070: James Jebson: Developing Your Personal Brand & Finding Your Why

I offer training and mentorship and what I always say at the beginning of everything is that this is the way I do it. And there’s loads of different ways of doing it. But I’ve, I’ve, I let people in a lot, probably a bit too much for the majority of photographers, but I don’t mind it, but you put yourself up for scrutiny and I’m sure we’ll chat about that at some point during this. But what I’ve found is letting people in, helps them build the connections with me before they’ve even booked. And it sounds really arrogant. And I don’t mean it sound, but I’ve had people that have like approached me going, oh my God, I I’ve always watched it. And I’ve waited for us to be able to do the things I’ve seen you do with all the couples. I have the meetings and do all the kind stuff. So for me, opening that door is kind of almost cemented customers before they’ve even been customers. If that kind of makes sense. Yeah.

And on a regular basis, I mean, stories are a great opportunity on Instagram to just be able to Chuck the camera into your own face. It is nerve-wracking and I’m nervous doing it now, even though it’s been a big part of what I do for a number of years, but Instagram story is just a great opportunity, as we all know, to just throw a little bit of what you’re doing out there and it might be personal stuff and it might be work stuff. I do a mix and it’s realistically 50 50. I used to avoid putting my personal opinions on there at the very beginning putting now I’m I put ’em all out there.

Yeah. I mean the, the, I mean, we, we’ve kind of, we started off with Facebook, this talking about my tenure run, started off with Facebook and through everything into Facebook and it worked beautifully. And then we shifted toward Instagram. I went through everything into Instagram and it works beautifully and is working beautifully. We’re now going TikTok and going, we’re gonna have to do it again. Really I’m knackered. Do we have to really? And it’s like, yeah, you’re gonna have to, or you’re just gonna get left behind. So it’s now reals and TikTok and it’s, you know, and to be able to have these platforms where we can show our work off to millions of people is just a rare, beautiful thing for, for business owners that used to rely on, do you remember the Thompson’s book? We used to have a big yellow book with not even adverts. They were just, it was like, there’s a number and everyone was called a one. So they’d be at the top of the list and AA one, one. And it was like, that was how people yeah. Advertised, like, and it was the fortune to go in this massive book that got posted through people’s doors. Yeah. But to be able to now have this in essence free platform, I know you can spend money on, on, on adverts. And personally, I think that’s a, a decent thing to be doing, especially at quid getting the coverage that you can get on that, you know, these platforms are incredible and need to be respected. And it, you know, unfortunately I know you’re not, we’re not talking about the downside, but I kind of find myself doing it quite quickly is the fact there’s a lot of people on there.

So hence why, you know, we’ve gotta stand out. And that comes back to the personal branding stuff, particularly because if you start doing that instead of, if, if all photographers just show the work, show the work, show, the work, show the work, it would be really difficult for, for clients, but they can kind of figure out what’s the right person. And again, going through the experience myself, now I’ve engaged. I want somebody who’s gonna be shooting it that I’m gonna get on with and all that kind of stuff. And it’s gonna have the right vibe for me. Yeah. So social media allows us to do that. So we can be really particular on what we, what we put out there we’re in real control. It’s not just a flat advert. We can really, really show off both, you know, our work and Oz’s consumers. So it’s just it to have a platform that does, or to have multiple platforms to do what they do is an absolute dream. And we, and we need to use them and respect them properly a hundred percent cuz the they’re a, a golden ticket. They really, really are.

Do you know what I, what I’ve found and it is, I think it’s relevant to what we’re talking about now as well, is that the, the photographers, keeping it to the photography, the photographers that we’ve inquired with their Instagram is amazing. And then there’s been a couple of full galleries that haven’t done the justice either way around. So that continuity of work needs to, to marry up a little bit. Yeah. And obviously we put our power shots out there. We’re gonna, that, that’s what we do. But having websites that really show off a full gallery, cause it’s, it’s again, it’s the pitfalls that we’re all mega mega busy at the minute and I’m subject to it, my new wedding website, my old wedding website, which is still out there somewhere. Hasn’t been touched for many, many years, cuz I’ve got this new fancy dancing website that’s gonna be going live probably next month.