Being Your Own Boss - A Good Reason to Start a Business?

Authored By: Erin Verbeck | Feb 16, 2011 8:51 am | Category: book reviews, entrepreneurship, owning a business, starting a small business, starting my own business

You may already own your own business. Or you may be trapped in a full time job you want to leave and dream of owning your own business. The Entrepreneur Equation, just released by author Carol Roth, helps 'wanna be' entrepreneurs and those who are looking to take their business to the next level ask the first necessary question: not "Could I?" but rather "Should I?" start my own business.

Carol's book may seem like a downer, but I think it's a much-needed reality check to what true small business ownership entails. It can save you a lot of time, money and effort avoiding small business ownership if you're not going into it for the right reasons. The book lays out some of the things you may not have considered that are required of small business owner. And it's an easy read.

Here are a few of the highlights:

60% of businesses don't earn a profit over their lifetime! Yet because of widely distributed misconceptions about the freedom, flexibility and money entrepeneurs benefit from, 6 million people start businesses each year. Many of those business owners are just creating a job for themselves by going into business. Yet this job takes more time and energy and risk than any job you'd otherwise get. And the pay...well it's likely far less than minimum wage given the time you put into the job. Sound familiar?

Most people think entrepreneurship means getting to spend most of your time doing what you love or want to do. But the reality is 90% of your time is spent handling administration, marketing, providing customer service to crabby clients, blogging, networking, selling, managing emploiyees, dealing with vendors and bookkeeping. That leaves just 10% of your time to spend doing what you love. So before you take the leap into the land of small business ownership (or get in any further than you already are), The Entrepreneurship Equation helps you identify your motiviations.

Another HUGE misconception is that you'll be your own boss when you own your own business. The truth is, as business owner you actually have MORE people to work for. To generate income, you have to accept the reality that your clients are now your boss. Without them, you have no income. Add to this the fact that your employees are now your boss, your investors are your boss, vendors, landlords, regulatory bodies and your family are also bosses and stakeholders. Whew...that's a lot of bosses to please. If your main motivation for going into business is to be your own boss, you may not be up for small business ownership.

Just because you have a passion for your hobby, doesn't mean you should transition into business. The biggest difference that Carol identifies is that a hobbie is all about YOUR likes and wants and a business is all about your customers' likes and wants. That can be a hard pill to swallow. Many pseudo business owners have what Carol calls a jobbie - a hobby disguised as a career. If you're working full time and are not making a profit and able to pay yourself at least minimum wage for the hours you put in - you have a jobbie, not a business. The good news is that you can transition into a bona fide business. It starts with creating a business plan including financial statements (this month's Cafe Joy teaches you how to do just that, easily). Then you can truly evaluate whether you have a bona fide business opportunity, or something that will forever remain a jobbie.

If you are dreaming of the day you can leave your full time job and pursue your hobby full time, The Entrepreneur Equation is a great resource and definitely worth the $25 you'll spend. If you're already a small business owner and are struggling, the book can help you understand why (hint, it's likely the wrong motivations) and get you back on track. It's an interesting reality check and a book I'm sure many business owners wish they had read when they got into this game.

A Summary of our last event.

Barry Cullen Had a great presentation and spoke to us about establishing your brand and great tips on how to make your business work for you. Karen Hunter was up next and shared her experiences in her business and a few things that have made her stand apart from the rest in her own business.

It was a great evening enjoyed by all who attended - thank you for coming out - it was a great time to see old friends again and meet new ones.

An interview with Wedding photographers.

Wedding Photography Spoof Video from Matt E on Vimeo.

Congrats to Joel Ross...

This year Joel was awarded 5 accreditation's! Awesome job Joel. Here are a few of the images that Joel entered.

Provincial Convention!

The provincials are fast approaching and there are some great speakers and events lined up for you! Here is a short bio on David Beckstead. Check out our website at ppocmb.com for more information!

David was named The Top 10 Wedding Photographers in the World by American Photo magazine March 2007


David is truly a mountain man at heart! He has traveled to over 68 countries and almost every state in the US. He has hiked thousands of miles of backcountry, including above the base camp of Mt. Everest. He was one of the first registered trackers for Arizona Search and Rescue, worked for the US Forest Service for 12 summers as a Hotshot firefighter fighting fires around the US and Canada, all the while carrying a Nikon SLR with a 50 mm 1.8 lens. David is a fine art watercolor painter and lover of all things artistic.

David lives out-in-the-middle-of-nowhere, NE Washington State. David mixes his passion for art and travel to run a 14 year destination wedding photography business. Kassandra, his wife (of 19 fabulous years!) and business partner, shares his passions. Together they have successfully mixed their lifestyle with their business. They have a 4 year old amazing girl named Asia! They have photographed weddings in Italy, Scotland, Ireland, UK, Bahamas, Caribbean, Mexico, Vietnam, Slovenia and many other destination style shoots.

David has a reputation for being honest and helpful and taking on life with passion and a smile!

www.davidbeckstead.com

7 Ways To Get Your Photography Business Noticed Online

How do I get my photography business noticed online?

I can’t even begin to count how many times I’ve been asked that question.

I wish I had a “one size fits all” answer for all of those people. But I don’t.

No one does.

There are many strategies that work together to help you get noticed as a photographer online. What works for one photographer in a specific niche in a particular section of their world may not work so well for another.

That’s just how it is. But that doesn’t mean you just throw you hands in the air or go back to your World of Warcraft!

Here are some easy to implement strategies every photographer can do to get noticed more in the online world.

1. Have a website

I suppose this should go without saying but we’ll delve into it just a bit because it’s the most important thing.

Your website is your home online. It’s your hub. It’s where you, ultimately, would like to drive the bulk of your traffic. You control how it looks, you control what it says about you, and you only have yourself to blame if it starts playing Enya on my speakers so freakin’ loud with a tiny mute button that’s impossible to find and all I want to do is punch my computer monitor when I visit your website.

Try Livebooks or SmugMug or something similar. They know what they’re doing.

2. Have a blog

This is the heart of your website. The soul. It’s where you give personality to your photography. You talk about the process, or the joy, or the whatever you think will get you more clients, or whatever. Just keep it on topic and keep it updated regularly. It doesn’t have to be every day or every week but it needs to be consistent. People like consistency. Again, keep it on topic! No one who’s going to buy your $4500 wedding package wants to hear your thoughts on the latest controversy surrounding whatever reality TV show you waste your time watching! Or maybe they do. What do I know?

Bonus tip: When you start blogging don’t publish your posts in the middle of the night. No one will read them and everyone will think you’re a sociopath for not sleeping when everyone else is watching infomercials.

3. Have a Facebook page

Start a facebook page dedicated to your photography business and invite all 45 of your friends to “like” the page. Then tell them to tell their 45 friends to like the page. Link your blog to the facebook page and post specials and other tidbits of info pertaining to your photographic awesomeness to that facebook page.

Then tell them to “like” our facebook page.

4. Have a Twitter account

This one may, or may not, actually drive much traffic to your website but if you learn to use Twitter properly it can become one of the biggest tools you can use to help you get noticed online as a photographer. You can become virtual best friends with people half way across the world who you’ll likely never meet but still feel a closeness to that is unsurpassed in any realm of reality.

I mean, that’s how I became BFFs with @photojack. No really.

5. Localize your photography services online

Use localized search engines that specialize in getting you business like SkillSlate.com. You can sign up here. It’s a good place to start, especially if you’re in a big city. Google won’t index your website right off the bat and it will take a while before you get top ranking when someone searches for a photographer in New York (if ever). However, if someone on SkillSlate goes to the photographers in New York City section, and you happen to garner a few good reviews, you’re more likely to get some business out of it. Think of these types of services as a virtual phone book. Sign up for as many as you find. It doesn’t take that much work and it’s worth the effort in the beginning.

6. Link build like crazy

There are tons of strategies to link building. You can pay someone. That’s easy enough but probably expensive and who knows how well that actually works. I’ve never tried it even though I get contacted about it almost every day. Seriously people…I’m not gonna pay you for your “magic”.

I prefer the more organic approach.

You can write some really awesome content on your blog, that nobody is reading yet, and hopefully, if a fairy flies over a rainbow and a leprechaun shoots it with cupid’s arrow while riding a unicorn, someone like Chase Jarvis will make a video about how awesome you are and Frederick Van will invite you on This Week in Photography where you will instantly become a photography expert and the skies will rain golden photography contracts!

OR…you could write some really awesome content, then submit it to a photography blog (like this one) as a guest post, that some people are actually reading and that Google already indexes, and you’ll get good Google juice while building a solid reputation as a knowledgeable person qualified to take someone’s pictures.

Links are like golden recommendations buttered with awesomeness and joy that tells Google, and all the other search engines, how awesome you are. Oh, and they drive traffic to your website. You know…your hub.

7. Be original

I cannot help you with this. Sorry.

Oh there’s more…

You just have to get creative and think of where the people who you think should notice you hang out online. Then stalk them like crazy until they visit your website and buy your photographic services.

What did I forget?

So if you’ve got a pretty solid “rep” online as a photographer why not share some of your tips and ideas in the comments below? Pay it forward!

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