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Archive 2015 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

dude90001
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

Hi group,

Sorry to be a bummer, but after a long career (magazine such as RDA, Nat Geo Kiids, Mutual Funds, Car Co PR Ford, Lincoln, etc plus design firm, big fortune 100 companies etc...) I'm now 50 and after dealing with parents sickness, the economy, learning Photoshop in the 90's, this new sharing (rip off free) economy and now video I'm still a freelancer since 1990.

I have lost the edge to market it's depressing what fees people expect to pay, how young people (I was always the young guy until now!) I don't facebook, or IG, or any of that and although I've read about it working it seems beyond me to freely throw your work out so others can say they did it.

I'm in Los Angeles, so I'm not a fuddy duddy grew up here so I know the drill and I feel I have pretty good work, technique creativity etc. but I won't follow up or market... I'm sort of screwed obviously and realize people who are crappy that I know still make the money because they can market...

Sorry about the ranting but what can I do to get out of this crap....situation.

Really want to hear your story not really answer mine.

Dec 19, 2015 at 10:31 AM

thebmrust
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

Bear with me:

I guess the first thing that comes to mind is: Does your photo work pay your bills?

If it does, then you have to either adapt or die. Every business has to deal with it big or small.

If your work doesn't (or isn't live/die) and you are shooting to just add to your household income, then you can do a few things.

1) Play. Shoot what you already shoot but shot with different lenses. Alter a style or add lights, remove lights to shoot more natural. Combine what you have but in a different way.

2) Shoot a totally different genre. If you don't shoot sports, go shoot sports. If you only do weddings now, try kids. Start shooting macro of food.

3) Triple your prices and start telling people no.

Don't worry about the marketing because your work can speak for you. Jut make sure you have somewhere that people can see it. (as it is, online, eg IG or Fb, is a cheap way for peole to see it and share it).

If you want to mix things up, raising your prices can make waves in the LA area and it will still make people talk. Altering your style can also get people to talk. Both are good.

Since you have worked in a lot of areas, might think about working as a second for those you know.

If you are near the end of what you believe is a long and fulfilling career, then put yourself out as someone that wants to have fun and enjoy the twilight years of a career. When you aren't seen as a threat, others might embrace your new situation. Especially other photographers.

If you still want to shoot for many more years, then some of the above options might reignite your inner fire.

Dec 19, 2015 at 06:18 PM

markd61
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

Great response.

I am 59. I shoot mostly commercial work. As such, my clients are a little older and are largely gained via referral. I acquired my clients over time. It was slow but they call me regularly and provide great cash flow.

I do not have a Facebook page, I am not on Twitter, I do not use Instagram, 500px, or any other platforms. I do not ignore them but my clients do not look for vendors on those platforms.

Social media is largely focused on wedding, PJ, landscape and fashion photography. Lots of beautiful work but will never make money for the average person. Retail portraiture and wedding photography requires constant marketing to get new customers. Those customers are also unfamiliar with purchasing photography and have a Walmart mentality about it.

Commercial clients are motivated by a photographer that can reliably deliver quality imagery that makes them look good to their boss.

Hopefully you are not under severe cash flow pressures as then you can go upmarket with boldness. The most important thing to realize is that you have nothing to lose by aiming higher.

The most dispiriting aspect of creative work is not getting a fair price. Ask for the price and those that say yes will be far more rewarding than a ballbuster trying to chisel you for pictures buy the pound.

Dec 19, 2015 at 09:05 PM

thebmrust
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

Summary: Social Media = Walmart Attitude, yeah, that's almost accurate. Some may be Costco attitude.

The one catch is Instagram. Where I believe art directors are looking for a kid with emerging talent who has no clue about copyright and will give away the farm for that "big break" to be in a print ad. That context, they aren't much different than music pop stars ... IG stars are a flash in the pan.

Real commercial work is it's own machine. (From my perspective, outside that industry)

Dec 20, 2015 at 11:05 AM

johnvanr
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

I'm not a photographer, but I'm a journalist and my field has been impacted as well.

I think the first thing to do is to stop thinking about yourself as an old guy. Make that into an 'experienced' guy.

In the end, the same things matter as before the internet and digital photography, which are quality and reliability for an acceptable price.

If the prices paid are no longer worth it for you, time to move on. Such is life.

EDIT: I see you want to hear our stories. Well, mine doesn't really apply, since I'm not a photographer.

As a former freelance journalist, I can tell you the field has always been threatened by younger people willing to work for less money, esp in the case of the kind of great jobs I used to have (US correspondent). There's a reason I no longer freelance. The amounts paid are a joke, so why bother.

I moved on and I've remade myself into a content strategist, which employs the same core ideas as journalism, but is a field where people are willing to pay. I'm not happy about this and like many journalists, I talk about my old reporting days with more nostalgia that I'll ever talk about the stuff I have done since I left real journalism.

I think our problem is that we are in fields that so many people enjoy, so many seek to enter it even if it may not promise much money. You rarely see people vying for accounting or banking gigs without pay. Or a plumber doing some personal plumbing on the weekend.

Dec 20, 2015 at 11:40 AM

glort
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

Sounds like I'm well amount people that understand here. Must be a think with turning 50. You feel pretty old, washed up and out of it. I am so damn sick of all the face waste drivel which thankfully seems to be falling off now.... as I predicted it would from the start. Now everyone is putting all their marketing eggs in "Blogging" like there is no other way to market yourself.
Give me strength!

I spent a lot of my time doing Commercial and weddings. I did events for a while as well till that completely died in the arse.
I earned more in straight dollar value 20 years ago in weddings and commercial that what I could now. I gave both of those markets away for various reasons but have looked at getting back into them. Scary

I posted earlier in the year about going going to a bridal fair and what people were providing for the pittance they were charging. I had ideas about getting back into that side of things but there is no way I could put in the effort to compete for so little return I'd go nuts over it.

Commercial and mag work is the same. A low end rag I used to shoot for would pay $1500 for a girlie centre 10 years or so ago, now you would be lucky to get any more than 150. And the way they stall and frig around on payment you'd be lucky to see it.

A while back I was slowing down badly and thought I was getting older and badly unfit. Turned out I had diabetes for a long time and never knew it. It and the side effects hit me hard and I could barley get out of the chair most days. I started up an event business and a weekend work would have me pretty much incapacitated till thursday afternoon giving me just enough time to prep for the next weekend and near kill myself again.

It was at this time I was ready to give my lifetime career of photography away. I looked at what else I could do thinking a new start would be a good thing. Took about a fortnight to realise that in my mid 40's I'd be starting off at the bottom of whatever I did again with the barely 20 yo's and be the shit kicker.
Pride, dignity or ego wasn't going to wear that so I was left with sticking with photography.

I thought I'd at least try to do something that I could at least enjoy rather than trying to chase every dollar whether I needed it or not as I had before. I also started looking for the niche markets because I do know enough about marketing to realise trying to compete in a saturated market is a mugs game.

I found a couple of very profitable things but like the sports event work, it dried up for a few reasons, mainly the novelty factor wore off.

I think these days one has to be prepared to either find something new in the way of a vocation or be flexible rather than say I'm a this or that photographer. I was doing kids swim school underwater pics. Something I had never done before and had no interest in other than the freaking great money I made out of it.

Photography is changing and markets have died and become non viable. At the same time new opportunities open up. We can either sit round and piss and moan about the good old days and how bad things are now or we can pull our fingers out and open our eyes and use our heads and find something else.
Or we can get out of photography all together and go do something else we are qualified as photographers for.... like working the consul at a service station or working the register at the supermarket or other exciting jobs that long term careers as shooters make us suitable for.

I saw an ad for these new robot cameras that you put a tag on your arm and put the camera on a tripod and the thing follows you around. Now I could make good money with something like that with the equine work I used to do. Mount the thing on a high stand in the middle of the arena and sell them a vid of their ride doing Showjumping, dressage, hacking or whatever it was. Sure the parents can film from the side but shot from the inside of the ring above the fences.... I could make money on that.

Not saying this is what people should do but I am saying we have to keep our eyes open and think where we can do things that other people cant or aren't doing. It's also pointless to say "I'm an XXX photographer" when it's clear that market is no longer viable.
Lets face it, as much as the Digital only guys would complain, those of us that have been in this game from the film days know one market isn't all that different to anybother. Sure, there are the tips and tricks but not like we have to go do years of study to find out how to go from wedding or commercial to something else.

As far as marketing goes, I find all this faceboob and blogging just makes the old ways even more effective, especially the face to face.
As I keep saying, You go out and find 10 other businesses to refer you and each one gives you one job, say a wedding, once a month, You have have all the work you can handle.
You need more jobs in a different market? Go find more referees or work the ones you have to give you more leads. It's not rocket Surgery. If you are commercial, Print your own Killer marketing piece and go knock on doors. I don't know how much work I have got by attemping to leave something with someone and they have said " While you are here, we need this or could you quote on that?"

The times I did these doorknocks, I don't think I EVER finished one as planned because I picked up work along the way that I got too busy doing to go finish the area I had planned. When things die down and you say where was I up to and go back to cover the rest, same thing happens.

When I was doing underwater work, I prepared an 11 page info package. I printed it all on gloss photo paper so it looked Smick, got some cheap folders from the office supply place which were plain gloss cardboard and when you opened them they were the standard folded pocket with the cutouts for a business card.
I had everything setup so it was just a matter of hit print on the file and the whole lot spat out ready for the folder.

I got every single venue I took these too bar 2. One of those closed the pool due to leaks and I got out of doing them before the drawn out repairs were done and the other the manager left and no one replaced her so it seemed no decisions got made.

I do the same sort of thing when I go after golf/ charity/ and fundraiser events and have a good strike rate with them too. The way i'm set up these things cost like $3 if that but even if they cost $20, When you are looking at even small jobs with a $2K return, they are a bargain. It's not like doing an ad that costs you 3k up front with no guarantee of return.

Motivation and being depressed are the real killers and something I am waaay too familiar with. I don't have any recommendation on that because I'm still looking for the answers myself and so are the doctors. It's one thing to have the ideas, it's a world away from getting off your arse and doing something because everything else makes it seem like there is no point. I have been to hell and back with depression and unfortunately for me, it's proven something very hard to shake. For me work is very much intertwined in it. If I'm busy and making money I'm OK, or at least I can fake being OK. Whn things are quiet and you have too much time to think and get lazy, it's bad.

I liken it to trying to push a truck up a hill. the thing will roll along for miles once you get it to the top but the bastard wants to roll back over you on the way up. Getting the thing to the top it the trick, once you get there it's all easy going.
Working up the motivation to stick with something till you get it there is the killer, once you do it's easy.

I feel for your worries with your parents Dude. I have had my own problem this year and at the back of my mind is my father. he's 78 next month and while still active and healthy, that can't last forever. I don't know what to do with him. he lives 3.5 hours away and while I try to be with him as much as possible, times like this are painful. We were with him last Christmas but my wife wants to spend this Christmas with her family which is fair enough. He won't come to the city and even though I beg he just gets annoyed. I'm left with pushing the point and making him come which I could do if I wanted but whats the point in that if he's going to be unhappy and uncomfortable? He just wants to be left alone and stay in his own place but the thought of that doesn't sit well at all.
I'm torn between what is really going to make him happy and what I want. I'm scared of making the wrong decision and either forcing him into something he really didn't want to do or not reading the situation right and not doing something I should have.

Atm it looks like we'll leave him be and just go up there the day after boxing day for a few days. I'm looking for a new home on the outskirts of the city where I have some land and can get a place that either has its own self contained place for him or I can build something nice to put him in. I'll need to have a big shed built for him as well as he'll never stop tinkering around while he can stand on his own two feet and I think that's what keeps him going.

Good luck with everything Dude. It's not easy I know but better to try and go on than just give up.

Dec 20, 2015 at 07:25 PM

Tom Robinson
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

Just reading all these this morning has helped me. Thanks to all. Keep the faith.

Dec 21, 2015 at 07:57 AM

thebmrust
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

I wasn't able to post "my story" earlier so here it is.

A few years ago at 43 years old, I finished my university degree and was looking for work and trying to be a full time pro photographer. It seemed that spending time digging up "real work" always got in the way of photography. Finally, I decided to grab a part time night job to augment the spouses income while I did photography full time.

August 2014 we moved back to my home town(s), population 250,000 (three major cities adjacent to each other) and seven large high schools and several smaller private schools. I started shooting high school sports Sept 5, 2014 after an introduction to a guy who was doing online radio type coverage for the local area and got us credentials. I also shot a high school senior portrait session that fall and the rest of the time was sports 5-6 days a week for 9 months.

We didn't have any marketing other than being at every sports event that was scheduled. Even if it was only for a quarter of a game, or the last :15 minutes... I was there. Fall would be three football games or 4 soccer games, sometimes would have 6-7 events in a day. My peak day was 8 events plus a portrait session.

This is my home town that I had been gone from for about ten years. My peers from high school had kids in the high schools so we had some built in contacts. As I attended games, my classmates would see me, we would friend on Facebook or re-connect. I also used Twitter already so I added an account for our new face of sports photography.

There were several things that set us (my wife and I) apart from every other parent and semi-pro photographer.
1) We covered every sport every season except for cross country and boys swimming. XC had a great local photographer that knows all the runners and knows the sport well. Boys Swim doesn't have a home pool so they travel for all events. We only covered local events.

2) We are aggressive shooters. We shoot tight and edit with high contrast/color/in your face action while focusing on inside players, cheer, band, dance, and students. We don't always shoot following the ball.

3) We talked with everyone all the time: staff, admin, AD's, parents, students (once they got used to us and we earned their trust), referees, local news (print, radio, & TV). Recognition was critical for our style of coverage.

There aren't many people at a venue that don't know who we are or what we do because of #1, 2, & 3.

This year is very different. We changed our pricing structure, added digital options, and offered to contract to parent's/players for game coverage. We haven't had any real takes for game coverage, but it's a completely new concept of photography here in this market and people still don't know what to do about it. Heck most people don't know what to do about our images in the first place since they are really very different than what they have been seeing. We also cover all schools and not jut "our" school that most parents with athletes do. That put us in a realm that not even our newspaper photographers can touch.

We reduced our coverage a bit this year. Our fall 2014 game coverage was 100ish and 2015 fall was 63. Winter will be mush less as well since we have only covered two games so far and the season has been going on since mid November. So I expect maybe 40 games on the high side. We will probably pick up some in the spring but I don't expect more than 30-40 games total.

Note1: I don't recommend the approach of the schedule we had in 2014/15. It wears you out (or could kill you). We ended up shooting 300 games in 9 months, three state championship weekends and tallied 150,000 images. We wore out or broke 4 lenses and two camera bodies and I was (and still am) exhausted.

Note2: We shoot sports on spec, provide schools with images for access and sell to parents.

Dec 22, 2015 at 03:07 PM

glort
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

^^^^
Could you tell us how you sell, onsite, or online i take it?

Also, has this been profitable for you. Having done sports i know there is a huge difference between shooting a lot and making anything worth while.

Most shooters I know in this market have given it up as a bad joke so it would be interesting to get some insight into what the return on your substantial efforts has been.

Dec 22, 2015 at 08:49 PM

thebmrust
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

Maybe this will help (summarized workflow)

Check schedule - note upcoming games and teams that need coverage (could be a team that has't been covered, a player on the team that might be having a good season or going off to college, or by request of a parent or the player themselves)
Note: We are available for hire, we prefer to shoot that way, but the "contracting a photographer for a sports event" is very new here so we are modifying it as we can to make sure we can get paid to shoot instead of shoot on spec. [Work in progress] Yet, we still shoot on spec even if we mention wanting to get paid, but we cover all players and not just the player/parent that made a request and we don't rush to get them images because they don't get a priority of they work the system. We reward our paid clients well before those that try to get something for free.

Attend the game, get a player roster and note those in their last year of school and try to keep an eye out for them. They will most likely be the clients after the season or end of school year.

Take a cell phone pic, post it to Twitter, tagging the schools and people in the photo.

Get a video of student sections cheering. Post to twitter and tag students.

Shoot game.

Move to next game, repeat above steps.

Get home, upload images to computer with Photo Mechanic (assign star ratings to images.

Export to Lightroom for editing.

Edit top images.

Upload a few images to Facebook, tagging players, students, parents.
Tweet the game info team v team with 4 photos of teams and students. Tag photos.

(New step) Upload to online sales site [ work in progress]
We are evaluating two online hosts and haven't decided on one yet.

Sales:
For the most part, we wait until we get contacted by a player or parent then the following happens:
a) Reply with pricing info.
b) We go through the games their player was in (eg all of the schools soccer, football, etc). Once we have all the images selected for that player we make an appointment at a local coffee shop to review images.
c) Give them a sheet of paper to write down image numbers and we color code images they select.
d) Go over prices again, options, expectations, payment, products (get payment for print products),
e) Return home, final edit images
f) submit print images or put digital images on CD/DVD or USB.
g) deliver get final payment

Our first year was planned to get our name out there. Then year 2 was to be more marketing and let people know we can sell.

That didn't happen.

Year one... month 2... everyone knew about us. We have parents coming out of the seats to come talk to us during timeouts, breaks and half times. We gave out cards, friended a lot of people and created some great relationships.

Note: I made the best relationships with the students and players. But that was a mistake. You have to gain their trust, but it's the parents that are the actual clients since it is the parents that pay for the images. We are adjusting our approach this year by trying to get more contact with parents and also working with students just like year one..

So.... the biggest bottle neck is our editing and getting the images in front of the parents. Facebook is great for that ... but the first year I posted way too many images and in this era of online imagery, I gave everything away and we didn't get very many sales. This year, I only post up to 10 photos on Facebook, unless the event needs more (my choice to post more).

We have had more sale sin the last two weeks for sports photos than all of last year (9 months) and we shoot 30-40%% fewer games this fall.

Even though this photography business is my wife and I, it is only me that does 99% of the shooting and 100% of the editing, sales, meetings, and follow up processes. She works full time in another job so doesn't have the time to do everything. We have talked about her quitting because we have enough business (we think) to employ 3-4 full time people. We are losing sales by not getting images to the clients. P. Alesse will attest to the need to get photos within 24-72 hours or less. Preferably same day.

This particular business model takes way more work than most will put in. It honestly could kill you if you aren't up for the challenge. If we can fine tune our workflow, I will be ramping up coverage next year to match last year. I want to be the one photographer that goes to every game. But we have to have the ability to get images up for sale same day or next day. (We are working on getting images up during the game but there are a lot of hurdles to get through before we can get there).

The reason we don't put up unedited images for sale is part of our brand is our editing style. People were drawn to us by being everywhere AND the results. We can't put up unedited images for the market segment we are targeting.

Is it profitable... in a word... NO. But it can be. I believe once we learn to shoot, edit and post for sale quickly we will be making a lot more money and we will begin to shoot on volume so once we get sales rolling we can sell lower price per image because they will buy a whole game or season worth of images and get higher per client sales amounts.

And yes, nearly all sports shooters quit after a year or two (or much less) because of the amount of time and effort that is needed. It is a HUGE amount of time involved. A football game (American version) is 3 hours long plus 3-9 more hours of editing for us. I average 4 hours or less sleep a night for the 9 months of school sports. It is grueling.

Dec 23, 2015 at 05:21 AM

Weasel_Loader
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

thebmrust wrote:
Maybe this will help (summarized workflow)

Check schedule - note upcoming games and teams that need coverage (could be a team that has't been covered, a player on the team that might be having a good season or going off to college, or by request of a parent or the player themselves)
Note: We are available for hire, we prefer to shoot that way, but the "contracting a photographer for a sports event" is very new here so we are modifying it as we can to make sure we can get paid to shoot instead of shoot on spec. [Work in progress]...Show more →

Thanks so much for the insight on your workflow. I just started shooting High School and Youth rodeo events over last summer and instantly got hooked when I saw how much the parents and kids loved my work. It finally drove me to start a FB page, IG, and website sales through Smugmug. I share a lot of your workflow, but on a MUCH smaller scale since this is still only a hobby for me (even though I earn a little through sales). I've kept my workflow small since I want to shoot on my time and not make it a job. I only post a few images on FB now and direct people to the full gallery on my Smugmug.

My biggest struggle (as you also mention), is speed. I'm shooting about 1200-1500 images on a typical event and it will usually take me a full week to edit (I'm really slow since, like others, I have a full time job). I feel I could gain more sales with quicker edits, but I feel my edited photos really stand out far above my competition. Most all the event photogs I've been around do not edit any of their photos, shoot jpeg, and have their photos up on the web the same day. People buy them and its good enough for them, and the photog makes great income. I've held back going to that workflow, because I really enjoy editing my photos and making them stand out. The comments I get when they see the images full screen or printed just melts my heart and keeps me driven.

I've been asked to shoot larger state finals events, but quickly realized times have changed for event photography and they usually only give you access while you get payment from sales of your photos. Of course a bigger event would give me more sales, but nowhere near what I would pay in travel, hotel, food, time, etc.

One thing I really enjoy is the photos I've donated to the organizations for year-end awards. The organization has custom handmade wood frames that they put 8x10s and 5x7s in and the parents/kids love it which in turn drives a few sales once they see prints.

I could be making a whole lot more with a different approach/workflow, but I love how I'm doing it now and income from this is only secondary. I'd really hate to rely on this as income. As mentioned previously, I'd get burned out really quick and it would turn into a job instead of a hobby.

Dec 23, 2015 at 06:02 PM

Michael White
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

I'm a old guy to but luckily I was interested in thr computer side of photography. I do fb socially but not professionally. If I was in you position I would seriously look into hiring a young energetic person to manage the issues that you have lost interest in. It doesn't necessarily have to be a full time position or if that what's they need then use them as an assistant to make up the hours. They basically assist you when needed then the rest of the time they promote the business and do the other things that you have lost interest in.

Dec 26, 2015 at 03:42 AM

dude90001
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

Hi group, sorry I didn’t receive any email notifications on the topic. I have been freelance my entire adult life, never had a full time job.

I have always wanted to do high end advertising but on the way, I did trade magazines, weddings, events, corporate, antique furniture, sports you name it. I also have a digital tech business, and went to UCLA for video directing. I also attended the Art Center College of Design when it was a prestigious thing to say 30 people a year per division.

I’ve always done conceptual work that was my forte but the crap work is what pays. Hired consultants and they gave good advice backed up by Art Directors at big agencies and design firms.

I’ve shot for a lot of magazines and had to sue Jim Henson’s company, Reader’s Digest, and National Geo over rights and the stuff like that, but ultimately it ruins your career.

I’ve done retail catalogs, and the PR stuff for the car companies here in Los Angeles, Orange County.

BlahBlah that and 2.00 gets you a cup of coffee…

Now, I am a video producer who shoots stills too, a small crew deal 1-5 people max. I need to figure out where to start over marketing or is it sales training, or is it re-branding…

I could be a handy man or something labor oriented but I do love the business. More a bit later, I’m cutting a job now…

Dec 26, 2015 at 09:07 PM

glort
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p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

Without trying to be rude here, I think you are dreaming and deluding yourself.

What you describe is not practical.

thebmrust wrote:
Even though this photography business is my wife and I, it is only me that does 99% of the shooting and 100% of the editing, sales, meetings, and follow up processes. She works full time in another job so doesn't have the time to do everything. We have talked about her quitting because we have enough business (we think) to employ 3-4 full time people. We are losing sales by not getting images to the clients. P. Alesse will attest to the need to get photos within 24-72 hours or less. Preferably same day.

I whole heartedly agree. Anyone that has done sports work knows the faster you get the pics to the clients the better and there is nothing better for sales than onsite ordering. Having done sports work I will also say that trying to sell online and make a decent profit is a virtual impossibility these days. Especially making enough profit to support the kind of overheads in labour you are talking about.

I would not touch an event I couldn't do onsite ordering for 5 years ago. I certainly don't think the market has improved any since! These days, I'd be hesitant about doing onsite let alone online. Far as I'm concerned that is just non viable even in the best of markets. The dropoff in sales after just 24 Hours makes it an exercise in futility anyway.

You are also in a bad market. Hammy taught me some rules years ago and they have held 100% true.
The trouble I see with what you are doing is several fold.
The cost to play the game is low so the price of a pic is significant in the over all spend of the exercise. Idid a lot of equine and Motorsports. $30 for a pic was nothing, it was not 3 times the game cost.

Nothing changes. For a whole year the kid is in the same uniform and looks the same from one game to the next. Buy one pic for the year and what is there to encourage the purchase of another? I think this is where your seasons game idea will hit trouble. Practice will not stand up to theroy.

The parents can get pics. No, not the same as yours but free. NEVER underestimate the power and persuasion of that one factor alone. Add to the fact there is always a parent that has dropped some cash on some decent gear that will blaze away and WILL come up with a decent pic he will happily give to other parents just out of a sense of doing something nice.
They are the biggest threat to your profitability in this market.

But we have to have the ability to get images up for sale same day or next day. (We are working on getting images up during the game but there are a lot of hurdles to get through before we can get there).

Hugely important. Online sales is a dead duck as far as I and many other people that have done this game are concerned but after 24 hours, kiss your profits goodbye. Yes, I'm sure you have received endless compliments and thanks on your pics and the parents love them etc but by your own admissions, what you have not got is cash to vindicate the hours of work and effort you have put in. Without the money it's a costly hobby not a business.

The reason we don't put up unedited images for sale is part of our brand is our editing style. People were drawn to us by being everywhere AND the results. We can't put up unedited images for the market segment we are targeting.

Really? And how have you TESTED this?
Don't tell me it's that the parents tell you, that's not testing, That's them BSing you to keep getting free pics. Try putting up unedited pics and see what the difference in response is. There will be some no doubt but that's because you have educated them in an unviable product.

I did a sports market where I pre printed every package and sold on spec. Yes, I had a huge amount of leftovers BUT, it was a profitable exercise just the same. The problem was when I got to the bigger events, there was simply not enough hours in the day to print all those packages even tough I turned the studio into a print house and had up to 8 machines going flat out and 3 people working on producing the packages straight out.

I had to go to selling the images off the Screen and either printing on site or doing the images on USB. Yes, I did drop profit and sales but I still made damn good money. It was a viable sales model where the other was not.
My STRONG feeling is that you would make a lot more money at the end of the day by selling images straight out of the camera or with a batch tweaking ONSITE or having them online an hour or 3 after the game.

No, they may not be your idea of perfection and what you want to produce and all that but I'm pretty sure what you are describing will not be a practical proposition in the first place and tat makes it and everything else a completely Moot point...... Unless your goal here is to enjoy yourself taking pretty pictures and playing tiddly winks pretending it's a profitable and worthwhile business.

If you want it to be a business, you have to be guided by financial and practical reality not a pipe dream. That may mean you can't do what you want as far as your product so the decision is do you want to do what you want to do or do you want to make money? That really is the first decision.
You don't have the time to edit them yourself, you don't have the profit or sales to pay others to do them, you don't have a real business without profit and sustainability.

Is it profitable... in a word... NO. But it can be. I believe once we learn to shoot, edit and post for sale quickly we will be making a lot more money and we will begin to shoot on volume so once we get sales rolling we can sell lower price per image because they will buy a whole game or season worth of images and get higher per client sales amounts.

I have to say I find this statement fraught with ideals that will disappoint you and are bad marketing mistakes. People DO NOT spend more than they were going to because of cheap pricing. They BUY more than they would have but usually the value, IE, your potential earnings is the same. I also find the likelihood of them buying multiple pics of somewhat looks the same in one to the other highly unlikely.

And yes, nearly all sports shooters quit after a year or two (or much less) because of the amount of time and effort that is needed. It is a HUGE amount of time involved. A football game (American version) is 3 hours long plus 3-9 more hours of editing for us. I average 4 hours or less sleep a night for the 9 months of school sports. It is grueling.

All the sports shooters I know quit after many years because the effort, investment and Risk was not worth the declining financial returns they were getting despite their best and most creative approaches to turn things around. There is only so much banging your head on a brickwall you can do before you realise the pain is not getting you anywhere. It would be a mistake to think you know something no one else does or hasn't tried before. To average 4 hours sleep a night for 9 mothns you are not making money out of to me is ignorant.

I made profit on my efforts first day out. Within 3 months I had paid back my total investment in my trailer, V stations, equipment and everything else. That was hard work too but I did make worthwhile PROFIT. You should not be doing something a year and still making no profit if it is actually a worthwhile business.

I'm not trying to rubbish your efforts or aspirations but I do think you sound a lot more hopeful than practical. I think you are making some dangerous and potentially dissapointing assumptions and frankly that you are letting your enjoyment of what you do get in the way of the profit and business reality's of it. I did the same thing the last year I did sports. You get to know the kids and the parents and get to enjoy the work as hard as it is, and it clouds your reality. I still made profit my last year but it was not enough and I should have flicked it the year earlier especially in light of what I went onto and the money with so much less effort and investment I went to with it.

If you re looking at this as a hobby/ side income, That's one thing. If you are looking at it as a real, profit producing, earn your living type Business, Then I would strongly suggest that there are a LOT of things you need to look at VERY closely.
Again, I'm not meaning to put your idea and enthusiasm down, but what you are saying has a lot of alarm bells ringing with me based on both my won practical experience and that I have read so many times from others that have been in the game and very successful at it that have given it away after a load of investment of time and effort.

The difficulty here in not in the photography/ production side of producing the pics, the turning lead into gold alchemy is in making a sustainable PROFIT from what you are wanting to do.

Good luck with it either way.

Dec 31, 2015 at 12:54 AM

cineski
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p.1 #15 · p.1 #15 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

I really hate to say this, OP, but at this point in my life it's the 50 year old photographers I see scrambling right now that have made me want to get out of the photography industry entirely. I'm currently successful as a photographer but it has taken a ton of work and adapting to keep me this way. I've adapted and worked at it so much that I'm not sure I'm willing to keep this up for the next 30 years because while I'm advancing, most of the people I work for are stuck in a regressive view of what photography is which tells me I'll be spending this much energy till the day I retire. 5% of professional photography is actually taking pictures but the other 95% has become so difficult it's completely overtaken the reason I got into photography. But I've done it and am successful....for now. Part of that you'll find proof of in my posting history as I haven't really been on forums for a very long time because being online is a distraction which leads to nothing. But despite that success I am STILL trying to figure out how to get out of being behind the camera because I don't want to relive my professionally confusing 20's when I'm in my 40's or 50's. But the vast majority of photographers I know are struggling both financially and existentially. Even the really successful ones I know are being realistic looking at the future like I am. A good number my age who have been less successful are getting out and doing something else because they still can, but those in their 40's and 50's have a lot more concerns with this because a career switch at that stage, while not impossible, is much harder. Photography is a sexy career to the youngsters but it's mostly become a youngsters game and taken over by people who may be talented but have zero real world business training and work for very little money, for credit, or for the completely worthless Facebook like. Instant fame has taken over sustainability. They learn by desperate ex-photographers who will coddle them in exchange for money (wedding industry) or they only rely on technique while ignoring the business. You're also dealing with a new generation who was taught in public schools that money and capitalism are evil which will wreak havoc on a system like freelance photography. These youngsters are in it for the share and fame while big corporations make millions off them. That's a whole other topic

.

You can add/change clients or change your photo emphasis, neither of which are easy to do and will take money and effort to build an appropriate portfolio. However, most emphasis like photo journalism or commercial are also hurting for the exact same reasons: People willing to do the job for next to nothing and think $35k/year in LA (or anywhere for that matter) is ok. During the last year I was in LA I saw commercial photographers trying to shoot weddings, wedding photographers trying to shoot commercial, photographers becoming videographers, videographers becoming photographers, photographers doing nothing but emulating other photographers, big photo agents and producers speaking to photo groups saying they were scared of what the industry was becoming, it was pure crazy panic and continues to be so for the most part. All of those people were experienced to some degree. But as others have stated, in order to succeed in photography above others, you must be willing to photograph what they're not wanting to photograph or be so well connected which is an art form unto itself. But connected doesn't mean making money. That means photographing things that are exclusive. Think about what's avail in your area that isn't considered glamorous. Don't be a rock star because rock stars aren't sustainable and most die young ;-). Think about what will sustain your career to retirement. I'm sure you'll find some things. If you can't find anything or you're not willing to do those things, it's time to put your energy elsewhere even if part time.

Yes, your age and experience level should be used as a virtue. But even the most experienced need to stay adaptable.

I will add this: is the current demise of the photo industry absolute? I don't think so for the truly talented and experienced. Photographer's incomes have been hit before (like car photographers back in the day). I've been doing this long enough to know that 99% of the people calling themselves professionals can't perform in a demanding professional environment. While most professional commercial photo environments are on the cheap photographer bandwagon, some of them simply cannot find photographers worth hiring anymore because so many who are experienced enough to hang with that crowd have gotten out of the game because they were replaced by kids working for credit...or they refuse to lower their expected income levels and won't work for corporations paying so little. So now those kids working for credit are moving up and they don't have the skills or experience demanded by some. I hear this first hand with numerous people I've spoken with in big corporations. So they're very slowly starting to pony up to hire better photographers because they have to adapt themselves or they'll start losing money with "professionals" not being able to deliver what they need. Just have patience and adapt but also be realistic and spend time decompressing.

OP, I know you already know all this. I'm writing it more for people in their early stages to start thinking about things they aren't thinking about.

Anyway, I'm not sure what to tell you aside from you do need to adapt which takes energy and you need to work on your energy first. Sounds dumb but eat healthy and work out. Take hikes in those mountains close to you, find inspiration. Also look at working full time for a corporation (those jobs are still hard to come by...some pay a lot, most pay little, and transitioning to a corporation from freelance can be hell). You're in LA so you have a big market which may bring you freelance production management jobs which will take a lot of pavement pounding but is an easy transition from photography since you already do it.

Jan 03, 2016 at 12:28 PM

Deezie
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p.1 #16 · p.1 #16 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

It appears that the writing is on the wall that you're no longer invested in photography. I think you need to find a new mountain to climb. Something that inspires you and makes you a little obsessed. We all hit the wall sooner or later. Time to start a new journey.

Edited on Jan 10, 2016 at 11:48 AM · View previous versions

Jan 08, 2016 at 11:28 AM

thebmrust
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p.1 #17 · p.1 #17 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

My reponses will be ALL CAPS (not shouting... just want to differentiate but keep everything in context). THX!

glort wrote:
Without trying to be rude here, I think you are dreaming and deluding yourself.

What you describe is not practical. TOTALLY AGREE WHICH IS WHY WE ARE MAKING SOME CHANGES

I whole heartedly agree. Anyone that has done sports work knows the faster you get the pics to the clients the better and there is nothing better for sales than onsite ordering. Having done sports work I will also say that trying to sell online and make a decent profit is a virtual impossibility these days. Especially making enough profit to support the kind of overheads in labour you are talking...Show more →

Jan 09, 2016 at 08:44 PM

glort
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p.1 #18 · p.1 #18 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

thebmrust wrote:
My reponses will be ALL CAPS (not shouting... just want to differentiate but keep everything in context). THX!

That was very hard to read caps or not so if i miss anything or get it wrong please forgive me.

I DISAGREE IN RE: BAD MARKET. WE HAVE 250,000 POPULATION BUT WITH THAT IS ALSO SEVERAL HUNDRED PHOTOGRAPHERS OF ALL LEVELS THAT ARE "PROFESSIONAL". WITHIN THE "SPORTS" GENRE WE OFTEN HAVE 3 PHOTOGRAPHERS AT EACH GAME. I HAVE COUNTED 9-11 AT A PLAYOFF GAME SOME ARE MEDIA PHOTOGRAPHERS FROM OTHER CITIES).

So what on earth makes you think that is a good market?
250K is hardly a huge population. Where I like and worked in the sports market the population is 8 times yours. Many other shooters I know work in bigger populations still. While numbers helps, it does not change basic and fundamental flaws with the current sports market. As you point out with the number of shooters in your area, it just multiplies them.

I'm not sure what your point is about having so many shooters in your area and at each game but a lot of people covering the same thing does not mean it's a good market, just a competitive one. It also does not mean it's a profitable one, as you seem to have found out so far.

WE HAVE 15 OR MORE VENUES JUST FOR HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS AND CANNOT OUTFIT EACH LOCATION WITH VIEW STATIONS. SELLING ON SITE IS NOT PRACTICAL NOR EVEN REMOTELY AFFORDABLE. ALL REQUIRE DISTRICT CONTRACTS AS WELL. ONLY A FEW LOCATION HAVE THE ABILITY FOR SECURITY IF THE STATIONS WERE LEFT ON SITE. THE REST ARE OUTDOOR VENUES AND SOME DON'T EVEN HAVE POWER EXCEPT FOR FIELD LIGHTS. WE HAVE LOOKED AT FOCUSING ON ONE VENUE AND JUST REDUCE OUR WORKLOAD. WHICH ISN'T OUT OF THE QUESTION EVEN NOW.

I don't think you even understand what onsite is or how to go about it.
I covered at least 30 Venues in the work I did, probably half of that more than 4 times a year.
Vstations are VERY affordable, certainly more now than ever. I ran up to 30. Hammy here runs over 100 now I believe. We di9dn't have security at ANY of the venues we covered. Sometimes we slept in the tent the Vstations were in ( which was very nice actually!) and other times we just packed them up and put them in the trailer which was locked. Security was low risk.
At indoor venues we just left the things there and never had a problem.

Many of the venues I covered didn't have power or had shitty generator power I wouldn't plug into. I bought my own generator which wasn't expensive and I also built myself a very high reserve UPS anyway because we would be flat out at the end of a gig and some twit would just turn all the power off which with the servers I had could easily take 15 Mine to get everything buck up and running.

These aren't insurmountable obstacles, they are just things you allow and prepare for and have solution's in place. We could literally operate in the middle of a paddock and be totally self sufficient. A couple of places I went to had problems with their generator so I lent them my backup so they could function.

YES... REMEMBER WHEN I SAID WE HAVE SEVERAL OTHER LOCAL PHOTOGRAPHERS AT SPORTS EVENTS... THEY DO LIMITED EDITING AND WE GET SALES FROM THEIR SCHOOLS FROM THEIR BUILT IN CLIENT BASE (PARENTS OF ATHLETES). THIS ISN'T A "SCIENTIFIC" TEST BUT A RESULTS ORIENTED TEST BASED ON SALES. OUR UNEDITED IMAGES ARE SIMILAR TO OTHER PHOTOGRAPHERS THAT ARE SELLING FOR COAST OR FREE. OURS ARE EDITED READY TO PRINT AND HAVE A DIFFERENT ENOUGH LOOK THAT THEY ARE CONSIDERED A DIFFERENT PRODUCT. AND SOME OF THAT IS A RESPONSE TO PARENTS BUYING. WE DON'T REDUCE OUR PRICES. WE MAY ALTER A...Show more →

That's all good and well but the bottom line is you aren't making money.
Not trying to be rude but you seem very product orientated and woefully business and profit naive. Your work i'm sure is fantastic BUT, you are not getting the images to the parents quick enough and there are not sufficient buying to make your extreme effort viable.
History is littered with fantastic products that were offered at a great price but the company went down the tubes because they couldn't get enough sales to keep afloat.

You are trying to justify a lot of things here but seem very close minded to the sustainability and profitability of your business.
I'm not trying to one up you or be a smartarse but i am trying to open your eyes to what I seem a a big mistake you are making in focussing on the product in what you are doing and not the profit. From what you have said, Multiplying what you are doing is NOT going to make it all turn round, it's going to make things even harder and give you less ROI.

From what I am reading, you HAVE to get the pictures to the clients and most likely, a lot more clients FASTER. You have to do your editing quicker. I'm not sure if your prices are even viable if you manage that but the first 2 are deal breakers in themselves if not sorted.

COST VERSUS RETURN BALANCE.
Is exactly what i am trying to point out. You seem to think putting more people on the job, IE, increasing manhours invested, id going to sort the problem. I would guarantee it won't. The costs will be too high for the returns because for one thing, you are still committed to online sales which is a completely flawed sales platform in this market and there is no way in hell you are going to change basic consumer behavior to make that any different.

WE AREN'T TRYING TO SELL TO EVERYONE. WE HAVE AN IDEAL CLIENT IN MIND AND WE GET TO THEM BY SPORTS AS OUR LEAD IN.

You might have an ideal client in mind but my first though is if there are enough of those ideal clients in existence to support and justify your efforts. After a year or more, it seems not.
For someone that says they aren't trying to sell to everyone, I have to wonder then why you are busting a gut to cover every game? If you have a select ideal clientele, Why not just work on a pre booked arrangement where you only cover the kids that have paid up front so you aren't trying to cover every kid in every game, just the "Ideal" clients.

I'm trying to give you a heads up to fundamental problems beyond your control. You don't seem to be able to grasp the difficulty in making a profit in this game is not hinged on what you do or what you offer. It is all down to consumer behaviour in this day and age. Your competition is probably not the 3 other shooters covering the same game, It's Iphoneys, The other thing the parents have to get to straight after the games you are covering, it's the pics the kids had at school, at the fun park, for last seasons sports they played, the parents lack of time and possibly budget and all the other things that make the sport you are covering, particularly sold online, an almost impossible thing to make a go of these days.

I can see you won't believe me know but in honesty, How long do you give yourself to do this before you make a profit and what is the goal of your net profit going to be? $50K yr? 100K yr?
More importantly, what is your hourly rate going to be?
You can't sleep 4 hrs a day for too long before you are going to run into all sorts of health let alone life issues so at very least i would say start setting yourself some goals so you know when you have reached what you set out to do or realise it's an impossibility.

Jan 10, 2016 at 03:18 AM

thebmrust
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p.1 #19 · p.1 #19 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

glort wrote:
Actually, my prior response is whats to ask forgiveness... I forgot to add in /quote . I;ll try to clean it up another day.

Jan 14, 2016 at 10:32 PM

Jeff
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p.1 #20 · p.1 #20 · Old guy - totally lost my drive to market myself...

thebmrust wrote:
We have talked about her quitting because we have enough business (we think) to employ 3-4 full time people. We are losing sales by not getting images to the clients.

I'm pretty sure I saw in there somewhere that you are also not making any money? I'm kind of with 'glort' for much of this; if you can't find a way to turn a profit with 1.25 people (or whatever it is) working 14 hour days and getting 4 hours sleep, I'm not sure how you can consider paying 3.5 people full-time and making money. It also seems your product (unique, requires significant time editing and post-processing) could be somewhat incompatible with what the market wants (a picture of their kid, fast).

You may be able to make it work, but by your own admission you're throwing up ample red flags, enough to be really cautious with how you approach it.

Good luck!

-Jeff

Feb 01, 2016 at 11:36 PM


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