So, you’ve finally decided to take the plunge and bring your love of photography to the next level: start making money by building a home-based photography business! Good for you! Of course, the B-word can be frightening, and that’s where this article comes in. I’ve built multiple businesses from my desktop, from a freelance writer studio to a media company focused on Remote Work, ThinkRemote. Let me tell you that there are challenges, definitely (if it were easy, everyone would do it, and it would pay no money). But all of them are surmountable, and if you follow the following roadmap, you’ll realize that it is much easier than you imagined. So without further ado, let’s talk about how to start a photography business from home.
How To Start a Photography Business: The Plan
I’d tell you to skip the plan and “Just Do It,” but life doesn’t work like a Nike commercial. That said, if at any point you feel overwhelmed with planning, you should skip ahead and start the business. Planning is important, but you shouldn’t let it bog you down too much. Any plan is better than no plan, and beginning with an imperfect plan is better than never starting because you’re working on the perfect plan.
Write A Photography Business Plan
Let’s keep it short, simple, and actionable. Open a new document in your note-taking or word-processing tool of choice, and answer the following questions (don’t worry about answering them ideally on the first try; we’ll be revisiting this document for the rest of the guide):
- What kind of photography will my business focus on?
- Who is my ideal customer?
- What will I do to reach those customers?
- How much do I need to make to live off this business?
- What is my profit goal for the first year?
- How much do I need to charge for my work to reach that goal?
Learning how to start a photography business became more challenging with the increasing amount of online work opportunities. However, you’ll notice that every question is about one of three things: product, customers, and money. These are the three pillars of any business you must keep in mind. Keep these in mind at all times, and the rest will fall into place.
Assess Your Photography Business Costs
Whether you already have the money to bootstrap your business or are willing to take on a loan, you need to have an idea of how much it will all cost.
Now is the time to write a list of your expected one-year expenses. This list will include the cost of photography gear (more on that later) but also other non-trivial matters such as grocery money and rent money. You’ll have an easier time if you start your business as a side-hustle while working your current job. That would be ideal, but I have to assume that the end goal for your business is for you to dedicate yourself 100% to it eventually. If that’s the case, you need to pay yourself a salary.
That salary won’t be too glamorous over the first couple of years — most of the money should go back into the business — but it should be enough to afford the bare necessities for you and your family. So while including groceries and rent and stuff like that in your business costs might feel a bit iffy and unprofessional, that’s the practical reality for a bootstrapped business.
Did you get the number you expect to spend on your business for the first year? Great. Now add an extra 20% on top. (Trust me.)
Prepare To Pay Attention To Cash Flow
We’re still talking about money. Where is all the photography talk? Where is the creative part? Sorry, but the main goal of a business is to generate revenue. So, the money talk IS important. We’ll get to the rest soon, I promise.
In the planning stages, you’re not earning, so no sense in tracking cash flow just yet, but you should have a plan to do so — no need to get complicated. A simple spreadsheet will do: You have a column called “sales” and another called “expenses.” At the end of the month, you do the highly complex math of sales minus expenses. If the number is positive, you win!
Alright, it’s a bit more complex than that. You should have small descriptions as well, so you know where you made the most money and where you spent the most as well. This math is one more boring thing that you think you don’t need to do, but at the end of the month, it will help you figure out what kind of gigs to invest in the most and where you have leaks fixed.
How To Start a Photography Business: The Product
You skipped the previous section, didn’t you?! Fair enough, you are an adult after all, but I think you should reconsider. You may feel that it’s a tedious chore and that you know all the answers in your mind, but trust me: you don’t. When you take the time to write stuff down, new problems show up, and it is better to know about them sooner than later.
Having stuff written also means that you don’t need to use processing power later when the time comes to decide. Should you take that “sweet sixteen birthday party” gig? You don’t need to ponder it; what you do is: go back to your written plan and see if it fits your customer, product, and financial goals.
Now that I’ve made the disclaimer and hopefully got you to write your plan down, this section will be dedicated to helping you build your product and offer. Making sure you have an appealing product and value proposition is a big part of starting your photography business…
Buy Camera Gear
But nothing too expensive.
Look, I’m not saying you should go around doing shoots with an iPhone. If you’re a good photographer, you probably could, but it would look stupid.
Let me tell you a secret that will make you slightly sad (and hopefully, I’ll be able to cheer you up with the rest of the article): the camera you buy has more to do with your client’s perception of you than how good the camera is.
If you go around doing iPhone photography, no matter how awesome it looks, people will think you’re an amateur and won’t give you the time of day.
Here’s the good news: Most of your clients will be clueless about the difference between a beginner-friendly Nikon D5100 and a more veteran camera like a Canon 70D. You should buy the cheapest professional camera you feel comfortable with because there are three types of camera: phone, tourist-person camera, and professional camera for the average human being. As long as you have something that looks professional, people will feel good about their choice in hiring you and paying your prices. If, of course, you deliver good photos! This brings me to the next point…
Get Professional Experience And Build A Portfolio
Yes. It’s time to get out there and take some photos! You might have heard about the 10.000-hour rule, the time it takes to achieve mastery at something. No matter how much time & effort you have put into your photography, there’s certainly much to learn. And the best way is by doing it. It’s time to get your first paid customers.
“What?!” you say. “I haven’t even built a website! Did you want me to get clients without a website? What kind of guide is this?!”
The good kind! Remember the three pillars of a business? Product, customer, and money. Is there a “website” there? Nope, I didn’t think so.
Customers won’t magically appear like fungi in a poorly cleaned bathroom in a Panamanian jail just because you have a website. A website is good, and we’ll get to it in the next section, but you need to be able to get customers without one. The hustle is real.
Friends and family are your golden ticket. That’s literally how every bootstrapped business starts: by asking around their family and network if there’s any need for the product. I know you’re shy, so I made a template for you to copy/paste:
Hi there, (insert name of friend and family), guess what? I’m starting my photography business! Right now, I’m focusing on (type of photography), and I’m excited! Do you have something coming up that you would like me to shoot, or if you know about someone who might? I’d love an introduction if that’s the case. Based on my market research, I’m pricing myself at X, that’s what similarly skilled photographers charge, but I’m taking orders from friends and family at half that price.
Go forth and send this to anyone you feel comfortable doing so on your Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, or other favorite social networks. I’d even go a step further and comb my email contact lists. You’d be surprised at how many people have something coming up: a birthday, a pregnancy, a wedding, etc. On LinkedIn, particularly, many people ponder about mixing up their headshot and profile header.
Don’t feel comfortable selling to friends and family? That’s not great. That probably means you still need to do some work on yourself before starting a business. Having a bootstrap business means you need to be conformable selling. That doesn’t mean you can’t be generous. I baked in a hefty discount on my template. Still, if you must, you can offer your services free to build up your portfolio.
Of course, you can try your luck at freelancer websites. These will never pay as well as seeking your clients because a) the platform takes a cut, and b) the clients go there to save a buck. But they can be a reasonable fallback if you are strapped for cash or need to pad out your portfolio. UpWork, TrueLancer, and FlexJobs are good places to start.
Set Pricing
Ah, we’re back to talking about money. I can feel you cringe with joy. Well, it might relieve you to know that I’m not going to tell you how much you should charge. You already know because you did the math back in the first section of this article! You already know how much you need (or want) to make based on your goals. So now, all you need to do is figure out how much time you can work and translate that into an hourly rate.
But you won’t charge by the hour. Instead, come up with 3 service packages. One is your “cheap” package that will pay you the bare minimum to reach your goals. It should be unexciting because you want people to feel like they are missing out if they don’t go for Tier 2, which is the amount you are happy to get. And you should always have an over-the-top Tier 3 plan! By over the top, I mean 5x to 10x what you are charging for Tier 2. You don’t expect to sell it, but occasionally, someone will show up wanting the premium treatment, and you’ll hit the jackpot. Basically, Tier 3 is only there to make sure you’re not leaving money on the table.
That said, make sure Tier 3 is a premium experience. When someone gets it, you need to make that client the center of your world. Research them and their needs as if you would be standing trial for your life, and the proof of your innocence was hidden somewhere in their life & career. Be obsessive about providing these people a service that they will mention to their grandkids. If you do that, they will likely mention you to other people — and push them to get the Tier 3 experience.
In summary: have three price points. The first one should be based on the market offer +20% because you want to be perceived as premium, not the cheap photographer. The second one should be based on what you imagine yourself earning for a comfortable, easy-going lifestyle. The third one should be the price-point for royalty — with service to match.
Red Tape and Fine Print
Being in photography means that you’ll often interact with people in complex and unpredictable scenarios. That means that more than professionals who mostly work online — like, let’s say, a blog writer — you are exposed to potentially litigious situations more often.
Imagine you are doing the aforementioned “Sweet Sixteen” party. Your flash scares the host’s pet Doberman into mauling the pretty face of her bestie-of-the-week for life. You can bet someone will be out for blood, and the scapegoat will quite literally be the person with the weakest legal representation. You want to avoid being that person.
Then, obviously, there’s death and taxes. Insurance and accounting are a blight on the human soul, but they are also necessary for those who don’t want to be expelled from the business world prematurely and permanently. I’m not an expert on any of those things, and realistically, what you need to do and how you need to do it will differ radically based on your location. So, here’s your “Google Search Cheat List” (aka homework) for the day:
- Accounting Services
- Invoicing Service
- Photography Business Insurance
- Photography Contracts
- Photography Legal Representation
Do you need these to start your business and land your first few gigs? No, you really don’t, and I would actually encourage you to not wait for these things to be in place to start… It can easily turn into one more “I’m not ready” excuse. But be sure to start the process of setting them up alongside everything else; don’t wait until you are over-exposed to risk (IE, doing multiple gigs per month).
How To Start a Photography Business: The Marketing
So now that you have the main pillars of how to start a photography business covered, I’d be remiss if I didn’t add some marketing tips. None of them will pay off as much as doing cold client outreach like I described above; the ability to do sales pitches is still what separates the poor freelancers from the highly successful business creatives. But they will help.
Make (or Buy) a Beautiful Website
It will take a lot of time and work until you generate enough organic traffic to get clients from the web. So, why put effort into a website? Well, it’s still the best way to showcase your portfolio, one you fully control. Much better than the popular portfolio websites where you are rubbing shoulders with many competitors (of course, you should still have a profile there, with a link to your site!)
Why would a photographer want a blog? It will be thanks to the blog that people will reach your website without you doing cold sales outreach. As you go on gigs, write short blog posts about the experience; talk about the venue, the equipment you used, challenges, pleasant surprises, etc. Encourage/ask your clients and friends to share your posts on social media; also, be on the lookout for photography websites and try to occasionally (once a week would be great, but once a month is more realistic for someone with a job that’s got little to do with writing) write an article for them, linking to your most popular posts somewhere in the text. I’ve just outlined the basics of the Dark Arts of SEO, and it’s engaging in this little internet song-and-dance routine that makes the Google Gods look favorably upon your puny existence.
Make Time To (Social) Network
Social networks are getting more and more visual every day. You might scoff at the amateurish nature of most Instagram accounts, but that’s where most of your potential clients are, so it behoves you to build and maintain a profile there. Twitter and Facebook are a bit more generic, but still good. LinkedIn can be very specific and somewhat frustrating, but if you are good at login in often and engaging in conversations with people, eventually, you might see the opportunity to pitch your services to a business or company that will deliver a massive payday.
No matter how far technology and society progress, the reality is that a lot of business is still about “who you know,” so it’s time to drop the “my art speaks for myself” act (I’ve been there) and start engaging genuinely with people. Find some Facebook and LinkedIn groups that appeal to you, start meeting and chatting with people there; follow brands and people who are appealing to you on Instagram, and comment on their posts. Be social to a point such as when you detect the opportunity to pitch someone your services, you’ll already have a prior relationship with them.
It might sound like a bother, but you can make it enjoyable if you pick who you follow and who is involved in things you find interesting, and the time investment needn’t be more than 30 minutes per day.
You also want to talk about your gigs and showcase your work often, but don’t make your social presence all about that; people engage with people who engage with them, not with someone who uses their social networks as a portfolio.
Be a Pleasure To Hear From
In what has since become one of my favorite commencement speeches, author Neil Gaiman had the following to say regarding making your life as a creative professional:
(…) people keep working in a freelance world, and more and more of today’s world is freelance because their work is good, and because they are easy to get along with, and because they deliver the work on time. And you don’t even need all three. Two out of three is fine. People will tolerate how unpleasant you are if your work is good and you deliver it on time. People will forgive the lateness of your work if it’s good and if they like you. And you don’t have to be as good as everyone else if you’re on time and it’s always a pleasure to hear from you.
Chances are, work won’t be incredible from the get-go. You are still on your way to putting in those much-needed 10,000 hours. Effort and commitment are important, but there’s only so much time in each day to get better. There’s a limit to how much you can strengthen your skills in the first few months of running your photography business. But what you can improve by a factor of 10 almost overnight is becoming a pleasure to hear from. Add to that a work ethic that lets you be always on time, and you’ll have two out of Neil’s three recommendations. That’s fine. Three out of three is what you will eventually aim for — that’s what pays the big bucks — but you have time to get there. For now, you want to make the best with what you have.
There’s Always More Things to Do When Starting a Home-Based Photography Business, But…
“But what about business cards? What about the nitty-gritty of how to select photos from my portfolio? What’s the best editing software?! This guide sucks!”
Look, there are a million things that you can do to sharpen your business. But this guide on how to start a home-based photography business is intended to get you up and running. We’ve covered everything needed to establish the three pillars of a business: product, clients, and money. The rest is optimization.
If you have a product to sell, if you can find people to sell it to, and you are making more money selling the product than you spend crafting and marketing it, you not only have a business, you have a successful business. Don’t let shiny objects distract you from the core pillars. If you send out my email template today without doing anything else and get someone interested in your service, congratulations, you already won. You are in the top 10 percentile of people who will read this article and act on it.
Keep at it, and you’ll have a fantastic photography business running in no time!
