Expensive camera…. check!
Exuberant photo comments from family and friends Facebook…. check!
Ready to start business…… maybe?

Starting a photography business is about a lot more than taking some nice pictures.  If you really want to create a business out of your hobby, here’s a little guide to start you on the right foot.

BEFORE STARTING A BUSINESS
Before charging anyone, have solid technical skill.  Consistently good focus and exposure are must haves.  Know how to avoid the major mistakes like dappled lighting, chopping body parts, and including background clutter.   You don’t need to be awesome just up to par.   The awesomeness will come with experience and finding yourself as a photographer.

GET LEGITIMATE
States vary on their business laws.  In North Carolina, a photographer is required to have a privilege license, “business under assumed name” filed with the county, zoning permit filed with the city (this include home offices), and sales tax due on session fees and all products. You also need to decide if you’ll be a sole proprietor or an LLC.  Do all your research and do business legally.  It’s better to pay all the fees upfront than pay the fees plus interest later on.

PORTFOLIO BUILD
So you know how to rock your camera and you’re ready for phase two, building the portfolio.  Don’t toss out a random number for pricing; do the math for how much you want to make when you are no longer portfolio building.  Remember to include all your annual expenses like website domain, hosting, taxes, marketing, gear, props, licenses and your per-session costs like gas, childcare, products, packaging.  Include an hourly wage and consider how much time you’ll spend with a client from inquiry email to delivering the product; it’s easily 8 hours.  Once you find your ideal price, discount it with the words “Portfolio-building Special!”  This way your clients will know you’re new in business, how much of a deal they are getting, and they won’t be surprised when pricing goes up.  You’ll get more respect from your local photography community too.

USE A PROFESSIONAL LAB
Color Inc, WHCC, Miller’s, MPIXpro…  all of these labs cater to professionals and the quality is excellent.  You might have to order test prints from several to see which lab produces prints closest to what you see on your screen.

SHOW THE BEST, DELETE THE REST
Showing 50-100 proofs might sound like the client is getting a great deal but you dilute your talent by mixing your best photographs with sub-par ones.  Chose the best 20-30 and delete the rest before showing them to the client.  If they ask, say you only show the best because you care about quality.  This helps your client by not overwhelming them with choices and helps you not to spend too much time editing.

DIGITAL FILES
The CD is one of the biggest controversies in the photography industry.  Do you sell it?  How much?  While the actual cost of goods is cheaper, a digital file is more valuable than a print.  You can only sell an image in digital form once where you can sell the same image in print multiple times.  You lose your potential profit.  You lose your quality control because the client has the ability to print from any lab that probably doesn’t care as deeply as your professional lab.  Don’t sell them cheap.  A good rule of thumb is that a single digital file should cost at least the same as an 8×10 if not more.  You can stairstep with selling packages of digital files or sell them all for one price.

MARKETING
If you already have a nice social circle and you’ll be living in the same place for a long period of time, word of mouth may work for you.  For others, you might have to step up your marketing game.  Research SEO and design your website with the purpose of showing on the first page of search engines.  Network with other business, hand out business cards, donate photography packages to local programs, do anything to get your name out there.

How long you portfolio build is up to you.  Six months, a year, two years…. when you have a full portfolio and the confidence to charge full price go for it.

A photography business is only 20% photography.  It’ll get stressful, crazy, and sometimes boring but never lose sight of why you fell in love with photography in the first place.  Shoot what you love, find your niche, and value yourself and your art.

Good luck!

When asked about new year resolutions, I usually throw out the old standbys.  Lose some weight, eat better, be more organized, save more money….  the same ones I make every year and half-heartedly attempt them, if I actually attempt them at all.  This year I want to really focus on this one resolution, one simple thing that would make me a lot happier… to mind my own gosh-darn business.

I know I’m not the only photographer that invests too much time in finding out what everyone else is doing.  Instead of focusing on making myself better as a business woman and photographer, I look to other photographers and see where I measure up.  And besides myself, nobody else cares!  No one wants to hear me bellyache about the latest shoot-n-burn or how So-and-So Photography has more clients then me.  Besides Katie Smith Photography is not about anyone else… it’s about my clients and me.  It’s about capturing families the way that I see them and in doing so, running a profitable business that fulfills me as a person.

There will always be cheap shoot-and-burn photographers.  New ones are building their free blogs and fan pages as I type this.  The clients they receive are not the clients I want.  I know I’ve invested too much time learning good technique and too much money on quality products and gear to give away the farm for free.  So I need to brush off their attitude of “same thing at cheaper prices” because their work is not the same as mine.  Along this line, I have to quit getting on the “quality photography isn’t cheap” soapbox whenever a consumer accuses quality photographers of charging too much.  I don’t like to debate and it’s not worth arguing over.  I know my prices are where they need to be and if someone values my skill and style, they will be willing to pay my prices.  End of discussion.

Quit coveting other’s gear.  There will always be a new peice of technology with the promise of better photographs or better online presence.  There will always be someone who gets that cool peice of gear before they really understand how to use their old equipment.  I might lust after all those new toys in the photo store catalogs but it is beyond pointless to covet another photographer’s gear.

Get over the client envy and the facebook like envy.  Okay, they have a bigger circle of friends, better online presence, and because of that, more word of mouth.  They might be booked until the end of time but unless they want to spill their secrets, quit worrying about it!  Focus on what I can do to get more clients and facebook likes.  And if I know the secret to their facebook likes is by having a business profile and hosting contests against Facebook’s Terms of Service, get over it!  I know it’s wrong and if I want people to respect my terms of service and copyrights, I have to respect those of the businesses that allow me to advertise my business on their site.  This also goes for not using copyrighted music even though a certain song would be perfect for a slideshow.

So my resolution is to stop wasting my energy on the blog/facebook stalking, the whining, the reading of other blog’s whines about “fauxtographers,” and the general negativity that comes with having competition.  It’s all pointless!  My energy and time is better spent learning new techniques, reading about how to better myself as a business woman, or even better than that… PLAYING WITH MY KIDS!!!  After all, they are the source of my inspiration and the whole reason why I got into the craziness of the photography industry.