There's a gas station that sells coffee right beside the Starbucks in my neighbourhood for 10 x cheaper. You can go a little more down the road to Costco and buy a big can of Folgers and make it at home for a few cents a cup. Yet everyday, at almost all hours, Starbucks is packed.

We need MORE unscripted John!! (Clapping at us). Love it!! Sharing real world experience.

Preach Bishop Branch IV!!! Amen...you said that. Drop the mic and walk away. Love it!

VALUE This is the key here. Value yourself and others will value you. I stopped myself chasing every single booking. They're not my people and that's OK. There are enough couples out there for everyone.

I feel so encouraged after this video. I'm in the middle of rebranding my wedding photography business, and think you shared some super useful advice for me.

Love it! More Tough Love from John. I totally agree with you on this. Photographers who think its pricing keeping them from booking, put themselves there, probably without even knowing it.

Good to hear that you agree on what I wrote on your video about "should you mention price". No, we don't get flooded with e-mails and calls. But the mails and calls we do get are never about the price. It's only about "are you available" and "when can we meet". Because they know the price, they know they're not on the fish market negotiating prices, they saw the price and like what we do so they want to book us. Period. Works great.

Just found you like 2 days and been binge watching your videos ! Started officially my couples & wedding photography business 👏🏽 excited to continue to learn more!

I know about small company here in Sweden that worked with climbing adventures. They used to have really cheap prices but had a hard time making a living from it, so they tried raising their prices. That didn't only lead to more income per visitor, but also MORE VISITORS! People obviously thought that the experience was going to be better when they saw a a price that wasn't "too low"

The most important thing is to understand the value of your product. I know photographers whose packages are pretty expensive but the quality and customer service isn't that great thus they struggle to be booked.

Love your video and very true about ourselves as wedding photographers. We will have cheap photographers and pricey photographers and both bring different services to the table. Cheap photographers tend to have less gears, less knowledge and simple editing style while pro photographers offer the best gears, best experiences and best editing style. I list all my packages as well as explanation on why i charge my rates. I'm giving the best to my clients and if they are serious about me, they will meet with me. My packages helps weed out the cheap clients too because I prefer not to deal with them and just refer them to beginner photographers too. Know your worth!

Ever since I raised my prices up to $375+, I never get a cold lead anymore. Every lead is a booked session. Before that, I would get messages all the time that would never go anywhere.

Thanks for the tough love

Always great points John! I think it’s also about having the right mindset and understanding what type of customer you are going for. Honda, Hyundai, all have a target audience as does Lamborghini and other high end luxury brand. We the business determine our customer, not the customer. We should never feel like we can’t walk away from a client not understanding the value we bring. Remember your worth guys and gals.

Raised my prices this year to over $1000 a package and used Honeybook as you suggested. Booked three weddings in about two months. Blew my mind. It works!!

I love it when a serious couple asks about my prices. They all end up spending more because I can educate them about the value of their wedding photography. The time wasters are a bit of a drag but their easy to spot. I just focus on the couples better suited to me.

So glad I came across your channel! Currently on my fourth straight video!

You can’t change the fact that younger or new photographers getting started. Happens in all industries. You have to change the perception of your business. It has been a journey for our company. We received a referral from a high-end hotel in our city. $10K wedding booked in two weeks. It is a patience game. Work on your brand and presentation and it will come.

Oh my god! I resonate with literally ALL of your videos, and am so grateful for the content you put out in helping photographers GROW, especially in the wedding industry. It is so insanely difficult to find free mentorship in starting a photography business, and you're really the only person that's out here giving us real deal advice and tips! Thanks for all of your content. You're the best!

Thank you. This is very helpful. I have been trying to build my team and raise our prices but I’ve been a little scared to really move to the next level

When I was a resort photographer the Texans would be on spring break and not give a crap about price. They just wanted the largest print to put over the mantle. “That’s the largest size you have?!” Then New Jersey spring break happened. Our boss straight up warned us. It was like flee market week. New Jersey housewives will try and nickel and dime you for everything. It was funny dealing with a different demographic every week.

Humbled in the bets way by this video haha, we need more unscripted videos like this holding us accountable. Thanks John!

4:29 Wow I'm not gonna lie you changed my mind on cheaper photographers! I gotta do better as a photographer and change my branding!

Increased my prices, put it on the website, using pic-time & flo-themes, and now I am getting almost none inquiries, but when, it's 80% a booking.

For a small country like Jamaica things are a bit different but the same in some instances.

The truth was spoken here today 👏🏾👏🏾

Love this! I would love a whole video on branding, marketing, social media, etc. I’m just starting out and need all the help☺️

Such a brilliant video, I’m definitely raising my prices in April and I’m not feeling bad about it. Not cause I’m rammed with enquires but because I’ve done quite a bit of work in 2021 for far too little and felt shitty about it. I know my skill and delivery is only improving, so my pricing should reflect that 🙌🏽 but unfortunately the majority of my client base are south Asian and wanting cheap prices is part of their DNA🥲. Trying to position myself the right way to attract the clients who will see the value and not question the price 👏🏽

Yeees! Louder for the people back there!

Thanks for this. Can I ask, have you done a video about HOW to get bookings/clients. Like... as I understand it there can be a snowball effect, you do a few, the recommendations come and so on, but for those working up to that snowball effect... how best do we go about things? Advertise? Optimise your google search for your website? etc etc. Have you done a vid about this stuff yet? Thanks again John, keep up the good work.

Can you make a video going over what we should put in packages.

Your the friend I always needed 🥺

Thanks for this video, a lot of great helpful points. I would also love to see a video about what important things you should discuss with a couple during their consultation when they're looking to hire you. Thanks!

Youuu ROCK! Jajjajaja I love those clappings…they help the information to get deep in my mind!! Like put your shi…together Marien!! Thanksss

Awesome video. Thank you! You just vocalised what I’ve been trying to explain to myself.

This is so good. Preach!

I love my Hyundai I30 Estate :D

Thank you so so much. Learned a lot and will be improving myself..

Love your channel mate

NC photographer here! What did you price your packages when you had a couple under your belt?

Well said JB

Agreed. There's a sweet spot though for most of us. First, your work has to be good enough. I'm sure it's like this nationwide, but in our area there are tons of wedding photographer wannabes. Many of them edit for dark and muddy or light and overexposed. Some apparently just shoot jpegs from a Canon Rebel with the kit lens. Those photographers will never be able to charge a higher price until they fix their foundational problems. And when you're starting, you need at least a little portfolio to show prospects. I've encourage several beginners to shoot anything they can find for free until they have some experience behind them (translation: made the common mistakes beginners make), and start to get the hang of things. There are clients who can't afford even the cheapest photographer and they won't complain very loud when you make a mistake while doing it for free. The trick is know when to flip the switch and working for pay. Then the question is how fast to raise your rates once you start charging. Even if you're doing good work, pricing yourself too low makes some clients skeptical of you. So not only can you still book clients if you raise your prices, you might actually book more depending on the old price you were at and your new rate while considering the quality of your work. I do occasionally see someone's work and their prices and think "You are killing it and giving it away!". Then on the opposite end of the spectrum, I know of at least one local photog who increased their prices significantly higher than most of our peers and it's hurt their bookings. This photographer does really nice work and is very experienced. They just went too far and too fast for the local market. There are too many great choices at $500-$1000 less. I raised my own prices a little this year but the biggest change I made was to eliminate all of the lower "packages". I was always arriving early and staying late for my benefit to make sure I had time to cover all the details before things really start happening and I never want to miss a send off even if they didn't book me to stay that late. I think down deep, most of us at some point have feared that we aren't good enough to charge more and in many cases that's not true. Thank you for the time you spend on your videos and sharing your experience with us.

These videos have lately been on point and what exactly I needed.

Ok, first off. You’re awesome. Subscribed. And these thoughts are some of the same ones I’ve had and how I’m pivoting. I’ve gone from cheap weddings 15 years ago (like $200 for a wedding day 😂) to now averaging $1800-$3000…and I’m still overbooked so I really feel like I need to go up to like $5k and higher. My question is about ad spend, getting the right customers to see your stuff if you’re trying to market through IG, Facebook etc. Do you typically put in your advertisement key words that may scare off price shoppers that way only luxury spenders are clicking on your stuff? Any tips on just how to get in front of those people without spending a fortune on price shoppers clicking ads etc would be helpful! Thanks so much in advance.

Man. I drive a Hyundai to Wal-Mart, consider myself an underpriced photographer, and work on a PC. I need to re-evaluate.

Thank u .....wat if they text and need a pricelist same time

I always agree with your advice and opinions but YOU YOURSELF said the price is based on experience and the average cost in the market... precisely therein lies the weakness of your argument since new photographers, amateurs, always they are going to kill prices and this is a big problem for experienced photographers, depending on the market and the local economy, clients will always look for the best price, even if this means lower quality, how many times have couples contacted me who rejected my quote and then they don't like the result that another photographer gave them and they ask me for help to try to improve those photos

PREACH!

People tell me I need to charge more for my work but I’m not fully booked out…. So I don’t think it’s time. I’ve got 12 weddings booked for 2023 And people always rag on the camera I use but not knowing that I use it and take stunning images lol.

It always comes down to clients understanding value, which isnt everyone. Im kinda slowly phasing out of lost cost weddings but its getting hard if people cant pay for photos in general. But overall, I agree with everything youre saying

Can we more behind the scenes :( they are awesome!!! I love them !!!

Hey John love the vids as always! I guess my questions are: how do you find the clients who understand your value and what should we provide as wedding photographers to justify that value?

I John, thanks for your content. Can I ask you which Squarespace template are you using? Also thanks for I discovered Pic-time and Aftershoot thanks to you. I'll give it a try this season

Holly molly! For Christ's sake! That's a blow in the face. Thanks for the advice. 🙏🏻

I was stuck at a lower price range than I wanted to be at and I did some major rebranding of my business and I'm gradually increasing the price. My problem is I'm still getting referrals from previous cheaper clients and I end up booking those instead of saying no. 🙃 How do you go about marketing when you can't rely on referrals? FB and Google ads?

JOHN! I love your videos and would appreciate an answer. How do you mount your camera to your strap?

Hi bro are you able to make a video about how to end a shoot wedding/engagement shoot etc. I feel so awkward and tend to do more time to shoot everytime I do some gigs T_T

real talk 100!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It’s very simple. It’s called the value equation. If your price is higher than your value you’ll have a tough time getting booked. If your price is lower than your value you’ll be booked often. Build value and communicate it. FYI it’s Por-Sha 😉

Excellent. In your opinion, can you come back from being a discount photog? Or once its up its stuck?

wOw! I have to increase my price :-)

Point to be noted.. it's well said..but the thing is here in India people have a different mindset..

Can you make a video on weather it's alright to take more than one booking for weddings on the same day. Pros and cons to it..

Do you think this applies for other industries like portraits and commercial photography?

Great!

One question though. How many weddings do you book at this price you're at now after raising and rasing throughout the years?

great video. Do you offer more than just an 8 hour option?

John i need ur reply quick man! U said u had no portfolio when starting on thumbtack so im wondering what happens if someone wants to see work i have already done? Thanks! Im getting a ton of leads but afraid to waste points

I feel so attacked right now 😂😋

I have to disagree with the apple remark. It nor customer service or quality. It's ostentation

Why are you always...right? lol

👀🍿

Pricing is totally lol… $1500 starting… nobody bats an eye.. $600 adjusted, the flood gates opened lol

Yassss

PREACH!