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Episode 89: How to Build a Luxury Level Brand
390 Plays5 years ago
Film Wedding Photographer, Lauren Fair, joins me on the Brands that Book podcast today to chat about building a high end brand. We chat about practical steps that people can take to curate a signature look and reach luxury level clients. If you're familiar with Lauren, then you know her work is beautiful and she's been featured in places like Cosmopolitan, Style Me Pretty, The Knot, and Brides magazine.
She shoots all over the world and if you're a photographer, she also teaches workshops in beautiful destinations like France and Italy. Both her workshops were sold out this year, but a few seats to the Paris workshop have opened up since it had to be rescheduled due to the current pandemic. If you're interested in learning from a talented photographer and businesswoman in a beautiful place, you'll want to check it out.
For the show notes, go to https://daveyandkrista.com/btb-lauren-fair-episode-89/
Recommended
Transcript
Lauren Fair's Photography Style
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Speaker
to shoot five images at every single wedding that could be considered my style, my brand, the vision that I wanted to create for my business and then I would only share those five images and I would never do full blog posts showing necessarily the entire scope of everything. I really wanted to create work that I was proud of that I thought was really beautiful.
Introduction to the Podcast
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Welcome to the Brands at Book Show, where we help creative, service-based businesses build their brands and find more clients. I'm your host, Davy Jones.
Building a High-End Brand
00:00:44
Speaker
At film wedding photographer Lauren Fair joins me on the Brands That Book podcast today to chat about building a high-end brand. We chat about practical steps that people can take to curate a signature look and reach luxury level clients. If you're familiar with Lauren, then you know her work is beautiful and she's been featured in places like Cosmopolitan, Style Me Pretty, The Knot, and Brides Magazine.
00:01:05
Speaker
She shoots all over the world, and if you're a photographer, she also teaches workshops in beautiful destinations like France and
Engagement and Resources
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Speaker
Italy. Both her workshops were sold out this year, but a few seats to the Paris workshop have opened up since it had to be rescheduled due to the current pandemic. If you're interested in learning from a talented photographer and businesswoman in a beautiful place, you'll want to check it out.
00:01:28
Speaker
Be sure to check out the show notes at DavyandChrista.com for the resources we mentioned during the episode. And I want to hear from you. Let me know what kind of content you'd like to see on the Brands That Book podcast as we move forward. To leave your feedback, head on over to the DavyandChrista Facebook page and send us a message. You can also DM us on Instagram at DavyandChrista. Now onto the episode.
Lauren's Photographic Journey
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Speaker
I'm here with Lauren Fair, fine art wedding photographer. And today, we are chatting about all sorts of different stuff. We're going to get into talking about building a high-end brand and building a luxury brand. And Lauren, I don't think there's any better person to talk to about this topic. So welcome. Oh, thank you so much, Davey. I really appreciate that. And I'm super excited to talk with you and anyone who's listening today.
00:02:15
Speaker
about a whole bunch of topics regarding branding and luxury weddings and what that all looks like. So thank you for having me. Yeah, admittedly, I shoved as much as I could into these questions, you know, so hopefully we'll get to cover everything that we have here. But we always start out with our guests sort of entrepreneurial journey. And for people who may not be familiar with you, could you just tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got started? Yeah, absolutely. So I have been a photographer for 10 years.
00:02:41
Speaker
I picked up my first camera when I was about 17 years old. I bought my first DSLR camera when I was going to visit my sister studying abroad in Italy. And I'd always loved taking pictures. And I thought, you know, this is my first trip to Europe. Let me buy a DSLR and I want to get some good travel photos while I'm over there. And I just remember being in Florence, Italy, and the Italians are very passionate people.
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and just watching these couples making out
Early Business Strategies
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Speaker
on street corners and these beautiful textured walls and it was just such an inspiring place and I was just snapping away and something just clicked in me for the first time of realizing that this was something I could potentially be good at or that I really had a passion for. And so I came back to college and I actually double majored in organizational communications and international business, so not photography at all.
00:03:31
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But I took my college years to shoot all of my family and friends that I could. So any couple friends who were dating, I just volunteered to shoot as many people as I could. I just really loved it and I just had a passion for it. And I was sharing things back on my very first WordPress blog back in, you know, 2009, I guess that was. And it's just crazy to think about the beginning of that. And I never really could have guessed that it would take us all over the world and be what it is today. But once college was over,
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I started my business at the end of 2010 and I just shot my first wedding in exchange for an iPad. I had two friends and two friends were getting married and I thought, I want an iPad. And they said, hey, we'll give you an iPad in exchange for shooting our wedding. So very high end roots I had here. Hey, you know, that's better. I think we shot our first wedding for like $400. So an iPad, I mean, iPads close to $1,000, you know? Back then they were, you know, $600, $700. So I thought, deal.
00:04:31
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that first year going into 2011, we used wedding wire, we used the knot, we used all the advertising that we possibly could in order to just get clients in the door, because the hardest part of any business is just starting it. And that first full year of 2011, we shot 35 weddings. And so it took off very, very, very quickly. And I think we peaked at myself and my husband, Tim, we shot 65 weddings ourselves in 2013.
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And then we thought, let's never do that again.
Signature Look with Film
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I mean, even 35 is a lot. I think we peaked around 43 or something like that. And had that same sort of reaction where it's like, we never want to do that again. I mean, and shooting 65 in a year. I mean, that's at least one every weekend. So I mean, I'm guessing there were a lot of double headers in there. Absolutely. Tons of double headers, because it's a little bit seasonal. It's not like you're shooting every weekend of February, necessarily. So we learned a lot. And we really learned what our limits were and what we could handle. And
00:05:26
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We also have associate photographers and we've had them since 2012. So that program was also running with more weddings. And we've never shot that many again, of course, because that was almost suicidal to try in a year with having associate photographers as well. And so last year I shot 42 weddings. Well, 2020 now is the pandemic year, so a little bit different.
00:05:49
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This year, I am down to 25, which is very intentional. And I feel really good about that number. And I'm very excited about that. So it's been quite the journey. I mean, my journey honestly really took off when I discovered film. And when I bought my first contacts, it was 2013 into 2014. And that is when I started developing a signature look, a signature style that is when everything clicked for me. And I think my work started becoming recognizable. Are you still shooting with the contacts?
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Yes. Awesome. Yeah, I love the context is going back to 2013. That would have been I think on like kind of the way on the early side of the resurgence of film, in my opinion, at least, you know, I mean, obviously films been around forever and people have been doing it since it's existed. But it's definitely made a bit of a comeback. And I'd say 2013 is probably on the earlier side of that. Yeah, I agree. I feel like there were not that many people really doing it for weddings. At that point, there was a course Jose,
00:06:41
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and a few others who have always been in the film camp, but I think it was pretty early on. And as far as the resurgence, I mean, now it's just, we have the hybrid co, we have a whole conference just for film loving people. And so it's been really fun to be a part of that community. I think the film community is such a positive uplifting community, I think. I don't know if it's because we're drawn to beautiful images rather than like edgy, dark images. I don't know if it is, but
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I just feel like the film community is really, really kind and I very much enjoyed being a
Business Mindset in Photography
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part of it. And it just was magic to me when I started shooting film. It just all made sense for the first three years of my business. I knew what I wanted my images to look like. I knew what I wanted my brand to feel like. And I was constantly pushing towards that, but I felt like I was always falling short because I didn't know the look. I hadn't quite mastered what the actual look was I was going for and film helped me hone in on that.
00:07:35
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And it just kind of transformed everything. And so I wasn't really using film for clients in 2013. It was 2014 was my first year of actually bringing it to weddings and shooting, you know, seven, eight roles. Not much, but enough that my film portfolio and my images started all of a sudden looking very high end compared to the years before.
00:07:55
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There's that aspect I think for us when we're transitioning to shooting film, just trusting yourself with it. And then all of a sudden, your film images are the ones that you're keeping and require the least amount of editing. And then you're trying to shoot as much film as possible every wedding because you know, it's gonna save you a ton of time on the back end. But going back earlier in your career, you had majored in international business and communication, right? Or communications? Organizational communication and international. Do you feel like that's helped at all as you started your business?
00:08:22
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Yeah, absolutely. I like to think of myself as a business woman who happened to find an artistic career rather than an artist who runs a business, if that makes sense. Yeah. I've always been very logically brained and I love marketing. I love the business aspect of running a business and I love photography too. And so it's just this perfect kind of blend of two things that I love, but I genuinely love business. I've always had a passion for travel, always constantly. I knew,
00:08:49
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I knew very early on in our business that I wanted to be a destination wedding photographer and not a destination wedding photographer who was shooting things for free in exchange for the clout of saying I was traveling, but a profitable destination wedding photographer who was actually making a living while traveling and shooting beautiful weddings. I've always loved travel. I grew up traveling. I have always had a passion for it.
00:09:12
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That was very targeted my entire career. I've been working towards really where I am now or none of us have arrived. That's the thing. There's no point in which we are there like, Oh, I booked that one wedding. I've made it, but that's all true because then you have to maintain it. You know, there's always a next level to kind of get to. And so for me, I've always been pushing myself, the business side of it comes more naturally to me. Almost. I have to work harder.
00:09:37
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to make beautiful images, I think, sometimes than to run the business aspect of it. But I don't mind that. That's just who I am, and I've embraced it. Yeah. Well, I mean, I think that just, I mean, your first year in business, you're shooting 35 weddings. I mean, you were doing something right. Because I don't think many people start their first year in photography and end up shooting 35 weddings in that year. You know, I think you're being modest when you say, you know, you haven't arrived. Because I think a lot of people would look at you and say, wow, well, you know, she's been featured, it seems like everywhere.
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and you host workshops and you have sold out one in Italy coming up in July.
Creating a High-End Brand
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And then you had a sold out one in Paris that has gotten moved because of the pandemic, which their seats open for that, right? Or now there are. Yeah, we have three people unable to make the date. I actually would be wrapping up our final day right now. Yeah.
00:10:26
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people not be able to make the new dates which are in August so yeah we have three spots open for that and it's gonna be amazing once the world opens back up it's gonna be this rush of being able to be together again and spend time in beautiful places so I think we're all gonna appreciate that even a little bit more than we do now
00:10:42
Speaker
And so huge bummer going through this, right? I mean, the pandemic is just such an unfortunate situation for everyone. But maybe a little silver lining here is three people who previously wouldn't have been able to attend this workshop in Paris can now go. When are you gonna open up seats again? Do you know? Are they open now?
00:11:00
Speaker
I mean, they're open now. I haven't really been sharing much about it just because I think everybody's been dealing with the pandemic. Everything going on, yeah. Everything. But I feel like in early May, I'm going to announce again that there are three spots that have now opened up. And so if anybody would like to join, we have three spots, and it's going to be incredible.
00:11:16
Speaker
Yeah, awesome. And I think this episode will go live earlier than early May. So if you're listening, you get a little bit of a head start, but your other workshops sell out, I assume this one's going to as well. So people should get on that. But I bring all that up. I want you to tell us a little bit about building a luxury brand, even in terms of how you got started. Are there things that you would go back and redo in the beginning? Or are there things that you specifically did from the beginning to build this high end luxury brand?
00:11:43
Speaker
Yeah, that's a really good question. So I guess it's a two part question. So things that I would do again, I'll start there. So yes, absolutely. I think because I have more of a business brain, I really had a vision of where I wanted to be. And I knew that I didn't want to be someone just kind of scraping by and not making enough for my work that I thought maybe it was going to be okay someday. The first year or two of business.
00:12:08
Speaker
I challenged myself to shoot five images at every single wedding, whether it was in a parking lot with barbed wire fence. I'm serious. We have done it all. I would challenge myself to shoot five images at every single wedding that could be considered my style, my brand, the vision that I wanted to create for my business. And then I would only share those five images and I would never do full blog posts showing necessarily the entire scope of everything.
00:12:38
Speaker
I really wanted to create work that I was proud of, that I thought was really beautiful. And so for me, those weddings early on were not great weddings. I mean, they were not weddings I was getting paid well for. I was not necessarily feeling very respected and valued as I showed up. It's not like how it is now. And so it was almost like these adverse conditions where you have to show up and everybody's running six hours late.
00:13:03
Speaker
and everyone has been drinking too much and you have to corral people. It's like the least fun parts of weddings. There was a lot of that the first two years, but I was so hungry for it and I knew what it could be that I just didn't care. And I just wanted to make a few good images at every wedding. And so I built my portfolio.
00:13:21
Speaker
fairly quickly just because I did challenge myself, even if I could get three images that I was really proud of per wedding, then that was what I was going to do. And people really enjoyed working with us. And so the reputation and the reviews started coming in. So even though they maybe didn't really care that much to begin with, all of a sudden they had a really great experience working with me and I made their wedding look almost better than it was because I cared so much about creating really beautiful images I could make
00:13:49
Speaker
parking lot with barbed wire I could find one cherry blossom and kind of like cover it all and just make something that looked really beautiful and so that is something that really helped and because I cared so much about creating the absolute best work I could even in adverse conditions I think the reviews started coming in the word of mouth started spreading like oh I found this photographer you know on the knot and she was only a thousand dollars but she was so good
00:14:13
Speaker
And so I think that the caring that I put in early on has served me really well and I would never change that about what I did early on. That's one thing that I think was good. I did some editorial shoots.
00:14:25
Speaker
Yeah, so I have a question about that because I think that's fascinating. And I think such an attainable goal for people out there who are trying to also build a higher end brand to, you know, take advantage of what they have in front of them and challenge themselves to create three to five great images. And regardless of what you're doing, so lots of different types of creatives that are listening, I think, regardless of what you're doing, it's very attainable to look at maybe a sliver of it and say, I'm going to make the most out of this part of it. But one thing that you mentioned was that you only shared five of those, those were the only images you shared, right? And so,
00:14:55
Speaker
Did you blog at all or did you just blog those three to five images? Exactly. I would just blog those three to five images. And then I mean, of course, there were a few good weddings in the midst of all of those, you know, somehow I landed a few really beautiful wedding during those couple first years. And those would get a little bit longer blog posts if it was more in the direction of, you know, a little bit of where you wanted to go. Yeah. And there was one venue early on that I just happened to shoot one extremely beautiful wedding.
00:15:21
Speaker
I don't know why they hired me, but they did. And so there were a couple weddings in between all of those, you know, parking lot, backyard, barbed wire type scenarios that I was really able to market with. And I got my first feature on Style Me Pretty, I don't think until like 2014 maybe.
00:15:42
Speaker
I think that early on there was this fire that I could make something beautiful out of nothing. And I think that I've still carried that into my beautiful luxury weddings that I shoot today that have all the budget in the world for gorgeous florals and, you know, amazing settings and castles in France and things like that. You know, I think I've never lost that little bit of scrappiness that I'm not afraid to sweat and put hard work in on a wedding day. I am constantly moving to try to make it the absolute best it can be. So even in a scenario in which it's stunningly beautiful,
00:16:11
Speaker
I'm still thinking the same way of what is the perfect angle? What is the ultimate best way to shoot this already beautiful thing? So I think that that mindset has really stuck with me.
00:16:21
Speaker
I can't tell you how much I like hearing that because as website designers, one thing that we're typically pushing back on is how many galleries and how many images. I think we feel like we have to show off everything. On our website, we have to show every wedding that we've shot in a full gallery of each wedding and that's what people want to see. Somebody told us early on that the best photographers share the least amount of work.
00:16:44
Speaker
So I think it's so valuable really choosing just the images that are your best images. And there's always a chance, you know, like, we'd always have people ask for full galleries after they've inquired, you know, that's
Reflections and Growth
00:16:55
Speaker
fine. And typically, we'd send them over after somebody's inquired anyways. But I think on your website, especially, I think people are going to have a sigh of relief hearing you say that, especially if they feel like I've shot some weddings, but I don't like all the images.
00:17:07
Speaker
And so I think this is permission here just to share. I mean, it can be literally three to five images and that's enough for a blog post. So that's awesome. I really enjoy hearing stuff like that, but you were headed on to something else. What were you going to say? Yes. So early on, I think there's actually not a lot that I would change to be perfectly honest, because I think that everything is a growing opportunity. So I don't really regret taking all the dozens and dozens of weddings every year. And I don't regret reaching a point of exhaustion and
00:17:35
Speaker
All of that, I mean, yes, would it have been nice to avoid that? Sure. But I think that it taught me my limits. I'm the type of person, if you're into the Enneagram, I'm a three, which is the achiever. And then with an almost equivalent score of a seven, which is the enthusiast. So I'm a very enthusiastic achiever.
00:17:56
Speaker
And so I think for me, taking on too much and doing a lot early on was something that I probably would not change just because I think it taught me my limits and it taught me to narrow in a little bit. It taught me to hone in on what truly was something I needed to be a part of. I think the only thing I did maybe a little too much was say yes to everything. I said yes to every opportunity, whether it was good for me or not, it can be hard to say no.
00:18:22
Speaker
especially if you are a people pleaser. I think most of us creatives are people pleasers because we have this creative thing that we're sharing with the world and we want you to like us. We want you to like the thing that we're presenting to you, right? So I think that early on I said yes to probably far too many things that were probably not beneficial to my brand. It's all hindsight is 20, 20. And I think that overall I'm happy with our journey and the way it's gone and you know, there was a turning point where,
00:18:50
Speaker
things started changing and we started building more of that luxury brand and teaching workshops and shooting film, all of that. Do you feel like saying yes to everything though or to more things than maybe you should have didn't have as much of a negative impact because you were so careful about the work that you were actually sharing? So even if you said yes to something and you went and shot it, I'm guessing that that didn't necessarily mean that you were absolutely going to blog it because you were really intentional about just creating a set of images per shoot.
00:19:20
Speaker
a really good way to phrase it. So for example, I would say yes to any styled shoot that any planner wanted me to shoot, right? I would just think to myself, oh, it's good content. Of course I will go shoot anything. And I would shoot some things and then I would show up and realize this is not at all the direction that I want my brand to go. Why did I say yes to this? You know, spending money on film, I'm spending my time and my entire day and all my editing time to be a part of something that's not necessarily going to push my brand forward.
00:19:50
Speaker
And so, but I could still challenge myself to shoot those three to five images and I could still have something to share even if they're not necessarily in the right direction. But I think that those things are a little bit of a time suck from something else that I could have been doing to push my business forward in the direction I truly wanted to go and that I truly believed in, as opposed to somebody else's vision and just showing up and shooting it, even if it wasn't going to be something I would be proud to share.
00:20:14
Speaker
One thing that you mentioned earlier was as you transition to film, that's sort of when you started developing a signature look that people would recognize.
Developing a Unique Style
00:20:23
Speaker
What was it about film that helped you do that? Was it the medium itself? Was it the images that you were creating using that medium, some combination of the two? How did that help you start building your luxury brand? When I started shooting film, it coincided already with the fact that I had been in business for about four years.
00:20:41
Speaker
And so I had already been building relationships with planners and venues. And I think we were already at a good point. And then I introduced film as well. And that just skyrocketed it. I don't know that it was necessarily just a different camera that I think was the turning point. But I think it was a combination of all things. I think, you know, I've been shooting for four years. I knew the editing I wanted. I knew the look I wanted of my images.
00:21:06
Speaker
And this is a long time ago too. So back in 2012, 2013, presets weren't a thing. I mean, all figuring this out on our own. I think VSCO maybe existed by 2012, but that was pretty much the only one. And that at the time was more for moody photographers. So we were all figuring it out on our own. And I think that it just coincided at a point where I had made really good relationships. I was starting to work with some planners, which is a huge key to building a luxury brand.
00:21:33
Speaker
It wasn't necessarily that the planners were recommending us. It was just that we were showing up at weddings and, oh, there's a planner here. That's great. And so it was just at that turning point where I was starting to make a lot of connections that I would continue to have as really good relationships for the next six, seven years. So I was starting to work with planners, starting to work at better venues. You know, we were charging maybe $3,500 then. So we were at a much more respectable level as far as price point.
00:21:59
Speaker
Definitely not in the luxury market whatsoever as far as pricing went, but reasonable, you know, like kind of lower to mid range. And so all of that was taking place at the same time as I found my photographic voice. And for me, Fujifilm, the context, the whole process of loading and shooting and engaging with my couples, the way the texture and the light and the colors pop on film. All of a sudden, I think that's when people maybe noticed my images more.
00:22:27
Speaker
They already maybe knew that I was nice or that I was easy to work with or they enjoyed working with me at weddings. But I think that was when my images started becoming better to match the good experience that we have been providing all that time. And it was just a real turning point for us that whole year, you know, we just started working with higher end everything. And film was a big part of it. We've been with Photo Vision literally since the beginning, since 2013. And they have been a huge part of us finding the look that we wanted for our scans and all of that.
00:22:56
Speaker
it would just kind of all happen in that same year. Do you have any practical steps that people can take or just tips for people who are in the thick of it trying to figure out what is my signature look? Do you have any practical steps that people can take? Yeah, I would say first and foremost, shoot a ton. I think that you don't necessarily know what you resonate with until you've shot enough to really know. I know that there are some things that I just get excited about because it's who I am and I know the type of couple I like to work with.
00:23:25
Speaker
But I think it's because I've shot so much that I truly know the exact direction I want it to go. And I would say shoot a ton. You know, really decide why you like some of the images that you like. One practical thing you can do is if you go to your saved images on Instagram. So I don't know if you guys ever hit that little flag icon to save an image when you really love it. I do it all the time. So go to your save folder on Instagram and take notes, write down words of what you love about these images that you're saving that are not your own.
00:23:54
Speaker
And I think that that can really hone in on what you love and what you want to create. You know, I'm not sure if you want to transition a little bit into talking about like branding and things like that, but for me, absolutely. Yeah. I have three keywords that kind of rule. They create this framework of what I share. And my three words are exquisite, joy filled, and what is my other one? Oh my goodness. Exquisite, joy filled, and iconic are my three words. And so for me,
00:24:23
Speaker
If something does not fit into exquisite, joy-filled, iconic, then that is not something I'm going to
Maintaining Brand Consistency
00:24:29
Speaker
share. It's not something I'm going to blog. It's not something I'm going to promote because I want everything to funnel into this framework to create this really strong brand so that when someone thinks about our work, they think of happy images that have joy in them. They think about editorial images that have that kind of iconic feel to it. They think about not just pretty, but a
00:24:50
Speaker
Like I want that wow factor with our images and so for me the word exquisite just is a little bit not just for sure. Yeah adds a little punch to it for sure. Exactly. And so if you've never thought about words that really define your brand really dig in and define those words and don't make them like romantic light.
00:25:10
Speaker
pretty, dig deeper, go on synonym.com. There are synonyms for all of those that can make you set apart a little bit more because how many photographers are there that shoot light pretty images? A lot. I mean, we all shoot light pretty images. And so I think having words that truly set you apart can create a much stronger brand. And you guys are brand experts. I mean, you can probably speak to this way more than I can. And so I would love to hear your thoughts on that as well.
00:25:36
Speaker
Yeah, and I think that's a valuable advice. I mean, you're always trying to walk that line of especially if you're taking the keyword approach, choosing words that aren't too cliche, you know? And I think to a certain extent, especially if people are looking to you as an example, right? Then some of those words, you know, eventually might even become cliche themselves.
00:25:53
Speaker
But I think kind of taking the approach that you had just mentioned is valuable in just trying to find connotations that like exquisite as an example, that just maybe add a little more punch to what you're trying to convey, you know, or just add the right sort of differentiation to your brand.
00:26:08
Speaker
I like everything that you're saying right now and again, I think that just how intentional you are about it is probably what makes it so practically powerful in the work that you're sharing. I don't use that Instagram feature saving images. I know what you're talking about now. I got to imagine that has to be a great tool even if you're getting ready for a shoot and you're looking for some inspiration.
00:26:32
Speaker
I don't know if there's any other use cases for it even beyond that, but I assume like even checking out what maybe different publications are sharing and starting to see patterns and then trying to go out and create images that might resonate with an editor of that publication. I'm starting to see how valuable a feature like that could be for a photographer. Absolutely. And one feature too that's pretty cool because you can actually make different saved boards within Instagram. So you can even go to your own images, like go to your own feed.
00:26:59
Speaker
and hit that save icon on your own images and pick like your all time favorites out of your own feed on its own little board. And then it creates a new grid out of the images basically when you go to that saved folder and you can look and you can see how much stronger those are or ask a talented friend to do it for you and create a grid and you can start to see how the images shared are maybe being diluted.
00:27:22
Speaker
with some less than great images on your feed, whereas it could be a lot stronger if you just curated a little bit more within that kind of framework of where do I want to go, what do I want my business to do in five years, where do I want to be, who do I want to be working with, where do I want to be shooting, like get very specific. So I think it's a super valuable tool for photography. Yeah, absolutely. Really? Well, yeah, and I think I mean, we might have to incorporate that into one of our branding activities just because when we work with brand clients, especially photographers,
00:27:51
Speaker
One of the things that, and I think Krista really enjoys this aspect of things, but I think as photographers, when we're looking at our images all of the time, it can start to get hard figuring out or you can just start to get hard curating them, right? You know, because you're in it. So I know one of the things that Krista likes to do during website design projects is have people just send over all their images and she'll help them curate. But this might be a very practical way to show somebody when you draw out just the best how much more powerful they look together.
00:28:20
Speaker
I really like that. That's a great activity. I'll try to recap that in the show notes as well. So people, if you're driving or whatever, you can just head back to the show notes and get a summary of that. But that's great. So are there any other steps that you would recommend that people take in sort of curating a signature
Booking Luxury Clients
00:28:36
Speaker
look? We covered a lot, so it's okay if that's it. I could talk about this topic for hours to be honest. If you guys ever do come to a workshop with me, it's a lot of business and branding and creating a very, very strong business. And I love this stuff.
00:28:50
Speaker
I think that you just have to be a little bit emotionally disconnected from your images in order to create the strongest brand. I think that I am the same way. I'm very attached to every image I take, and I think they're all great, but then I also kind of hate them all. If that makes sense, I think a lot of us creatives feel that way. It's like, oh, I'm a professional. But I also think that every image I've ever taken is crap most of the time. It's this weird thing where we're weirdly attached to our images, even though we kind of aren't satisfied with them.
00:29:20
Speaker
I constantly feel that, I constantly feel dissatisfied with my own work and I want to be better. So I think that it's that weird line of sometimes you need to bring in a third person and like you were saying, you know, with you and Krista, you guys will curate galleries for them and that's so helpful. And even if you're someone who is not going through a professional branding right now and doesn't necessarily have that resource, you can still utilize your other photographer friends because sometimes just having another perspective to look at your work and say, oh, remove that image. It's not strong.
00:29:50
Speaker
you know, create a pick time gallery of your favorite 300 images, right? And have a pool of very trusted photographer friends go in and maybe even not just photographer friends, but other friends, someone creative, someone with a good eye who you trust. It doesn't even have to be a photographer friend, but just someone go in and mark his favorite 50 and then use those 50 on your website. So that's another practical tip as far as, you know, curation and narrow down a little bit.
00:30:18
Speaker
I will say, especially when in the off season, and I know right now is unfortunately the off season for everybody, right? One simple activity that you can do really to elevate your website is just going through and updating all the images, looking at your best work from last year, and updating all your portfolios with those best images. Really, I think it goes a long way in giving your website a more powerful look
00:30:41
Speaker
But anyways, moving beyond even curating a signature look, how does one go about booking luxury level clients, you know, or everything we just talked about was very practical. But I mean, how do you use that to get in front of more people in your first year alone, you're shooting 35 weddings, I know you'd mentioned the knot and wedding wire, and those both sounded like they were good sources of referrals for you? Have they always been like, are they still a good source now?
00:31:04
Speaker
To be honest, in transparency, I've been pretty critical of the knot and wedding wire just in general on the podcast and elsewhere. I'd love to hear what channels you're using to kind of get your work out there and generate leads. Yeah. So Davey and I are on video right now so he can see me shaking my head. So those sources were really good when we were charging $2,000. Those are not the sources that necessarily are going to produce high-end
00:31:30
Speaker
clientele, maybe someone out there can prove me wrong. But I don't think so. I think honestly, once we even hit like a $4,000 starting rate, we were way priced out of any of that advertising. So I would not recommend it if you are above or anywhere near that price point currently. So on average, our booking is anywhere from 15 to $20,000. So obviously, that is not a source that would be worthwhile for us to invest our marketing dollars into from the cost of an iPad to 15 to $20,000. That's amazing.
00:31:59
Speaker
Yeah, so 10 years. It's definitely not an overnight thing. Sure, sure. If anything someone gets from this, it's that you can do that too. It just will not happen overnight. And there's a lot of things that we wish we could skip in this process of becoming a luxury wedding photographer. But unfortunately, and fortunately, it is a long process that requires a lot of hard work. It just requires consistency, consistency, consistency for years and years and years and building up a reputable brand that people can trust at that level because
00:32:29
Speaker
So first of all, a hundred percent of our bookings come from planners. We very rarely interact with brides directly to book. It does happen occasionally, but most of the time it's a hundred percent book through a planner. We will Skype with a couple or talk with the couple at some point as well. But typically, you know, the planner is negotiating everything. They're sending us the details. You know, we shoot a lot of two to three day weddings now. So we're covering like a full weekend. So it's rehearsal dinner, a brunch, a boat party day, whatever is going on with this.
00:32:58
Speaker
kind of full weekend event. So all of that is being negotiated with the planner. And then I will hop on with the couple once we're very close to a contract or right after the contract has been signed and the contract has been sent in and the deposit has been paid. After that point, I will hop on with the couple and just say, hi, we can't wait to work with you. But the planners are the ones advocating for us at this point in our career. And so you have to have a body of work that supports a luxury planner, putting their neck out for you and saying to this couple,
00:33:28
Speaker
This is the photographer you should hire. So I would say networking with planners is a massive part as far as working with luxury clients because most of our clients are very busy. You know, they are successful professionals. They are someone who wants to hire a professional that they trust and just let them do their thing. They make the best clients in the world. Luxury clients are wonderful because they're very hands off. They just trust you and they don't nitpick a lot.
00:33:55
Speaker
which is absolutely wonderful. And I think that the mid range market has a lot of nitpicking in it still. And so for us, it's been truly a joy to be able to work with clients who trust us and value us and just trust us to do their thing. They are successful in their own careers. And so they realize that if you are charging that and their planners recommending you and all of these factors are in place, that you are as good as they say you are. And so they just
00:34:22
Speaker
So networking with planners is a huge part as far as working with luxury clients. That's how they're booking every vendor.
00:34:29
Speaker
So you mentioned, I think it was back in 2014 that you started shooting weddings where, and it wasn't necessarily that the wedding was coming from a planner, but you would notice that planners were at the wedding. So I assume that those planners, when they saw the gallery, they loved your work. And so there was that aspect of things where, you know, having worked with you now, they knew that they could recommend you. Was there anything else that you did in addition to that, just showing up and doing good work that really got you in with planners? You know, I guess like
00:34:55
Speaker
But even some of the planners that you're working with, I imagine that they're not just going and getting coffee with everybody who wants to go get coffee, right? Just because their time is probably pretty limited themselves, right? So I guess how do you even start to get in the door with some of these planners? Yeah, that's such a good question, maybe. And that's actually a question I get a lot at any educational thing that I go to. I think that people want to know how do you get in with planners? How is this a relationship that actually converts to real clients?
00:35:26
Speaker
And I have never done client gifts or planner gifts or sent a present to anyone. I don't think bribery is the right way to get in with planners. If you talk to most luxury planners, they would agree with you a thousand percent. They say, you know, I don't want a candle sent to me. I want a reliable professional person to recommend, to be an asset to my team that I'm putting together. I want phenomenal images.
00:35:52
Speaker
and I want to get it published. They don't want little presents that are kind of generic. And so if you have maybe heard that you should be gifting planners in exchange for referrals, I don't think that's the correct approach at all, personally. It's certainly just because you get somebody a gift, they won't refer you, right? You got to be doing good work.
00:36:13
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. It's a trust factor. And they have to recommend someone. So think about it that way, you know, like planners have to recommend somebody. So in order for that to be you, what can you do to be the most valuable asset? So for me, if I want to work with someone, I'm not going to send them like a gift box candle in the mail and say, Hi, here's my brochure. It's impersonal. And I think it doesn't add value to their life. And I would also recommend very strongly against emailing anyone and asking them to meet for coffee because
00:36:41
Speaker
Again, that provides no value. You're the one who was them, right? And so asking them to go out to coffee or quote unquote, pick their brain, both of those things, almost every planner I know would say that they would never do that. And that they almost like immediately would just delete that email because they get so many of them. I would recommend against that. And instead for me, if I want to work for the new planner, I just did this. I want to work with this one planner and I offered to go shoot a rehearsal dinner for her.
00:37:08
Speaker
That is so beyond a scope. Like I charge thousands to do that normally for everybody. But I think just because I was willing to say, Hey, what do you need? Is there any event that you have coming up that you don't have images of? Maybe they didn't hire a photographer for this. Is there anything I can help? What can I do? Can I go shoot your team? Do you need new headshots? Do you need holiday card pictures? Do you need, what can I do for you that's tangible? That not only is a gift to you, but also shows how good my work is.
00:37:36
Speaker
What I can do for you and how professional I can be. So I think that anything you can offer to a planner or a venue, I would say is kind of in the same realm because if the high end venue was recommending you, that can be a huge source of referrals too. But yeah, I think offering anything that is tangible, that shows your work, that's not generic, that shows them that you're willing to go the extra mile.
00:37:57
Speaker
That is, I think, what planners respond to and what they truly want. And that just shows the type of person you are and that you're willing to work with them and go the extra mile because they're thinking in their head, what is this person going to be like on a wedding day? I have no idea because I've never met them. They're just an Instagram that maybe I like their pictures, but how can I trust them? So I think building that trust is really important.
00:38:18
Speaker
Yeah, that's really helpful. And along those lines, getting published, I assume that getting just consistently having your work published probably also helps building trust with planners. Did you find that to be the case and couples? Yeah, I think so. And I think that I always knew I wanted to shoot destination weddings. And so maybe somebody in France would have loved my work, but they have never seen it. So how can I have them see my work? So can hire me for a wedding. And I think publications is how that happens, because
00:38:48
Speaker
Met thankfully has no borders and so getting your work out there in as many touch points as you really can has been huge for us as far as expanding our brand and being able to work with international planners and shoot international weddings. I think that most brides are browsing style me pretty they are looking at Martha Stewart weddings and so I think that publications are definitely not dead. I think that there's huge value still to be had in getting your work published and planners love it too because they're putting
00:39:17
Speaker
a year or two years of work into the design and execution of this beautiful day. And they want it published. They want it in a magazine or something. Even if the couple doesn't really care, the owner really cares. And so being able to show that you have good relationships with editors and can make that happen with them is a really huge selling point to, I think, somebody wanting to work with you and creating that relationship. So it's just a mutual, beneficial,
Finding Creative Inspiration
00:39:44
Speaker
Relationship that you can create but I adore planners. I think that their jobs are the hardest in the world and What they do to make our lives easier as photographers on a wedding day is so invaluable So I take them so much and I think you know showing that how we work with them is something that anybody can do Just kind of making that extra effort going the extra mile and offering them something really tangible
00:40:05
Speaker
Yeah. Awesome. I don't want to take up more of your time, but I do want to kind of wrap things up by talking about something that you seem passionate about talking about, which is staying true to your own voice, especially in I think any sort of creative industry. It's really easy to look at maybe what's popular and what other people are doing. And I think especially in, I would say the creative industry broadly, I think this is maybe certainly true of photography industry as well. Maybe it's sometimes it's hard to keep the blinders on to a certain extent and really focusing on
00:40:33
Speaker
creating your own signature look, you know, so it's one thing for sure to go on and use the save image feature on Instagram and put together images that really do resonate with you and use that as inspiration versus trying to go out and copy exactly what other people are doing, right? So could you tell us a little bit more about this idea of staying true to your own voice? Yes, 1000%. That's such a good point. So one thing that I always encourage my students to do
00:40:59
Speaker
is to look outside of the wedding industry for inspiration. I think the best thing that you can do for your creativity is to pull inspiration from other places. I think if you're just regurgitating styled shoot after styled shoot, that's just kind of modeled after other styled shoots that have, you know, that doesn't create viral content that makes anybody stop and be like, whoa, what's that? And that's the goal is to create images that make people stop and say, wow,
00:41:24
Speaker
So I always encourage people, look outside of the wedding industry. When I'm pulling together a shoot, it's very, very, very rare that we start with an inspiration image that comes from anything wedding. You know, I'm very inspired by fashion. I like looking at runway shots. I like looking at old black and white photography. I'm very inspired by travel and architecture and kind of like lines.
00:41:48
Speaker
and forms and things like that. And so a lot of times our shoot inspirations, if I am a part of an editorial shoot or a workshop shoot, things like that, they will get pulled from other sources. And then of course we'll have a wedding dress and different things in there, but almost all of my shoots don't start at all with any wedding inspiration images whatsoever. They all start with colors or textures or forms or architecture or nature, something like that. So I would encourage,
00:42:16
Speaker
you not to look necessarily just on Pinterest wedding images to create your own content and your own shoots. I think that there's so much beauty in the world and you can find incredible inspiration elsewhere. I mean, music, films, books, iconic places in the world or, you know, a certain color, water, all of these different things I think can inspire you.
Hard Work and Perseverance
00:42:39
Speaker
And so that would be my biggest recommendation, I guess, as to keeping blinders onto the industry and not just
00:42:44
Speaker
copying other people's work is to look outside of the industry. Yeah, 100%. Krista has a great blog post on our blog about that, and some of the ways that she stays inspired. And that's one of her biggest points is just really not following too much what's happening in the industry. And of course, it's helpful to just see what other people are doing and we have a lot of friends in the industry.
00:43:03
Speaker
you know, we love supporting them, but we try as much as possible to draw inspiration from, you know, other aspects of just life that we enjoy, but then certainly parallel industries to us, you know, so looking at websites of or looking at custom home builders, for instance, you know, and that's something that we're doing right now is building a home. So I know that a lot of inspiration has been drawn from that recently. So I really appreciate that.
00:43:26
Speaker
Something else that I really appreciate about just this interview in general is that if you go to your Instagram, right, you see sort of the peak of the iceberg. You see where you're at right now, you know, which is featured everywhere, shooting these crazy awesome weddings, hosting workshops in Paris and Italy. But I really appreciate kind of getting a glimpse into the hard work over the last decade plus that went into all that. And I really, really appreciate anybody who's listened to the podcast knows that one of the things that I talk about a lot is just getting started.
00:43:55
Speaker
And then early on, especially when we start talking about finding your ideal client. And I think there's so much pressure on people sometimes, especially early on to maybe, oh, you don't want to take on everything. You don't want to say yes to everything. You don't want to do too much. But I think one thing I really appreciate about your story is that you just worked a lot early on. You did a lot. You just got started and things fell into place because you were intentional along the way.
00:44:19
Speaker
So I think this is just going to be a valuable episode for especially people who are just getting started. So thank you for your time. I really appreciate it. Where can people follow along to learn more about you? Well, thank you so much for having me. I really enjoyed our conversation too. And thank you again for saying all that. That was very, very kind. And yeah, I hope that if everyone just takes one thing away from this, it's just work hard, stay humble, and good things will come. So you can find me on Instagram. My handle is just at Lauren Fair.
00:44:46
Speaker
And then our website is laurenfairphotography.com and you can click the workshops tab if you want to learn more about coming and hanging out with me in my favorite city in Paris.
00:44:55
Speaker
It'll be the perfect excuse to travel when we all can leave our homes. If you're listening, you might get a little bit of a head start to maybe snag one of those three seats before they are announced to the public. I encourage you to do that. If you've missed that for whatever reason, do you have plans in the future to continue doing workshops? Yes. We've been doing international workshops for five years. We have workshops when you're up every year.
00:45:19
Speaker
Yeah, so if you missed this one, if you're listening after, you know, if you're listening months from now, be sure to check out Lauren's workshop or the workshop page on our website for upcoming dates. So thank you again. Thanks, DV. Bye, everyone. Thanks for tuning into the Brands That Book Show. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider subscribing and leaving a review in iTunes. For show notes and other resources, head on over to dvandchrista.com.
00:45:52
Speaker
you