5 things I wish I knew before quitting my 9-5 | #60

I spent 1 year struggling to quit my 9-5 while focusing on building my photography business

Some days I made forward progress, other days I went backwards.

I had little to no guidance. Then I invested in myself and everything changed.

Here are the top 5 things I wish I knew before starting my photography company:

1/ Don’t offer highly customizable options.

The more productized your service is, the easier it will be for clients to know what you offer.

Stick to 1 or 2 types of assets (product photos, lifestyle, headshots, stop motions, etc.. )

2/ Free work rarely leads to paid work.

If you offer free work to a client in hopes they’ll pay you one day… they won’t.

Take on free work to boost your portfolio.

Charge from the start if you want to get paid.

3/ Get organized.

You’re going to have dozens of leads. Get a CRM to organize them (I use close io).

Same with client projects.

Don’t drop the ball because you forgot how many lifestyle photos they needed. Be professional.

I like Notion for organization.

4/ Create SOPs.

Standard operating procedures sound boring, but you'll thank me later.

When you find yourself repeating anything, create a checklist on how that thing gets done.

This helps you remember and it allows you to scale your business via new hires.

5/ Make Progress.

Move the needle forward each day.

Updating your portfolio feels good but it doesn't get you new clients.

Clients come from cold outreach.

Focus on sending 10 emails every day.

BONUS/ Pay others to learn from them.

The biggest return on any investment I’ve ever had was buying a course.

At the time, spending thousands on an online course was very very expensive for me.

But the knowledge I was able to learn saved me from months and months of pain and allowed me to start landing clients.