Welcome!! I am so excited you are here for my three part series and guide to the wedding photography consultations. Check out this FREE Wedding Photography Consultation Guide for you to download, if you want to follow along. Consultations can be tough, especially as a brand new photographer. This series will help you to know what to do when a client inquires about your services and how to increase your chances to book them. Each part of this series includes the before, during, and after consultations. Keep reading to find out the tips!
We are going to dive into the BEFORE part of wedding photography consultation tips. I have five specific tips that will help you before you sit down with your clients to discuss what you offer, and why they should book you as their wedding photographer.
1. Response Time
The first thing to know is that the response time is crucial. The minute you receive an email inquire, you should reply extremely fast with a specific time for a meeting because the potential client is already connecting with many vendors. The likely hood of the potential client responding back increases the quicker you respond.
2. Set an Expectation
Next, you will want to set an expectation for the consultation. When you reach out about the consultation, you will want to let them know how long it will take, what to expect during the meeting, what package could be the best fit for them, and how you work. I, personally, encourage a face-to-face meeting with the potential client because the chances of them booking with you increases. It keeps the meeting more human and gives them a more personal connection to meet with you. Phone and video calls are still powerful, and you can still leave them with a great personal connection.
3. Pick a Location
Pick a location for the meeting and send it to your potential client. Always push for a face-to-face meeting. As I mentioned before, it is more powerful than a phone or video call. If you end up with a face-to-face meeting, make sure to send the potential client the location to meet. I usually go to a public place because I don’t have a studio or private place to offer. Going to a public place is perfectly ok!
4. Things to Bring
Remember, there are three things I want you to bring to the meeting. The first is your portfolio. This allows them to flip through it so they can bring any questions up during the meeting. Next, bring a leave behind. What I mean about these are contracts, proposals, pricing/packages, and a round of your collections. On top of that you will want to make it more personal by bringing a small gift or a personalized thank you card. This is a way that will make you stand out and making a personal connection. Lastly, if you are doing a virtual meeting, send your potential client a gift card. This could be a $5 giftcard to Starbucks with a note saying, “Coffee is on me since we weren’t able to meet in person”.
5. Arrive Early
Lastly, arrive early!! I can’t express this enough. You want to arrive early so you can grab a table to set up your portfolio, collections, laptop, and prepare anything else you need to. If you decide to do a phone or virtual meeting, there are many creative ways you can prepare to “arrive early”. You can send the potential client a virtual tour, send over your contract, pricing, and links to your galleries. These are all ways to “set up” for your virtual meeting so the potential client can follow along as you talk and chat about you and your services. There are so many ways to make this digitized to keep the human connection and experience while being virtual.
Bonus Tip: Send All Information Before
BONUS TIP! Send all of your information before the meeting. This includes the contract, proposal, packages, links to the galleries, etc. This is so they can follow along when you meet with them or during your virtual meeting.
Thank you for following along on this three part series. To learn about the “during” part of the wedding photography consultation, head on over to the next blog. Remember, I have everything outlined for you in my wedding guide and ready for you to download. Click on the link, print it off, and follow along during the three part series of the wedding photography consultation! For more details about each tip, check out the YouTube video. Don’t forget to hop on over to my Facebook group for a great community for more tips on your wedding photography business!
