Watch Normal Businesses React to the Promise of Exposure

Working in the creative arts world has always involved the struggle of conveying value to clients and educating them that our time has value and that exposure doesn't pay the bills. It's nothing new, and it will likely continue, especially as the barrier to entry in the industry continues to fall, but we all have the power to change it.

HK Magazine has published an article showing a conversation between photographer Marcobilly Chong and a prospective client named Rachel Mok. Originally, Mok had reached out to the regionally famous photographer, Deric Wong, about photographing 45 families and their one-year-old babies at a party. When Wong quoted $15,000, that was the end of that. Mok then contacted Chong, and that conversation started off on the wrong foot.

Rachel Mok starts out by asking:

I want to ask if you have time this week to help take photos at our party.

Immediately, Chong replies:

What am I being paid? Not just word of mouth.

Mok drops the bomb:

We are Oct [sic] mama group and we will hv [sic] a Baby 1 yr old birthday party, we hv [sic] 45 families join [sic] the party and we are will ing [sic] to like and share ur [sic] fb.

And we're off to the races. Immediately, you know this cannot end well, and it doesn't. I do have a criticism of the first words out of this photographer's figurative mouth being about price and (correctly in this case) assuming the prospective customer wants to pay with exposure. But the conversation quickly spirals into a condescending mess of patronizing and name-slinging from Mok, while Chong struggles to regain control of the situation. No amount of being nice was going to help at this point.

Now, the conversation does take place in Chinese. It's a different culture and a different language; so, there's a possibility some aspect of this entire ordeal was lost in translation, but it still brings up the point I'd like to illustrate. We tend to get hit with two major types of free proposals. The first is spec work, which is short for "speculative work." This is a situation in which you work for free with the promise of paid business in the future, and in my experience, it's rare that a company promising spec work will come back to you, no matter how satisfied they are, because they know they can jump from vendor to vendor on spec, never paying anyone ever. This is the slippery slope of spec. Spec work is also not the same as charity work. The other, and most common for most day-to-day freelance photographers, is the promise of exposure. Both are menaces to all creative industries, whether you're a musician, illustrator, or graphic designer. The craziest thing is that while they are a plague to us, they are relatively unheard of in other industries. Advertising agency Zulu Alpha Kilo put together this fantastic video that shows how absolutely crazy spec work sounds when applied to other industries.

I don't have $1.75 in a budget right now just to try one coffee willy-nilly to see if I like it or not. That's why I'd like a spec one.

In this lovely short video, a man goes to people in all sorts of different service industries and tries to purchase their services on spec. He meets with a barista, a restaurateur, a framer, and an architect. He even goes to a personal trainer and says that while he will pay the trainer, in return, he will own the all the rights to all the different training methods they talk about, to which the trainer says:

Absolutely not ever would I do that. Who would ever agree to that?

It's funny because it's true. This attitude is absolutely nuts and would offend almost anyone. So, why do we photographers, as a group, still put up with it?

But have no fear! We have some amazing tools at our disposal to combat the devaluation of our time and livelihoods: education and humility. No matter how much you think you have your client pegged, no matter how offended you are, no matter how much entitlement you believe you deserve, you need to treat all inquiries with the utmost respect and professionalism.

I live in a small town that happens to have a Bentley dealership. Yes, that $200,000 luxury car maker, Bentley. It's the only one of its kind in our entire state, and I'd been driving by it for years, peering with lust through the showroom windows. But one day, 19-year-old me wanted to stop in. I was very obviously unable to afford even a keychain there, but I was treated with the utmost respect and given the same attention they would give any lawyer, CEO, or media mogul. The next day, I told my parents about going into the dealership and how well I was treated, and my mother put it into a perspective I will never forget:

In business, you should treat everyone like they can afford you, because one day, they might be able to.

Not only have those words resonated deeply with me for a decade, but the experience I received from the dealership has as well. I keep those events in the back of my mind at all times when talking to new clients. I am not the most expensive photographer on earth, but I am certainly not cheap. I am out of the price range of many, but I never treat those who go elsewhere as undeserving of my services.

I get asked for spec work, too. I get offered the promise of exposure, too. And I treat those prospective clients no differently. Why? Because one day, they may learn and they may be able to afford me. So, I implore you: be polite to everyone. Be understanding of where they are coming from. Really take the time to educate, but do not be condescending. Do not belittle or talk down to them. Do not act like they should know better, because most people just don't, and they never will when met with arrogance.