106: The Next Five Years For Family Photographers

What it will take for family photographers to stay booked over the next five years as AI, search, and social media keep reshaping how clients choose who to hire. We lay out the practical shifts that build local trust and visibility, while naming the emotional reality of trying to run a creative business in an unpredictable economy. 

• thinking beyond fear about AI and what kind of future we actually want 
• accepting that many businesses will struggle without stronger marketing habits 
• becoming a hyperlocal authority instead of chasing global visibility 
• building a clear website that reduces friction and increases trust 
• dropping generic branding and choosing a memorable point of view 
• creating a marketing ecosystem across multiple channels 
• making educational content that answers real client questions 
• using AI as an assistant without breaking client trust 
• showing up with less passive marketing and more consistent visibility 
• questioning gurus, income claims, and “easy” business promises 

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The Future And A Rant

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello. Uh okay. So this episode is going to be about photographers who are doing well in the next five years, will probably, probably because who knows what's happening in the next five years, um, will probably be doing these things. So I'm feeling a little ranty today. So I do apologize if a rant or two shoots out. Let's start with one. So I was listening to this podcast about AI, which I'm like, I loved seeing all of the college graduates booing the speakers for talking about AI. Because I was listening to this interview with a certain man who I wish would just shoot his damn self to the moon or Mars. Um, you might know who I'm talking about just by that. Actually, that could be that could be like 49% of men. Um, so what he was saying is how, you know, after 2029 or some time frame that's not even that far away, that there'll be no turning back for all of us, and that, you know, the all the white-collar jobs will be gone. Anything that requires a keyboard and a mouse, and then the humanoid robots of which he is predicting this person is predicting will be more of those than humans will be doing all the blue-collar jobs. And I just want to say that, like, that is the opposite of the matriarchy.

AI Anxiety And The Matriarchy

SPEAKER_00 1:45

So I've been thinking a lot about the matriarchy, this thing that I want so badly that I won't be able to have. Um, and how, like, I asked myself, because I would try to be a responsible thinker, right? I don't want to be someone who's like, oh my, this is what's best for me, and this is all the, you know, that's not how my brain works. Also, as I am incredibly jealous of people whose brain does operate that way because the pure simplicity of their life. I can't even imagine. But I was thinking about this idea of like, what would I give up, right, for a matriarchy? Being a mother of daughters, I think of a matriarchy as the safe, is the the only way that society could run that would keep them safe. What I mean when I say matriarchy is that I believe, as I've said this on the podcast before, that society that takes care of its mothers, meaning the mothers of the society can thrive, everyone thrives. And it's such an easy view because it's hard to argue with if you have livable wages and affordable housing and healthcare that's not tied to a job, then both stay-at-home moms and working moms thrive. Single men have higher paying jobs and lower cost of living. Women who do not want children also have the same, more flexibility. Um, so I was thinking, like, what would I give up, right, for that? I would, and this may not resonate with a lot of you guys, but like I'd be willing to live a smaller life in the way that I feel like sometimes when I look out at the grand scheme of what the aspirations are, right? So, like I stumbled across this morning is what got me thinking about this person who's made a lot of money with like re like selling Amazon resell courses. There's just a random thing that I stumbled upon. And they have multiple houses, and one of them is in Vancouver in Canada, and they have another one in LA, and they have another house in somewhere else, and they're so they're just bouncing all around and playing tons of golf and golfing on every golf course that's ever been made. And I would not that I had have ever aspired for a life like that, but I feel like I would rather have just a smaller, safer, community-driven world. And I think that's really becoming so clear. Like my needs are just about my relationships. And I feel like that's the beauty of the matriarchy, right? And so we all feel like we need so much money, not because we necessarily want things, we just want safety, we just want the feeling of being okay. Like, I think the way that the world is now has made a lot of us feel like, oh my gosh, like I've I went to um a shoot that was uh like an hour drive from me and I had to fill up my car, and it was one of those like sneaky, super fast pumps. And I've this is something that I become really aware of now, like how if it's the only gas station in kind of a rural area, they can really charge like really up the price for gas. So I think the gas at this place that I had to get because I wasn't gonna make it to the next one, was like $6.20 a gallon. Um, also for my New Zealand and Australia listeners, because I know I have that's my second largest audience beyond the US, I read that gas in your country is tw the equivalent of twelve dollars and fifty cents a gallon. I don't know if that's right, but if that is, that's I mean they so anyway, so I did wasn't paying attention. I put the gas in, then I was like, I was only gonna fill up enough to like get to the next spot. I warned you I was gonna be ranty. So put the gas in, kind of started cleaning trash out of my car and doing the things that I do, and then I heard it click like it was like a hyper speed. And I turned around and it was $94. And I drive like a um 2014 little SUV, like not crazy big car or anything. And I was just like, it tapped into my it made me feel unsafe because I was like, oh, this is like an unpredictable, like I I haven't, you know, as a as a photographer, I haven't changed my prices. This kind of where it's we're in this hard spot with pricing. And I talked about this on yesterday in the membership. This idea of like, we my costs are going up, my costs in my family. Not only just my general grocery bill and everything, but costs are rated directly to my business. Gas, ferry, the ferry is up 33%. But then I feel worried about increasing my own prices because everyone else is in the same boat, and then I just feel like a crazy person because we could do whatever we want with this life, and this is what we're doing. And I feel like like insane about it. Because I look at my girls, 14, 16, they're gonna launch into the world in two starting in two years. How amazing would it be if they could just launch into a community that they could flourish in? And like, why are we so far from that? So I feel like as a photographer and as someone who is passionate about life and empathetic and a very, I feel like I I pride myself on trying to be as critical of a thinker. I can't figure this one out. Why we choose what we choose. There are no rules here on planet Earth. Every rule that we encounter is one we made up. Money is something we made up, even how the idea of what a house looks like or a car, all of that we made up. And what we have done is made force people to build lives that now feel unsustainable, and we're threatening them with replacing them with a humanoid robot. I just feel like, are we all in a reality show? Because who would choose this? And why are we choosing this? Why are we even talking about there being more humanoids, robots, than humans on planet Earth? Who's going forward with that? And why? And so, anyway, just a small rant about this feeling of slight desperation I feel to just give my girls a better world and knowing that because I'm not someone who has 17 houses and 400 jets and you know needs to explore space because I've built the biggest company in the world, I just feel so frustrated. Also, I would just be a plea to all people to like really take a close look at your idols and like what you're idolizing and wonder if there's what you would, if there's anything that you would sacrifice to build more towards the life that you want. And if you want like a jet-setting private jet lifestyle, um, I mean, I think that that is truly a 1% ideal that's held over our heads that none of us are really gonna reach. So I'd much rather just pour the resources that we do have into each other. Okay, sorry, I needed to get that off of my chest, I guess.

Pricing Pressure And Marketing Reality

SPEAKER_00 9:00

Okay, so our I keep seeing these threads. Um, I'm in the groups, I'm in the Facebook groups, I'm looking around, and everyone's like, oh my god, I'm gonna go out of business. Okay, so one, a lot of people are gonna go out of business, and that's just the truth of the thing because what the moment calls for is harder marketing work than ever. That's that's just the reality of the situation. And anyone, oh my gosh, I heard this thing. Nope, oh, we're launching into rant number two, 45 seconds after rant number one, about how you can run a photography business two hours a week. I I run a successful photography business that is well established, and there's no way this makes me actually mad. There's no way that you could do that. That is ridiculous,

Why Instagram Alone Stops Working

SPEAKER_00 9:52

anyway. Okay, so um in the next five years, what it's going to become basically visibility is way too global. I talk about this as the issue, I talked about this too on yesterday's marketing meeting. How when you're this person was like, I just want to do Instagram. I'm so overwhelmed with all these other marketing ideas, I don't want to do them. The task of you just using Instagram, which is I would say 80% of photographers are like, if you say family photographers, especially, if you're like, what's your marketing plan? Instagram is up there at the top of the list. It's become so globally visible, it's really hard to be seen locally unless you're doing strategic marketing, which is the only way to win on Instagram. Very strategic, local-based marketing. And then in my world, I'm like, just back it up with an ad so that you get more visibility. If you're on the platform anyway, boost your visibility. No, don't boost on your phone because you'll be charged a fee. I'm just saying, I'm just saying, explode your visibility of the good local hypermarketing, hyper local marketing that you're doing with an ad. But these people in five years who are who, you know, as long as these idiots don't destroy the world with humanoid robots, which like I picture myself in 20 years, am I gonna be like battling humanoid robots? Kind of sounds like I have a lot of pent-up rage. So part of me is like, it could be kind of fun. Okay, so what they're gonna be doing is they're going to be known locally, they're going to be people who are not afraid to adapt to things, they're going to create marketing ecosystems, so not just Instagram, they're going to market not with their emotion, but through consistent habitual action. And I think that the next generation of successful family photographers, meaning like there'll be new people that enter the field, and then there'll be those of us who are gonna stick with it through the changes, they're not going to be afraid of the truth of the human person who's looking to get a photographer. This person is aware of AI, they understand that Google search behavior has changed, they know that the general public has a very short attention span, that posting images on social media is not the what it was, which carried a lot of family photographer businesses through. That clients are craving high trust and ease when a lot of us are still doing difficult booking systems and complication. So I think we're gonna go into the seven things, but that's like the global view of who this person would

Become A Hyperlocal Authority

SPEAKER_00 12:39

be. Okay, so number one, already talked about it kind of, but you will be expected to be a hypo hyper local authority. And I talk about this all the time about blog posts and anything you're doing. You do not need to talk to anyone outside of your town. Who are you talking to? Who do you need to talk to about your local photography business? But we're stuck doing that. So you in five years know your audience really well. You're a trusted community name, and any marketing materials that you do create are hyper local. Like that would be how you'd want to be seen and known. And this will help you not only for your own confidence as becoming that local brand, but Google rewards an AI overview in the way that we have to serve AI in marketing is rewarded or is reward, it rewards specificity and local expertise way more than generic inspirational type content. So the future in this realm relong belongs to photographers who are rooted locally. So as I want you to like, if you're a visual person, which photographers are, how you might be is scattered in tiny, tiny pieces from your town out to your county throughout your state, and other photographers who are following you all across the US. I want it to be that you're a tree in the center of town and your roots are there, right? Unless you're moving, which you just have to pick up the whole thing and move it to a new place and plant the tree in the middle of that town.

Build A Website That Converts

SPEAKER_00 14:21

Number two, this one, you guys aren't gonna like this one. But number two, a successful family photographer will, in five years especially, have better websites than their competitors, not better websites like websites that have a lot of trickery or complication. They will have websites that do not have confusing home pages, that do not have vague messaging, that have no pricing guidance, that have weak calls to action. The next group of websites that will win will be emotionally trust building, clearly explain the process, consistently reduce friction throughout the person looking at the site, build authority. This one is so hard for a lot of you because you don't want to see yourself as the as the expert of your own brand, but you are.

Stop Being Generic With Your Brand

SPEAKER_00 15:52

Okay, number three, they'll stop being generic. So the brands that photography family photography brands that are succeeding in five years will cannot be built on capturing authentic moments. It needs to have this brand in the future, it needs to have opinions, personalities, stand for something, be a clear communicator, feel memory, feel memorable. You can't just be for everyone. If you're struggling, go back to my most basic advice: simplify, simplify, simplify. One offer, one season, one offer per season with one to two marketing channels and pour all your energy into that. And I guarantee you will see more bookings than if you try to be everywhere all at once. Okay, number four. Sorry, you can probably hear my papers, a crinkling. I will not be removing that sound because it'll take too much time.

Create A Marketing Ecosystem

SPEAKER_00 16:46

Okay, they will build, so these brands, it will be an ecosystem. We already kind of touched on that. It's not gonna be one thing. Your marketing will look like email lists and Pinterest and SEO and referral systems and repeat client systems and local partnerships at the capacity that you can handle, right? So it's not the very the the base, the average photographer probably isn't gonna do all of those things well. But if you did too well per season, you could cover quite a lot of marketing over the course of a year. Okay, number five, they will create educational content that is built on the foundation of them being the authority of their own brand. So, not generic guidance. We want to know, and potential clients want to know now and in the future, what do we wear to your sessions? What are your locations? How do you bring joyful moments out of Grumpy Kids? How do you do that? How do you prepare toddlers? What's your philosophy? Tell us about your boundaries. All of those things are going to be so important because we're going to be working against. I mean, I don't know how much shorter the attention span can get, but I'm pretty sure it can get even shorter. So you need to be speaking in an excited, authoritative way about your work. That's gonna be the most important piece of copy change that will be absolutely necessary.

Educational Content And AI Trust

SPEAKER_00 18:22

Okay, number six, if they use AI, they will use it as an assistant. So I keep seeing this thing where where like photographers are like, I use it. This in my this especially on TikTok, which I feel like TikTok is like the um the first line of social discourse on things, more so than Instagram. I don't know what it is about Instagram, but it feels like months behind TikTok in terms of where I see people's the um the zeitgeist, I think is what you call it. I actually don't know if that's the correct word, just like where people, the social perception of things. Okay, so there's now pushback for photographers from clients for using AI in any part of their business. And I know that there's pieces of AI that really help people, you know, there's like culling and editing, and the issue is that the sentiment of AI is very negative for the average person. And you have to understand that, like even within the white collar world, there's a thing of like, oh yeah, I use AI and it makes my job easier. And also, AI just stole my entire future. And from a small business perspective, it's like, oh yeah, AI made it really easy for me to build this business, but it also made it really easy for every single person in my town to build this business. And then on the blue-collar side, it's like AI is taking the money from the people who pay me to work. So there's not a lot of positive feeling towards AI, but I feel like a couple of photographers are misreading this sentiment mostly because they're in the business of selling to other photographers. Um, and when they do that, they are turning potential clients off by talking about how they use AI in their business. So I feel like at this point, you know, I've seen other photographers come out and ha with a stance, like, what is my stance on AI? How do I use it? And those posts have been well received, especially when the posts are talking about how they minimally use AI. Um, so there's definitely a misreading of the room, and I think that's only going to continue. Yes, there's probably money to be made, and we're all leaving it on the table by not creating AI, freaking clawed, cowork, whatever these things we are all we all probably could be even more efficient and even more impersonal, but is that what the moment is asking? If you had an organic, human-driven connection business that we all do, that is what family photography is, and you're holding hands with a cold robot, that doesn't really like match the vibe. You know what I mean? So I feel like photographers who will win in the next five years will be those who lean into their whimsy, into their humanness, into their connection, into their own thoughts, their own formulated, articulated thoughts. And then going back to like what would you sacrifice for the world you want? I'm fine being a little bit less productive to be able to hand touch all my edit, all my edits. That's just like a thing that I feel. Um, I don't use any AI like get editing and I don't use any um AI culling. And I'm not saying that they're necessarily bad, but I don't think that that's something that clients who who are feeling a very negative AI sent. Are you going to feel connected to is the way that I'll say it. I use AI in the way that Lightroom and Photoshop have basically inserted AI into the systems, but I don't use AI as in in any other way. So, and I'm not calling you out if you do. I'm just saying it's not something that is gonna build trust with people. And if you're missing that sentiment, you may just be listening to people who are trying to sell you AI tools. Okay.

Less Passive Marketing, More Visibility

SPEAKER_00 22:30

Um, the last one, number seven, is that they will be less passive. There's a lot of uh passive marketing going on, and it's not even it's generic passive marketing. So when you think about so I want you to do this little task right now in your head. If you think about anybody on social media who who gained your attention, who won visibility from you again, that's all marketing is, that's all it is. If that happened, what was it? So the last person I remember was literally someone who was just speaking their truth about something. And my brain was like, What are they saying? They seem to be speaking very passionately about this thing that I'm interested in. That's all it was. But when I see a lot of photographer marketing, it's just extremely passive and generic because it's safe. And we all understand that feeling. Like it's much feels much more safe to be able to be gently speaking to a large group of people than passionately speaking to a smaller group. But that passionately speaking to a smaller group is what the moment will ask for. So what that means is that you can't wait too long to market. You need to give yourself runways and time frames and the access of time that will allow you to implement strategy. You won't be able to disappear for weeks and weeks and weeks unless you have alternative visible alternative visibility systems set up. You can't be inconsistent because in this day and age, both in our in all of the businesses that I have my hands in, which is a family photography business, a local Airbnb, and a handyman business, all of us, all three of us, three being my mom and I do the Airbnb together, that is last minute bookings are way up. So if you are gone, if you are just pieced out because you can't man handle it for handle the consistency of showing up, you will miss out on those last minute people. You have to stop avoiding visibility because of fear, or you're gonna have to come up with a complete other way to have your people's eyes on your business. Like, I think there's this thing where Instagram gave us all this feeling like, you know, if I when Facebook first came out for us dinosaur people, you couldn't even get on Facebook unless you were part of a school. And so, of course, it was my high school. So sometimes I look back and I'm like, what even was Facebook? Is my posts are like Fiona ate soup. I'm like, why was I saying that? Fiona went outside. Like, what was even happening? The people who were seeing those ridiculous announcements were my entire high school. And so Instagram gave us all this way to feel like, okay, now we're breaking free a little bit and we're and we don't have this judgmental visibility on us. So I'm saying you have got to get over it because you're a local business and you will be seen locally, and the people that hire you will be people in your town. So the faster you get over this feeling of, oh my gosh, what if people see what I'm building and get to the mindset of I don't care if people see what I'm building, if they do witness it, it's okay, I will survive. The better off you'll be as more clarity and visibility will be needed. Because what you want is Jonathan, who went to high school with you, if you used to live in the same town, to be like, oh yeah, I know Fiona, she does like adventure family photography on the mountains, and I see her work all the time because she's like super locally rooted in this town. That's what you want.

If Marketing Feels Like Too Much

SPEAKER_00 26:19

Okay, so I hope this helps you guys to think about the future. And I also just quickly want to say that, like, if it is all too much, right? If it if it's the moment is asking too much of you, you may just be framing the moment of marketing in this idea of it being Instagram, that what was required of you is basically going to be some person who's posting five to seven times a day on Instagram or TikTok or whatever. That's not the only marketing path. But whatever path you choose, whether it's you run an ad, so let's use ad, for example, if you run an ad with an excited local authority voice selling something specific, a specific session with built-in scarcity, that ad is going to do a lot better than the safe generic ad that talks gently to all people and in and encourages none of them to actually get excited to book. But the one where you are excitedly talking about the work that you love so much will open you up for more judgment from jerk-faced people. That's just the reality of the situation. I you have to, the more visibility that you have in the world, you have to know that like people aren't always gonna, you're gonna rub some people the wrong way. And that's okay. That's like part of it. You are building a business in the light of your town. So it's okay if people see you. But if the moment asks too much of you, which I know that this is true for some people who are like, I just I am not made out to be a marketer, right? Because that's what this job will call you to do. It's okay. I just want to say, like, if you need to piece out and figure something else out or get a local job that's paid and so you can just have a breather. It's been a real roller coaster of emotions in this industry. And I'm constantly like baffled by other family photographers who seem to place family photographers who ignore that struggle on a pedestal when those people are clearly out of touch and clearly haven't been building, actively building photography businesses during this transition of lower visibility and scattered trust and and changes in the industry, and they're just relying on their old email list. So just again, not only be careful about idols in the world, about are the people that you're listening to wanting to build the world that you want, which the world that I want is a world where my girls can live peacefully. That's

Beware Idols And Easy Money Claims

SPEAKER_00 29:08

literally it. That's literally it. If someone isn't building towards that world, which does not include eight billion humanoid robots, then I have to think about what I can do in my own world and community to uplift and put energy towards people who are interested in that. And it's the same thing in the family photographer world. Be really aware of, especially in the world of AI, people selling you, especially on income numbers. If you want to be a family photographer who makes X number of that type of selling is the easiest, is the easiest way to get attention. But it's not always the truth about what it actually takes in this business. And it's true in all sales roles. You can make it seem easy, all coaching, all mentorship. If you could just box it up and give it to someone, if you could box up your success and give it to someone, and then that person just opens the box and becomes successful, then everyone would be at the same place. All you'd have to do is pay the thousand dollars to this mentor and you can have her success, but we know that's not how it works. Success in a creative industry as a woman is hard fought, and it's a disservice to pretend like it's not. And that doesn't mean that the work that you have to do to gain visibility for your photography business isn't worth it. I just want to acknowledge that it is hard work. It's worthy work, but it's hard. So, anyway, let's hope that some good news comes our way uh over the next week instead of just boatloads fulls of weird news, which I feel is all we're getting. Okay, hope you guys have a good day.