(c) This week guest blogger David Coblitz begins his series on Networking for photographers on PhotoBizCoach.com
What if you could get clients who don’t even ask the price, or who pay you more than your bill says they owe?
What if other people went out of their way to learn enough about your business that they excitedly recommend you to your ideal clients?
In this series of articles I’ll show how I have made it happen, but more importantly, how you can make it happen. I’ll share with you how you can get clients who are not looking for “a photographer”, but are looking for YOU.
The method is business networking. It is the systematic development of business relationships between business owners who help each other mutually improve their results in a consistent, planned fashion.
Does it work? When I first started networking, it paid for itself in the first 4 months & within 6 months was 91% of my business.
Where do you start? It starts with education and finding places to meet the right people, then meeting them in the right way with the right frequency.
There are many organizations to help you develop your business networks. Among the largest is Business Networking International (BNI). They are an outstanding source of networking education. They provide the starting education and an instant network of people who “get it”. Why do I bring them up now? I do so to introduce their slogan, “GIVERS GAIN”. Not a new concept, but concise. If you’re looking to help others, which is fun & can lead to amazing results, then you’re on your way.
Networking is not selling. Let me say that again, since it’s critically important. Networking is NOT selling! Networking is the systematic development of the right relationships with the right people who YOU can help, and who in return might want to help you.
Here are some actual situations in which I have found myself through the consistent application of the Givers Gain principle:
A client had me do a head shot for her business. She never brought up price, so I did, since I don’t like surprises in either direction. Afterwards, I asked why she never had asked about price. She said, “I knew you do good work and will treat me fairly, so I wasn’t concerned about it.” Would you like customers like that? You can have them by following the methods I’ll show you.
Here’s a testimonial from my Linkedin page that surprised me when I first read it, but it shows results of this process.
“David combines photography and art in ways that are very innovative. He is a man of many talents. He is one of those individuals that you want to be associated with not only because is he a great person, but because you just know that great things will result!” March 1, 2012 (http://linkd.in/LinkedinProfileDBC)
My goal with these articles is to help you position yourself so people feel that way about you. I hope you enjoy the results. If you have any tips on networking please share them in the comment field.
Hi David,
BNI didn’t work for me because I had too few contact none of whom would ask me to refer a service. I mostly received cold leads and requests for prices dressed as a referral. I did once had wedding client from the USA pay more than I charged, because she was so impressed how hard I worked in adverse weather conditions here in Scotland, but also I had a portrait client who didn’t ask for a price and refused to pay saying he could get the same for £30 from another studio.
I am interested in any ideas you may have for better marketing most photographers seem to shy away from the subject.
Ivor,
Thanks for your comment. I wasn’t aware the article had been published yet. As will become clear as more of my monthly series on this topic comes out, it was not my intent to recommend BNI per se, and I will be mentioning many other resource groups in future articles. Due to space limits & my message priorities, I only mentioned that one in order to introduce the “givers gain” concept. That said, let’s talk about BNI for a moment. Each chapter has its own makeup & character. My advice to you would be to visit other chapters ( or sub for members ) after making sure of two things. They don’t already have a photographer, and they do have professions where the potential for you to develop a mutually beneficial relationship exists. Who that might be depends on the type of photography you do. E.g. If you do weddings, you could be a benefit to & benefit from the following: florist, event planner, travel agent, caterer, etc. In this situation, after developing the appropriate level of visibility, credibility, and trust with each other, whenever any of you runs into someone planning to get married, you could refer to each of the others. That is the simplest example, but the same approach can be used for other types of photography. For instance, I focus on fine art & commercial photography, so I network with interior designers & architects, since I can help them show off their work & they can help me place my artwork.
As for not being clear on price before shooting, I never allow that to happen. My point was that I was the one who brought it up because they didn’t.
Back to BNI, my own experience is that there is an almost unlimited market available for head shots for business people & when you do that for members, you’re actually doing each other a favor (not for free, but I did discount members & made sure they knew my non-member pricing for when they would refer me). I had several members set up shoots for me at their company & sign up fellow employees who needed head shots. It made them look good to provide that service conveniently at their place of business, & it was good business for me. I also set up next to our meeting & provided head shots to our members. They then used those on various web sites (BNI, Linkedin, their own, etc) and were able to point to those as examples of my work when referring me. When I would visit other BNI chapters that had no photographer, I would almost always come away with some work for one of the members. Hope this helps.
All the best,
Dave Coblitz – “Showing off the work of interior designers”
Yes, David,
I did all of the things you are saying, I didn’t even break even on the fees. Many of the businesses I met were happy with their suppliers outwith BNI network including other chapters.
Ivor,
Developing visibility, credibility, and trust take time, but are required to be successful in network marketing. It usually takes about 6 months for referrals to come your way. You need to have one to one meetings with the members to get the process working. Just showing up to the meetings isn’t enough.
Dave