So I decided to try and email some wedding venues with the same approach I had for the wedding dress shops, admittedly I only emailed 10 venues however I cherry picked the venues that thought would best suit the sort of clients I’m going to be working with including the place I got married which was the Hackney Round Chapel in East London. I felt very happy having spent a Sunday doing this and if nothing else this made me feel productive. After all, setting up a business is not going to bring about instant results for each and every task (or any at all for that matter), as I mentioned in my last blog.

The responses I received from venues made me realise how naive I was being! The venues who responded quoted prices for a photographic shoot that I could only afford on receiving business so it is a bit of a catch 22 situation. How do I get the perfect portfolio shot without having to spend a large amount of money? The most helpful response I had from here was from a venue called The Asylum, which hires out the main space hourly for a reasonable amount of money. The phrase Speculate to Accumulate is perfectly appropriate here and in setting up a business I need to accept that there will be upfront costs that need to be accounted for. All part of a steep learning curve!

Meanwhile, I have been using Facebook and have joined some very helpful groups including ‘How to run a successful wedding photography business for beginners and profs’ and ‘UK Wedding Photographers’. A photographer at the Honeywood Museum Wedding Fair also recommended various second shooter groups that I joined. Basically, a second shooter is someone who works (lurks?) behind the main photographer in a wedding. My learning curve has been very steep in setting up this business as, again simply putting your name on a second shooter job does not make an opportunity. In fact, going via the second shooter route only served to cause me a lot of stress and if course insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results. Having no portfolio is not going to create any opportunities here at all! The Facebook preview also does not publicise my website in the best way and subsequently it gets lost in a sea of logos from photographers with more established websites. Yet another thing to learn – how can I point websites to the image of my logo on my website, as opposed to the generic image of Strasbourg Cathedral that I took?

Groups such as ‘How to run a successful wedding photography business for beginners and profs’ have been set up with the intention for people to get advice and share experiences about the setting up of their business as opposed to simply being a platform solely for established photographers. Therefore, I find this sort of a group very nurturing and supportive. One of the great pieces of advice I gleaned was how to really get an accurate picture of the type of client I wish to market my business to. Ultimately, this is who I need to think about when staging my portfolio and make sure that it can more accurately reflect the style of shot that my business, The Timeless Lens, will deliver. My next blog post will therefore talk about who my ideal client is, aside from someone who wants to employ me to shoot their wedding of course!