The Beginner Photography Podcast

The Secrets Behind Maximizing Mini Sessions for High Profits with Phillip Blume

• Raymond Hatfield

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#406 In this episode of the Beginner Photography Podcast, I had the pleasure of speaking with Phillip Blume, a talented photographer and entrepreneur who shares his incredible journey of taking his photography business on the road while traveling with his family. From leveraging mini sessions to rebranding and creating strategic partnerships, Phillip's insights will inspire you to think outside the box and find new opportunities for growth in your own photography business. Learn how to reset client expectations, maximize your mini session profits, and simplify your processes to achieve scalable success. Phillip's practical advice and actionable strategies will empower you to take your photography business to new heights. So listen in, take notes, and get ready to capture both stunning images and exceptional business results!

THE BIG IDEAS

  • Rethink Your Value: Focus on delivering a full-service experience, not just cheap photos. Clients value memorable connections and quality, even in short sessions.
  • Build Relationships Over Transactions: Meaningful connections with clients and local partners will sustain and grow your business beyond digital ads and quick sales.
  • Lean Into Simplicity: A clear, repeatable system makes booking and delivering mini sessions efficient and stress-free, leaving room for creativity and freedom.
  • Be Willing to Pivot: Embrace flexibility—whether in business strategy or personal life—to turn challenges into major opportunities for growth and adventure.

Resources:
Philip and Eileen Blume's Maximizing Mini session training - https://beginnerphotopod.com/mini

Sign up for your free CloudSpot Account today at www.DeliverPhotos.com

Connect with Raymond!


Thanks for listening & keep shooting!

Philip Blume:

When we began many sessions, we had just started our business advertising, only wedding shooting, only weddings. And we were booked up like crazy for the simple reason that we had charged so little. And so we were losing money and we were committed to shooting all these weddings and we were going to lose our business. So that first many sessions that we did was basically a moment of truth. We decided we obviously screwed things up trying to be creative and do things differently and sell cheap and instead go to pure business basics and build this mini session strategy just to see if it, if it works. And so that first mini sessions weekend that we did, it was a test case that paid off really well. We netted almost 10, 8, 500. And one weekend just shooting minis, not having to plan any weddings or deal with any mothers of the bride.

Raymond Hatfield:

Hey, welcome to episode 406 of the beginner photography podcast brought to you by Cloudspot. The easiest way to deliver and sell your photos online. I'm your host, Raymond Hadfield, and today we are chatting with wedding and family photographer Philip Bloom about how to travel the country in an Airstream with your family and have many sessions pay for it. Now, I know that sounds a bit sensationalized, but, no, really they, they did it to prove that it could be done. And Philip and Eileen are the masters of many sessions. I mean, even the Professional Photographers of America Association has invited them to travel and teach photographers all over the country about their many session strategy, because not only is it incredibly easy to follow, but because it is equally So with fall fast approaching, if you are considering offering many sessions, then you better grab your pen and paper and get ready to take a ton of notes today. Let's get into this interview with Philip Bloom. Philip, I want you to tell me about this amazing year long road trip that you took with your family.

Philip Blume:

Oh yeah. So the big adventure and we've just come back from it. And honestly, it's kind of like reverse culture shock. I'm still trying to process everything, and reintroduce myself into this life at home and in our, actually in our studio during the work week. It's a big, it's, it should be something I'm used to, but it's like a huge shift back because we were on the road for about 14 months. So a little over a year, we were full time with our three kids. just kind of an adventure that I had dreamed about my entire life, really. it was years in the making, in many ways. And, almost looked like it wouldn't happen. We were planning on taking this trip, right when COVID started was the original plan we had been building up to. And, things shifted, a lot of us have learned, if we didn't know before, we now have learned how you have to pivot sometimes in life. And so we, we didn't actually go right when we would have gone, but we kind of re we kind of salvaged our business. lot of like a lot of wedding photographers out there, a big portion of our work at the studio is weddings. so that was definitely we were busy all hands on deck for a couple of years. And then finally got, we didn't think we'd ever get out there, right? Because we put all our, all of our savings for the trip back into the business and kind of trying to pick it back up. and then we found some really creative ways that, even though we were, you know, it'll be a little while before we're back up to snuff from the losses of those two years. Weddings, what a lot of folks who are listening to us know is that the biggest income generator for our studio is surprisingly not these. 10, 000 high end weddings. We do our biggest income generator is actually little mini sessions. and so we were able to take that back, and kind of generate around our own system, the things that we teach, we just kind of pivoted and we just took that and transformed it to a business we could run while we traveled. And so we ended up doing that year long travel, with some work, it was definitely, definitely, we wanted to pigeonhole where the work took place because we wanted to be present with our kids and enjoy the adventure, spend weeks at a time in the national parks and be off grid, but between travel stints, we would just, make some strategic stops in different places and, have clients wherever we went. All across the nation. And that was thanks to many sessions. So yeah, we decide speaking at some of the conferences and things that we usually speak at. We just drove there in our air stream this time instead of flying. We'd make those stops along the map. And then in other towns, we'd stop and have many session weekends, which would be our portrait shooting along the way. So we learned, that you can really learn You don't have to have a location for your photography business after all, you can actually bring it with you. and it's, it's one of the beauties of what we do, I think is, is how flexible it can be. If you open your mind up to the possibilities,

Raymond Hatfield:

I am so excited not only to talk about the possibility of shooting on the road, because what you guys did was prove the concept that you could just travel all over the country, almost forever, and just keep shooting mini sessions and have that pay for it. But, I have to you got three kids, they're young kids, you went to a number of national parks, which one was your favorite?

Philip Blume:

Oh, Yosemite is heaven on earth as far as I'm concerned. and I've traveled a lot, so I'd say New Zealand and Yosemite, right here in the U. S. Are are just been on Earth and people who travel to national parks for fun will kind of recognize this probably. But what we learned going through so many national parks is that everyone has its own culture and its own flavor. Its and unique things. national parks are not all alike by any means. So you have like Acadia up in Maine, which is maybe my second favorite, but very different. Acadia is like the swanky bougie national park where you go and you have nice demanding hike and some beautiful views. But then you go down and get dressed for a lobster dinner at some beautiful little town, that the National Park is built right around, and watch sailboats. And so there's that. And then there's Yosemite, which is. captures my heart. It's more of a, kind of, it has a really neat culture. The people who are in there want to be there. No one was really pulled there. Just like, at Yellowstone, you can pull in and there's some tourist friendly boardwalks where you can look at the buffalo and people just drive through in the millions. Yosemite. It can be a busy park at times, but you pass through the gate and you still have two or three hours to drive before you get to the actual valley of the park where everything, to do is, so, you know, picture Half Dome and El Capitan and all these big granite faces that climbers are, are climbing at night, you go out there and it looks like the sky just bleeds into the mountain because there's stars and then there's speckles of light all over the granite where, climbers are like camped out with their headlamps on, hanging from hammocks. And then the people who are there are like kind of living there and, facing huge challenges and living in these rustic camps that have been there since, almost 200 years ago, they haven't changed much. so it's just this gorgeous, pristine place. And, everyone's there. Everyone there is kind of pursuing health and adventure. And it's really exciting.

Raymond Hatfield:

Had you ever been before?

Philip Blume:

I have, I went with my dad before, and kind of a father son bonding trip just a few years ago. And that's when I knew I had to take the family back. That was the big goal. As we, even as we've traveled across the country, every hike we did, I told, we told our kids, listen, this is a hard hike, but this is nothing compared to. To the half, to the top of Half Dome . And so this is just training and sure enough, I mean it was amazing that our kids were the ages. They were, I'm glad it took us two years extra to, to take this trip 'cause they were so much more capable, after those two years. And sure enough, they hiked. And one day in that entire, like, 17 mile hike, up and down, to the top of Half Dome. And our feet were blistered, but, we did it. It was quite an experience.

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh my gosh, you took the kids to the top of Half Dome. I had been in 8th grade. I went in 7th and 8th grade for a, uh, field trip. We had, it was a week long field trip. It was amazing. and shout out, I don't know if he's listening, but, our site coordinator, Dave, who went by Psycho Dave, was probably the coolest person I had ever met in my life up until this point because, I had always, you know, just, we lived in a neighborhood, a suburb, it was very new. Suburban, you know, and then to go down there and to meet this guy who, who, to me, I don't think I'd ever met somebody, even still to this day, who was as connected to nature as he was, and being able to see all the things that he could describe and point out the things that he saw that I never would have seen, was such an amazing experience, and, I look forward to going back one day, but I remember looking at the top of Half Dome and thinking to myself, I, I have no idea how people get up there like that is insane and to hear that the kids did it that is such a such a cool thing and I can't imagine what it is he

Philip Blume:

sounds like a great guy just the way he introduced that to you and you I'm mind blown so Indiana were you in Indiana as a kid and schools would take a field trip out to

Raymond Hatfield:

no no no no I grew up only about 45 minutes north of San Francisco so I had lived there so you were in

Philip Blume:

California man jealous Indiana was It was awesome.

Raymond Hatfield:

It was amazing. And you know what's crazy? Is that I still think I remember going to like the Redwoods, like the Sequoia forest, you know, as a kid, I never went there again after that. And now that I'm an adult and like, I live so far away, I think to myself, why did I not go there more often? That place was so amazing. Well, now

Philip Blume:

you have kids. You have an ex. You have an opportunity to share that with them, put it in, even if it's been in your mind this whole time, that was valued to you. Now you got to pass that on. That's awesome.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah. Yeah. We, we've got to go at some point. We've got to go. But, I know, last year, we took a trip to, for the first time ever, we took a month off of work. My wife was a, uh, she is a nurse, but she had so much. She worked so many extra shifts during COVID that like, she had some extra money and we're like, we're going to spend a month in Laguna Beach. So we went out to California and I remember thinking to myself, Hey, this would be great. If we could do this and travel to like all these different locations, like throughout the year and still make work happen. And I know that you guys are wedding and portrait photographers, but having not lived in, I wasn't a native to Laguna Beach. I didn't know, where the places were. I didn't know who the people were. I wasn't connected to that community. I want to know, how did you guys make it work while you were traveling? Is it just through your email list that you had that you would connect people? Or were you running some Facebook ads? How did you get in front of these people who wanted mini sessions?

Philip Blume:

Yeah, no, um, the, we have this awesome community online, our photographer community. And so we, you know, Eileen to Eileen, I mean, the most important thing in life is relationships. So we definitely had. you know, folks who are just part of our community started out that way, and we have become really connected, and we've seen each other through different hard times in our businesses and good times, and so that list, I would say was, was important because we got to visit and meet in person for the first time, a lot of the people who we love who are in our community on Facebook and in our email list. So it was just like real relationships and to me, it's just an affirmation that, that part of that community that we've had for so many years is more than just like a piece of our work. it has become something real between people. so being able to visit people, in their territory and and see it all was awesome. And that was part of our, our work. Many times was we would take a. friend like that, or even just personal friends we have outside the photographer world, and, we would kind of, allow that opportunity, to them to be a host for our many sessions event. Now, we wouldn't do a whole huge event. to the scale that we would back here at home where we have, kind of a presence and a client base that has built up over successive years, we would just want to keep it smaller because we really wanted to spend most of our time just hanging out with friends and catching up. so if they were into this idea, then what we basically offered them, was, the closest analogy I can just kind of spit ball is, is a Tupperware party, right? Hey, listen, and this is something we did for our friends, whether or not, they hosted, but we would love to, we'd love to take some portraits of you and your family, just as a gift, you know, you're hosting us, you're allowing us to park our air stream in your driveway or your farm. And we're going to love this like three or four days that we have with you to, to, our families to connect. but we want to take like 20 minutes of one day and photograph your family just, and it's a gift, right? just to thank you for that. And so there's, there's no, no, uh, kind of carrot or anything related to that. It was just a gift between friends. and they would have, you know, we'd give the digital images to them as. 100 percent just, a thank you. But then if they wanted to have, like the artwork, the prints, the coffee table books, and, we would love to do all of that for them without costing them anything. So he said, say, Hey, if you want to host mini sessions. Party at your house when one day that we're with you. maybe, you know, we have all that. We have the emails. We have the kind of the process. We have all the information. You can just send it out to your friends list and see if anybody wants to join the party. And the benefit would be that for anyone who joins in and would like to have their portraits done during this time. you're going to get a part of that. Basically part of that goes toward you. getting free artwork for yourself. and so it's, it's amazing how that works in the Tupperware party world, which took a product, you know, back in the 1950s, plastic food containers. And it, um, those were originally offered in big retail stores and, you know, your riches and Macy's of the day and pretty, they were selling fine, but pretty soon they changed their business model at Tupperware. And it was so profitable that they took their product out of all of those big department stores and just sold through Tupperware parties is what made them a global phenomenon. Because you have friends who come as really an excuse to get together and enjoy your neighbors. But also people want to partake in something that they know is helping their friends. So just the knowledge that, oh, when I'm getting artwork, my friend's also getting earning free artwork, that's special to them. But there's also, promotions and things that we can offer to them for this special time that we're in town. If, if they wouldn't normally have a great local photographer who they could trust. It's an exciting opportunity for them as well to have that kind of portrait made with their family, that experience. So it's just kind of all around fun and people are able to just come in and grab some refreshments. That's the only thing that we really asked of our host was, Hey, if you'll, if you'll provide some refreshments. We even have a budget for that. So we'll help, produce that, but just invite your friends and we'll, and we'll, you'll be able to just chat and hang out. People can drop in or stay the whole time. We'll just make it a lot of fun. And we'll, we like meeting the friends of our friends anyway. So very personal, very personable touch. And it allowed us to, without talking about all the details, cause I know we've talked about it before in our, in our other, discussion together. And so I hope people will check all that out. But, just all of those elements that go into an impactful high profit, many sessions day, still play out and they still are effective and allowed us to take basically like you're describing. Raymond was, earn a lot of money. and people are happy to pay it because of what they're getting in return. And then, um, And as a result of each one of those moments, take a lot of time off. And you know, the next couple of weeks we'll be in Yosemite or somewhere like that.

Raymond Hatfield:

Wow. This sounds, almost too good to be true. And, it's funny because, when I talk or hear from listeners about mini sessions, there's always, it goes one of two ways. They're either really excited to get started in mini sessions or they've done many sessions and now they hate them because it's so much work for very little money. So it's a

Philip Blume:

huge amount of work. Yeah, especially on the front end,

Raymond Hatfield:

of course so to have somebody like you who is not only accomplished but has a proven track record for making many sessions work. I gotta know like how do you make them work? Like, what is it that you're doing different that, that so many others aren't doing when you go on Instagram and see how many sessions, you know, 20 minutes for a hundred bucks, you know, how is what you're doing in many sessions different to be successful?

Philip Blume:

Yeah. I mean, there's, there's a lot of little detail things, but the overall thing that makes it different is just, most of us, 99%. when I see photographers across the world doing many sessions, it always looks the same. It is always undersold. so most of us think of many sessions as one thing. And one thing only really is that they're a kind of a promo for our business just to get our name out there. And so we hope that, it's, you know, we will generally charge more for our full length portrait. So we'll charge for our wedding packages. but we just This is a slow season and we're willing to sacrifice and, and do, kind of a lot of extra work for no real money, as long as it kind of gets our name out there, because we're so desperate for leads. And so all we're really looking for with traditional mini sessions is, we end up charging very little amount. And we, that's the only strategy that maybe at the time we have in our mind that we've heard, if we charge less, maybe we can get people in because we're so concerned that our, our prices are too high and that's why we're struggling. That's rarely the case. that's, that's almost never the case. but our, prices, it's this one time that we're going to give, give everything away. And what that does is, yeah, maybe, I mean, maybe it kind of allows you to connect with a bunch of people who are looking for cheap photography, but none of those are qualified or ideal leads who actually want coming back to your business because they come back if they do with the expectation that everything's going to be as cheap as your mini session was, so we're kind of undercutting our business, undercutting our brand when we do many sessions and we're underselling ourselves with the session itself because we're not making profit on it, the time and the effort that's put into it, If you make anything at all, it is, basically less than minimum wage. Usually you're losing. So instead when we do mini sessions, and this, this sounds like it sounds like this would completely destroy the point of the earlier mini sessions we were discussing, but I'll show you why it's different. And when we, when we do mini sessions. It is a smaller, kind of, barrier to cross in terms of the session fee, right? Because our normal portrait session fee starts at 300 for a full length portrait session, right? But for a mini session, 100 instead. So yeah, it's a little bit of a smaller barrier to cross for a potential client. Who wants to risk less on trying a new photographer, but it's not just free or cheap, right? So there's that, but that is only the session. It really is a full experience. so they're going to have an experience with us. That is full service, that represents our brand that doesn't undercut it. and there, there are many elements of that. but part of that is going to be walking them through the process of ordering prints and artwork, and digitals are available as well. But all of these things are sold separately. It's not just some downloads that you get with your mini session and then move over. We need to work with the next client now. No, it's a real hands on approach where they're getting to know how our business runs as a full service studio. and if they come back, it's going to be that they have correct expectations about what we do. so, the, kind of the, the question is, okay, great, so you have these mini sessions that are, you know, in our case, I think we are currently averaging about 1400 to 1, 500 of income per 20 minute mini session that we shoot. and that's, that's great. Our, students, generally start out at around 800, like not to oversell expectations, usually about seven to 800. per many session is the average that a lot of our students who are starting this process aren't there's a heck of a lot more than a 100

Raymond Hatfield:

and,

Philip Blume:

and the nice thing about it is, yes, there's extra work involved. but it's, it's work. It's a process that is packaged. That is, basically you think of it as like a franchise process, right? Why does why when they put into McDonald's, does it pretty much always. continue to do business and survive, whereas like no name hamburger place pops up and then you see it go out of business three months later, it's because franchises succeed about 90 percent 90 something percent of the time franchises succeed, whereas small mom and pop businesses fail within their first three years, about 80 something 90 percent of the time. So the difference is simply that there's a system that even though there's a lot of service being done for the client. becomes very little work because it's just automations and it's repetitive motions that we as business owners put in place. so we're not having to go through that whole process fresh every time. it's on autopilot to a degree, and you're able to because it's a mini session, it's much easier to sell, the idea to someone. clients tend to actually prefer go figure, especially families with small Children and impatient husbands. they actually tend to pervert prefer when you can deliver quickly and efficiently. they only need a few portraits to put on their walls. You know, they're gonna pay 2, 000 for some nice big portraits or for a coffee table. But they don't need 200 images. They certainly don't need you to add an extra hour. So that there's their sessions now 2. hours long. No, God, that's not what they want. They're begging you. Please don't do that. So there are other things we can offer people that, Yeah. Are actually more in touch with what the client needs. Now I'm in it to our advantage. We're able to stack those back to back. And just book the days we want. It's not like you can book a mini session any day you want, in most cases. Um, instead it's like, you know, ten sessions back to back today, and then I'm taking off the rest of the week or the month, you know, depending on how well they're doing for you.

Raymond Hatfield:

One, I appreciate you breaking that down because it sounds like the way that everybody starts off with mini sessions, trying to get into mini sessions, is to give people like a taste test, hoping that they come back. For a full session, which is

Philip Blume:

great, and it should be that, but you don't want to give them the wrong flavor if they're looking for that taste.

Raymond Hatfield:

Ah, you don't want to give them the wrong flavor. That's perfect. Yeah. So, I mean, I find that typically, I mean, maybe you have more insight shooting more families than I do, which is, I think, three, but, typically when a family gets photos done, They're not going to come back for another year, possibly two. So when we come in at it as like, here's a taste test, book me for my full session. By the time they're ready for a full session, say a year or two later, your pricing could be entirely different. Your style could be entirely different. You could be an entirely different photographer that now no longer connects to this family. So now you're, you're ruining your client base that you put in all that work for very little money. To do these mini sessions and the way that you guys are doing it is not hey, here's like a taste test But it's it's almost just like mini as in time We're gonna get all the photos that you need within that time But unfortunately, I think I think the disconnect is that because they have the same name People are looking at them as they're the exact same product. Do you find that there's some sort of disconnect with your families as well when you explain the process to them.

Philip Blume:

That's a great question And that you know, that's one where So many things, Eileen and I will say, like, there's not a right and a wrong answer. It's a matter of actually, sitting down with our students. Talking through rationale behind things and deciding what, what works well for your brand and your, your market. we have used many sessions. We've used that term. It's actually the term we use. and it, and it has worked well for us. I can go through some reasons why I think specifically it works well for us and in our market. and it's usually when the client inquires. It's not exactly what they expected, but I will tell you, we do a really good job of resetting expectations and making the value pitch. So you have to learn how to do a good value pitch. And if you can express the value of what you're providing, it doesn't really matter if someone came to you with a certain something in mind. If you can show them something new and help them to feel that that's valuable, then they'll pay for it what it's worth. Anyway, that's not easy to do. And it's a process that can be taught. but there are other markets and we have students who have simply changed the branding on their, what we call maximized mini sessions. but when they do their maximized mini sessions, so they're doing many sessions the right way, through this strategy, then they'll call them something like. Petite sessions, you know, you say it with an accent and it sounds a little more luxury. Um, so the, there are studios who are using our system who are just calling them petite sessions or boutique minis or qualifying it. So even the word of, on the front end, when people, in your market hear it for the first time, they kind of know it's something different. In our case, we don't mind if, if they think it's the same old thing they're used to, we're going to educate them after we touch base and then we feel it works well on doing it on that back end. but yeah, totally, totally, you can rebrand it a little bit to make it sound a little sweeter.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah. I know that you guys got into these mini sessions, after you had been shooting weddings for a number of years. So you guys had a, a client base. You had, clients who knew. Like and trusted you so that when you did introduce these, it was almost a easy yes, right? Like, oh, we love Philip and Eileen. Of course, we're going to do this. This sounds wonderful. Is it possible to start off a business? Is it possible to like kickstart your business with many sessions without, a large previous client list?

Philip Blume:

Yeah, and I'll, I'll actually just kind of add a little context to what you're saying. We had started our business already, but when we began many sessions, it wasn't well into a well established business. It was after just, just over a year, we had just started our business, advertising only weddings, shooting only weddings, and we were booked up like crazy for the simple reason that we had charged so little. And so we were losing money and we were committed to shooting all these weddings and we were. we realized we had put ourselves painted ourselves into a corner and we were going to lose our business. while still trying to make good on all these commitments and act pleasant and peppy about it. It was a very stressful time in our lives. and we would have lost more than just our business. you know, our home and, lots of other things were in question. so we were kind of in the midst of turmoil hanging on the edge of that cliff. And we hadn't really, we had a lot of clients who had just booked us, but we haven't had anyone who had gone through a full experience with us or had a reason to book us for something new. We haven't even completed their weddings yet. so yeah, for us, it really was jumpstarting a business with debt. and so that first many sessions that we did. it was basically a moment of truth. We decided we obviously screwed things up trying to be creative and do things differently and sell cheap. and instead we're going to go back to Eileen's business degree and actually trust in some of the stuff that she learned. and go to pure business basics and build this mini session strategy just to see if it, if it works, it's a test case. And so that first mini sessions weekend that we did, it was a test case. That paid off really well. So we, we earned, we netted, almost 10, 000, I think it was 8, 500, in one weekend, just shooting minis with not having to plan any weddings or deal with any mothers of the bride, and it was done in a day and it was over ostensibly. and so that, that completely transformed our thinking. And we, of course, it was. Also took a lot of those business tactics and then added those to our wedding business, which has now become, you know, like 10, 000 wedding packages and that sort of thing. So it, it paid off when we applied it to the wedding business, but even over time we have remained, we prefer the mini session side because it's, it gives us our weekends. It's a lower stress kind of business. It's not stretched out over a year. It's not this huge. This huge routine that you have to go through to try to book someone for 10, 000. That's a high wall to get someone over. You can do it, but you have to really build trust before you've done anything for them. With many sessions, you can book them pretty easily. And then payments are made only for artwork. So all of our profit comes through prints and things that are ordered. For people who already see their pictures and love them. You don't have to convince them of anything. So there's definitely, definitely, I would say more often we're using the strategy to help photographers jumpstart new businesses, or even just stagnant classed businesses that should have had that jolt a long time ago. And it's finally time.

Raymond Hatfield:

Wow. So, you sung the praises so highly. I have to ask, why do you guys still shoot weddings?

Philip Blume:

Well, I mean, weddings are, we shoot a few weddings. and to be honest, to be just 100 percent transparent about it, I would probably stop shooting weddings. happily at this point, we've been doing it for 16 years. and I would retire, but we shoot just about five weddings a year, and I do that to keep myself sharp because we're teaching wedding photography to students. And so I've got a, I feel like we have to be in the game. We have to know what's new. We have to know what the trends are and what the clients are like nowadays. And so we're shooting just five. And then we have our associates. So we've grown our business to have photographers who are out there shooting weddings for our studio. under our name. and we just have the process running. So that's a very easy way to scale our studio, and earn more without having to be the wedding photographers. and so who we're shooting now, mostly our family, you know, when we're local, like we've just gotten back from a year away, but when we shoot our families locally, it really is families who we've been shooting for years and years because they love the mini session experience so much. That they come back either for a mini or for a portrait full session. We could care less either way. They end up buying the same amount of artwork. they come back for what suits them and serves them well, year after year. And we watch families grow. And, it's often families that our kids play with, their kids, and that sort of thing. So it's pretty cool.

Raymond Hatfield:

That is so cool to see families grow up in front of you. know that, I think you've shared examples of how, like, you shot a couple's wedding, and then they had kids, and now these kids are getting older, and you're still, you're still shooting them.

Philip Blume:

You didn't have to go there, Raymond. You didn't have to go there. Are you gonna start tearing

Raymond Hatfield:

up? Is that it?

Philip Blume:

No, I got some gray in the beard. Now I just turned 40 this week. Hey, congratulations. So thank you. Hey, I'm feeling good about it. I'm training for a marathon. 40 is going to be good, but, it really was funny because before we started our studio, I taught high school. And one of my, I taught senior, juniors and seniors. So my students were already not that much younger than I. and, and then one of my students got married really young. So, like, two years out of teaching high school, I was shooting the wedding for one of my students. Wow. And nowadays, nowadays it makes me feel really old because we have babies who we photographed, like newborn sessions and family portraits when they're toddlers. And now they're engaged, so yeah, it's, uh, or I should say, like some of the kids, some of the kids are now getting married, but some of the ones who are babies are like now seniors in high school, senior portraits, uh, it's just amazing to see all that, and it feels horrible.

Raymond Hatfield:

I will, I will relate to you, obviously not in the same, in the same sense, but, my wife and I watch, Big Brother. it's just one of those fun shows that we watch to, just kind of relax. And last, they just introduced a, a new competition that they hadn't had in 18 years or something. And people were all excited about it. And one of the contestants on the show was like, that competition happened when I was two years old and I did the math. And I was like, I was out of high school by that point. Like, oh my gosh, like here's this kid. I was looking at him and I thought like, we're the same. Like we relate. We're the same. No, he was still in diapers as I was, driving off to film school, which is crazy to think about, but, uh, I love being able to see the people, obviously, like you said, like in front of you, like get them in front of your camera and be able to relate to them. that's one of the things that I love most about photography is that you can build community around this camera and that it's not just, hey, sales, sales, sales, sales all the time. and that is wonderful, but, I want to go back to the, sales process, I suppose, of the minis, right? So, I guess first, how do you market these minis? Because everybody who's listening thinks to themselves, if, if they haven't started a business, if they're not new to this, or I'm sorry, if they are new to this, we either post about it on Instagram to our, 318 followers, we post about it on Facebook and it gets seven, a reach of seven. and maybe I'll tell my friends at work, like, and that's it. And if it doesn't completely sell out, well, then maybe I should just give up on photography completely. So, so from your perspective, as somebody who's done it, as somebody who's experienced, how do you market these minis so that they are successful?

Philip Blume:

Yeah, that's a great question. So assumptions, um, kind of false assumptions, but very common misconceptions are that it's all through Facebook ads. And I think that's just because it feels to us like that's something easy we can hide behind it. There must be a technological answer. Surely, if I listen to enough webinars and learn how to hack the algorithm, then all these things like we just we and a lot of us, although we're creative or artists, a lot of us photographers we find after just working with hundreds of photographers over many years, that we're not all necessarily extroverts. so going out there and doing the work of marketing the work of a real business that is intimidating. you know, naturally. So. but really it has to be done and it, it feels a lot better doing it when you're at least know what the process is, understand why it makes sense and you can have some confidence in it. And then if you can go out there into your community and market in that way confidently, it's not quite as intimidating anymore, but I will say that grassroots, the beautiful thing about that kind of marketing, that classic marketing is that it will always work. It always has worked. People communicating with people. and you don't have to constantly learn the new thing that Google's looking for in their SEO or the new thing that Facebook added to their ads manager. so I'm, I've just started brainstorming to write what will be my first book, called simpler. My whole life is about, simplicity. My, what my values are all kind of around, peace and, taking things out of your life that get in the way and just ruminating on the good stuff. and so that was a big part of our trip this year, the way we lived off grid. And it's certainly part of our business. So we, almost all of our students come into maximizing mini session into the course, like asking about Facebook ads. And I know how to run them basically. I know where they're applicable. We'll use them when we're advertising like an online product or something, but it's not really the best thing for services and local communities. The best thing instead is, think of what we described before with the travel sessions. I didn't have a list in any of those towns that we started in, that we stopped along to do many sessions. I hadn't built a business there. I didn't have, I never shot a wedding there or have past clients to reach out to. I tapped into someone else's network. I was able to, to offer value to one person. And in turn, they exchanged for me the value of their network. And you can do that all over the place. You can also do that at home. And so a big part of marketing for us is building strategic partnerships, with local businesses and local families. And for each one of those types of relationships, we have a different value add that we can offer that contact that one person we know and exchange for them inviting other people they know into the process. And so it really can compound over a short period of time and grow, grow your list of contacts. Ultimately, when you have that huge list of contacts, whether you directly have them sitting in front of you and you can click send and email all of them. A strategic set of email, advertisements or a strategic set of email, announcements about your upcoming sessions, whether it's that, or whether it's getting someone else to do it for you to their networks, that ultimately is what is the most impactful, for scheduling for selling any kind of service based, offer, I believe, because ultimately people will trust. That third party over. They'll trust you saying, Hey, I'm an awesome photographer. You should hire me. They'll always trust somebody else who says, Hey, I would like to invite you to use that power for because I trust them. Then that trust is transferred. So it's really the way that we try to run every part of our business.

Raymond Hatfield:

What I love about that is that, you acknowledge how everybody wants to get into Facebook ads because that seems like the easiest. It's, you just set up these things and you're like, Hey, look, that may work for you, but there's nothing like building a relationship with somebody else, either in your community or in your business community. And what stinks? Is that a lot of people aren't going to do it because that takes a lot of work, a lot of work. And

Philip Blume:

it, well, it sounds like it takes a lot of work and it takes some work, but, the beauty of it is that you are actually, once you start it, you find you reap benefit, you reap real life relational value, just becomes like, Quality of life for you. You just meet people and your life improves. It has nothing to do with business, in all sorts of ways. But then beyond that, which is kind of hard to describe. But once you, once you experience that, you know what I'm talking about is it's worthwhile. But besides that, it's not actually that much work. It's not like you're going out pretending to be someone's friend. That's often the false assumption. I have to go out there and like, take them out to dinner and pretend to be their friends. So they'll hopefully send me work. It's really not that at all. It's just simply having a solid value offer that you offer them. And it's, it's very much like a, you know, the essential example is a lead gift, like you're going to get this gift when you send leads to us, it can be as simple as that. So it's really just a process that you set up and you let it run and it can be pretty easy.

Raymond Hatfield:

Well, what also is great about that is that obviously as you have said from your own life experience, it's not as hard as people think, but because I think there's still that high perceived, pain of it being hard. So few people are going to do it, which means. That's just a better opportunity for those who leave the market to you, if you're willing, leaves the market to you, if you're willing, that is going to be my quote of the episode. It leaves the market to you. If you're willing, that is perfect. So short, so sweet. okay. So let's, let's move on then to the sales part of it, because we as photographers, we know how to shoot. you told us how we market and get people in front of the camera. That's great. Now let's lead to the sales part of it, because as you mentioned, it's only say a hundred dollars to book your session. How are you getting 1, 400 averages? You're obviously selling product after the fact. Are you saying, hey, mini session, 100, come have fun and then afterwards being like, oh, by the way, here's all this very expensive, you know, quote, unquote, artwork that you need or how are your clients, open to seeing the prices and, then purchasing them. I feel like that was a very roundabout question and I apologize.

Philip Blume:

I know I get 100%. Be very careful. Be very careful not to even accidentally. Do that, like, wait, you know, and this is our, this was my tendency at the beginning of our business was, I know if I state anything about, like, I, at this point in my life, cannot afford to order a canvas photo that this at this price, and then we project as humans, we tend to project and assume that what's true for us is true for everyone. It's not, it's not the case. Part of what you have to know is how to identify not only your market and what you believe or assume about your local market, but to find sub markets within that. And there's, you're always going to be able to find some sub market of people who are, have a different experience than you. Maybe like they can't afford it and they do value it. You can always say my market doesn't value photography. You don't know every person find the sub market. There is a group of people who, who appreciates and values photography and will pay for it. learn how to find those people that you only need a very small number a year. You don't want to serve your whole city. You don't want to serve 500, 000 people. You want to serve that small group. So you identify them first, of course, your market to them through your partners, your local relationships. and then this is where you have to be careful. painstakingly and very clearly paint out the process and what it is you do as, as a full service studio, what the prices are ahead of time, what special offers will be ahead of time. and how the process will look at how will they even make those purchases? Let them know that it's completely open and optional. There's no, in our case, in our studio, there's no minimum purchase requirement or any of these punitive kind of strategies. We get rid of all punitive strategies. I feel that's very important in any business. And we, we have, strategies that reward people for good behavior. So if they ordered the most popular items, the items that we want to see sold that give us higher profit margins, then there's benefits to them. There's further promotions, there's further opportunities to save, things like that, that are rewards. And so, we make all that clear before someone books us. They inquire, we walk them through this process, and then it's like, if if we have made the value propositions strongly enough, you see the value in this. You weren't even thinking about physical artwork before, but you know, you're going to have to have some. You're not just going to keep them digitally all the time. Now we've introduced you to that idea. Do you see the value? Great. Well, now you can book, you know, click to confirm if you want to book now. So everyone who books. ultimately has already signed up for this and we're not going to let them down. Not only are we going to stay true to the pricing, they know all that, but they're going to actually have lots of pleasant surprises along the way. Not any unpleasant surprises. So prices are known, but special favors, special promotions, the way that we serve them, if they come physically into the studio, is going to be beyond their imagination when they show up to the session. Because a lot of our photographers don't do in person sales, by the way, we do much fewer in person sales now than we used to. We do most of them through a quick mini sessions. It's about a 15 minute zoom meeting, everything's set up. so we love it when people come to the studio, we treat them really well, but most of that's just over zoom. So what becomes very important is at session itself, how unexpectedly well they're treated. And that could just be as simple as setting up a little base camp where your clients come in and they're not just in front of your camera getting hot. they have a base camp where they can sit down. There's cold waters. There's places to charge their phone. There's a whole experience. that usually as the dad of the family, you know, first time family, the dad comes up and his eyes get big when he sees this little set up and he's like, oh, you guys are real photographers. And we realized it's probably the first time he's ever experienced being photographed by someone who gives customer service a lot of attention rather than just someone with a camera who would like, you know, hopes that their artwork will be good enough to get them paid. it's more than that. You're running a business, not just being an artist.

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh, isn't that funny? You haven't even pulled up the camera yet and somebody says, Oh, you're a real photographer. You're a real photographer. Just from the service that you're getting. Wow. That is incredible. So you go through, this meeting, this in person or this Zoom meeting and you present some products and then that's their opportunity to purchase if they would like. It sounds like, as you said, there's no sales minimum. They choose what they want and then you deliver it and then they're happy. And then that's it. Is that right? Am I missing anything?

Philip Blume:

That's it. I mean, there's delivery is the last part you mentioned, and that's essential. You can make that easy on yourself hard on yourself, depending on how important your brand is to you. Literally, all these things can just be ordered and shipped directly to people's homes. The labs we use, we recommend, like custom wrap it so it's on brand for us instead of it's looking like it's coming from the lab. It looks like it's coming from us and very boutique, and we never touch any of that. or if you, if you want to, if you're real big on your physical studio, then you can, of course, have it shipped to you and package it up all beautifully in your brand and have people pick it up. I'm at the door, but it can really be very low key. And I always encourage people to understand that, deal with that stuff down the road, if you want to make it more hands on, but in the meantime, you can set all of this up. And basically it never even passes through your hands. There's some really trustworthy labs who take care of all of that for us.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah, for sure. I have used similar services to have photos sent directly to clients and I'll get a text that says, Wow, thank you so much. Like, this looks beautiful. And I'm like, I didn't even know it shipped. I'm like, that's such a good feeling to not have to worry about one more thing and coordinate a time for somebody to come and pick it up. But as we come to a close here, I want to know because a number A number of photographers, a large number of photographers has gone through, your course, maximizing many sessions. I want to know. Where do you think the biggest shift happens for them? Because when they come in, they obviously have a pain point, and when they leave, they're a different person. Where do you think that happens?

Philip Blume:

Yeah, I mean we first started teaching maximizing mini sessions, so I was teaching this system, and we just like offered all of our documents and kind of our process in a box. It was on a CD. And it was like a 400 CD with our documents and things on it. And I think an audio file where you can listen to me talk about the general idea. That was back in 2012, 2013 maybe. And now the course, you know, we just, we've, our lives have been about this, and about coaching students kind of using this process as a method to do that ever since then. So now the student enters into our course. If they're doing the full fledged course with us, it's like a something they have lifetime access to. It's kind of like our franchise in a box. And what they come in, I think, with is just the intimidation of, oh, I've got to hire three or four people to put all of this together and I need someone who's doing a scheduling and all that. And we show them ways to do that more on auto autopilot. And what you get to is a point where it's fear that prevents you from taking action and then you get confidence in. I forget who said the quote, but I've always loved it. Simplicity exists on the other side of complexity. There's always a hundred thousand details on something that works. Well, a good motor, whatever it is, there's complexity in there, but you get it all together in one place and it works. And all of a sudden everything becomes simple. And so I think that's really what drives the success that a lot of photographers are having changing their businesses around this many session idea. And it's just that, that kind of auto pilot. Now you do at the front end, you know, you have to listen, you have to learn, you have to. But like you're talking about earlier, you have to be willing, right? You have to set it up and not be afraid to try it. If you hear it, you understand it, then you need to trust it enough to try it. And then all of our students who do that. It you get to prove to yourself and I love this also about many sessions is it's not like you're learning all this stuff about weddings and you're like now I've really got to put my butt on the line to photograph someone's one and only wedding. And that's going to be my test case and God, I hope this goes well. instead it's a mini session, like go out there and test, do a test case, learn what you need to learn. Do go do a test case. You have all the confidence in the world because there's not that much pressure. And then you can just use that to scale your business, your life forever after that.

Raymond Hatfield:

Wow, Phillip, I feel like once again, somehow we're always able to get together and talk about, these mini sessions and how it can change people's life in an interesting way. And, I appreciate you for coming in and once again, delivering all the value that you do from your experience, which is great. I can't say that everybody, speaks from that point, but you definitely do, you share everything in a very approachable way, easy to understand. And you're clearly living your mission of simplicity, which I appreciate. And I know that listeners do as well, but, before I let you go, I know that listeners are going to wonder where can we find out more about maximizing mini sessions.

Philip Blume:

Sure. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I know that, you can always come to our store at the when we have the course available and there's, there's only certain times we release it where there's room for people to get in. You can purchase it from our store. But really, just like with our clients on the photography and when we're working with photographers, we want to make sure that it fits them and it's right for them. And so we, we much prefer to it. Yeah, it isn't like we're doing now. I get as much free value as possible and help set people up in the right direction. So, I know you and I will try to, if someone's listening to this live, we're going to be working on doing a free webinar, for folks who, who know you.

Raymond Hatfield:

And I'll have links for that in the show notes.

Philip Blume:

Oh, perfect. Yeah. I think that's the best way right now is just follow that and make sure to show up live. There's we'll have just a limited room for folks in there who we want to really interact with. But yeah, find out if it works for you than maximizing many sessions. Just like in the sales room, right? So if you know it's right for you, then it will be amazing offer that pays for itself. Unlike the normal a la carte price if you were to just go on our store any random time and buy it. So that's, that's probably the best way to do it. And of course you can always reach us, for other crazy things. We're doing workshops and speaking at events, through our, our website, theblooms. co or just Google The Blooms.

Raymond Hatfield:

Man, every single time Philip comes on the podcast, I leave energized, and, I just feel a little bit clearer on what it is that, needs to be done. One of my biggest takeaways from this interview here with Philip was just that, well, honestly, success is not guaranteed, you know? Philip and Eileen, as Philip shared, you know, they struggled. hard in the beginning. They were not only going to lose their business, but they were also going to lose their, their home, their livelihood. And that is a terrifying thought. But rather than just wishing for some magic to turn everything around, they tried something new. They got to work, and they made success happen for them. You know, sometimes you have to do more than want. You have to do. You have to take action. You have to make a plan. At the very least, you have to try. So I just want to encourage you to take action today on something on anything that you're struggling with, whatever obstacle you are facing right now, take some sort of action. And if starting or growing a photography business is the goal for you, well, then I encourage you to take action by signing Eileen's mini session training which you can sign up for over at the beginner photopod. com forward slash mini. It is totally free and you're going to learn so much all about mini sessions and how to incorporate them into your, I mean, even a brand new business, just to get going. But if you are more established and you have a business, then it is a fantastic way to just increase revenue. As I've shared before in the podcast, I implemented this exact strategy into my wedding business. Yeah, weddings, not even just families and was able to in just in one weekend book 19, 000 worth of bookings. Make 19, 000 worth of bookings. So, it works. I can say for sure that it works. So again, if the business side of photography is something that you want to take action on, sign up for their free mini session training over at beginnerphotopod. com forward slash mini. So that is it for today. Remember, the more that you shoot today, the better of a photographer you will be tomorrow. Talk soon. Thank you for listening to the Beginner Photography Podcast. If you enjoy the show, consider leaving a review in iTunes. Keep shooting and we'll see you next week.