93: Why You Should Keep Marketing Right Now

Helpful Links

One-on-one Marketing Memberships

I unpack why continuing to market family photography during heavy news cycles is not denial but a steady service to families and your own sustainability. I share how to anchor messaging in a personal worldview, reduce emotional labor, and market from calm instead of guilt.

• fear of visibility and judgment blocking marketing
• difference between marketing and moral indifference
• art and creativity as grounding forces
• choosing a worldview instead of a party
• women’s leadership and power as a guiding value
• aligning offers and messaging with mission
• handling risks, boundaries, and tone
• softening language without disappearing
• marketing from calm rather than guilt
• simple blueprint for one clear offer

One-on-ones are still going on, they’re so fun… $600 for members for three one-hour calls… $750 if you’re not in the membership… In February, I’m going to be doing a training on the AI overview, $35 for non-members and free for members… If you’re thinking about joining the membership, just join it already. It is $35/mo. Less than a bougie lunch. 

My Instagram + My Membership

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

Why Keep Marketing Now

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello everybody. Okay, so as you know, if you saw the title, this episode is going to be about why it's okay to keep marketing right now. Um, this is something that has come up many times in my DMs over the past couple weeks and years, honestly. Um, instability in the world obviously isn't new going back to the start of everything. Um, we're just an an unstable group of people with a lot of emotions and thoughts, and um, yeah. So why uh why is it okay to continue? That's a question. There's already so much holding family photographers back from marketing uh that have to do with perception and judgment and nothing to do with whatever else is going on in the world. There's just a lot of silence because people are afraid of being seen. Um, and then when you add in this layer of like, okay, now I'm gonna try to get seen when all of this other stuff is happening, um, and there's always this vague sort of demand for um people to speak out. I'm personally not a huge fan of that. Uh I don't believe in canceling people or unfollowing them because they haven't said anything. For me, if it's someone, I will say on a personal note, if it's someone that I'm giving my money to, I generally kind of like to have an idea of the type of person they are, just values-wise. And usually that shows up and is pretty clear to me. I've also had um kind of relationships over the past five years where I feel like parts people have tried to hide parts of who they are from me because I am sort of like an out there person with lots of opinions, and then I've uncovered that and felt very uh like frustrated by that. And so that's just a personal sticking point for me. Um, I really like to have kind of an idea about where people's values lie if they're going to enter my personal friend circle or I'm going to give them money. So that may be true for your people as well, and it also may not be true. You may have people that don't care about that, and they literally just want to whatever it is that you share, they want to just continue to learn from you, see you, see your imagery, whatever it is.

Fear Of Visibility And Judgment

SPEAKER_00 2:35

So if you're in the bucket of people who is like, I don't care, I'm gonna keep doing whatever and it doesn't matter, then obviously this isn't a question that is plaguing you. You're not worried about it. But for those who do feel like f they are affected by things that are going on in the world, and then they feel like they don't, it's not now is not the time. I just want to challenge that a little bit. And here's why. So when you're marketing your business, how you make your money, that is not the same as pretending that everything that's going on in the world is fine. Like those two things are not the same. Continuing to show up when things are unstable with a steady presence. There's nothing wrong with that. Families, we are a family photographers. Families are still living their lives inside of hard seasons and outside of hard seasons. And so many things go on in the world all the time that affect families that we don't make the news, and they have the choice to keep consuming. It's a two-way street, right? So they're still living their lives, we're still photographing their lives. And it would be a really sad thing if we had to put family photography documenting milestones and chapters and important times in people's lives, we had to put that on the back burner uh for what what period of time? What what what period of heaviness in the news suddenly tips the scale that allows you to do your job? There's no there's no scale there that makes sense. Um, it just doesn't work. And also, sometimes when the world is heavy, one of the first things that people give up on is art and creativity. When in fact, those are two of the most important things that can keep your brain grounded in reality. So that's reason number one. Two is that it just hurts more than it helps. It doesn't, you going silent, you going silent out of protest or uh feelings of uncomfortability, it it doesn't serve anyone because you're just quiet. And

Marketing Isn’t Moral Indifference

SPEAKER_00 4:50

if the question is, do I say something or do I not say something, so we had a this was like one of the last things we talked about on our marketing Monday call, because it was a question that came in, but it's so important and I and it keeps coming up in certain ways. I just want to address it here on the podcast. So, me as a person, I've always been pretty out there with my worldview, and my worldview is not a political party. Sometimes that's like a misconstrued idea. I don't think that there's one political party that that's doing things right all the time. And I think that's been a huge mistake that both sides have decided to say is like, this is the exact path, and these people have it all together. There's too much money, there's too much influence, and there's too many not real things going on. There's too much saying one thing and doing another. It's a the whole system is very untrustworthy because there's so much money involved. It ideally, what I want it to be is a political job, is a political job, and there's no money or influence. Obviously, this is like a complete pipe dream. There's no money or influence involved in that, and the the policy decisions can literally be the policy decisions, and that's the end of it. Will we ever reach that place? No. But my worldview is that I place the freedom and autonomy of women above everything else. That is so that's not talking about a political party, that's not talking about a law or a rule. It's whatever is going to lead to more economic freedom for women, for more for them to have complete control over their bodily autonomy, whether or not you agree with me on that stance is fine. Like I am I've been so entrenched in that particular conversation since I was 15 years old, when I was clearly a person who was non-judgmental, and girls would come to me in high school and tell me their stories. I have been entrenched in those stories and and believing in women and trusting women and knowing now as a mother of daughters that the most important thing for them is that they are free, they're truly free. So there's this idea of freedom that's like a very American sort of um idea of a woman being able to be free. So that's my worldview, and that's how I paint every vote that I cast and every thought that I have. So you don't you can have a worldview that has nothing to do with a direct policy or politician or political party. So if you're not wanting to choose a side, which I feel like is is this thing that we're in, it's what is your worldview? What's the world that you want? And a lot of my content that sort of is a is a call out to tell people where I am in the world, that's what I talk about. I have a viral reel reel right now. It has like 360,000 views, and it's just about how women are magic. I truly, truly, truly believe that women are the true leaders of the world. And there's been a lot of systems of of power and religion that have kept us from obtaining the power that we should have because we're just naturally better leaders. We can think about more than one thing at one time, we are empathetic, we're caring, we are just amazing. I find us to be amazing. I'm obsessed with us. That's basically it. Um, and it the really hardcore parts of me are like men should just give power to us. That's like how I think. I'm just like shh, men, shh, shh shh, no more taki. Give power to women. So that's how I think. That's not political, right? So if you want to take this time to formulate an overarching worldview

Art And Creativity As Stability

SPEAKER_00 8:56

of what you think the world that you want to live in looks like. I think I talked about this on another episode where it's like, I want women to be able to choose to stay home or have careers and those careers to have high wages and affordable daycare. I do not want health care tied to jobs because it keeps women in jobs that don't serve them because they need health care. It hurts entrepreneurial women. I'm an entrepreneurial woman. I, if I want health insurance right now, my health insurance is through my husband's firefighting job. If I was doing this on my own, then my health insurance would be extremely expensive because I'm not employed. Those sorts of policy decisions are tied to my worldview. And it's it's whoever, I don't care who it is, whoever is gonna step forward and say, Hey, the world that you want matches the world that I want is someone that I will put my support behind. They'll never be a fangirl of that person. They'll never be like, everything they say is correct. And so that's why it's not one person or one party or one thought, or it's how this is what I care about. I want women to be, I want my girls, okay. That's how I think about it. I want my girls to be able to afford a house. I want them to be able to do a job that they love and survive. I want to make sure that they have autonomy over their bodies. Though those things are very, very important to me. And if you disagree, it is fine. I totally understand. But at a policy level, that is what is important to me. There's a personal level, personal level of comfort, and there's a policy level. So maybe part of this is taking time, despite what your family is doing and what your friends are doing, what your state is doing, what your perceived political party is doing. Define your worldview a little bit. And that will help you gain your own clarity because I think there is this issue where it's like, I don't know, I don't know what exactly how I feel. Like even the issue of immigration can be confusing for people because they're like, oh, I don't know. I don't want, you know, millions of people flooding in the border, but but then I also don't want families to be ripped apart. And so how do you reconcile those feelings? Those are normal feelings that every single person is trying to figure out. I have gone so far to think forward. This is so ranty, I apologize, but to think about how in like 20 years immigration will be completely insane because it'll basically become climate migration. Whole swaths of the planet will have to move. Um, and I saw this really pretty TikTok reel, I can't remember, but it was basically this woman sitting on the beach and she's like playing her guitar and she pauses because these birds like fly over her head. And she was like, migration is an earth right. And I just sort of like that idea of like people are gonna move if they feel unsafe. I would move if I felt unsafe. That's what I always go towards. Like, those are the people that I want to support, and I think that's a true statement across the world. I don't believe that people should have to remain unsafe just because

Say Something Or Stay Silent

SPEAKER_00 12:18

I had the lottery of birthplace. That's how I think about it. And I know women who have caused major, major ruckuses and upheavals in their life because they wanted to move school districts. So that's a little bit about my worldview. If you're looking for one and you want to borrow one, you can have it. I I'm just super fan of women. That's basically what I am. I want them to be free and happy and healthy and safe. And that's my worldview. So if you need one, you can borrow it. If you want to establish your own, um, just spend some time really thinking about it outside of any uh grouping that you feel like you have to be put in. Okay. So going back to this marketing thing, if my worldview is that women are amazing and powerful and beautiful and and the future leaders of a true like world that I want to live in, or men who are aligned to that idea, then me continuing to market my small business as a female owner, that going silent right now doesn't serve my mission, my my worldview. And it's the same way for you. So when I see women powering through and continuing to talk about the beauty of connection, how much they love to document families, how important their creative spark is to them, that they want to hit their income goals, like those things are aligned for me. And I'm like, yes, that's what we have to do. Who does it serve? Who does the silence serve? So the question is no, you don't need to be silent. And the secondary question is if you want to work in your worldview into your brand in a way that I have or other people have, or if you just want to make a blanket black and white statement on how you feel on something, you are allowed to do that. Yes, there may be some repercussions in the class I talked about and the marketing membership I talked about, how one time I got into this political discussion on Facebook, and it ended up with this person finding my phone number and anonymously threatening me. Like, yes, that stuff can happen. It's rare. And unluckily for this person, I am also could be a spy. And I figured out who he was that he was a lawyer in Utah, and I called his cell. I paid $20 to get his cell phone number, and I called that man at home and I said, if you ever threaten me again, I'm reporting you. I have our conversation recorded to the Utah Bar Association. So again, it's okay. Am I gonna, you're nothing bad particularly is going to happen to you. You may have people that feel uncomfortable with your comfort with your decision to say something, and that is not about them. It's your decision. You have freedom to say whatever you want to say, whatever you want to say. And there may be repercussions on either side, and you have to be willing to own those and stand in your power of your belief system. Okay, so the last thing I want to say, actually, is this the last? Let me look at my papers. Sorry, Russell, Russell. Um, okay, there is a, and this goes back to my shockingly, this rolls right back into my worldview. There is a gendered expectation of emotional labor. So there's a gendered expectation that a woman would be like, oh, I will do everything right through these times to make sure that nobody gets their feelings hurt by me. I'm to remain kind. So I remember one time I did this, I was doing this project for the schools about how kids see themselves. It was connected to this other project I was doing where I was taking photos of kids and they hold up a sign of what they want to be when they grow up. It was one of my favorite little projects, and they all showed up, they were like black and white, and they showed up in the yearbook. So it was like this little five-year-old, and then it's like, I want to be, or no, they were fifth graders. So it's like, I want to be whatever it is, fourth graders, I think. And then it says like president of the United States. So many boys wanted to be YouTubers. So we got a lot of YouTubers in there, but like it was just really a fun project. But then the question was like, how do you see yourself? And for girls across the board, the number one word was kind. And I was really frustrated by that because while I think that kindness is important, I feel like women kind of slam themselves against the kindness and it doesn't allow them to be other things as well. Like I can be empathetic and powerful, I can be both things. Like I can be confident and kind, but the kindness doesn't have to lead. And so this gendered expectation that women are often expected to carry emotional awareness perfectly. They're supposed to carry like just the right blend of sensitivity and moral responsibility when

Worldview Over Party Politics

SPEAKER_00 17:04

the expectation often isn't there for men. So men are rarely questioning whether or not they should continue to sell or promote during difficult times because they know that this is their job and them losing their money, losing their income, and losing their sense of of feeling safe, their safety net isn't going to serve them. So women are taught like, is this appropriate is this appropriate? Before asking, is this sustainable? Like, is it is it sustainable for me to take on the emotional labor of reacting perfectly to everything that's happening in the world every time? No, it is not. I will answer it for you. So empathy is not the same as self-erasure. You don't have to be like, I'm epathetic, therefore I need to not exist right now. You can be both things. So caring deeply doesn't mean that you have to disappear from the business side of things. And your silence, again, is not serving anyone. No one's looking for your silence. And if someone is looking for your silence, I would say that that person is a nefarious weirdo. They're just sort of waiting for you. They're sort of one of those people that's waiting on the wings, being like, I hope she, I hope she doesn't handle this right. They're a hater. Like no one's handling anything right because we've never, ever in the history of humanity had to manage this many news headlines at once. It's like we're brains, our brains are not even meant for it. It's completely ridiculous to think anybody's managing it well. So you don't have to comment on every news cycle. You don't have to explain while you're still posting. You can say that why you're uncomfortable, and and that can be part of your letting people into your worldview. And I've seen a lot of photographers do that, and that's awesome. And they're getting great response from that. You can soften things without abandoning everything. So if you need to mention, if you need to soften your your language or not be like, I'm just exploding with joy right now. Like you can soften your message down a little bit. You can talk about connection, family, meaning. You can share a little bit more reflective content if that feels more on brand. You can let your work, your slower to pace or tone or reflective sort of vibe speak for your work without over contextualizing it, right? So I've seen a lot of posts that say, you know, I don't know what to do in this moment. Human. We are all human. We all feel that. We all feel that, right? So it's normal and it it's connection. That's a connecting thing to say. Um, but anyone who's expecting perfection out of you is a hater. So just know that. No one's expecting that. So just remember that your work still has. Value right now. You still have purpose. Your job, our job, family photography as a whole, is about memory and presence and love. And those things don't become less important during hard times. And anybody could argue that those are actually most important right alongside creativity. So you can hold in your amazing hands that hold a million emotions and a million thoughts and a million fears and a million worries. You can also hold concern for the world and appreciation for the beauty and connection that you still want and need to capture, both creatively and because this is your job. And it's not a distraction, it's you just grounding yourself. This is the world that we live in. Do you think that next year there's not going to be any headlines and it's going to be like major headline? Llamas can sing. Like, no, that it's going to be here's another crazy thing that's going to hit you in the face like a baseball bat. And the next week it could be another thing, and we don't know what's in the future. So this is your hopeful reassurance and a little bit of clarity around the situation that you're not doing something wrong by continuing to market. You're allowed to run a business with care, with boundaries, with integrity. You don't have to start screaming at everybody. If you want to insert, if you want to scream, go ahead. Like I love a good screaming moment. I'm a big rantor. You guys are listening to this podcast. If you need to scream, like I would connect to a reel that was just like a woman who just went out in the woods and screamed her freaking head off into the tops of the trees. I'd be like, I feel that. So I take that back. You can totally scream if you want to, but you don't have to do that. So the question to ask yourself is what would it look like if you switched your mindset to market from calm instead of guilt? Because I feel like those are similar enough sometimes. Like we're like, I'm a little worried. I'll be calm. I'm gonna mark it from this place of calm understanding that this is my job and I'm still gonna show up to do it, instead of do I post. And if you want to be mad about it, just go back to this expectation question. There's no, there's hardly a man on planet Earth who's like, you know what I should do? I should just I should just become homeless in protest of these news headlines and the experiences that we're all having, because I'll just stop making money. Absolutely not. So I hope this gives some clarity. Also, uh one-on-ones are still going on, they're so fun. Basically, anything that you really what I'm trying to do in those is get people to center down on one offer and then build the marketing around that one offer so that you as a photographer have a blueprint moving forward so that whatever new offers you come up with or even your ongoing yearly offer, you have a blueprint for marketing that. So again, $600 for if you're inside the membership for three one-hour calls that they're spread out as much as you need. So if you wanted to do one call now and then do the work to clean up your offer and your mindset around what you're actually trying to have people book, and then a couple weeks out, book the next call, and then a

Women, Leadership, And Power

SPEAKER_00 23:28

couple weeks out, book the next call. That's totally fine. Or you can do it one, two, three weeks at a time and just bust it out. It's $7.50 if you're not in the membership. Um, in February, I'm going to be doing a training on the AI overview, and that one will be $35 for non-members and free for members. I'm gonna be doing a monthly training that will be like that. So it's $35 for non-members and free for members, and they uh get all those trainings for free. So if you're thinking about joining the membership, just join it. Just as I said, we're talking about things like this, and we're also talking about how the frick do you run a meta ad. So, you know, that's what we're talking about. It's good stuff in there. All right, see you next week.