5 Love Practices for Crafting a Successful Photography Business

Photography is all about love.

Photography is an all about love because it’s a practice of non-judgement. It’s an art, a philosophy, a way of seeing, interpreting and sharing. As a business, photography concerns itself with seeing, empathizing, understanding, and making art for people and of people.

I’m writing this post in response to an aspiring photographer’s question: how do I go from doing photography for fun to creating a successful photography business? Since photography is all about love, the guidelines I’m outlining here are a “love list” I find crucial for entering and thriving in this creative career.

Love of People

To create a successful photography business, you need to love people. To be clear, I don’t mean this in an, “Aww, people are so cute and kind and great!” kind of way. We all know not all people are warm and welcoming, especially to photographers or the idea of being photographed. I mean the verb “to love.” You have to love them through their uncertainty, their worries, and all the questions they bring.

You’re going to meet all kinds of people. You’re going to meet 98-99% incredible people who make you think, damn, people are awesome. You’re going to meet some who are difficult, some who are hard to please. You’ll also meet people who inspire you and help you to discover new strengths. You’ll meet and work with people who make you feel less than. And you can skip them next time around. But the love has to stay steady, or you’ll get bitter and burned out. Staying curious and open-minded is a true gift for a photographer. Also, patience, empathy, and understanding. You will feel like a therapist sometimes or a mediator for family dynamics. The beautiful thing is you don’t have to get involved as much as you have to lead yourself through the imagery of it all. When do you these people connect most tenderly? When does this child feel most listened to? When do the people at this event appear most at ease?

Love of Business

It surprises me that “business” is so high on my list of how to create a successful photography business, but it’s in the name. This guide isn’t about how to be an artist or how to live a creative life. The concentration is how do you make a living out of your artistic life. So maybe “love” is a bit strong here, but it still fits. You need to retain a deep curiosity and reverence for business and its potential to fuel your creative career. Being a small business, and especially a minority-owned business, comes with unique challenges and also, at least for now, advantages. People are seeking small businesses for original, local, mission and value-driven, non-corporate brands. Being really interested in exploring approaches to business, like marketing, pricing methods, website design and functionality, systems and strategies, loyalty and referral programs, and experimenting with different tactics to approach sales and exposure is vital.

Learning is a big part of being interested in and curious about business. Researching, reading, and constantly expanding your knowledge helps me stay engaged in current ideas and new trends. I’m a big podcast listener and do well with audio learning. Photographer YouTubers create incredibly valuable tutorials, lessons, and information about gear. Books, too, of course. I’ve linked to my top go-to resources at the foot of this post.*

Love of Photography

Odd that this comes third, but it’s true. Obviously, you love photography—that’s why you’re doing this. But to love it as a whole means loving all its aspects, avenues, and styles. People doing real estate photography, drone photography, macro photography of insects and flowers, street photography, fashion photography—all of it has value and artistic merit.

I highly recommend getting rid of any blockages you might have, like, “That’s not good photography,” or “That’s not really art,” or “that’s just commercial stuff.” Regardless of what or how you’re shooting, the camera is an invention that let’s us see how others see. It’s uniquely powerful and interesting for that reason. Learning about lenses, cameras, styles, and what inspires other photographers is part of the process of falling and staying in love with this artform.

For example, most of my Instagram feed is photographers—probably 85%. I need to clean it up a bit (political stuff and *possibly* too many dog and cat accounts have leaked in) but making photography and photographers part of a steady diet keeps things fresh and motivational. Explore lighting, studio setups, night shots, street photography, boudoir, documentary family work, commercial shoots, etc. Don’t limit yourself. Natural light photography might feel most interesting or authentic to you, for instance, but closing yourself off from other options only boxes you in.

Love of Yourself

You have to love yourself as a photographer. Your growth, your struggles, your ups and downs, financially and emotionally, are all happening simultaneously. Business is never streamlined or predictable. You might have a year where you don’t do well. You might have a year where you do oddly better than expected. Then the next year might take a dip because the economy is teetering or you had to take more time off than you’d planned. A client might cancel on you and you only get to keep the deposit for what would have been a lucrative project. An event organizer might not like the work you created. A family client might want a full refund, and you won’t understand why.

Love yourself through these moments. Believe in your ability to grow from those stressful or disheartening experiences. Always. Portfolio critiques, website audits and contests are great for building this kind of love for yourself and your art because you walk into them completely vulnerable. The more rejections you get from contests, project bids and magazines the more you’ll grow you as a creative, and as a person in general. Rejections are part of any public-facing creative life. Submitting work requires you to love yourself because you’re asking for rejection, or at least the possibility of it. Being vulnerable means asking your future self to give you grace.

That emotional intelligence is essential. If you’re tired, take a break. If you don’t want to schedule holiday shoots, don’t. If morning shoots aren’t for you, block your mornings (that’s one of the first things I did for myself.) Set boundaries: after 6 p.m., stop responding to client emails. Block your calendar with time for travel to and from shoots so you’re not taking calls or responding to messages in between. Block your calendar for editing so you can sink into that part of work with a kind of indulgence. You can make those blocks of time like meetings used to be in a 9-5 job. They are non-negotiable. Those boundaries are acts of love and are vital, productive and healthy. I can’t tell you how powerful creating a schedule and sticking with it is, even when, or especially, when that means saying “no” to a shoot and passing it off to a local photographer friend who is available and eager for more work. It’s humbling, and it’s all part of improving your business, self-esteem, and your craft. Also, make sure to pay attention to when you’re not as excited for a particular kind of shoot or photo season. We are constantly sending messages to ourselves that we choose to fight against instead of listening to. Am I taking on too many shoots this summer? Are my prices too low for how much energy I’m expending? Do family photoshoots still excite me or am I more interested and prepared for long-form magazine shoots? Am I getting cranky from spending too much time in the car going from one event shoot to the next? All of these little uncomfortable pinches are telling you how to better shape your business for the next photo season.

Love of the Unknown

We live in the unknown, and I think we’d all feel a lot better if we accepted and embraced that fact. When you start anything, you don’t know how it will turn out. You can plan and prep as much as you’d like and however much that helps you, but you can’t predict how a photoshoot will go, from how your gear performs to how your or your client’s mood will affect a session. Challenges will always come up, and it’s better to almost look for them and stay curious about them than to run from them or eradicate them. The unknown keeps things interesting.

Financially, in your first year, you can’t possibly predict what you’ll make. You can make a safe guess that it won’t be a ton, and definitely less than you want to make. It could turn out differently, but it’s best to assume you’re not going to make a living wage. Your first-year income might bring you less than $20k, or it may bring you $40k. But when you think about it, you’ll realize: you earned that $20k–$40k from people who trusted you, all by yourself, without any other management or tools. You dropped yourself into the unknown and came out successfully. It only gets better from here.

If you love prepping, prep away. If you don’t like prepping, see how that goes. You have to know your style, but also know how to adapt your style (carefree, very organized, methodical, carefree) to make people feel comfortable and seen. Some clients need direction—others don’t.

The unknown is part of small business ownership. People often say you’ll know by the five-year mark whether your business will flop or thrive. That’s not to scare you. It arises to ask you: do you still love it?

Addendums:

Also, this one I ought to add though it’s implied: take pictures every day, everywhere you go. Always take your camera with you. Make it an appendage. You know that sensation when you realize you don’t have your phone with you and you feel like a part of your body is missing? That’s how it ought to feel/will feel when you don’t have your camera. Avoid that and take snapshot style or well framed and composed photos everywhere. When you get home you will have life-filled specimens to inspect. You’ll likely fall in love.

I started noticing about a year ago (so 5 years into my photo business) that, looking at another photographer’s work, I could see if they really love people. Sometimes I can see right away that someone doesn’t love them, or at least not with love at its fullest capacity. I don’t mean this in a judgmental way. It’s just that you can tell when a photographer sees and loves a person unconditionally, and when they are just trying to get a good photo of a person. The contrast is stark and actually really moving. It’s likely that the person who takes a portrait that doesn’t convey love is authentically attracted to non-people subjects, like landscapes, animals, cities, or commercial projects. There’s nothing wrong with it since tons of photo subjects exist. It might also be a person’s relationship with photographing people that needs some sculpting. I’m always sculpting my relationship with people; we all are. It’s just that it’s immediately evident in photography where it isn’t in other art forms.

Resources

Top 3 Photo Biz Podcasts:

That’s My Personal Business with Eden Strader

Business of Photography Podcast with Bryan Caporicci The Six Figure Photography Podcast With Ben Hartley

Top 3 Photo Biz Books: Coming soon..!! Local resources: 1) Search your city for clubs, photo walks, meet-ups, art volunteer committees, etc. 2) Attend local festivals, talks, special guest photo walks, university/college public speaker series talks, studio visits, art markets, art magazine launches, parties...and take pictures everywhere you go

3) Offer free photo documentation while you're out at an event. You're "working" but also hanging out, scoping out the scene as a photographer and also enjoying the event. Best all worlds.