How to Grow a Photography Business Through Relationship Building

Business  •  Photography Tips  •  Wedding Photography

Today’s article kindly comes to us from Otto Schulze and James Christianson, named best wedding photographers in the world by Harpers Bazaar. They have just created a new course designed to help driven wedding photographers elevate their wedding business if you want to check it out or grab the free chapter (enrollment opening soon).

There’s a huge misconception among many photographers who run a business: they think they’re only photographers. The truth is, to be at the top of your niche, you also need to be an effective salesperson. Now, that doesn’t mean going door-to-door trying to make hard sales for portraits. It means selling your services through outreach, building relationships, and maintaining those connections. Certain sales skills will help you achieve that.

Building relationships is key to success in this industry. This is Business 101, however, many photographers don’t do enough outreach, which causes a lack of referrals and inquiries. The more relationships you build, the more qualified leads you’ll receive, and the more money you’ll make.

Sounds great, but how do you do it? It all starts with The Tier System.

The Tier System

To stay in business and keep doing what you love, you need clients. So let’s look at the math. If you’re a wedding photographer, to book 10 weddings per year, you need to generate 300 inquiries. To get those 300 inquiries, you need to contact roughly 2,000 people over the year since only around 10-15% of the people you contact will respond.

Seems intimidating! But it doesn’t have to be. If you reach out to 20 people each work day, you’ll get around 3-4 responses, which adds up to 80 inquiries a week. You’ll hit 2,000 contacts and 300 responses in no time, finding yourself fully booked. The goal is to take the guesswork out of success and failure by building a consistent method that can be repeated. That’s the power of The Tier System.

There are three tiers involved:

• Tier One is the big dogs. These contacts are the elite, the best of the best, and who you most aspire to work with (dream clients).
• Tier Two is people you hope to work with soon. Most of your outreach efforts will involve these contacts because they’re more reachable and can bring in the most new business.
• Tier Three is contacts or partners with established trust. This could be previous clients or vendors you’ve worked with. Since our focus is relationship building, these contacts are just as important.

It is crucial to maintain relationships with all three tiers because you never know when you’ll get repeat business or when a contact will lead to new opportunities.

Let’s take a closer look at each tier.

Tier Three: Contacts with Established Trust

If you’re new to outreach, it’s best to start with this tier because there’s already a connection. Though tier one contacts are your ideal, they’re going to be the most high-profile or in-demand, thus harder to reach. It’s best to work your way up slowly until you refine your relationship-building skills through practice.

With consistent outreach, you’ll work toward strengthening the connection with tier one people, opening opportunities for future referrals from them. And when we say “outreach,” it’s exactly how it sounds: send them an email, DM, text, give them a call, say hello in person, etc. You’re not trying to hard sell them or talk about your business, you’re simply dropping in for a quick chat to engage. Ask how their work is going. Focus on them. Show them you’re genuinely interested in who they are and what they do, and you’ll create a bond they’ll remember the next time they meet someone needing a photographer.

Tier Two: People You Hope to Work With (Mid-level)

You’ll start by identifying who to reach out to, and the wider your net, the better. You want to connect to as many people related to your niche as possible. For this tier, remember that you’re not going after big names in the business. You’ll be focusing on mid-level contacts. For example, if you’re a wedding photographer, look at DJs, bands, designers, florists, venues, and (most importantly) planners. Wedding planners are the bread and butter for wedding photographers because they deal directly with couples who need your services, plus they have a large book of vendors who can help you network.

When compiling your list, start with established resources first. For wedding photography, think of magazines like Brides, Harper’s, and Vogue, and sites like The Knot will also be goldmines to help you narrow down your search. For other niches, anywhere that businesses related to your niche will want exposure is the place to look.

Social media is another great resource. Look at competitors’ Instagrams to see who they are working with and who is following them, then select the ones that look promising and add them to your tier two outreach list. Also, reach out to your competitors. It may sound counterintuitive, but the goal here isn’t a “me versus you” mentality. The goal is relationships. At the end of the day, relationships will build your business and grow your income, even those with competitors. You never know when a competitor may be fully booked and call you to refer a client (it happens!).

One more note before we move on: remember not to be too lofty with tier two clients. The top tier is where you can place all of your big dreams and goals, but tier two shouldn’t be luxury brands/clients or only top-level planners. Business is business, and plenty of small-time planners and clients can get you more than enough referrals when you reach out.

Tier One: The Best of the Best

Here we are at the top. How do you like the view? This tier is for aspirational relationships. Contacts for this tier should be luxury brands and people who are at the top of their field (e.g. those on Vogue’s list of top planners). You’ll need to bring your A-game. Your brand messaging, aesthetic, and strategy are important factors to consider when trying to attract these top-level clients.

No one likes to talk about rebranding (because it’s a lot of work), but as you get comfortable with reaching out to tier three and tier two contacts, you may feel you’re ready for tier one. At that stage, rebranding may be necessary as your business grows and develops. But if you’re not yet ready, don’t worry. It’s better to start reaching out now to tier one and two, even if your branding isn’t perfected because you should be growing your influence and network from day one.

Refining Your Approach to Outreach: Connecting VS Hard Selling

Building relationships is a long-term commitment, and it’s important to remember that everyone feels uncomfortable when doing something new, so don’t let imposter syndrome hold you back. You and your services have value, and you’re not trying to become best friends with everyone you contact. Building rapport is key. It can be as simple as commenting on an Instagram post with compliments about someone’s work and then asking if you can chat to learn more about their business. Showing admiration and appreciation is always a great first step.

Here are some tips to refine your outreach:

• The information you want to compile and track for each contact includes their name, company, email address, location, and the last time you reached out.
• With tier two and tier one contacts, the goal of outreach is to get a phone call or meeting (in-person is always better).
• Be specific when reaching out and do your research to get a better response. So no, don’t copy and paste the same DM to everyone (this could also get you banned on Instagram as spam!). Research your potential client’s tone so you can match it. Once you’ve done your research (Instagram is a great resource for this), you can connect with the client on common experiences.
• Being persistent and looking for different angles will yield greater success. Any successful salesperson knows that you need to pivot, experiment, and continually adjust your approach.
• Most contacts will be wary, so it’s important to take the pressure off at the start of the conversation by letting them know that this is not a sales call. You just want to learn more about them and connect, so they should feel free to share as much about themselves as possible.
• The goal of the first call is to connect so you can learn more about them and use what you learn to strategize for follow-up calls.
• By asking open-ended questions and being genuinely interested in hearing about who they are and what they do, you will be able to get valuable information. Listen more than you speak and ask about their vision for the future (this will give you insights into how your services can meet their needs).
• After your initial meeting, touch base regularly. Here is some hard data: Only 2% of sales are made on the first contact; 3% of sales are made on the second contact; 80% of sales are made between the fifth and twelfth contact. Photographers who follow up just three times are ahead of 75% of their competition, so remain consistent with your outreach.

No Matter What, Keep Going

Anyone who has ever started their own business knows that the journey is not easy. There will be highs and lows, triumphs and defeats. But it is important to remember that even the most successful entrepreneurs have had their fair share of failures. The key is to learn from your failures and keep moving forward.

As you begin your outreach journey, initial response rates may be low. Don’t let this discourage you. Instead, put outreach and building relationships into your weekly schedule to train yourself to do it regularly. If you spend 30 minutes a day researching contacts and then another 30 minutes writing to them, you may get three leads. Then an initial phone call usually takes an hour and a half, so that’s 4-5 hours to call those three leads. If you do all of that every week, you’ve still only worked 10 hours. And that 10 hours could be worth hundreds in revenue.

Keep reaching out to potential clients, focus on connection and building relationships, and the dream opportunities will eventually start rolling in.

For Further Training:

This article was written by Otto Schulze and James Christianson, named best wedding photographers in the world by Harpers Bazaar. They have created a new course (enrollment opening soon) designed to help driven wedding photographers elevate their wedding business and be able to charge $20k, $40k, or even $60k+ per wedding, even if you don’t think this is possible…yet.

They are even giving away a free chapter from the course and any wedding photographer who watches is eligible to receive some of the $42,000 in prizes they are giving away.

Enrollment opening soon: The Business of Luxury Weddings