Nathan Pidd and Mike Robertson are VIP Creative. Together they run a video and photography business in Hull. Nathan had been doing photography as long as he can remember. He met Mike through a mutual friend and Mike helped on Nathan’s first wedding. In the business they have now, Nathan heads the photography side and Mike heads the video side. After three years of running the business alongside full time jobs, they decided to run the business full time. 

Nathan explains his training was through a fine art degree that then moved into lens media and really enjoyed using Photoshoot. After university he ended up opening up a print shop at the university and then also started teaching at the university.
Sam asked how they managed with running a business after all of the focus on creativity at university. Mike says the accounts and marketing is something they have always struggled with. So their marketing does takes a back seat. They do outsource some things like accounts.
Mike says when they started out they thought they would be able to finish early and work three days a week. But now he finds he works much longer hours than he ever has done before, but he enjoys it. Nathan says he was scared to be a photographer by himself, so having Mike alongside him make that move much easier for him. Nathan says it’s great as they both have different skills.
Sam asks if they have advice for others thinking of setting up a business as partners. Mike says they have creative differences and that can cause problems. You have to also make sure you get on really well as you will be tested on the way. Although you will have differences you have to agree on the core of the business. Mike also says think is this the person I can manage with when the going gets tough.
Marcus asks if they have a niche and they say no. They work with a variety of businesses across video and photography. With their time in the industry they have done a wide range of things. Mike thinks this helps to maintain their creativity.  Nathan says they also enjoy the challenge of doing different things from one day to the next.

Marcus asks about their setup. Nathan says he is a “lighting nut” and that’s the first thing he focusses in on set. They also use the lighting for their video work as well as the photography. They also work together, so most projects they do together as a team. On site they work together and tend to have specific roles that they automatically get on with. They say their knowledge of sound and lighting means that the videos they produce have very high production values.
Sam asks how they persuade people to use them and not their phone to make videos. Mike says the client needs to appreciate what they do, so they see the value. Mike also says they need to do both. Take photos and videos on your phone, but then also have the higher quality professional photos and videos too.
You can find out more about the podcast on our website

 Join the Facebook Group here

and get the podcast delivered to your inbox every week here.

This show is about working with models but is also working with all sorts of different people on a shoot.
How do you find a fashion model for a test?

A test is a situation where everyone is working together for free to build images for their portfolio. It is a very typical way of starting the fashion world. Marcus says the first thing is what a fashion model looks like. Look at fashion magazines to get an idea for this. Marcus says that fashion models should look striking / unusual. Marcus says now there is a very positive change from everyone being very skinny to there being more body shapes seen in fashion. Although he says there is still a long way to go here.
A good place to go to find a model to do a test with is a local model agency and then you need to find the newest models on their books. The newer models will be the ones who also want images for their portfolio. Agencies may ask to see your portfolio before letting you shoot one of their models. This can be an issue if this is also your first step into the world of fashion photography. But don’t let this be a barrier to you, give it a try.
Street casting is another way to find a model. So approach people on the street who you think would be a great model. Having a portfolio to show as part of this is helpful.

There also online model agencies. Marcus thinks are not necessarily the best models for fashion shoots. But you can still approach them.
Sam says setting up this test means you have a group of people all starting out in fashion who can all help each other as a network.
Marcus now moves on to posing a model and this part of the podcast is also relevant to other areas of photography. Although he doesn’t like the word posing.
He has three ways to help get a model / subject to pose in a certain way. They are Mirroring, Role play, Observation
Mirroring

He got this idea from the photographer Richard Avedon. Basically you have to get “in tune” with the model and they will naturally mirror what you do without thinking about it. So if you cross your arms they do to.
Role Play
Marcus says he does this a lot in brand photography. Marcus suggests scenarios and then the subject acts them out
Observation

This is about looking deeply at the subject, spotting what they do naturally, remembering it and asking them to do it again.
He says there are many other ways but Marcus thinks these are the most effective. Marcus says one of the most important things on a shoot with a model, or anyone, is the “vibe” in the studio. Music is a good way to create a vibe, both using music the model like, but also the music can be used to effect the mood on the shoot.

Marcus’s final hint is that if you are going to put together fashion shoot make sure you know who it is going to be for as different magazines have different styles.

Are you a photographer looking to get more leads for your commercial photography business? In this episode, we're talking about Google Ads. We'll cover the pros and cons of using paid ads, the crucial research you need to do before you start, and a simple strategy that ensures your ads actually work for your business.

Three Things You'll Learn in This Episode

• The key difference between Google Ads and other marketing methods for commercial photography. Discover why ads give you instant results, what the downsides are, and how they can either be a fantastic investment or a total waste of money.

• The crucial maths you need to do before you spend a penny. We'll break down the simple calculation that will tell you exactly how much you can afford to spend on ads to ensure you always turn a profit.

• The one thing you must get right for your ads to work. Find out why simply sending people to your homepage is a disaster and how to create a simple, effective flow that turns clicks into paying customers.

Meg is from San Deago, our first guest from the US.

Meg is a brand photographer, and has worked with over 300 entrepreneurs. She always wanted to work in an area she had passion in. Twenty seven jobs later she started to work it out. While teaching English in Taiwan she bought a camera and started a travel blog. On her return to the US she decided she really loved photography and so started a business. She started doing all types of photography. Then one day someone asked her to do some branding photographs and this converted her to brand photographer.

That business changing brand shoot was seven years ago. At that time photography was still a part time job. So then she started going to networking groups and meeting more business owners.
Meg describes brand photography as bring broken down into brand photography and personal brand photography. Brand photography is for a product or business. While the personal brand is for the solo entrepreneur, one man band or family business. The personal branding is what Meg really likes doing. In this age of social media these branding photographs are so important for businesses.
Meg now works less, adds more value and charges higher prices which allows her to spend time with her toddlers.  She enjoys the flexibility that a brand photographer can bring.  She enjoys the creativity of brand photography. If you want to get into brand photography then first of all spend some time getting to know how it works. A client will often have a bigger budget than a personal client. But you need to ensure you let them know what value they will get from your work. Meg also says the planning side of a brand shoot is essential and a key part of the this type of work. This is about finding out about their personality, brand , business and the end use for the photos.

Getting in front of as many ideal clients is really important. It’s a numbers game. The more people you can get in front of the more clients and the better clients you will gain. This is a part of the business photographers don’t necessarily enjoy but it is vital for a thriving business.

Marcus asks what makes a branding photograph different from a portrait. Meg says it tells a story. You want to try and capture the essence of what a business is through the use of photography. Meg says that although we say the photography market is saturated, this is not unique. Many other industries are the same and businesses in those industries need photography to make them stand out from the crowd.

Marcus and Meg agree that in branding the coffee cup and computer and overused, although they have both used them. They say that you need to get more creative than this. How could a brand photographer go beyond this? Props, location and wardrobe can help and make the photos more unique and interesting.

Jamie runs Circle networks and he used to be a reluctant networker. Back in 2013 he had to go networking to find customers for his social media business. At the time most businesses were not on social media, so he had to go and find them. But he fell in love with networking and it took him on a long journey. Jamie says the business was providing social media for businesses that weren’t using it at all. It was mainly Twitter.
When Jamie started business he wanted to be able to do the school run. On that basis he never did breakfast networking. One of Jamie’s clients pestered him for weeks and then he eventually went and enjoyed it and got some business. When he started networking he was offered training, which he thought he didn’t need. Then Jamie eventually did some networking training. Using the training he moved from getting £18k of work in a year from networking to £88k a year.

Jamie says we have all experienced just going networking and pottering along, but few of us think of training. His business also involved getting video testimonials which he enjoyed doing. That got busy and took him all over the country, which wasn’t what he wanted to do. And people started to approach him for networking training, He eventually moved his business to doing that. He says it is around understanding what it is you really want.

Jamie says before networking, he thought carefully about who he wanted to work with. He decided he wanted to work with a franchisee. His plan was to do excellent work with one franchisee, get referred to others. This worked well and in the end he also ended up working for the head office. All from doing a little planning before going networking.

Marcus thinks most people are just “winging it” in networking rather than planning. Jamie also says what you would wear to networking should be the same as what you would wear to meet a dream client. He says for Zoom meetings many people don’t make any effort at all.  He also talks about what people see on the background of your Zoom calls. Marcus has some lighting which shows exactly what he does. Marcus also says he has made Zoom backgrounds that were slide shows of his work and people loved it at the networking events.

Jamie’s top networking tips
1. Prepare. Don’t just jump from one call to another with no breaks and no planning.

2. Arrive early. You would never arrive late for an in person event so don’t online

3. Go networking with one thing in mind. It might be you are looking for support, a recommendation, an accountant or anything else,  but go with one aim in mind. If you are going for referrals. Have one in mind and be crystal clear. Treat it like a marketing campaign. You could do it as simple as explain who your latest client is or your ideal client is. You want people in the room to be able to filter all the people they know down to one, who they will introduce them to.

4. Be proactive with referrals. Go out and find people to refer, don’t just refer people you happen to come across. Jamie says for example while speaking to people he asked them if they had business insurance and then when it needed renewing. If the renewals were coming up he would pass them on to a connection who sold insurance.

Jamie has a photographer he works with on quarterly shoots. He says his face is his personal logo. Using photographs of ourselves is not showing off, it’s personal branding. He also says that as he’s used more professional photos he has found his social media reach expand.

Most people though don’t know the value they would get from professional photos. It is therefore important that photographers explain what value they deliver with a photoshoot. 

So while networking talk about your clients and then the follow up is really important. Jamie said he made a decision to pass more referrals than ever before. And as a result of that he has been passed more referrals than ever before.

Marcus says the show was triggered by a client he had recently who wanted images cropped in a very specific way.
Back in the days of film Marcus says it was a lot simpler and to some photographers it was a badge of honour not to crop their images. There were of course a great deal of different film sized and ratios back then including:
35mm – which were a 2x3 ratio

6cmx6cm so a 1x1 ratio

6x7 ratio was also possible for magazine covers.

Large format 5x4 was also available

There also camera specifically for panoramic images that were a range of formats and sizes.

Back then once you had chosen your film that was about it. Now with websites and social media these is so more to think about and so many different sizes. And when shooting you need to think about what crop you will use at the end.
For example a website header might be a 2:1 ratio, quite cinematic, while an Instagram reel will be 16x9 in portrait mode, which is very challenging to shoot. Sam says when shooting for a website you need to remember that the images will be auto-croppped so it needs to cope with a range of crops. Marcus says when shooting a website banner think first about if there will be text over the image. If there will be ask for an overlay so you can work out where the text would go on the image. View finders allow you to have crop marks (like rule of thirds) and these can help you think about the final crop you will have.
There are lots of sizes needed for social. For example for a profile banner a really wide thin shot is needed. Because there is such a range of image sized needed it’s important to ask the client what the client is going to use the images for. It’s a great value add for the customers providing them with pre-cropped images for different platforms and uses. Doing this also ensure that your images are shown in their best light when used.

Marcus loved the square Instagram photograph format, but with the move to reels being more popular, then this is a move away from squares to 16x9 portrait. As he has said before this is a challenging format to shoot in.
When thinking about cropping you also need to think about file size. If you are going to heavily crop an image you need to ensure it is a large file size that can cope with the crop.

Marcus suggests another thing that can make you stand out from other photographers is making videos from still images and giving them to your client. Marcus suggests using Canva for this and Sam suggests using CapCut. Marcus says making gifs for clients is another thing you can do them.  

Jo wants to help people who don’t want an average vision. She asks them if the level of effort they are putting in reflects in their bank balance, but for most people that is not the case. Jo finds that most people don’t know how to sell or land business. Once she helps them with that they can afford her and move everything else forward. One of the things Jo shows people is that it doesn’t matter what you do, it’s how you present yourself that is important. And once they do that the work follows.
Jo says she helps people present themselves in the best possible way. But there is a problem. People can see her, and in many ways photography, as a luxury. So a photographer needs to show a potential customer what they are going to gain from the photography, and what losses will be avoided.
Marcus explains what she is saying follows a Japanese philosophy he follows Ikigai. It has four tenants. Jo has mentioned two of them. Getting paid for what you do and adding value.
Jo says if you don’t believe in yourself you are never going to get work. She also says the prices needed to reflect your value. And if you are very good at what you do, charge accordingly.  The conversation then moved onto mindset and Jo says the key is that it is simple. But that doesn’t mean it is easy. The first step is self awareness. Be able to see the  doubts and negativity in your mind. That awareness then flows onto to the changes being possible. They discuss the Jeff Olson book The Slight Edge that talks about this gradual change. In Marcus Galdwells Outliers he says you have to put 10,000 hours into something to become an expert. Jo says it is a journey and you need to enjoy that journey. Ask what a confident person would do and how would they behave.  Jo says awareness and little and often changes are really key.

That self awareness and confidence is vital to the process of photography. Jo says it’s important that this inner confidence is important. And that the work on improving ourselves is vital every day.  Not many people like their photograph being taken and so that confidence and calmness is essential.

Jo likens your self confidence to being on a perch. If you have self belief and self confidence then day to day issues won’t knock you off your perch. But if your confidence is not in place, you can easily be knocked off your perch.

Marcus brings up the idea of melancholia and getting creativity from the darker times. Jo says that everyone will go though these times but what’s vital is that when you go through this you are aware what is happening and being aware that “this too shall pass”. Working through it is more possible with strength and resilience.

Other book recommendations

Beyond positive thinking, Dr Robert Anthony

The courage to be disliked   

As a final thought Marcus brings up sods law, which he thinks he is effected by. Jo says here partly this is about letting go and saying what am I doing this day to make this day count. 

 This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠01482 765871⁠

This week Sam is talking about using Google Business and Google maps for your business. Google maps is great for photographers, as most photographers want local clients. Google maps is the app we all know where you can find your nearest hairdresser, or photographer. Google maps gets it's information from Google business, or Google my business as it used to be known. Google business is a system that is free to use and easy to setup. It gives your business a pin on Google maps, information on Google maps and information about your business appears on the right hand side during a desktop Google search. For photographers that work all over the country Google maps isn’t that useful. But, for those wanting local clients it is very valuable and can get you a lot of local leads.
If you get your Google maps account setup correctly it can delivery a lot of leads.
Location

For most photographers the location for your business is their house. For a few it is a studio, but most are home based. If your home is in a large urban area, like Marcus here in Bristol, then your location really helps as you have lots of potential leads nearby. If you live out in the sticks it is more challenging for Google maps to deliver good results for you. If your location is in the middle of no where one option is to pay for a local virtual address in a local urban area. You can often pay co-working spaces or accountants for a virtual address service.
Name
If your business name has photographer in the name that really helps. Fancy names are a nice idea in theory, but if your business has photographer, or something like brand photographer in the name that will really help you getting found on maps.

Category
Google business gives you a choice primary and secondary categories and you need to think carefully before choosing these. If you are a general photographer then your main category is photographer. You can then add other sub-categories for the types of photography you offer.  But if you are a wedding photographer you may want wedding photographer as your main category. The key is plan this carefully. Also some types of photography, such as brand photography are not categories that exist.

Review
These are really important. Get customers to leave reviews for you on Google. This is very important for Google maps and SEO in general. Lots of reviews and recent reviews are really important.  Keep pestering your customers to give them reviews. Do not simply ask once and forget about it. Keep asking until they leave you one. If you search for ‘photographers’ in your area in Google maps, most of the photographers there will have lots of reviews.

Services
This is important. Get all of your services onto Google business. List as many as you can. And for every service use all the space that is available in the description. You can break your services down into sub services to add more.
Photographs
Adding photographs in Google maps as a photographer is essential. Add as many as you like.
Description

You get to add a large description of your business. Use all the space you have available. Think carefully about what you say.
Posts
You can post on Google maps. It seems odd and gets almost no interaction. But, it means when people find you on Google maps they can see recent content from you. It also helps you getting found.

Look at your competition

Look at the other photographers locally, see what their Google business account is like. Then work on your to make it better than theirs

Google search
Remember your entry in Google maps will show up in a standard Google search as well as Google maps search.

Zoe runs Ask Zoe and calls herself a consultant with a difference. She focusses not just on your business, but also on marketing. So she educates customers on what to do, when and how to help you grow. Sam and Zoe met four or five years ago pre-Covid when Zoe ran Fab Events. This business was setup in 2016. Zoe grew the business with 4N, the networking group Sam and Zoe were involved with at the time. The name Fab came because people kept saying “Zoe you are Fab”. Even in this business she was doing marketing as well as events.

When Zoe started Fab events, she said she could do all events, which she realises now probably wasn’t the best idea. While Zoe was running lots of events she spent a lot of time working with event photographers. She says if you are at an event you will usually need more than one photographer. There is usually too much going on for one person to capture. You can be the main photographer in the room, but you will need other photographers at other places, such as arrivals. That doesn’t mean as a single photographer you can’t do events like these. It means you just will need to collaborate with other photographers.

The reason Zoe called the business Ask Zoe is that she has built and kept relationships over a long time and those people who she is connected to will always Ask Zoe. Covid brought big changes to Zoe’s business and from a business point of view she sees it as a blessing. It gave her a chance to stop and reflect on what she had been doing and what she wanted to do going forwards. During Covid, Zoe was busy analysing the news and working out what would happen next and what she needed to do. As Covid was building in early 2020 events were already being effected before the UK population. This was due to early restrictions on imports. At this stage Zoe decided the best thing for her to do was focus on online events management.

What happened during this time Zoe’s business was doing well while many in the industry were fading. And so Zoe’s connections were asking what she was doing. She had been using a 7 step consultancy strategy that she had been trained in at Hilton and at University, and was using this in her business. But many people were feeling overwhelmed during Covid, so she stripped it down to a 4 step process.

Zoe then found that her business was only 5% events and 95% marketing and consultancy. She then talked to a lot of people including Collette Evans who does her branding photography to Clare Froggett who does Zoe’s branding and she developed Ask Zoe. So most of what she does is marketing and brand consultancy.

Sam asks if there is some common things that photographers could do to improve their business. Zoe says it really depends on the business and Zoe always starts with a call to see what help people need. But business owners tend to feel overwhelmed in terms of what they need to do to get to the next level they want to reach.

Zoe has worked with a few photographers and tends to find that they are very creative and tend to focus on this creativity, rather than what they need to grow their business. Creative people tend to be a little introverted and their creativity is their output. Zoe talks about getting KPIs (key performance indicators) in place in your business. These are just goals, nothing complicated. But things you need to focus on to get the end result. This is related to the show on business planning. Sam and Zoe discuss the types of KPIs photographers may have. For example it might be to do three weddings a week in the peak season, but have a month off in winter. But other photographers may simply to just do one wedding a weekend. The key is it’s relevant for you and your business. Zoe says a business a plan should be like a story, have a beginning a middle and an end. The middle is how you make it happen and how you join the dots.

This week Marcus talks about building a portfolio as a photographer. He breaks this down into three areas, photographs, pace and presentation.

Marcus starts by taking about Robert Frank and his book 'The Americans', that was published in 1960. He took photos and made what he called about a visual poem out of them. Marcus encourages you to look at the book and focus on the fact that it is a series of images.
Sam asks why a photographer wants a portfolio. Marcus says there are two reasons. One is to get more work. The other is to present a body of work. Years ago a portfolio was leather bound and shown to people to show your work. Marcus still has some of these. Clearly now there are many more options. You could have pdfs, movies and more, but printed material still has it’s value. And printing out work and showing it to clients will make you stand out from the crowd. You can also make a slide show to go at the back of Zoom calls during networking meetings.  Marcus thinks 20 to 30 images in a portfolio is about right. Less is more. Sam says that on websites photographers usually add far too many images.

When you are putting together a portfolio the beginning and the end are really key. They are the parts people remember. The middle is almost a filler. The beginning and end does not need to be your best shot. It may be more your most impactful or alternative to get attention. Tweaking portfolios for the viewer is also really important.  Marcus says to look at your portfolio from the back forwards, remember some people flick through books this way (if it is physical).

Think about how the photographs are arranged. So colours for example, or work on themes. Working through a time frame can also work. The key is do not put them together randomly. Sam introduces the ides of adding humour in there and Marcus agrees this is a great idea.

Finally Marcus talks about pace. Allowing space and allowing your portfolio to breathe. Marcus gives examples of leaving blank pages or part pages.

Marcus explains that he offers online portfolio reviews that can be booked in via his website.

The Professional Edge: Is the rise of AI and a crowded market making you nervous? Jeff Brown, President of the BIPP, joins Marcus to explain why now is the time to double down on your professional identity.

• The World's Oldest Secret: Discover the massive business benefits of joining a Professional Photography Association and how 123 years of history can protect your future.

• The Death of the Generalist: Jeff explains why the "freelancer" label is damaging your income and the urgent steps you need to take to niche down.

• AI vs. Authenticity: Find out exactly where AI fails and how to position your Branding Photography to offer the one thing a robot can't—personal storytelling.

This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠01482 765871

Sam talks about who is your ideal client or customer. First Sam explains why you want to an ideal customers. If you think “anyone” is your client, your messages is bland and doesn’t land with people and so “nobody” listens. While if you have a specific audience in mind when you are writing your content it is much more engaging and interesting for that audience.
So the first thing to do is decide who your ideal client should be. A good place to start is to think about your current clients. Are some of those ideal clients? What makes them ideal? Then try and find out more about them, things like age, gender hobbies, etc. For Sam the two things that makes them ideal clients is that they are profitable and enjoyable to work with. Marcus also points out that the target market needs to be large enough. Marcus says at networking events he always said I work with coaches and motivational speakers. And they are the people he now works with and the people that gets referred to him. Sam points out that there are 120,000 photographers in the UK on Linkedin and many more photographers, so there are lots of them that you need to stand out from and having content targeted to your ideal client helps with that.

There are other things to think about with ideal clients like how easy are thy to reach an connect with. They also need to be definable. They are also a group which you can provide value to. Marcus brings up the idea of having a tribe and Sam points out that’s a big thing in Seth Godin’s books. Marcus says that for him and many businesses their ideal clients are people just like them.
Once you have decided who your target audience is you need to clearly define them with things like age, gender, hobbies, work, family. People then make avatars. So invent people that could be in your target audience. Give them a personality. Then when writing content aim it at one of your avatars. You also need to think where are you going to find this target audience, which social channels or print media.

Marcus says it’s clear that doing this exercise really helps you to get work.

Gareth says his focus is the monetisation of this autism. One of his obsessions is LinkedIn. And he decided with his knowledge of LinkedIn he should help people get better with Linkedin. Gareth is also a percussionist. Marcus explains we do have a show about what we can learn from the music business.
Gareth has been on LinkedIn just a year after I began. He has been on it 14 or 15 years. LinkedIn has been owned by Microsoft for quite a long time. More recently Microsoft has been getting more involved and they have been pushing users into paying for the use of the platform. Gareth says that up until recently it’s been possible to use LinkedIn as a free user. And if you use Linkedin to find a job then you can still manage free. But if you are trying to grow your tribe and your business it is very hard now without premium. It effects now even how much your posts are seen. LinkedIn give you a score your SSI score which you can find here. Having premium effects that score.

Gareth says that connecting with people is important and he has an connection message he thinks you should use. Gareth says an initial message ensures you get a higher connection rate and you get more of a response after the connection, if you started with a connection message. He thinks now up to 20 touches are needed on LinkedIn before you can get someone to do something you have asked.
Gareth says commenting on other peoples stuff is really important. He also says posting about other peoples work and asking questions is a great way to go.  Gareth recommends having a camera in your LinkedIn profile photo. That enables connections to know what you do almost instantly.
Gareth says he works on the principal that he gives away 80% of what he does. He wants people to see him as an authority in this field. So he gives them stuff people can test him on. They use it and then they start to trust him.
Gareth then talks about the SSI. This is based on 4 different scores added together. Those four scores are different aspect of LinkedIn such as interacting and connecting. Posting regularly and commenting and liking other peoples content is another part.

Gareth also recommends resisting using AI to create content. But says it’s great for structure and helping to improve your content.
Top voice is the next topic. For anyone with over 1000 followers you get asked by LinkedIn to comment on some things. You can use this to become a “top voice”. To do this you have to answer and write comments on AI generated content. So Gareth recommends follow the link when you are asked to comment, but then within that topic do not comment and move up to the top level where you can chose topics. You can then see all the topics A-Z. Pick one that is close to you, then in that section pick a sub-section relevant to you. Then comment only on topic in this area. Gareth recommends in these area to be provocative and ruffle some feathers. That will get responses. You only get top voice if your comments get further comments and interaction.

Gareth’s final tip is ensure you have the odd spelling mistake in some things you do to show you are not AI. Also avoid “Z”s in your work, which shows that content has been made by AI using American spelling.

 Emma runs Natural Aspect. She creates images for her clients so they can market their brand with ease and confidence. And Sam said that is reflected in her social media where she is promoting herself with confidence. The name of the business has changed many times over the years. During her last rebrand she was in the mountains in Wales. She as looking for a name that reflected her style, capturing the natural look and the logo reflected the mountains.
Sam asked about TikTok and Emma said she was dragged onto it by a marketing coach. Emma says her ideal clients re not really there, but their kids might be. So TikTok is not a strong focus, but something she uses. LinkedIn is her main social media. Emma has been a photographer for seventeen or eighteen years. She has changed the focus of her business many times during this period. This is partly because she is a military family so has to move around a lot. Currently Emma works with businesses as this works with her and her family life.
Sam and Emma discussed the point that moving a photography business is hard. For Emma she was in Lincolnshire before the pandemic and is back now, so that has helped. Emma says niching has really worked for her and helped her with her marketing and messaging. She doesn’t work with any particular businesses.
Marcus asks what differentiates a brand photographer from any other sort of photographer. Emma says branding photography brings together skills from a wide range of photography genres. She spends a lot of time researching her clients, getting to know them. This way by the time it gets to the day of the shoot it’s all carefully planned. The customer knows what they need to do on the day, as does Emma. Emma really enjoys this side of her business. For example she worked with an accountant taking pictures of them tap dancing, which was their hobby.
Emma also does charity work with Remember My baby. They offer free remembrance photography for families that have had a loss before, during or after birth. It’s a tough subject and one that not many people talk about. She currently supports Lincolnshire hospitals with that. She goes into hospitals and take pictures of families. Every shoot is different, the mood, how much they want to talk, what they want and more.

Marcus asks about other charities and Emma in that case worked with families with children with life limiting conditions. That the Butterfly Wishes Network. Again Emma gave her time freely here and found the work very rewarding.
Marcus like to play devils advocate and asks what Emma thinks about working for charities for free. Emma says if she was going to provide marketing material for a charity she would charge. She sees that as different from being part of a charity which you are helping and feel emotionally attached to. This becomes a wider discussion between Sam and Marcus about getting paid for charity work.

Sam asks Emma what she would say to explain the cost of services. She said this could include added value to the package, it’s about promoting yourself and so having the reputation. It’s about being able to listen and also having the right kit for the job.

The discussion went onto the area of balancing listening and directing on a shoot. There is a podcast about listening, that is relevant here. Having a level of confidence is important here, to be able to do the direction well.
Emma has just returned from a family trip to China where her brother and family live. She had an amazing trip and recommends visiting.

Marcus talks about repetition in this show. Repetition was a core part of the five Rs show which you can listen to here.

Marcus has recently been to a Martin Parr talk. What Marcus found is that Martin has done huge amounts of fashion photography, which he wasn’t very aware of. Marcus explains that this is partly because he does what Marcus talked about in another recent episode alternative genres.
To recap the previous episode the 5 rules of creativity in photography are

1. Research
2. Rules
3. Repetition
4. Reflection
5. Rest

Marcus in this show focusses on repetition. Repetition splits down into three areas

1. Learning
2. Improving
3. Diversifying
   

Learning
If you are learning photography, it is best to photograph things that you can go back to again and again. So something at the bottom of the garden rather that what you see on holiday. This also means you are focussing on the mundane, so you have to try to make it interesting. Marcus says take a picture, look at it reflect on it, then take it again. Keeping repeating, reflecting and learning. Marcus says this idea works just as well for more experienced photographers. Marcus thinks this is a great way to get to know your kit and getting to know shutter speeds, apertures and more.

Improving
If you are an improving photographer you want to go an photograph things multiple times. Thinking about varied weather, varied times of day, varied lighting conditions. Marcus says when you repeat things you are growing the connections in your brain. But it’s important that critical reflection is combined with repetition.

Diversifying

There is a style of photography where photographers photograph something again and again in a very similar way, this is called Typology. Bernt and Hilla Becher, Thomas Struth, Lewis Baltz are all photographers who have used this. They tend to photograph a series of photos of something similar. Edward Munch’s the Scream is a block print that works in a similar way. As a photography example the Bechers were photographing gas tanks over time. Years apart but from the same position and with the same weather so they are very similar shots.  

Robin Thompson says he is an IT stress reliever working with small and medium-sized businesses helping ensure that their IT is not causing them stress. Sam and Robin have known each other for a long time having started their business at a similar time and having run a networking event together.

Robin’s journey into IT has been an interesting one. As a child of the 80s he has been using computers since he was a child. Robin spent ten years in financial services and then moved to working in higher education. He did do some first line IT support as part of his role. But also did things like exam timetables for the University of Hull. At one stage Robin was offered the opportunity to take voluntary redundancy from the University, At the same time Helen his wife and co-director was between jobs and so they decided to take the redundancy and setup the business.

Sam asks what photographers need to think about in terms of their IT. Robin says for those in creative industries you will need high spec equipment and lots of processing power. Backing up your data is an important thing to think about. But due to the file sizes that photographers deal with are very large so that cloud storage can start to get very expensive. Robin suggests one way of doing this is having project files on cloud storage, but use external hard drives to backup the raw photo files. Backblaze is  service that some photographers use as the storage is a lot cheaper than Google or Microsoft cloud storage.
In terms of security Robin says the built in security has got a lot better over the years on Windows computers. He also reminds us that Macs, contrary to popular opinion, can get viruses. They can also pass viruses onto Windows computer and it is not good for your business if you accidentally pass viruses onto customers, so ensure macs have 3rd party anti-virus software on them.
Robin says domains and emails are also important. Some small businesses use Gmail or Hotmail addresses for their business and this does not look very professional. Then have a professional email system around that, that will scan incoming and outgoing emails. Spoofing is a challenge at the moment (spoofing is someone pretending to be someone else). Good email scanning will deal with this. On top of this email marketing needs a domain based email address.
Because we do have problems like spoofing there are now systems in place to prevent this. But this does also mean it can be harder to deliver genuine email. When properly setup this isn’t a problem, but setting up email accounts correctly is correct.

Robin explains that backups are much more than photos. Emails, invoices, contact information and more, all needs backing up. If these aren’t backed up it could cost you your business.
Robin has used photography in his business and he says you can tell when photography has been done professionally. Robin had the opportunity to be in a magazine with a focus on his wife in the business. They got professional photography for that and thought the results were excellent. Although you can take photos with a phone, it is not the same.

Sam asked Robin to share his experience of using professional photographers. Robin thinks that initial conversation, before the photo shoot is very important. It’s a careful balance of  the photographer providing expertise and suggestions with listening. Also many people are very uncomfortable in front of the camera and so making people at their ease in front of the lens is important. He likes the idea of a retainer for photographers but doesn’t work on that basis with his photographer.

Zoe Hiljemark is a PR and marketing consultant who works just with photographers. She has spent twenty years in PR, ten of those working with photographers.  She leverages PR content and SEO to promote photographers.
Back when Zoe became a mother she wanted baby photographs. So she got a photoshoot with Karen Wiltshire. Zoe got on well with Karen and the ideas went from there. Zoe realised Karen’s work was amazing but could reach many more people. So Zoe started working with Karen and then moved on to working with other photographers. The business grew from there and Zoe ended up just working with photographers. Zoe now works with all sorts of different photographers which she enjoys. She has a niche now and recommends niches for other businesses.

Sam asks if Zoe is getting photographers photographs in the press, or them and their services in the press. Zoe says it’s largely about getting them and their business into the press. Marcus wonders if particular magazines are good for particular niches. Zoe says that it depends on the client and their niche. But it’s largely not about photography magazines, but magazines read by their ideal client. Sharing photos to be used in the press is also a great way to get your images seen.

 Sam and Zoe discuss how important it is to know your target audience. Without this it is hard to know where to put your PR efforts. It takes a lot of time and effort to get into the press, so ensure when you get this you use it. Keep sharing it on social media, feature it on your website and keep talking about it.

Marcus asks if this is about making the photographer the star. Some photographers are not very keen on this and like to hide behind the camera. But PR is about being visible. Zoe thinks that PR is under-used by photographers, but to use it you have to share something about yourself.
Zoe talks about how photographers could improve their websites sharing information about a photoshoot and the story behind it, not just share the images. All of the work the photographer has put into this photoshoot needs to be shared.

Marcus asks about the challenges working with photographers on PR. Zoe says first of all they need to be in the right mindset. Also they can respond quickly to opportunities. The press may need images or a story very quickly so if a photographer is not keeping an eye on messages then they might miss the opportunity. Having a press pack ready is really useful. That means a pre-written bio and some headshots and other images.  It’s essential that photographers have good headshots and lifestyle images of themselves. These can be done reciprocally with other photographers.

Zoe says PR is not spin, just being seen in the right light.
Sam brings back the topic of niches and the worry people have when niching as people feel that they are cutting off a major group of clients. But if you don’t niche you can easily confuse clients with your messaging. When you have a niche, marketing becomes easier as you know who you are speaking to. This makes it easier to create content and posts that engage with your audience.

SEO part III on site SEO

This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here

⁠⁠⁠⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠⁠⁠⁠

⁠⁠⁠⁠01482 765871⁠

This follows SEO part one, which as about planning and SEO part two, which was about work external to your website. That leaves this show, SEO III on site SEO. The first thing to do is ensure you have competed part one and part two. So if you have not listened to those shows and planned your keywords then do that now.

Once you have done the planning and looked at your external SEO the next most important thing is creating content. Good engaging content. But initially Sam goes through some other areas of SEO.

• You need to make sure your site is fast, otherwise Google will suppress your search results. Use a speed test website to check this
• Ensure your site works and doesn’t contain broken links.
• Make sure you have meta-descriptions in place. These are simply descriptions of the page that Google uses.
• Have alt-tags for your images. These help visually impaired people and it helps Google understand your images.
• Have a site map. You need to submit this to Google Search Console.
• Organisation of pages and menus. These need to be organised into a clear structure. For example have different services as sub-pages to the main service page.

Marcus asked about websites using only images and not text. Sam said for SEO this is a really bad idea, These sites will not do well in the Google search.

Content

Use one key word or page on one page. That work better than having a single page trying to focus on several key words. When you focus on one word / phrase you can ensure that you include it in the text, in the title, in the meta-description and in the alt texts. But they need to be used sparingly. Google doesn’t like the keyword / phrase used too much within the text. Think about internal links, so can this content link to other content within your site. External links are important too.
Tools
If you have a WordPress site Yoast is a free tool that helps you with your SEO. It checks keyword density, content structure and assesses the complexity of content. You can also check your writing on the Hemmingway app. This helps keep your writing simple.

Structuring
Structuring your content really helps Google and people navigate your content easily. You can use paragraphs, bullet points, headers and more. Headers are number for importance from 1 to 6. Only use one H1 header per page.
Refocus your existing pages and blogs
Content doesn’t just need to be new. If you now have keywords you want to be found for you could adjust content you already have to help it focus on these keywords.

Data
Make sure you keep an eye on the data. Google Search Console and Google Analytics will help with this. Use this to see if your SEO work is increasing traffic to your website.

Denise Brady has been a food photographer for two and a half years. She is based on the East coast of the UK in Suffolk. Before this she was doing weddings and family photography, but Covid meant Denise had to pivot her business and moved to food photography. Denise’s photography journey began on her wedding day. When she got the images back from her wedding day she didn’t like them, and said she could have done better herself, which her husband laughed at. Denise had done photography in her youth but stopped. The next Christmas her husband bought her a Nikon digital camera. Later that year she was asked to photograph a wedding for a friend of her daughter. Denise tried to turn it down but her husband said no, this is your chance to show you can do better. So, Denise shot the wedding for free. The couple were pleased with the photos and paid Denise for them. It then built from there until Covid.

Marcus says in fashion the photographers are often not that interested in fashion. So he wondered if she liked food. Denise loves food and was as up with great home cooked food as a child. Marcus asks if Denise has read the book Toast by Nigel Slater. Denise says her cook book shelf is about a meter and a half long. She says if a food photo doesn’t make your mouth water and invoke a memory then it’s not doing it’s job.

Denise loves to use natural light. She can use lighting but uses natural light for all her photos. She will use bounce boards to get light into a shot and blackboards to take light out of a shot. She will use foils and scrims to block out and filter bright direct light on sunny days. On a flat light day her works becomes easier. The hardest days to work on are ones with sunshine and showers so the sun is constantly coming in and out. Denise likes to get the white balance right in shot rather than afterwards. There is a show all about lighting, the ten principles of flash photography.

Denise’s preference is to take dark and moody shots. Some clients need light and airy shots and she is. Sam asks how she found it finding clients with the move to food. This was very challenging at the start as Covid hit the entertainment industry so hard. Denise has found that she has to be flexible in her approach and work within a clients budget, which can be limited.
Denise’s son in law is a chef. He has been very helpful to her and means she has someone to go to, to ask questions when she doesn’t understand things within the industry. Denise says plating is important and changing all the time. Denise has a particular style. She tried other things like the floating burgers and stop motion, but she prefers to work in her style. Marcus refers back to the recent Joe Giacomet show  as he has been making the gif style stop motion food animations.
Marcus asks about working with food stylists. Denise often does the styling herself but she has worked with food stylists. Sam asks what food stylists do. The summary is that they move the peas around the plate and arrange the knife and fork tastefully and things like that. Denise also takes props with her for shoots. They also discuss planning and hot food. When hot food comes out it needs to be photographed very quickly. That means there needs to be lots of planning in place so that when the food comes out the photos are able to be done very quickly.

Denise’s influences include: Jonie – The Bite Shot

Sarah - Broma bakery

Her influences also comes from going to restaurants and looking at their photography. Her ambitions include working on a cook book and getting into a major food magazine. She has been published with other shots, but not food. Her ideal chef to make a cook book with would be Gordon Ramsey or a local chef Galston at Morston Hall.

Every episode has an extra bonus tip that we give only to newsletter subscribers. For the show about fashion Marcus’s tip as if you want to shoot fashion, don’t shoot fashion. And now Marcus has a whole show on this principal.

When Marcus was working in fashion lecturing, students would come up with great fashion work. But he would say remember editors commissioning this work see pictures all the time. So if you want to get noticed, do something different. Sam says this reminds him of the interview with Joe Giacomet. He spent ages making football cards as a personal project and it was almost these that made his name.
Marcus thinks that if you shoot fashion then getting out and doing street photography. This is so different to fashion. You have to be much quicker and be in a much less controlled environment. It will really improve your craft. It then means you have some photos to show to the fashion editors as well as your fashion work. This can help to get you noticed. Marcus spent a lot of time taking street photography which he really loved.

Richard Avedon was one of the first photographers to get the models out of thestudio and out into the streets of New York, which at the time was quite radical.
Marcus suggests that portrait photographers should think of trying still life as an alternative genre. Still life photography is all about the lighting, composition and attention to detail. The skills learnt here can then be applied to your portrait photography.
If you are product photographer perhaps try landscape photography. When you are in the studio with a product you can control everything, while you have no control over the environment, which makes it very different.
Marcus and Sam discuss that wedding photography has changed greatly over the last ten years with it becoming much more documentary style. Marcus suggests that wedding photographers should go and try fashion photography. Fashion photography is all about style and making the models looking great, which are perfect skills for wedding photographers.

Marcus’s other suggestions are:
Street photographers try portrait photography.

Landscape photographers could try art photography, the sort of thing in galleries and museums. Marcus suggests looking at Jem Southern, Beckers (Bernd and Hilda) John Davies, Edward Patinksky. These are people taking images with a political message.

Family photographers could try painting. Looking at them for ideas, styles and light.

This week Marcus and Sam speak to Sonya Dove who is Wella’s Global Creative Director and Marcus’s big sister. Sonya has been with Wella for 40 years and hairdressing for 45 years. On a day to day basis Sonya travels around the US and Canada educating and mentoring hairdressers. She also does classes and photoshoots. Hairdressing has given her the opportunity to travel the world. She still travels at least two to three times per month.

Sonya says photoshoots can be for hairdressers, or for consumers. She used to work in a salon, but now with all her other work she does not have time for that. Sonya has had her work on the front of almost every hairdressing magazine. Sonya says it’s hard to find the right photographer for a hair photoshoot. Most photographers don’t focus on the hair in the right way. Lighting the hair right is really important. With darker hair colours this becomes harder. Getting the texture, colours and dimensions, especially with dark hair is very challenging. All other parts of the model and shot are extra. The hair is key. Sonya says she has done photoshoots where the detail of the hair is lost. However she realised that this was as much on her as the photographer as she hadn’t explained what she wants. As a solution to this she suggests mood boards are a great way to discuss this type of thing before the shoot.
Marcus says there is lots of work out there for hair and beauty photographers. If you think about all of the hair dressers and salons out there who need work, as well as manufacturers, the number of potential customers is huge. At the moment Sonya works with Richard Monsieurs. She has also worked with Marcus many times, Robert Lobetta and many more. Sonya says the personality of the photographer can make or break a photoshoot. They need to be calm, get on with everyone and really understand what is needed from the end result.

Sonya says there is huge amount of potential work as a hair photographer, even at a local level with all the salons.
Studio photography is safe as you can totally control the lighting and environment. But Sonya also says this can be very sterile as sets need to be build or use green screen. So these are great for some shoots, but she prefers location shoots for the atmosphere. But for the photographer there is less control. That background provides so much for the shot. But outside there can be issues with heat, rain, wind, etc. Sonya says she did a shot in the desert which was quite complex and the poor model started to get sun burnt.

Marcus asks if hair shoots are moving to more on location out of studio shoots. Sonya says yes. Campaigns are getting out of the studio and moving to more editorial, lifestyle of shoot and campaign. The idea is the campaigns try to look like getting great hair is simple and easy to do.
Marcus asks how a photographer could get into hair photography. Sonya says going to shows is great for building a network. The next thing is putting you out on social media as a hair photographer. Explain you are looking for hairdressers to help them show off their work. Competitions are great to enter and can help boost your visibility.  If you go to a brand they will want to see your portfolio and you’ll need at least twenty stunning shots. So the best thing is start with this and move on to brands once you have experience and a great portfolio.

Sonya explains that hair photography is lots of fun and a very lucrative area of photography. She has worked with a range of photographers with a lot of different approach to retouching. Some people she works with do very little retouching , but spend a lot of time getting the initial shot perfect. Other photographers do lots of retouching. And during a shoot the photographer needs to be talking to the team on a photoshoot to ensure everything goes as they want.

You can get hold of Sonya here

Insta

@thesonyadive

FB

SonyaDove

SEO Part Two There are going to be three podcasts on SEO.

1. Planning
2. External SEO
3. Internal SEO

This episode is looking at External SEO.

This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here

⁠⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠⁠

⁠⁠01482 765871

This week Sam is talking about external SEO. That means things you can do, external to your website, to help your SEO.

One of the most important things you can do is get a Google Business account. A Google business account gives you a pin (or area) in Google maps. It also gives a table of information within Google about your businesses within the Google search. It is worth spending time setting up a good Google maps account. If you work from home Sam suggests you set it up showing the area where you work, so it’s not a pin at your house.  Posting on Google business is useful, but don’t expect engagement from this. You can add products to your business account. If you don’t have any packages, come up with some. The most important thing you can do is get as many reviews as you can on. Lots of reviews and recent reviews are both really useful. As you always need fresh reviews you always have to stay on the ball with this. Marcus manages two business accounts promoting different sides of his business.
Social Media is another  vital part of your SEO. Google isn’t checking every post. But it is keeping an eye that you are active. To ensure this helps with SEO you need to make sure your social media profile shows your website. The one social media account you need to treat a little differently. That’s YouTube, that is owned by Google. Videos can be a great way to bypass the website search. When you search for a term Google will often put Google map entries and videos ahead of websites. So that’s one reason why having a good Google business profile is so important. It also means you can create videos to target specific search terms.

Back links. This means other websites linking to your website. Google thinks if other high quality websites are linking to your site then your website must be good. So trying to get links to your website is important. A simple way to do this is get on as many free business directories as possible. As a warning reciprocal links don’t really work. So don’t trade where two businesses link to each other. Guest blogging and guest podcasting are great ways to build backlinks. If you do a podcast or guest blog ensure you get links get back to your website. Links from high quality sites provide more kudos than links from low quality websites. Over time back links will build over time if you keep producing high quality engaging content.

Paul Cooper has been a professional photographer for over 30 years. He is currently a commercial photographer. But, in the last 30 years he has shot most types of photography. His photography business Baily-Cooper Photography is run with his wife. They also have a photography education business called Master your Photography. Master your photography caters for everyone from someone who wants to buy a photographer and doesn’t know what to buy, to professional mentoring.
Before Paul was a professional photographer, he was an amateur photographer. His parents got him a camera when he was 18. Him and his wife married, and photography was still a hobby. Paul worked for ten years in IT working on the first PCs that came out. After ten years Paul took the leap and setup the business. As the business grew, they realised they needed a second photographer in the business, so Paul’s wife left her job and joined him. Paul then got his professional qualifications with the British Institute of Professional Photography and the Master Photography Association. This process was back in the days when the training available was through face-to-face meetings in the associations.

Marcus asks how Paul and his wife divide up the work. Paul says that Kate his wife tends to do babies, young children and families. He tends to do corporate work, and then they come together for big projects. But they can mix it around as they wish.
Sam asks why they are a limited company as many photographers don’t do this. Paul said they did this years ago on the advice of their accountant. He also thinks for larger jobs it can give more kudos.
They discuss style and developing a style and having a passion for it. Initially photographers tend to copy other photographers and then go on to use those influences to develop their own style. Paul says that many photographers don’t understand lighting and it is a very important factor. He says his business has spent more money and time on lighting than on cameras. There is another podcast about lighting here.

Sam asks Paul about the teaching side of the business. Paul says customers tend to come from the photography work they do anyone. For example, clients chat about a camera they have and don’t know how to use. He does offer videos etc. but many people want to come into the studio and lean how to use their camera face to face. They will also go into business and work with a group of people to help them do things like get their own PR shots.  Paul says that with just a little training people can take much better photographs. Paul’s main advice for students is just to go out and use your camera as much as you can.
Marcus asks Paul if he has any favourite photographers. Paul says Bob Carlos Clark. Bob gave Paul the inspiration to become a photographer. Later Paul went to his studio and Bob made him a frittata in his studio! He was a boudoir photographer before that was really a “thing”.

Marcus asks Paul to explain his roll with the Master Photographers Association. Paul has been on the qualifications side. Photographers can put a panel into the qualification panel for judging. Paul says the two reasons a photographer would want to get a qualification. Firstly, it pushes you creatively. Secondly, it’s good from a marketing perspective. You can shout out about the qualification, and it differentiates you from other photographers. The qualification process is that a photographer has to put together a “panel” of around twenty photographs. All of those should be photographs you have been commissioned to take. They can’t be from personal projects.

Bel is part of Turpin Accounting Services a business setup by her Mum.
Bel she she fell into accounting. She started in retail management, but when her Mum’s business expanded she needed help. Bel started doing data entry on her days off, and then applied for a role when it became available. So she started on admin, then moved onto bookkeeping, then accounting and did all the training in those areas on the way. Now she works with clients on business development.

Marcus says he doesn’t have an accountant and asks why he should use one as a sole trader. Bel says it’s a lot about having someone to be able to ask the right questions. It’s not that the accounts are often wrong it’s just that as a business owner it’s hard to see the bigger picture from your numbers. So she could help Marcus make more money, make him more tax efficient and things like that.

What is the difference between bookkeeping and accountancy? Bookkeeping is the day to day data entry and organisation. An accountant does more advanced work such as end of year accounts or giving you advice. Sam asks as a photographer is it best to have an accountant or a bookkeeper. Bel says it depends what you want to get out of the business at the end of the day. Look at the time you are spending on accounts, is it worth handing that over to someone else? In terms of accounting it’s a question of whether you want to move the business forward.

Bel thinks there is education needed in terms of what things can be put through business expenses. Things like a home office, internet bills, gas, electricity and a percentage of the mortgage. Equipment can all go through as well as subscriptions like Adobe and CRM packages.
Bel highly recommends using accounting software as it makes life easier. As the government is moving to making tax digital it means that almost all businesses will need to be using the software before too long. It’s likely that will be for all businesses turning over more that £12k a year.

Sam asks if Bel has any thoughts on which accounting software is better for as small business. She thinks Xero gives a bit more analysis than Quick Books. But overall they are all very similar.
Marcus asks the advantages and advantages of being a limited company and being VAT registered. Bel says it’s about what your business wants to achieve. Some large clients will only work limited businesses. As a Limited company you have different ways to get money out of the business which aren’t available as a sole trader.
Being VAT registered is again linked to bigger clients and some may expect you to be VAT registered. It has big effects on buying equipment and claiming VAT back. Sam wonders why more photographers don’t become a limited company. Bel does warn that such a change tends to double your accountants costs.

Bel does free accounting clinics once a month which can be found on Eventbrite
Sam asks what a photographer does if he owns equipment and then starts a business. How you can account for this. Bel says you can, if you are a limited company you can sell the equipment to the business. So the business then owes you that money. Sam talks about equipment depreciating and accounting for that, but Bel says you will probably need an accountant to deal with this.
The discussion also goes onto the fact that accountants need brand photographers and videographers. So make sure you talk to your accountant to see if you can help them with their photography.

You can get in touch with Bel here
https://www.turpinaccounting.co.uk

bel@turpinaccounting.co.uk

The ten principals of Flash Photography

These apply to all types of light including natural light.
1. There are only two types of light, hard light and soft light. Hard light is the sort of light you would get at midday in a sunny place. Very contrasting light. The imagine it’s a cloudy day then the light becomes soft.

2. The closer the light is to the subject, the softer the light. And so the further away the light is to the subject the harder the light.

3 As you move the light source from the subject, the light intensity drops very quickly. If you double the distance the light is from the subject you quarter the amount of light that reaches the subject.

4. The harder the light is the more contrast you have. Contrast is highlights and shadows. The harder the light the further away from each other the highlights and shadows become. So in soft light the highlights and shadows are closer and have more variations in between.

5. A shadow will have a hard edge with high contrast from a hard light. It will have a soft edge and low contrast from a soft light

6. Light can be direct or indirect / bounced. A direct light comes straight from the light source. Indirect light is often bounced off something like a ceiling or reflector. By reflecting the light you are changing the size of the light source.

7. Light travels in straight lines, unless it meets an obstruction. So particles of light behave like snooker balls, they bounce off objects. Grids are objects that go over lights to channel the light to prevent it spreading out and as hard light is becoming more popular, so are these.

8. Light coming from the side of a subject will show more texture than a front on light. You can see this in landscape photography, when photographers tend to like early morning or late evening light, when the light is coming from the side, which gives more texture.

9. Flash light varies in speed. The speed of a flash is measured using it’s T number. If you are capturing moving subjects, like sports then you need very fast flashes so that you freeze the action

10. If using flash outside, especially on a sunny day you will need a much more powerful flash than you would indoors. So for indoor photography you don’t need that much power from your flash.

This episode is an interview with Fiona Scott a PR specialist.
To start Sam and Fiona discuss the difference between PR and marketing. Fiona says public relations encompasses every type of marketing as public relations is about any time your business contacts the public. Fiona says that means if someone says they can help you with all of your PR be very wary, that is a very wide field.
Fiona’s specialism is in press communications. Fiona suggests that when you are starting business, get some advice about marketing and PR. You probably can’t afford PR or marketing, but get advice to help you get through the first few years.
Marcus asks about the history of PR. Fiona said that Queen Elizabeth the first was one of the first people to control the images that went out of her. Marcus was thinking of Edward Burtynsky who took the ideas of Froid and applied them to PR.
Sam bring in the idea that images and photography are vital to PR. Fiona says she will only ever work with people who have photos that re renewed every 18 months at the most. Fiona has a retained photographer in her business as photography is so vital to PR. So PR could be a good source of work. And offering a retainer to regular clients can be a great way to get a regular income as a photographer. It’s important when working on a retainer that you make it very clear what is covered in the retainer deal and what is not.
Fiona says the best photographers she has worked with do a wide range of photography, portraits, weddings etc. She also says that photographers are often awful at getting their own headshots done. They need to ensure they keep their photographs up to date.
Marcus asks how photographers can get involved in PR. Fiona says start localm and get in touch with PR companies within your own communities. Call them up and ask to meet. Fiona says there can be issue with copyright and PR. PR businesses need to pass photos on to other businesses, like newspapers. Therefore the PR business needs the right to do that and so the copyright for the photograph. Fiona says that a PR business can send the photographers details with images sent to press. But, the press do not have to credit the photographer. But a photographer can of course share on social media when their work has been used in the press.

Marcus asks what makes a good PR photograph. Fiona said that if you want to work with the media your photographs need to be media friendly. No plain backgrounds.  The background needs to help tell the story. Landscape only, portrait is rarely used unless you are being used for the front page of the magazine.  Usually they want a 1 to 3 Mb jpg. High end lifestyle magazines may ask for higher quality. Having lots of photographs to hand that you can send at a moments notice can really help you get your photographs published.  Product photographs are a little different and do need a plain background.

Fiona suggests photographers should get out on strong weather days, snowy, windy etc. Get out there, get some images and then very quickly send them to newspapers, and other media in your community.

You can get hold of Fiona here

https://uk.linkedin.com/in/thefionascott

https://scottmedia.uk/

Are you a photographer who's ready to finally get found on Google? This week's show is the first in a three part series on SEO, revealing the most important step in the entire process.

• Why doing any SEO work without a proper plan is a complete waste of time, and how to create a strategy that actually works.

• You'll learn how to choose the right keywords and geographic areas for your business and use a simple tool to check if they’re worth going for.

• What your domain score is and why it's a vital number to know before you start any work on your onsite or offsite SEO.

Maureen helps elevate peoples Linkedin profile. She helps them create more opportunities and visibility. That creates more leads and more business.
Maureen tells her story. She started off in the world of sales and marketing. She went from telemarking to field sales. To then running sales teams working with tech startups. As a Sales and marketing director LinkedIn was always her go to platform. She has always known that it is such a great tool.
About 12 years ago Maureen had a son and wanted to work for herself. She started being a general marketing consultant. Before lockdown she was 50% marketing consultant 50% Linkedin work. During Lockdown this moved to being 95% LinkedIn marketing and only 5% marketing consultant. And this has stayed ever since.
Sam asks about LinkedIn recent restrictions for those not paying to use LinkedIn. LinkedIn are now heavily restricting the number of people you can follow. So Maureen says it is getting harder to use, but is still a great platform to use.
Marcus asks the difference between Brits and Americans using Linkedin. Maurenn thinks this just reflects the difference between US and UK culture and business culture. People are happier promoting themselves in the US than they are in the UK.
Sam says photographers do like to hide behind their camera and really need to come out from behind it. Maureen says this is very understandable, but photographers do need to try and get over it. Maureen says having packages can really help, so you can get out onto LinkedIn and sell your package rather than have to sell yourself, which is harder to do.

Maureen says Linkedin is used to give clients value and build a community. But she does do one sales post per week. It might be subtle but she always has one. Marcus said for a commercial photographer then LinkedIn is amazing as it is B2B. which Facebook and Instagram isn’t. Maureen says focussing on a sector really works well on Linkedin. Send out posts for your niche, use relevant hashtags. And connect to people in the right sector. She says with a connection message you should get 1 in 3 or 1 in 4 connections. But connection messages are being limited. But, you can still connect with more people without the message.

Maureen says that if you spend an hour a day on LinkedIn you can achieve a lot. Send time posting, making new connections and follow up messages.
Marcus says also that business people need photos for Linkedin for posts, headshot, banner images and more. So photography for people to use on Linkedin is a great area for photographers to work in.

Sam asks Maureen some top tips for their LinkedIn profile. She says a profile photograph is a must. She has 5 pillars of success on Linkedin and the profile is one of them. Look like the top dog that you are. Your LinkedIn profile needs to be generating work for you. It needs to have an amazing tag line. It needs to really shine. Your banner needs to be excellent. As a photographer you can feature things like images you have taken recently. The more visual your profile is the more you will stand out.

One of Maureen's other pillars is let the other steal the show. So tell stories about other people you have been working with. Maureen says she gets customers by giving out hints and tips and talking about people she’s been working with.

You can find Maureen on LinkedIn (big surprise) or at her website

https://www.linkedin.com/in/maureenlkane/
https://linkedinbreakfastclub.co.uk/

Marcus has been using three pieces of software for a long time in his career. Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom, Capture one. But initially Marcus goes back to the history of retouching, which started only a couple of years after photography was invited. So “photoshopping” has been around from well before photoshop.
Adobe photoshop was early photography software that started in the 1990s. Marcus remembers using this for the first time while he was at university. But back in those days it was slow to use due to the speed of the computers.  Marcus even had to do a photoshop exam at one stage and became an accredited expert!

Lightroom came out after Photoshop. It is a very easy to use intuitive piece of software. Lightroom and Photoshop are complimentary pieces of software both made by Adobe. The difference between Photoshop and Lightroom is that Photoshop is designed to work at one image at a time, while Lightroom can do bulk editing. You can chose to edit a photo in one way, then apply that editing to lots of other photos. The terminology used in light room was the terminology of the dark room so photographers easily understood it.

Photoshop also has many more uses than photography. Marcus uses it for all sorts of areas of his business such as making reels for Instagram or making posts for Linkedin. Photoshop has so much functionality that it can be overwhelming initially. Also it means it’s very easy to spend a long time on photoshop editing images. This can be a challenge for professional photographers, making sure they don’t spend too long using Photoshop.

Capture one is the third piece of software Marcus uses. Marcus uses it’s ability to tether. That means Marcus works with his camera plugged into his laptop and the people he photographs can see the photos as they are taken. Lightroom can also tether but Marcus thinks this works better on Capture one. But Capture one is not easy to pick up and use.

This week on the podcast, we're joined by renowned British advertising photographer and director, Joe Giacomet With his unique and vibrant style, Joe has created an impressive body of work for major clients. He joins us to share insights on his creative process, the importance of personal projects, and how a unique style can be your greatest asset.

What you'll learn from this episode:

Discover the secret behind Joe's distinct photography style and how it sets him apart in the competitive world of commercial photography.

Find out why dedicating time to your personal passion projects is the key to unlocking major commissions and commercial success.

Learn about the meticulous process and attention to detail that goes into creating a high end advertising photography campaign.

Sam and Marcus discuss consistency in your marketing. Sam says the basic idea is decide what you want to in your marketing, and do it consistently and well. If you look at businesses that are doing well through their marketing, they are being very consistent. That doesn’t mean that all businesses that consistently market, do well.

This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here

info@website4photographers.co.uk

01482 765871

Planning

The first stage of marketing is planning. You need to have your ambitions first of where you want your business to be. You then need to think about what you need to do to get there, in terms of marketing. But, be realistic about what time you have for marketing or the budget you have for marketing. So be ambitious in your targets, but realistic in the time and/or budget you have for implementation. 

Marcus says things take way longer than you plan for. But, Sam said this can happen initially, but, if you are being consistent and doing things again and again, you get quicker and more efficient at it. 

Implementation

Once the planning is done you need to think about implementing it. Sam says a daily or weekly plan is essential for this. If you have a clear plan for your day or week then you can ensure you make time for your marketing, or whatever else it is essential to do in your business. Marcus thinks that with photography this is challenging as you have to do photo shoots. Sam says it’s the same for every business. Having a weekly timetable that is the same for every week, like a school, doesn’t work. It needs to be done on a week by week basis. This can be done by photographers the same as everyone else. It can be easy to spend all your time processing photos. It is important to set time aside for marketing, accounting and other essential business tasks. 

Use your weekly plan to help you implement your marketing plan consistently. 

Sam talks a little about the sort of thing your regular marketing might be, like building a community on social. As you do marketing you need to be monitoring your sales and leads and seeing if your marketing is working. Make sure you ask everyone who comes to you as a customer how they found you. They won’t remember every time they have come across you, but they will remember something. Use the data to help focus your marketing and trim away the stuff that isn’t working. But ensure you have been consistently doing your marketing for a good while before you judge it. It needs more than just a couple of weeks before you can judge it. Marcus and Sam discuss touch points and how many touch points clients have before they will contact you. Different books say you need a different number of touch points before a sale. But you certainly need a good few. And the closer together you can get those touch points the quicker you can move people to a sale. Remember when you are assessing your marketing, that some touch points will not  be mentioned by clients and if you remove it, it might be detrimental to your marketing. For example they may have forgotten about seeing yuoir posts on Linkedin. But, that doesn;t mean they didn't help in the process of moving them towards becoming a customer.

Marcus mentioned the idea of accountability groups. Where you hold each other to account. These can work really well at helping you getting stuff done. If you write a goal down its better than being in your head. If you add a deadline that’s better. But it’s a lot more effective if you then share these goals to someone that means you will put much more pressure in yourself to meet those goals.

Marcus and Sam finish by discussing common marketing mistakes. One of them is of course, not being consistent in your marketing.

Toby Lee
Toby is a headshot photographer in the UK. His business is called Headshot Toby. He has been a Headshot photographer for 7 years. He started out working with actors and those in the entertainment industry. He is now in Lincolnshire working more with businesses.

Toby started out as an actor and went to one of the top acting schools in the country. During his final year at acting school, it was essential to get a professional head shot. His headshot was done by Robin Savage. Toby felt he really enjoyed the process. He happened to have a DSLR he bought to make films. And he started to use it to take images of his friends on the course. He felt that friends were spending lots of money on headshots. He ended up taking lots of headshots of his friends on his course and got great feedback. Gradually he was spending more and more time on the photographer while nothing was really coming in on the acting front.  Eventually he decided that photography, not acting was the way to go.

This was Toby’s business for about six years. Covid put a stop to this work with actors not work. At that time Toby and her wife made a decision to relocate to Lincoln and Toby transitioned from photographing actors to working with people in business. Toby feels the styles he was using for acting headshots, he is now using in business headshots which means he has quite a unique style.

Marcus and Toby discussed that not that long ago a business headshot was a simple head and shoulder shot with a plain background. While now it has evolved into something much more. When Toby first started to work with businesses, while working with actors, he found it difficult trying to take those dull simple headshots. But now he does much more interesting ones for businesses.

Sam and Toby discuss the fact that people will make snap assumptions about you from your headshot. The headshot also becomes like a logo that people will recognise as they scroll through LinkedIn. Also this images needs to be updated and kept fresh from time to time. There is a balance in using these images between recognition and over exposure.
Marcus asks about the process. Toby says it’s all about the interaction with his clients and the photos are almost a bi-product of this. Toby has to build up the client to a point where the client will feel positive about the photos, but also positive enough so they feel able to use them on social media. He finds that on arrival customers tend to come with five minutes of “verbal vomit” where they make lots of negative comments about how they look. Toby lets them get this out but then starts to talk to them and build them up. Toby things it’s important to play for time. So gradually build them up let them get comfy in the space. He also spends more time than he needs faffing with equipment and getting “test shots”. During this time Toby is just building a relationship with them before he starts taking the photos. Then before long Toby can feel the trust has grown enough and he can start.
Sam and Marcus said this reminds them of the episode about listening with Colin D Smith where he said it was important to listen when people speak and relax into the space. Toby says when his clients leave they say they have had a great experience and are really looking forward to seeing their photographs.

Toby thinks he has lost some work to people using an AI app. But, Toby says he is not really concerned about this as the personal element in the headshot is so important. That building of confidence is so important. But Toby thinks also that AI will help with the post photoshoot work.
Toby said lots of photographers in the APHP helped him. Robin Savage, Nicolas Dawks, Gareth Bailey and Adam Hills. They let Toby come to sessions and assist on shoots, which really taught Toby an huge amount. He found these more inspirational than photographers he found online.

You can find Toby at

https://www.headshottoby.co.uk/

Marcus has a wide experience in fashion having worked in it for many years, and then being a fashion photography lectures.

It’s a team sport
Fashion photography involves a team of people, not just the photographer. This might include hair and make up, stylist, model and assistant. Marcus says as a fashion photography there is no need to know anything about clothes. This is the job of the stylist.

Stylist As a fashion photographer you need to build relationships with a good stylist. We have a podcast episode where we interview mens stylist Nick Hemms.

Hair and make up people who are good at fashion shoots are hard to find. It’s important to note that fashion make up is very different from other types of make up.

Assistants are very helpful on a shoot. They mean you are able to focus on the model and the look, while the assistant is working in the background on the setup.

Models are a vital part of the fashion shoot. Marcus says fashion models often look a little different, have a striking look. It is vital to find a model that helps you get the end look you are looking for. The simplest way to find a model is to talk to a model agency. Marcus says they often have new models on their books who are looking for gaining images for their portfolio. But before an agency lets you work with them they will want to see some of your work.
Fashion vocabulary

Look book. This is a photograph usually with a plain background where the garment is front and centre.

Editorial This is a series of shots that often are telling a story
Shooting ahead In the fashion world the photography is for items coming out 6 months ahead. That means that in the summer you could be shooting ski wear and bikinis in the winter
Edging / street look vs. episode
Catwalk / print The look is very different
Call sheet This is a list of everyone on the shoot and all the information about the shoot.
Ready to wear vs haute couture Make sure yuo know the difference
The September issue – This is a film about the fashion world that Marcus recommends watching.

This week, we're joined by professional photographer Martin Hobby. With over 30 years in the industry, Martin has experience in many genres, from weddings to corporate work to music photography. He shares his story, offering valuable advice on how to build a successful career and handle life’s unexpected challenges. Martin also sheds light on the business side of photography, the importance of community, and the surprising role of personal setbacks in professional growth.

Keywords: photography, professional photographer, commercial photography, business, networking, career, wedding photography

What you’ll learn from this episode:

The value of assisting: Find out why working as an assistant for an established professional photographer can be one of the best moves you can make for your career.

Why community and networking are so important: Discover how a supportive network of fellow photographers can lead to referrals, friendships, and a stronger business.

How to turn setbacks into success: Learn how to adapt your business and photography skills to overcome unexpected challenges, from moving house to global events.This week, we're joined by professional photographer Martin Hobby. With over 30 years in the industry, Martin has experience in many genres, from weddings to corporate work to music photography. He shares his story, offering valuable advice on how to build a successful career and handle life’s unexpected challenges. Martin also sheds light on the business side of photography, the importance of community, and the surprising role of personal setbacks in professional growth.

Keywords: photography, professional photographer, commercial photography, business, networking, career, wedding photography

What you’ll learn from this episode:

The value of assisting: Find out why working as an assistant for an established professional photographer can be one of the best moves you can make for your career.

Why community and networking are so important: Discover how a supportive network of fellow photographers can lead to referrals, friendships, and a stronger business.

How to turn setbacks into success: Learn how to adapt your business and photography skills to overcome unexpected challenges, from moving house to global events.

 This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠01482 765871
This week Sam talks about apps you can use in your business.

Accounting apps

This is a vital part of all of our businesses. This can be done on excel, but this doesn’t give you much business information. The app also makes your life easy in many ways. Once the template is set up sending invoices is quick and easy. The app also gives you key business information in the form of reports. It also makes paying VAT easy. Xero and Quickbooks are the biggest players in town. Zoho Books is an option and can integrate with other apps. There is also Wave which is much simpler than ⁠Xero⁠ and ⁠Quickbooks  but has some free features. The free  version is great but Sam doesn’t rate the premium version
Project / business management
These are effectively ways to organise your to do lists. We can get overloaded with post it notes, pieces of paper etc. These help us get more organised. They are great for repeating task lists that you can use for consistency with every customer. It also helps with tracking the day to day tasks you need to do.  The main apps here are Monday Asana and Trello. These do very similar things but in different ways. They all have free trials, so you can try them and see which one you like. For most photographers the free version of these will do the jobs you need.
CRM
This is a customer relationship management tool. Many CRMS do a wide range of tasks. But, at that core they track all of the people you speak to and every conversation you have had with them. You can click on someone and see all the email, phone call and other conversations you have had with this person. It also allows you to set reminders to help you get back to leads or customers at the right time.  Most CRMs also do many other things such as email marketing and landing pages. Marcus uses Studio Ninja which is photography specific. Sam says it’s easy to setup CRMs as as soon as anyone emails you they are entered automatically into the CRM.
There are lots of CRMS. Sam uses Hubspot free version and has done for 6 years. There is also Freshworks and of course Zoho. Sam says in terms of a CRM, a photography business is like any other so Sam doesn’t see how useful a photography specific CRM would be.

Book an appointment app
Marcus brings these up as useful apps. They all do a similar thing. They hook up to your diary and allow people to book appointments. They work well. Marcus uses Calendly and Sam uses Doodle. It does save a lot of time going back and forth organising appointments.

AI
Sam says AI like ChatGPT is really useful for all sorts of things. For example checking a contract you’ve written, changing a blog into a LinkedIn article, giving you blog ideas etc. Don’t use it for creating content though.
Communication Apps

WhatsApp Business is a great app. WhatsApp is a great way to communicate with customers and leads. It looks more professional that standard WhatsApp and is free. Slack is great if there are several people in your business. If there is just you it’s a waste of time. But if there is several of you it is a great way to organise the communication within your business.

This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here

⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠

⁠01482 765871⁠

The show starts talking about why would you have a business plan?

The most basic answer is it helps you achieve your goals in life and in business. This is linked to where you and your business want to be in one year or in five years. Then the key is working out how you are going to get there. Sam thinks this is the essence of a business plan and it should be for you, personally.  The goals might be financial, lifestyle, number of shoots whatever is relevant and important for you.

So the business plan is about you helping yourself to achieve your goals. This means the business plan is not a one off price of work that is then ignored. It is a living document, it is guiding us day to day to help us meet our goals.
What do you put in a business plan?
It depends what your goals are. There will usually be a financial element. There will be steps you need to take to achieve your goals. Most plans will include: Marketing, sales and finance as a minimum. There could be all sorts of other things in there like business processes, your team (if you have one). There could be a section on your development and equipment. The key is it’s about the things needed to reach your goals.

Marcus asks about if there are apps etc to help. Sam said there are loads of advice and templates out there. It’s a case of finding ones that work for you.
The business plan usually contains big steps in your journey to achieve your goals. Therefore you need a system to break those down into much smaller steps that you implement in day to life in your business.

Marcus asked if an accountant or business coach is the best person to speak to, to get support with making a business plan. Sam suggests it depends on the focus of your plan.

The first step in your business planning process is thinking about what do you want to achieve. This is about making it interesting, fun and relevant for you.

The Royal Photography Society
This week Marcus is doing the show solo, without Sam, and talking to Dr Michael Pritchard from the Royal Photography Society(RPS).  
Michael’s story

Photography has been something Michael has been involved in since he was 11  years old.  He started working as a Saturday boy in a professional studio in the late 70s. The studio did a wide range of different work from weddings, studio and commercial work. He also got to work in the black and white darkroom. This really sparked Michael’s passion for photography. They allowed him to do his own work there, using the professional dark room.

Michael went to university, but would always come back in the holidays and do more work and use the dark room. He started to develop a love of the history of photography and joined the RPS as a junior member as he wanted access to the historical group within the society. He used to go to the RPS’s London location in London and meet with the historical group.
Michael got a job at Christie’s as they knew of his historical knowledge of cameras and photographs. He was organising auctions at Christie’s. Michael learnt a huge amount about the history of photography through this work.  Michael still now has a small amount of historical cameras which he still uses from time to time. He worked in Christie’s for about 20 years. He then moved to do a Phd in the history of photography. While there he still did some work from Christie’s and for the British Library who had gained the Kodak library and needed help organising it.

Michael also did some teaching at DeMontford university on a module on the history of photography. Then in 2011 as he was finishing his Phd he was approached about applying for a role of the RPS as director general. Since then the role has been split in two and he then moved to the programs and education side of the role.

What does the RPS do for photographers?

The RPS is a registered charity and a membership organisation. There ultimate goal is member education, helping them become better photographers. Most members of the RPS are amateur, although some are professional. Some photographers get letters after their name showing their work has been recognised by the RPS. The RPS has a journal the has been going for over 150 years. The RPS do a lot of work with the local universities. The RPS has moved from Bath to Bristol. The Bristol location gives them a large exhibition space and an auditorium. Their exhibition changes every year, but some of the work can date back to the start of the RPS. The RPS is a community of people, about ten thousand members. Part of the RPS’s work is building that community. Michael also reminds us that photography should be fun and sometimes we can forget this.

Artificial intelligence

Marcus asked Michael about AI. The RPS has issued a statement about AI.
Generative AI is something the RPS is wrestling with. The RPS doesn’t see AI generated images as photography. There is also the use of AI in software. So the software in your smartphone, the software in photoshop all uses AI. The RPS is comfortable about most of that, be it autofocus, setting enhancement etc. But then this software is starting to go forward doing things like replacing the sky. That is then an issue as it is no longer really a photograph. The RPS is actively wrestling with these issues. A lot of photographers are already using AI in their practice and Michael thinks it is better to work with AI than fight against it, but within certain parameters. He sees no reason why photographers can’t embrace it into their practice, as they did with digital when that came out.

Sam and Marcus have a cozy fireside Christmas chat about the podcast over the last year. Marcus refers back to our very first show Degree or disagree. Marcus loves this for the content of the show and for the pun. This is always a debate that stirs up a lot of emotion.

Sam refers back to the show on networking. As networking is such an important part of your marketing for photographers. Marcus thinks thinks networking in person will be a great place to focus for 2024. He is going to try to do more face to face networking next year. He touches on the idea that it can be better to have a small strong community than a wide shallow pool of connections.  
Marcus then talks about the show we did with Colin Smith the listening guy Marcus thinks that taking part in the show has made Sam and him better listeners and better podcasts hosts.
Sam talks about the show with Donna Green. That show stands out for Sam because she was so organised. She had all her processes and systems very well organised.

Gillian Devine is a photographer of 18 years. Gillian started with weddings and babies, but is now a brand photographer, business coach and marketing mentor to other photographers.
Gillian says she is where she is today as married the wrong man. She started in corporate marketing and then married a man called Phil Devine. His dad Vincent Devine was a professional photographer with 40 years experience. Gillian started to go to weddings with him. Vincent eventually mentored Gillian and helped her become a photographer. She then took over the family business. Sadly Vincent has passed away and Gillian is now longer married to Phil, but the photography continues.

Gillian went through a dark time during her divorce. Her business and confidence took a big knock and she was left in a lot of debt. But she then built the business and her life back up. Working hard to get where she is today. She now helps other photographers grow their business.
Sam and Gillian discuss how important being able to run a business is, and without these business and marketing skills it is hard to have a successful business. Marcus and Gillian think that back in the 90s or 2000s there were less photographers and less competition. So much less marketing was needed. A few local ads used to be enough back then. But Gillian says there is still plenty of work out there, but you need to market yourself well and get the work that is out there. Sam asks what a photographer should do who is struggling to get work. Gillian says it’s all down to your visibility, messaging and experience. Marketing is about building new connections and relationships. It’s a bit like the dating scene you have to meet a lot of people, getting visible, and then start conversations. You need to know who your ideal client is. And then you need to know where your clients hang out. As an example Gillian collaborated with a pregnancy yoga class when she was doing new born photography. Sam and Gillian discuss that first conversation and what it could be about. Gillian says advice and a free download is really great at this point. For example Gillian’s first lead magnet was a guide to what to pack into their bag for going to hospital. Nothing to do with photography. And the initial conversation is all about them. Ask lots of questions and get to know them. Gillian explains that the technical side of lead magnets does put people off. Email marketing apps are vital though, these must be used for email marketing and lead magnets.

Gillian and Marcus discuss brand photography. Gillian says that she loves it as it combines all of the elements of other areas of photography that she loves. For example the story of a wedding. Brand photography also ticks boxes to make Gillian’s life how she wants it. She has her weekends free, unlike being a wedding photographer.

Marcus asks what makes a good branding photograph. Gillian says it’s full of vibe and personality. It has to tell a story of who that person is. So the photos need to reflect the person who is being photographed. Gillian says it is also a suit of images that include storytelling elements. It isn’t just a portrait.
Gillian now lives in Spain. When she first though about moving in Spain she started marketing to people in Spain right away. And so when she arrived she already had quite a number of English speaking clients in Spain. For any photographer moving it’s important to plan ahead and start marketing into your new area.
Gillian and Marcus agree that branding photography is very new and has really only established itself in the Uk in the last couple of years. Gillian is excited about the future for brand photography with 5.5 million businesses in the UK and they all need brand photography.
You can get in touch with Gillan, she holds regular free marketing workshops and masterclasses which you can access below.

https://gilliandevine.com/masterclass

https://www.linkedin.com/in/gillian-devine/

Marcus’s answer is… it depends!

The pros of working for free

If you are starting out as a photographer Marcus thinks there are some advantages to working for free.

One is getting experience. Marcus thinks that if you are working for free it allows you to try the client photographer relationship but without the client handing over any money.
Portfolio building is another reason to work for free. When you are starting out you need portfolio photographs for your website, social and to show people.
Experimentation. Marcus thinks this is another reason to work for free. You can be a bit more creative and experimental.
The cons of working for free
If you have worked for someone for free it can be hard to charge them if they come back and want further work.

People who get your work for free don’t value what you produce and don’t value your time. Sam and Marcus us the analogy of the supermarket, we value more the food we get from Waitrose than the food we get from Liddle.

Remember your time is valuable and does have a cost.

If you do work for free it is very important that you set clear expectations from the start of a free photo shoot what is the outcome. What will you deliver and how much input to they get in this.

Working for charities
Should you charge working for charities? Marcus initially never charged for working with charities. But now he has realised that the charities are full of people getting paid so why shouldn’t the photographer get paid to? Sam and Marcus discuss this could be variable depending on the charity, small local ones compared to large national ones. But do remember the accountant, marketing agency etc are all charging charities for their work.
Editorial photography
This means photography for magazines. This is not an area with much money in it. But it is a chance for your photographs to be seen by many people who would not normally see it. Marcus has never been paid for photos in a magazine, and it costs him time and money for the shoot. But Marcus feels the benefits of getting his photographs in the magazine out way the costs.
Personal projects
Marcus thinks all photographers should be doing personal projects. This portfolio can be shown to potential clients. Marcus says that this got him quickly to have a good job in photography.

She helps people who have got to a point in mid life when they start ask who they are and what are they doing. Her job is about finding what really fires people up and she helps them identify that and helps them make the change towards doing what they want. “Life is an illusion of your own creation” How do you see your own life?
Marcus asks what she means by mid life. Sarah says it’s the forty to sixty age bracket officially, but it’s also about mind set and where we are. And Sam commented that this is linked to children leaving home. Sarah says this is a time when people can lose themselves. It is also important to let them go and find their own way in life. Hovering over the children and not letting them make mistakes and learn doesn’t help them.

Mid life is a time when many people set up their own business, be that photography or other businesses. Sarah went through a divorce at this time and a little later set up her own business as a recruitment consultant.  
Sam asked about what someone should do who is thinking about a move to setting up their own photography business. Sarah says the key is just get out their and do it. Find out what it is you like about photography and get out there and do that specific thing. Right now don’t worry about making money from it. Just get out there and work on what you love doing. And as you get known for this area of photography, you will start to find work. The key is find this area of photography that is your passion.

Sarah says also avoid the push to always grow the business, scale up and move to the next level. The key is to do what is right for you right now. If you wish to make money so you can travel the world, why not make money by taking photographs while travelling around the world. There are different ways of doing things. Make sure you know what you want your life to look like, and work out from there. And be creative in how you do it. Sarah says you should value yourself, but also don’t focus on the money. Focus on what you want.

Marcus asked Sarah some tips of how to get from A to B. Sarah says the first thing is define B and be specific. Where do you want to live, who do you want to spend time with, what do you want to do. And spend time thinking about this and getting it right. Without this clarity there is nothing you can do. Once you have this clarity then you can think about when opportunities come along, are these opportunities going to help me move towards B. Stepping into the role of where you are at B helps. Tell people who you are. Be present with the language you use with yourself and others. Know that B is where you want to be and talk about this in a positive way. Be yourself and follow your own path. Don’t compare yourself to others and let them bring you time. Just focus on what you want and getting to B. Surrounding yourself with the right people can really help with this.

You can reach Sarah at any of the places below

https://www.sarahjnaylor.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarahjnaylor/

https://www.instagram.com/sjncoaching/

This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here

⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠

⁠01482 765871⁠

There are several different models for how to decide on a price for your services. We talk about some of the main ones in the show.

1. Charge per hour.
With this approach you decide what you want to be paid per hour. Then work out how much time the whole process takes and work out a price accordingly.

2. Look at your competitors
Look at your competitors websites. If you are feeling a little cheeky, phone another photographer and pretend to be a lead and get a price
3. Value pricing
What is the value of your work? This is hard to define. You have to think what value are you providing to someone with your service. For example what is the value of someone having that wedding album for the rest of their life and having had an amazing experience on the day.

4. Cost of business model

For this approach out you work out for your business how much everything costs, including paying you the rate you want to be paid. Then work out how many jobs you will do a year. Then divide the total cost by the number of jobs and that is how much that photo-shoot costs.

Marcus mainly follows the value based system for his branding photography. But for event photography Marcus just charges on a per hour basis. And then on the rare occasion he does weddings he generally looks at others in the market and charges a similar amount.

New businesses almost always charge too little.

Almost all new businesses charge far too little for their services. Often new businesses can easily double their price and still have a good price. But when you do this you may initially lose customers as you move from the bottom end market into a higher level market. Sam suggests that almost everyone with a new business can increase their prices easily.
Should you display your pricing?

This is a big debate and everyone has a different view on this. Marcus uses the “My prices start from” approach. It is helpful that leads get a ballpark figure. Sam thinks if you have a subscription service these should always be clearly priced. He also suggests that having some packages and pricing them is a good idea. Just make sure your package is not really comparable to other photographers. That avoids direct price comparison.
Subtly showing pricing

The way your website and marketing look already gives subtle ideas about pricing. The customers shown the way it looks already gives leads an idea of how expensive you are.
Stick to your guns

If you give a price do not negotiate. Stick to the price you have offered. If it is too expensive for them offer them less for a lower price. But don’t just drop the price. If the price goes down what they get also needs to go down.
Working for free

Marcus suggests this is a good thing to do if there are specific things you need. For example you need photos for your portfolio if you have a new business. But ensure that if you do this you make it very clear what you want out of the process.

Allie used to lecture and the  decided to walk away when she had a photograph hanging in a gallery alongside work by Martin Parr. Allie started photography when she was 16 or 17 shooting black and white with film. But Allie had a difficult childhood and so felt she had to get a “sensible” degree so she did a degree in English literature. She then taught, until she felt she had been “bled dry”. When her daughter was in her teens Allie Crewe went to night school to study photography. Allie had already studied film and Italian at night school and loved learning.

Allie’s journey from night class to gallery was an interesting one. Her first tutor thought an image (you can see it here), the one hanging on Allie’s wall behind us as we record the podcast, had something about it. So her tutor sent it to a curator. wasn’t sure about it being sent, but her tutor sent it while Allie was taking a break in the loo. Her work was accepted and ended up in a gallery amongst lots of photographs by high calibre male photographers. She came home three mornings afterwards and decided that she would leave the security of teaching and move to being a photographer.

It changed her life. From that initial success Allie has quickly enjoyed a lot of success. She had an exhibition about domestic violence that was opened by Queen Camilla. And that bought a lot of press and publicity.

Allie is unsure as to whether she could have managed this work when she was younger. All the work has been about her in some way. She has started her work thinking about herself and then connected to a group and the work then becomes about the group. One example of this was her work with trans women. Allie’s work has appeared in many national papers including the Guardian, the Telegraph and the Sun. She enjoys the social conscience work and making work that is relevant to people who want change. And she enjoys being authentic and becoming part of the group she is working with.
Allie has won several awards including the BJP (British Journal of Photography) award. She got this with an image of Grace, a doctor. Allie feels that the award was a way of validating herself. Allie explained that this is a male dominated industry with a 40% pay gap. She felt this award made her feel validated and helped with imposter syndrome. But as well as the positives awards add pressure including pressure to get more. Allie also has an award from the RPS (Royal Photography Society).

Allie is currently studying for her masters at Ulster and in her first year her tutor was Ken Grant. He is now with Donovan Wylie. She was with ken at Martin Parr’s studio for a few days. It was there she got asked to enter the RPS award.
Sam and Allie discussed the idea that there are awards at every level that photographers can go for and these wards are great for your marketing. But equally this is not compulsory as a photographer. We can as photographers do work just for ourselves.
Allies Instagram references Chris Killip who is a photographer she is drawn to. She found his recent exhibition very emotional. Allie has been careful in her masters to only reference female photographers, but personally she likes all sorts of photographers.
Alessandra Sanguinetti has an amazing book called "Some say Ice". Alys Tomlinson is also an influence who Allie was looking at on the morning of our conversation.
Allie still shots film, 35mm and medium format. She loves her Mamiya camera.
Marcus asks Allie how people can get into shooting portraits for exhibitions magazines and books. Allie explains that for her she chose something than was personal and took it from there. She worked as an artist in residency with the help of her connections (ones she had worked hard to build). From that starting point she felt the artistic residency gave her the legitimacy she needed when showing her work or entering it for competitions.

 Marcus talks through his customers' experience
Marcus’s customer journey

Marcus likes to respond initial enquiries quickly, ideally within an hour. He then moves on to trying to setup a Zoom call. As photography is visual, having a visual call is really important. That call is all about listening not selling. Zoom also means ideas can be shared visually.
After this Marcus will send out a quote, which is done automatically using his CRM. So Marcus doesn’t really talk much about pricing in that initial call, that comes in with the quote goes out.
If the job goes ahead Marcus sets up another Zoom call before the shoot. This is a very creative call, talking about clothes, props and locations. It’s also a great way to get clients used to working you before you even meet.
People don’t like being photographed.
Marcus think in the UK people would prefer to go to the dentist than have their photograph taken. That means photographers need lots of...

Techniques to relax people
Chatting to them
Ask them about what people do, what they did at the weekend etc. All the classic questions to try and engage people.
Get people involved in the process

Shooting tethered means subjects can see the results of the photographs on the screen. They can then engage much more actively with the photography.   Ask them about clothes, props and angles.

Things Marcus does
Observe

Marcus observes people intently. He is looking for things they naturally do and then asks them to do those in the photos. It might be a way they hold their head or a way they hold their hands.

Mirror

This is either you showing them something and ask them to follow it. Or even better if you can quickly build rapport you can get them to just automatically copy you. So for example if you cross your arms they do it to.
Direct

This is the classic of the photographer telling the subject what to do.

After the shoot

Initially Marcus narrows the photos down to about forty or fifty photos that he sends to the client via an online platform. He has found sending more than this just confuses the client. These photos have had a light edit, but not much more.  From then what happens depends on the client. Some keep all the images, some make a selection.

Lauren McWilliams is a Brand photographer and Strategist. Lauren works with ambitious service based entrepreneurs across the UK through photography and programmes.

With a keen eye for capturing the essence of brands through photography and a knack for strategic thinking, she’s the go-to for those looking to make a lasting impact in their market.

 Her passion for helping others can be seen and was recently recognised in the Great British Entrepreneur Awards 2022 as a finalist for Young Entrepreneur of the year. 

Lauren's business story

Lauren started her business in 2019 not long before the pandemic began. When she started she had no idea how to run a business. Photography had always been a passion, so when she burnt out from her 9 to 5 job, she setup a photography business. Lauren got lots of support from the local authority for her business.

Lauren started saying yes to any work that came along, like almost all of us do when we start a business. She quickly realised that what she enjoyed most was working with businesses. When the pandemic hit she had no work, as with most photographers. So, she decided to launch a challenge to help keep businesses telling their story.

After lockdown she was suddenly fully booked having run the challenge. As she worked more Lauren realised that customers didn’t know what to do with their photographs. Most of the photographs she gave to customers stayed hidden. So she started to learn more about marketing and then started to help her customers with this.

Lauren ended up with a contract as a consultant to support businesses in the same way as she had received support at the beginning of her business journey.

Where do Lauren's customers begin as photography or branding clients?

Lauren is known mainly as a photographer and so her clients tend to come in for photography, but then they move on to also become brand strategy clients once they have their photographs. Lauren works with businesses over a long period of time and builds up a long term relationship with them, which she really values. She tells us the story of a recruitment business that she has documented over time. Initially it was just the CEO of the business on her own. Now she has a team of 20 or 30 with a new office. Lauren has documented those changes.

What could photographers could do to add more value to clients.

Lauren suggests building more of a relationship with the client. Ensuring realty careful panning happens before the photo shoot. As an example for a corporate photo shoot you could involve the people having their photo taken from the planning stage. Ask them for ideas so that they can become involved in the process and start to own it and enjoy it.

Collaboration

Lauren thinks it is really important as photographers to collaborate and learn from each other. When she started off she found some local photographers saw her as a threat and wouldn’t answer her questions. Later she found more supportive photographers. She is now using her skills and knowledge to help other photographers. 

Shoot to the top Facebook Group

We have launched a Facebook group for the podcast. You can find it here. Lauren, Sam and Marcus are there and you can ask them questions. 

Sam asked Lauren how we can make content to show the person we are without making it to much “me,me,me”. She says the balance is that we show who we are but we balance that with sharing out networks and our clients success. Lauren suggests the simple things that photographers could do to improve their marketing is to practice what they preach. Photographers are usually telling clients to get out and be visible. But then many photographers then hide behind the camera and aren’t seen. You can contact Lauren here.

lauren@foryouphotographer.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauren-mcwilliams-brand-photographer/

https://laurenmcwilliams.co.uk/

Suzanne has been working fo the last 16 years as a personal stylist. Once people find what clothes suit them and work for them, shopping and dressing becomes so much easier.

Suzanne was nurse for a while, but decided it wasn’t for her. She then studied fashion and worked for various high street brands. From there she had her own shop. After she closed that business she trained as a stylist and has been working as a stylist ever since. Suzanne’s shop was a ladies accessory shop with a café. Marcus points out that twenty years ago having a café in a shop has ahead of it’s time.

She trained and then worked with the House of Colour in Watford.

Suzanne says now she tends to work with 40 plus business people. And the proportion of men she is working with is gradually increasing. With lockdown and the use of Zoom men are spending a lot more time looking at themselves and either getting bored with what they see or deciding they want some help with styling. We have spoken to a male stylist Nick Hemms.
Suzanne works as a stylist with one photographer in particular, Suzanne Fells. She helps Suzanne's clients helping them find clothes that are appropriate before a photo shoot. This allows them to arrive at the photo shoot stress free, prepared and more in control.

Marcus has asked what Suzanne does if brand colours don’t suit a client going for a brand photoshoot. She says in that case she aims for neutral colours that fit them and the brand.
Sam asks how she goes about finding what colours work for people. Suzanne says its about skin tone. She starts with the primary colours, red, yellow and blue. Once she has looked at skin tone and the colours she works out which work best together. Marcus asks how she makes sure that the clothes people  where are authentic. Suzanne says it’s a lot about asking lots of questions about there current clothes and lifestyle. And asking lots of questions as people try different clothes.

Suzanne has regular photo shoots for her business with Suzanne Fells. Suzanne says that with all of the photos you can ensure you look authentic on social media while using all these new images.

Marcus asks Suzanne to share some hints for photographers. Suzanne know how many outfits a client is going to need. Talk to them about ensuring they are clean and ironed and take them I a bag that won’t crease them. Ensure the clients give themselves plenty of time before the shoot to sort their hair and make up. Marcus asks about colours. She says some colours are universal and work well for lots of people like teal and coral. Some light colours can look washed out in photos. Suzanne says dark colours, not necessarily black, give people authority. A jacket also tends to give authority. Suzanne also says those with brighter eyes tend to be able to wear brighter clothes.

Suzanne also advices women on make up and hair colour. Marcus points out that we had a whole show about hair colour with Sonya Dove. Changing hair colour can change what clothes and colours work for them.

Suzanne suggests that people get a style review every few years as skin tone and hair colour changes. Marcus asks about make up brands. Suzanne says she works with Colour me beautiful which is a colour based make up brand. She also no 7

recommends No 7. IN terms of make up for photo shoots, Suzanne says neutral is good, don’t go too bright. Chanel have a virtual lipstick app so you can try different colours of lipstick.  

Marcus says working with a clothing stylist is great for a photographer. Sam says although adding a stylist adds cost to the shoot, it does add a lot of value.Marcus asks if Suzanne could share a women and a man she would like to work with. Suzanne says she’d love to work with Mary Berry. She thinks she could work with Mary’s make up. Suzanne says she’d love to work on Boris Johnson and tidy him up.

This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here

⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠

⁠01482 765871⁠

In this episode Sam says we should talk much less about ourselves in our marketing. People are interested in themselves, not about you. So if your marketing is talking about you, the people receiving it are not very interested. They are more interested in themselves.

Social
Who was your last social post about? Was it about you? If so how interesting is that for other people?

Some people think that being on social media regularly means talking about yourself all the time. This is not engaging for other people.

So what can you post about?

• Helping others. By doing this you are helping people, but subtly showing them you are an expert.   
• Ask a question. Ask others for their ideas and opinions.
• Commenting on other peoples posts. This is helping to build a community not just talking about yourself.

Websites
Visitors come to your website because they have a problem and want to know if you can solve it. The general public don’t browse photographers websites for fun. They come to see if you can solve their problem. So are you talking about the visitor and their problems and how you can solve them.
The "I" test
Look at your website. How many times do you use the word "I"(or we) and how many times do you say the word "you". If you use "I", more than "you", then you need to re-focus your website to the visitor and away from "you".

About me page

You have to even make the about page not about you, but what you have done, how you have helped people, rather just your story from birth.
Blogs, videos and testimonials
These are a great way to show how great you are and how knowledgeable you are without you having to do it directly. Visitors reading your blogs will realise you are an expert over time as they read your blogs.

Networking
This also applies to meeting people in networking meetings. Let the person you are meeting talk as much as possible. You will build great relationships as people will see you are interested in them.

Newsletters
This principal again applies to the newsletter. A newsletter that just explains what happens in your office last week is not engaging. A newsletter should not be your news. It should be entertaining, informing and engaging.
Promoting yourself is not the same as talking about yourself. You want other people to be talking about you and your brand, you don’t want to be doing this yourself.

Pascalle Bergman is a person who puts this into practice perfectly. She is constantly helping people, not talking about herself. Find her here on LinkedIn

In this show we talk to Colin D Smith who is an expert in listening. A skill we have talked about many times in the show.

Listening makes people feel needed and valued. It is something that can be learnt either through coaching in group settings or 121. Even though most people think they are good listeners in reality very few people have the skills to do it well. And this is reflected in society with a rise in loneliness and sadly suicide rates.

Colin goes on to say the importance of using open ended questions

“how do you feel about that?”

“ interesting, what more do you want to say about that?”

Sam poses the question of how can we use this in our business, in particular networking.

Good listening can results in building trust and be more likeable. So when dealing with customers get them to open up with open questions, exploring different options. And if you become a better listener your clients will in turn listen closer to you. It's a win win!

Colin believes deeper listening can be learnt. Clear away distractions, go in to your discussions with a settled mind and be more in the present. Avoid interrupting, stop trying to fix things, don’t be an eighteen second manager.

Colin goes on to re-enforce the quality of being present. Think along the lines of becoming a listener as to doing it.  Take a three second pause after the other person has finished speaking, observe their body movements. Listen for key phrases

“I have never told this to someone before”

Marcus brings up non verbal conversations. Eye contact, facing people during conversations, equality of viewpoints all contribute to the effectiveness of listening.

In times where you have to get to know people quickly, head shots, for example, it is important to get yourself centered before and during the event. Keep a calm demeanor in spite of everything.

Good listening skills will make your clients feel that they have the right person on the job.

You can contact Marcus

colin.smith@dexteritysolutions.co.uk

https://dexteritysolutions.co.uk/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/colindsmith1

07939-013651

Creativity and Rest
Marcus takes us back to episode 12 and reminds us about the 5 Rs of creativity

• Rules
• Research
• Reflection
• Repetition
• Rest
  

Today Marcus is going to talk more about the subject of rest.

Marcus has been looking at the latest research into creativity. According to the research your brain works in two different modes

1.   “Default Mode Network”

When you are not really thinking about anything. When you do something by habit. Like having a shower in the morning, or driving your car and you arrived without knowing how you got there. It is when your thoughts are going inwards

2.    “Executive Control Network”

This is when you are really in the zone and doing focused activity.

It’s been discovered that the Default mode network is linked to creativity.
Taking the time

 When Marcus wants to think about ideas he sits down in the evening with a glass of wine. Sam suggests then that meditation should be part of this process, which Marcus agrees with. It’s important to find that quiet space, and think about nothing and let the ideas come to you. It’s crucial this is in a quite space with nothing else going on.

Notebook
Marcus recommends always having a notebook to hand to write down your ideas as they come to you. But also Marcus says as you get better at getting creative ideas you can also train your brain to remember these ideas.
How to start
For Marcus he says about 8pm he sits in quiet with a glass of wine and just sits, and thinks. And the more you try this the easier it becomes. There is lots of meditation help online, both in terms of techniques and calming sound tracks. Marcus recommends doing this every day. Finding that time can be very challenging. But it is worth that effort. For some people the day time is a better time, when the house is quiet. It’s important to try and schedule that quiet time into your day.

Long term

This is a long term process and it will take time to get better at this. There is a great Netflix documentary about this

This episode is sponsored by Website for photographers. Website 4 photographers help photographers get more leads from their websites. You can get in touch here

⁠info@website4photographers.co.uk⁠

⁠01482 765871⁠

In this episode Marcus and Sam discuss the different platforms available for building a website. Sam grouped into three different broad groups.
1. The self build platforms – Wix, SquareSpace, Shopify and others
2. Content management system platforms. This is dominated by WordPress, but there are other platforms here like Joomla

3. Custom coding. This means someone builds a site for you using code.
Self Build websites
These are easy to use drag and drop website platforms. These make it very easy to get a website online. With some use of templates, dragging and dropping you can make something that looks quite good, quite quickly. They are easy to use  and deal with maintenance, security and hosting for you. This means it’s one simple monthly or annual payment and it covers everything. Once you chose one of these platforms you are locked into it. So if they dramatically increase your prices your only choice is to give up on that website, or pay the higher price. The speed and SEO for these platforms has improved dramatically in the last ten years, however they are behind the other types of website in these areas. Speed effects visitors experience and can also push you down the Google rankings. These platforms also have limits as to what they can do. They have quite a good range of functionality.  But if you want to go beyond the functionality they provide, you have to start again with a different platform.
Sam explains there is a lot more to building a website than adding some text and images and making it look pretty. Take a listen to our back catalogue to get some ideas about this.
WordPress and other CMS platforms
They talk about Wordpress here as it’s the dominant force. Sam explains that Wordpress is quite a basic platform (a bit like a new phone) but you can then add plugins (like apps on your phone) that can do all sorts of things. Some are free, some premium, some freemium. There are different ways to build a WordPress website, but many now use a visual editor so you can see what you are doing. But they are not drag and drop builders like Wix.
When using WordPress you do need to think about your own security and updates. This isn’t that complicated, but does need thinking about. The most important thing is to keep all the software up to date.  Wordpress websites can move between website hosting. So if you have a problem with one web hosting service, you can move it to a different one.
The number of plugins for websites is huge so there is a wide range of flexibility in what WordPress can do. Because these plugins are used by a wide range of users the cost of writing them is shared across hundreds or thousands of users, which keeps the cost down.
Custom coded website
This means that a site is built just for you. There is no excess code here. It is a way to get a very fast efficient website. It can do a huge range of things. But it is very expensive as a coder writes it just for you. For a simple five page photography website, this would be very over the top. But if you want to do something more complex and you have the budget, it’s a great way to go.

Moving between platforms
Think carefully before committing to a website platform as to leave you have to abandon the website and start again. But also don’t be afraid to let an old website go. For example maybe you built a Website on SquareSpace two years ago and you want to greatly improve it. Think carefully about whether you would be better to over onto another platform and start again, rather than stick to what you have.

 
Image sizes
As a sideline Sam and Marcus started chatting about photographers getting images onto their websites. Sam explained it’s important that photographers don’t add huge images to their websites.