beliefs, or whether or not you could be considered to be a nice person by others, or have high moral values. Those are completely divorced from the ideas presented here.

More accurately, in the context of this article, our beliefs and values are what define our character and personality – who we are, if you will. Every one of us is unique, with our own particular set of beliefs and values, with which we govern all of our decisions in life and in business.

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Photography Business Ideas business, inner values, limiting beliefs, success

I’m going to start off today’s post by having you ask yourself a question… “Why did you want to be a professional photographer?” Was it something you knew you always wanted to do, or did you (like many of us) come into the business later in life, having first tried working for other people?

I belong to the latter group, having spent almost 20 years working as a computer programmer, systems analyst and project manager for various corporations in the UK and, finally, in Bermuda. Although I really enjoyed the challenges, I found myself with the increasing feeling that something was missing in my life, and I longed for work that was more satisfying on an emotional level than writing computer programs. I needed something more gratifying to my soul than a well-written piece of computer code. This was quite scary to someone who had spent their whole life involved in science and technology, because I felt as though I was turning into, of all things, an artist…

Anyway, to cut a long story short, I ended up leaving the world of IT to make the radical change of becoming a professional underwater photographer. After several amazing years of working in the Red Sea and the Caribbean, I moved to the US to open what you might consider to be a “real” photography business.

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How To Be A Professional Photographer e-myth, motivation, photography business, success

This is another follow on post to the “12 Ingredients For A Magic Pill In Your Photography Business” (read Part I and Part II), this time exploring the idea that we need to remove our mental boundaries in order for us to move forward into the success we can achieve for ourselves.

Let me begin by stating that I firmly believe success is not a rare commodity, available only to an especially select few. It is readily available for all of us, and that all we need to do is simply reach out and grasp it. There was a time when I would have disagreed with that statement, citing the reasons that life is hard, there’s a recession on, no one wants to spend money, there’s too much competition, I’m not that good a salesperson, my marketing isn’t good enough, and so on…

In reality, these so-called “reasons” are nothing more than excuses thrown up by our own subconscious programming, designed to keep us precisely where we are by preventing us from taking the necessary steps to progress out of what we might consider our comfort zone.

Don’t believe me? Then let’s consider a simple thought experiment…

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Photography Business Ideas motivation, photography business, positive attitude, success

Recent posts have outlined the “12 Ingredients For A Magic Pill in Your Photography Business” (read Part I and Part II), and I thought it would be useful to explore each of those 12 secrets in a little more depth, starting with number 1: “Eliminate Negativity”.

What Does This Have To Do With Photography?

Of course, “getting rid of the negative” doesn’t mean, “stop using film and go digital…” but it has to do with our photography business nonetheless.

The ideas presented here can apply equally well to any business circumstance or, indeed, to any aspect of our lives. While you won’t see any mention of apertures, shutter speeds and focal length, or any debate on whether Nikon cameras are better than Canon cameras, the concepts contained herein are at least as important, if not more so, than the technical elements of photography.

After all, it really doesn’t matter how much gear you have in your camera bag if you have no one to point your lens at, since the only way you are going to have someone to photograph is if your marketing is effective. The power of your marketing is a direct result of your own personal attitude to life and your business, which has everything to do with whether your thoughts are more positive or negative.

So, yes, the idea of eliminating negativity does have a lot to do with your business, and its ultimate success or failure…

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Personal Zen motivation, photography business, positive attitude, success

How much do you believe in stereotypes?

Do you think you fall into any particular stereotype category yourself? If so, how do you think it might affect your success in the photography business?

A favorite radio show of mine is Radiolab from WNYC and I was listening to one of their not-so-recent podcasts this morning while out driving. The podcast in question is called “The Obama Effect” and posed some interesting ideas.

Having listened to this, I asked myself the question, how much do our subconscious stereotype tendencies affect the way we behave in business, and what bearing might they have on our ultimate success or failure?

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Personal Zen obama effect, photography business, self-belief, success

As mentioned in a previous post, fear (in its many forms) is probably the number one thing holding many of us photographers back from success in their business. Few people are completely immune to its effects, but there are ways to combat it and keep our fears in perspective.

Think about your favorite successful entrepreneur for a moment. Mine happens to be Sir Richard Branson, but you can pick whomever you like. Imagine them facing the challenges they’ve had to overcome in order to be successful…

Now, do you think that person has ever experienced feelings of fear in their business ventures?

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Personal Zen encouragement, professional photographer, professional photography, success