Why isn’t your business where you want it to be yet?
While there may be some very good reasons, I bet there are several excuses that you tell yourself that are holding you back from reaching your true potential.
To get the business you really want, you can’t allow them to get in your way.
Sometimes we don’t even realize how many excuses we’re actually believing. So today I’m going to list them out, and over the next several months I’m going to take them down, one by one, and give you the tools you need to overcome each and every excuse in the list.
Excuses are for your competitors, not you. YOU are aiming for success!
Don’t let some lie keep you from getting there.
What to expect
I’ll be releasing several videos in this excuses series along with the audio-only version of the videos so you can listen while you edit or drive if you prefer. Some will be shorter, and others will be longer and may include other people as well. Links will be added as posts are created for each excuse, so bookmark this and check back often and subscribe to my YouTube channel. These posts will be in addition to my regular content.
[powerpress]
Photography business excuses that hold you back:
Excuse #1: My photography isn’t good enough
Excuse #2: My camera/gear isn’t good enough
Excuse #3: I am not cute enough or have trendy enough clothes for people to book me
Excuse #4: The market is over-saturated
Excuse #5: If I could just get one ideal “high end” client that I could showcase, then I could get more clients
Excuse #6: X Photographer gets all the business
Excuse #7: I don’t know anything about business
Excuse #8: I won’t get any business if I do ________
Excuse #9: I don’t know what is best to do next
Excuse #10: I don’t have enough money to grow my business
Excuse #11: I’ll never be able to retire
Excuse #12: My full-time job doesn’t allow me enough flexibility
Excuse #13: I can’t raise prices or I’ll offend and/or lose my current clients!
Excuse #14: How do you compete with crazy-cheap shoot’n’burn photographers or Groupon photographers?
Excuse #15: I don’t know where to start
Excuse #16: I want to raise rates but $XXXX is a dead zone.
Excuse #17: That won’t work in my culture. People here won’t get it.
Excuse #18: I’m not strong enough
Excuse #19: I’m depressed
Excuse #20: My accent/disability/race makes it difficult
Excuse #21: I’m scared of success
Excuse #22: I’m scare it won’t last and I’ll fail and won’t have anything to do?!
Excuse #23: I’m moving soon.
Excuse #24: An accountant/lawyer/insurance is too expensive
Excuse #25: I prefer stability to the feeling that I always have to hustle
Excuse #26: I don’t have a studio
Excuse #27: I’m too busy to learn something new
Excuse #28: You have nothing to fall back on
Excuse #29: I need a job with benefits!
Excuse #30: I can’t take money for something I love
Excuse #31: I can’t charge more because I’m not full-time.
Excuse #32: I don’t like turning people down because they can’t afford my fee
Excuse #33: I’m scared I’ll do something wrong when filing as a business and have the gov’t tell me I owe them TONS of money
Excuse #34: You may not follow through
Excuse #35: I hate selling and can’t do it.
Excuse #36: I’m too slow
Excuse #37: I won’t have enough clients if I “specialize”
Excuse #38: I live in a small town and there isn’t the market for it
Excuse #39: If my photos were better, clients would flock to me
Excuse #40: I’m a photographer, not a social media blogger who also loves accounting
Excuse #41: I don’t know how to price competitively for my area
Excuse #42: I can never get where I want to be with the clients I have now.
Excuse #43: People just don’t understand my vision
Excuse #44: I’m not as good as ________
Excuse #45: I can’t write
Excuse #46: I am not experienced enough
Excuse #47: Kids/Family/Parents/Spouse/Etc make it too difficult
Excuse #48: Everything (including market) keeps changing
Excuse #49: The economy is bad
Excuse #50: Everyone just goes to their friends
Excuse #51: I’m not creative enough
Excuse #52: I’m too pessimistic
Excuse #53: I’m afraid to charge more because I don’ thave confidence that people will be willing to pay it
Excuse #54: I’m too short/tall to take good photos
Excuse #55: I’m too soft-spoken and shy
Excuse #56: What if I get too much business and am overwhelmed?
Excuse #57: I’ve been doing things this way for X years; no need to change now
Excuse #58: I don’t want to announce anything yet, because what if someone calls me!
Excuse #59: I couldn’t afford myself at those prices
Excuse #60: I can’t afford to have a professionally designed website
Excuse #61: I don’t want to shoot things I’m not interested in shooting because I “need” the money
Excuse #62: I can’t afford backup equipment
Excuse #63: I need financial security
Excuse #64: Advertising is too expensive
Excuse #65: People look down on those who do ____________ photography
Excuse #66: I don’t want my colleagues to know I do phtoography
Excuse #67: I’ll turn people away
Excuse #68: I just don’t know the right people to get ahead in this business
Excuse #69: I don’t stand out from the crowd
Excuse #70: My market won’t pay those prices
Excuse #71: I’d get more bookings if I had more Facebook fans / Twitter followers
Excuse #72: I’m not “techy” enough
Excuse #73: I didn’t study photography in college
Excuse #74: My first client was a bad experience, so I’m afraid to get more clients like that
Excuse #75: It’s too hard to become a legitimate business
Excuse #76: People don’t value photography anymore since cameras are so cheap and good now
Excuse #77: Everyone asks me to work for free since I did when I was portfolio building
Excuse #78: I’m ashamed to be “just” a photographer
Excuse #79: I’m too old/young
Excuse #80: I’m not good with people.
Excuse #81: I have no support from friends or family
Excuse #82: I don’t want to raise prices because I might have to drop them later if no one would pay it and that’d look bad.
Excuse #83: Finding childcare is hard and expensive and keeps me from booking sessions
Excuse #84: I don’t want my photography to interfere with my full-time job
Excuse #85: I don’t have time to do more
Excuse #86: I don’t like talking about myself and don’t like attention
Excuse #87: I’m waiting for the right time to start
Excuse #88: Afraid of losing money if it doesn’t work out
Excuse #89: I say I’m going to raise my prices soon (but never do)
Excuse #90: I can’t afford what everyone else seems to have!
Excuse #91: People say I’m “too expensive”
Excuse #92: When I try to network, no one responds to my emails
Excuse #93: I’m scared to fail
Excuse #94: I don’t feel like it
Excuse #95: Client management is more work than I thought and I just can’t keep up
Excuse #96: I only shoot natural light and that limits my business
Excuse #97: I don’t believe my work is worth that much
Excuse #98: I’d hate it if I did it full-time
Excuse #99: But ____ is already doing something similar….
What excuses resonated with you?
What are the excuses from the list that hit you the hardest? Are there other excuses not on the list that you deal with? Leave a comment below and let me know! I’d love to hear them!
