Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Photographer to Models Tip: Marketing, Freelance, and Making Cash…

Disclaimer: I'm not a professional; these are my opinions and my opinions only and based on my own experiences in model photography.


Ensure you’ve followed my Portfolio Building tips article [HERE] and Market Yourselves! article [HERE] before attempting the following tips in this article.

Build a fanbase by the following… Market yourself as much as possible by following my Market Yourselves! article and additionally…

Once you have decided on a specific type of modeling you love and want to dedicate, commit and stick to, your fanbase will pretty much create itself if you follow the following basic rules.


  • Offer exclusive interaction with your fans online on webcam chats on skype, and messaging on chat facebook/skype/etc softwares.
  • Interact with your fans on your facebook fanpage, facebook account, and twitter.
  • Running contests and giveaways to give the fans to win a chance to talk to you online on skype or autographed prints or/and clothing.
  • Network with other people in your industry from photographers, models, MUA’s, hair stylists, and especially if they’re very well established or popular and have a fanbase themselves because their fanbase will be exposed to you and then will feed into your fanbase and may become a fan of you if they like you and your work. Just remember the bigger the network the better, and ensure to stay in contact, be friendly and professional.
  • Meet and Greets with fans, public appearances, public events to give you more opportunities to get new and different exposures to different markets and areas. i.e. if you have a friend who’s attending a convention of some sort as a promotional model try to get a job with her/him and bring along business card/postcards to give away to people and that will give people an opportunity to learn who you are and what you do. Great for potential new work, fanabse, and networking opportunities.
  • Blog. Blog. Blog! Why blog? Because fans love to always know more about you personally, and professionally even if you feel it may be weird to share anything personal with fans or anyone you don’t know personally but share tiny personal things even if its related to your career or not. Share tips based on your experiences in your career and tips that have worked for you and you think would work for others. Share stories personal or professional stories based on your life or just your career, but note when you add a touch of personal feel to your blogging the more connection fans will have which real good fans love and want. Fans want a real feel of a connection with their ideals so adding some even tiny bits of personal stories would help a ton to building a fanbase, as well make your fanbase more dedicated to you and your career.
The following rules of marketing and keeping/creating a fanbase are commitment, dedication, constancy, and creativity, if you don’t you will fail at marketing yourself and keeping/creating a fanbase.

Once you see that you have a decent number of dedicated fans attempt to advertise your exclusive limited time autographed prints of your recently completed work or/and most popular work. Any prints from 4x5s, 5x7s, 8x10s and even posters… if you need the hookup on professional printing services that can do this hit me an email or add me on facebook and chat with me on facebook chat, or/and I’m free on skype as well at “chris.adval”. Also it’s highly recommended to mark up the prices from amount spent to create the print, mark it up about to whatever number but if the print costs me about $3 to make, plus shipping and handling about $10 total, I’d charge $50 per photo including the autograph, as a model of course, for an 8x10 print –just a sample.

More will be added this is just a basic starter article…

Like this article? Want more? Did you learn anything? Check out the following related series blogs... Models and Photographers Tip Series and Photographer to Models Tips Series

2 comments:

  1. Oh hi Chris, this is a great article. I guess this would be really helpful for those who aspire to become models. Well, basically photography and modeling comes hand in hand. I think I'd have to agree with your tips, so I hope those who want to become known should take note of this. Great job!

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  2. Thank you Offset Printing! Much appreciated.

    ReplyDelete