Welcome to The Pet Photographers' Journal, a practical and unfiltered podcast for talented pet photographers ready to build a business with more purpose, passion, and profitability.
I’m Ina J, a pet photographer who turned my side hustle into my full-time career. In this podcast, I share exactly what I’ve learned and actually applied in my own business. We talk about pricing, mindset, marketing, client experience, and sales, without feeling pushy.
Some lessons I picked up from others but I always tweak things to work for me and I’ll tell you how you can too. I overshare sometimes but in the best way possible because I believe in learning from real-life experiences not just theory.
Whether you’re just starting or scaling to five-figure sales this show is your behind-the-scenes guide to pet photography business success.
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Meta Ads for Pet Photographers: What Actually Converts, with Monica Koudsy
Season 2 · Episode 41
Wednesday, November 4, 2026 • Duration 01:01:00
Meta Ads for Pet Photographers: What Actually Converts, with Monica Koudsy
In February, Ina spent $688.80 on a Meta ads competition for National Love Your Pet Day. It brought in 191 leads and 13 bookings. That's a 6.8% conversion rate, which sounds low until you see the sales: a total of $35,326. Before that, she tried Google Ads for about three months, spent two to three thousand dollars, and got zero bookings.
In this episode, Ina sits down with Monica Koudsy, founder of Kurious Group, an agency that runs Meta ads for photography studios. Before the agency, Monica helped open a pet photography studio on Sydney's northern beaches and ran its booking calls and sales herself. They were buying about 750 leads a week, doing five sessions a day, with a $3,000 average sale and fully booked two months in advance. Together they go through Ina's live International Dog Day ad account: the offer, the settings, the lead form, and what happens after the lead comes in.
Key takeaways:
Your offer has to beat the next studio's ad. Monica says once someone clicks on an ad, the next seven to twelve ads they see are your competitors'. Studios copy each other from the Ads Library, so if a competitor's offer is better, they're likely to win that client. For the studios she works with, that usually means gifted artwork or a credit off.
Turn off Advantage+ Audience, or your ads can end up interstate. Monica builds a campaign live to show where Meta hides the settings. With Advantage+ on, a Sydney campaign showed up to 20 million people, because the ads could run in Queensland and Perth. She turns off "reach more people likely to respond", clicks "further limit the reach of your ads" even though Meta promises a 9.7% lower cost if you leave it, sets her own age range, and excludes Audience Network, which she calls a complete waste of money.
Put your budget where the bookings are coming from. Monica recommends setting the budget at the ad set level, not the campaign level. In Ina's account the lookalike audience was bringing in leads at $1.48, so she'd give it more budget and drop the spend on the other two. And if you need to pause, turn the ad off rather than dropping the budget, because dropping the budget alters its learning.
Speed to lead is where bookings are won or lost. Monica contacts new leads within the first 24 hours, because the longer you leave it, the colder the lead gets. Her studios text during commute hours, when people start replying before 9am, aim for at least 10% to respond, and then ask when they can call. Her other tip: ask for a photo of their dog. "The moment you ask someone to send you a photo of their dog, they're your best friend."
A cheaper session fee brings in more rubbish, not more leads. For Australian studios, Monica says $149 to $150 is enough skin in the game that people show up. She has seen good come out of $90, but she has also seen studios struggle to get good clients in at that price.
Use video and statics, and don't over-edit. Monica says face-to-camera video is the most authentic thing you can make, so pick up the phone and record. She recommends the Edits app by Instagram, which has a teleprompter built in, and a good variety of static images alongside.
Want to see the screen share? The video of this episode, with Monica walking through the Meta ad settings on screen, is inside the Consistent Bookings Mastermind.
Edits by Instagram (free video app with a teleprompter)
Meta Ads Library: https://www.facebook.com/ads/library
Work with me in The Consistent Bookings Mastermind
The Consistent Bookings Mastermind is currently open for enrolment. It's a group coaching container focused on implementation support to help you build your repeatable marketing system, with full support across pricing, sales and mindset.
Apply here → The Consistent Bookings MastermindConsistent Bookings Audit
If you're getting inconsistent bookings and you don't know what's causing it, do the free consistent booking audit quiz to find out which gaps is costing you.
💬 Join the Pet Photographers' Collective (free community)
A free community for pet photographers who want to build a profitable, sustainable business with less overwhelm. Inside, Ina shares practical marketing tips, business lessons and mindset shifts, and free resources.
How to Sell Pet Photography Without Feeling Salesy, with Shelley Janes
Season 2 · Episode 40
Monday, November 2, 2026 • Duration 58:34
How to Sell Pet Photography Without Feeling Salesy, with Shelley Janes
Selling feels salesy. Emailing your list feels spammy. Posting your offer twice feels like bothering people. That's what Ina hears from pet photographers over and over, so she asked a sales psychologist about it. Shelley Janes says if you're scared of turning into the pushy person who gave you the ick, that fear is evidence you never will.
In this episode, Ina sits down with Shelley Janes, a sales psychologist with a master's in psychology and 20 years in sales. Shelley was the first sales hire for a Techstars company and then a Y Combinator company in San Francisco, burned out, and now lives outside Amsterdam teaching people how to sell without pressure or manipulation. They talk through pet photography sales from the consult to the ordering appointment: story selling, the money conversation, what to say when a client says it's too expensive, and why your emails only feel spammy when you only email to ask.
Key takeaways:
Sell what a normal day looks like with it. Shelley once sold salad-making robots to food service distributors at conferences. She was told to talk about the specs. Instead she described employees at a company like Google getting a fresh, customised salad that no one had touched, at any hour. For pet photographers, she says, what you're selling is art on their wall forever.
Use a past client's story to take the pressure off. Shelley's favourite way to sell is to talk about another client, like the one who thought she only wanted a few prints and ended up choosing a big piece above her fireplace, and what that cost. It shows you're capable and that people love what you do, and because you're talking about a third person, the listener's defences stay down.
Have the money conversation long before the ordering appointment. Ina's clients see her pricing before they book a consult, and get a video to watch after they book. At the consult she asks where they'd like to display their photos, then tells them most of her clients spend between $1,000 and $3,000. Some clients now pre-purchase before their session. When Ina's first meeting with a client was at the park on the day of the session, her average sale was around $600 to $700. Once she made an in-person consult the only way to book, it went up to $2,800.
Connect with Shelley:Resources mentioned:Work with me in The Consistent Bookings MastermindApply here → The Consistent Bookings MastermindConsistent Bookings AuditConnect with Ina💬 Join the Pet Photographers' Collective (free community)
Your Pet Photography About Page: How to Find Your Real Story, with Andrea Shah
Season 2 · Episode 39
Monday, October 19, 2026 • Duration 01:00:27
Your Pet Photography About Page: How to Find Your Real Story, with Andrea Shah
When Ina built her first website, her About page said she loved photography and had done darkroom in high school. Copywriter Andrea Shah hears a version of that story from almost every photographer she works with. She wants to hear the one that's actually yours.
In this episode, Ina sits down with Andrea Shah, a US copywriter who writes website copy for wedding photographers and other creative businesses. They talk through pet photography website copy from a copywriter's side: where to find your real story, how to talk about pricing without scaring off the right people, how much to write so Google and AI search can find you, and whether AI should be writing your copy at all.
Key takeaways:
Your reviews already hold your story. Andrea's first move is to reread past reviews and look at why those clients connected with you. In her words, "they will tell you why they love you and why they related to you, and you need to use that to get the next five, ten, or twenty clients like them." No reviews yet? Read the reviews of photographers outside your area, not your direct competitors, and look for the themes.
If you wouldn't say it out loud, it doesn't belong on your website. Andrea's test is simple. Read your copy back, and if you think "I would never say that out loud," cut it. Your website should sound like you do on a Zoom call.
Give people an idea of price, not the whole menu. Most of Andrea's clients don't list one fixed price. They say what the average client spends, or where pricing starts, and they name any session fee or minimum so people who won't pay it don't enquire. The same goes for how you deliver. If you sell artwork rather than digital files, say so clearly, because "the only way they can weed themselves out is if they know."
Write enough for search engines and AI to understand you. Andrea aims for at least 300 to 400 words on every page, and says the first hundred words matter most for tools like Claude and ChatGPT. Keep your business name the same across your website, Google Business Profile and Instagram so AI links them as one business, ask clients to review you on Google, and add new photos to your profile regularly.
Connect with Andrea:Work with me in The Consistent Bookings MastermindApply here → The Consistent Bookings MastermindConsistent Bookings AuditConnect with Ina
Consistent Bookings With a Full-Time Job: How Coaching Helped This Pet Photographer Get Fully Booked Three Seasons in a Row
Season 2 · Episode 38
Monday, October 12, 2026 • Duration 40:42
Sharon Canovas used to charge $75 for a session with around 40 photos, and it was turning into a very expensive hobby. Today her average sale is around $2,000, and she has booked out spring, summer and autumn in a row. She did it while working full time as a stunt woman, and while recovering from a concussion.
In this episode, Ina sits down with Sharon, a pet photographer in Hamilton, Ontario, who has spent twenty years doing stunts for film and TV. Sharon first came on the podcast in February, after her first fully booked spring. They talk about marketing for pet photographers when your time is not your own, why she raised her prices three times, how she sells photo albums, and what changed when she moved from Ina's marketing workshop into the Mastermind.
Key takeaways:
A planned year keeps your marketing going when you can't. Sharon got a concussion last year, and this year it brought panic attacks, anxiety attacks and having to teach herself Photoshop again. Because she had already planned her marketing for the year, with everything scheduled in HoneyBook and her landing pages done, she could keep going one small step at a time.
Three things a night will move your marketing forward. Sharon sets a marketing goal for the month, and each night she writes down three things she has to do the next day to support it. On set she can be gone fifteen hours a day, so she answers emails and blogs in her lunch hour and photographs dogs on the weekend.
Posting on social media is not marketing. Before the workshop, Sharon would post, hold her breath and hope for the best. She dropped business cards at pet stores, and the only thing that reliably worked was the Pet Expo. Now she runs a variety of marketing, and she is taking half of November off to plan next year.
The clients who value your work won't question your prices. Sharon went from $75 to $250 to $350, and says it got scary. What settled it for her was hiring a pet photographer herself, for close to $1,400. Her average sale is now around $2,000, and she is raising her prices again next year.
Put the album in their hands before you talk about it. The photo album is what Sharon sells most. At every consultation the album is in the client's hands while she talks, and she shows videos of albums she has designed for other clients so they can picture their own. A payment plan helps too: "A lot of people don't wanna put two thousand dollars on their credit card."
Connect with Sharon:Resources mentioned:Work with me in The Consistent Bookings MastermindApply here → The Consistent Bookings MastermindConsistent Bookings AuditConnect with Ina
From Inconsistent Bookings to Booked Out: How This Pet Photographer Booked 14 Sessions and Raised $87K
Season 2 · Episode 37
Monday, September 28, 2026 • Duration 58:26
In April, Aubri Poon wrote down her dream result: another successful calendar contest, and $10,000 donated to dog rescues. By August, the beer can label contest she ran with a Calgary brewery had raised $87,341 for the Calgary Humane Society. A separate campaign, a birthday giveaway she launched during the Marketing System Workshop, had booked 14 sessions and filled her calendar into October. In this episode, Ina sits down with Aubri, a Calgary dog photographer who went full time in August 2025 after twenty two years as a flight attendant. Before this year, her bookings were few and far between. They walk through both campaigns step by step, and the pet photography marketing structure behind each one, from the entry form to the press release to the email drip campaign. Key takeaways: Start with the ordering appointments you haven't booked. Aubri had clients she had photographed and never brought in to see their photos. Her first win in coaching wasn't a new campaign. It was booking one of those clients in, and they ordered over $2,000 of wall art. A giveaway only works if it is set up for clients who will spend. Aubri says she doesn't believe in giving sessions away, so she put qualifying questions and disclaimers in the entry form to set expectations before anyone entered. Over 25 people entered, she made offers to 17, and 14 booked and confirmed. The sales so far are $2,500, $2,500, $1,500 and $700, with more ordering appointments still to run. You don't need an ad budget to get press. Aubri had never thought of sending a press release. She used Ina's template, sent it to Calgary news stations, and the campaign was covered on Global News. She then worked out which Calgary radio DJs were dog people and messaged them directly, which got her an interview on air. A cause campaign should also bring in bookings. Ina coached her on how to keep her own business visible while the contest ran. Two months after telling Ina she didn't have enough enquiries to need one, Aubri built an email drip campaign with a special offer session, and three people beyond the winners had already contacted her about it, with a week still to go. Your own call recordings show you where you lose sales. Aubri now runs her consultation and ordering appointment recordings through AI to check what she missed, the questions she skipped, and the objections she didn't answer.
Resources mentioned: Work with me in The Consistent Bookings MastermindApply here: Consistent Bookings AuditConnect with Ina
Pet Photography Pricing When You Feel Guilty Charging More (Live Coaching Call)
Season 2 · Episode 36
Wednesday, September 16, 2026 • Duration 01:04:46
Kaity Hartley has said the thing most pet photographers think and never say out loud. She wants to be the photographer everybody can afford, because she genuinely believes everyone should be able to have beautiful photos of their dog. She is also a full-time mum with bills to pay, and three families a month at her entry package comes to $1,500. In this live coaching call, Ina works through what that one belief is costing her, and why her pet photography pricing is the only lever she has that does not cost her another weekend.
Kaity runs Koarlie Studios Pet Portraits on the Sunshine Coast, shooting bright, colourful, joyful studio portraits of dogs. She is a certified canine behavioural dog trainer, which is why anxious and reactive dogs do so well with her, and it is the thing almost nobody knows about her. This is a real coaching call, recorded live, with her real numbers and her real goals on the table.
In this episode:
Why accessible and profitable are not opposites, and what happens to the people you want to serve when the business stops being able to stay open
The three gaps Ina looks for first: messaging, visibility and conversion
What Kaity is actually booking now, and the dream she almost talked herself out of saying out loud
Why more sessions is the wrong goal when your weekends are already spoken for, and what happens to the maths when you raise the average sale instead
Making the financial decision for your client before they get to make it themselves
Why raising your prices without raising your positioning is what makes people say you are too expensive
The client who paid Ina $250 for all the digitals years ago, came back in 2023, and spent $3,000
Giving people the full pricing before they book, and letting them decide
What Kaity already knew, and the one thing she actually needed
If you have ever felt guilty about what you charge, this one is for you.
About Kaity
Kaity Hartley is the photographer behind Koarlie Studios Pet Portraits on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland. Her work is bright, playful and deliberately a little bit different, built for furkids of every type and every temperament. She has worked across the animal industry since 2012, from conservation and education to doggy daycare, behavioural training, rescue and enrichment, and she is a certified canine behavioural dog trainer. She was part of the first beta round of Ina's marketing workshop, and the feedback from that group shaped what the workshop became.
Work with me in The Consistent Bookings MastermindApply here: Consistent Bookings AuditConnect with Ina
The Free Publicity Most Pet Photographers Never Use
Season 2 · Episode 35
Wednesday, September 2, 2026 • Duration 19:16
Two of my clients have been on television recently. Neither of them paid a cent for it. They both sent a press release.
In this episode I'm talking about press releases, which I think is the most underused free marketing available to pet photographers. I'll walk you through what my clients actually did, what it produced, and the part almost everyone skips: being featured doesn't get you booked unless you go and use the coverage afterwards.
I also cover the two things that stop most photographers sending one. Not knowing what to write, and not knowing who to send it to. Both are much smaller problems than they feel.
In this episode
Why a press release is free advertising, and why most of us never send one
The fear that actually stops people, and it isn't the writing
How Aubri's beer can label contest raised $87,341 and got picked up by Global News Calgary
How Stacey got on Philadelphia TV without having to be the story herself
Why press buys you authority and credibility, not just visibility
Being featured is not the same as being booked, and the four places your coverage needs to go
The three questions that come up every single time I talk about this
How to find the right journalists, and why that isn't the hard part
One thing to do this week: find your angle
One thing to try this week
Look at what you've got coming up over the next few months. A campaign, a charity project, an award, a new studio, a collaboration with a local business. Pick one, and write down the angle in a single sentence. What's the reason a journalist would run this, and why now. That's the hard part. The writing is easy once you've got that.
Work with me in The Consistent Bookings Mastermind
The mastermind is currently open for enrolment. It's a group coaching container focusing on implementation support to help you build your repeatable marketing system along with comprehensive support of your business from pricing, sales, and mindset. My marketing templates library is included, press release templates and all, which is exactly where Aubri got hers.
Apply here: The Consistent Bookings MastermindConsistent Bookings AuditConnect with InaLinks and resources mentionedPress I've had from sending a release
Pet Photography Website Copy: How to Attract the Right Clients with Erin Ollila
Season 2 · Episode 34
Tuesday, September 1, 2026 • Duration 01:06:39
Erin Ollila spent years comparing wedding photographers before her own wedding, and she still remembers ruling one out. Everyone in her area loved them. She looked at their website and thought she would probably get in trouble if she did not smile correctly.
In this episode, Ina sits down with conversion copywriter Erin Ollila to talk about pet photography website copy, and why beautiful images are not doing the selling most photographers assume they are. Erin writes websites for service-based businesses and pairs SEO with conversion, and her position is blunt: your site is not a portfolio, it is your marketing team, your sales team and your education team. They get into what is actually missing from most photography websites, whether to put your prices up, how to ask for a testimonial without feeling like a nuisance, and where AI genuinely helps your copy and where it makes you sound like everyone else.
What We Cover
Why your website is not a portfolio, and the three jobs it should be doing instead
The answer for anyone thinking "but my photos are better than a beginner's", and why that stops mattering the moment you are compared with another good photographer
The most common copy mistake on photography websites, over-explaining what is included and under-explaining why you and what happens next
What Erin found when she researched one local photography market: the site ranking far above the rest was the one with the most of the photographer in it
Why the line items should be negligible, and what people are actually choosing between
Confidence has four layers and only one of them is your camera skill
The honest read on the word "luxury", and the rule if you are going to use it
Why it is fine to be exclusive, and how repelling opens the door wider for the people you want
Pain points do not work in photography. Desires do. Erin explains the difference using her own wedding
The distinction worth the whole episode: you can repel someone without turning them off, and reminding a client their pet has an expiration date is turning them off
Should you put pricing on your website: why Erin says no detailed menu but yes to pricing clues, and how to set a range that actually means something
Consistent Bookings AuditThe Consistent Bookings MastermindJoin the Pet Photographers' Collective (free community)Connect with Ina
Michelle Marchant on the Marketing Plan Behind Consistent Bookings
Season 2 · Episode 33
Wednesday, August 19, 2026 • Duration 57:39
Michelle Marchant used to be flat out for two months, then drop off to nothing. Leads were never her problem. She had them coming in, she just did not know what to do with them once they landed. Now she has eleven bookings sitting in her calendar for August and September, a three week holiday booked over the top of them, and no stress about either.
In this episode, Ina sits down with Michelle Marchant of Captured Hearts Photography in the Dandenong Ranges, Melbourne. Michelle has been in business for about ten years and has worked with Ina one on one. She shares exactly what changed when she stopped running her marketing on the fly and built a proper pet photography marketing plan, a follow up process for her leads, and full pricing transparency before the session. This is a real look at how consistent bookings actually get built, numbers included.
Key takeaways
Leads were never the bottleneck. Michelle already had a good filtering process and knew which marketing worked. What she did not have was anything that happened after a lead came in. A three email nurture sequence and a consultation script closed that gap.
One question she was not asking in the consult changed the whole conversation. What is your why. Why do you want this, why did you enter the competition. It opens up a real conversation, and it hands her ideas for what to capture, which lifts the sale.
Past coaches had told her not to disclose pricing before a session, and it never sat right with her. "I felt like I was handing over a surprise." She now sends the full pricing list once a client books, gives it earlier on request, and her pre session questionnaire asks whether they have looked at it with the link right there.
Between transparent pricing and a reworked price list with more collections, her average sale moved from around $1,500 to $1,800 up to about $2,200 across the last six months. Clients who tell her they are just going to take the minimum package regularly land between $2,000 and $3,000.
A $250 Facebook ad run over one week for Mother's Day brought in about 80 leads and 10 bookings. That is $25 a booking. May went from her usual four to six sessions up to eleven, and the campaign worked so well she did not need to run the autumn campaign she had planned.
One thing to try this weekAbout MichelleConnect with MichelleAlso mentioned in this episodeConsistent Bookings AuditThe Consistent Bookings MastermindJoin the Pet Photographers' Collective (free community)Connect with Ina
The passive marketing every pet photographer needs, and why it will never fill your calendar on its own.
Season 2 · Episode 32
Friday, August 7, 2026 • Duration 17:04
For years I did what everyone tells you to do. I posted consistently, I showed up on social media, I made sure my website was SEO optimised. And I was still sitting there waiting for the bookings to come in.
Last year, more than half my bookings came from campaigns I deliberately launched. Book projects, giveaways, being physically present at expos and markets, and the business relationships I built through them. I can track exactly one booking directly to a reel.
That's not an argument against social media. It's an argument about what social media is actually for. In this episode I'm walking through the four passive marketing foundations every pet photographer needs, why they're not optional, and why none of them will fill your calendar in the week you need bookings.
This is Part 2 of a two-parter. Part 1 was the full breakdown of one of my active campaigns, the Facebook ads that turned $688.80 into over $30,000 in sales.
In this episode:
What passive marketing actually is, and the honest reason it works slowly
Why a marketing campaign is smaller than you think, and what makes something a campaign
Your Google Business Profile, and why it matters for AI search now, not just Google
What your website has to say about you, beyond being SEO optimised
Why "I don't want to be spammy" is costing you bookings, and how often I clean my list
The client who booked because a newsletter landed in her inbox at the right moment
What your social media is really for, and why a caption without a call to action gets you nothing
Where my bookings actually came from last year, tracked honestly
Why you can't build a custom audience without passive marketing underneath it
The 24 hours I lost access to Instagram, and what saved me
💬 (free community)✨ 📲
Saying your price is reps, not personality. Shelley's advice is to say your price out loud in the mirror 30 or 40 times, until you know your packages the way a barista knows the coffee menu. When a client says it's more than they expected, try "Totally fair. Tell me what you were expecting." Then adjust the scope or offer a payment plan rather than jumping to a discount, because a quick discount tells them you weren't sure about the price either.
Your emails feel spammy when you only email to ask. If you only email when there's a promo, every email is a sales pitch. Email regularly, especially past clients, who Shelley says are the ones who will pay you the most. A pet photographer has their dog's details, so even a birthday email keeps you top of mind, and staying top of mind is what leads to referrals.
Put your call to action where understanding peaks. Shelley says the moment someone understands something is the moment their trust in you peaks, so that's when to invite them to take the next step. That can be early or in the middle of a reel or caption, where people are still watching. And a vague "if you're interested..." reads as a lack of conviction. A clear next step shows them the door exists.
The Consistent Bookings Mastermind is currently open for enrolment. It's a group coaching container focused on implementation support to help you build your repeatable marketing system, with full support across pricing, sales and mindset.
If you're getting inconsistent bookings and you don't know what's causing it, do the free consistent booking audit quiz to find out which gaps is costing you.
Mentoring & Coaching for Pet Photographers: https://www.inajeducation.com/coaching
A free community for pet photographers who want to build a profitable, sustainable business with less overwhelm. Inside, Ina shares practical marketing tips, business lessons and mindset shifts, and free resources.
Fix your homepage and services page first. If you're writing your own copy before you can hire a copywriter, Andrea would start there rather than the About page, because "the homepage and the services page are where you're making those sales."
Use AI to research, then write your copy yourself. Andrea uses AI to transcribe client interviews and to look at what competitors are doing, not to write. Her reason: "I want to get a sense of who you are, not who Claude thinks you are."
The Consistent Bookings Mastermind is currently open for enrolment. It's a group coaching container focused on implementation support to help you build your repeatable marketing system, with full support across pricing, sales and mindset.
If you're getting inconsistent bookings and you don't know what's causing it, do the free consistent booking audit quiz to find out which gaps is costing you.
Mentoring & Coaching for Pet Photographers: https://www.inajeducation.com/coaching
The group is where the ideas get better. Sharon brought an idea to the Mastermind: a colour palette to help clients work out what to wear next to their dog's coat. Ina built it in under an hour, and every member now has it. "It's a very lonely business," Sharon says, "and coming up with ideas sometimes it can be very exhausting."
The Consistent Bookings Mastermind is currently open for enrolment. It's a group coaching container focused on implementation support to help you build your repeatable marketing system, with full support across pricing, sales and mindset.
If you're getting inconsistent bookings and you don't know what's causing it, do the free consistent booking audit quiz to find out which gaps is costing you.
The mastermind is currently open for enrolment. It's a group coaching container focusing on implementation support to help you build your repeatable marketing system along with comprehensive support of your business from pricing, sales, and mindset. My marketing templates library is included, press release templates and all, which is exactly where Aubri got hers.
If you're getting inconsistent bookings and you don't know what's causing it, do the free consistent booking audit quiz to find out which gaps is costing you.
The mastermind is currently open for enrolment. It's a group coaching container focusing on implementation support to help you build your repeatable marketing system along with comprehensive support of your business from pricing, sales, and mindset. My marketing templates library is included, press release templates and all, which is exactly where Aubri got hers.
If you're getting inconsistent bookings and you don't know what's causing it, do the free consistent booking audit quiz to find out which gaps is costing you.
If you're getting inconsistent bookings and you don't know what's causing it, do the free consistent booking audit quiz to find out which gaps is costing you.
What happens to the client experience when someone books at a price they were not expecting, and why you start from below zero
A more creative approach to case studies: the client spotlight, and how it does the selling and the SEO at once
How to ask for testimonials when you feel like you are bothering people, and why the real problem is that clients do not know what to say
Using AI for your copy without sounding like everyone else, and the work almost nobody wants to do first
The third option between DIY and done for you that most people do not know exists
One thing to try this week
Look at your website like someone deciding between you and one other photographer whose work is just as good. Not a beginner. Someone genuinely good. If the only difference a reader could name is the number of images included, the words are not doing their job yet.
About Erin
Erin Ollila is a conversion copywriter and SEO specialist who writes websites for service-based businesses. She studied fiction, poetry and creative nonfiction before moving into content marketing in the early 2010s, writing for very large brands, then moved into website copy when she started her own business and found herself surrounded by skilled people who did not know how to write about what they did. She hosts the Talk Copy to Me podcast. Ina put a call out on Threads looking for a copywriter and Erin came recommended by Colie James.
If you're getting inconsistent bookings and you don't know what's causing it, do the free consistent booking audit quiz to find out which gaps is costing you.
The Consistent Bookings Mastermind is a 6 month group coaching program aimed to help you build your repeatable marketing system with implementation support and accountability. Click here to learn more and apply for the mastermind.
A free community for pet photographers who want to build a profitable, sustainable business with less overwhelm. Inside, Ina shares practical marketing tips, business lessons and mindset shifts, and free resources.
Michelle does not rely on one campaign to book out six months. She runs several across the year, targeting different people, bringing in a few bookings from each. "A campaign can do so well one time. You try it again and it's the opposite."
Her Pets of the Hills calendar fundraiser for a local wildlife shelter raises around $4,000 to $5,000, with Bendigo Bank sponsoring the printing for the third year running. Fundraiser clients arrive thinking they are doing her a favour, so she added a phone consult and an in person studio consultation to shift that. Two of the highest sales she has ever had came through it in the last few weeks, one of them over $4,000.
The first half of this calendar year has already brought in over $60,000 in revenue, against a goal of four sessions a month at a $2,200 to $2,500 average sale.
Ask every enquiry why. Why they want this, why they entered. Then use what they tell you to plan what you photograph.
Michelle Marchant is the founder and photographer behind Captured Hearts Photography in the Dandenong Ranges, Melbourne. She picked up a camera in a high school photography class, went on to a Bachelor of Arts, and worked as a camera assistant in the film industry before launching her own portrait business about ten years ago. She photographs families, couples and single pet owners with their pets, works on an in person sales model from her studio, and runs the Pets of the Hills calendar fundraiser for a local wildlife shelter.
If you're getting inconsistent bookings and you don't know what's causing it, do the free consistent booking audit quiz to find out which gaps is costing you.
The Consistent Bookings Mastermind is a 6 month group coaching program aimed to help you build your repeatable marketing system with implementation support and accountability. Click here to learn more and apply for the mastermind.
A free community for pet photographers who want to build a profitable, sustainable business with less overwhelm. Inside, Ina shares practical marketing tips, business lessons and mindset shifts, and free resources.
One thing to try this week: look at your last 90 days of bookings. How many came from something you deliberately launched, and how many came from someone who just happened to find you? That split tells you exactly where to put your effort next.
Work with me in the Marketing System Workshop
The Pet Photography Marketing System Workshop is where you build your own campaign with me, in the room. Three live sessions where we build your ideal client, your messaging, and one campaign planned start to finish, that you run again every season. The next cohort starts 13 August.
A free community for pet photographers who want to build a profitable, sustainable business with less overwhelm. Inside, Ina shares practical marketing tips, business lessons and mindset shifts, and free resources.
Ran a marketing campaign that didn't work and you're not sure why? Send me a voice note or a DM on Instagram and I'll break it down on the show. You can stay anonymous
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