Elizabeth Halford Photography {the blog} » photography {in real.plain.english}

Starting Your Business Vlog Series pt.3 {5 things you need}

May 16, 2012

Hello and welcome to my 10 part vlog series sponsored by Pretty Presets. Over these ten weeks, we’re discussing just a few of the different things you need to look into when deciding if you’re ready to venture into charging for your photography and becoming a ‘professional’.

This is week 3 and in this video, I’ll be discussing 5 things you need to be thinking about as a starting point. I’ll also be revealing the very first step you need to be taking to start your business.

Note: if you’re viewing this post in your inbox and there’s no video, click here to view this post on the blog.

{Video Notes}

Can you get a camera and go straight into business? Yes and no. Can you start a business as a beginner? Yes and no.

Thinking about business is the very first step of starting one. If you were to get a camera tomorrow purely for the purpose of going into business, then just thinking about business is the first step.

Some trades/careers where people go into the trade purely for the purpose of business:

Bricklayer
Physicians
Filmmakers

You may be in the thinking stage of starting your business for years before ever beginning to shoot for money. And again, unless you have consistency in your work, you’re not ready to start taking people’s money.

In this video, I’m going to talk to you about 5 things you need to start working on to get your feet on the path to starting your business:

Get serious about your education. Eat, sleep and breathe photography. Make learning your full time job or part time job if you have to. Take classes online, join a club, go on photo walks, start discovering what you really love shooting. Hone in on your specialty.
Get a mentor. Find someone locally or someone online who can help teach you the ways of photography and business. Find a photographer who will allow you to second-shoot or be an apprentice. I think it’s time for us to stop being so tightly guarded with our secrets.
Practice practice practice. If you want to be a photographer, start taking pictures.
Start learning about business. Study marketing, learn how people think. Read the blog Psychology for Photographers. I love this new blog and I never miss a post.
Get critique. Have your work looked at and critiqued by other photographers who you admire and respect. One way to receive real, honest critique is through things like Chic Critique {you can get on the waiting list for my periodic months of critique here}. Don’t ask for critique from your friends. They’re going to tell you what you want to hear and unless they’re also professional photographers, they won’t have the critical eye needed for giving you advice that will help you grow in your craft.

So remember…you have to start thinking about your business as the first step to going into business. Don’t hurry that stage!

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Are people even reading your posts? How to tell.

May 14, 2012

pinterest_250x400_post image Two years ago, I wrote the post No comments on your Facebook – do you get paranoid, too? and in it, I suggested that the world is suffering from comment fatigue. Two years on, it’s gotten ever worse. I, myself, am the recipient of so much incoming information -such jam packed feeds of information- that I can’t possibly personally respond to some of the things I’ve seen/read. Some of which have even been life changing or business changing for me.

While I do think that we need a revival in folks personally responding in thanks and gratitude for the things which keep us educated, informed or entertained, I don’t think we can guilt people into doing it. I do believe that overly simplistic calls to action are needed these days, exe:

“If you like this post, tell me why!”

-or-

“If you like this, click ‘like’!”

However some people simply won’t.

The number one thing I’ve started doing which boosts my confidence that people are even responding to my links is to start employing a traceable link generator like bit.ly to get updates about how many people have actually clicked on links to blog posts on both this blog and the blog for my business, Gracie May Photography.

With a generator like bit.ly you generate a shortlink and you will be able to watch real-time stats for your link. For example, 3 hours ago I posted a link to today’s blog post. Even though I’ve only received 5 comments on that Facebook post, I can see through bit.ly that, in fact, 360 people have clicked through to that post. It even shows me how many people have viewed through Facebook on a computer and how many have viewed it through a mobile device. This can help you determine if you need to focus more on the look of your device-friendly site so you don’t lose potential viewers. Mine is generated automatically through the ProPhotoBlogs theme I use on my WordPress based blog.

Try bit.ly out yourself! See if it can help boost your confidence that people really are out there viewing your work and reading your stuff!

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Starting Your Business Vlog Series pt.2 {The #1 thing you need}

May 9, 2012

Hello and welcome to my 10 part vlog series sponsored by Pretty Presets. Over the next ten weeks, we’re going to be discussing just a few of the different things you need to look into when deciding if you’re ready to venture into charging for your photography and becoming a ‘professional’.

This is week 2 and in this second video, I’ll be discussing the #1 thing you need before charging money for your services.

Note: if you’re viewing this post in your inbox and there’s no video, click here to view this post on the blog.

{Video Notes}

Before taking anyone’s money, you absolutely need to be able to consistently produce the same level of work over and over again. So many photographers are guilty of displaying happy accidents on their website which they aren’t able to recreate and this will snowball into a whole lotta different problems. If you’re going to be charging for your services, it’s not going to be that simple and you have to have consistency! Take pictures on purpose – don’t shoot for luck.

6 ways you know you’re a lucky shooter:

You take way too many pictures.
Your sessions take hours longer than they need to
You feel panicky, nervous and out of control while you’re shooting
You can’t explain to someone later on how you made a portrait or the settings you chose
You either shy away from manual all together or you ‘wing it’ and take the same shot over and over with different settings ‘just in case’
Your clients are confused as to why they spent hours with you, witnessed you taking a bazillion photos but they only ended up seeing 20 of them (note: clients will ask this anyway, but the less you rely on luck, the less they will ask)

There are a few reasons why this can be dangerous to a photographer who is charging for their sessions:

Your clients have gone to your website for a product but when they come to you for their session, you won’t be able to produce the same product for them.
Following on from the above, some of you might know of the story of Jesus cursing the fig tree. He was enticed by the leaves of the tree, but when he approached it, there was no fruit. He cursed it and it died. Being a haphazard photographer is like a tree of leaves enticing clients who later find that there isn’t actually any fruit. A business built on these principles can’t last.
You will smash your own confidence if you rely on luck. You will feel out of control and deep down inside, you’ll know that it wasn’t really YOU creating the images.

When I look back, I can see that I have learned many things from my lucky shooting days. I learned about composition. I learned about self restraint and, most importantly, I learned how to stop shooting for luck and how to start taking pictures on purpose. Here are the things I wish I knew back then to get started sooner:

Learn light
Learn your camera
Learn posing
Try bracketing
Have restraint

See the video for expounding on all of the points above.

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Your camera: 5 signs you’re ready for an upgrade

May 7, 2012

Oh my I really wish some of my most commonly asked questions were the easiest ones to answer. Alas, some questions just aren’t that easy. But before I try to answer this one, these are my top three unanswerable questions:

And coming in as my #4 unanswerable questions is {drum roll please….}

“How do I know it’s time for a new camera?”

I was a total idiotographer when I started my business. I think back to 3 or 4 years ago and literally just sit here thinking “how the heck am I still in business?!” I upgraded my camera every time something new came out. I bought cameras on credit {ouch} and then bought other cameras before I was finished paying them off. In 2 years, I had a 350d, 450d, 500d, 550d, 7d and 5dmkII. Stupid, right? Why is that succession of cameras stupid? Because the first 4 are all the same camera but with slightly upgraded bells and whistles. I was the Canon marketing team’s dream: blinded by shiny specs and hype. And under the impression that a better camera would make me a better photographer.

So here are reasons not to upgrade:

Some other camera looks like a ‘good’ one
Because you think a bigger camera makes you look more serious {c’mon…I’m not even asking you to show your face. Be honest with yourself if you’re thinking this way. I have!}
Because your pictures aren’t what you want them to be
Because the features of the newer model make you feel yours is inferior

It’s funny how I’ve been super in love with my 5dmkII for about a year now. Every time I pick it up, I’m like ‘aaaaah I love you!’ but the DAY the mkIII is announced, I suddenly look at it like ‘oh you’re so not a mkIII’. What changed overnight? Did the outstanding quality of my camera change? No. Did my camera break or something? No. Was it still the same camera I was smitten with just 24 hours prior? Yup. The only thing that changed was a new camera was thrown into the mix. Something else for me to oogle online and plot for how I could buy it, which lenses I’d need to sell to afford it, how I might get by without a backup camera so I could sell both my cameras just to get one. But instead of doing all that -for the first time ever- I just said “humph. Yeah, Canon brought out a new camera. Again.” and that feeling of disliking my mkII just faded away. Because really, I love it. And I will probably run it into the ground before I ever consider another camera.

The greatest jump I ever made was from the 7D to the 5DmkII and this is because the 5D is a full frame and that completely changed the game for me. It’s like seeing for the first time. But you know, I knew it would be that way. A friend once said that once you look through the viewfinder of a full frame camera, you will never want to go back to a crop sensor. And I took that very seriously and no matter how many opportunities I had to lift someone’s 5D to my face, I said no thank you. I never even looked through the viewfinder of a 5D until mine came in the mail. Because I know myself. And I wasn’t financially prepared to start wanting a full frame camera yet.

So why did I upgrade?

Of all those silly upgrades, the 5DmkII was probably my smartest. And I’m not saying the 7D isn’t a fantabulous camera because it really is. And I still enjoy it. But even that wasn’t a particularly educated decision. A good decision in hindsight, yes, but it was just the next link in my never-ending chain of cameras. Here are some reasons I’d say warrant an upgrade:

You’re nearing the end of your camera’s life expectancy.
You have grown out of your camera. For example, when you got your camera you were a new photographer and now you’re traveling to sessions with off camera flash and your camera doesn’t fire a Speedlite remotely. These types of situations mean you’re actually growing out of your camera and that’s good! Really good! {Note: you can just get a radio trigger for the hotshoe on your camera to fire a Speedlite. But even that costs a couple hundred smackers}
You need a second camera. I’d never photograph something important like a wedding with just one camera. If you’re going to take these events into your own hands, I would highly recommend having two cameras because any number of disasters can happen that cause you to be responsible for ruining a couple’s eternal memories. So if you find that a second camera is required, you can take this opportunity to upgrade and make your current camera the backup.
Because you know the value of the upgrade. Like I said, the first 4 cameras in my list were basically all the same camera. Same sensor, fresher bells n whistles. Slightly bigger screen or better quality video {as if I ever even used it}. So when/if you choose to upgrade, do it because you’re actually upgrading. I don’t consider a slightly newer camera an upgrade. Going from the 550d to the 5DmkII? Now THAT was an upgrade. And I say that because the sensor is actually in a whole ‘nuther universe from the sensor in the Rebel series cameras. So if you’re going to get a new camera, make sure you know exactly why you’re doing it and how it will truly benefit your art.
And lastly, upgrade if you feel there are reasons why a different camera will enhance your ability to create art. I don’t mean this whole business of better camera = better pictures. I mean, for example, you struggle with noise because low-light photography is your thing. Or you’re a wide open junkie {welcome!} and you crave that full frame DOF.

Do you think painters just pick up a different brush because it looks like maybe it’ll be better? Or because someone else is painting with it? No. They choose their tools wisely and for very specific reasons.

So that’s the end of this topic for now. But before I go, let me say…I don’t think that a better camera = better pictures. But I do think you can make that argument in terms of lenses. If you feel like your photography is missing something and you can’t put your finger on it, it’s probably more an issue of lens choice than camera choice. So read this and see why I think a majority of the time, it’s wiser to invest in a new lens and not a new camera.

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Starting Your Business Vlog Series pt.1 {what’s a ‘professional’?}

May 1, 2012

In this first video, I’ll be defining what I mean when I use the word ‘professional’ and looking at the argument from a few different points of view.

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“It’s not you, it’s me” {managing expectations & difficult clients}

April 30, 2012

HUGE thank you to Jamie Swanson of the Modern Tog for writing this fantastic post for you today!

Almost every photographer I know wants more clients.

Without clients, we wouldn’t have a business. They’re absolutely vital to success.

We don’t just want any client, we want awesome clients who totally love us and can’t help but to rave about us to all their friends.

Let’s face it: the more our current clients talk about how amazing we are, the more likely their friends are to hire us, right? And with things like Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest making it easier than ever for people to tell their friends about the fabulous experience they had working with you, it’s one of the best ways to get more photography clients.

Yet the reality is that most of our clients are not these ideal clients we want. Not only that, but you’ve likely had at least one “difficult” client.

Dealing with difficult clients is stressful and time-consuming. We end up spending more time trying to resolve their issue and make them happy than we spend on our ideal clients. If you have several difficult client situations, it can burn you out and start to make you bitter towards your clients, which is a bad place to be.

However, I believe that almost every difficult client situation can be prevented completely, and I’m going to tell you how to do it.

It’s simple, although it does take a decent amount of work. But once you’ve perfected it, not only will you have fewer difficult clients, you’ll also have more ideal clients that rave about you to all their friends.

So what’s the secret?

Manage Expectations.

It’s almost a disappointment how simple it really is, but SO many photographers fail miserably at this.

Think about it. Almost all difficult client issues come from your client expecting something different than you provide.

Let’s consider an example.

The Story of Sally Supermom

Sally Supermom books a child portrait session with you. Sally has never had professional photos taken before, and has only ever had her neighbor, Bob Tographer (who just started his photography business), take photos for her.

Bob spends an entire afternoon photographing her kids, and an hour after he’s done he gives her a disc of 500 images and printing rights for less than you charge for a single small print.

But Sally saw her friend Suzy’s family portraits taken by you, and she fell in love. Suzy convinced Sally that you were worth hiring.

What do you think Sally is expecting to receive from you? If you don’t tell her that she should only expect to receive 15 photos from her session but that’s what you deliver, she’s going to feel like that’s a ridiculously low number because she’s used to getting 500 from Bob Tographer. Not only that, but if she isn’t completely familiar with your prices and doesn’t know that the files are not included and must be purchased separately, you’ve got a surprised customer who is not going to be raving about her experience working with you. In fact, if it’s shocking enough to her, she may even complain to her friends about it. Not good.

Sally Supermom is now disappointed and you have to spend extra time managing the situation to make things better in her mind.

However, had you clearly explained what Sally could expect from her session with you up front, from pricing to number of proofs to every detail that she needed to know about the experience, this situation would be non-existent.

Do you really want Bob Tographer setting the standards of expectation for your business?

If you do not set correct expectations for your clients, someone else will. Chances are, you’re not going to like what they come up with.

When Managing Expectations Isn’t Enough

While most difficult clients situations are preventable through managing expectations, there’s still some situations where you’ve done everything right but you still have sticky situations in front of you that are difficult to respond to.

The mother-of-the-bride at your last wedding e-mails you disappointed that there aren’t more photos of her side of the family.
Your client feels the images you took of them are not the same quality as you show on your website, yet they are consistent with your style and quality.
A prospective client really wants to work with you, but you’re out of their budget.
A boss or colleague wants you to do photography for them, but you are afraid it’d be a conflict of interest.
Someone wants you to shoot for free or for good exposure.

In cases like these, it’s important to respond professionally, but it can be hard to find the right words to say to them. Saying the wrong thing can cause even more stress.

The Go-To Guide For Client E-mails: 100+ E-mail Templates for Photographers

My friend & colleague Jenn Brindley and I have created an ebook to help you create a business filled with clients who can’t stop raving about you. It’s called “The Go-To Guide For Client E-mails: 100+ E-mail Templates For Photographers.”

Not only do we give you concrete examples of how to manage expectations and do everything you can to prevent client issues from happening, we also have created over 100 e-mail templates that are ready-to-use for even the most sticky situations.

In addition, we talk about concrete ways to go above and beyond in these situations in order to get clients raving about you to their friends so you can get more clients.

We’ve just released this ebook to the public, and we’ve included a free sample of the ebook that you can download right now with 10 e-mail templates that you can use today.

Get client issues resolved quickly and learn how to prevent them in the future. Stop wasting time trying to find the right words to say. Learn more about the “Go-To Guide For Client E-mails” and get your free sample by clicking here.

Jamie M Swanson helps people get more photography clients and learn to price photography over at The Modern Tog. She also enjoys eating watermelon, gardening, and homeschooling her three young kiddos. You can connect with her by liking her Facebook page.

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Creating a composite in Photoshop {video tutorial}

April 28, 2012

A ‘composite’ is two or more images pulled together to create one. This video shows you how I combine two so-so images to create one fabulous one!

Note: final image edited with Florabella’s Luxe II and Spring action sets.

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How I ended up with my business names {and more about how I got started}

April 20, 2012

This is what elizabethhalford.com looked like when I started blogging

I was asked again today how I ended up with my business names. I suppose it does seem strange that my photography business, Gracie May Photography, is a woman’s name. But it’s not MY name. So I shall tell you the tale of my many names.

When I started my business as a baby photographer back in 2009 {or was is 2008?} I didn’t really think anything of just calling it Elizabeth Halford Photography. Which is fine but I just didn’t really think there were any other options. So I bought a domain, printed business cards and started booking sessions. On my website, I started writing about photography. My first ever post was called “Preparing for your session. Dress to match the sofa?” I think it’s still here on this blog today. After writing the first few posts, I saw a job posting on ProBlogger for photography writers for dPS. I did a guest post and out of many others who did the same, I was hired to write for their blog. Did that make me a professional blogger? I don’t know…but I do know that the thrill of 3 million people having access to my blogging was overwhelming.

At this point, I discovered the stats section of my blog and noticed that many thousands of people were visiting my own blog each time a new post went live on dPS. But I really didn’t have anything there! And I was just using the free WordPress template. Panic! I needed to start creating content for my own blog so that dPS readers {who were interested in photography} would have something to read. And Elizabeth Halford Photography {as you know it} was born.

I found myself with two different businesses, but with one name. I was both shooting and blogging as Elizabeth Halford Photography. But did my clients really care about the clone tool in Photoshop? And did I really want them seeing my sales advice for other photographers? I needed to splice my business. I had a greater following as Elizabeth Halford Photography so I didn’t think that changing that name would be good for my audience. Which was only a couple thousand at the time. Hindsight is 20/20. Had I known what I know now, I would’ve changed it to something less about me and more about photography. For instance, I also own the domain for Photography in Plain English. But, alas, I didn’t change my blog’s name, I decided to change the name of my studio instead.

At the time, I was doing primarily white seamless studio shoots. I couldn’t name the business after myself because I already had one with that name. I wanted the name to be quirky and memorable. And not necessarily anything to do with photography. You know that Cadbury’s commercial with the gorilla playing drums? It’s nonsense and makes you say “huh?”. So I thought I’d harness the power of “huh?” to make a more memorable business name. I entered my kids’ names into an anagram generator and came up with Glacier Cake. Yup, that was definitely quirky! So Glacier Cake Photography was born and I spent a year or two saying “no, I’m not a cake photographer”. People were just plain confused and the name was distracting attention from the work.

I needed another name. Maybe I should have stayed more traditional. I didn’t want the brand to overtake the images. And I’d learned so much about branding by this point. Mainly that I was already my brand. And this thing we call ‘branding’ isn’t about logos or colors or emblems. It’s about communicating who I am to the world through visuals. I had to rebrand my entire business. And it had to be about who I am. I renamed the business after my daughter, Gracie May. And Gracie May Photography was born. I ditched the bright funky branding and in-your-face visuals and allowed my brand to become one with my work which was now being created in Hampshire’s great outdoors, not in a studio.

So here I am today with two very different businesses with two very different visual identities that both represent me perfectly. With Elizabeth Halford Photography, I support photographers. With Gracie May Photography, I actually am a photographer and while many of my blog readers frequent that website, my goal there is to support clients and actually do the work of a photographer which is why I don’t dish about my suppliers or editing techniques. Clients don’t need to see that.

I’m now at nearly 12,000 Facebook likes with about 60k unique first time visitors per month. And every day, I thank God for the business He dropped in my lap. And I’m so thankful to Darren Rowse for giving me the opportunity to write for dPS which has opened many doors including writing for three issues of a Canon magazine and other unbelievable opportunities. I love what I do and I love my readers and the community of amazing people that are now surrounding me and loving photography together. Thank you to each and every one of you!

{further reading}

Don’t underestimate yourself {how I went ‘pro’}

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