p.1 #1 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
What’s the secret to making any money from sports work? I’m a runner myself and while I’m out of racing I go shoot a lot of small 5k’s that local non profit groups put on for fund raisers. I shot enough races in a few years that I was invited to cover a USA T&F National Championship race but there still no money to be made there. Just a lot of visits to my web site. I was next invited to shoot some NCAA Div 2 (small college) basketball but still being a small area with little attendance to these games there is really no money to be made.
Am I just in too small of an area or going about this in the wrong way? Any advice or just give up trying to make anything and continue to shoot the small events just for the fun of it? BTW Photography is not my main income source as I work a full time job in live theatre.
p.1 #2 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
My first question is what is your reason for wanting to make money as a sports photographer?
1-Is it supplemental income?
2-To justify purchasing more and/or better gear?
3-To move towards photography as a profession?
4-Just want to make a little spending money?
5-To just have a side business?
Ways to make money as a sports photographer:
-work for wire service
-work for newspaper
-work for large studio
-own your own studio/sports photography business
-freelance for paper or large firm such as Life Touch
From my experience, I have found the team and individual photo business is the most profitable approach for sports photography in my area. You would starve trying to make a living selling action photography in some vicinities.
I still sell game action but it's less than 10% of my yearly income from the photography business.
A parent will easily spend $50-100 on little Suzie or Johnny just standing there but wouldn't spend one dime on them in the field running, jumping or hitting and I offer both services on my order forms.
This is just me...but I have found that a few high school or middle school photography contracts along with a few youth sports leagues mixed in with media coverage makes for a nicely-balanced, seasonal business model.
p.1 #3 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
leewoolery wrote:
My first question is what is your reason for wanting to make money as a sports photographer?
1-Is it supplemental income?
2-To justify purchasing more and/or better gear?
3-To move towards photography as a profession?
4-Just want to make a little spending money?
5-To just have a side business?
Ways to make money as a sports photographer:
-work for wire service
-work for newspaper
-work for large studio
-own your own studio/sports photography business
-freelance for paper or large firm such as Life Touch
From my experience, I have found the team and individual photo business is the most profitable approach for sports photography in my area. You would starve trying to make a living selling action photography in some vicinities.
I still sell game action but it's less than 10% of my yearly income from the photography business.
A parent will easily spend $50-100 on little Suzie or Johnny just standing there but wouldn't spend one dime on them in the field running, jumping or hitting and I offer both services on my order forms.
This is just me...but I have found that a few high school or middle school photography contracts along with a few youth sports leagues mixed in with media coverage makes for a nicely-balanced, seasonal business model.
As I get older (I’m 54) I’d like to have some side income from my regular job and something to keep me busy. I’d prefer to not buy more equipment but big field sports (football) are out of the question unless I bought a bigger lens. In the end I may be in to of a small rural area to even think about this venture. I do thank you for the reply. Lots of great info.
p.1 #4 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
Resqu2 wrote:
As I get older (I’m 54) I’d like to have some side income from my regular job and something to keep me busy. I’d prefer to not buy more equipment but big field sports (football) are out of the question unless I bought a bigger lens. In the end I may be in to of a small rural area to even think about this venture. I do thank you for the reply. Lots of great info.
Talk to people in your area about potential streams of photo income.
With some careful marketing (and you don't know unless you try) you could create opportunities that don't exist now.
I am a big supporter of small business and entrepreneurs since I have been one for nearly 40 years so I encourage anyone thinking of turning photos into dollars...and it can be done without spending a fortune on new gear!
Much success.
Nov 25, 2022 at 04:34 PM
osv2 Offline • • • • [X]
p.1 #5 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
i used to do video and web work for a company that polished sports resumes for kids looking to get scholarships for college.
video was the key, there was little to no income for stills, so you might want to consider branching out to include video as well.
p.1 #8 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
Kind of late to the discussion....
I can tell you what does not pay...if the athletes have too many photos of themselves. If they are competing in training races...if they are poor to begin with. If they are neither kids or doctors and lawyers...
Getting good shots is only part of the reason and the rest...too many factors.
You need a larger size attendance. From my experiences, usually less than 10% people would buy photos. If you have less than 50 people attending, you are lucky you have 5 people buying photos. The larger the pool, the higher chances people would buy photos.
People on a budget competing wont' buy photos. My clients are usually adults and working in various professional fields. They can easily drop $100 on a set of photos. Struggling college kids with a part time job and with no sponsor obligation?
Get paid from the promoters. Convince the promoter that your work has so much promotional values in them that they would pay you to shoot regardless if anyone is buying photos.....Your photos can help the event to become more popular and to provide the needed content for the event social media present....
p.1 #9 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
We built our business for 17 years on making money with action photos. The success we have had is staying focused on the youth market and being pre-paid to only photograph those athletes whose parents pre-paid us.
The old ways of photographing the game and then posting online with the hopes of selling is what we call ‘spray & pray’ We failed at it and had to pivot our business 13 years ago to save ourselves. FYI, our company is Glossy Finish (www.glossyfinish.com)
We have created a community to help and support other photographers looking to make money with action photography.
p.1 #10 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
I think that the best way to monetize your photos is to turn it into a business. Unlike other niches, in the photography niche this is easy to do because the same tools you use for your hobby, you can use further for business.
Transforming a hobby into a business refers more to changing the perspective, creating a business plan, planning the finances. Check this additional info about the simple steps to go through this stage.
After that, here are some ideas that you can use to monetize your photos:
Sell prints: You can offer prints of your sports photography for sale on your website or through a print-on-demand service. Make sure to showcase your best work and price your prints appropriately.
Offer digital downloads: You can also offer digital downloads of your photos for personal or commercial use. This can be a good option for businesses or organizations looking for images to use in their marketing materials.
License your photos: You can license your sports photos to publications, websites, or other businesses that may be interested in using them. This can be a good way to generate recurring revenue from your work.
Work with clients: You can also work with clients such as athletes, teams, or sponsors to provide them with customized images for their personal or commercial use. This can include things like action shots, headshots, or product photography.
p.1 #11 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
A lot of people interested in baseball here. I know they took photos, more portraits, probably before the season. You might be able to get those gigs in nearby towns. More once yearly, Idk about game photos. Might still be able to get those if they haven't done them yet this year?
p.1 #12 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
I think a lot of it involves where you think your skills are. If you can punch with the most talented photographers, there are always photo wire companies that are willing to pay what you sell. Otherwise, its a tough world to get into if you aren't willing to travel or have a extremely flexible schedule.
p.1 #14 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
Cnyphotoguy wrote:
> 2-To justify purchasing more and/or better gear?
Man that really calls me out...exactly why I opened this thread lol
That's one thing I'm kinda trying to do as well haha. There's awesome photo potentials in auto racing and I hope that I can get enough funds to keep buying things I don't really need but really want.
p.1 #15 · How is the best way to monetize sports photography?
Here's a depressing case study. Rather than selling families images from a recent high school track and field championships, we negotiated a deal with the organizers where they paid us an upfront fee and we opened our archives so they could use our images to market the meet, we provided marketing support, and we tried to photograph all 2,300 competitors in the meet and made the images available as a free download to athletes, families, and schools. We uploaded just over 9,000 images and so far have had something like 14,000 images downloaded. Now... just imagine if all those downloaders would pay a buck an image... makes for a pretty good weekend for our team of four shooters and one editor. But... not a chance that people would put the money down. End result of the weekend is that we did get paid (we did the gig for a deeply discounted rate because of long-term support for the sport), families and athletes are ecstatic with the images, the organizers seem very happy, and the governing body is really pleased. Comparing this gig to how other recent similar gigs have gone we find a rather depressing reenforcement of the reality that people just don't value photography.
