I was supposed to go to Lowe's.

My husband and I were out running errands and I remembered that Grouse House an antique and vintage home goods warehouse that an interior design client had been telling me about for weeks was having a sale. So I made an executive decision that a Saturday at a gorgeous warehouse full of vintage European furniture sounded a lot better than a Saturday looking at plastic planters under fluorescent lighting.

I did not expect to spend a thousand dollars. I also did not expect to walk out with a collaboration in the works, a lunch date on the calendar, and a Matriarch session booked.

But that's what happened. And in this episode I'm walking you through the whole thing the DMs, the content, the collab pitch that happened mid-candle-order because I think the way it unfolded is more useful to you than any strategy I could draw up on a whiteboard.

I also want to talk about something my girl Laura Stansberry brought up in my Posers membership when I shared this story, because she named a pattern that I know a lot of you are stuck in too, where you try to do a collaboration, end up giving away a free session, get one post out of it, and never hear from them again.

That's not a collaboration. And by the end of this episode you'll know exactly what the difference is.

Here's what we're getting into:

Why I've always treated every room I walk into as a room full of my next clients and how that mindset was born when I was shooting weddings
The behind-the-scenes content habit that has done more for my personal brand than any portfolio post ever has
What actually happened at Grouse House and why the alignment between our businesses made everything easy
The real DMs including the part where I pitched a collaboration in the same message where I was ordering a candle
How the Matriarch session got booked without a single sales conversation
The difference between a collaboration and an influencer deal (this one is important)
A 7-step playbook you can take and use in your own market today

This is one of those episodes where the story is the strategy. I hope it makes you want to get your boots on the ground.

Timestamps:
00:00 Podcast Intro
00:42 What Collaboration Means
03:14 Weddings As Client Rooms
05:08 Working The Room
07:27 Warehouse Sale Story
12:25 Content That Builds Trust
21:21 DMs And The Soft Pitch
24:53 Avoiding Freebie Traps
28:16 Collab Is Access Exchange
31:15 Seven Step Playbook
38:17 Wrap Up And Call To Action
40:31 Outro And Reviews

🔗 Connect with Jodi:
📸 Website: https://www.j-annephotography.com
📷 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/j.annephotography

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I built this business as a single mom of three boys with no fallback plan and no safety net. Failure genuinely was not an option.

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