Being Declined is Tough – Marketing is the Key
After every setback is a chance to improve oneself. The question is how?
It’s a tad heart-wrenching when you hear someone is picking another photographer instead of you. There’s no malice toward the other photographer, maybe just a little bit of envy. After all, business is business, and if you’re not getting the work, at least someone else is.
If anything, I can only blame my inadequate marketing skills. We all know any business needs good accounting, pricing and marketing sense to be successful, no matter how good you are at the trade. Having never taken any business classes, I rely on people’s advice and books to learn. Obviously it hasn’t been enough as I’m not getting enough clients.
Some of you probably aren’t aware that I hold a full-time writing job in a local newspaper (wanted to be a photojournalist but they’re full on places now). It brings in the money I need but it’s not what I love. I want to shoot but I need to get the business skills right for it to work when I do take this business full time. Sometimes I can hear the spirits of consciousness haughtily saying “I told you so” for refusing to take business class when in college.
Apart from reading more (still a good way to learn), I should sink more money into real advertising in ads or posters. If I take a loan, maybe I can have a studio as well to provide storefront marketing. So far I rely on word-of-mouth and my photos to speak for themselves. Many times I wish I was a more obnoxious and shameless person, who would boast of his skills and invincibility without being a jerk.
There’s always this fear that things won’t work out. No matter how well you shoot, if you can’t get the business, you can’t survive. Still, “don’t stop believing,” as I hear so much in the song by Journey, from Glee and movies. Have faith that it’ll work out, even if you won’t become a millionaire in the process. Doing something I enjoy has always been my aim, and that something is still photography.
