← Book More Photography Clients Podcast | Photography Business, Photography Leads, Marketing
Book More Photography Clients Podcast | Photography Business, Photography Leads, Marketing
4 Ways to Stop Blending in With Every Photographer
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Welcome to the Book More Clients Photography Podcast. You can stop spending hours on Google and YouTube because you just found your number one resource for growing a profitable and sustainable photography business. Hi, I'm Brooke Jefferson. I'm a believer wife, mama to two and Oklahoma family photographer. I left the classroom in 2018 to pursue my photography career full time. Now I'm here to help you do the same. In this podcast we're covering the most asked about topics including pricing, marketing, client experience and all things systems and workflows. You won't find any fluff or BS here. Just tried and true strategy. Are you ready? Grab your kids some snacks and charge those camera batteries. It's time to jump in. Hey everyone. Welcome back to the podcast. Today we're talking about something I see all the time in the photography industry. And honestly, it's one of the biggest things holding you back from booking your dream clients. It's this blending in with every other photographer out there. And I get it. When you're scrolling Instagram or you're looking at other photographers websites, it's easy to think, well everyone else is doing it this way so I should too. But here's the problem. When you look and you sound and you market yourself exactly like everyone else, potential clients have no reason to choose you specifically. You just kind of blend in with the thousands of photographers out there and then you say things like it's really saturated in my area or I just cannot seem to get any leads or clients. So today I'm sharing four specific ways you can stop blending in and start standing out as the photographer your ideal clients are looking for. So let's dive in. The first way that you can stand out from other photographers and just going to say it is that I can tell when a photographer is using chat GPT or some kind of AI service to write all their captions and their website copy and so can your potential clients. They can smell that from a mile away. Now before you think I'm completely anti Chat GPT and you should know that I'm not. I'm very much a ChatGPT champion. I think it can be helpful. However, I don't think that you can just take everything it writes for you and throw it into your content by making it your captions or your website copy or your email copy where you without fluffing it up and making it your own. That's the difference. It is just. It's too obvious now everything looks like it was written by Chat GPT and so we really need to be careful and go back to our imagination that we had as kids and tap into that creative side of our brain. I know it doesn't come natural to most of you. I get that, I really do. But we have to at least put our spin on things and try to write it out and then take it to Chat GPT. And then we need to edit it one more time. Your voice is the way you talk. It's the stories that you tell. It's the little quirks and the phrases that make you you. And when everything sounds like it is written by Chat GPT, this robot, you're going to lose that connection with your audience. It's just going to sound me. It's just going to sound bland. It's going to sound like everybody else. So I want you to focus more on what can you. Can you write your captions like you talk? Can you write an email the way you talk? Instead of taking everything to Chat GPT, can you try maybe saying it out loud and recording it on your phone and then telling Chat GPT just to polish it up and sound like you? Your ideal clients want to work with a real human, not Chat GPT. They want to know what you're like. They want to know your interest. They want to know how you think and what your values and opinions are. And the only way they can know that is if you are actually the one writing the content and also showing up and using your voice. So here's my challenge. Start writing like you talk. Imagine you're sitting across from your ideal client at a coffee shop or wherever your happy place is, and you are telling them about your business or they are telling you about their experience with you. That's the tone you want to write with. It doesn't have to be perfect. It doesn't need to be poetic. It doesn't need to be polished. It just needs to be you, the real you. So if you do use Chat GPT for help, use it as a starting point. Use it to brainstorm or use it to polish it up after you've already written it. But be sure to add your personality, tell real stories and make it human. So that's the first thing, okay. Start utilizing your voice and the way you talk. And the way you write. The second way is to stop. Or the second way to stop blending in. Sorry, is. Is to get crystal clear on your brand. And I don't just mean picking some pretty colors in a nice font and creating a logo that is part of it. But I'm talking about knowing who you are as a photographer, who you Are as a CEO of a business, what you stand for and who you're actually trying to attract. If you don't know those four things, you don't have a brand, you don't have a solid brand. So if you need to pause me and you're in a place where you can take some notes, do it right now. Who you are as a photographer, who you are as a CEO of your business, what you stand for and who you're trying to attract. Here's what I see happen all the time. Photographers trying to appeal to anybody and everybody. They can shoot anything and everything. Their mini sessions are for the dog, the grandparents, they're for wedding couples. They're for just because. And that causes so much confusion. And again, it makes you blend in with everybody else because you don't become known for anything. You're just kind of a. She just kind of does a little bit of everything. And so you're not actually speaking to anyone specifically. Okay? But when you get specific about your brand and you know your style, your values, the type of experience you create, the type of clients you love working with now, you become memorable and you're able to stay top of mind for people. You become the obvious choice for your ideal client. Think about that. Don't you want to be the obvious choice? Right, for what you do? Of course you do. I do. I want to be the obvious choice. So ask yourself, what's my photography style? And I don't just mean light and airy. I mean, what makes your images and your method different than everybody else? This is something that we dive very, very deep into in the fully booked method. So that's something to think about. If you really need hand holding through this, then I have a whole week that is dedicated to diving into all of this. What experience do I want my clients to have? And not just step one, step two, step three, I mean, what's the true experience like? What do you want them to have emotionally, physically? What is the whole experience, top to bottom? What do I want to be known for? This one's a really good one. If you want to be the obvious choice, you've got to be known for something. So what is that going to be? And then who is my dream client and how specific can I get about them? What do they care about, what do they need, what are their pain points, how can I help them, etc. Etc. When you can answer these questions clearly, then your marketing will become so much easier. That's the number one thing I hear when I teach people my methods. Is that they are literally like, oh my gosh, this makes so much more sense. Like now I don't feel like I'm floundering in my marketing. I actually know who I am talking to and it makes creating content so much easier. So be something specific to the right people. And yes, this also, this whole idea of getting clear on your brand, it does include the visual side as well. So your colors, your fonts, the way your profiles look, the way your website is designed, all of that should feel cohesive and intentional, not thrown together or constantly changing because you saw another photographer do something different. Now you think you need to do it. It's being very intentional and keeping your visual brand in alignment with the deeper aspects of who you are and what you want your business to stand for. Consistency in your brand is going to build trust. And what does trust get you? It gets you clients. Number three. This one is huge. And it's something a lot of photographers don't even think about. You cannot build a sustainable business by copying someone else's packages and pricing. It just does not work. What works for another photographer might be completely wrong for you because you have different goals, you have a different lifestyle, you live somewhere completely different than they do and you don't even have the same ideal client. So we can't just pop over and see what our competition is doing and then take their pricing as our own. We cannot do that because we have no idea if that even aligns with our lifestyle, our goals, etc. So I see photographers who are burned out because they're offering packages that don't actually support the life they want to live and it doesn't support that profit goal that they set for themselves. Maybe they're shooting 40 weddings a year because that's what they think they're supposed to do. Because that's what successful full time wedding photographers do. But they're exhausted and they're resentful. Or they might be pricing themselves too low because they're scared to charge more. So they're working way too hard for way too little. And this is the reality of just throwing some packages and pricing together. But here's the thing, your pricing and your packages, they should be designed around your life and your goals and your ideal client. So think about, you know, what are your goals and let that drive you to the pricing that you want to charge. I have a free pricing for profit formula. It's a guide. Plus there is a training. And that training not only talks about like how to find your package pricing, like your starting price but it also goes into, like, how do you pay yourself? And all those things. And so you guys can definitely check that out. I'll have that in the show notes of this episode, but you can also find it on my website, brookejefferson.com/four-photographers so that should be on there as well. When you create offers that are aligned with your life and your ideal client, you'll stop blending in because you're not just doing what everybody else is doing. You're doing what makes sense for you and you're able to put your spin on it. That confidence and clarity is going to come through in your marketing. When you are fully 100% confident in your pricing and your packages, that's gonna relate and come out in your marketing so much quicker. Okay, last but certainly not least, this one is going to make you the most uncomfortable. So that is my fair warning to you. But it is one of the most powerful ways to set yourself apart. Are you ready? You need to show your face. Period. The end. A lot of photographers are more comfortable behind the camera than in front of it. But here's the reality. People hire people. They don't hire a camera, they don't hire a portfolio. They hire a photographer, which is you. And if they never see your face or they never learn anything about you, or they never get a sense of who you are as a person, they're way less likely to feel connected enough to actually book you. Right? Why would they, why, why would they invest in you if they have no idea who you are? We are so far gone from the days where people look up some pictures and they're like, oh, you take really good pictures. Yeah, let me pay you now. They're like, okay, yeah, all these photographers, they take good pictures. But who do I relate to the most? So think about accounts that you follow on Instagram or the businesses that you feel most connected to. I'm willing to bet that you see their face. They share behind the scenes, they talk on stories, they let you into their world a little bit. That's what builds the know like, trust factor and that's what turns a follower into a client. Now, again, hear me out. I'm not saying that you need to be posting selfies every day or doing TikTok dances. And by the way, please don't, please don't do that. Don't do that. But you do need to let people see the human behind the business. So share behind the scenes photos and videos from your sessions. Show us what it looks like to edit. Show us what it's like to pack your camera bag. Show us what it's like at home. When you're not photographing, what can you share with us? Post a photo of yourself on your website's about page. Do introduction. Post talk on your Instagram stories. Don't be afraid to share more about your life and your business and why you do what you do. When people can see you and connect with you as a real person, you're no longer just another photographer in the sea of options. You become someone that they begin to not only like and feel like they know, but now they trust you and they get excited about investing their hard earned money and into hiring you as their photographer. And that is the goal. So there you have it. 4 Ways to Stop blending in with every other photographer out there. And this is really going to help, you know, nip the saturation myth in the butt. Okay, so that. That's what it is, right? This is it. This is your roadmap to getting out, of blending in and really standing out and seeing a huge difference in 2026 than you did in 2025. So stop using Chad to write all of your content and let your real voice come through. Get clear on your brand so you're not trying to be everything to everyone. Create packages and pricing that actually support your life and attract your ideal clients and show your face so people can begin to connect with you and trust you. When you do these things, you won't just stand out, but you will attract the ideal clients who are the perfect fit for you. And that's when business gets really fun and you're going to see your bookings take off. All right, I will catch you. Same place, same time. On the next episode. Sam.