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Most articles that give you info about how to start a photography business will focus on a range of things from the sort of courses you should (or shouldn’t) study, what sort of experience you should build, whether or not you should specialise and so on.But seeing as this website is focused more on the marketing aspects of running a photography business, it only seems natural that we should focus on what you might need from a marketing standpoint when you’re starting a photography business.Below some of the titles there are links to more in-depth articles about each of those aspects if it’s something that you need to look into a little more.

Your Business Name

In some respects the marketing of your business begins with your photography business name.Do you simply go with your own personal name, or do you come up with something a little more creative that fully expresses what your business is all about?

Logo & Business Cards

One of the first things you need to think about when it comes to the marketing of your business is your logo. Often times this will come from your business name, and may have even been the inspiration for that particular name.Your logo is something that will get printed on your photography business cards, and used on other marketing materials like your website, any print advertising you do etc.Because you’re going to be working in a creative industry, you need to take the time to make sure that your logo is going to be of a professional quality and meshes well with how you want people to perceive your business.

Your Website

Of all the marketing tools you have at your disposal, the website is potentially the most important of them all.There are now more people than ever before using the Internet as their main way of searching for photographers, espcially when they’re looking for a photogrpaher in a specific area, town or city.So if you’re the sort of photographer who works locally (such as a wedding or portrait photographer), without a website you’re really limiting the opportunities for attracting clients.If you haven’t got a website yet, and aren’t really sure where to start or what to look for from a website designer.

It’s also worth noting that having a blog as part of your website allows you to do much more from a marketing perspective.But you need to be committed to updating it regularly – once or twice a month is fine, more is obviously going to be better.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Once you’ve got your website online you need to let the search engines know about it. This is done via SEO.Because more and more photographers are starting to realise the benefits of SEO, it’s becoming increasingly difficult for time-poor photographers to learn how to do it and then find the time to consistently do the work required to achieve stable front page rankings.If you’re serious about starting a photography business that is more than just a hobby, than at some point you’re going to have to start investing in your business, and SEO is definitely one investment that can create fantastic returns.If you’d like a two month free trial of a photography SEO service you can follow the link below – there are no committeemen or obligations, it just gives you the chance to see some results for yourself before you commit to investing in your website.

Facebook Page

Facebook now has well over half a billion members, and in the U.S over 50% of the adult population use the site.This means that more than 50% of your target market are on Facebook, so you might as well add some Facebook marketing to your toolkit.There are two ways to go about this – one is free, one costs money and they can be combined to increase their overall effectiveness.The free method involves getting a fan page online for your business. This then becomes another way for you to communicate with people about anything that’s going on in your business whether it’s showing photos from a job you recently completed or promoting a new offer that you’ve just launched.While you can get a fan page online for free, you can also create customised fan pages that cost you a little bit of money, but allow you to stand out from the crowd and make a much stronger impression.

Other Options

Some of the other marketing tools that you could use (but you might not need straight away) include:

Email Marketing
Video Marketing
Twitter
LinkedIn

As you continue to grow your business you should always be looking for new and improved ways to attract more clients to your business.Starting a photography business is never easy, but if you focus on improving your ability to market yourself, you’re going to have a distinct advantage over 90% of the photographers out there.