Are you a little like me in that you’ve lost track of what day it is? Between Christmas and New Year’s it all kind of melts and mashes into one, but let me remind you what day it is today…it’s #TravelTuesday! Yes, that’s right, it’s time for a sprinkle of wisdom to be laid down from me to you, so let me tell you what it’s all about today!
If you want to make your photography contribute to your bank account, I’m going to show you some ways to do that. Happy New Year to you all, let’s make 2019 the year you make money from your images!
First of all, Instagram. Instagram is an easy way to make a little pocket money and some people even make their entire living from it. Take a look at Jeremy Jauncey, the founder of Beautiful Destinations. This account got in there in the early days of the gram and quickly rose to be one of the biggest corporate accounts. Now reviewing hotels and travel destinations the world over, this account puts food on the table for a whole bunch of influencers and employees. To get your Instagram account monetised you need just a handful of things: –
Consistency, engagement, and a trusted following. With these things set, which is fairly easy to do, you can apply to micro-influencing agencies who will either send you briefs or have open briefs which you can apply for. A good agency to start with is Takumi. If you don’t yet have the three key ingredients listed at the start of this paragraph, build on that first. Engagement leads to engagement, so if you interact with others it encourages them to interact with your account too. Consistency means a defined look, style or topic. And the trusted following means that your followers are actual people, not bots and not paid for!
Next up is stock. Stock can, at first, make small amounts owing to the proportion of the sale retained by the agency making the sale for you. You may get something as little as 20% of the sale, however, look at it like this: – if you get 20% of $1000 you are still making a decent whack, and in any case, 20% of something is way better than 0% of nothing.
To get involved in stock photography the key is, generally, having a library of images which are retouched in a realistic way, and having a lot of them! Get yourself on Adobe Stock, Getty Images, iStock, ShutterStock, or any of the big stock vendors by registering for an account and uploading a test submission. Take note of the submission guidelines and make sure you adhere to the rules, and once you’re in make sure you upload as frequently as possible, taking into account market trends, and bear in mind that if you offer images exclusively to one vendor it’s likely to make you more money than offering the same image across multiple libraries.
Next up is to approach publications that match your genre. Writing to editors of magazines or blogs to pitch your photography is a great way to have people license your images directly, offering exclusivity to someone in need of images like yours. This method is going to result in rejection more often than not, so make sure you’re ready for that. When you do get through to someone interested in your work, it’s worth all the hard work!
Ladies and Gents, make 2019 your year in photography! If you need any extra advice, you can always reach out to me, Dave Williams, or get involved in the discussion in the KelbyOne community.
Much love
Happy New Year!
Dave
