Why So Many Photographers Get Into Education

Why So Many Photographers Get Into Education

You may have noticed a photography education form in recent years online. With the popularization of digital courses, photographers have found fantastic ways to spread education in their community. They’ve also found a lot of opportunities for their business growth in creating an educational platform. So, why do so many photographers get into education in the first place?

Many Creative People Like to Share Their Knowledge

Many creative people like to share their knowledge. In the photography community, building community over competition can serve your business well. Instead of hoarding your secrets and strategies, learning with others can build a strong sense of community, both locally and on a global scale for your business. Connect with photography professionals all around the world that you can teach things to, and maybe they can teach you a little something as well.

Photography Education Can Become a Lucrative Side Hustle

Photography education can become a lucrative side hustle for photographers. This is because it is often something that you don’t need to be physically present for. You can do photography education through physical workshops in your local community, or you can opt for online education platforms which will allow you more flexibility in your schedule.

Going Online for Passive Income Opportunities

Opting for online education can also allow you to set up a course and then let it run in the long term without much maintenance. This is what makes photography education a fantastic passive income source for creators. having education online on a platform that can run itself will allow you to focus more of your energy into the other aspects of your photography business.

Creating Consistent Income Through Photography Education

As we have learned in the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, photography income can seemingly disappear overnight. Having a consistent stream of income through creating photography education can set you up for long-term financial success. As a photographer in any given month, there will be ups and downs. When you use education as a platform to profit, you can create a consistent source of revenue for your business. 

There’s Always Something New to Learn

No photography professional knows everything that there is to know. There will always be something new to learn. Whether it’s learning about different genres of photography, different lighting techniques, or different editing styles, there’s always something. There are also a lot of photographers who are not educated on the business and marketing side of photography. All of these educational topics are crucial aspects to running a successful photography business.

Diving Into Your Expertise

Regardless of what your expertise is, there is definitely someone out there looking to learn about it. You have a unique set of skills as a creative person to be able to educate others. If you are a boudoir photographer, for example, there are plenty of topics you can tackle through educational meetings. An example of this would be making your subjects comfortable, replicating natural light and boudoir photography, or how to market a boudoir business online.

Setting Yourself Apart From the Competition

Gifting others with the chance to learn from you is something that can set you apart from your local photography competitors. For example, if you are a family photographer, you can set up education for your clients on how they can photograph their families as well. Your clients will still come back to you as a professional photographer for their regular needs, but they will also be able to make wonderful memories on their own which is something that they will thank you for forever.

Nobody Can Do What You Do

At the end of the day, nobody can do what you can do. Many photographers and creative people can fall into comparison traps. However, there is nobody on this planet like you. You have a unique perspective and educating others can give the opportunity for up-and-coming creators to learn something unique.

Why Your Business Resonates with Your Clients

Yes, there are hundreds of thousands of wedding photographers out there. But there is a reason that your clients hire you and you alone. There is something about your wedding photography business that has resonated with enough people for you to create a stable living out of it. Creating education on your unique value proposition can not only help others, but can help you dig deeper into your own business and strategy. 

Adding to the Craft of a Number of Other Photographers

Teaching others what you know will show other photographers something completely different than what they may be doing. However, it will also let them put their own spin on it as well. When other photographers learn from you, nobody can do what they do either. They are blending their unique experiences and techniques with the education provided to them.

How to Market Your Photography Education

if you’ve decided to get into photography education, the key here is marketing. You must be able to market your education and communicate the value to prospective students. There are many ways to market your photography education platforms, specifically if you are doing online education. Physical workshops can also use the same strategies, but you can also take those strategies to a local level with physical marketing opportunities.

Work on Your SEO

Work on your website SEO to make yourself searchable to other photographers. When these creators are looking for advice in specific areas, you will want to make sure that your business is the first thing that pops up when they Google their questions. Creating blog content around these educational topics can allow you to get more visibility and interest in your education. You won’t want to put all the content of your course into blog posts, just enough to get people interested and then promote your course.

Build up Your Email List

Building up an email list Can impact your online education sales dramatically. The people who are opting in to your email list are there because they want to hear more from you and your business. You can start building this email list with free content that you make available to people in exchange for their email address. The reason that having an email list is so important is because it is the only platform that you truly own. Your social media audience can diminish, or the platform you’re on fizzles out and becomes irrelevant.

Keep Yourself Active on Social Media

Keep yourself active on social media because that is where much of your potential audience is. Figure out which platforms are most relevant to what your potential audience is interested in. Many younger photographers, for example, are starting to use TikTok for their social media marketing. Millennial photographers are still on Instagram and Pinterest. Keep your eye on social networks to see where your educational marketing opportunities fit.

Start Dreaming up Photography Education Ideas

Once again, nobody can do what you do. You have a completely unique perspective and set of expertise that people do want to hear from. It is all about finding your audience and creating your educational content based on their needs. Consider getting started in photography education to help grow your business and stabilize income.

Megan Breukelman's picture

Megan is the owner of Brooklyn Wedding Photo, and host of the Photo Opp Podcast. She aims to share actionable tips to help photographers grow and scale their businesses.

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5 Comments

All very true. I'm a professional photographer that teaches for the Department of Cultural Affairs, Los Angeles on the side out of my love for helping people. I started my Youtube channel in order to help more people than I could teaching local classes and for many of the reasons mentioned in this article.

There's no better way to learn a subject than to teach it to someone else. At least for me, it always forced me to ask the question, "Am I really doing this the best way? What don't I know?" Becoming an educator also gave me the opportunity to shoot alongside some of the world's greatest photographers (and I learned something from each of them). Overall, even if your long-term goal isn't education, it's a great way to hone your skills.

Spot on! I'm only just getting into teaching and have come to the same conclusion. Especially when you get a question you don't know the answer to. It pushes you to be better.

sorry, but 99.9999999% of photography "courses" are little more than "no one will hire me to take a picture, but I can show you how to take off a lens cap for only 6 easy payments of $39.99 + taxes"

Virtually all photo education sites are anything but . . . they are bullshit . . . people who couldn't get any kind of job no matter what . . . or, more precisely, welfare frauds.

The absolute worst at the moment are the never-ending food photography sites and food bloggers. Anyone who has even a micro-gram of intelligence and experience will see that they are all worthless crap. Loaded with no useful information whatsoever, and page after page after page of pointless dribble laced with ad after ad after ad.

fstoppers is a shining example. They have one or two people who offer some degree of info, but the whole site is nothing more than click-bait . . . which holds true for their colleagues slrlounge and petapixel.

Some manufacturers offer minimal guidance for wannabees, and more importantly, lighting manufacturers Profoto, Bron, and Elinchrom offer quite good info . . . FREE.

Do yourself a favour if you are looking for info . . . spend a bit of extra TIME not money and you will find some good info.

Westcott, Chimera, Bowens, Photoflex, Profoto, Broncolor, Elinchrom, all have a good selection of edu info, and if you can find it, Lowel's incredible free book on lighting and on and on.

Stay away from the wankers, including the author of this article. They can't teach you anything except how to spend your money on nothing.

You haven't posted any portfolio pictures. Why not show us what you can do?