Hey, guys, Welcome back for week four of the first month of the group mentorship here on Creativelive. This is the last week that I will make you fill out a spreadsheet. Maybe, but thank you so much for sticking with me. So far, I know that some of these things have been tedious and a little soul searching E but they're all a Z. I'm sure you will all agree incredibly crucial to setting up the backbone of your business so that once we get out there and we start shooting next week, this will definitely ensure sort of your success here in all of this. So the first thing that we're going to do this week, assignment number one, is working with free marketing strategies. These are the things that you're going to do to market your business. That don't really cost you anything other than your time. Okay, the first thing you're gonna do is we're gonna complete the blog's submissions spreadsheet. It is in the business and marketing Workbook. If you are reading along, it will be the very next thi...

ng that you have to read. It is also uploaded to the course page both in Mac and word format. If you need to get a hold of that, you'd rather do it that way. What I want you to do is figure out the blog's admission spreadsheet, the magazine Submissions spreadsheet and the vendor spreadsheet. That is your assignment number one and those air going to take time, right? You're really going to need to invest some time in this and these Air master spreadsheets that you should really just tack to your wall and continue updating. These are things that will continue to be crucial for your business as you continue going onwards and upwards. Second thing this week, we're gonna talk about paid advertising or talk about where your competitors are advertising in ways that cost money that seem to be working for them. So blog's magazines, anything that you have to pony up a credit card for. I want you to do research on it and figure out if you think that it would be worth it for you or not to become involved in something like that. I also want you to go back to your vendor spreadsheet because now that we're looking at throwing some money towards marketing, take a look at some of those vendors and see if there's anything that you could do financially to maximize your relationship with them. Maybe it's making them albums. Maybe it's taking them toe lunch. Paid advertising doesn't have to be a magazine ad. It could be anything that you do to market your business, so that could be putting some money into improving those relationships and then just above and beyond. All that puts him blogging on your marketing calendar. It's kind of important that you start blogging, so maybe having a day a week that you do it would be a really great thing for you. Next thing marketing the high end wedding, that mythical high end wedding that I'm not such a fan are. But if you what you want to do is high end wedding is the first thing you need to do is determine what a high end wedding is to you doesn't mean they spent a lot of money on you. Does it mean that they've spent a lot of money on their wedding itself? You know, when you have to understand that people who spend lots of money on their own wedding that doesn't necessarily mean that they value photography. So the first thing you need to do for that one is determined what the high end wedding is for you. Then you need to create a marketing strategy to reach the vendors affiliated with high end weddings and to reach clients affiliated with high end weddings. Crucial that you read your textbook for this week, your business and marketing workbook. It will walk you through all of that and give you all of the calls to action to make that happen. Next, marketing your business with social media. I want you to download and utilize the marketing calendar. It's one of the things that will be uploaded for you for the week. It's also the next thing that you'll read in the business and marketing workbook. It's there for you. I don't want you to do all of the calls to action for this. And as you'll see when you download this, there are about a 1,000,000, of them that you need to dio right. Everything from writing down 10 phrases that potential clients might look for when searching for you to cause the action on social media outlets to default social media posts it is a lot of stuff to do. This one is major. This is also I keep pushing this book at you. But the book was written to help you through this month. So really, take your time in this social media part of the book. Read it thoroughly. Do every single call to action. That's your homework assignment for this one. Then we're gonna talk about sending out your price list. We're gonna figure out exactly how you're going to do it. Once you've gotten these packages done right, we've done your packages already. Now we're figuring out how to put it in some pretty form that you used to convey your prices to your clients. So we want to get this set up. We want to figure out how you're going to deploy your price lists to your clients were tested to make sure it works. That's your assignment. Um, number six, understanding your enquiries. That's when we're gonna start doing your inquiry Tracking spreadsheet. You're welcome. It's another spreadsheet. But what we're trying to do is we're trying to figure out how many enquiries you're getting. Why aren't these enquiries booking you? What are these enquiries booking like, what are your most popular packages? What vendors air continually being associate ID with the wedding. That your booking. So this one is a really important one for you to fill out. And then the last thing is very simple. It's negotiating your rates. What are you willing to negotiate? You need to develop a strategy for it. Are you willing to take money off? Are you willing to give extra hours? Are you willing to only negotiate on certain days, these ones? This week, the Facebook community is gonna be super crucial. You all will have each other. You're also gonna have me. You're not on your own, but let's sort of, ah, recap your assignments for the week Number one Free marketing strategies number two Paid marketing strategies Number three, high end wedding marketing number four. Marketing with Social Media, which is long number five. How you're gonna send out your price list. Number six tracking your enquiries and number seven negotiating your rates. Now, at the end of this week, I need to make sure that all of these homework assignments that you've had for weeks one through four, you need to gather them all together I've been helping you out the entire way. We've been talking on Facebook. You've been watching My weekly videos. Now is when you need to make sure that if you have not turned in these assignments by now, you need to turn them into the creative live email address. You need to have the assignment and your name written in the subject field, and you also need to write anonymous if you want it to be kept anonymous, and I will not use your name at the end of this week, I need to make sure that I got everybody's answers and everybody's bits of homework, because when I come back and I do the lie of day, I can't critique your work if you haven't turned it in. So get out deuce and spreadsheets. Let's figure out how to market. I'm gonna see you guys live against Super soon. Have a good week

Class Materials

bonus material with purchase

Mentorship Launch and Social Media Keynote.pdf

Susan Stripling - Study Packet Spreadsheets for Numbers.zip

Susan Stripling - Study Packet Spreadsheets for Excel.zip

Susan Stripling - Month 1 Mentorship Assignments 1 - 7.pdf

Susan Stripling - Business and Marketing Workbook.pdf

Susan Stripling - Study Packet Spreadsheets - PDF.zip

Susan Stripling - Month 1 Mentorship Assignments 8 - 14.pdf

Susan Stripling - Month 1 Mentorship Assignments 15 - 21.pdf

Susan Stripling - Month 1 Mentorship Assignments 22 - 28.pdf

Susan Stripling - Month 2 Homework.pdf

Susan Stripling - Month Two Introduction Keynote.pdf

Susan Stripling - Month Three Assignments.pdf

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Susan Stripling

Susan Stripling never knew that she'd end up a wedding photographer. Though she purchased her first camera in high school she went to college to study theatre and dance, obtaining a BFA in 2001. Shortly upon her move to New

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Ratings and Reviews

a Creativelive Student

A couple years ago I attended WPPI and sat in on Susan's class. Out of all the classes I sat in on that year her's was in the top 2 for actual information and not just fluffy feel good hype. So I figured her Group Mentorship course would be a good one and it definitely has! A bit of background on me, I've been running my own wedding photography business for the last 6 years, 5 of those full time. I've taken tons of business courses and have circled back around to taking more classes to improve my craft. Susan's class focuses on both business and improving your craft. The big warning I have for this class is that there is a lot of homework, A LOT!!! But that is not a bad thing at all. I was swamped with weddings as the class started and was late to get to my homework but I'm so glad I didn't skip it because there was a lot of things I learned about my business just in answering her questions. I believe there were homework assignments every single day and while some are quick others will take awhile. So my recommendation is to take this course in your off season and use that down time to really concentrate on doing the homework and putting together questions to ask during the weekly chats. I was not able to do that as much as I wanted because of my schedule and I feel I did myself a disservice by not taking full advantage of what was offered. As another reviewer stated there were a lot of basic questions that were asked like how to get proper exposure in an image, etc. If you aren't sure how to do that then this class is not for you. I believe this class is geared towards those who are past the portfolio building stage and are looking to set their business up for success on the back end while improving their craft. Remember to ask questions, keep a notebook and write them down while doing your homework. Don't focus so much on what she uses for everything but why she uses it, if you understand the why you can apply that better to your business vs just the what. Again I would say to properly allocate time to take this class, treat it like a college class with weekly homework and study required. Don't buy it to watch later as you will lose out on most of what this class is about which is access to Susan for questions and feedback. Do the homework, I found the questions she asked us to answer led to a lot of revelations for myself in my business. Her questions led me to ask my own questions and review a lot of historical data for my business to get a better grasp on where I am. Luckily for me I'm doing way better then I thought ;)! Also I recommend for image critique to not just submit your best images, while we all like a pat on the back that won't make you better. She requested a mix of your best and areas of struggle. The images I submitted that I was struggling with are the ones where her advice will improve my craft.

a Creativelive Student

I found this course helpful - but I also did all (well most) of the homework and I think to get the most out of this class you really need to be prepared to do the homework - which does require a reasonable time commitment. I found the business information (month 1) invaluable, and Susan was very, very active in the Facebook group, constantly answering our questions, which was great. Month 2 was a big image critique and I also found this very helpful. Month 3 was about editing and it was also a critique, which was helpful as well. Susan, Sandra (her assistant), Jen (her post production person) and CL worked very hard for us so we could get the best out of this course and I really feel I did get the most out of it that I could have gotten out of it. It is definitely worth it if you are willing to do the work. All of my questions were answered and I feel like my work is going to improve for the better now. If CL run any more mentorships such as this one, I would highly recommend them as I found I learned a lot more than in a regular class - because of the homework and the feedback (direct from Susan) on the homework. I am so glad that she was honest about my images because now I am seeing them in a new light (no pun intended).

Carissa

Susan, simply amazing photographer, amazing woman, amazing business woman! If you want your but kicked then this the course for you! A kick start for your 'business', awesome .. honest .... brutal.... critique.... don't take it personally.This is a course for beginners and for those been in business for 4 + years. I have been in business for 4 years and this helped me seriously start from the beginning again on the business side of things and fine tune my processes. I learnt so much.... but was also great to know I was on the right track. For those beginning - oh I wish I had this as a guide 4 years ago!!! Enjoy! worth every penny! cheers Carissa www.capture-t-moment.com

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Month 1, Week 4 (Sept 29-Oct 6) - Assignment Video

Month 1, Week 4 (Sept 29-Oct 6) - Assignment Video

Lesson Info

17. Month 1, Week 4 (Sept 29-Oct 6) - Assignment Video

Lessons

Mentorship: Introduction and Overview

Mentorship: Business and Marketing

Mentorship: Shooting & Post Production

Social Media Marketing

Google Analytics

Targeting Your Market with Social Media

Social Media Marketing Q&A

Common Issues and Problems

Student Questions and Critique Part 1

Student Questions and Critique Part 2

Month 1, Week 1 (Sept 8-14) - Assignment Video

Month 1, Week 1 (Sept 8-14) - Feedback & Weekly Review

Month 1, Week 2 (Sept 15-21) - Assignment Video

Month 1, Week 2 (Sept 15-21) - Feedback & Weekly Review

Month 1, Week 3 (Sept 22-28) - Assignment Video

Month 1, Week 3 (Sept 22-28) - Feedback & Weekly Review