016: Nick Evans – Thoughts and Ideas for Wedding Photography Business Success (from when he was new to the game)

016: Nick Evans – Thoughts and Ideas for Wedding Photography Business Success (from when he was new to the game)

Andrew Hellmich: All right, I'm really excited to have Nick Evans, from Nick Evans Photography, on the podcast today. The reason I'm so excited about it is because so many of you have asked to have a newer photographer onto the podcast and to delve in a little bit deeper on what these newer photographers are doing to get successful. Now, the beauty of Nick is I definitely know he's doing something right. He's been mentored by Ian Wilkinson that you may have heard on an earlier podcast. His website looks great. He's got some beautiful images there. His pricing is right up there. And I'm really interested to find out a little bit more about Nick and the way he does things. Nick, welcome to the podcast.

Nick Evans: Thanks for having me, Andrew. It's exciting to have a little chat about this sort of stuff. I don't know where, whether I'll have much information for your listeners, but hopefully I can pass on some tips for people.

Andrew Hellmich: Mate, I reckon it'll be a great story. So if you want to start off telling us a little bit about you and you know the type of work that you're shooting?

Nick Evans: Yeah, definitely. Yeah. So I got into business sort of two and a half years ago, I guess, threw myself into it full time, which wasn't the wisest financial decision, but my motivation was that I wanted to make it work, and so far, I've managed to do that. Initially, I was shooting whatever I could get my hands on. I had a crack at some real estate, some model portfolios. I was focusing on trying to get some second shooting work in weddings at the time, which was sort of not paying very well because I was looking to build a portfolio. And I also sort of picked up the odd commercial job in there as well. And I've still got one or two commercial clients who I still do a bit of stuff for, but the focus these days is purely on weddings and sort of engagement or couple shoots. And it's going pretty well this year. I've got around just under 25, I think I've got 24 weddings booked for this year. So couldn't be happier. It's going great.

Andrew Hellmich: That's awesome. So to get to that, that 24-25 weddings, is that like been a slow process? Or did you find you went from five to 25?

Nick Evans: No, it's definitely been a slow process, Andrew. I guess in the first six months, there was nothing at all, that was purely portfolio building and assisting and second shooting. I got one or two weddings under my belt after that's, between in that sort of second six month period, a lot more second shooting, then once I had a bit of stuff to show. And then I guess, the second year was pretty good. Probably had been about eight or 10 weddings. And from there, word of mouth and the ability to blog those weddings and sort of keyword venues that I've shot at has really helped things roll on. And I guess I've sort of booked a lot of weddings off the weddings I've shot, which is pretty common in our industry, and from there it's, it's really going a lot better for me. There's, there's more sort of website traffic, there's a bigger portfolio, more people I've shot for talking about me. But it was definitely a slow process that hasn't, hasn't really come on in one big burst. It's more of, more of a steady progression, I guess I'd say.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, sure. Okay, so I really want to delve into that, those early days in just a minute. But can you let us know how much you're charging for your weddings now, and if you've got an idea about an average spend that a couple would make with you for a wedding?

Nick Evans: Yeah, definitely. So my prices, I've just started charging, I've bumped my prices from 3000 to three and a half thousand dollars for my base package, and that package includes full day coverage and online slideshow, and sort of average of five to 700 edited high res JPEGs. And after that, I've got sort of two higher packages which include some album credits. My sort of mid package includes a $1,500 album credit.

Andrew Hellmich: So when you say that this sounds like the way that Ian does his album, so you give them a credit and then hope that they spend more. They usually do spend more, I guess?

Nick Evans: Yeah. So the idea behind the album packages is to save them money to entice them into committing to an album upfront. I know that Ian charges a per page price for his albums. I haven't been doing that for probably 18 months, and in the last couple months, I've just changed to a set price for my albums. I've got two albums. Got a nine by nine and then 11 by 11, just to, sorry, a nine by nine and a 12 by 12, which are two and a half, and three and a half thousand dollars respectively. And my main motivation behind that was just to take the guesswork out of how much my couples will have to spend.

Andrew Hellmich: So taking the guesswork out of it for them?

Nick Evans: Yeah, exactly right. Just I can sit down in the initial sort of meeting, and when they're looking through a sample album, they can ask me, "How much does this album cost?" And I don't have to sort of go through the whole "Well, if it's about 50 pages, at $85 a page. It'll be this much", but we never know how many pages it'll be. I like to be able to give them a firm answer. And the other motivation behind it was that I can then receive full payment prior to the wedding, and I don't need to be sending them a final invoice sort of two or three months after the wedding, when the sort of excitement of the whole wedding day is worn-off, I want to be able to get all that out of the way before the wedding. Get all the bad stuff out of the way before the wedding. After the wedding, they get their online slideshow, which is pretty cool and exciting. They get some prints and all their digital files. And then we get to sort of design a nice album for them, and they get to sort of make a few changes, and then they get that in the mail, or sort of delivered in here by hand, if I can. And there's none of that sort of, I have experienced a bit of, it's bit of a negative process, I guess I feel it is, the upsell process of delivering an album layout that might be 70 pages when the album credit only covered sort of 30 or 40 pages, and then the process where they have to sort of color pages they didn't like, or the pages, sorry, the pages they did like but couldn't afford or didn't want to spend money on, sort of became a bit of a negative process, which I wanted to avoid.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, makes sense.

Nick Evans: And probably too early to say how it's gone. So hopefully it's going to be beneficial.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, no, it sounds like a great way to do, I mean, no one likes doing the upsell afterwards. It always gets on, well, it can get uncomfortable, particularly if there's, you know, it's after the day. And like you said, that the excitement's worn down, and they're up for more cost again. But, I mean, it obviously, definitely works with some photographers, but I know it is uncomfortable for sure.

Nick Evans: Yeah

Andrew Hellmich: So, so do you find then? So, so your clients will come in, they've booked the middle package, they've got a $1,500 album credit.

Nick Evans: Yes

Andrew Hellmich: They'll make a decision then whether they want to go to the two and a half, or the three and a half thousand album and then pay for that before the wedding?

Nick Evans: Yeah, that's the idea behind it. Yeah.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, so do you, do you ever find anyone that will then say, "Well, we're not sure if we're going to get an album at all, but we want that package." And do they do they sacrifice that $1,500 album credit?

Nick Evans: I haven't had that situation yet.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, all right, so that would more likely go for the lower package, if that was the case you think, or you just haven't had that?

Nick Evans: Exactly. If they're unsure about it, I'd just tell them to go for the base package, which includes the digital negs and then they can decide after the wedding day. And all they're doing then is sort of costing themselves a bit more. I'm happy to share my price list so people can go through it if, if you like.

Andrew Hellmich: Oh, yeah, that's cool. Yeah, I think you've got pricing on your website anyway, don't you?

Nick Evans: I've only got my start price on there.

Andrew Hellmich: Right. Okay, okay.

Nick Evans: Yeah

Andrew Hellmich: I think, I think it's good to, I guess that the listeners, they really like. They said that, I said that earlier, they really want to hear from a newer photographer. So it's great to get an idea of, you know, someone who's only been going for two and a half years, how they're managing their prices. And you know, it sounds like you've hit the ground running, and you know, those prices certainly aren't cheap. Which, which a lot of older photographers, you know, they get all cranky about new guys coming in and being too cheap. And you know, you're definitely not doing that at all.

Nick Evans: Yeah, now look, when I started off, my base package was at $2,200 so I've been stepping it up sort of, I guess it would average out to be, every quarter I've been bumping it up a few $100 so on, from starting at 22 to now starting at 35.

Andrew Hellmich: That's great.

Nick Evans: Which has, hasn't been too difficult, But I still have lost some bookings, some word of mouth referrals, where people have approached me saying, "Hey, our friends spent $2,200 book you for our wedding day." And I'm like, "Well, actually, my prices are now sort of three or three and a half thousand", and it's, it's a pretty good lesson to not be starting off too low, because once you're in with a group of people and all their friends, and you get sort of known as that, I don't know, a $1000 or $1,500 wedding photographer, it's pretty hard to break out of that group into the higher group, you sort of, you start in fresh. You can't really keep that same referral group going. So that's one thing that Ian really stressed to me when I was getting started, not to start too low.

Andrew Hellmich: So if you, if you were to go back now, knowing what you do know now, would you, would you start even higher than where you started? Or you think you've taken the right road so far?

Nick Evans: Probably would start a little higher. It's hard to say whether I would have made those initial bookings, but I don't think starting at two and a half would have turned people away, compared to sort of 2200.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, sure.

Nick Evans: Yeah. At the end of the day, I think it's less of a financial decision once you get sort of up above $2,000, even more so above three, there's other factors that people are looking at, yeah, but that's sort of little bit of guesswork there. It's hard to say.

Andrew Hellmich: Definitely, yep. And what about the online slideshow? You mentioned that a couple of times, you said, it's pretty cool. So what is that? Is that something that goes on to your website?

Nick Evans: Yeah, it's a sort of eight to 10 minute slideshow. It's the highlight sort of package of their, their wedding day. I sort of cull their digital negatives back to, I aim to get down to around 100-120 images. And I will, I use a program called Sound Slides Plus, and sort of put together a couple of songs and put the images to two songs, comes out around 10 minutes and hosted on my website. And that's the first thing that the clients will see after their wedding day, with the intention that they will share that around with all their friends and family and drive traffic to my website. It's awesome.

Andrew Hellmich: It's beautiful.

Nick Evans: That's there's a few sort of benefits to it. People love them. It's a great way to showcase the wedding images. And that's one thing I really focus on, being able to tell the story of the wedding day through that slideshow, which ties in with my sort of full day coverage. I like to be able to tell the whole story of the day.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah

Nick Evans: And then, yeah, the free traffic to my website that it brings is something that Google loves. They'll always rank you higher if you've got lots of visitors.

Andrew Hellmich: So is that, was that a conscious decision, then not to use Facebook to promote the business, but rather bring them back to your website?

Nick Evans: In a way, I use both, but the slideshows are more important to me. I want people landing on my website so they can see more of my work. I still use Facebook for a quick preview here and there, but I really want that web traffic coming in just to help with SEO and so people can see full weddings, yeah.

Andrew Hellmich: Cool. Mate, let's go back to the to the beginning. How did you get started in all this like is, you know, you just didn't, I guess, pop-up two and a half years ago and buy a camera and think I'm going to shoot weddings?

Nick Evans: Yeah, kind of did.

Andrew Hellmich: Serious?

Nick Evans: I kind of dove into it head first. But no, photography, I studied, studied business and journalism for four and a half years, and I guess photography has always just been a bit of a passing interest for me, never a full-on serious hobby. I was never one of those kids who was born with a camera in their hand. It was a bit of a technology geeky thing and an interest in photography that got me into it. And in my final semester of uni, I had a photography elective as one of my subjects, and I loved it. After that, I bought my first digital SLR and a few lenses, and became more of a serious hobby at that point, and at the same time I was sort of graduating uni, took a few months off, and my girlfriend and I went to Whistler for a winter skiing and snowboarding. And I don't know what prompted me to do it. It was sort of, a sort of joking at the time, sort of wondering if I could get a photography job in Whistler.

Andrew Hellmich: As you do.

Nick Evans: Bit optimistic, but sure enough, I did. I googled sort of Whistler photography jobs and landed an on mountain tourist portrait photographer job. One of those guys sort of standing at the top of the mountain as you come off the chair lift hassling you to have a photo taken.

Andrew Hellmich: I know you guys. You drive me nuts.

Nick Evans: Yeah, we weren't making friends too well on the mountain. It was a bit of a demoralizing job, but it was, it was a way to fund the hobby and hang out with some like-minded people. And yeah, one thing led to another, and loved Whistler went back for another season, another winter and summer.

Andrew Hellmich: Shooting as well?

Nick Evans: I did one, one shift of the photography job, and halfway through, I knew I couldn't take it. It was, yeah, it was just, it wasn't that fun. It was way more of a sales position than a creative photography job. It was very, very regimented, the shots they wanted us taking, and the constant rejection of people who really weren't into having their photo taken. Sort of got a bit much, you know, I threw in the towel on the photography job and went into the ski rental shop instead and kept photography as a hobby that winter.

Andrew Hellmich: So just tell me. So with this, with the job on the snow, with that, did they give you exact shots they wanted? So that was sort of standing there look at the camera and smile type of shots? Or were they action shots?

Nick Evans: The first it was more of the stand there post portrait sort of stuff, no action stuff. It was getting people off their skis and out of their snowboards, which was a pain for most people to begin with, and then you'd sort of line them up, holding their skis or boards, and just the big, cheesy grins straight down the camera.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, okay.

Nick Evans: Straight in their face. It was pretty, beautiful stuff.

Andrew Hellmich: And so you're doing this, and are you getting, then paid a commission per sale, or is it for how many families you shoot? Or how does it work?

Nick Evans: It was a commission. It was $8 an hour, big bucks. And then 10%, I think it was 10 to 12% commission. So it was, I think it came out around $13 or $14 an hour, which is pretty equivalent to most of the jobs in the ski resort. Not the best money, but enough to live off and have some fun.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, sure.

Nick Evans: But yeah, the big benefit was meeting a lot of other photographers who I'm still in contact with now, and one of the guys I met in that job I had sort of come up and helped me out with a couple of weddings a month ago. It's been really great the people I met, but yeah, the job itself was more of a stepping stone into photography, and some of those people I met were really my inspiration to get into wedding photography. I saw people, people's work that was a lot better than any wedding photos I'd seen, a lot different as well. And yeah, that sort of inspired me to have a crack at it. So I did.

Andrew Hellmich: So you come home from Canada and then what's the next step for you?

Nick Evans: By that's, by the time I was leaving Canada, I was pretty sure that I wanted to get into weddings, so I came back.

Andrew Hellmich: So hang on. So why weddings at this stage here? Because you hadn't even shot a wedding in the stage, had you?

Nick Evans: No

Andrew Hellmich: So what made you think "I can make a living out of wedding photography?"

Nick Evans: I have no idea. I like. I don't know. I just, I just like the idea of it. I had a close buddy, my mate, his name's Steven Goh. He was from New Jersey, doing a great job of it, making some decent coin. And, yeah, I'm not really, really too sure, looking back now, it sounds like a silly idea, but it's just something that really appealed to me. I loved capturing, I love the creativity. I loved capturing those important moments in people's, people's lives are presented.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, I totally understand all that. So at this stage, though, you hadn't, you hadn't even been out with another photographer yet to shoot a wedding?

Nick Evans: No

Andrew Hellmich: Right. Okay. Alright, so what, so what do you do, yeah?

Nick Evans: When I got back to Brisbane, that was one of the first steps, was I just went through, went through Google, found all the people whose work I liked, and just started sending off emails telling people that my dreams and aspirations and asking to come and tag along on some weddings, and Ian Wilkinson was one of, one of the first to get back to me, or one of the only people who responded with a yes, and that sort of just gone from there, I went out with Ian on some weddings, and then he put me in touch with Ben Clark, another Brisbane wedding photographer. I went out with him on a wedding, and then I'd initially emailed Marcus Bell at Studio Impressions, and he took a while to get back to me, and I ended up going out on a few weddings, assisting him, wedding and engagement shoot, and ended up second shooting a couple with him, and picked up some referrals along the way from Ian, I think, and got my sort of website populated with a bit of a portfolio.

Andrew Hellmich: So let me just interrupt you, Nick, so when you're shooting for these guys, so you're shooting for Ben and Marcus and Ian. Are they, are they allowing you then to take the files that you've shot and use them to build your portfolio? Is that something you discussed beforehand?

Nick Evans: Yeah, it was something I discussed beforehand. Ian was more than happy for me to use any of my work as long as I was sort of making reference to the fact that I was second shooting for him. Ben was the same. Marcus wouldn't allow me to use anything I shot with him.

Andrew Hellmich: And did he say why?

Nick Evans: I think he probably did at the time. I can't really remember his exact reason. I was happy. I was happy. I was just happy to get the experience at that point.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, so you went, you weren't 100% focused in on your portfolio as much experience as getting some shots.

Nick Evans: Yeah, initially, experience and just finding out whether I would really enjoy it was the number one priority. And I sort of worked out after two or three weddings that I sort of, I loved it. I loved the challenge it presented. So after that, it became a bit more about sort of developing my experience and getting some stuff for my portfolio. And Ian was very open to helping me do that.

Andrew Hellmich: That's unreal, isn't it? So nice to make that initial contact with Ian and get that help. That's, that's a huge leg-off.

Nick Evans: Yeah, it was very lucky. He's been fantastic. But without that ability to sort of come along and get so much experience and develop a portfolio, I definitely, definitely wouldn't be where I am with this sort of, I guess you'd call it limited amount of success that I've had.

Andrew Hellmich: Oh mate, it's awesome. So how many, how many emails? I don't know if you remember, how many emails did you send out to photographers in Brisbane?

Nick Evans: Would have sent out eight or 10, I think.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, and you got one yes to start with?

Nick Evans: One 'yes', a couple straight up 'no's', a couple no replies.

Andrew Hellmich: Did you feel nervous sending those out? Or was it like, what the hell I've got nothing to lose?

Nick Evans: Yeah, more of a 'what the hell nothing to lose'. I was sort of guess I came back a bit overconfident from Canada. Yeah, there was, there really was nothing to lose. I just sort of, and at that time, I was kind of blessed by not knowing these names in the industry like I do now, like I wasn't aware that Marcus Bell was this sort of world renowned wedding photographer. I mean, it was sort of mentioned on his website. But I wasn't sort of aware of the fame that some of these guys had to the same extent that I am now. So I just sort of jumped into it and thought, "This guy's got great work. I'd love to, love to go and get some experience alongside someone who can deliver work like this. So why not? The worst that he can say is, 'no'.", so, yeah, I did it.

Andrew Hellmich: Love it. I love that you did that. That's so good. And you know, so many photographers will be listening to this thinking, "Man, there's no way. I'd like to phone Marcus Bell, and see if I can second shoot or, you know, Ian Wilkinson, you know, just with the reputations they got. And it just doesn't hurt to ask, does it?

Nick Evans: Yeah, not at all. So many, I'm yet to meet a photographer in this industry who's not open and willing to share and sort of help people as much as they can. It's such a really great industry. I don't know, I don't know what it's like down south, but Brisbane is fantastic. Everybody's sort of, everybody I've met has been fantastic.

Andrew Hellmich: That's good, man. I think, I think from what I know, it's that's the same everywhere I haven't, you know, barely had a knockback doing this so far, and everyone's been so open with what they've shared. It's been really cool.

Nick Evans: Yeah, no, I definitely recommend people to don't hold back. Just approach them, even if it's just for a quick chat, jump on the phone, give them a call. Ian mentioned to me in the early days, one of the reasons he responded to me so positively was the fact that I'd really personalized the emails I sent out to everybody. I didn't, sort of, didn't draft up a template and copy and paste it to each email address. I sort of, I really only approached the people whose work I loved, and then I sort of tried to tell people what I liked about their work as well, and why I thought, why I sort of wanted to come out with them, I guess. And I think, I think Marcus made mention of that as well, actually, but I think that was pretty important, just not the sort of copy and pasted template arriving the inbox that's easily ignored.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, there's nothing more off-putting than a template email.

Nick Evans: Yeah

Andrew Hellmich: Some of them aren't even personalized. It's just, I mean, we get a lot of job inquiries at my studio, and it's like, "Dear sir", you've got to be joking.

Nick Evans: That's an easy way to get ignored.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, so you mentioned your website there, and you sort of, you're conscious of getting some images on the website and getting some traffic there. So is the website that you started with, the same website that I see now?

Nick Evans: No, I've changed it. It's been through a few different, few different facelifts over the journey. I started off with a Flash PhotoBiz template site, which was, wasn't too bad. It was very easy to get going and looked reasonable, but it was very slow, terrible for search engine optimization, and I ended up ditching that probably 18 months ago in favor of the ProPhoto Blog, which I've got now.

Andrew Hellmich: So that's a template sort of set up as well, is it?

Nick Evans: Yeah, it is. Yeah. ProPhoto Blog, think it costs around $200 and you sort of buy access to the template, which is pretty customizable, and you just gotta buy some hosting and a domain name, and you're good to go. I spent a lot of time customizing it, and I'm always, always tweaking and changing things, but it's sort of, it hasn't changed too much in the last 12 months.

Andrew Hellmich: Cool, and you've got a little your own little logo there. Do you have the designers sort of come in for that? Or did you do that yourself?

Nick Evans: No, I had a designer do that for me. I had, I had the idea behind it, and I've got a friend who is a graphic designer who knocked that one up for me. She did a great job on that one.

Andrew Hellmich: That's great. That's great. And I've also just noticed, looking at your website, that you've got some new packaging, and looks fantastic as well.

Nick Evans: Yeah, yeah. Initially I was sort of just doing the DVDs and it, I don't know, I just didn't feel right handing over some DVDs in a little case. When people are spending so much money with me, I really want that, that full service from start to finish to be really impressive for them.

Andrew Hellmich: Can you, can you describe what you're offering now?

Nick Evans: Yeah, cool. So the digital negatives I deliver in a, it's a five by seven, fancy little cardboard box by Loktah is the company I get them from, company in the States. They're just a really nice little box. They're about, I think they're about 10 bucks each, with some sort of craft paper to pad out the box, and then a custom timber, USB thumb drive, which I deliver the images on. They're a little eight gigabyte thumb drive. There's a bit of, sort of stationary in there, explaining how to care for your digital files, making sure people understand they have to back them up. That's one of the downsides, the USB drive is you can actually just delete everything. There's no safe way to lock the images to the drive like you can with a DVD. So I make sure people are aware they need to back them up. And then there's just a thank you card, some, some referral vouchers that people just sort of entice people to send their friends my way. And four or five art prints, fine art prints. I think it's really important to get those physical prints in people's hands, so I include them with the digital negatives for every wedding.

Andrew Hellmich: So that's like a little bonus that they're not aware they're getting?

Nick Evans: If they've seen that on the website, they might be aware, but it's not listed on my price list, no.

Andrew Hellmich: Very nice. Man, you're underselling it there, because it really does look fantastic. There's, it's beautifully presented, beautifully wrapped. And it's nice to see the five by seven case with the tiny little thumb drive in there with it, with the padding in there. It looks, it looks really classy. Mates, top, top job.

Nick Evans: That's good to hear. Thanks.

Andrew Hellmich: What, can you tell me the name of the company? Was it Locta?

Nick Evans: Yeah. Loktah is the company I get the boxes from, L-O-K-T-A-H.

Andrew Hellmich: Fantastic. We'll put links to that in the show notes. So that's awesome.

Nick Evans: And the thumb drives come through Flashbay, which they'll be pretty easy to find there a, I think I copied those off Stuart Ross. He was very kind to share his supplier with me. Hope he doesn't mind me sharing it.

Andrew Hellmich: No, I think Flashbay, I've heard of them myself. Yeah, they're pretty big mob, aren't they?

Nick Evans: Yeah, no, they've been pretty good, pretty reliable for me.

Andrew Hellmich: That's great. So okay, so things are developing. You've been out with Marcus and Ian, and you know you, are you, do you find you're developing their style? Or have you, you know what's happening with your own shooting during this time?

Nick Evans: Yeah, initially, I was sort of developing quite similar to some of their styles, taking the things I really loved, and I guess I just ended up shooting like them. But also, I spent a lot of time sort of online, stalking other photographers blogs, finding images that I really loved, that really appealed to me, and trying to work out how those photographers made those images, and trying to sort of recreate and copy a few of those images, I guess. And over time, I've sort of kept the images that worked well and the style that really appeals to me, and sort of weeded out the images that didn't work so well and yeah, I've sort of, I guess I've, apparently, I've developed a little bit of a style of my own, a bit of a look of my own, but it's nothing too groundbreaking, really.

Andrew Hellmich: Cool. So what happens now? So business is building, you, I think just before we started hitting or before I hit record, you said that Ian was actually helping you book weddings. I'm guessing he was already booked and he's sending weddings your way?

Nick Evans: Yeah, I think I've got two or three referred directly from Ian once he's been booked. I've also, in the early days, I sort of ran a few different Facebook ads, booked a handful of weddings from those as well. I am 26, so a lot of my friends are getting married.

Andrew Hellmich: Perfect age.

Nick Evans: Yeah, it's been a bit of a blessing, which I didn't expect initially. So there's been referrals from friends who got married, and then by that stage, I probably had eight or 10 under my belt. The odd person, maybe one or two, just found my website and liked my work can book to me from there. So once I had those eight or 10 under my belt, things got a lot easier. I could blog those weddings and try to drive a bit of traffic to the website. Whenever I was blogging those early weddings, I would, I was quite, quite focused on keywording those blog posts for the venues that I'd shot at to try and drive a bit more traffic to the website.

Andrew Hellmich: When you say 'keywording' so you would mention that particular venue over and over in that blog post?

Nick Evans: Yeah, trying to do it discreetly, not, not too tacky. I'd tag, but yeah, definitely tagging and mentioning the venues 'Brisbane wedding photographer' and sort of 'wedding photography Brisbane', those keywords are very hard to rank well for. So, sort of ignored those initially. I've always keyworded for them, but never expected to be to be landing or ranking very well. Initially, I was sort of down around for a long time, sort of page 20 or 30 of Google for those terms for 'Brisbane wedding photographer'. So I was never going to get found going for those terms. So I sort of turned my focus to the venues which I liked shooting at, and I would keyword for those venues, or the sort of less contested keywords and that seems to have worked. Well you can, it's a lot easier to place in the first or second page for some of those venues, some of the good venues in Brisbane. And I found that to work quite well for me.

Andrew Hellmich: Nice one, that that's really smart thinking. That's great because that, like you said, 'Brisbane wedding photographers' going to be so, so tough to rank for with the competition.

Nick Evans: Oh, it's insane. People spend. I've heard of people spending big money to be sort of locked into the first page, and it takes a lot of effort and a lot of traffic to be up there, so initially there was just no point even bothering to get up there. I needed to be a bit smarter about it and keywording for venues and locations is has been a lot more successful.

Andrew Hellmich: So you obviously, I mean, you're talking a lot about SEO and keywords and your blog, so I'm guessing that a lot of business comes from the blog itself?

Nick Evans: Yeah, definitely, yeah.

Andrew Hellmich: Really? Okay, so, so you obviously know your website's working.

Nick Evans: Yeah, the website's been, it's been a big thing for me. I haven't, haven't been to any wedding expos or anything like that. It's sort of word of mouth, and the website are my key tools for booking weddings.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay. And then, what about the Facebook ads that you mentioned earlier? So you're not doing them anymore?

Nick Evans: No, I'm not doing those anymore. They were, they were pretty good. I've sort of encouraged a few new photographers to run them and people have booked some work from them that I know they've been they were pretty good. They were just a really good way to get access to the right target market. You can really, really hone them down to the right target audience. So I am, I studied my business major was advertising, so I'm sort of pretty aware of finding the right market for my ads.

Andrew Hellmich: So you would target, say, you know, 26 to 32 year old females in the Brisbane area and they're engaged?

Nick Evans: Yeah, exactly, yeah. I think, I think I was going sort of 22 to 35 year old women. But the rest of that was spot on. I might have gone a bit broader initially. I think you used to be able to select 100 meter, 100 kilometer radius of Brisbane.

Andrew Hellmich: Yes

Nick Evans: I'm happy to travel to the Sunshine Coast or Gold Coast for weddings. So, um, I didn't want to rule out that market, and it was sort of, it was all, you were paying for traffic. But you're definitely getting sort of high quality traffic to your website. I was getting sort of, I think I was getting six or eight click throughs a day, and pretty reliably getting some inquiries through that.

Andrew Hellmich: So you would be paying guessing around $1 a click?

Nick Evans: Yeah, I think it's somewhere around there.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, so you get say, and were you taking the traffic from those Facebook ads to your Facebook page or to your blog?

Nick Evans: To my blog.

Andrew Hellmich: Right. Because you pay more to do that, don't you with Facebook?

Nick Evans: I think you do. I never tried sending them to my business page. It was, I didn't have as much sort of continuous work to show through the, through the Facebook business page. So I was always interested in getting them onto my website. Once I had the website to a point where I was happy with it, that was really important to have a good looking website that sort of gave people a good idea of my approach. Gave them a really good cross section of weddings, like full weddings that I'd shot. I found it was sort of, I was really interested in being able to show that full day wedding story in blog posts, and, yeah, sort of until I had that website to a point I was happy with. There wasn't really much point sending people to an ugly website. So I got that stuff locked away first.

Andrew Hellmich: Sure. So I'm not quite sure. What I really want to know is why you stopped doing Facebook ads if it was working for you. And you know, are you happy with 25 weddings a year? Or what's your target number?

Nick Evans: I think the reason I stopped was I got a bit busy, and I didn't really, didn't really need to be spending the money on them at the time. And I think I found a lot of the, sorry, a lot of the inquiries were coming through for dates I was already booked on, so it was a bit of a waste of time for me.

Andrew Hellmich: Because you can't, you can't change that, can you? You can't sort of pick when the ads are going to show up and for what dates.

Nick Evans: Yeah, exactly. But there's definitely no reason for me not to be running them now, apart from just being sort of busy enough to not really need to spend that money at the moment, but I'd definitely recommend running them if, I mean, I'm thinking about running one at the moment. I was saying to a mate a couple days ago that I might run one again, just to see how they go. But my goal is to always be a one-man band. I like the idea of being able to be the only contact point for my clients, so if they sort of shoot me through an email or give me a call, they're always going to be talking to me, and there's no sort of miscommunications from other staff and things like that. So 25 or 30 weddings is sort of my target at the moment. I just need to increase my average right now, my average spend from clients would be probably around, sort of three and a half, three and a half thousand dollars, with a fewer ,I'm not selling too many albums at the moment, but when I do, they're up around, sort of six, six and a half thousand dollars gross sales per wedding. And I want to sort of be averaging around sort of five or $6,000 for those 30 weddings. So that's the, that's the target.

Andrew Hellmich: So when, when do you make that jump to put the prices up again? Is it? Will you tell me?

Nick Evans: No, the price is probably going to stay where it is for a while. I need to get people buying more albums, I guess. I'm not sure, not, not quite sure how to do that. I will, I'll probably wait another sort of six to 12 months before moving my digital package, that full day, full day digital package, with the high res digital negatives, before moving that package up to $4,000. My album prices, I'm pretty comfortable with where they're at the moment, so they'll probably sort of stay there. And then I've got a few extras, like engagement shoots, which are, which I charge around $500 for, and then a little sort of photo booth style setup at the wedding, which I charge 600 for. It's just a just a backdrop and a camera on a tripod and a remote release, and a few props.

Andrew Hellmich: Very cool. So you don't have, you don't have to be there for that. That just runs by itself.

Nick Evans: I do need to keep an eye on it. By that point in the night, there's normally plenty of drunk people, sort of getting around and, but it can run itself. I just need to sort of keep one eye on it most of the time. I'll sort of tend to try and bring an assistant along for that, just so I can focus on still shooting the reception, some sort of really nice candid stuff for the reception, there's not too much involved in running it for the assistant, other than just keeping an eye on it, making sure nobody's playing with the camera, or sort of zooming things in or out, or bumping the tripod or anything like that.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah. So are you there to the end of the night at your weddings?

Nick Evans: Yeah, I am typically, yeah, pretty close to the end. Sometimes it's all the way to the end till the couple are sort of leaving. Some weddings tend to drag on pretty late. And if things are sort of really quietening down and there's not much going on the dance floor, and it's sort of just that, sort of that process of everybody saying goodbye, I will, I'll go and sort of see if the couple are after any more photos, and I'll sort of slide away as well. But I, but I definitely cover all of the formalities of the night, all of the cutting of the cake and the first dance and throwing the bouquet and garter and all that sort of stuff. And then if there is going to be an interesting departure, like a sparkler exit, or anything like that, and it's not too late, I'll hang around for that too.

Andrew Hellmich: Cool. That's awesome. So, so where do you see? Is it Nick Evans Photo, or Nick Evans Photography?

Nick Evans: Photography. Yeah, yeah.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay. So where do you see things that you know in a few years’ time for you?

Nick Evans: I still want to be, I want to be sort of booking, probably 30-35, weddings a year. To give myself the ability to take a month or two off of the year, sort of a month or six weeks around Christmas, and then maybe a month in sort of July, August, if I get, if I get lucky enough. I want to be able to sort of live a little and those, those 30 or 35 weddings averaging around that five or $6,000 mark, and I, yeah, sort of might need a hand with some of the editing. Might need to outsource a bit of that. I've just, just recently started outsourcing my album layouts, just because I was slow at them, really slow at selecting the images I wanted to use.

Andrew Hellmich: Because you're so emotionally attached.

Nick Evans: I think so.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, I found the same.

Nick Evans: Yeah, it just really slowed me down way too much, and then I'd end up procrastinating and get distracted, and that ended up taking me days.

Andrew Hellmich: So who's doing that for you?

Nick Evans: I got a guy in Brisbane helping, two different guys I'm sort of trying out at the moment, Tyler Alberti, the young photographer, and then Chris Allen at Go Brave, who was Stuart Ross and Ben Clark have been using Chris for ages, so I've just got him doing one at the moment.

Andrew Hellmich: So when you do, when you're looking at doing outsourcing, is that you pay for that by the hour, or is it by the album?

Nick Evans: These guys charge, I think. Chris at Go Brave, charges per page.

Andrew Hellmich: Yep.

Nick Evans: And then Tyler just quoted me a flat fee for the, I sort of told him that I had 700 images, and 150 of them were selected as favorites, and I wanted a somewhere around a 60 or 70 page album, and he just quoted me, quoted up a price for me.

Andrew Hellmich: Really cool. So you obviously busy enough then to be outsourcing then, or you just want to free up that extra time?

Nick Evans: Bit of both. I've got a lot of wedding edits on at the moment. If I wasn't as busy, I'd still think about doing it myself. But it was so much, it was worth the money, they've cost me around, sort of three or $400 to get that layout back and it frees up sort of, I guess it would free up two or three days for me. So that's pretty wise spend. And it also means that I get the album layout done quicker, a few weeks quicker than I would have, so I can get it to the client quicker, keep them happy, and then obviously get the album sort of finalized and sold to them quicker, because the albums I'm doing at the moment, I still have that upsell processing them with the extra pages so they're not finalized. So want to get them sort of finalized as quick as possible.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, sure. Mate, it's been unreal. How are you feeling? You ready to get into these 10 quick questions?

Nick Evans: Yeah, let's go for it.

Andrew Hellmich: All right. 10 quick questions, 10 quick answers. 3-2-1, Go! Canon or Nikon?

Nick Evans: Nikon.

Andrew Hellmich: Sorry.

Nick Evans: Started off with Canon.

Andrew Hellmich: Oh did you? You changed.

Nick Evans: Yeah. I killed a 40 day in the snow. It just wasn't up to it. It copped a really hard time. And then I had a buddy with a D7100, which was sort of three or four years ago, four or five years ago. It was the best full frame option for the money. I mean, Canon only had, I think they had the 5D Mark II, or the 1Ds Mark III, and neither of them did what the D7 00 would do in terms of sort of focus and auto focus, and low light performance and frame rate as well. I wanted some sort of, initially, I thought I needed eight frames a second to get good stuff. I wanted to shoot some action stuff in the in the park, in Whistler, in the..

Andrew Hellmich: Oh yeah, the jump back there.

Nick Evans: Yeah, you don't. I mean, I don't really use the high frame rate anymore, but the D7100 was a good option, and so I switched over to Nikon. Haven't looked back. Now, being a D800 and a D3S and a bunch of, bunch of primes. Mainly shoot 35 mil 1.4 and 85 1.4 for 80% of the day. And then I've got a 45 mil tilt, which I love, up that lens. And then I've just got the sort of standard 24 to 70 or 7200 if, if I need them, which is typically only during the ceremony I'll use them.

Andrew Hellmich: It's, it's been one interesting thing asking these questions with every photographer I've had on. It's, it's always a different lens. It's very cool.

Nick Evans: Yeah, no, 35-35 mil would be the favorite. It's, it's just rock solid. 85 is a bit fiddly with focus sometimes, it's got a bit of personality to it, but it still delivers beautiful results. So 35-85 I really got to the point where I can sort of mentally frame an image at 35 or 85 ,so I can look at it, look at a scene, and go, 85 that'd be perfect. And it sort of just helps me, helps me sort of think about the image more before taking it like I would with a 24-70.

Andrew Hellmich: So, so how many shots you're shooting at a wedding roughly?

Nick Evans: Right around 28 to 3500 images.

Andrew Hellmich: Whoa. I got off the phone yesterday to another photographer, he was shooting, he does shoot 4000 images at a wedding and delivers 3800 of the clients.

Nick Evans: Wow, insane!

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah. He says, "I don't want to choose, and they want them all, so they can have them."

Nick Evans: That's insane.

Andrew Hellmich: So how many you typically giving?

Nick Evans: I aim for sort of six or 700 maybe, maybe lower than that sometimes.

Andrew Hellmich: That's pretty, pretty standard.

Nick Evans: I want to see my bad images. I can take some terrible shots. I'm sure we all do, but key is to just hide them from the clients. They get the good stuff.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah

Nick Evans: I'll cull it down as tight as possible for them. And then there's sort of that slide shows, what I'm, slideshow or album selections, normally right around 150 of my favorites.

Andrew Hellmich: Cool. Mate, let's keep plugging away through these questions.

Nick Evans: Yeah

Andrew Hellmich: First ever camera?

Nick Evans: Would have been a Canon IXUS Point and Shoot, like an IXUS, was it? They have like, an IXUS 40 or something like that.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, like little silver ones?

Nick Evans: Yeah, something like that.

Nick Evans: Very good.

Nick Evans: Got started for me.

Andrew Hellmich: I was gonna ask you your favorite lens, but I think, did you say it was a tilt and shift?

Nick Evans: Yeah, it's a the Nikon 45 mil tilt. Love it.

Andrew Hellmich: Is it fiddly to set up a new at a wedding?

Nick Evans: Yeah, yeah, definitely. It's quite, quite tricky. It's, it's all manual focus, manual focus, manual aperture. And then, of course, you're tilting and shifting as well. And the margin for error when you're shooting it at 2.8 is its tiny and it's, it's very easy to miss focus, but when you do nail it, it's, it just gives a look that you can't really get with many other lenses. And I love it. I sort of love the challenge of using it and getting those shots.

Andrew Hellmich: So that's all tripod mounted with a tilt and shift?

Nick Evans: No.

Andrew Hellmich: Oh, can hand hold it.

Nick Evans: Yeah, I'll hand hold it.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, cool.

Nick Evans: A little bit of spray and pray. I've found is the best way to guarantee focus. Sounds really amateur, but just sort of manual focus it to where it looks like it's in focus, and then sort of just take a couple shots either side of that for insurance. You got to double check them. They're so easy. I mean, when you're shooting full length of a bridal party, the depth of field is, sort of, it's less than half a head. So when you miss it, you miss it by ages.

Andrew Hellmich: So it's like shooting with a 1.4 almost.

Nick Evans: Yeah, yeah, very much. So it's, it's quite tricky, but really delivers good results. And I love it.

Andrew Hellmich: Nice. JPEG or RAW?

Nick Evans: I shoot RAW, deliver JPEGs.

Andrew Hellmich: Cool. What do you think was the biggest breakthrough in your business? I know it's only been a couple of two and a half years.

Nick Evans: Biggest breakthrough

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, when did you think this is good? I'm on my way. I've cracked it.

Nick Evans: Oh, that's really tricky. I don't think I've had one of those moments, Andrew, it's sort of been, bit of a roller coaster, up and down, loving, loving some stuff I get, hating some stuff I get. Really positive about a booking, negative about missing a booking. Yeah, I haven't really had that.

Andrew Hellmich: I'll get you back on in two years’ time, we'll find out.

Nick Evans: Yeah, but now sort of still just progressing, I think

Andrew Hellmich: What software do you use for your batching, editing, renaming and renumbering?

Nick Evans: Lightroom 4. Lightroom 4 for sort of 99% of my work. I'd say, I'll send an image into Photoshop for some if I'm maybe, if I'm stitching a panorama or need to go in and clone something out, which I can't do with the clone tool in Lightroom. And I will, I have just started culling in Photo Mechanic as well, just because it's a bit, bit quicker to load the previews, so I can cull a bit quicker in photo mechanic.

Andrew Hellmich: Yep, that's what we use. It's great.

Nick Evans: Yeah, it's pretty, pretty good, and I've set it up to interface nicely with Lightroom so that the XMP, the split, the color rating from Photo Mechanic translates into a color rating in Lightroom, which is probably pretty basic, but then I can sort of load up that catalog and just select those images.

Andrew Hellmich: If you say tagging an image, the good shots, or the duds.

Nick Evans: Yeah, I always go through and select what I think are the good ones.

Andrew Hellmich: Yep

Nick Evans: It's quicker than looking for the bad stuff, I think. So I'll select the good ones and then bring them into Lightroom to work on them, and I'll, I'll go through and drop a lot of the selected images on the way through, just as a sort of little lesson I learned a few months ago. There was, I won't go into too much detail, but there was a photographer in the States who was getting a hard time from a bride, and she'd gone through and selected the 50 worst images he delivered and put them up on her personal Facebook page and got all her friends sort of jumping on this massive negative bandwagon and leaving terrible comments on the images. And even terrible Yelp reviews. So at the end of an edit, I'll always go through and try and ditch the 50 worst images, even if there's nothing sort of too bad about them, just to sort of improve the overall, just to prevent that happening. If somebody was going through looking for the 50 worst to post to Facebook, I want them all to be pretty good.

Nick Evans: She must have been a real bitch.

Nick Evans: Yeah, in the nicest possible way, but yeah, not something I want to ever experience. Just avoid it.

Andrew Hellmich: My next question was, I've only got three left, but one of them was going to be, do you watch what other photographers are doing? And I know that's a resounding yes from you.

Nick Evans: Definitely.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah.

Nick Evans: I try not to let it influence me too much, but I try and definitely watch what others are doing and try and work out why. And then once I've sort of got an idea about why they're doing it, try and work out whether it's something that would help me in my business. And I've learned so much of what I've learned is from other photographers. Ian helped me so much with, with learning how to shoot the wedding day. Ian and Marcus and Ben were great with, sort of being an open book as far as their posing and what they're shooting and why. And then other photographers have shared, like the online slideshows, like, I'm not inventing anything new here. I've got that from all from other photographers, and been to a few workshops. And the website, all the website stuffs from, from other photographers, a lot of tips from, from Matt Ebenezer, got a lot of just sort of picked up a lot of his stuff in online forums, and have been to Matt and Katie's workshop.

Andrew Hellmich: I'm interviewing them next week.

Nick Evans: Oh, really cool. Say hi to them.

Andrew Hellmich: I will do. I will.

Nick Evans: Matt's got some really good, really, really good business advice, which I've implemented sort of six months ago. It's really helped. I've really noticed that it's worked and helped my business.

Andrew Hellmich: Very good. So he's, he's the business side of the, so the business side of the partnership, and she's the artistic one, is that right?

Nick Evans: Yeah, that's, that's the impression that I've got from them. A lot of that was because this is sort of what they've told me, or what they've sort of taught in their workshop, was that Matt really had to develop some good business principles and systems to help Katie out, because she was struggling a bit with the business side of things, and once he found they've worked, he's, he's got a real passion for sharing those systems and principles with other photographers and they've definitely helped me. A lot of it I just found online, a lot of the stuff which they'd taught in their workshop, so I'd sort of had the opportunity to implement it before the workshop, and come workshop time, I could really sort of just reinforce that a lot of it worked. And I was, I was on the right track.

Andrew Hellmich: Excellent. Hopefully I can extract a few little tidbits out of him as well.

Nick Evans: Yeah, and I'm sure we'll be happy to, you'll have him chewing your ear off for hours, right?

Andrew Hellmich: Well, mate, this is the question you've been waiting for. What's your most embarrassing photography moment or stuff up?

Nick Evans: Had plenty of them. Dropping, sort of dropping Marcus Bell's flashes off his light stands.

Andrew Hellmich: Serious?

Nick Evans: Yeah, onto carpet. Terribly embarrassing. I've offered to tie a tie for some of the groomsmen on a wedding with Ian and had two or three cracks at it and just not been able to tie it.

Andrew Hellmich: Do you know now?

Nick Evans: Yeah, and then on one of my own weddings, it's just, just silly little things that, it was a bit sad, really, I sort of asked the bride and groom if there was any other family groupings they wanted when we were doing the family photos, and I sort of asked the bride. I was like, "Oh, did we get a shot with your grandparents?" And her grandma had passed away sort of the week before the wedding.

Andrew Hellmich: Oh no.

Nick Evans: Which I didn't find out until the reception.

Andrew Hellmich: Oh, so they hadn't told you previously.

Nick Evans: No

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, but they're not as bad.

Nick Evans: I was looking for a hole to crawl into. The sort of lesson I took away from that was to really sort of communicate as much as I can before the wedding about those sort, of those family groupings. And I'll always have a pre-wedding meeting with the clients, where I go through parents, siblings, grandparents, who gets on, who doesn't, whether mum and dad are still together, if they're not, would they be happy in photos together? Just that sort of stuff to sort of, to avoid those situations arising on a wedding day.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, yeah, definitely. That's definitely worth knowing, isn't it?

Nick Evans: Yeah, pretty basic stuff, but I mean, once you've learned it, you won't make that mistake, guys.

Andrew Hellmich: Nick, it's been an absolute pleasure mate. Where can people see your work and, you know, follow you online?

Nick Evans: Yeah, cool. They can find most of my work on my website, at nickevansphoto.com, I've got a Facebook business page as well, just Nick Evans Photo, all one word. I, and, yeah, it's been great. Hopefully I've been able to provide a little bit of information that's been helpful to people.

Andrew Hellmich: It's been absolutely awesome. Let me, let me ask you, why did you go with a.com URL instead of.com.au?

Nick Evans: I just thought it had a bit more credibility initially. Dot com businesses seem bigger, I guess, even though I'm always sort of been structuring it as a one man band. Yeah, that was about it.

Andrew Hellmich: Do you plan to shoot overseas?

Nick Evans: I wouldn't turn back overseas jobs, but I much prefer to shoot close to home. I've traveled for a few weddings on my own, and it just adds sort of a few other degrees of difficulty, which I'd rather avoid, and sort of just be able to drive, sort of 10 or 15 minutes into sort of Brisbane City and shoot a wedding, and then drive home. When you're sort of on the road for weddings, you got to be so careful with your gear. And then backups and sort of keeping duplicates of wedding files after you shot. I shot a couple of weddings in Byron a few weeks ago, and back to back weddings, actually. And so for the, I got home from the first wedding, had to back everything up. I think I made three or three copies of it on hard drives, and then kept the card that all the shots on the cards as well. And then you sort of got to be so careful with those the next day and wanted to go for a swim on the on the morning after the second wedding. And by that stage, I've got sort of two full days of weddings spread across four different information sources, and then one wondering, sort of what I should be doing. Should I be sort of split them between the car and the hotel room, and then I should have been sort of carrying a hard drive on the beach with my towel, which I take cards down there. And that's all stuff you can just avoid by sort of shooting a bit closer to home, so.

Andrew Hellmich: You just took all the glamor out of traveling away to shoot.

Nick Evans: The destination wedding photography. It's like a glamorous thing that people aspire to, but there's nothing glamorous about sitting in a hotel room on your own, trying to get a Wi Fi connection through your phone and sort of sitting on Facebook in this hotel room on your own. I just, just not something that appeals to me. I'd much rather be it at home with sort of the girlfriend or the ability to see friends and family the night before or after a wedding.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, my favorite wedding venue is five minutes from home exactly.

Nick Evans: It's a big plus for me, and the time it saves you as well. Like, if you've got to travel a day each side of a wedding, then the weddings cost you three days instead of one.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah.

Nick Evans: Got to be sensible about your time and whether you're getting reimbursed for it.

Andrew Hellmich: That's exactly right, mate. You got to promise me now you're going to come back on in a couple of years’ time.

Nick Evans: Definitely be more than happy to. Hopefully, I'm hopefully I'm way too busy and rich and sort of self-important to even bother but I don't think that'll be the case coming in a couple of years.

Andrew Hellmich: Fantastic. Well, I've got it on. I've recorded it now. So yeah.

Nick Evans: You got my word.

Andrew Hellmich: Nick has been a pleasure. Thanks very much.

Nick Evans: Not a problem at all. Thanks, Andrew. Good chatting to you.

 
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