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Introduction to Marketing

marketing is the M word, which is The money weren't too. I talked about it, but the foundation of your company was really yesterday. Now, this is where we take the idea of having a business and we put it into play. We're gonna get our names out there. We're gonna create visual statements. We're gonna make sure that everybody knows who we are. And marketing is the way we do that. Now they're all kinds of levels of marketing, and I'm gonna break it down to the things that are most successful in my company. Many of which a lot of if you follow me. I mean, I've been teaching for 15 years. I've been on the road for the last eight. We've done 10 major tours around the world, eight of which were in the United States. Are I'm sorry. Six of which were in the United States. So So a lot of you have seen me over and over again. And there are few things in here that are gonna be repetitive. But do you know why? They're the things that made the success that I have. The foundations of my company are ...

things like the baby plan display programs, referral programs, keeping communication with my clients, which are things like newsletters, etcetera. So if you've seen my programs before I marketing, we're gonna cover those. I did put a lot of new twists, a lot of new campaigns that you guys have never seen before, so hopefully that will add a little mix to it. But the bottom line, this is how I make my money. And if you want to talk about those numbers we talked about yesterday and how to get to those, this is how I did it. There's always gonna be fat marketing. There's always gonna be the next latest greatest thing. Those things come and go over time. I could historically go through my career and say, OK, in the eighties, this was popular in the nineties. This was popular, you know. And I could go through that that process. Those fads come and go. I remember exactly who and when Ferry Portrait's became the big hit. I remember the walled ins. They were a responsible for relationship portrait of those black and white close ups of lips and hands and feet. Aiken Document and I can also thank those people because they made me a lot of money with their fags. I mean, they came up with a great idea, and I recognize that this is awesome. In 2008 when I did bellies and babies, that whole tour was based on relationship Portrait's, which was really something I have learned from the walled ins. And from there I went through, did a whole tour and through my own studio, made a lot of money creating relationship portrait. Everything was black and white turtlenecks, baby naked, baby, Mom and dad Close. I haven't shot one of those in two years. Honestly, we used Teoh in the consultation to tell people to wear all black. And it's interesting watching the evolution of how something that at that time was the most popular thing that made us the most money. I just It just sort of fades and goes way, and yet I still have a great referral program. I still have. We still do a newsletter. We still have displays all over the community, those air, the foundations of what we do. So our goal is to market in a new way. We want to try to create something new and interesting and get you excited about marketing and the vision that you have getting started is pretty easy because, of course, there so much information available now with Webcasts and books, places like Creativelive. It's just it's there's nothing better this education. Nobody in the world provides free education at the level they do. This is these are the greatest speakers in the world that they're pulling from. And I'm literally humbled and honored to be here because I'm just a mom with a cab. You know, I just I just like to have a lot of fun, and I'm truly grateful to be here. So it's It's It's impressive when I look at the names people who I have admired for years people who are up and coming, that I'm blown away by their talent and to see even the evolution of creativelive branching out into other industries. But the tie and things like the marketing programs that they're doing that are really cover any business. I mean, you could nonstop 24 hours a day, sit on creativelive and never leave and never stop learning, which is really, really impressive. Every topic is available for free online At this point, you can Google anything. And so the question is, where are you going to spend your time? Because we said time is the most valuable asset we have. It's not about money, it's about time. But you need money, toe have time. So how do you find this information? Where do you Where do you gather all this information in it? It's always nice when a speaker takes and makes a little box and says, OK, we're gonna cover this today and within those hours you get all that information because as most of us, you go on the Internet, and if you Google marketing right now, you get 10,000 pages arm or of information on marketing. But if you click on a video or something in marketing, you're gonna click on a video and then all the seven. There's gonna be a Justin Bieber video and you click on that. And then all the sudden there's gonna be some other weird thing, and all the sudden you're gonna be in this black hole of of Internet garbage, where and it's where your brain goes, and then you look up and you realize 2.5 hours have gone by and you don't know where your Children are. And dinner is long gone. And you know you start to really realize that the world, the world, the Internet world can be a black hole. So having functioning education that's pre produced for you, that's in a box that says, Look, this is what you need to know today. Take it like that elephant, Take a bite, take one bite, then go put it toe work. One of my biggest fears, Andi, it happens to all of us is we get into this mode of learning and knowledge and we forget that if you don't apply any of it, it's a waste of your time. It's that precious time that you're losing. So so for me getting through this course, I really want to see you. And I have seen your fruition. I've seen you accomplish a few tests. What I really saw was light bulbs go off. I see. When you talk about what you did, he chose different things to work on. But light bulbs go off. I'm most impressed with your 47 pages of your business. 43. I'm sorry not to exaggerate here 43 pages of your business flat, and that's pretty darn impressive. Now, did you have that already When you got here or Okay, so you didn't have it when you got here, So that that's pretty darn impressive that you said it. 43 pages and pages of business plan. But kudos to you, because you felt like that was what you need to take out of it. And that's what you needed to accomplish in your precious time before you go home. And that's very impressive. So we're gonna all keep plugging along. I'm not gonna lie. You're probably gonna get hit with at least five more pieces of homework tonight. I think there are two that are fun and three that are hard and you'll you'll you'll swim your way through it. All right, So let's talk about marketing. What is marketing? Marketing is what you say and how you say it when you want to explain how awesome your product is and why people should buy it. Anything from an ad, a brochure, a press release, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest. All of that is marketing. We want to go back to that 12th marketing you have 10 seconds to catch somebody's eye with marketing to stop their tracks to make them go. What's that? And to drive them to think or read more. So it's really important. Understand that to me, everything is about that seconds. How do I get if I have to hit somebody? If stickiness is three times or five times you've got, they've got to see 3 to 5 times a stick. How do I get that 10 seconds out of that person, 3 to 5 times toe wear when they finally are thinking about portraiture. They're thinking about my studio, and that's what we're going to talk about today. The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customers so well. The product or service fits him and sells itself. That's really key as well, because if you were starting out and you're very diverse and you don't know really what you are, we have a lot of people talk about what kind of shoot a little bit of everything. You know what I do, too? I mean, technically, I should families, babies, pets, Children, business, weddings. There's not a genre that I haven't touched in my career, some more than others. But at some point I had to decide what I was most good at. And babies and Children are really my forte. So of course, once I made that connection, I had to start marketing to that connection. My community thinks of me as a baby photographer, but every single client I've ever had for the most part, I photographed their families as well. So I'm equally a family photographer. But in their minds, I'm the baby baby photographer, and I'm fine with that. I'm fine with understanding. Niche. I'm fine with understanding that there specializing. And then there's niche marketing. People who specialize are people who do one thing, and specialization is important. But what I can tell you about that is in a bad economy, specialization can be very hard on your business. If you Onley do pets and the economy is a tough economy, you'll have a lot of people that'll be hesitant to spend their money on that on that pet, even though they love them. As much as we love our Children, there's gonna be some different decisions making made there. So specialization is different than niche marketing, and I want to make sure there's clarity there. Because as we go through, we're gonna talk about both. We're going talk about what you specialize in or what what your your marketing audio audience feels you specialize in. And then what is your real niche? What do you really feel like? You're good at. All right. So we're gonna walk into some homework here. First of all, we want to talk about finding our Judy now in marketing. There's a lot of terms for this. Judy is one of the most popular ones. But Judy is your potential client. She is. She may not live where you live. She may not dress like you dress. She may not wear what you wear, but she is your potential market. Now, tomorrow we're gonna talk a little bit more about her. But who is your potential client? Where does she live? Where does she shop? What does she eat? Where does what do her kids go to school? What volunteer work this You do that she is you involved in any chair, charities or any events? And where does he socialize? Because if you think about this, if you recognize that there's a specific type of client that we're all looking for and nobody's client is exactly the same. You eat, you're gonna have different options. Um, there's no shame in any photography. If you want to work for, Let's say you're an event photographer and you want to do tons of little kids with soccer balls and little kids with footballs and, you know, people. A lot of people, including myself. I did that to get my business started. I was shooting every soccer team in football team and dance studios. Oh my gosh, let's talk about Nancy gets also bring you to your knees 400 kids in three days. You know, you sit there and you go, OK, well, I'm not doing that, or that's it's kind of that that's beneath me. I'm a portrait artist. I would like you to know, and I want you to remember this quote. There's a great quote out there that it says he who let's see he who works for the Mac. He who works for the masses, lives with the rich, and he who works for the rich lives with the masses. So I want to break that down because the first time I heard that it was actually and I told you about the $1,000,000 Club. I was with a group of photographers, all of which studios grows. The 1,000,000 plus the person that said that to me made many millions of dollars per year in photography, and he did it through event photography. It was through soccer balls and footballs and dance studios. He was that guy out there with 50 photographers that were going into these dance studios and shooting and making a ton of money. There is a lot, lot, lot of money to be made in events in a bad economy. A mom is more likely to spend 14 95 on a small set of pictures than $4995 on a beautiful portrait collection. So So I just want you to think about that before we go forward. If you're comfortable, if that's when your genre, if you love working with the masses, there is money to be made there. It's also a lot of work, and it goes back to sacrifice. What do you really want? If you want to be a fine portrait artist, I also have friends. I have a friend that his minimum order is $25,000. Now he works for very famous people. He travels all over the world, but his starting point is $25,000. I'd love to be him, but I will tell you that in the last few years he's never struggled like he struggled before. He spent years building this incredible business because the economy took a huge turn. Even the wealthy. That price point is at a level that it's just not easy to touch, So he struggles to So So you have to kind of understand Who is your client? Where is she at and what does she look like now? This concept we actually want you to design your Judy. Now we want you to actually take the time. There's several ways you can do this just in on paper. You can just write down the things you know about your Judy. You can also use Pinterest if you want toe fancy it up a little bit. You definitely can use Pinterest and sort of curate where you think what you think she would look like. That might be a little more homework than you need to do. Because, honestly, the key here is understanding in your own community, where Judy is because more than likely her Children go to private schools. More than likely, she works for a charity. Or she don't donates her time to charity more than likely her. You know, if they go to public school. She's very involved in athletics and sports and things like that. Those types of parents are very doting parents. They have the financial means to support more than likely she's in a two income household or her. Her husband is doing, you know, a six figure income. More than likely she lives in this neighborhood. You guys probably in your minds, could think about the areas where think about zip codes. I always think of things in like this zip code has really nice homes, really nice areas. So you start thinking about that. Eventually, you're gonna break it down to finding the ZIP codes we've actually got in the car, and we will drive around and drop pins just to figure out what zip code you can buy maps, and I mean you can go online and get the maps as well but sometimes E If you're not there looking at the homes, you can go from a beautiful neighborhood right down into a low income neighborhood, right into a beautiful $1,000,000 neighborhoods. There are times when we drive around and we try to figure out where are we and where these people coming from. Better ways to get involved in the schools, through charity events and things like that as well. We'll talk a lot about that. So that's your first. Some work is you're gonna design your Judy. You can give her a face if you like. If not, I just in writing would like to see who she is. All right, So what is marketing really? Well, Marketing is a deep psychological understanding of your customers. Need Steve Jobs had this gift, I think better than anyone. I think he truly was somebody who understood people. Henry Ford, Thomas Edison. Walt Disney also had an uncanny understanding of the human needs and the innovation vision, innovative vision to deliver it. Think about the people in the impact that they made on our lives. Tomorrow we're gonna go into depth on these folks and what makes them different from us because a lot of times we sit and think about you know, somebody like Henry Ford or Thomas Edison, even while Disney and the great things that they did. And sometimes you feel you we pale in comparison to these great folks. But ah, lot of people that historically changed the world didn't do it because they wanted fame or publicity. They had no choice. There was. There was, Ah, junction in life where they had to make a change. Things were bad and they were making them better. Now we can do that every day. On a smaller level. We're gonna talk in Day three a little bit today. But in Day three, a lot about charitable work making the difference in one person's life is just as good as inventing, if not better, than inventing the car. Because ultimately that one person can go on to make changes in other people's lives. And the wave that you start changes the entire world. So I want you guys to focus on that energy, and how can we make a difference in just one person's life? How can we affect one small group going into a school and making one small donation going, you know, instead of just donating, taking the time to work in a soup kitchen or deliver blankets or whatever you have to do those air, the waves that literally go across the world and change everything. And those are the things I think in the long run, super fascinated by this life because it's almost over. If you think about it, I'm halfway through my life, and the coolest part about it is we have no idea what comes next. Nobody knows what's really out there. So there's a sense of urgency to live our lives to the fullest. And as you all know, the older you get, the more anxious you get about it cause you're like Holy cow, Molly. We were talking about that yesterday. We were running on treadmill going well, I'm halfway through my life. What what am I doing here? You know you start, but it's incredible because first of all, nobody knows when it's really over. I could walk out tomorrow and it could be done, but the knowledge that you're living and are you living to the fullest are you doing the right things the right way and you can't change the past. You cannot predict the future. You have to live in the here and now. And I told you I told my kids that and they've been beating me up with here and now. But it's worked. I have taken in the middle of days. I like we're going to the movie. I'm just cut out of work and go into the moving. My whole staff is like, What are you doing? You know what? Right here. Right now, this is the most important thing I could be doing. And that is why we have to work towards that. Marketing is understanding yourself so that you could understand others. Somebody who works from their heart will always understand others. They will always have that core of what they are. The bottom line. If we were to get less philosophical and you guys were all tear it up again, I like this. I totally control your emotions. Just could be a roller coaster all day. Bottom line marketing The marketing department needs to create buzz and buzz is the key. How do you get people to talk about you? Who are you and are you worthy of being talked about honestly, are you that person that's making a difference in the world that people want to talk about you? When it comes to your marketing message? You want to make it simple, make it memorable, make it inviting to look at and make it fun to read. We're going to talk about engagement today, getting people interested. We want to create a memorable message. This is how we tell our prospects. What we have and what we have to offer and why they need it is more important because with portraiture, a lot of people consider it a luxury item. I do not. I think it's an absolute necessity, and I feel for the people who do not have that in their lives, I would rather them go to a chain studio and spend $14 for a printed memory, then not do it at all because they couldn't afford me. I have no problems. I'm not everybody's photographer. I understand that I am a certain client, tells a certain Judy's photographer, and you will all be somebody else's. So in order to find my Judy, I need to have a clear call to action. I need to make sure the message is so clean and so clear that she gets it right out of the 10 seconds that that buzz, I need to make sure she catches it. Now there are lots of words that are proven that have been studied that are proven to catch people's eyes. Now these air in your books. You guys have this if you have the book. If not, you can shot some of these down because these are words that are attention getters. This is specific to the portrait world. You can see things like portrait artist, heirloom quality, inner beauty forever preserve extraordinary artistic desires. Fine workmanship. You start to recognize these words. One of the things we teach on the university is how important writing really is, how we visually can connect to people. But there is a certain amount of artistry that comes through words that comes through the written word. Now, if you dig deeper into that, then there are certain tested words that actually affect people that certain genres is a matter of fact. So, for instance, women love to hear words like glamour, charming, flattering, lovely. I mean, we all want to be that right? Brides love radiant, elegant, glowing, beautiful. These are These are catchwords and you'll see them in the marketing pieces that we create. Children are precious, adorable, cuddly, precocious older women. This is a tough one. Like, you know, you don't want to say I want to keep whirling smart. I'm technically getting into that older woman days So smart, chic, sophisticated, dignified. Those air appropriate words because an older woman is not gonna look at something that's talking about a youthful presence and and you're gonna disconnect from that. But a woman who, at our age, whatever that is, we want to be smart. The one thing that I can tell you that my age is brought to me is comfortable in my own skin. Like you go through this phase and we all have done this in the twenties. You care about what everybody thinks in the thirties. You start thinking about, you know, that it doesn't matter what they think. I'm gonna be an individual by the time you're 40. It's less about proving yourself and more about saying, you know what? I totally dig me. And if you don't, I totally get that and it's OK, you can you can do your thing and I'll do my thing. So So being sophisticated in that 40 plus age is the direction you wanna go. So So if you were marketing to say a business head shot, you would probably use some of those words because you know that the majority of successful women, especially in business, are probably 30 plus heading to 40 or beyond. And so you start to think about these words and break them down a little bit more. We design a campaign, we're gonna sit and plan and create. We're actually gonna go through and build an entire calendar. So there's some important things you need to know when we build a marketing campaign. You want to create a full description of the marketing campaign you can't really executed if you don't really know what it is. So you want to know what you're offering and who your target market will be. If I was gonna do fairy Portrait's in my mind, I know who I would go to if I was gonna do business headshots. Totally different clientele, totally different market based, right down to the structure of who I would send them to how I would get the word out etcetera. Probably one of the most important things I can teach you in marketing. And this one is big and I need you guys. In fact, this is going to be a challenge. It's not a homework, but I'm going to challenge all of you when you're creating marketing. The most important thing you need to do before you put that marketing out into the universe is check it and we check it with the W's, the who, what, where, when and why. If you take any marketing piece, any good marketing piece you're gonna go through and you are going to ask yourself once you've created it and you put it together, you're gonna look at and say, OK, I'm looking at this. I have 10 seconds to catch somebody's attention in 10 seconds, doesn't tell them who I am, what I am when this event is where it's gonna be and why I'm doing it. If you have a very short period of time to catch their attention, those things need to be covered. Now I have a lot of marketing. I have a lot of graphic artists that worked for me because we produce the marketing for the university every month for our students. Every month they produce marketing. Every piece of marketing has to go through me. It's a control issue. It's really important for me. I'm I'm guiding my students businesses, and I want to make sure that they have clarity. So I'm gonna give you an example of one of our artists. If you look at the one on the left, this is what she was doing. An Easter portrait campaign and super cute. She was using, You know, fun elements, bright poppy colors. The one on the left was the 1st 1 that she sent to me. Honestly, most people would say, That's cute. Send it. I looked at it and I said, OK, tell me who. Well, first of all, her logo is at the very bottom ghosted back in grace, you don't know who is to me, most important, your logo. Is that that 12th that stickiness So that who was a little tough? The what you could see Easter Portrait's that exists, but it's ghosted back a little bit. When the dates were not huge, they're kind of in that ghosted gray area where you have this, the city al to know Wisconsin. So that was reasonable. And then why? And the why is really that looking for something different? That little blurb, that short blurb that's gonna catch their attention? Most people would say that was a nice piece, however, when we sat and broke it down when we went back through it, you can see the slight changes we made that her logo was moved to the top so that there would be more of its Easter portrait's by Melissa, and that's right out of the gate. What? We want people to know things like the dates we need to make those bigger cause that's what people are going to say right out of the gate. They're going to say, You know, I can do it or I can't do it. And then, of course, how to find her the see you naked, etcetera, those air, The little changes, even things like font style and font size were fanatics. Aaron is the queen of the forints. I mean, she knows every fund, my heart, every phone by name, everybody. Everything goes through Aaron as well because she has to determine what foreign they're gonna work, what's what's really in right now and what is classic and works really well. So between the two of us, we beat these things up You. If you quickly glass of that, you wouldn't see huge difference if you really break into it. There's a tremendous difference between those two pieces. From a consumer's standpoint, what I always do is always look at pieces that I come across my eyes and I try to see what I could see most. Does that make sense? Because a lot of times will use visual colors and things to catch people's attention and right out of gate. The thing I see most is her logo, because it's a different color to different tonality. So So those are the little things I wouldn't like everybody. It's not homework, but to take a piece of paper and this is an all cap. You just need to write who, what, where, when and why. And my suggestion is that you post that wherever you do your marketing, if you have a computer or something like that. All of my SPU students have this posted above are they're supposed to anyway, Above there, you dio good supposed to have it posted above their computers because the last thing you're going to do before you put out a marketing piece is you're gonna ask yourself, where is my who, what, where, When and why? And when you start breaking that down, you're gonna know if you're hitting your mark and that's and pretty soon you're gonna very good at it. You're gonna be looking at other people's marketing, and you're going to go through that exercise constantly as well.