Running your business or ruining it! Episode 2.

Episode 2

I made the decision to move forward with one major mistake that I should have realized. I didn’t know what to shoot! I was misguided from the encouragement of friends and family that I have taken pictures of and for over the years without any form of compensation. We can be fooled by the comments and reactions of parents seeing photos of their child and getting excited without realizing any photo of their kid would get them jumping up and down. So, I continued down this path walking away from 30 years of knowledge and experience working for someone and now building something for myself.

Did fear set in or was It excitement or the fact that I was burned out from doing the same thing over and over again and never really being appreciated or feeling like I was accomplishing something. When someone hires you to do a job you do just that, you complete something they ask you to do and they pay you for it. But when it’s not yours, they are the one’s reaping the benefits, you are just the cog in the wheel making it happen.

There is a different feeling when it’s yours. I felt like I was free to do what I wanted but had a clear goal in mind, build something that makes money so I can provide for my family. Why am I telling you this? Because if anyone say it’s easy or just listen to me they don’t know what they are talking about. It’s not easy, there are no guarantees! Your success is measured by you and what you want to accomplish and do. Each person has their own journey or at least they should. Each step I took was a nervous one, never knowing which direction was best, it was almost like gambling and hoping your number came in.

Where did I start? The easiest and fastest way to get it out there was word of mouth. Telling everyone you know and don’t about your new venture and how amazing this is and that you can’t wait to take their photo. So, I put it out there and waited, I did start to get some interest but not like when I was asked to shoot for free, that they all wanted. Now that there a cost of having me show up and shoot I saw the difference. People love a free “anything”, but when it came time to pay well the pool of clients got smaller. Yes, friends did hire me and paid me fairly but not anything to live on. We all must start somewhere, right?

Episode 3 next week… If you want to see more, please comment so I know to keep going.