Social Media & Your Photography Business - Michelle Szpak

 What is social media to you and your business? Is it something that you channel and use productively? Is it something you don’t understand and just waste time on? Do you think it should be a quick fix? 

Social media to me is an amazing way to spread the word about your business, to build brand awareness and create a following that will move your business to the next level. But often, I see people trying to use it as a quick fix... the way our world works today everyone wants the golden fix to suddenly make their business successful over night. I am afraid to say that social media isn’t it, but it can and will work for your business if you implement things correctly.

No matter which social media platforms you choose for your business, it needs to be in line with your brand, with who your business is. Are you high end? Mid end? Low end? If you look over your social media now what does it say about your business?


Get friends to tell you what they think? Does it show quality of work, who the business and team are behind the scenes? Does it show your passion and love for your business? Or are you just using it in a panic to get clients? Is every other post about your next sale or offer?  Is it being used for promotion after promotion without anything in between?
I ask this as I see many businesses’ using their page as a desperate way to pull in bookings, instead of showing how amazing and passionate they are, and why as a client I should book them. Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s important to use Facebook and other media to pull leads and run promotions as part of your overall marketing, but it’s also important to mix it up and show who you are in-between. It’s important to create an excitement about your business.

One of the items I see missing from many of the business’ I work with is a social media plan. It should be no different to your main marketing.  Creating this plan will help you
to focus on what you need to be doing on a week by week basis.  What promotion are you running next month, how can you build the excitement on Facebook today....

sneak peeks at what is about to happen?  Behind the scenes of the test shoots? An all will be relieved on the 1st.


 How do you start a social media plan? 
You may already have something similar in place but I want to start from the beginning for everyone.  To start with get a sheet of paper and list words that sum up your business i.e. Families, passionate, lifestyle or studio, high end, positive, personal... etc.

Those words are something you can go back to when you are thinking about what to post. Anything that you put onto social media should be in-line with those words and should represent your business and brand.

Next, more paper or something on the computer, create boxes from January to December, although as we are so far through this year you could just do the next six months.  Then in the relevant months put topics that you need to discuss (remember if you’re running a promotion in August you need to start promoting it in July).

It’s as easy as that.  You could go more detailed and you could do it weekly.  I now put my weekly tasks on a board next to the computer, so have a monthly breakdown and then use that to help create what I am focusing on that week.

Michelle Szpak 
for The Photographer Academy

For more information visit: http://www.szpakbiker.co.uk