How do you book more clients? It’s an ongoing problem for many photographers of all genres of photography. Do you spend money on traditional marketing and advertising? Should you spend hours cold calling or emailing prospective clients? In this video, Katelyn James explains the ways that she operates her wedding photography business without spending a single dollar on traditional advertising. Yes, you heard that correctly, she spends nothing on advertising her business.
So what then, does Katelyn do? Well, a number of things, and they are all easy to implement. And many of them don’t just apply to wedding photography either, they are just as applicable across most genres of photography, even commercial photography if you just re-frame things slightly.
Katelyn covers a number of aspects, some of which seem obvious like educating your client about the whole process early in your interaction with them. They may never have hired a photographer before so it’s up to you to walk them through everything and hold their hand a little. It also makes you look more professional. When people book a wedding with Katelyn one of the first things she does is to send them a printed out Bridal Guide brochure, telling them all the info they may need. It goes a long way towards making you look slick and professional although you only need to have spent time making the guide once. Genius! Some of Katelyn’s points do lean a little more towards event style photographers. Some of her points like getting a blog post up within 48 hours or sharing a slideshow of the event during the actual event on a tablet are obviously more pertinent to some photography genres than others. However, I do think that with a little thought you could tweak these things to suit most types of clients. For example, during a portrait shoot, you could share some of the best images with the client and have a social media sneak peek up quickly. For commercial photographers it’s not always possible to share images straight away due to embargo, however, you can be organised and keep track of when those lift and share as soon as possible afterwards. Katelyn explains that it’s not enough to do just one or two of these things, you have to do them all or almost all of them because the impact snowballs the more of them you do. Once again it’s all about building relationships and sustaining those relationships. It’s taken me longer than it probably should have to realise this fact, however, it remains to be true. A client in the hand is worth two in the bush so to speak, and if you treat your existing clients well, like a tiny baby bird in the palm of your hand they will likely help spread the word and market your business for you as well. Do you have any extra tips for word of mouth marketing?
