The biggest enemy you face in achieving the success you deserve in your photography businesses is “Fear”.
It comes in many guises and can strike even the most experienced, and it can be so powerful that it can mean the difference between life and death for our business:
- Fear of losing clients because our prices are too high…
- Fear of creating inferior work…
- Fear of facing client objections or complaints…
- Fear of an idea that seems good but may not work…
- Fear of appearing foolish …
- Fear of closing the sale…
- Fear of dealing with people…
- Fear of dealing with children…
- Fear of messing up someone’s wedding…
- Fear of setting goals that we might not achieve…
- Fear of a failed marketing campaign…
The list is endless…
Read more…
Free Content
This content is free
Personal Zen
professional photographer, professional photography, success
How do we measure success? As far as I know there’s no ruler or gauge that we can use to measure it. Do we wake up one day and suddenly find ourselves successful?
Are there varying degrees of success? If so, where’s the point at which a higher degree of failure becomes a lesser degree of success?
Perhaps this is a “half-full” versus “half-empty” type of question.
Some people might measure their success by the amount of money in the bank, others by the achievement of awards or the attainment of goals. Others count themselves successful if they’re living life on their own terms.
Is being successful the same as being happy or content?
Free Content
This content is free
Photography Business Ideas
goals, professional photographer, success
It’s a new year, a new decade in fact, so perhaps we should start out with a new attitude – a mindset designed to win. Let’s forget all the negativity and depression that came to a head in 2009, and start afresh with a new outlook.
Think of your favorite successful brand for a moment.
They probably have a CEO, numerous vice-presidents, departmental managers and front-line workers.
Photographers, on the other hand, are usually one-man bands – we have to do everything from opening up shop, managing the accounts and cleaning the bathrooms.
Often, that’s the root of most of our problems…
Read more…
Free Content
This content is free
Photography Business Ideas
professional photographer, professional photography, success, time management
This weekend, in the USA at least (I know the UK have already done so), it’s time to “Fall Back” an hour as daylight savings for 2009 comes to an end. This is where we get to withdraw the hour we deposited in the time bank at the start of the summer – if only they paid interest on that deposit, oh well…
The question is, “What are you going to do with your extra 3,600 seconds this year?”
Read more…
Free Content
This content is free
Personal Zen
success, time management
How many times over the last weeks and months have you heard the word “recession”? Even if we discount those references that might pertain to hair loss, we hear it a lot more than we’d like to. There does not appear to be an economic analogy for Rogaine though… Turn on the TV or the radio, open a current-affairs magazine or newspaper, and the word leaps into our consciousness and sticks there like a limpet.
I actually heard the phrase “we seem to coming out of the recession” recently – but only once. I strongly suspect that the person who said it was taken away somewhere and is spending their days counting salt grains in the depths of an anonymous mine…
Free Content
This content is free
Personal Zen
marketing, photographer, professional photography, recession, success
You’d better answer the door, because it may not come knocking again – worse still, it will probably knock on your competitor’s door to see if they are listening. Opportunity is blind in the sense that it doesn’t really care who answers, as long as someone does.
The inspiration for this post is this great quote I saw this morning:
“The secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes.” Benjamin Disraeli
What does this statement really mean? There is certainly more to it than first meets the eye…
Read more…
Free Content
This content is free
Personal Zen
attitude, encouragement, opportunity, success
I was reading Seth Godin’s blog the other morning, as I often do, and was particularly struck by that day’s post entitled “Thanks for leading”.
He talked about how being a leader means to live and work outside of one’s comfort zone, that leadership means dealing with things that are not easy; otherwise, everyone would be doing the same thing. One statement in particular stuck with me, quoted below:
When you identify the discomfort, you’ve found the place where a leader is needed.
Read more…
Free Content
This content is free
Personal Zen
branding, professional photographer, Seth Godin, studio branding, success
If you earn your living from pointing your camera at people (or things) and creating photographs, you might disagree with the rather odd-sounding title of this post. If I listen carefully I can hear you protesting your innocence – “of course I’m a photographer – I take photographs all day of weddings, families, products, children seniors etc. My camera has practically become a part of my body and would need to be surgically removed to get it away from me…”
I understand totally but, sorry, you are still not a photographer – not if you earn a living from your camera; not if photography is your primary source of income.
Free Content
This content is free
Sales & Marketing
marketing, professional photographer, selling, success
I am almost finished reading “The Brand Called You” by Peter Montoya (with Tim Vandehey), and have enjoyed reading this so much I thought I would share it with you here. This is a must-have book for any photographer (or anyone in business for that matter). There are so many actionable tips that they are too numerous to mention here.
For anyone, like me, who has a hard time trying to figure out how to brand themselves effectively to create a unique place in the marketplace, I can’t recommend this highly enough.
The book is a no-nonsense read of about 270 pages and is great for anyone new to the idea of trying to create a brand.
I’m sure I’ll be reading this one again several times.
Here is a link to the book on Amazon:
Free Content
This content is free
Sales & Marketing
book review, branding, education, marketing, studio branding, success
One of the biggest challenges facing myself and other professional photographers is how to stay continually creative – how to produce images that are full of life and energy that force us to develop and grow as artists. This is especially true in the current economic climate and with today’s hectic lifestyle, with all the stress and worry that comes with the territory of trying to run a successful business.
Stress is apparently one of the archenemies of creativity, and it can quickly lead to feeling unmotivated or being unable to create work that feels new, fresh and uplifting. If we are already tired before we begin, and feeling burned-out, we can come back from a photography session feeling unsatisfied with the results. This leads to a sense of insecurity, lack of confidence in what we’re doing, and even more stress.
If we aren’t careful, we might become locked into an ever-decreasing circle that could lead to more serious consequences, such as depression – with disastrous consequences for our business.
It’s all too easy to succumb to this cycle, and even easier to blame everything else for the problems we face (the economy, where we live, other responsibilities, even the weather), but how do we combat this and stay positive and creative?
I don’t pretend to have anything close to all the answers to this question, which is why I invite comments from anyone who might have any insight on this subject – I’m sure it will make for a lively discussion. However, I have found some things that can certainly help me at least and thought I would share them here…
Free Content
This content is free
Personal Zen
attitude, creative, creativity, encouragement, professional photographer, success
Unless you’ve been on another planet for the last few months, you’ve probably heard the word “recession” more times than you would have liked to. The news is full of it, mainly because negative material like that is more newsworthy – have you noticed how the [few] positive stories on the news are at the end of the reports, and are given the least amount of air-time?
All this negativity flying around is one reason why I really try hard to limit my exposure to the news during the day, and I try very hard not to look at it at all before at least noon.
But it isn’t just the news – it’s all around us; the people we talk to on the phone, our family, friends, neighbors, Facebook friends, Tweeters and all those other folks we connect to online. Everyone, it seems, is convinced that the end of the world is on its way.
Read more…
Free Content
This content is free
Personal Zen
attitude, encouragement, inspiration, positive, professional photographer, success
Every time I turn on the TV or visit the news pages on the Internet, it seems that the word “recession” pops up constantly. If we were to believe everything we read in the news, we might be forgiven for thinking that the end of the world is imminent.
Sadly, I hear the same from some other photographers – “It’s the end of the industry“, “No one can make a living from it“, or “The professional photographer is doomed to extinction“.
Personally, I prefer to ignore most of this talk of doom and gloom. Yes, the economy has taken a dramatic downturn in recent times and there have been some major upsets in the financial world that have spilled over to affect us all, but do I really believe that the professional photographer’s days are numbered?
No, I don’t.
Read more…
Free Content
This content is free
Photography Business Ideas
professional photographer, success
Recent Comments