Getting More Inquiries

The speaker is excited to have the opportunity to connect and share advice on getting more inquiries in a business. They talk about their own journey starting a photography business in Florida and the importance of connecting with your "why" in order to attract clients. They suggest using Facebook moms groups and running model calls as effective ways to get more inquiries. The speaker emphasizes the importance of language and energy when making posts and recommends targeting potential clients who are active on social media. Good morning! How are you doing today? I hope you're doing awesome. I genuinely, genuinely hope you're doing awesome, wherever you're at, whatever you're doing. I'm super excited to be here, just to have the opportunity to try to connect and go deeper, like deeper than what I feel I can do on Instagram, and so I'm super excited. Some of you said that you're interested in hearing about how to get more inquiries in your business, so that's what this little riff is about. Yeah, I hope you love this. I'm excited, like I said, to go deeper this year, so let me know what you think of this, and that's what it's all about. I'm growing and I'm learning, and then you're growing and you're learning, and we kind of just ping-pong back and forth off of each other, and we grow together. It's like holding hands and growing together. So, thank you so much for taking a couple moments out of your day. I really, really, really appreciate you. I'm going to dive right in, so a little bit of my backstory. I don't want to go too much into it. I can do that another day, but a quick backstory. Five years ago, I started photography, sort of just dabbled for the first couple of years. I started right when my firstborn was born. Dabbled for a couple of years, was working in the service industry pretty full-on during that time. My secondborn was born. This was in 2020. Secondborn was born, and I lost that job of 10 or 11 years, something like that, so I hit the fork in the road. We were living in Colorado. My partner and I, we decided, let's move to Florida. We're going to move to Florida. We didn't know anybody, and the plan was that I was going to grow my photography business, and he was going to be a stay-at-home dad. That first year, I grew my business from the ground up in Florida, and I had my best year yet. I almost crossed the six-figure line that first year. It's pretty crazy, and there's so much that I've learned in hindsight, like hindsight 2020. I want to share a little bit about my roadmap. Of course, it's going to look different for you. There's just a lot of things that are always at play, but I can kind of see what worked, what didn't work, and some things that I wish that I would have taken a little more seriously off the bat. I see now that if I would have implemented a couple of different things, then I probably could have grown even faster. Thank you so much. Where should I start? When I was first diving into photography, I started to get into podcasts, and this is really when my self-development, self-improvement work began. That's kind of what a business is. It's definitely like when you're an entrepreneur, you're growing along with your business, and at the rate which you can grow is the rate at which your business can grow. When I started eating up all these podcasts and self-improvement books, all this and that, it always came back to this theme of connecting with your why. Connect with your why. Connect with your why. Over and over again, I heard it. Sometimes I could really do that. It was really easy for me to connect with my why, and then sometimes I just really felt like I couldn't. I'm saying all of this because the first step to getting inquiries and having your business really, really work for you is to connect with your why. I always say this. I say ask yourself why, not just once or twice. Ask it three or four times to really get to the heart of why you want to do what you're wanting to do. With photography, this could be with any business, but with photography, it's like why do you want to get more inquiries? Why did you click that button on my poll? Why do you want to get more inquiries? Well, I want to get more inquiries because I want to have a business that's thriving, that I'm bringing business in. Well, why? Because I want to have a business. I want to work for myself. Why? Because I want to have flexibility. I want to have time freedom. I want to spend more time with my kids. Why? Well, I want to spend time with my kids because my kids are the most important part of my life. I don't want to have to send them to daycare every single day and me work a nine to five. I want to be with my kids. I want to be a present mom. I want to live my life. Well, why? Because I understand how fleeting life is, how one day it's here and the next day it couldn't be. It's so important to just live and live the life that you want right now. Okay, so now that I've asked myself why a bunch of times, I'm really getting to the heart of why. Why do you want to do this? Why are you pursuing this path? When you really start connecting with that why, when you are creating from that place, that's when you become magnetic. Where it's less about you going out to find customers or clients, they actually will start to come to you because that's how magnetism works. When you connect with your why and are creating from that place and putting things out into the world from that place, a lot of this is just going to come to you, which is kind of crazy. That's what I'm learning now. I'm seeing that now. If I would have gone back and really made it my number one priority to connect with my why and to water my soil as a woman, mind, body, and soul, and really be taking aligned action from that why, I would have grown my business much faster. Maybe it would look different right now, but everybody's journey is so different. Even to have the opportunity to even be talking about this now, well, everything needed to happen the way that it happened. Again, this is just a roadmap of what worked for me, but depending on how quickly you can connect with your why and take aligned action, your roadmap is going to look completely different. I just want to say that that's kind of the foundation, and that's what I would definitely, woman-to-woman, friend-to-friend, business owner-to-business owner, creative-to-creative, our responsibility is to connect with our heart and our why and create from that place. That's your gift. That's my gift. That's how there's enough room for everybody. I always hear like, oh, the industry is so oversaturated. When you connect with your why and are taking action, there's always enough room at the table. That's something I'm always constantly learning. That's the abundance mindset that I'm really trying to embody at this point in my business. Just wanted to start there. Thanks again. Let's get into what I did first when I first moved to Florida. Okay, so the first client I ever got in Florida actually happened when I was driving cross-country from Colorado to Florida. We hadn't even arrived in Florida yet. We were in the hotel. This is such a good omen. Now that I think about it, it was such a good omen. We were in the hotel. I was on a Facebook moms group, saw a post that somebody made that they were looking for a photographer. I responded to that post with a nice comment in a photo, and they ended up booking me. Facebook moms groups are so valuable. People are always on there looking for a service. Go on there, engage, and let people know that you offer a service. Even if that person doesn't book you, because a lot of times they won't, people still go on there, and they'll look in the little search bar, and they'll type in photographer or doula or dentist and see what past posts have been made so that they can look through recommendations. I do that a lot. So take your time. Go on there. Have some photos already ready that you just throw into those types of posts that are shared on Facebook moms groups. They're super easy, great way to get more inquiries. Second, model calls. Model calls, without a doubt, are the number one thing that got my business off of the ground here in Florida, without a doubt. It's how I got traction. It's how I got plugged into the community. I highly, highly recommend that you run model calls. They are an awesome way for you to start getting sessions in your portfolio that are a true replication of the work that you want to be creating. The model call is the space that you're creating where you get to have creative control. You get to say when the shoot is. You get to say what the people are wearing. You get to give them the framework and give them the vibe that you are looking to create. And this is the way that you call in the type of client that you are trying to call in. So model calls, absolutely. I'm going to give you guys the actual template or the actual post that I made in the Facebook group when I moved to Florida. And this is where I connected honestly with so many people. I was blown away with the response. So what I did here, I want to share it with you because I think that language is so, so important, the verbiage, the energy in which you're coming from. Don't go on there and put yourself in this powerless position where you're saying, hey, guys, I could really use some help. I'm trying to build a portfolio. Tap into the energy of your why and then go in there and make that post in that energy. So what I did, and I would make some tweaks now. It's been a few years since this post, but what I wrote was model call. I'm in search of some adventurous mamas to model for me. Must be open to being fully styled, going for boho vibes, must be down to cuddle your babes, okay with showing a little skin, nothing weird, I promise. Bonus, if you are active on social media, specifically Insta. So I know that there's all different ways to market your business. I've always been more drawn to the Instagram route. I'm just not very Facebook savvy. It doesn't really speak to me. We all are going to be drawn to different marketing avenues, streams. I like Instagram. I was specifically looking for people who were active on Instagram, people who I knew I was going to take photos of them while they were pregnant or on their family and that they were going to reshare it in their stories and give me a shout out. And I wanted that because I wanted to get my name out there, so I was really strategic about it. And it wasn't just about finding people who had followers. That wasn't it. I mean, you all know that there could be somebody who has 500 followers, and you look at their pictures, and they have 100 likes on it. And then you look at somebody who has 15K followers, and they have, you know, maybe 100 likes, but from people from all over the world. And, you know, I knew what I was looking for. I was looking for somebody who was already plugged into the community that was really going to be this, you know, this way for me to get tethered into the community. So I got a lot of response with those model calls, and I carefully went through every single one of them. And I just tried to follow my heart and pick people that I thought would be a really great fit for getting my feet wet here in Florida and really the style that, you know, I knew they would be down for the style of the client that I was trying to call in. Some of those people that I did as a model call are still booking me three years later, still referring me three years later. I mean, on the regular. I mean, absolutely on the regular. You're building these relationships with people that can last for years. So there's always this little bit of maybe pushback on the model call. Don't offer your services complimentary. Don't offer them for free. Your time is worth, you know, worth something. Don't give away your services for free, et cetera, et cetera. I completely, completely feel that. And I think that if you feel really, really strongly about that, absolutely do a model call and structure it a little differently. Include maybe five, ten images and then upsell the rest of the gallery. Or, you know, there's different ways to go about it. Don't just write off the model call. This is your space to creatively explore and connect with people and get your feet wet and get excited. And so, yes, the model call. The next thing, connecting with local businesses. The businesses in your community, those small mom-and-pop shops, those women-owned businesses, they are your friends. They're your friends. I like to think of them as my friends, even if they don't know who I am and don't know anything about me. I like to think that they're all these potential friends. Try to team up with them. See if you can work collaboratively together. Maybe you could do a giveaway on social media where they give away something that they're offering and you give away a complimentary photo session. These are just other ways to get plugged into the community. I ran a giveaway with the Jacksonville Moms Group. That one was a paid, that was something I actually paid to do. But, you know, I just felt right. I knew that they had a really big reach of moms in the community, and so I did that. I paid, and I think I got, like, a thousand new followers or something crazy on Instagram. I mean, it's priceless. It was just an invaluable experience. It was a step in the right direction. Sometimes you've got to pay to play. Think about that, too. Sometimes I was talking about the model call. Yeah, I did give away probably five or six shoots complimentary. I did do that. I might have even done more. I really was just following my heart and seeing what felt right. And, you know, my partner, Joe, he would say, don't give it away. You know, don't give it away. Don't pay to do a giveaway. I was following my heart. I knew that Jacksonville Mom had a big reach. I just energetically felt right to be doing these sessions complimentary. So always check in with your heart and see what feels right, and then kind of build again from that space, and it's going to look different for everybody. And then the last thing, the last thing, which is the most important part, and I'm really, really excited, the biggest takeaway is be a photographer. Be a photographer. Be a photographer. Identify as a photographer. This moment right here, right now, be a photographer and let people know that you are a photographer. A lot of times people will want more inquiries, and I'll go and I'll look on their Instagram page or their Facebook page, and I have no idea that they even do photography. There's nothing in there. There's no captions. There's nothing that would show me that they are a photographer. When you are at a fork in the road, well, I should say, when I look back in hindsight, me losing my job was the biggest needle-moving piece of my photography story because I had to become a photographer out of necessity. Prior to me losing my job, people would ask me what I did, and I would fumble around the question. I would feel so uncomfortable. Joe, my partner, would chime in and say, she's a photographer, and I would cringe. I would just, I would feel so like, oh, like creepy-crawly under my skin. I was embarrassed. I didn't want to share anything on Instagram or Facebook or anything. I didn't want to even allude to the idea that I was trying to turn my photography hobby into a business and a profession. I was embarrassed, and thank God that I lost my job and was forced to step into the photographer identity because that is how you make it happen. When you decide that, no, I am a photographer. This is what I offer, and this is what I'm doing, and this is where I'm going, and this is my why, and I'm creating from this place, and it feels good, and it's easy and fun. You're here for it, and you're excited, and other people are going to be excited, and other people are going to want to support you. But you need to decide that you're a photographer. You need to share with people. You need to let people know. Again, I just want to say that when I started, I was so, I mean, I was all of a sudden worried about what ex-boyfriends would think of me sharing a family photo that I took, like wondering if they would think I was lame. I mean, people that I dated years prior. It's just so funny. The mental resistance that you're going to get when you're trying to put yourself out there is just incredible. Your brain is so good. Your mind is like so, your ego is so good at trying to protect you and keep you in this safe space where you're not growing, and I promise you that everything, all of your dreams are on the other side of that line, like the other side of just making the decision to shift your identity and be brave and put yourself out there. So put yourself out there. Let people know you're a photographer. And full circle, every morning, connect with that desire, what you want and why you want it, and create from that place, and be excited, and know that people are rooting you on. I mean, they're rooting you on, and they want to see you succeed, and that was one thing I had to learn is that even when people weren't cheerleading me along, like I would post photos on Instagram, and I would get eight likes, and I would feel like a total loser, and again, thank God that I kept going because my life has changed so much from the inside out now, and I'm going even bigger places and growing even more, and I'm so excited to share. So connect with your why. Start getting plugged into the community more and more and more and more and more, like model calls, responding to those Facebook posts when people are looking for a photographer, letting people know that you are a photographer. Start viewing the local businesses in your community as friendships that are just ready to blossom, and yeah, have fun. Become a photographer. Have fun, and I just love you guys so much. I want to see you thrive. I want to see you calling in more of these ideal clients to you. I want to see you grow. I want us to grow together. Let's hold hands and grow. Have a great day. Thank you so much.