545: Katie and Jez – How to elevate your photography business

PhotoBizX The Ultimate Wedding and Portrait Photography Business Podcast

Premium Members, click here to access this interview in the premium area.

Katie and Jez of www.heartstoryphotography.com.au and the upcoming Elevate Photography Business Intensive are back for what was initially going to be a 15-minute segment about the current state of business and their upcoming photography business workshop. Instead, we went deep into all things marketing, advertising, sales, and still loving photography and photographing families after so many years of doing the same thing.

If you haven't stumbled upon their portrait work yet, these Canberra-based photographers don't just take portraits; they capture souls. Every session they conjure a story whispered in light, and their talent has brought them multiple Australian Family Photographer of the Year titles.

Beyond the photography, Katie and Jez are wisdom whisperers, business ninjas, and all-around photography guns. They've built their studio from the ground up, battled the same anxieties and late nights we all know, and now they're burning with a mission: to show you how to ditch the struggle and embrace the joy of capturing stories through portraits while being profitable in business and living the life you want.

In this interview, discover what makes Heartstory tick and how they can be so in love with their business, clients, staff and processes… after doing it for so long.

Here's some more of what we covered in the interview:

• What to expect during the highs and lows of a business
• How to deal with low sales
• How to boost sales numbers
• How to efficiently reschedule client appointments
• What an amazing sale looks like
• How Katie and Jes spent 50k
• The importance of taking a business break
• Katie & Jeremy's sales tactics
• What is the secret to success
• Know your locations and how light works
• Katie and Jeremy's photo sessions process
• Appropriate attire to wear during photo sessions
• Why you need to look after old clients than newer ones
• How to re-engage past clients
• Has marketing changed over the last years
• Despite their success, why hold a workshop
• Advise to photographers who fears too much of the unknown

What’s on Offer for Premium Members

If you’re on the fence about becoming a premium member, join with the $1 trial today and get access to the FULL interviews each week, a fantastic back catalogue of interviews, and have ALL future interviews delivered automatically to your phone or tablet.

Plus, special member-only interviews.

One of the upside consequences of approaching our business the way that we do is that I've never loved photographing families as much as I do right now. – Jeremy

You'll also receive access to the members-only Secret Facebook Group, where you can connect with other Premium Members and interview guests to help, support and motivate you to take ideas you hear in each episode and put them into action. The group also has FB live video tutorials, role-play, and special live interviews. You will not find more friendly, motivated, caring and sharing photographers online.

Seriously, that's not all.

In addition to everything above, you'll get access and instructions on forming or joining a MasterMind Group with other premium members. These groups are super motivating, make you accountable and build friendships with other pro photographers with similar motives to you – to build a more successful photography business.

What is your big takeaway?

Following this interview, I’d love to know if you're taking anything from what Katie and Jeremy shared. Is there something you heard that excited or motivated you to the point where you thought, yeah, I'm going to do that! If so, leave your thoughts in the comments below; let me know your takeaways and what you plan to implement in your business due to what you heard in today's episode.

You have to know your locations and you have to know how the light works. And you have to be confident that you can go there and replicate some images. – Jeremy

If you have any questions I missed, a specific question you’d like to ask Katie and Jeremy or if you want to say thanks for coming on the show, feel free to add them in the comments area below.

Can I trust Alex Vita of ForegroundWeb?

Last week, I recommended and shared the fact Alex Vita has some availability if you're looking for a website redesign, an SEO audit, or a new and high-converting website.

I received this follow-up email from Adrienne…

I looked over Alex Vita’s website; he does some amazing work. I am very sceptical of working with somebody that I don’t know and lives out of the country when dealing with so much money being exchanged, especially with something as important as my website. Is there anything reassuring that you could tell me about where I could consider using him in the future?

As always, thank you for your feedback and thank you for your podcast.

Adrienne Angelo
Dragonfly Portrait Design Photography

My reply…

OMG, Alex is the most amazing, trustworthy person, and I can’t recommend him highly enough.

In fact, I was having issues this weekend (today) with the last two episodes not showing up on podcast apps. I emailed him, and he has fixed everything.

I’ve known him for more than five years now, regularly email him, have interviewed him several times and pay him a monthly fee to look after my websites. Plus, he has built and rebuilt the PhotoBizX website, which is massive and super complicated with all the courses, the membership, premium and free podcasts, etc.

If you need someone like him and he’s available, you will not find a better person.

Hope this all helps.
Speak soon
Andrew

A response to Dave LePage's interview by Tony Knight

Following last week's interview with Dave Le Page, Tony Knight of www.thisismylife.com.au shared the following email with me regarding a couple of things Dave shared and that I referenced in this week's episode:

Hi Andrew,

Tony from This Is My Life

I thought I would drop you a line regarding Dave’s interview as he made some comments that I thought could be alarming for some listeners, and I thought I would throw my opinion in.

He commented that he felt that in the near future, we won’t need stills photography, only Video; as the Video was getting that good, we will take Stills off the footage.

Yervant made the same comment ten years ago when 4K first started becoming more mainstream, and he started making 11 x 14” prints from the video – it was very short-lived.
The reason is that when you shoot video, especially for a wedding, you need motion flow between the frames, the rule of thumb is if you are shooting 30FPS, then the shutter is usually around 60th, and if you have any flickering lights, then you may even need to drop to as low as a 30th or even a 15th and as you know in a low light situation even with stabilizing, this may not be sharp enough, because remember unlike a stills photographer the camera is usually moving with the subject and not locked off if it is locked off then the composition is probably boring for a stills shot and may need cropping which is going to compromise quality again.

For my commercial clients, I shoot 4K 60FPS pretty much all the time onto Ninjas in RAW C-Log as well as 120 FPS when I need to really slow it down; I also shoot 8K in Raw Clog as well, depending on the shoot.

I do provide still images from the 4K and 8K for web use only when requested, and we have used the AI software to enlarge for packaging when desperate, but they are a compromise, and because they are not composed as a still, they are truly a poor second compared to a dedicated still.

A typical commercial shoot for me is stills and Video for that reason.

To get a good still of the video, we need to expose at a higher shutter of around 250th, even with IBIS, because we are moving, which means a truckload of light depending on the aperture and the area we need to light. They are still a compromise, but if I was shooting for a wedding or anything with mood, I want a really slow shutter to have that motion flow between the frames, which you can add with software, but it is just not as good and of course needs a heap of CPU as you need to render every frame and considering that I now talk Drives in TB, not GB, my Mac Studios would have smoke coming off them, and they are maxed out already.

The other thing Dave mentioned was to start with Davinci Resolve because that’s where you will end up; whilst Davinci is a great program and is awesome for colour grading and does have a pretty good free version, it is not the industry standard by a long shot.

Premiere stills ranks number one for ease of use and there is also Adobe Rush for mobile.

The other big consideration of using Adobe is that they all talk to each other, and a lot of the shortcuts are common between them; I can add an image in Premier and right-click it and edit in PS, make the change, CMD S and it updates in Premiere, and the same applies for Audio into Audition, Logos, into Illustrator, and the big one, After effects which are just amazing (but a huge program to master) and then when you want to send it out to Youtube or Facebook etc you use Adobe Media Encoder and all the Codecs are built-in and allows you to use premier to edit other jobs or the same job, while it is encoding in the encoder. Your CPU is directed towards Premiere,

Whereas Davinci and other programs will make you wait while it encodes from the program, so you are twiddling your thumbs.

Love em or hate em, Adobe has it sewn up.

Within the Adobe platform, we get all the AI too, and all the content aware fill is available in Video; we even have AI in Sound. If I have a piece of music that is 2 minutes long and I need it to be 2 mins 34 secs or 78 secs, I dial in the duration. Adobe uses AI to adjust magically, just like Generative fill; I get a few options to choose from, so why would anyone use Davinci? I don’t know.

The list is long for reasons to stick with Adobe, and I have touched on a few.

This is just my opinion, of course. I thought I would throw it in the mix so everyone doesn't run off taking Dave’s advice un-challenged, but in saying that, OMG, his work is awesome. I love his films, and he is so undervaluing his work.

He needs to work through an agent and get paid much more.

Whilst I respect his opinion to explain his costs before his client asks, he must have been beaten up by many clients to have been conditioned to be so reactive.

Stay well, and have a happy Christmas.

Regards Tony Knight

You can also hear Tony's interview here: Episode 242: Tony Knight – How to Create a Photography Business with No Competition

iTunes Reviews and Shout-outs

I check for any new iTunes or Google reviews each week, and it's always a buzz to receive these… for several reasons.

Firstly, it's confirmation that I'm on the right track with the interviews and that they are helping you improve your photography business. That's awesome!

We usually wait until the numbers come through before we make big decisions about money. – Katie

Secondly, iTunes and Google are the most significant podcast search engines, and your reviews and ratings help other photographers find PhotoBizX. More listeners mean more interviews and, ultimately, a better show.

If you have left a review in the past, thank you! If you haven't and you'd like to, head to https://photobizx.com/itunes or https://photobizx.com/google, and you can leave some honest feedback and a rating which will help both me and the show, and I'll be sure to thank you on the show and add a link to your website or blog if you let me know the URL of your website and your name.

9/10 of a good photo is not what you see but what you feel. And if you feel it, then it means something. And if it means something, you got to want to look at it. – Jeremy

Alternatively, if you've left a review for PhotoBizX and are looking for more backlinks to help your SEO, leave a review for the new Photography Xperiment Podcast. Email me your keywords or phrases and where you'd like me to link them.

Another great way to get a backlink to your site is to send a video testimonial. It doesn't need to be fancy, and your phone will be perfect. Click record and tell me how PhotoBizX has impacted you and your photography business.​

Links to people, places and things mentioned in this episode:

Katie and Jeremy – Elevate Business Intensive

The code for a $250 discount off pay in full or payment plan is PBX250, valid until Dec 31st.
PBX112 Episode: Katie Kolenberg & Jeremy Byrnes – Putting Your Heart and Hard Work into a Great Portrait Photography Business

Heart Story Photography Website

PBX402 Episode: Katie Kolenberg – Take control and thrive with your photography business during the pandemic

PBX470 Episode: Katie Kolenberg – Profitable photography book projects Q&A

Photography Book Projects for Profit Course

PBX087 Episode: Sue Bryce – How to Make Real Money From Photography

Alex Vita — I do have a few more spots available to take on website support clients. That's either WordPress maintenance (see here https://www.foregroundweb.com/web-design/wordpress-care-plan/) or a more comprehensive platform-agnostic website support plan (info here: https://www.foregroundweb.com/web-design/website-support/)

Alex Vita — Web design for building/redesigning photography websites from scratch: https://www.foregroundweb.com/web-design/custom-website/

484: Brianna Shrader – How to grow a fantastic team to support a fast moving and profitable photography business

517: Jon Cripwell – How to use and benefit from Chat GPT in your photography business

Thank you!

Thanks again for listening, and thanks to Katie and Jeremy for coming on and sharing their thoughts, ideas and approach to building a successful, long-lasting portrait photography business that thrives on happy clients and fantastic sales.

It's so important to look after the clients that you already have because more energy has to go into generating new ones, right? Less energy has to go into your current clients. – Katie

That’s it for me this week; I hope everything is going well for you in life and business!

Thanks, and speak soon
Andrew

The post 545: Katie and Jez – How to elevate your photography business appeared first on Photography Business Xposed - Photography Podcast - how to build and market your portrait and wedding photography business.