Recorded: Welcome to The ReWork with Allison Tyler Jones, a podcast dedicated to inspiring portrait photographers to uniquely brand, profitably price, and confidently sell their best work. Allison has been doing just that for the last 15 years and she’s proven that it’s possible to create unforgettable art and run a portrait business that supports your family and your dreams. All it takes is a little rework. Episodes will include interviews with experts from in and outside of the photo industry, mini-workshops, and behind the scenes secrets that Allison uses in her portrait studio every single day. She will challenge your thinking and inspire your confidence to create a profitable, sustainable portrait business you love through continually refining and reworking your business. Let’s do the rework.
Allison Tyler Jones: We’ve all had them and we all hate them. Painful conversations with clients. So what to do? How to avoid? I think many of us might try to avoid painful conversations by simply not having them. Don’t even ever get on the phone, just do everything by text and email. Some of us might try to get out ahead of painful conversations by putting one more paragraph in an already too long contract that probably doesn’t really even need to be there in the first place. If we’re really smart, we use these painful lessons and create processes in our business. Processes that educate our clients early and often and allow us to do our very best work in the very best way possible. Today’s guest, Kathryn Langsford from Photos By Kathryn in Vancouver, Canada is joining me in the podcast studio to discuss all things pain, policies, and processes, and I can’t wait for you to hear it all. Let’s do it.
Allison Tyler Jones: Kathryn, welcome to The ReWork.
Kathryn Langsford: Hello.
Allison Tyler Jones: I’m so glad that you’re here.
Kathryn Langsford: Love being here with you.
Allison Tyler Jones: Well, I love you. We are in the middle of the insane, the insanity that is the holiday season when we’re recording this. Not sure exactly when this is going to be listened to but right now, we are in the thick of it, and one of the things that you and I probably spend most of our time talking about other than our children and our lives is how we can make the process of our business better, how we can always refine it. You always talk about polishing the diamond, just continually making it better, which I love. And so I wanted to chat today about policies, principles, and processes that we developed in our business and those three words in particular and how those really have developed out of another P called pain. Yes, so let us hark back 20 some years when you were a younger photographer, when we both were starting our businesses. What were some of the pain points for you. You hear so many people talk about pain points for clients and solving them, but as business owners, what were some of those early pain points when you were starting your business?
Kathryn Langsford: Let’s see. Really early on, way back. I mean I started as a film photographer in 1999. So I learned from some big mistakes I made because I basically had no business training or photography training for that matter. I was just kind of figuring stuff out. So one big one was I had a lot of … Not a lot, but I had a fair amount of no-shows for sessions, and I realized that that was greatly decreased when I had people pay when they booked. I mean it never even occurred to me. I just put it on the calendar and showed up and waited for them, so learning really early on that if people don’t have any kind of investment in the appointment, then it’s not as important to them. So that was very early.
Kathryn Langsford: I think another really early one was I used to show people … I mean honestly, I was so green and just didn’t know anything about anything. I used to show people the contact sheets and for those who have never worked with film, that’s like showing like every frame you shot. So I would circle my favorites but it didn’t matter because what they did was they looked at all the other ones that weren’t circled and were just really caught up in the bad photos. Which didn’t make a lot of sense to me. I was like, “But these are the good ones.” And it really worked against me obviously for obvious reasons but like I said, I was young and knew nothing.
Kathryn Langsford: So then I made a process. My process was that I was going to print my chosen photos and show them … I used to show them paper proofs so the paper proofs were only the good ones. But that didn’t come to me before the pain, the pain of clients just getting lost in how many bad ones they saw and not even being able to appreciate the good ones. Not to mention the fact they’re looking at photos that are like an inch by an inch and a half big on a contact sheet. Like that makes sense to me but of course it doesn’t make sense to them.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. I love that.
Kathryn Langsford: So just learning along the way, yeah. Those are a couple of early examples.
Allison Tyler Jones: Well and I think when we … I think back to when I had my scrapbooking store, it was a similar situation. We would have these classes and we realized really quickly, if somebody didn’t pay for a class, they generally weren’t showing up for it. But I was still having to pay the teacher and we were still having to have the lights on and have the kits made and all of that kind of stuff. So I actually had learned that from a previous business that no, we will be having the session fee and it will be paid before anybody comes and I think most people know that.
Kathryn Langsford: I think I had in mind that, “Oh, I shouldn’t ask someone to pay for something before they have received it.” Like I just sort of saw it as I don’t want to be unfair to my clients, but really, it’s just that that’s how business is. You don’t really commission someone’s time without giving them an investment of some sort.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right, and I think this is … Some people listening might say, “Okay, this is way too basic. I totally charge a session fee, so I don’t really need to listen to this.” But really, when we think back to that, that’s just a metaphor for everything in business, right? So when we start, we love photography, we want to create beautiful images for clients, we want to create amazing artwork and then we would like to be paid for that obviously because we’d like to support our families, and so you wade into those waters just like you’re a little lamb to the slaughter basically. You’re like excited but you don’t realize that there’s going to be … There are going to be things that come up that you have to be very, very clear about ahead of time.
Allison Tyler Jones: So when you get burned the first time, the first time that somebody didn’t show up for a session or somebody said, “I want to see all of the other images that you’ve shot,” because when I started my portrait studio, I started it after digital and I still very early on, that was one of the most common questions people asked is, “Well are these all the images?” And then I would talk to people that would say, “Oh no, you need to renumber your stuff so that they don’t see that there’s spaces between the numbers, that they think that’s the only thing you shot,” and I’m like, “No, I’m not doing that.” I’ll just tell them, “Yeah, these are the best ones, whatever.”
Allison Tyler Jones: So anyway, so you have something that comes up that is not to your liking that you realize, “Wow, they didn’t show up, I didn’t get paid, or this just completely went south.” And so I don’t know about you, you’re nicer than me, so you might have gotten sad, but I usually would get mad. And then I would think, “I need to make a policy about this.”
Kathryn Langsford: Uh-huh (affirmative). Yeah, for sure.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right? And this is where I think many photographers come up with these 10-page contracts, initial here that you will not wear rugby stripes on the bottom half of your body, initial here that if your kid’s a brat it’s not my fault the pictures don’t turn out, et cetera. There’s a lot of those policies. But I found that, especially with you and I, the talks that we’ve had, is I think we always like to go back to that principle, like what do we really want? We really want our client to feel totally taken care of and spoiled and in order for that to happen, we have to have rules for everybody because if we’re running around shooting sessions on spec and not getting paid for it for these 25 people, we can’t spoil this one amazing, great client, right? So then rather than a policy, I think you and I have really worked on process and processes. So thoughts about that? Like where do you feel like that you … Somewhere along the line, you developed a process to run your clients through and how did that evolve?
Kathryn Langsford: It evolved through making a huge number of mistakes. Not doing things right led me to make changes and do things differently. I think in some cases it was to do with leaving too much up to the client and not being the expert. So sitting with them and letting them run the sales meeting. Letting them tell me, or asking them, “So what do you want? What do you like?” Instead of way before then, talking to them about, “Let’s talk about your walls. Let’s talk about what you think about art on the walls. Let’s look at some sizes.” Like guiding them. It wasn’t like that, and so sometimes that would work, sometimes I would luck out and that would work, and then sometimes it would completely burn down, more often than not. Because we hadn’t even talked about that when we got in that room.
Kathryn Langsford: So that’s where a lot of my mistakes were, in the sales room, and that’s where a lot of my processes came from. My processes of needing to have a fine art minimum spend before I would release digital files, before I would sell holiday cards, before I would sell anything I frame.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay, so talk about that. Talk about how you came to that, because in the early days, you decided you did need to charge a session fee and that was like … What was it generally when you first started?
Kathryn Langsford: Oh, early, early, like $300.00.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay, which 22 years ago, that’s a pretty high session.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. Yeah, so I mean I think I started even less than that but every time the phone rang I’d [inaudible 00:09:48] because I wanted … To me, I thought $300.00 would be a good place to land. So I just kept quoting higher, higher, higher until I landed at $300.00 and then that was my session fee for I don’t know, a year or two. Every time I felt like I needed to go up, I would just psych myself up and quote the next person who called more.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay, love that. All right, so you had a session fee, and that was just the session, right?
Kathryn Langsford: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah, it was just the session and no product, until –
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay, so then tell me what caused you to evolve into that next process or policy?
Kathryn Langsford: Right. Yeah. Well what caused me to evolve was it was probably 10 years into my business and I started to notice a stack of client files that were sitting there waiting for view and order meetings. So I’ve done the sessions and I just couldn’t get people to come in and order, which didn’t make any sense to me. Like why would you have a portrait session if you don’t want any work created? But that’s what was happening. So I actually had a conversation with another photographer and she was doing things a little differently and including a product credit, so I just like that day started. I actually framed it as a promotion. I sent out a big email blast and I said I’m cutting my session fee in half, but what I did was I cut my session fee in half and I added a $900.00 product credit.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay.
Kathryn Langsford: So that was how I rolled it out and that problem didn’t happen anymore. Because people had already … I mean there are times when people lag on their view and order, but it’s very unusual now.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. Because they’ve got $1,000.00 in that they need to spend.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. They’ve already decided, we’re buying product. Part of it is already paid for, so let’s make this happen.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay. I love that.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: My experience was similar but a little bit different. What I found, the reason I introduced a product credit, because I was doing … I think my session fee was like $195.00 or something like that, and I realized that like October, November, December was just insane. And everybody was just waiting until the last possible minute and then you just had people that only wanted cards or whatever and then I also had great people that wanted to do wall art and I was wanting to spend time with them but I was shoving off people that were spending $10,000.00 on wall art doing the twelfth revision on somebody’s holiday card that they were only buying holiday cards and I realized this is doing a huge disservice to my very best clients.
Allison Tyler Jones: And so what I did, and it was so scary, is I introduced a product credit for November, December, it was $1,200.00, and then the session fee was like $200.00 and then you had a product credit of $1,000.00 or whatever, something like that. And I was terrified. But what happened is that made people that were price-sensitive book earlier, because they didn’t want … They always would have spent that amount of money anyway, but they just didn’t want to spend it upfront. So it shoved them earlier to the year and then over time, they realized, “Oh, I am going to spend that so I might as well,” and then eventually we just rolled it out for the rest of the year because I realized our break-even, we couldn’t do a session, we couldn’t roll forward with our consult, with a session, with a view and order, and getting all of that ready for less than $1,200.00. It just wasn’t feasible for the business.
Allison Tyler Jones: So that became a policy you could say or a process and it also became a weeding and I’m sure this was the same for you, that people would be like, “Oh, I was only thinking I would spend like $500.00 on portraits,” and just say, “You know what? There are a lot of really talented photographers that could probably do that for you. For us, we specialize in finished product and wall art, so totally understand.” But that was scary. That was really scary.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah, it was scary, but there’s been so many scary moments. I mean that’s how a business is grown.
Allison Tyler Jones: It never gets not scary.
Kathryn Langsford: No. Jumping off one cliff after another. I remember the first few years felt like I was jumping off a succession of cliffs. Like I just … It was like, “Oh, another scary thing. I’m just going to do it. Oh, another scary thing. I’m just going to do it.” And lots of mistakes and hopefully learning from those mistakes, but yeah, that’s how a business is built and that’s how a framework, I don’t want to call them policies, I think we should call them processes, don’t you?
Allison Tyler Jones: [inaudible 00:13:58]. I think there is both. I know we talked about that, that I don’t really like the word policy because I hate that when I’m trying to get something –
Kathryn Langsford: It feels like a rule. It feels like a rule.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah, and I hate rules of all kinds. So I don’t really like that. But there does have to be a structure by which you conduct business, and you and I have very similar business models. So our business structure is that we specialize in finished wall art, custom designed albums. You have a hybrid business in that you also sell digital files, printable digital files, I do not, and so I think that’s interesting for the listeners to hear, and we both have very successful businesses. So you putting that minimum fine art spend into place, that also was kind of a speed bump for people to have access to digital files, yes?
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. I definitely in the sales room was hearing conversations about, “Well, if we buy one more, then we can buy the digitals. If we get to this much, we can buy the digitals.” And I didn’t love that. I wanted people to have what was perfect for them. I wanted them to have in mind that this was a service that they were going to … They were going to receive my help in having fine art created and I just didn’t want that to be interrupted by here’s the threshold and we’re not going to go any further.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right, where they just get focused on that.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. And so how did you overcome that? Like what process or policy did you put in place for that?
Kathryn Langsford: I asked myself, “Okay, what is the minimum amount of work that I am okay with creating and would feel fine about?” If people were to just buy one piece with me that I felt totally okay about creating, where’s the spend for that? And that’s how I came to the threshold number and then beyond that, they need to pay for the digital files, and the same applies for if they want holiday cards, and I also don’t sell anything unframed technically unless it’s a copy of a framed piece.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay, so if I came to you and I’m your client and we’re having this initial phone call. I’m saying, “Okay, so Kathryn, I’d love for you to photograph my family. How much is it? What do you charge?” Assuming that you’ve already talked to me about how great my kids are and how much I love my husband and all the things … Whatever, what are you telling your client? Like how are you rolling that out as far as what that [inaudible 00:16:13] –
Kathryn Langsford: So if this is our first conversation, I’m going to tell them, “My session fee is $1,500.00, $900.00 of that is product credit. Part of what we do is a pre-session consultation where we talk really specifically about your home and your walls and the art that you’re interested in,” and out of that meeting comes a very clear quote. So I like to be transparent about cost of fine art, so the $900.00 product credit goes toward that, but I wouldn’t say that’s an all-in price. So some people are like, “Yeah yeah, sounds goods, okay, let’s meet.” Other people want to drill that down. “Okay, what can I get for $900.00?”
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah, what can I get for $900.00?
Kathryn Langsford: So to be honest, for $900.00, you could get one framed 8×10. Nobody comes to me for one framed 8×10.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. It’s overkill.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah, exactly, and it’s not usually what they’re hoping for.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. So if I wanted to get … Like I want a bigger portrait of my family, I think that’s going to be my main one, probably in a … Like maybe over my fireplace, maybe over a sofa in my living room, and then I really do … Like my kids are at such cute ages, I really do want to do either like a little gallery somewhere else or some kind of an album, but can I get the digital files?
Kathryn Langsford: If we’re doing that kind of wall work as well as an album, then you would qualify to be able to buy the digital files.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay. [inaudible 00:17:31]. Okay. So you have all those policies or you have those speed bumps I guess … That’s probably not a good word for it but … Go ahead.
Kathryn Langsford: Sorry, I should add. When people ask about the digital files, I do talk about that a little more. Like what’s important to you about having the digital files? Most people purchase them because they want to catalog them, have them in their family archives. Is that what’s important to you? Like I try to get a sense of what is the reason behind wanting the digital files? If they’re wanting them so they can print work and send [inaudible 00:18:03] and do this and do that, then we may need to talk a little more about the specifics. Like they don’t print very large. That’s when I would have the conversation of specializing in finished fine art, and what [inaudible 00:18:13] in finished fine art, what finished fine art looks like and how it’s delivered and the difference between … Maybe not the difference between, but just the specifics of what services.
Allison Tyler Jones: Well, and I think what’s important about what you’re saying and what we both based our business on is that principle, which the principle is our highest and best use as artists and photographers is beautiful, fine art for a client’s home or documenting in a custom-designed album. That’s really what we want to do, and not just what we want to do, but really we honestly to our core feel like that is absolutely the best use of our talent. And so we want to guide our clients to what we feel is the best use of our talent and that obviously like any business that comes with a price tag but it’s not we don’t want them to buy the digital files because we don’t want them to go print the things themselves so we don’t get the money. It’s like no, you know that we haven’t served the client to the full extent of our ability because they’re only getting a quarter of the work done. Then they have to go away and try to figure that out and manage it and it’s just not going to be great. So it’s not a good luxury service.
Allison Tyler Jones: So really why you’re selling digital files is for that exact reason which is that family archive, it’s just an add-on. They just want them, they just want to have them, and they want to have them –
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. And usually, that’s exactly what … It’s almost an afterthought. It’s just like they’ve ordered all their wall art and then, “Oh yeah, let’s get that.” When I hear an initial conversation that is sort of centering around digital files, I make sure and go into a lot of detail about what the services and what it is that they’d like and what I can do for them and make sure that I’m a good fit for them.
Kathryn Langsford: The other [inaudible 00:19:51] is if they’re only wanting one or two wall pieces, that’s all I’m going to shoot. So they won’t have a big, robust collection of digital files in addition to that one or two pieces they put on the wall. And that’s part of our conversation too. Not to steer them away from digital files, but just to make it really clear as to how I preplan and set the agenda for their session. It’s based on what’s perfect for their home and if that’s just one awesome piece for this one spot, then that’s all we’re shooting.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. And that is such a foreign concept to our industry. Anybody that’s listening to this that is not in our industry might be like, “Okay, why are they talking about baby steps? Why are they talking about that you only do the thing that you’re getting paid for? Like isn’t that just how business is run?” But in our industry, it isn’t. There’s a lot of just like, “Let’s do everything. Let’s shoot everything that you want, and then stand back and let you just cherry pick it.” And you can’t be fully creative in that way I don’t think.
Kathryn Langsford: Well let’s face it. That was another pain point that led to process. Because I did use to operate like that. I did use to just shoot my heart out, just get the best I could get of every combination and the child in this outfit and that outfit and this look and that look, knowing that if I had enough great stuff, they would buy a lot. I mean that is how I thought about it. But then many, many times was burned because little did I know, they weren’t planning on buying more than one or two pieces or they weren’t planning on spending more than x. Because I never discussed that with them.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right.
Kathryn Langsford: So when the pre-session consult became a nonnegotiable part of my process, that all changed. I got a lot more information from my clients upfront. Some of this stuff are points that they hadn’t even considered themselves. How much do we want to spend? Where do we want to hang this work? I have no idea. We’ll just see how it comes up and we’ll decide.
Allison Tyler Jones: Exactly.
Kathryn Langsford: So when we flip that process and have them say, “I’m going to help you with that right up front because I want you to know exactly where you’re hanging things, I want you to know exactly what the clothing should be. I want you to know exactly what everything’s going to cost.” And nobody really pushes back against that unless they’re an older client, which is my main pain point at this time in my career. Just people that have been pre-trained to all the bad –
Allison Tyler Jones: All of your bad habits.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: And that’s true. When you and I met the second time, we did a book together a long, long time ago but we hadn’t actually really met, but where we picked up a few years ago is you had been doing consultations and then you had kind of slid back into let’s just send a gallery, an online gallery.
Kathryn Langsford: Oh no, I’ve been doing in-person sales.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yes.
Kathryn Langsford: And then I went to –
Allison Tyler Jones: Consultation.
Kathryn Langsford: No, I never did a consultation. I was doing in-person sales but repeatedly I was hearing from people, “I can’t decide this right now. This is too much. I can’t make this decision. I need time.” And so what I started doing was sending people an online gallery three days before so they could think about it and look at them a million times and then come in with their favorites which of course I mean they whittled it down to like three small gift prints by the time they got in the studio.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right, because it’s too scary to try to do it. Yeah, so that’s a good example of, “Okay, you had a pain point of people not being able to decide and then you actually made a policy or a process that made it worse.”
Kathryn Langsford: Made it worse. Made it worse.
Allison Tyler Jones: That was a mistake.
Kathryn Langsford: Made it worse. It took my service out, it left them at home in their living room in front of their computer by themselves. It made everything worse, it wasn’t good.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. And the result of that was obviously it wasn’t giving you the sales you needed to have a sustainable business, but you were also doing a ton of work for that non-sales and really not serving the client to the best because what happened is they got in there and just went like we all do with online shopping. The online shopping is a reductive process. So you look at everything and you go and you’re like, “I love that skirt. I love those boots. I love that belt. I love the …” And you put it all in your cart and you’re kind of thinking about the outfit but not really. You just like all those pieces, right? And then the total comes up and it’s $7,000.00 and you’re like, “Whoa whoa whoa whoa.” And then you just start remove, remove, remove, that little trash can starts getting hit again and again. And then you end up with like a belt, a skirt, a T-shirt, and then like maybe a pair of boots, but do they even go together? You don’t really know, but oh well, I’ll just get that.
Allison Tyler Jones: Whereas if you’re in that clothing store or that clothing boutique and you walk in there and you’ve got somebody that looks great head to toe and she finds out that, “Oh, we’re going to your high school reunion,” or it’s Christmas or whatever, and she’s going to dress you head to toe for your body type, for the type of fashion that you like, for how you live, for, “Oh, you’re going to be shooting kids and you’re going to be on the ground? Well here are these great leather-looking leggings. Here are these boots that look really cool but they’re still super comfortable. Here’s your cashmere tunic, like what you’re wearing right now.”
Allison Tyler Jones: And then it puts those outfits together for you. Then it’s $7,000.00, but you are standing over at the counter, looking at all those outfits. She’s walked you through that whole process and you can pick it apart but you don’t want to because it’s an entire [inaudible 00:25:00] and it’s perfect beginning to end and so then you’re just going to be like, “Well that was more than I wanted to spend,” but yes. Or take off one outfit, I don’t need that outfit for the next Christmas Eve party, I’ll wear the jeans I already have or whatever. So you can adjust it at that point but there’s no surprise in that because they’ve quoted you all along the way, you can see how much things are and that you have this expert that’s walked you through this whole process.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: But online, that’s simply not … It’s just not possible. Because you don’t have the expert there to help you. Okay, so when you and I got to be friends and you were doing the online thing and we were talking about, I’m like, “Have you thought about doing consultations?” And you’re like, “Look, they don’t even want to come in to look at the pictures. I can’t do one more appointment.” Because you’re in Vancouver, a city –
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. Nobody has time for anything.
Allison Tyler Jones: Nobody has time for anything.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: And so you had gone to a reductive process in your business and you and I were trying to help figure that out together. So what made you take the leap on the consultation? Because I know, I remember you were not really happy about that when we first became friends. I’m surprised that we are still friends.
Kathryn Langsford: We made it through that.
Allison Tyler Jones: We did make it through that. There was a little arm twisting.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. Well I mean a lot of it was … Something had to change. I wasn’t happy with how things were and it was great to have reconnected with you at that time because you gave me so many examples of what that’s done for your business and what that process looks like when done right, right? So it was just like jumping off another cliff. It was just like, “I don’t want to do this, I’m scared of this, I’m afraid people are going to say no, okay, I’m doing it.”
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah, I know. I love that about you. You are a master executor. You are really good at that. You don’t let a lot of grass grow [inaudible 00:26:43] … Okay, so then when it was first started, so you said, “Okay, I’m going to introduce a new process because of the pain that I’m having about my clients are not getting what they should have, I’m creating some beautiful work, it’s ending up as a 5×7 in a box somewhere. So I’m going to do this new process and I’m going to do a consultation.” It did not go well in the beginning.
Kathryn Langsford: Oh gosh. I don’t know if I remember exactly –
Allison Tyler Jones: I just remember there was some complaining. People resisted, mainly the existing clients, were like, “Wait a minute. Why are -”
Kathryn Langsford: Can’t you just send us the gallery?
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah, send us the gallery.
Kathryn Langsford: I can’t get my husband in there. Can you just send us something online?
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. And so then this is where I think … I mean you have many geniuses but one of my favorite geniuses about you is that you have a really great way of talking about things to clients. So when those clients were saying these things to you, what were you saying to them to get to basically have them see it your way? How are you presenting it, why they needed to do a consultation, why we weren’t going to do galleries anymore. Like okay, so I’m going to be the client.
Kathryn Langsford: Sure.
Allison Tyler Jones: “Look. We’re busy. I don’t have time to come down there. I don’t know why I need to do a consultation. Can’t you just send us the things, the gallery?”
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. So what I said was, “I have changed my process since the last time we worked together. I think you’ll find that it’s far more efficient and a better way of having you have less time spent making decisions and less time spent agonizing over photos. What we do is we start with the end in mind, so we start with where are we hanging this, what are the important portraits, who are the people you want to give gifts too. We start with the list of what you want to come out with. You may not know the answer and that’s something I’ll help you with. But with that list, we plan your session, and then out of your session comes exactly what you wanted. So there aren’t all the extra things that you like but you don’t know what to do with, it’s just what you want. Down to how big will it be, where will it hang, what will it cost. We talk about all those things ahead of time and I’m hoping you’ll find that it’s far more efficient than the previous process.”
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay, love that. So now I can see why somebody after hearing that would say, “Okay, well I’m willing to come in for a consultation.” So then we do the consultation, you let me know kind of how much things are. I’m getting the sense though that I’m not going to get my Kathryn Langsford who’s going to shoot 100 photos, show me 100 photos of all the breakouts. Right? I’m getting the sense that I’m telling you I only want one picture this year, one big picture this year. But what about Dad and the girls and Mom and the boys and the kids together and all of that? You mean you’re not going to shoot that?
Kathryn Langsford: If we have a place for that, if we are creating something for that, absolutely. If you’d like that kind of variety in an album, I am very happy to shoot it.
Allison Tyler Jones: Can we just wait, can you just shoot it and then I’ll just decide?
Kathryn Langsford: Why ask that question, honestly? Why?
Allison Tyler Jones: Because they always do ask that question.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. I mean that’s time spent for your family that can be exhausting, can make the process not as fun. It’s much more directive and precise, sorry, I’m messing this up.
Allison Tyler Jones: No, you’re doing great. Because that’s what I found is that you think, “Okay, I’m going to do this consultation,” and then I’m going to say, “Okay, what are we doing with this,” and they always say, “I don’t know.”
Kathryn Langsford: You know what? To be honest, I wouldn’t say … Okay, I would say a lot of my past clients, probably 75% of them, they hear the new process that I’ve put in place and they’re really happy about it. They’re like, “Oh my god. That sounds so easy. That sounds great.” It’s the 25% who think that there’s value in those 100 breakouts that I used to shoot. And those people need more education. They need to hear from me why it’s not useful to shoot things that we’re not going to use and that if I put all my energy into just the pieces that they want, they’re going to be exponentially better. It’s like spending more time on something creative is going to have value rather than spreading my time really thin to get all these different breakouts that they don’t really need. They just maybe like the process. I have a couple clients like that, we’ve needed to work through those issues. New clients totally love it and have zero pushback.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. Now.
Kathryn Langsford: They’ve often never heard of this process before and they’re like, “Oh, that’s great. Oh that sounds awesome. I love it.”
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah, totally. Yep, I agree. But I just think it’s important to highlight that yeah, when you do make changes, there can be pushback and people … They love you. They love the way that it was done. But sometimes, you have clients that will just weed themselves out. Like they really did just want somebody that they could take a million pictures and they just wanted to run the show, they wanted to call all the shots, they didn’t want expertise, they wanted to be the expert, and they just needed a camera for hire to fulfill their vision, and then you might realize that like this is no longer a functioning relationship and that this isn’t how I want to work [inaudible 00:31:40] I’m really not serving you to the best of my ability so we just … Love you, love your kids, but we can part ways and that’s fine too.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. And usually we don’t have to have that conversation. I just explain how I work and they decide they don’t work it. So that’s fine. It doesn’t need to be like I’m not firing anybody or –
Allison Tyler Jones: Exactly
Kathryn Langsford: … [inaudible 00:31:59] things are now.
Allison Tyler Jones: I do feel like that when people start to make change, it’s tempting that when you have that first little bit of pushback to retract.
Kathryn Langsford: Yes.
Allison Tyler Jones: To go backwards. Okay, okay, for you, I’m going to grandfather in, and that is in my opinion, that is an error.
Kathryn Langsford: I regret it every time.
Allison Tyler Jones: Every time.
Kathryn Langsford: Every single time.
Allison Tyler Jones: Every single time.
Kathryn Langsford: Because the pain just keeps being administered over and over and over. It’s not like doing them the favor of “grandfathering them in” is going to smooth everything over, no. All the problems just keep resurfacing and resurfacing. It’s horrible. It’s like getting in this new really well-adjusted healthy, emotionally healthy relationship and like having lunch with your ex-boyfriend everyday.
Allison Tyler Jones: That is so good.
Kathryn Langsford: You know?
Allison Tyler Jones: Yes.
Kathryn Langsford: Just this horrible like –
Allison Tyler Jones: You’re like I didn’t want this relationship. I don’t like working this way. But I found that when you are okay with it, when you have the inner confidence of like … And for me, the inner confidence isn’t borne out of like, “Yeah, I think I’m great and this is how I’m going to do it and tough if you don’t like it.” My inner confidence is borne out of I simply cannot have my soul destroyed any longer. So it really is borne out of … Like I’ve gone through so many painful circumstances that now it’s okay to let somebody go if we’re not going to work the way that I need to work for the business and to be the best, most creative, creating the highest and best product that I can. It’s going to be okay to let somebody go that doesn’t want to work like that, whether they’re a new client or an old client.
Kathryn Langsford: But honestly, the time and mind space that’s required to deal with a painful client eclipses the creativity that you need to be your best self with everybody else. Not to mention taking it home to your family. Like I’ve lost sleep over those kind of clients, I’ve lost my appetite. They’ve just had so much impact on my personal life as well as my ability to work well with my wonderful clients that it’s totally not worth it.
Allison Tyler Jones: Well and also your team. Your team too. Like your employees.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: It’s just like putting them through an emotional shredder.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah, it’s painful for them too.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. So okay, so that being said, so we have –
Kathryn Langsford: We’re still learning this. [inaudible 00:34:13].
Allison Tyler Jones: I was just going to say, we go through this process, we get the basics down, like of course, charge a session fee so people will show up. Then maybe have some product credit in there so that you know that your basic thing is being handled, and that we have a consultation where we have clarity, we’re taking them through a very well-oiled, thought-out process. So then of course everything after that is perfect, right?
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah, no. There’s other stuff too.
Allison Tyler Jones: Great. And I think as your averages, as your session averages are higher and higher, there’s little speed bumps along the way, like wow, this is a lot, like we have to talk about that, and that’s really consultation. For me, I feel like, and I feel like this is probably true for you too, almost every problem that comes out in a view and order session or sales appointment can be traced back to something that I did not disclose or quote or talk about in the consultation session, I got too chatty about clothes or whatever and did not nail something down, or I had a fantasy about that they didn’t really mean what they said they meant. Like they said something that was a red flag, and rather than saying, “Okay, hold on. Do you mean XYZ?” and clarifying that, I just kind of was like, “Surely they could not possibly mean XYZ.”
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: And then it comes back to bite me later. So you’ve had a recent experience with this lovely concept. Let’s talk about that.
Kathryn Langsford: This recent experience is such a good example of not closing up every possible loophole. I have a client who’s been to me for many years, she comes every year. She in the past was really … She would talk a good game of what she wanted me to shoot for her this year and what she was excited about and I really want to hang this and hang that. This is even before I had consultations and then they would come in, we would do the shoot, I would of course shoot everything I could possibly think of so that she’d have lots of variety to choose from at her big ordering session, and she would order holiday cards, with the promise of maybe ordering something after Christmas. So that happened a couple of years in a row, and it was just infuriating.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah.
Kathryn Langsford: So then I came up with, “Okay, I’m going to make a package to her. If she really wants card, then I’m going to make a special package where I only shoot for the card and the cards are rolled into the package and she has to …” I think back then I wasn’t even insisting that she got art. I just thought, “I just need to make this not a huge session.”
Allison Tyler Jones: Right.
Kathryn Langsford: So then the first year I did that, I again, didn’t close all the loopholes. She chose a card design that had like six photos in it, so that I had to shoot a lot of variety to get enough for that card, which was a nightmare. So then following that, I had her package include fine art, which I think was okay for one year. And then the next year, she was saying, “I don’t think we need to do that package because I want to do a whole wall gallery this year. So I just know I want to do it. This big gallery with past stuff and present stuff.” So then we worked on this big wall and had it all set up before her session, so we knew we were going to do this before I shot, it seemed really safe and all buttoned up, and then after she started pulling the wall apart and asking if we could just do six pieces, actually can it just be four, you know what, I just want these two. So every year, it has burned down, and every year, it has been because I did not lock it down before the session. I did not have a crystal clear quote that she approved and paid for based on what she told me she wanted and was sure about. I did not do that.
Kathryn Langsford: So this year, she told me that she’d like albums. She wants albums for herself and for her family and can we shoot for albums. So I know what that means, that means shooting every single combination under the sun. So if I’m going to do that, I need to make sure she really wants this. So I sent her a very clear quote of exactly what that will cost, and I asked her to approve the quote before we confirmed the session. So in with the quote for the albums is a quote for the session. She approved the session, she paid for the session, she did not prove approve the quote to the albums. So I texted her, and asked her, “Can I get you to approve this just so I know what we’re shooting?” “Oh yeah, we’re going to go ahead with albums.” So we shoot a big huge session and while her husband and her are here, they’re looking through my big complete retrospective albums which is an album including 10 years of portraits, and she says, “Actually this is a great idea. Let’s do this.”
Kathryn Langsford: So I gave her the tear sheet on the complete retrospective, it has a full description and a price, it’s the highest priced item in my studio, it’s a big ticket item. Made sure her and her husband saw that price, spent days designing the album, and she did confirm that yeah, she knows how much that is, and yeah, really excited about it, really want to do it. So that’s a great job. I thought, “Finally, after all these years, I’m going to be redeemed with this client.” So I spent days designing this album, it takes days. You got to pull things out of the archives and pull scans that have been done from film. She came in and then started the process of wanting to reduce the page count, reduce the album, make the album smaller and smaller. Now at that point, I had been so emotionally abused by this client and this process that I thought to myself, “I’m going to let her reduce it. I just want her to buy this.” Because I have worked so hard on it and I have tried so hard to lock down a product purchase from her.
Allison Tyler Jones: Exhausted.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah, I’m just exhausted. I’m worn down.
Allison Tyler Jones: You’re at lunch with the bad boyfriend.
Kathryn Langsford: I am.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah.
Kathryn Langsford: Exactly.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yes.
Kathryn Langsford: So I let her cut the page count, I reduced the price accordingly, should not have done that. Should not. There’s still 10 years of portraits, but as you said, it’s 500 pounds of portraits squished into a 100 pound bag. So then I said, “Okay, let’s do it. Here’s your revision. Here’s the new cost. Let’s do this.” And then I got another email saying, “Actually, I think we’d like to reduce it even further.” She wants to take those 10 years of portraits and put it in basically a one-year album. So at that point, I broke.
Allison Tyler Jones: You did.
Kathryn Langsford: I broke wide open.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay, so I’m going to stop you right there.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: Because you broke because you realized, and this was a conversation that we had last night, is I don’t even now know what to do. I don’t know where I’m at, up is down, down is up, and we all have clients like that, that they just work every loophole and just make it hard. And so we kind of processed this last night. So you had time to think about that and sleep on it. So what now, and I think this is important for those listening, is that when you got yourself into a position like this, we feel like, “Okay, well we just have to proceed. We can’t go back.” But I don’t think you’re going to do that. What are you going to do?
Kathryn Langsford: I’m going to apologize to her for losing sight of what this project really needs to be. A 10-year retrospective album needs to be an absolutely spectacular work of art. Like each portrait having the space it needs to breathe on each page. It can’t be compressed. Compressing it is just a … It doesn’t do service to the piece of art as it’s intended to be. So I lost sight of that because I just wanted to nail this down and wrap this up, and I’m going to backtrack and tell her that we need to go back to looking at what this project started out to be and I need it to stay true to the integrity of the intended design, and if she’s really not okay with that, I will happily refund her money but if she does truly want to have this project executed as it’s intended to be, then I’d love to do it.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. For the initial, what she initially agreed to.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: And so it’s hard. That’s not an easy one decision because you have hours and days and a lot of time into this.
Kathryn Langsford: You know what? It actually feels easy because what felt hard was when I was getting confused with what she’s asking me for and not wanting to lose the sale and how can I negotiate this but still keep this project moving and I started to lose sight of the whole point of the piece that I designed and I created for people to have this spectacular piece in their home. It isn’t that anymore. It’s [inaudible 00:42:41] reduced into a pamphlet.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right.
Kathryn Langsford: Right? So –
Allison Tyler Jones: An ugly one. I mean [inaudible 00:42:46] but too much smushed onto the pages.
Kathryn Langsford: And so when I looked at it that way with your help, when I looked at it that way, I thought, “This is easy. I’m just not doing this. I’m either not doing it, or I’m doing it this way,” and if she decides she doesn’t want it, “Okay, I lost a few days of my life designing this thing, but whatever.”
Allison Tyler Jones: But you’re not going to lose more days of your life for even less money.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. No. I feel totally fine about having that conversation.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay, so actionable takeaway from that process. When something like this came up, so let’s just bring her back again and rewind the clock three or four weeks when this all started and I’m her and I’m saying, “Okay, we are so excited, we want to do this album,” and then you’ve quoted me. Then where do you feel like this went off the rails? Was it when she came back and said, “Okay, you know what? I think we can get it down to the 60-page album from the 100-page.” At that point, do you feel like that’s the point where you should have said … Where do you think was when –
Kathryn Langsford: That is the point. That is the point. Because I think until then … Now to be honest, I was waiting for that shoe to drop the whole time. But it wasn’t dropping. She approved, she knew what the cost was, her husband knew what the cost was. It was all staying together. But when she started wanting to make it less pages, that’s the part for me where I was just like in my mind, the fear mindset part of me was like, “Just get it done. Just push it through. Just get it done.”
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. Just get something out of it.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. And that was my mistake. Because that’s not what this work is.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right.
Kathryn Langsford: It’s not what this work is. Sure I don’t want to have worked hours and hours and hours for nothing, but it’s better than feeling like, “Okay, I’ll make this into whatever you want to piece together.” Like she was telling me what photos to put on what.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right.
Kathryn Langsford: It was out of control.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right.
Kathryn Langsford: Completely a runaway train.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right.
Kathryn Langsford: And that feels horrible.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. And it’s not what you’re meant to do and it’s not the business that you’re in. You’re not a camera for hire and you’re not a graphic designer for put this there, put this there. You’re the expert that’s going to lay out your vision of her children and the story of her family in these albums and a 10-year album is in 100-page album and a five-year album, a three to five-year album, is in a 60-page album, and a one-year is in a 20-page or whatever. So you have these processes and we can have these processes, we can have these policies, and we can have our principles but if we are not willing to enforce them, and that comes along with how tired we are. What’s going on in our personal life. Sometimes you’re just like, “Look, it’s the Christmas season. Like we just got to keep this thing moving.” I mean we all know the orders are taking forever, the supply chain is totally screwed, like we just got to get things moving, so we take our eye off the ball and don’t … Slow down, right?
Allison Tyler Jones: And then just go, “Okay, maybe I don’t need to respond this second to this. Maybe I just time her out for a day and think about what needs to happen, then come back.” I’m just thinking of things that I’ve done whenever I’m making decisions and really, really quick, I got to hurry, that is a bad, bad thing.
Kathryn Langsford: Yep. Yes.
Allison Tyler Jones: And then when you know that this client has done this again and again and again –
Kathryn Langsford: All the more reason to slow down. All the more reason that I should have slowed down with her. I should have been more careful.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. But I appreciate you being willing to tell that story because you are absolutely, you know that’s everybody’s story. We’ve all had clients like that and sometimes multiple and I know photographers that have never gotten out of that camera for hire mode. They’ve never gotten out of the letting the client boss them around. They’ve never been able to fully step into the expert space. I think for women in particular, it’s difficult, because we are nurturers, we want to give people what they want, we want to be loving and creative and all of that, but I have a client that she’ll say, “I just love the candid pictures. I just love where they’re just having fun and they don’t look posed.” But when she rolls onto my set, she is over there like, “Smile, stop doing that. That looks like your fat face.” Like she’s directing her kids in a way that is only going to result in cheesy, Stepford children smiles and so I have literally had to banish her from the room, give her time-outs in front of her children, kind of teasing, but also, like she doesn’t trust herself, so she can’t trust me. And yet when I really push against her and make her leave the room and really go to the mat, then I always get what she loves, but she almost can’t let me do it.
Allison Tyler Jones: So we’re kind of a point right now in our relationship where I’m thinking I don’t know if I can work with her anymore because she simply cannot allow me to do what she really, really, really wants. She really, really wants. So I’ll be showing her the pictures in the sales appointment, and she’ll say, “That’s a fake fat smile. That’s a fake smile.” And I’m like, “Okay, well those are all the ones that I let you direct. All the fun ones that you like are the ones that you let me do.” And this last year, she almost … Like I did have to send her out of the room because she just couldn’t let go. So I think sometimes we aren’t well-suited and it’s like the boyfriend. We ignore the red flags, we think, “Oh, it will probably be okay. I mean he beat his last three girlfriends but he probably won’t beat me.” Or whatever. We just tell ourselves the lies because we think maybe business is slow, we talk ourselves into maybe that it will work, and we don’t put up the boundary and say, “Okay, no, this is actually how I work and this is how it’s going to be the best thing.”
Allison Tyler Jones: And so if you had that to do again and she had said to you, “Okay, well now I’ve gone home and I’ve looked at this and I figured out how we can get it down to 60,” what would you say to her now? Like if you’d had time to think about it.
Kathryn Langsford: Once I had all the information from her, like if she was cutting out a bunch of photos and making it a three-year album, fine. But once I had the information from her, I think I would just say, “I have to tell you what this piece of work is intended to be. It needs the space that we’re giving it. We can’t reduce the page count and -”
Allison Tyler Jones: And have 10 years’ worth of photos.
Kathryn Langsford: No. Mm-mm (negative).
Allison Tyler Jones: No.
Kathryn Langsford: This is how it’s designed. And so if it’s a price thing, then just like with work on the wall. If you want to have less years, it can be a smaller album.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yep. Smaller things and less things.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah, we can’t take the same amount of things and compress it into less pages. It’s just not how it’s intended to be and it won’t look good.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. I love that. Well I think the overriding in all of this, in all of our policies, in all of our principles, in all of our processes, is just that concept that we love about Tim Walden is that clarity. Just being so clear upfront, being clear all along the way, slowing down, being willing to really think about like, “Okay, is this really going to be the best way to do this?” And rather than just making 50 million policies, it’s going back to the principles that we are a photography studio that specializes in finished art, which is wall art for your homes, custom-designed albums, and then those albums have certain parameters and the reason why they have those parameters is because that’s going to make … Like you say, it’s going to make it perfect. It’s going to give our creativity the best way to live and for you to have the best way to see your family represented, and we have 16 to 22 years of hard-won experience in that and then being willing to just say and if you don’t want to do that, completely understand. Not necessary, we can refer you to somebody else or whatever, but that’s how we work.
Allison Tyler Jones: And so it’s hard to do. It’s a hard one, but a lot of these policies, a lot of these processes that we’ve developed have really all come from those pain, from the pain of doing with those things.
Kathryn Langsford: And one thing we haven’t touched on is the reward when these policies are upheld, and we do explain things properly to our clients and they do enter into service with us fully informed. That’s a great experience. That’s like the dream. It’s like the dream job.
Allison Tyler Jones: It is.
Kathryn Langsford: Working in this creative way that’s totally directed by the artist and creating the best-quality products that are perfect for the wall in size and in format. It’s a dream way to work, and everybody’s happy. I mean we got to talk about that too.
Allison Tyler Jones: Oh yeah.
Kathryn Langsford: We just talked about a whole bunch of heartbreaking situations [inaudible 00:50:49] –
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. That’s true. I know. I’m so glad you said that.
Kathryn Langsford: But the end is a good ending. It’s really worth it.
Allison Tyler Jones: Totally. And really those hard things kind of come about as like you say those people that we’ve allowed to grandfather in whereas if we cut it and are like, “Okay, this is the new way that I’m working,” and then with new clients, so many of those older clients like you say are thrilled, like, “Oh. I don’t have to spend nine hours on my computer on an online gallery trying to figure out what to do? You’re just going to do that for me?” Awesome. Brand new client, you’re going to tell me how much it is and exactly what I’m in for before, great. And then, like you’ve said before and we’ve experienced that view and order session or that sales appointment is just … It’s like we’re chatting. All we’re doing is just we’re chatting and –
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. So not stressful. So fun.
Allison Tyler Jones: No, no, we’re not even really selling at all because they’ve already decided –
Kathryn Langsford: No, it’s done. It’s already done. Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: It’s already done. Yeah, they’ve already picked it out ahead of time and now we’re just populating what it is that they said they wanted and we’re talking about how cute the kids are, let’s make this [inaudible 00:51:46] –
Kathryn Langsford: And I honestly didn’t even really believe it could be like that. Like I understand that that’s the idea, but it is like that. It’s exactly like that. If that pre-session consultation is done properly and completely with no steps left out, it’s exactly like that. That meeting is super easy, they’ve already decided in their mind, the money’s already spent, it’s like not even a thing. It’s so great.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yep. And at that consultation, if it’s not going to be like that, they will cancel. So you will have them go away and maybe it’s not right now, but nobody’s mad. What are they always saying? Even the people that go away are like, “Thank you so much for spending this time with me. This was amazing. I love this process. It’s not in the cards for us right now, but next year or in two years or when our kids graduate,” or whatever. So they’re planning it in their mind because now they see, “Whoa whoa whoa. This is a whole different situation. This is a whole different process.”
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. And getting that news before you’ve shot it and culled it and prepared it for the view and order and wore your best clothes for the day of the sale, I mean you don’t have to go through any of that.
Allison Tyler Jones: Hair washing, grooming, makeup, yeah.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah. You don’t need it. Don’t do it if you don’t have to.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. Right. I know. Yeah, I love it, and I’ve definitely found that this year, that as I’ve really got it even more and more dialed in, that it’s just … My view and orders are my favorite days, just because we’re just going to celebrate the family. We’re just going to love on their kids, we’re going to figure out what’s going on in their house, and it’s just … I mean other than installation day, but there’s no trepidation. I used to kind of think, “Okay, I got to get geared up because today’s going to be my sales day. I got to get my sales tricks.” Now it’s like, “Oh my gosh, my friends are coming, and we’re going to pick up their kids’ pictures, we’re going to figure out what goes on the wall. It’s going to be super fun. Maybe I’ll go to lunch with somebody,” whatever, but it’s not hard.
Kathryn Langsford: Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: So okay. Well figure out your pain, what’s painful for you and your business right now. What is killing you. Is there a policy that you can create out of that that goes back to the principle in your mind of why it is that you’re doing what you’re doing in the first place and the kind of business that you want to run and then what kind of process can you develop that will smooth out this pain and either make the pain go away or make the pain get in line and follow the process the best way that allows you to create your best art for your very, very best clients, and Kathryn, I really appreciate your time today in allowing us a little peek into your behind the scenes of your studio and sharing that story because I think it’s going to be really valuable for everybody.
Kathryn Langsford: Thanks.
Allison Tyler Jones: [inaudible 00:54:24].
Kathryn Langsford: [inaudible 00:54:25].
Allison Tyler Jones: Do you know someone who would really benefit from this episode of The ReWork? Maybe a fellow photographer who’s in the trenches with you and always looking to level up their biz. Or perhaps you have a friend who is struggling to make their business work. I would be so grateful if you would share this episode with them. All you have to do is head to the platform where you are listening, click the share icon, and text it or email it to the person that you think could need it most. Thank you so much for doing that, and while you’re there, if you have a chance and can give us a review, it would mean the world. We are a micro, tiny podcast and we’re trying to get the word out to as many portrait photographers as possible to help them build better businesses and better lives for their family and if you would help us do that, it would mean the world. Thank you so much and we’ll see you next time on The ReWork.
Recorded: You can find more great resources from Allison at dotherework.com and on Instagram at do.the.rework.
