Lessons

Lesson Info

Networking

So networking, networking and outsourcing kind for me go hand in hand because networking really is that outsourcing of marketing and an aspect we want, what we want work to be happening for us when we're not necessarily doing it and that's what networking does, you can do it all by yourself, you could be the loan ranger and do it, but when you start bringing other networks and he start outsourcing your marketing through networking, you're going be able have more time to explode and grow the business it's a group of people or organizations that are closely connected and work with each other? I mean, we know that we know what networking is, but the problem is a lot of people say, I'm gonna go to networking events, they get business cards, they stay in their bag and they never do anything with it because they don't know what to do with it and that's where you're going to remedy today. One thing that I have found a lot of educational events, so just like the big conferences and stuff are g...

reat to go to there's great educational content, you get to see new samples of different products, but I have found that the best thing that comes out of it for me has been the networks, the valuable tools of the people that I've met and the referrals that end up coming out of it I think that's even more value in the actual education and maybe received a cz well, I mean, you guys are networking here hoping all's exchange business cards and got to know one another there's a network built right there. So the homework you need to do before reaching out to touch somebody is what is there is your target client in their network? So I'm going to reach out to another business? Is it worth way time? This is my target client, also their target client. I don't want to be if I am a family photographer, I don't necessarily want be reaching out to someone who caters to sports. I don't know, I don't really give an example for that. Maybe if you look more the demographics, if I know that this is my individual person is a forty ish female with three kids and they're this kind of income bracket, I'm probably gonna look more towards type of places that they frequent, that those individuals freak, it's just pause and salons inside because their target client is my target client. Ah, and so because I want to maximize the amount of time and my outrage, I don't need to waste my time on networks that are not going to pay off. What is the reputation in the community of google search in talking other photographers that can reveal a lot about businesses that are not readily apparent to the public? One thing I do want to warn is always keeping mining here people they write reviews online don't necessarily know if that's legit or not, people sometimes or just a heavy people on write reviews, so I always try to take good stock and research and someone before I'm gonna reach out to them. I mean, do I have time to help of them? Nothing is more frustrating when someone reaches out to me to help should be a network with them, but they have absolutely no time to give me anything in return. They have no desire to give me anything in return, like why I'm trying to run my business also, I'm trying to hit the pavement hard. Why air you wanted me to do your work, but you're not willing to meet me half way, and so these are all the four factors that I run through before even write somebody down on my list to insured to reach out to network with them. So other businesses in your location pulling resource is as a group is super super important we talked about you guys saw in pre show where they did the style shooting, they got a lot of vendors together that is, opens up the door for so much client referrals, blogging for one another. If you don't have blood content available, the search engine ization recommending one another, even if that vendor is not from that style shoot isn't necessarily being able to provide you clients. Maybe there's someone else when we wanted their vendor friends needs a photographer to refer to us that's, colonel, the networks all reached together, other photographers I boulder this for a reason. I think a lot of times we get into the zone of its us, we've got to do this, we gotta compete against each other, and we don't realize that there really are more clients and there are us. I don't really I don't really care where you live. That's pretty can't article that's probably really the truth that there are more clients and people in that the city than there are photog. You may not feel like it majority of the time, but there are because not everyone's target client is for them. Tapping into other photographers that you can refer between a super super important, especially when he specialized. Since I don't photograph children always keep a running list of photographers that I want to refer clients to. The reason for this is I don't want a client to come in my inbox or potential clients come in my in box and say, hey, I need, you know, I want to do a little timmy's pictures, and I'm thinking, yeah, well to me, and I'm like, no, I don't do that by what connotation is that leave there's just like a brush off? I mean, I told her I didn't do it, I didn't just ignoring the emails, I did halfway good, right? But I didn't really offer that person anything takes me two seconds because I have a template referral email to send them to the people that I have reached out to and other photographers to refer them to and then also on top of that gives me a way to reach out to other photographers. I can get benefits from them, but that goes back to the last point on the slide before this did they have time in the will power on the willingness in order to be able to refer to me I'm not going to send it all one way it needs to be a mutual that mutually beneficial thing photographers a super super important and also when you have one photographer endorse another it's kind like a seal of approval as well because we are professional business is you know, one salon recommends another to me or such I'm going like, oh yeah you know and I may be I'm going to feel a little more confident in my decision so having other photographer you are you doing that for them is super important network with your clients I don't recommend doing business with your clients but I recommend like engaging their services or whatever they do just because it kind of overlaps the lines a little bit but you want to network with them to tap into their clients their clientele if there are other small business owners that's really perfect already handed in, obviously I would wait till the transactions pretty much complete and final and then you could try it because you can already start cultivating that when you find out that extra information during the session, what do you d'oh yeah, you're right your own business you guys were like, I mean we're looking a little club having being a small business owner you are able to connect with them and reach out two other networks, and if it friends and family last, I don't I'm not anti friends and family, but I do believe that they could be a source of problems. It could be source of misguided expectations because you may have friends who are that you've given a discount to in the past or that are really championing for you, and they're like, how she's really cheap and I'm like that's, not the message that I want to send you know that kind of example, but you should utilize them if you can, as much as possible, because it could be your biggest cheerleaders, especially your mama probably would be your biggest cheerleader as well. So how do we even go about doing this? We need to do physical and virtual outreach, but first we're going to go over physical, we're actually gonna hit the pavement aa lot of people think that you start behind the computer when you're already location scouting. I like to see what other businesses in the area, because I need to be as efficient as possible if I say google search online that I got to figure out how close those businesses are to each other, whereas if I can find one there on a general geographic location, I can hit them all in one day. Reach out and touch those business owners in one day and be able to do all my follow ups like we're going to see very quickly so actually hit the pavement I mean we're going for a drive and the baby won't quit crying dr turn on frozen and drive and drive and drive and just make note I take pictures of locations and do that and drop a pin on my phone and I keep up with that so that when I go back to my computer and just type it in and I could do my outrage go to your chamber of commerce this is a good resource they have lists right their client list like that gold information right there that you can find other people and if there were chamber of commerce to probably vetted a little bit more because there is a process to get in on certain levels of chamber of commerce events in such local business groups this don't have to be photography groups just others small business owners in the area because a lot of them are probably complete lost in the marketing aspect of needing help just as much as you and that's probably why they're there they're looking for you aa lot of you may need a hair and makeup artist in there maybe one there who's needs a photographer to be a referral network um expose affairs I also include large photography conference exposing this well and also the unrelated ones that may just be in your local area could be bridal expos affairs might just be a women's won a lot of times there's business affairs and if you offer business corporate head shots go enter yourself even if you're not actually taken a booth, you could still network and get to know the people that were there by getting business cards and then doing outreach, throwing one location take the baby in the stroller, get the cards you know, calling when you get home cinnamon email we're going to go how to do that in one second professional photographers groups again why do we have to do this on our own there the greatest source of information and referrals? Because there's only so many people available an event vendors I'm really glad that we had that segment this morning about the style of shoe because other vendors are key to a lot of aspects they can't you can do the permission of files to them for networking. You could just talk about guest blogging for them link backs to your son sight in all sorts of vendors are more than likely going to have your target client they're earning and have people in the door especially their established brick and mortar wedding photographers that may be out of their home or just starting need to have people that are establishing community to help them you can do it, but you could do it quicker by having these they're already established cause what is the logical flow? And you have a wedding, you're going need flowers, candy cake and, well, most likely they're going to have a flower and cake shop that were physically in the community on and you get to kind of be the monkey on their back in a positive way and get in host, you're owning that you could host your own photographer ring that we get pushed around a small business owner in that, especially if you have a office, you could even do this at a local restaurant. Perfect way to reach out to a restaurant hey, look into doing this event gives you away and in to start talking to them, um and so physical outrage and the example I gave you guys yesterday with the light insurance and all that when every child the hotels were differently boudoir marathons and stuff it's basically hosting, writing that I'm able to open up then and also not only that is that hotel can offer me maybe a special rate we haven't in to start talk about future events, they have other vendors that they work with two when I did one of these events last year. They were like oh that's a great idea they got on board like hope would one marathon you're going hear makeable one room where we can do this we can all we know this flower shop must be thinking to me flowers and you know, getting roses for all the girls for free I don't have to pay for it and if I hadn't reached out into said hey like the whole share if you tell someone to share you said, hey, do you know someone there will be oh yeah and we're able to do that same thing there was a truck, a tear in town boom right there and it lowered my cost for the event and up the experience and I got to know this multiple vendors all in one shot, so I'm really in big on like hosting your own things that I also have more control surprise, surprise I have more control over it and I have more handle on what's going on you laugh, man all right, so and then once we've done the physical outreach we also need to virtual resource is these are things you can do when you're rocking the baby to sleep three not going to sleep, you have your phone on dh you could do a web search organic web search the problem with this is what if they suck it a ceo you're not going to find him right but that's why I say hit the pavement first because that's really where we're going to be able to find and you can do that when you're on the way the grocery store let me just drive down a different street than I normally do and see who's over here you're going to extend beyond your community by doing the web search and kind of get out of your backyard so that's where we start getting a lot more global on it social media makes the world small utilize that we're utilizing it for outrage in clients why not to other people as well? Another one is such linked in uh change they just changed their platform again and I can't keep up, eh? So yes it's when we're social media platform but you don't have to use this on a daily basis you can use this when you have a slower time and it's on your global to do list that you need to network and outreach lincoln is a perfect place because it's going to be kind of a search and pare down search for you by geographic location and type have all those kind of filters in there for you to pull it up. I would probably put that before web search if we're going to put these in priority order on then you have the organic google searches always look on hashtag global media instagram and twitter because people tag all sorts of virginia photographer virginia florist I had a couple of people reach out to me in the past week simply cause I had tacked virginia photographer on one picture I had wasn't his consistent I wish I had that now I went, whoa! They always blows my mind when this happens I have multiple vendors reach out to me and I didn't have to do the work so I did what I did was adding and I actually added the hash tag not to get a hold of the vendors. It was to get a hold of clients, but I had the benefit in the same time. The vendors are also searching for local networks as well, and they look at local photographer connections. Get him online groups, be mindful again we are competitors to a sense, but if you can try to present yourself and be genuine on wanting to help, you'll find others as well and then look at the client occupations that's the network what can we dio? I have a client who is a dentist? I have potentially considered offering a gift to his clients a cz away to outrage it's one of those do I wanted to do I want to blur the line a little bit I'm not necessarily doing something for him, but I could be doing something for his clients tap into friends and family could do that. Virtually all of this can be done from your phone when you're sitting in carpool line iraq in that baby. All right, so for all of these things to work, you have to target actively, not passively that hashtag bubble media was a little bit more passive. You need to be activist possible that's why this needs to stay a global list item till you can I actually do it because you don't want to be all active and reaching out. They get so busy and not be able to follow up because it's gonna look really bad to the networks that you've already put a lot of energy, and too so you wasted your time. You wasted their time, so you want to try to be as active as possible and only act on it when you can be active, you want to follow up with them. People are all of these networks are also business owners. Me, I have good intentions or read every email. It comes through my inbox and it's filtered and most the time we'll start things and I need to respond to later. Sometimes the star does not stick and he gets pushed down if you follow up with me, I am impressed. I love it because I feel a little embarrassed I didn't respond, but I love it because I'm sure that you're really serious ahs well, you're not just expecting me to do the work for you, you're already demonstrating to me that you're going to meet me maybe halfway at least the court of the way by falling up so always follow up my recommendation when you reach out to people is not too don't just show up at their place of work. Well, I said hit the payment that was to find the people, but I would honestly just walk in because it was like a restaurant and it's busy time and you're trying to talk to me and I'm running the restaurant that's really going to irritate me off in the middle of a session and someone comes up to have had this happen before another photographer come to me during a session with a client and try to network with me. I've had looked at him like, but what could I say? I want to be rude, but at the same time I'm like this is my client's time, you know, and I never I never cultivated network with him, then I never referred anybody to then either, so right there they got two hits there's, some because I felt like they didn't respect and value my time and my client so I always do a, uh what tronic outrage to first, but you know, I mean I could do it at home it's easy to do my email and I listen to this fellatio followed by phone because sometimes technology can get lost don't consider it a no simply because you haven't heard maybe they're too busy they forgot to follow up or they just didn't get it must always make it mutually beneficial is possible and use referral fees. What doesn't incentivize people more than money? I mean really s o you can look at having referrals he's among vendors and networks to send people to you. It just then triggers that you have disclosure laws in taxes that may be on that this next one so you may you must disclose the connection referral female in certain transactions uh whenever they but my thing is, even if you have that and it's not required by law, you should still tell your client because if I was a client but found out later that you've got money out of it, even if you legitimately were happy to refer and endorse that person's product still would feel kind of like, oh, do you just refer them for the money? Um so because that was the whole idea is that that money may materially affect the whole reason behind the referral um ok yeah, even if not in law doing the faith of your client on then there's tax reporting laws that come along with this so money can be a very good motivator, but you have to consider me outsource idea here they're going to look into informed ten, ninety nines when you reach a certain amount. This also includes every doing a formalized client referral program. What you have to do, a tent form to ninety nine for america, obviously, whenever payments the recipient down the calendar year or six hundred dollars combined or more on and that's the cash or gift card doesn't have to it's not products or services, it's cash or gift card compensation. Um, because this again certificates essentially cash in the eyes of the tax law, but it is important to note that if you are going to referral fees while they're very benefit, you need to make sure how these supports in place to be able to track this. Yes, um, with that amount, would that roll into just like gifts for your clients? Or is that specific tio like referrals or rewards of like that gifts or get but if it is because they referred somebody or to incentivize them to refer somebody that's the connection, okay, so it comes with the incentive eso kind of senior wrap programs our perfect one. Andi, if you have a formalized client referral program for me, I don't have a formalized client referral program. I am just, I guess that's why stock instagram and all that kind of stuff. But if I have say, you're going to receive twenty five dollars for every client I hit over six hundred dollars, in a calendar year, never send them tonight nine. Honestly, that kind ofthe word. Why did I hire my client? But you have to do it because they receive that amount of money. Um, the good thing on this, though, is that the harasses catching up and so with some with technology that if you do pay them through a payment processors such as paypal, that room it's the ten, ninety nine for you, um, that you don't have to physically do with the ten, ninety nine they do it for you just have to make sure you account it on your income as a deduction, and you have a c p a that can do all that for you, but it helps if you can't hire a cb and you don't know how to remit one of those if you paypal and those type of processors will take care of that for you and it's legally good.