My Secrets to Building a Long-term Career in the Photography Industry
I started my photography business in 1999, sort of by accident. Photography had always been something I loved, but I never thought it could be a job—let alone a career. It was just something I played around with on the weekend.
In 1999, I was teaching kindergarten and struggling to get by on my teacher’s salary. For fun, I’d taken some maternity photos of a friend of mine, which she loved, and it was she who suggested I start offering maternity photography on the side to supplement income.
Maternity photography has changed.
Back then, maternity photography was not what it is today. Very few photographers offered it, and I was pretty sure that NO one would pay me to take their picture. But I was desperate, so I took the one good photo from my friend’s photoshoot, turned it into a postcard with my name and phone number printed on the back, and put that little postcard in every coffee shop, yoga studio and maternity store I could find. To my astonishment, women started to call.
The next year, I decided to go down to part-time teaching, so I could focus more on my photography. A couple of years after that, I quit my teaching job altogether. I’ve been a full-time photographer ever since!
To say the industry has changed since I started is a colossal understatement. In 1999 we all shot film, hardly anyone had a website and there was no Facebook or Instagram or blogs. Google had just started, but I certainly didn’t know what it was. If you wanted to look someone up, you used a phone book. Businesses relied on the Yellow Pages to get in front of potential clients.
Since 1999, I’ve witnessed the death of film as well as its rebirth. I’ve seen the rise of digital cameras, the advent of the “mom with a camera” and the fear that that the industry is dying every time something new comes along (and something new is always coming along). My business has survived the birth of my twins, the worst recession since the Great Depression, a global pandemic and the fact that I have no formal training in photography or business.
I made a choice to learn from my mistakes.
So much has changed over the past 20 years in all aspects of my life. And yet, here I am. Why? That is a question I ask myself all the time.
I’m not the most talented photographer to ever have walked the earth. I haven’t done everything right. I’ve made mistakes. But I also made the choice early on to learn from those mistakes. If something is not working in my business, I don’t blame my competition or buy into the story that the market is too saturated for me to be successful. Instead, I look for solutions. I figure out what’s wrong, and I fix it.
When I realized that inconsistency in my work was hurting my business and keeping me from growing my brand, for example, I fixed it by learning to create natural-looking light with strobes so that clients who came to me in the winter received the same quality of work as clients who came to me in the summer.
Investing is key, and I don’t shy away from it. After all these years, I still take classes and go to conferences. I hire mentors, and I push myself to keep getting better. It hasn’t always been easy, and I’ve learned some things the hard way. I’ve thought about quitting, more than once. In fact, I have a recurring dream that I close my studio and get a job at Starbucks.
The only thing that has stayed the same over the last 20+ years is the fact that things change all the time. And if you want to stick around, you have to be okay with that. The industry will evolve and trends will come and go. Institutions will fall and new ones will rise up in their place.
The secret to building a long term career is not letting the changes scare you. Balance knowing what you do and what works for your business with the ability to evolve and learn. Know that there are no absolutes. There is no one way to do something or be successful.
Be willing to get help when you need it and stick to your guns when it’s necessary. Love your work. Love your clients. Know your craft, and do it well. And most importantly, learn, learn, learn. The rules change every day, especially in business—but solid foundations and classic photography never go out of style.
I offer photography education on topics like lighting, posing, film, marketing and more. Browse my courses here!
