|
| Author | Thread |
|
|
04/12/2012 08:59:42 PM · #1 |
This is a hard question I think:
I've been into photography (And video) for a long time now. I've done my share of free weddings, some paid. I've sold photography from my website and gotten assignments through it as well. Unfortunately, the amount I get is not enough to live off of and so I'm not exactly putting much into it (As far as a business). I still work Mon-Fri teaching and then I am a wedding minister on weekends (Which pays me the biggest amount overall). So far the photography has been 'Get some money, use it to fund the hobby' since it can become a very expensive one.
I've slowly been building a small home studio, but with the small apartments here in Japan you can just imagine how much space I DON'T have. The studio and all of it's equipment are for practice really (And because I'm a gear freak).
Video is still something I'm practicing and the learning curve has been a steep one. I've come to the point where I can comfortably film a wedding and do a better job than the generic stuff coming out of most of the chapels I work at. But, turning all this into an actual business...I don't know. I would LOVE to put everything else aside and focus entirely on this and have it as my main source of income. I'm just not sure how to approach this in the 'safest' way.
I know this is a hard question to ask, and I'm sure there are varying opinions on how to approach this but I would love any advice from those who have made similar transitions or have any other experience.
|
|
|
|
04/12/2012 11:48:29 PM · #2 |
there's a bit more to that answer than what you might get in a regular forum response, so here are a couple articles you might find useful: career change? go for it! and is this the right time to start a business?
good luck! |
|
|
|
06/26/2012 12:17:51 AM · #3 |
Do you want to run a business? You have to take the pics, edit them - as well as accounting, marketing, advertising, etc. It's the latter items that determine how financially successful you will be. McDonalds isnt' the largest restaurant chain because they make the best food!
So start with what you want to shoot. Unless you are in a boom town everyone that needs that type of photography already has a supplier - so you need to essentially steal clients from established businesses - but offering something better - better pics, service, price (value! do not compete on price), speed, etc. You need to answer the question - "Why would anyone choose me over X" where X is everyone currently serving that market. What is your unique selling proposition? And no, this may not be easy to come up with!
OK - so what is being sold, at what price, to those folks now? Since your prospective customers will be shopping around you need to do it first.
OK - now for the harder part - how much business is there overall? Enough to support you? If not then you may need to expand the photo services you plan to offer. (I couldn't get enough weddings so I added HS seniors and then sports leagues. Diversification is good - but also means i need three different prices/products/marketing strategies. At times I know I don't put enough effort into each)
You also need to answer the question of how much money do you need, how much time do you have to devote to the biz? The most you an shoot/edit is prolly 60% of the available hours - the rest is prep, travel, education, acounting, shopping, cleaning, paperwork of all kinds, etc. A typical work year is 2000 hours, you can work (bill, get paid for) 1200. If you can be 80% booked that's pretty good I think. So that's about 950 hours. 19 hours a week. Seems like not much when there's 40 in a work week, huh? Till you try to fill them...
If a wedding takes 24 hours (meet, prep, travel, shoot, edit, deliver, etc) 950 hours works out to about 40 weddings. Since weddings are seasonal in most places it's very hard to get more than 25. If a portrait session takes 4 hours total (on average of course) you'll need 235 of them. That is a LOT of sessions BTW.
Typical personal service type work, retail, is $75 to 125 an hour (car repair, plumber, etc). I can show you all the math, but trust me - this figure works for photography too.
950 hours at 100 per is $95,000. If you work from home (no rent) you'll have overhead of 15k (insurance, gear, office costs, phone, etc, advertising of 9k (packaging, samples, website, actual ads/mailings/flyers, FB ads, etc - 8% of sales is avg in the US for photo biz's but it's higher for new biz as sales are lower and you need to advertise more to grow than maintain), product cost of 24k (25% of sales is what the PPA says is normal - my figures agree - it's lower for weddings and higher for sports leagues but balances out to around that amount)
After those costs you are left with $47k out of which you'll pay taxes. Assuming of course you book all 950 hours at $100 per and have no labor expenses for help, assistants, etc. Also out of this money comes whatever you want to reinvest in the biz for the future - a printer, backgrounds, flashes, etc. If you only reinvest 5% of sales then that's $4500ish...not enough to buy a first line pro body or a lens and a pro printer.
So say you figure you can do 150 port sessions - that means your avg sale needs to be $630 (including session, sale, product costs). You've shopped the competition by now - is that a viable figure? Is your work comparable to those getting that now?
The hardest part, in my experience, is getting the customers! My senior average is around $1000. But I'm stuck at 25ish seniors a year for the past 4 years...this year is looking up (ramped up my marketing to get more reps, use FB intensively, did a photobooth at a prom, some photogs are failing, been around long enough to have some repeat/referral business). But you never know - was having the best year ever in weddings this year then had 4 break up and cancel and 3 more postpone...lost 50% of my weddings. Still have the costs of marketing to get them in the first place just no revenue.
I'm seriously looking at other businesses - my marketing/ad/management skills are such now after 8 years that I might make more money in another business! A DJ can make $1000 or more per wedding. Cost is the gear ($2500) and about 7 hours/wedding. No album to do after, no 10 hour wedding days...I can sell my $30k in gear and buy rental properties to supplement the DJ income. I have the connections to probably get 20 weddings a year, working the bars can pay $300/nite, toss in a few dances and such and I might make as much as I do as a photog - for less work. Just saying - explore your options.
I read this recently - amateurs talk gear, professionals talk technique. And it's true. Lighting, posing, sales, marketing, packages products and pricing are what I discuss with photogs at conventions, rarely the latest/best camera/lens/doodad.
Message edited by author 2012-06-26 00:22:41. |
|
|
|
06/26/2012 12:29:17 AM · #4 |
Originally posted by Skip:
there's a bit more to that answer than what you might get in a regular forum response, so here are a couple articles you might find useful:
good luck! |
Good info in those articles..from 2009. Seems his site hasn't been updated in a year or a bit more. Too busy or out of business? |
|
|
|
06/26/2012 11:33:38 AM · #5 |
Nowt
Message edited by author 2012-06-30 11:41:22. |
|
|
|
06/26/2012 11:40:10 AM · #6 |
Originally posted by willop:
Originally posted by Skip:
there's a bit more to that answer than what you might get in a regular forum response, so here are a couple articles you might find useful:
good luck! |
Good info in those articles..from 2009. Seems his site hasn't been updated in a year or a bit more. Too busy or out of business? |
poke around enough and the answer should be obvious... |
|
|
|
06/26/2012 12:17:36 PM · #7 |
Originally posted by Skip:
poke around enough and the answer should be obvious... |
lol |
|
|
|
06/26/2012 03:02:05 PM · #8 |
Ahh, I see now.
So skip, are you working for a college now? Why did you abandon your blog site - without so much as a post as to why or where you'd gone? You have a dead FB page too. You should either keep them up, kill them off, or make some statement as to where you went = even 'leaving self employment for other opportunities' (as I've seen many other photogs say) |
|
|
|
Current Server Time: 03/11/2025 01:11:08 PM  |
Home -
Challenges -
Community -
League -
Photos -
Cameras -
Lenses -
Learn -
Help -
Terms of Use -
Privacy -
Top ^
DPChallenge, and website content and design, Copyright © 2001-2025 Challenging Technologies, LLC.
All digital photo copyrights belong to the photographers and may not be used without permission.
Current Server Time: 03/11/2025 01:11:08 PM EDT.
|
