7 Ways to Grow Your Photography Business

Transcription

1 7 Ways to Grow Your Photography Business WAYS TO GROW YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS IMAGE BY PAGE KAYLE1 of BARTON 11

2 Since the beginning of 2013, PhotoUp has been dedicated to helping real-estate photographers grow healthy businesses through our innovative impact sourcing model. Photographers all over the world seem to be asking the same question, How do I grow my business? and so we put together this little info-pack with 7 handy things you can do today to help you grow an efficient, healthy, and beautiful real estate photography business. 7 WAYS TO GROW YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS PAGE 2 of 11

3 1 Network and marketing Finding time to attend networking events and keep up with the endless amounts of marketing and social media networks out there could be a full time job in itself. However, this is an imperative part to any business that is looking to grow. Real estate photography is no exception. Making sure to set aside time throughout the week to attend networking events and market your business is essential to helping your business grow and prosper in todays day and age. Some marketing and networking suggestions are as follows: Keep your website up to date and relevant. By adding new pictures, content, and blog posts. Keeping your website current with fresh content will help you to rank higher in search engine results (Google, Bing, etc.). Consider focusing your content around realtor needs and questions in order to provide value to them and their business. This will also help to increase traffic to your website. Be active on social media. Whether you only have a Facebook business page or if you have every social media account under the sun (Twitter, LinkedIn, Snapchat, etc.), making sure that you are posting regularly and providing relevant and useful content to your audience is key. TIP: Engagement with a small number of fans and followers is more beneficial to your business than having 5,000 likes or followers who never interact with your content. Find time to attend at least one networking event per month. Ideally, this event would be real estate focused where you could mingle with realtors in your area and explain to them the benefits of using real estate photography (increases the number of online views, increases foot traffic at open houses, and inevitably, sells homes faster!). Also consider taking additional photography classes to continue to improve your skills and techniques! 7 WAYS TO GROW YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS PAGE 3 of 11

4 2 Hire an associate photographer and other people Many real estate photographers start out as a one man shop where they shoot, edit and deliver their images all by themselves. This also means that they are responsible for accounting, marketing, and all the other admin work that goes hand in hand with running a business. By outsourcing your editing and hiring admin staff to take care your booking and accounting, you can free up some of your time to shoot more homes, but pretty soon, you ll hit a ceiling and just do not have enough hours to shoot more than 4 to 5 homes per day. By hiring a second (or third, or fourth...) photographer, your little company is able to cover more ground, to take on more clients and free up more of your time to handle other other important aspects of your business. 7 WAYS TO GROW YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS PAGE 4 of 11

5 3 Keep your existing clients happy It is really that simple! By keeping your current clients happy through continued communication, providing high quality photos and delivering those photos in a timely manner, you are on track to maintain and grow your current client base. Be sure to be open with your clients about your availability, delivery times, and cost when it comes to their photos. The more open and honest youa re with your clients, the more trust you earn, and the more they will be willing to talk to other realtors about your service! Which leads us to our next tip... 7 WAYS TO GROW YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS PAGE 5 of 11

6 4 Ask for referrals The easiest way to grow your business is to have your current clients tell others about the awesome work you do! Stats show that about 91% of customers are willing to give referrals, however only 11% of people personally ask for a referral. Asking current clients for referrals is a great way to grab some of that low hanging fruit in order to grow your real estate photography business. 7 WAYS TO GROW YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS PAGE 6 of 11

7 5 Offer 1 st home discounts to new realtors Offering discounts on your first shoot for a new prospective client is a great way to get your foot in the door. This is a perfect opportunity to show realtors the quality of your work and the benefits of using real estate photography when selling homes. The goal behind this discount would be to hook your clients in with the quality of your service, your imagery and the benefits they will reap from using a professional real estate photos so that they become loyal repeat customers using your services on all their listings! 7 WAYS TO GROW YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS PAGE 7 of 11

8 6 Target younger / forward thinking realtors As we know, real estate is an extremely competitive industry. Good realtors are always trying to find ways to differentiate themselves from the rest of the competition. As technology continues to change and evolve, so does the way we do business. Forward thinking (and typically younger) realtors understand that the first place people look when buying a home is the internet and the first thing they are looking at is the photographs. Younger and forward thinking realtors are therefore should be a prime target for you when looking for new clients. They understand the importance of professional real estate photography and know that first impressions are now made by the imageas posted online. By targeting this younger, more tech savvy generation of realtors, you can open up a whole new market that will help you grow your business. 7 WAYS TO GROW YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS PAGE 8 of 11

9 7 Use a real estate photo editing service After working with many real estate photographers from all parts of the world over the last couple of years, we know that there comes a point in a photographer s life when the time spent shooting and editing becomes too much for one person to handle on their own. Some photographers choose to hire a part time editor to help them with the overflow, but this can be costly, time consuming, unreliable and limited for those looking to really grow. By using a scalable editing service like PhotoUp, real estate photographers can shoot more homes, market and network more, hire other photographers without having to worry about who is going to edit their photos, and best of all spend more time with their family and friends. PhotoUp is a scalable solution for those photographers looking for a high-quality, timely, and in-their-style photo editing solution - we take care of your editing so you can focus on taking care of your business and your life. 7 WAYS TO GROW YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS PAGE 9 of 11

10 Some examples of our work... IMAGE BY KAYLE BARTON IMAGE BY ELENA SEEFELDT IMAGE BY LAURA WERRELL IMAGE BY ELENA SEEFELDT IMAGE BY ELENA SEEFELDT IMAGE BY DAVE DAVIS 7 WAYS TO GROW YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS PAGE 10 of 11

11 Interested in learning more about PhotoUp? Visit us at and fill out our contact form. 7 WAYS TO GROW YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS PAGE 11 of 11