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Connecting with your Headshot Clients

You know I get ceos. My favorite thing is this I get a ceo highfalutin person or whatever they're busy, they got schedules. Their assistant called me twenty times trying to schedule this thing. I finally get it scheduled. I got a half hour with the guy, right? You know what my favorite thing is when the guy gets on the phone and says, hey, can you move that meeting back a little bit on with peter right now? How awesome is that? You know why? Because people care about getting their picture taken, they just don't think it's fun they think it's like going to the dentist, they don't like it, they've never have a good when they don't like the minute than you do a good job and you get them a good picture and they actually enjoy it that the world stops at that microsoft thing that I did like they were there for, like, a serious, like meeting of all these people that came in fluent from all corners of the world, they were talking about their pictures and post them on facebook and all this craz...

y stuff. Do you know how on facebook when somebody posts a new profile shot or a new headshot, it gets more likes than anything else to post all year? Did you notice that with yours in that amazing like this phenomenon is not going away this is only growing soto have this skill set where you could take somebody and take a good picture of them that makes them proud, and then they want to show it to their special ink. I get these people that they're there have contracts with different companies and the company's just say, hey, whoever is in the marketing department says, hey, you're a new hire, you've got to go to peter, just call him, right? So they call me, they set it up, they come in and they walk in and there, just like, I don't want to be like, I just they told me, I have to. They just got hired, I have to do this and then I start with my shtick and I do my thing and they're like, this is can I show these to my wife? Can I use these? Do I have to know? Only I can only use these on with the business. Can I use these like, can I put him on facebook? Can I do? Do you mind if I use one on lengthen? Do you know how cool that is? Do you know that the turnover rate in companies is big, right, people don't stay and we move around and we move and shake and we bob and weave. And I'll shoot for one company and then the person will go to another company and they'd be like, well you took my headshots for that company do you want to shoot like for this company or can I use this head shot even though that company paid for with this company? I mean it's amazing. So if you get in if you get your feet wet and dive into this stuff a little bit you can create a source of income that's pretty amazing do you guys realize that I never want to do it again? You take it off the tripod can you do realize then on a daily basis if you had told me like before I picked up I picked up a camera in two thousand if you'd told me that at some point my life I was goingto point this it's somebody pressed the button and get paid like that's crazy that's not somebody walks in front of it, I press the button and then they pay me I can't believe it it's like like it's unbelievable like I get to do that every day how cool is that? Is that awesome? I mean and to do it like like you know, fortunately I worked hard at it I've been successful at it and stuff, but I've raised my family with it I live in new york city, I have a studio in new york city like head shots allowed me to do all this stuff it's just and every time somebody walks in the studio people are always like, well you've been shooting on a white background doing the same setup for like ten years or fifteen years aren't you bored and I'm like, you know what the difference is what's the difference the difference is the person when I focused on that that when I changed my focus and yet hey, we get burn out on everything right if you do something long enough you're gonna get burned I have absolutely zero burnout for headshots dockery zero and I had it in like two thousand eight I was done I was like I had climbed the mountain of head shop photographers in new york and I had been shooting like a madman I would be like booked like two, three months in advance and I couldn't stop and I was like crazy and I was done I was like I got this is crazy and what happened was, uh, one day the f stoppers you guys know if stompers everybody checks out f stoppers f stoppers is awesome um lee from half stoppers called me and he said he said, do you remember like, ten, five years ago I sent you an email I was in college, I emailed twenty entire version you were the only one who emailed me back I was like, I don't remember that, but okay, I'm glad I emailed you back. I usually do that. I try and get back to everybody. Um, do my best anyway. Anyway, he said, I'm doing a video for this block that I do do you mind? And he had then started doing very much. Do you mind if we come by your studio? I'm going to be in new york. Can I come by your studio and video? You and I'm like the most petrified photographer ever tab people watch me like I was I thought that I had done all this work like and I was not gonna let anybody know. Back then it was squinting eye. Now I turned it into squint. I made up a word squint for those of you that don't know what home you're going to learn about squinting in a minute, but I was a petrified to let the world know that everybody that I told everybody to squint in front of my camera, I just thought that that was the biggest news. I was like, nobody can find that out, so I was like, so I was petra, I didn't want anybody in my studio, I don't like people watching me shooting, do you know that now? Obviously I teach and there's a room full of people I'm going to get some of you poor saps up here tio and you're going to be watched by the world when I'm photographing you like do you know how like horrible that is right but but in my studio I don't let it happen so guys if you're out there and you e mail me and you ask if you can watch no you can't watch I don't like to be watched I don't want to be watched I get that all the time can I just come be a fly on the wall now and there's no flies there's no flies you can come into my workshops and stuff but no flies because why that person on photographing is the paying customer if they weren't then I'd be like yeah I got you know sometimes I do shoots and I'm like and somebody says I mean town I'll be like yeah you come check this one out that's fine if I'm doing like if I did a lookbook for kids there's so many moms in the room and there's so much going on and there's kids jumping around and it's crazy what's one more person checking it out it's fine but in a headshot situation your one on one and if you're not it's a problem and if it's a kid and the little league mom is there barking orders what you have to do you got it you well you've got to be careful but you got to get him out of there usually I every time I don't get that mom out of there it's a problem one time it got so bad that the woman the it was a fifteen year old girl my assistant was going to start crying the fifteen year olds crying the mother said just oh my gosh you're so unattractive how's he ever going to get a good picture of you like I'm shooting? I'm like the mother says this the fifteen year old starts crying my assistant's almost to tears I can't believe this is happening and the mother I was like I was like you're out of here I said get out and I took a chair and I put it in the hall and I said sitting it was like a dunce cap in the corner type situation and I said you are not coming back in here till I'm done and I shut the door and I turned to the fifteen year I said okay, look your mom's out there we're gonna get this done you're gorgeous let's go but just chill out for like five minutes because you got to stop crying then the makeup artist has to redo your makeup so guess what happened three years later she's eighteen so I get emotional about my clients because what I did for her at fifteen mattered at eighteen because she came back and she gave me a hug and she told me that that was the best thing you could have done for me so I might as well just get all the most it out at once in a criollo later because I got to tell you another story but uh this is powerful really powerful and you can do stuff with it and you have a one on one opportunity with people and in that moment I did something for that girl that could have been on any other way and I think she she knew and when I got the hug and she came back it was huge for me. So do I get burnout that's my lighthouse going back right no because the person you have the ability to touch somebody every time you pick this up and put in front so powerful for people that's why we have p s that's why things happen so um I'm going to tell you about this so internally somebody with p s feels like that internally externally it's like this internally they're going externally zip and you're photographing it. I know your photographs because I photographed it and I photograph it in the beginning so internally there like that how you're going to get them to calm down how you going to do it? You gotta work with them, you gotta work it out you gotta make a plan but to tell you the truth, the pr there any ps sir's here you don't know you're not a p a s sir you are not saying she's a ps sir how many think they're ps sirs okay all of you that I hate that excuse I hate the excuse oh yes when I'm behind the camera you good over I hate hearing that that's terrible okay, this is really bugs me how many of you have a have I don't have a picture of themselves on their about page on their web site how many who doesn't have a picture of themselves on what are you a photographer? You take pictures of people but you don't have a pictures up p s ir right there it doesn't matter obvious I don't care if you're a hobbyist I don't care do you take your sitting in this room? You want to learn about photography, right? So guys, if you're not but I I've been told that I'm a personal brand manager basically is what I'm doing these days so everybody comes to me and they want, you know, pictures for whatever they're using a ton of, um to tell you the truth, a lot of what's been coming in my door and they won't tell you when they book the session, it'll just be like, oh yeah, I need some head shots that's fine and then they come in and they go, they got all this stuff, and they go, I really need to look good. I was like, all right, that's, what I do, I got you covered. Can we do a little bit more than just headshots? And I brought this outfit. I'm like, are you single? I do mourn online dating profile stuff to these days that comes through because I do head shots that they don't want toe, put the two and two together, and I'm like, I got you covered. Don't worry about it. So managing people's, personal brand and digital identity is really what what goes on and it's really important. And if somebody is really freaked out by the camera, that's, not their brandon walk in like that, the camera does that to them. You have to unravel them to get the get the best of them and bring them back to being themselves.