Are You Talented?
Advance Notes: Are you a versatile stock photographer? If you are, you may be surprised that your versatility is working against you. Here's why.
As a stock photographer, what's your objective in contacting a photobuyer? "To show off the variety and depth
If you were a service (commercial) photographer travelling door-to-door to advertising and pr agencies with portfolio in hand, your answer would be fitting. But if you are an editorial stock photographer attempting to interest an editor in using your work, the above answer will lead to disaster
Ad agencies, yes, want to see variety in photographs and versatility in a photographer's use of their equipment. Photobuyers at publishing houses, however, want to know if you can supply pictures in the specialized subject area that they represent.
If you do your homework and identify their particular focus area, and then present good pictures that fit their subject area needs, they'll buy them. Period. Ninety-nine percent of the magazines published today (this excludes the general newsstand magazines) are published for a specialized audience, and for specialized advertisers. Your task is to identify those publications that want photos in subject areas that you like to photograph, and then work with those markets.
Most newcomers to photomarketing tend to think of photobuyers as a mass of people on the other side of a fence. The photographer erroneously figures if she/he can send out enough photographs to enough photobuyers, like dropping leaflets from an airplane, enough of their pictures will score. In today's targeted markets, and today's specialized economy, that kind of broadside marketing doesn't work anymore.
Publishing houses themselves have become highly specialized. It's more cost-effective for them to focus on special-interest subject matter. Publishing companies look for writers, for example, who are knowledgeable in the theme of their particular publishing venture, be it hunting, cars, archaeology, medicine, early childhood learning, and so on. The publisher feels uneasy giving a writing assignment to an author who is not totally familiar with their subject matter. An author, then, stands to gain more by hiding his/her versatility. Cultivating the look of a specialist results in finding a home quickly for writing talents. (The writer can devote Sundays to engaging in versatility, or in writing his or her Great Novel.)
Similarly, photographers, too, should "hide" the scope of their talents, and specialize if they want to move forward. Pick an area that you know a lot about, one that interests you, or even one that attracts you and that you'd like to learn about (and then busy yourself learning about it).
Your interest and knowledge of the subject will shine through in your photographs. The photobuyer will say, "This photographer speaks our language."
Editors will recognize your expertise, whether it be in sailing, tennis, or aviation. Don't consider photobuyers as "them" out there on the other side of the fence. Instead, see them as individuals, each looking for photographers who can fill their highly specialized needs.
There are more than 15,000 editorial markets in the USA alone, that buy photos for publication. If you did some homework and discovered ten who want pictures in subject areas where you like to photograph, each with a $10,000- a -month budget for photography (which is a modest budget, many are much higher), you would soon cease dropping leaflets from your airplane
As publisher of a photo marketletter, I do business with both photographers and photobuyers. Photobuyers like to
This holds true in most all professions. If we have a copyright infringement situation, we don't deal with a tax attorney. The same in medicine. If we have a particular medical problem we feel more confident going to a physician who specializes in that problem.
Photobuyers look at photographers the same way. No one can believe a doctor can be "all things to all patients." Likewise, a photobuyer feels more comfortable coming to you when he knows you specialize in his subject area and he can count on work from you that's right on target.
Versatility is a virtue, but in today's economy, it's something to relegate to Sunday photography, where you're more concerned with artistic satisfaction than with sustained marketing success.
Rohn Engh, veteran stock photographer and best-selling author of "Sell & ReSell Your Photos" and "sellphotos.com," has helped scores of photographers launch their careers. For access to great information on making money from pictures you like to take, and to receive this free report: "8 Steps to Publishing Photos," visit his website at PhotoSource International or call 800 624-0266.
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