Practicing for business onboard ship

As many of you know, I’m serving my country in the US Navy. I’m currently deployed and still practicing my photography. One of my photography goals at the beginning of cruise was to learn more about the business side of photography.

Being a photographer automatically makes you a businessperson. Dealing with clients, accounting, negotiating, marketing, etc. are all part of being a good photographer. From what I have learned you are a businessperson first and an artist second. Being a good businessperson is key to running a successful photography business.

When many of the sailor here found out that I “take nice pictures”, everybody wanted there picture taken. So, I thought about it and it was a great opportunity to learn to deal with clients. It’s kind of different though because a lot of the work is Navy related, so I couldn’t charge for my services. If I did charge, I would probably lose out on a learning experience because they could always get the ship’s photographers to do the work for them. Which I have been told that I’m a lot better than the ship’s photographers.

I try to treat the sailors as if they were paying customers. I talk to them about what they want. I shoot in a location that they choose. Sometimes they ask me what I suggest. I also shoot re-enlistment for some sailors. I’ve even shot sailors at work as you see in the above photo. The last re-enlistment I did, the sailor requested me over the ship’s photographers. After the photo is done, I offer them a CD with low-resolution images on it. They are able to email these photos to there loved ones and I have a satisfied customer. Satisfied customers equal business and word of mouth when I return from this deployment. Navy related projects such as posters, slideshow, etc. shows my talent and create potential clients.

I include contact info through metadata. And I also leave a word document on every CD with my info contact info. When I get home I should have a few clients just from my work being displayed throughout the ship. Word of mouth is a powerful marketing tool!

This entry was posted on 17. May 2010 at 19:14 and is filed under Navy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

| Print