What do I do during the Photography Slow Season? | Kentucky Photographer | Tips For Photographers
Guess what friends, slow season is here and to be honest, I have a love/hate relationship with it! For most photographers, the winter months mean a lot less inquiries and emails and appointments to manage. Fall is typically such a crazy time as well as trying to schedule in those Christmas Card photos and many photographers look forward to those quiet, slow days where we can recover from ‘busy season’.
However, as most entrepreneurs, we must stay busy and after a few weeks (days, or maybe even hours!) of the slow life, we start wondering if anyone will ever hire us again, where everyone went, and just WHAT ON EARTH are we supposed to do with all of this TIME?!
I am here with fifteen ideas for things to keep you super busy during that slow season. Because if you are working ON your business during the times you aren’t working IN your business, there should never be a ‘SLOW’ season, just seasons for different parts of running your photography business! Right?
Clean Out Your Inbox - When was the last time you had a nice clean, empty inbox free of clutter? Never? Well then, start organizing! I keep my emails organized into folders and take advantage of color coding and labels to help me sort through things easier and save any correspondence I may need to find at a later time.
Take New Head shots - Whether you trade with other local photographers and make it a fun event or you go the self portrait route; slow season is the perfect time to update that outdated headshot. You do want your potential new clients to know what current YOU looks like plus it is always a greta way to begin the new year with a fresh portrait.
Revamp Your Website - Chances are, you haven’t updated your website in quite some time. You probably have plenty of amazing new images to show off and you have some outdated information on there. Whether you want to create an entirely new website, give your old one a small facelift or just update the details; it’s always good to keep the content fresh and relevant on your site. Hate designing but had a successful fall? Outsource it! I offer website desgin help and guidance through my mentoring. If you’d like to know more information on this, just send me a message. I would love to chat and help out.
Get Your Gear Cleaned - This is something that I personally need to do! I am one of those people who fear sending my gear off but I need to break through that fear because my camera needs cleaned and recalibrated badly. Maybe even a few lenses as well. It’s really good to keep your gear updated and fresh each year.
Start an Email List - Email lists is a great way to keep in touch with clients. This is something I plan on looking into for this year as well. I have heard that Flodesk is a great website to use.
Blog - I have yet to meet a photographer who really keeps up on blogging like they should. I am sure you are out there somewhere magical unicorn blogging photographer, but if that isn’t you, then blog your heart out. I plan to post more than just about sessions this year. Which is why I am writing this one, right here, to share some tips and tricks along the way to other photographers and clients.
Update Contracts & Questionnaires - It’s a great time to update all those annoying things like contracts and questionnaires. Chances are you’ve learned some things you need or want to change in your business, so you need to make sure all of your documents are up to date and ready for booking and to be used by upcoming clients.
Rebrand - If you are ready for a fresh new look, get in touch with a designer or if you are feeling creative, hop on Etsy or Creative Market and begin the rebranding DIY process! It is always nice to start out fresh for a new year. I am currently working on retouching up on my website and social media accounts.
Schedule Content - Whether you write and schedule out a ton of blog posts to get you through the next several months or you start scheduling out content on social media to save you the hassle of daily posting, scheduling is a GREAT way on all fronts to take out some majorly tedious work our jobs create. By batching and scheduling content, you can actually save a TON of time. You can even do this in Facebook Groups, which is a reason why I started a VIP group. It helps to keep my client’s updated on everything.
Host a Class - There are tons of people out there who are looking to learn new things about their own personal camera, wanting to start photography as a hobby, or even professional photographers out there looking to revamp their own businesses. This is the perfect time to connect with others if you feel like you have something to share or want to learn how to get into mentoring.
Get a jump on taxes - Like it or not, Tax season IS COMING. Don’t be one of those people struggling to input all of your information days before. Handle it now and get it off your plate while you have the extra time!
Invest in Your Education - Slow season is the absolute best time to invest back in yourself! Whether you look into a mentorship, in person workshops, or take an online course; take the time to learn something new. Again, I started offering mentoring to anyone who would be interested. I don’t know everything but I sure am happy to share everything I have learnt for the past five years.
Plan Out Your Year - I always make it a point to schedule myself time off so that I don’t get too booked up and forget. Make sure to schedule some vacations and days off but also plan out and schedule special events and sessions you may hold. My husband bought me the “Business Boutique 2020 Goal Planner” for this year to help with growing my business and I absolutely love it already. I highly recommend any business owner to look into it and Christy Wright’s bool “Business Boutique”.
Gather Reviews - Contact past clients about leaving you a review on Google or another platform you use and have them fill out a feedback or customer satisfaction form. It can be a little scary to ask for feedback, but you can’t work on improving your business and learn what those love most about you if you don’t ask!
R E L A X - Yeah, it’s hard. But, burn out is a real thing and it’s nice to take advantage of the slow season to recharge those batteries! Take a break, organize and declutter your home, binge watch a Netfix show (or Disney+ since we are now people of the future and IT’S HERE!!!!!) and spend time with your loved ones. They are, after all, the reason we do this!
And that is all that I have for now. I hope that these tips help you during your slow season. If they have, please let me know I would love to hear how it’s helped you out. Thank you so much for reading. Until next time.
xoxo
India