Ethics. A Vital Business Component.
There are a lot of people who claim to be Photography Business coaches yet they know nothing about ethics. If someone tells you that as a newbie photographer you can charge or charge whatever you want though you may not know the difference between an F-Stop and a Bus Stop; or they tell you that you don’t need to use contracts in your business they are absolutely unethical and you should immediately reject those teachings.
There seems to be numerous people like these who are absolutely unethical in their business teachings by encouraging unprofessional and unethical behavior and and following that kind of advice will get you in trouble.
There are more and more people launching photography businesses than I’ve ever seen and while that may be great in general; many of them are being fed incorrect and blatantly bad business information and it needs to stop.
This isn’t always their fault per se’ however. Case in point I was recently kicked out of a Photography business group on Facebook because the owner said that I caused controversy a second time because what I posted didn’t agree with what her business philosophy was and what she was teaching these people in this group.
I’m not afraid to tell you that she wasn’t wrong about that. The controversy I caused is what happens when someone like me comes into the group and says things like “new photographers shouldn’t be even thinking of charging people a premium for services they don’t even know how to provide yet.” and that statement goes against the ethos of the group that individual had created.
But let’s talk about what ethics are and do and why that’s important to business owners such as yourself. Ethics dictate the moral direction of your business. They in fact inform your morality. An ethical person doesn’t overcharge their clients while under delivering the result.
And ethical person also doesn’t agree to take on a job or client they aren’t certain they can meet the expectations of.
When you’re new to photography and don’t know how to work in any environment and consistently deliver high quality results you have no business charging the same thing an actual experienced professional photographer charges.
There are a lot of unethical teachings out there from supposed photography leaders and quite frankly; listening to them is very likely to eventually leave your clients dissatisfied and get you into deep trouble.
Please reject these kinds of lessons from the so called gurus who tell you that you can charge whatever you want when your skills don’t warrant that. They’re being dishonest and preying on your hopes and dreams of being a professional photographer so they can pay their bills.
Don’t fall for it. I know how it is to be excited to start a new photography business. But do it the right way. And that requires ethical values of how you’d want to be treated if the roles were reversed.
These are the kinds of things I go over in my facebook group as well as at my boudoir photography business seminars and lighting workshops.
