Referral Business for Weddings

[Phisch]

Originally Posted by todd_a

Knowing what I know now, I would have never put down the camera when I was 18 and listened to everyone telling me that I need to get training for a "real" job.... I would have continued in the direction I was wanting to go myself. I would have over 20 years experience working as a photographer at this point, and I wouldn't be trying to play catch up now and bothering everyone by asking all these silly questions.

There are no silly questions except those that remain unasked!

[ronocnikral]

i'm late to the game, but will still cast my 2 cents, and won't charge you anything.

first, i always say, one must decide if they are in this for the money, or in it to make beautiful pictures. it is very difficult to sit the fence on this one, imnsho.

second, there is no relationship between the cost of a photographer's equipment and how much money they make. for instance, we only recently bought a 5d mkii, before that, everything has been shot using used 5d's we would pick up here and there. i still have yet to pick up the mkii and use it btw. also, my favorite lens, a sigma. if a cook came up to me and said, "i cook on a bosch super duper sd-10000000000," i would say, "let's taste some food, i still want to taste your food."

third, there is very little relationship between what photographers regard as wonderful pictures and what the general public regards as "wonderful" pictures. ooo's and ahh's from ppl on this forum does not net you business in the real world.

fourth, you are selling an image. just taking a quick look through the trueblood's website, my first impression was there are decent, pretty well exposed pictures. the images are fairly sharp. but, they also look like snapshots, and nothing stands out and grabs you (At least it didn't for me). it looked like something uncle elmo (who loves photography btw) produces. they aren't bad, but they aren't breath taking either. so, what conclusion do I come to? well, you can already guess. none of this means they are bad photographers, but just not marketing themselves well.

fifth, there is marketing that pays off. we used bridal shows, which in houston, ran us about $2000 per show after was all said and done, in addition to eating up friday, saturday and sunday. we begged and aggressively pushed our way into ironically, 2 shows. and they paid off. ymmv. we did the show dirt cheap. smallest booth, off the "red carpet," but we got in the first aisle and about 75% of the brides walked right past us. it's about numbers, imo. the best things that came from bridal shows, networking. we are recommended photographers for 2 venues in town.

so, to sum up my rambling in a single sentence, your marketing skills are 100 times more important than your photography skills when running a successful business. ymmv. some may not want to make money, but rather (and masochistically imo) create "beautiful" images for art's sake. to them, I have no advice.

btw, even with seeing growth potential in our business, i would never quit my joe job. in fact, we are coming to appreciate the weekends off and not dealing with brides, and decreasing business (and we are moving and the wife is pregnant). there is no way i could support our lifestyle (and the benefits my joe job provides) and start a photography business (would definitely need a studio and i don't have the cajones, hats off to those of you who have taken the leap). perhaps i lack the business skills?

disclaimer, I am rather bearish on the economy right now.

[ShutterSpire]

Originally Posted by ronocnikral

fourth, you are selling an image. just taking a quick look through the trueblood's website, my first impression was there are decent, pretty well exposed pictures. the images are fairly sharp. but, they also look like snapshots, and nothing stands out and grabs you (At least it didn't for me). it looked like something uncle elmo (who loves photography btw) produces. they aren't bad, but they aren't breath taking either. so, what conclusion do I come to? well, you can already guess. none of this means they are bad photographers, but just not marketing themselves well.

Just a quick correction, our name is Truelove.

I thank you for your opinion, but I am curious as to which pictures (or what about the pictures) makes you feel that they look like snapshot quality?

Sorry if I sound defensive...

Is this the consensus that others on the board? The brides have LOVED their images, but from a professional eye, do our pictures really look like unprofessional snapshots???

[ronocnikral]

sorry about the truelove. it was an honest mistake. isn't trueblood a tv show or something? (we only get 2 channels through our rabbit ears...)

i don't have the time to do a critique, but your images seemed to be executed pretty well, but they seemed to be missing something that would make everyone excited about them.

i truly believe it's a fallacy to think b/c a bride loves their pictures, everyone else will love them. when people make an investment, they tend to either see the best or the worse, and have a hard time being truly objective. but i don't want to get into consumer psychology...

please don't take it as I have all the answers or that I think I am all that. what i am really trying to say is, it's rare to find a really good photographer who is really good at business/marketing as well.

[LadyShutterBug]

Originally Posted by ShutterSpire

Just a quick correction, our name is Truelove.

I thank you for your opinion, but I am curious as to which pictures (or what about the pictures) makes you feel that they look like snapshot quality?

Sorry if I sound defensive...

Is this the consensus that others on the board? The brides have LOVED their images, but from a professional eye, do our pictures really look like unprofessional snapshots???

This is coming from a photographer, so bear in mind that a bride might think something completely different... but i'm a girl and I've looked at a lot of wedding photography sites in my day.

The very first pic that pops up on the site for me is a bride in the middle of some bridesmaids (yellows and coral colors). She isn't small, and it's a really bad angle on her chin/neck-- probably one of the most unflattering angles you could possibly shoot her from. It's a cute shot, but it isn't in any way telling me "wow, these people totally know what they're doing!". It's very snapshotty. There are eleventy billion colors and no real point of focus.

My first image on the site is one that is "different", something a bride probably hasn't seen on the other 10-12 photographer sites she browsed before mine. Maybe look for something like that. I would make the first image they see really be something that defines what your eye likes. Even if you market toward the bride who wants candids, find a candid that has a little more gripping emotion. Something to make them go, "OH MY GOSH!!! I WANT THAT!!!".

[ShutterSpire]

Thank you! This advice REALLY helps.

We have always struggled with picking out images... so much so that I would love to pay someone to help us go through some of our galleries and help us decide which images we should use.

[ronocnikral]

Originally Posted by ShutterSpire

so much so that I would love to pay someone to help us go through some of our galleries and help us decide which images we should use.

i would suggest a marketing professional, not someone who is solely a photographer. and they can also help with branding.

FWIW, and we aren't the best at it, but you want to pick images where people can imagine themselves in the picture. that means chubby brides, out. chubby guys, out. chubby grooms, out. ugly people, out. images that have some personalized meaning to the clients, out (e.g. my wife loved an image of a bride on a motorcycle, we went back and forth on that one).

I can't tell you what to do, just what not to do...unfortunately, I only know what not to do b/c we have made all these mistakes in the past.

[LadyShutterBug]

i respectfully disagree on having all thin people in your images. it can cause bigger people to steer clear of you because they feel that you can't shoot heavy people well, or that you only work with little skinny people.

but only use them if you have beautiful, flattering images.

[ShutterSpire]

Originally Posted by LadyShutterBug

i respectfully disagree on having all thin people in your images. it can cause bigger people to steer clear of you because they feel that you can't shoot heavy people well, or that you only work with little skinny people.

but only use them if you have beautiful, flattering images.

I agree... We are going to feature one wedding where the girl is a little on the plus-size, but she is GORGEOUS and the images were great. It was also a higher-budgetted wedding....

We are going to scale back though and instead of picking the brides with our favorite personalities, we are going to choose for the website brides that are 'prettier' than some of the others....