Better Photos
From beginners to pros, I'm taking you from photography basics to creative challenges to find your unique passion for photography.
Better Photos
008 Five Steps to Confidently Set Your Photography Pricing
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5 FREE BP PHOTO PROMPTS to download and keep on your phone
24 PHOTO PROMPT CARDS WITH what to shoot- GAME CHANGER!
THE CREATIVE'S SHOT LIST- 15+ things to shoot at your next session for variety and stop-the-scroll power
GROW YOUR BUSINESS- use these chatGPT prompts (copy and paste style) to find your brand identity, target market, and get a 30 day content plan for your social media
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We explore how to price your photography services and attract your first clients with confidence. This episode is packed with practical steps for photographers looking to turn their passion into a profitable business.
• Discussing the common fears around setting photography prices
• Importance of understanding your time and expenses when creating a pricing strategy
• Setting clear expectations with clients to build trust
• Marketing strategies to reach your first paying clients
• Utilizing scheduling tools and contracts for professional client interactions
• Encouragement for photographers to reflect on their value and grow with their pricing
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Hey, mama, whether or not you're trying out your camera for the very first time or you've been doing this a while and just looking for some creative inspiration, I've got all that and more. I'm here to help you see your world differently, challenge you creatively and find your passion for photography. Hey everybody, welcome back to Better Photos Podcast. I'm so happy that you're joining in today for part two of starting a side hustle or photography business and we'll get to that in a moment but I wanted to see how your portfolio building was going from last week. We kind of talked about getting your clientele, getting your clientele showing them what you offer and building your Instagram and website with photos that you love to shoot. So the challenge was to set up some sessions that are really going to define your style and what you like, so that you will have things to promote. So I hope that you got a chance to do that. If not, go ahead and get something on the books so that you can just get a friend or a family or like an ideal person that you would love to photograph them and their friends to model for you and just practice. And if you need help knowing what to say or what to do. I've got some great things in the show notes. I have my prompt cards that not only give you things to say, but what to shoot while you're saying them. There are a lot of prompts that I've seen like on Instagram, or ones that I personally purchased, and they'll tell you what to say to the clients. But then you're left getting these wide shots of the family doing stuff when I wanted more of like what am I actually supposed to be looking for when I'm queuing this prompt of like, what am I actually supposed to be looking for when I'm queuing this prompt? So these will say um, whatever the cue is, and then it will say capture, like the baby's hand holding on the mom's shoulder or capture the kid's grin. When you cue this prompt, so it it gives you like a couple different um things to shoot while you're prompting that, and then what you can stack it with is my creative shot list and that gives you um, I think it's like 15 different ideas, but some of them have like multiple in them ideas, but some of them have like multiple in them.
Speaker 1:Um, that give you a variety of shots to get. So it's kind of like a scavenger hunt based on all of our um, the episode on composition and um, storytelling and all of those things that we've learned. It is a just a shot list that you can keep as the screensaver on your phone. You can also. What I like to do is I like to take a picture of it on my camera, as like the first image of my session, and then I can refer back to it as I'm doing my session to make sure that I've gotten those. But you can also print them off and stick it in your pocket and then physically check off the ones that you've done. So these are going to be like looking for leading lines. So what you could do is you could use the prompt cards and prompt the family to do the thing, shoot the thing it's telling you to shoot, while also looking for leading lines or motion blur or detail shot, wide shot, middle shot or before middle end. Like all the things that we've learned is a detailed shot list, and so getting those creative shots while doing the prompting, then you are golden. You've got such a great tool set to keep on hand. So those are in the show notes. Grab those, and I think there is a couple of free ones that I'll link as well, if you just want to see what they're about.
Speaker 1:Speaking of all that kind of stuff, this weekend I was working on launching my Etsy shop, so I have bpandcobigcartelcom and that is where I started like a hat making business and kind of like gifts and stuff, because I love to make things for my clients and for their client boxes and just things that I personally like, and so I launched that last summer and now I wanted to incorporate some more things like digital downloads. So all those things I mentioned are also Etsy shop slash reopened my Etsy shop from like 2010. I don't know when it was, um, when I used to sell like handmade, um, pacifier clips, um, and all this other random stuff, and one time a couch that I purchased at like a Sleepy Poet maybe, or something, and sold to somebody, maybe like in New Jersey or somewhere, and this is kind of a funny story. But so they ordered this couch and I have no idea about shipping, like what are we doing shipping a couch? It was not like a big couch, it was like one of those vintage, um, like small couches I don't even know what they're called and um, so my husband worked for a construction company and they ship freight things. So he figured out the shipping of like taking this couch to work and wrapped it in all of this like you know, wrapping stuff like plastic wrap and then freight shipped it to these people in New Jersey. So that was the last time I sold furniture online to a different state all the way, which we're in North Carolina, if I didn't mention that.
Speaker 1:So, revamping my Etsy shop, it's digital downloads, it's also gifts for photography, I mean for clients and things for photographers, things for moms, like inspirational things like coffee mugs and hats embroidered hats, um, and some like fun candles and stuff that say smells like editing, um, and just stuff that would be a great like thank you to your photographer, a great thing to have as a photographer, making your whole like aesthetically pleasing desk area just set the mood when you're going to be sitting there for hours editing stuff like that. So open on Etsy and I'll put that link in the show notes as well as my big cartel shop. But I started like doing some print on demand stuff. So I'm going to be having like shirts and sweatshirts and fun stuff like that that I'll be designing and um putting that up. So just another creative outlet. Like I'm in the um in the how would you say in my era of let's just try it so, which I love, like, let's just try a podcast. Let's just try um a like designing mugs. Let's just try like learning cricket and uh, iron on hats and uh, let's just try, um, yeah, anything and everything. And if we fail I think I said this last week if I fail everything, and if we fail I think I said this last week if I fail, the only thing I've lost is time and money. So, um, just do something fun, do like make time for things that you enjoy.
Speaker 1:Also, a random other thing that happened is my ring camera that is in my chicken coop kept going off and like at midnight and stuff, and I don't pay for the subscription to record what's going on, but I'm like that's so weird. My chickens don't really like get up in the middle of the night, and the other night it went off and I caught something and it was not a mouse, ugh, so yesterday it was a, it was nice outside, and so yesterday was the day the clean out the chicken coop day, and so there was so much dust. Okay, so chickens love dirt and mulch and like stuff to dust bathe and it really is beneficial for them to not have mites and to clean themselves. It's basically like they're putting like dirt in their feathers that kind of cleans out everything else. Yeah, it's like counterintuitive to um humans.
Speaker 1:Um, so when we went out of town for um the holidays, like to Curacao, we uh took our old sandbox, this like turtle thing, and we filled it with all like the mulch and dirt and stuff that they love to dust bathe in, because we were going to keep them locked in there. Um, they have an inside coop part that leads to like an outdoor run, but all of it is enclosed and I have this like automatic coop door that will open and they can free range during the day at certain times and then they go back in at night and the door shuts so they're all safe. But when we went out of town, I was just going to keep the door the automatic coop door thing shut so that I didn't have to worry about like hawks or anything or whatever. So we brought the sandbox full of the mulch and the dirt and the dust bath stuff into the inside part of the coop. Okay, so the inside part of the coop is like a um shed, but it's not. It was like we custom made it so it was way more expensive than a shed. But um, it's like divided in half, so the back part is the chicken part, and so I put the turtle in there. There are no windows yet in here, so I leave. We have like a double dutch door thing, so I leave like the top portion open for airflow.
Speaker 1:And um, when, maybe like a couple weeks, I just went in there and I noticed how dusty it was, and why did I not think about dust bathing chickens would stir up dust and it would get all over everything. So, with the combination of the dust and then the ring camera with the mouse, I was like it is time to clean this thing out. So I had energy, I was ready to go. I was like sweeping out all the dust, like took every single thing out of the like front half of the coop which is like all our like storage stuff for Chicken food and just random things that we've put back there, and so I get everything out and like like sweep everything out. Then I have like that um, pest control kind of like broom thing, and I'm getting like all the dust and spider webs and like everything out and then I take like, um, oh, my husband got the blower, oh my gosh, and it stirred up so much dust that I was like coughing and I'm like, oh my gosh, like this is not a good idea. We should have had like a dust mask on. So I was like we should try to sweep everything first and then do like the last ditch effort of doing the blower thing. I was like you can go outside and blow out all the stuff, like outside the coop, because I'm dying in here. So I get everything cleaned off and then I like wipe everything down with like vinegar and water and Dawn dish soap and it looks so good, I'm so proud of myself. But then, like last night, I was like, oh my gosh, like I was taking like a respiratory supplement, just because I was like, oh my gosh, there's so much dust in my lungs and so I was so happy. When I woke up this morning I was like, oh my gosh, I'm alive and I didn't die from the dust. Okay, that was so long. I'm so sorry.
Speaker 1:But now let's get into what we're going to learn today. Back to photography, and what we are going to learn today is five simple steps to confidently set your pricing and book your first paying client. So that is what we are going to get started with. So stay tuned. All right, so you're ready to start charging for photography. That is so exciting. But you're a little scared and someone asked how much do you charge? And you can go into all this like self-doubt, like what do I price myself at? Do they think I'm worth it? And so we're going to be talking about five steps to confidently set your pricing today. So let's dive in. All right.
Speaker 1:First, choose a beginner-friendly pricing strategy so you don't need like a complicated package, you don't need all these add-ons, just start with a great package. First, how to discover how much you're going to charge for that package. All right, so you're going to have a base price. How to determine your base price is you are going to do a formula that is your time plus your editing time plus your expenses, and that is going to equal your base price. So many photographers think that they are only charging for their session time when setting their prices. But your prices is not just your time, even though we are going to include your your time of client communication, emails, contracts, location finding, travel time to the location, your session time, actually photographing the clients, and then your editing time. Okay, so that is all time-based things.
Speaker 1:Then you want to think about your expenses. Okay, so you have your camera, your lenses, your editing software, your website hosting, gallery hosting content, creating apps and whatever else marketing and then you have taxes. So there are a lot of other things like I pay for so many subscriptions a month and annually that it is like so expensive. So I am keeping all of this in mind and, as a new photographer like you still are valuable, valuable. You are putting in that work to get your portfolio right, so that you're proving that you can do what you say you can do. And then we are going to start charging, not as an experienced photographer, but where you are and what. How does that help make sense?
Speaker 1:Okay, so, starting off, and you can do like, scale this as you get better. But you're going to do a another formula. Okay, so think about how many hours you are going to be spending on photography for the year. Okay, so you can set that. So maybe it is 500 hours that you are going to be working on sessions, editing emails, whatever. Then you are going to say that you want to make 30 grand a year and you have $5,000 in expenses from that year from your subscriptions, your gear, lightroom, photoshop, all those things hosting galleries, okay. So say that that is five grand. So what you're going to do is you're going to take your 30 grand income goal plus your five grand expenses. So there you're at 35 grand. And then you're going to estimate say you're going to work 500 hours on photography.
Speaker 1:So what you would do is you would take your $35,000 divided by 500 hours and this would equal $70 per hour. So that means you need to charge at least $70 per hour to reach your goal. So that is like kind of big picture stuff. Um, but what you're thinking of is okay. So if it takes me an hour of session time, maybe it takes me two to three hours of calling and editing, and then it takes me like an hour to respond to clients, to invoice them to prep them for the session style guides, whatever else, any client communication. That's an hour. And then maybe we're traveling 30 minutes to an hour. So your total time spent per session is five to six hours.
Speaker 1:So, keeping that in mind, if you were charging $70 an hour of your time expenses, all the work stuff, then you would be doing five hours times $70 and it would be 350 minimum per session. So that is why we cannot charge $50 for a session because that will devalue you as the reliability of programs to ensure that you are going to deliver a great product to your clients and, honestly, like I did, start out with those $50 sessions. So this is like big dream, like stuff, and you can make it, you know, fit your needs as you grow. But starting out with that $50 session or $100 session, you are letting people know I think you should let people know like it's an introductory price and that you will only be offering it at this price for a minimum amount of time because you are trying to build your portfolio, whatever, but it cannot stay at that price because you're going to realize real quick that you're making nothing like to support your business or to have money left over to spend, which is why you would want to start.
Speaker 1:Well, maybe, maybe that's why to have some money to spend on things that you like to do, but maybe your goal is just to pay yourself back for the camera that you invested in. Let's be honest, that's where I really started was I bought this camera and now I need to have like some sessions to pay myself back for the camera that I bought and the lenses that I bought this camera. And now I need to have like some sessions to pay myself back for the camera that I bought and the lenses that I bought. And then, once I got there, then it was like, okay, I met that um dollar amount, but then maybe it's more than you expected and maybe you love doing it more. So, um, now you want to really be invested in it, and so that's when you need to really take into account all of these other things with your pricing structure.
Speaker 1:All right, so after you figure out what you're going to charge, you need to number two, set clear expectations for what your clients get. Okay, so you're going to decide how many photos do they get in this session? How long is this session? How will they receive the images? This will give your self-confidence and your clients confidence in you if you can go ahead and specify what they are getting, and then you won't get awkward requests of like, well, do I get all the raw photos? No, I heard a joke. It was like do you ask a chef for the raw chicken? No, um, so as an artist. Like that is your. Your plan is to take something and create something beautiful out of it, and so I don't like giving that like mid-process um file to somebody because, like that's not your work. Your work is the finished file, the finished product. Um, so be specific with what clients get All right. Number three you're going to find your first paying clients, and this can be by posting on your Instagram that you are offering this introductory price for a limited number of sessions to build your portfolio. Um. Post about the sessions. Come up with an idea. So you've done these like free ones. Now you're going to start paying a minute or asking people to pay a lower fee to do these sessions with you. Okay, so that's when your marketing comes into play.
Speaker 1:And I also have a resource if you are into chat GPT, which I am like obsessed with. The free version offers so much, and I have a chat GPT guide that will give you an idea of what your brand identity is. It'll like help you answer questions about your brand and what you offer so that you can define who you are as a photographer. Then it will help define who your target audience is and your ideal clients. I even give mine a name. Her name is Susie and I've defined everything about her, and so when I go into chat GPT, I just ask questions specifically about Susie, so you can do that. And then this after you get your um brand identity and your ideal client target market, then it puts you into um. It helps you come up with a 30 day content plan to grow your Instagram and I was doing this last year as a test and it was phenomenal, like I was getting clients that were like my ideal clients and the only way they found me cause I have an intake form when they book a session and and it was like no people in common, no friends in common, only Instagram. So I was like okay, marketing is working, so I'll put that in the show notes as well. You don't need to know chat GPT at all. You basically are copying and pasting these prompts and it'll have like some like once you figure out your brand identity, it'll like copy and paste your brand identity in the section for the next prompt. So it is a game changer in building your business. Okay, so now you've posted about it that you're offering sessions and you're charging for them and once you have your first client, okay.
Speaker 1:Number four is you are going to figure out how to collect the payment and get a simple contract. So I use Acuity Scheduling. This integrates with my calendar and I can set up exactly like. They have a free version and I can't remember what the difference. Have a free version and I can't remember what the difference is between the free and the paid. Um, so the free one, um, I think I did like a lot for the free one and then you could keep all your stuff and just upgrade to and I can't remember what the upgrade is, but you can try it out.
Speaker 1:So it will list out what my sessions are. It will show availability so my clients can book online, which is like amazing because I can put what times I'm available and then it syncs with my Apple calendar. But it can do your Google calendar too and it'll block off my other things on my calendar. So, and look, show that I'm not available for shoots. So, say, my kids have spring break or whatever, and I had my availability, my availability open for Saturdays, like every Saturday from 5 to 6 pm or something. Well, it will notice that I've blocked out spring break on my Apple calendar and it will make those times automatically not available to my clients. Okay, so with that I can do my scheduling.
Speaker 1:I can also put in, like, when they book a session, it has my terms and conditions and it has what I'm offering for the session. So maybe some of my sessions will only include 10 photos, maybe five edited images, and it will say that in there, so they know exactly what they're getting. Um, I also have like a guide and stuff and like rehearse and re-say that like. Um, it'll take like two to three weeks to get your online gallery and I like to do it quicker than that. Um, but I like to what? Is it under promise and over deliver? Yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1:So, um, acuity kind of knocks out um, the payment. Um, because people can pay online that way and I think maybe that was the types of payment or something I can't remember the um paid version. But, um, you can also use HoneyBook is something that I'm looking into. But they have like a free trial but then it gets kind of expensive per month for just starting out as a business. But if money is not a problem, then go ahead, sign up for HoneyBook and you get, I think, all these things included. I've been kind of doing minimal research on it.
Speaker 1:But um, like your scheduling, your client relations, um, like automated messages and payments and invoices and contracts and um, even tax information, um and email blasts, like so a bunch of like things that I pay individually are all in HoneyBook, um and I know a lot of photographers use that or Dubsado, Um. But just to have a simple contract, um, you can uh use a free um thing like Dropbox sign, sign, well, and I think they're oh yeah, like jot form, um, you can create up to free or five free forms, um, and so in those the client can sign those electronically. But you can also create a um, a contract, in um Canva or Docs and export it as a PDF and email it to them, then ask them to print and sign and send you a picture back. What your contract should include is the date, time and location of your session. What's included, like how many photos are you offering them and when can they expect to have those photos and how they're going to be delivered to them. Are they coming on a thumb drive? Are they coming digitally? Are they going to have to download? Are they providing a USB themselves? So there's a couple ways you can do Dropbox. A lot of things have limited storage, so that's when you'll also end up paying for hosting images and being able to send your clients those that way.
Speaker 1:And then the payment terms. So are you taking just a deposit or are you taking the full payment at time of booking or the day of the session? What I've noticed is that when I did not ask for a deposit, I had a lot of cancellations or rescheduling, and that's another thing that you want to have in your contract is what is your cancellation policy? And mine is basically like, unless I say it's canceled or there is some weather not just like rain, but like some other kind of weather that is preventing the session I mean, maybe it is rain, if I deem it like okay, this is definitely not going to happen, or if there's like a sickness or illness, so I have like minimal things and they can reschedule, but I don't do cancellation. But if they, they can cancel, but they will lose their deposit, and so the more the deposit, the less likely they are wanting to cancel. So that's just what I've learned from experience is that having a deposit put down ensures like you're not wasting your time planning and location finding and emailing the client just to be ghosted. So getting something from them that you both have skin in the game is definitely ideal for your sessions to go better. Okay, so make sure that your clients are agreeing to your terms, whether signing the contract or clicking the button on acuity scheduling. Make sure that they have that all filled out before they pay and I'll put a sample contract template in the show notes so that you can see that there. All right.
Speaker 1:So number five, confidently responding to how much do you charge? Okay, so you're going to go in to to asking for payments with confidence. You're going to say I'd love to work with you. My session fee is X amount of dollars, includes X photos. Let's pick a date. Or you're going to offer your calendar from acuity scheduling. Um, if someone says you're too expensive, that's okay. You know you don't need to do free photos all the time. And like, the ones that you're doing for free are the clients that you are picking the styles that are going to align with you.
Speaker 1:I have found that if I most likely like if clients would come to me and say I love your style, I love neutral aesthetic, I like if you have any openings. Like if you have any openings, you know, for you know, um, portfolio building shots. If you need anybody, you know, then I'm more likely to think about them whenever I am wanting to build my portfolio with a session. But if people are just trying to get the cheapest price for photos, you honestly don't want to work with them anyways because they are going to get the cheapest price for photos. You honestly don't want to work with them anyways because they are going to be the highest complainers.
Speaker 1:Honestly, it is so true, like the people I can tell, I can tell like as soon as, like, a message comes through and they are wanting all these extra things but not wanting to pay the extra money for it. Or they're asking if I can do like half the time or half the work, and I'm like it doesn't really work like that, like I can't. I can't offer half the things because I'm still paying and spending my time doing like the full amount of work on even a half a session. So I always offer, you know, some sort of like mini sessions throughout the year for the people that um want photos by me but can't necessarily afford a full session price. There are options to even buy gift cards, or buy yourself a gift card throughout the year. So then, um, so then you will have, um, something to put towards that price. Or, you know, like baby shower gifts, like photos, are the best gift to give. You know, valentine's Day, christmas, give your wife photos, mother's Day Perfect. I've got some Mother's Day sessions and so price is not something that you should compete on.
Speaker 1:So, while you're starting, think about your experience level and that you shouldn't be charging the same amount as somebody who has been doing it for 10 years. But as you start getting more clients at the price that you are offering, then you start upping that price. So you have your limited availability, your limited sessions at this discounted price and then, once you fulfill those, then you are going to increase your prices and it is scary. It is scary, uh, upping your prices and wondering if anybody will book and the market will tell you. The market will tell you what you're worth. So if you are charging too high, then you can always adjust your prices and come down or slash them on your website and say they're normally this price, but now, right now, they're on sale for this price, um, or limited time, whatever this price, and you don't want to start off like being so cheap, because then it's going to be hard to have people see the value in your work and so setting your price at a comfortable number.
Speaker 1:That is, thinking about your time, thinking about your goals, thinking about your income goals, thinking about what you want your life to look like because of photography, if you want to have, you know, the ability to create your own schedule to do something you love, and have you know the ability to create your own schedule to do something you love and get paid for it, to give beauty captured to families, to freeze time for them, to give something that you didn't get to someone else.
Speaker 1:These are, all you know, going to fluctuate with your pricing and obviously your pricing doesn't have to stay the same as you grow and different seasons, so in some seasons I'm slower and others because of the weather or because I just know like people are traveling a lot in the summer, or you know the kids are home and they're like at camps and like, so maybe in the summer sun stays out too late, so maybe my session prices are lower in the summer.
Speaker 1:But then when fall comes around and like I just don't want to be so swamped in uh taking photos that I don't have time for my own family.
Speaker 1:So sometimes I jack those prices up, um in the fall, so that you can still meet your goal, your income goal, without having to do so much work for like less money and you're really spending.
Speaker 1:Like, when you get down to like doing your expense list, you're going to see all the things that you pay for and it is going to be very eye-opening that you're not really just paying for your camera and your software or your session time.
Speaker 1:There is a lot more involved, okay, so I hope that helped you figure out where you're going to start with pricing your sessions charging for for photos, start thinking about your beginner pricing, start posting your limited sessions and confidently respond to that first inquiry so that they know that they are receiving a great value and your work on your Instagram or TikTok or whatever platform. Facebook that you have, your website that should all reflect what they're going to get, so that you can be confident and that they already love your work because they've seen it. Okay, next time we're going to be talking about the client experience, how to prep your clients and creating a stress-free session. So join me back next week as you are starting to grow your business, seeing if this is for you and wanting to make better photos, all right, see you guys later. Bye.