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Real Life Networking

We're moving on to leaving social networking, leaving the wet, leaving, hiding behind your computer, and now we're gonna go into real life networking. So keep Razi. I love him. He's got a block in a book called Never Eat Alone. And the whole idea behind that is that success in any field is about working with people like what we said before. Business is a human enterprise by humans. So as much as you thinking business, it's all about people. And so, whenever you can in your networking, try to get out into the real world and out from behind your A lot of it's just about showing up, you know, it is just about showing up. So, um, being generous with your time and your resource is means it's sort of the same thing about showing up. And if you're involved with your school saying and they need help in the classroom, do that, or if you know someone, if you can connect people together because someone is looking for a hairdresser and you know that person, you can connect them together. So I thin...

k what she's saying is this the clients will choose, like interest over skill every time because they at the end of the day, they want to be able to feel a connection and feel that can trust you, feel they're gonna get the products that you tell them that they're going to get. They're gonna have the experience that they wanna have. I mean, we all know that it's just as much about experience as it is about skill and about products. And if they even if you are the most fantastic photographer on the planet, if you make them feel bad or they have a negative experience with you, then the likelihood is that you won't be asked again or referred to their friends well. And the other thing is, it doesn't matter how many photographers air out there. It's people that year the go to photographer that they're going to. So what about the hairstylist example? There's just one hair stylist that all the moms and at my elementary school go to because everybody talks about it. And I was like, Hey, where did you get your hurt and the character in your life? So she's becoming a character in all of our story because we all know her. We all like her. We all go now. She also is a good hair stylist. So I'm saying that you need to work on your craft. You need to know what you're doing, but you also need to be known and be out there. So sorry, I'm It's a becoming a mom. So since we're talking about moms and moms, the great Mommy Network out there I remember when I became a mom, I had no idea. Like all the whole network of Mommy's is out there, his mom Unity. So read some of them off. When I want to hear well, like joining a Mummy and me play group getting involved in Mother's clubs. I loved that, like before elementary school. You're with this baby and you're feeling alone, like, What do I do? There's all kinds of stuff out there in the community. There's mothers, clubs, there's mother's groups. There's play groups, you can go to the playground, and there's all these people there. It's the playground, like I never had a reason to go to the playground before. So now I was there with my little Stoller, and as I get older and you get into elementary school, then you have other reasons to get involved with the community. If your child like sports, you can put him into very sports or daisies and brownies are helping out in the classroom. Chaperoning for field trips is one of my favorite going to the ballet and then even volunteering for school events like putting on the auction. Or there's always the p t. A. And I think when I started to get really overwhelmed with working with jewels at first I pulled out of all those things like, Oh, I don't have time. I can't help in the classroom anymore. Can't do this. And then I realized, What what am I doing like? This is the perfect way to get out there and and I genuinely knowing them and teaming up with people in your community and then finding support and finding people who like minded people and a little of what we were talking about earlier fostering the relationship. So these are just some of the ideas where you could use your mommy hood, and I know that not all moms, but even getting involved, even, like for me going to dog park metal hair cells that I was you know, like and other dog people. I think it's about just showing up, not always hiding behind your computer. Just and I think talking the life balance thing will help us with this part of it. But I'm curious to hear if there's other things that people discovered that they have been great. Resource is for connecting with other people like minded people or in particular, when you became a mom, what changed for you? What kind of things? In terms of your business and your network, the reason I went into business is because I mean, I I've always been a photographer. I've always been a hobbyist, but, um, you know, ever since I was a child, But, um, when I you know the experience of becoming a mom for the first time and wanting to capture your kids when they're tiny. And, you know, um, we were actually talking about it yesterday about how our kids are growing up with cameras in their faces. Their whole lives are documented, and that's gonna be super valuable when they're older. And, um, you know, um, it's just a passion for sharing that with other moms. I think, um, and that's it's kind of hat. When I when I had my daughter, it was that was kind of a huge wake up call for me. I was like, OK, I have something that I that I can share that people will appreciate. So, you know, it's ran with it. So and I think that happens to a lot of women. When they have Children, they decide they want to become a photographer because they want to document those Children or because they feel like owning their own business will give them freedom to spend time with their Children. Sometimes it doesn't always work out. The business starts to take over you. Yeah, but we can talk about that. I'm curious how having a child changed things were what it meant to other people. Do you have? Well, I think my story is exactly the same where it just changed my focus so much that, um what do you say, E? Oh, yeah. So, I mean, it just seems natural to move into photography because of that capture. You know, just like so with food I love to take have those moments to remember forever. So where the kids are food or whatever. It's like my saver, my way to savor. So I like that same. Everything's What are you Julie? How did having a child changed? Things are Well, I was a photographer before Children, so it's a little different. I worked in studios, Um, so as she she was are poor test subject for studios. Oh, new person will train you here, take a picture of the two year old. Let him go. So a lot of different. Not actually. I didn't shoot her for a very long time. I shot like a few things at home, but a lot of times I would have. It just seemed for her. It worked Better to not shoot my own child and get more things out of her than when she deal with me. So it was. I've got lots of pictures of other people and to see how they see her is always that interesting to me. Johnny, I would just have to agree with what you guys are saying because it's very, very much true that being involved in your community, especially in a small small I mean, you guys say small words. I'm small town and that's really big and I lead a daisy group and a daisy Girl Scout brownies, brownies on. That has been a really nice T b just to get to know people. And I actually working on taking pictures of one of my daisies. Little sister is that, you know, and and just being able Teoh have that relationship with the family beforehand. Then it just kind of was organic, and that was never something I sought out. Don't do Daisy Girl Scout so I can get clients, you know? So I think that that's very it's very true. And I guess I had never really thought about it that way. But, um, to be involved in your community is, is a is a big deal. And what about Dan? I know you have kids having kids changed things for you Or did they? It didn't drastically. I was a travel photographer for a company out of Portland, and I was really, like the lone wolf like 20 something. I had the job, you know, and I didn't want kids. I didn't want a family. And as it happens, you know, boy meets a girl in the family. But when I had my youngest, my youngest, who is now my oldest anyway. So I'm taking pictures of her and I got one specific frame that I remember. I still have it. And the magic in that frame just just the power in the emotion. Excuse me in that frame changed. All of a sudden. I didn't want to photograph landscapes I wanted. If I wanted a photograph that I wanted to capture that magic and give it to other people on that was it changed. It changed. What I did was excuse me. I was allowed to cry joys like I'm gonna get right now. Say, even especially, you know, I'll go back to your block post about It's really obvious that you're really invested in kids, and I think that that is your why, you know, wanting to give that magic back very much. Yes, so we have ah, lot of moms that are joining us online, but we have a lot of non bombs. So several people are asking if you could talk even further about some ideas for non moms in terms of getting a bold and I know me personally, I'm not a mom, but I'm an ant and So I have kind of tried to tap into my sisters network because she has three Children and ill and she also lives in same area. And I was photographing Children and so that that was a good way to go about it as well. Yeah, I wear to really talk about soon and because we're so close to our break, can we go to the next thing? And then we'll come back to that, Okay. How has having a child or Children changed my perspective and effective my career drastically In amazing ways, I was given a new perspective on my business. I could see it kind of the new set of eyes from the outside looking in as a mom. If this is a big deal, all of this is about my kids. Seen what? It's like. Teoh run after something they believe. I feel like I was fortunate and I had my twins. That's when I opened my first studio. I could be room mom. I can go to their things. I can be in everything that I want to be out of possibly can be at. I find that as a porter photographer who is focused in Children that being able to spend so much focus time with three very different Children has really enabled me to better get a larger variety of kids. In that respect, it's been really good for my career. Can we just have really fast? But I just want to recap what they said because I loved it so much. I like how Vicky says, and much like you just mentioned it gave her a totally new perspective on her career. He was a photographer before happened Children, right? And for Mira, she loved how she could show her Children essentially, like you could do whatever you want to dio. It gives them from write little notes down. She she likes each other, have I can run after what something that they believe in and how first era she really felt like having her own business allowed her more time to spend with her kids. And I think for me, what she's saying is like she can schedule her life in a way that she is available to attend things or be there for her kids and and in a way that maybe you couldn't do if you had a 9 to 5 and for Tamara. I love how, she says, because she has three totally different kind of kids that it really helped prepare her to shoot portrait sessions with, like any kind of Children. Her Children are really cool. She has two adopted Children and and biological yes, and how different they all are. And yet they're all so close. And I love that about what she said.