Powerful Content Planning for Photographers - How to do More with Less

If you use (or are planning to use) content to market your photography business then this video is for you. I’m going to show you what powerful content planning for photographers looks like and how it results in actual bookings.

I also have freebie content planning templates and examples for you to download!

Prefer to read? Scroll down for the blog post...

Most photographers give content marketing a go at some point

They start writing blog posts, sending emails or recording videos in the hope to reach more potential clients.

Unfortunately, most photographers also give up on this pretty quickly.

They find that the results just aren’t there. They’re slogging it out to create content that no one seems to see and they just don’t see the point in putting in all that time and effort for nothing in return.

Content marketing isn’t right for everyone but it’s a powerful strategy when it’s executed well.

Modern day consumers expect to be able to get to know, like and trust you via your content before they get in touch

That’s what we do now when we’re looking to buy something - we do our research.

Photographers short on content will have to find another way to take potential clients on that journey.

Because that’s what your content marketing should do. It should take them on a journey from:

• becoming aware of you
• to getting more interested in you
• to reaching out to you
• to booking you
• and finally to becoming a loyal client who refers others

For that to happen you need a strategy and a plan. Just throwing together the odd blog post or video now and then won’t move the needle for your business.

How to plan your content that is highly strategic and, done well, will lead to more bookings for your photography business over time

This content planning technique is based on you creating ONE regular piece of content which then feeds your email and social media marketing too.

It’s all about getting the absolute most out of every piece of content you create.

Let’s dive in!

1. Start with your main marketing objective for the quarter

What’s your primary goal for the next 12 weeks? Do you want to book lots of stylish weddings? Do you want to get as many newborns in the diary as possible? What’s the focus?

Yes, I know you’ll have other, smaller marketing commitments during that 12 weeks but we’re looking at the bigger, 3 month picture here.

So you note down your marketing campaign focus AND what you want to achieve with it. How many bookings do you want in return for your efforts?

2. Regular content marketing you’re going to do

So are you going to write blog posts? Or are you going to live stream on social media? Maybe you’re going to create pre-recorded videos? (Check out these video content ideas for photographers)

What’s your content preference and how often are you going to release new content? Weekly is best but can be a big commitment so fortnightly CAN work.

3. Brain dump as many content ideas as possible

Topics that will help you to generate awareness for your campaign AND convert potential clients into actual clients.

This is SO much better than just randomly creating content here and there with no overarching strategy or campaign to link it to. Your campaign should gain momentum week to week with your increasing content efforts.

Check out this blog post for content ideas and examples for photographers.

Let’s look at a content panning example for a headshot photographer:

As you can see, you must have a mixture of content. A HUGE mistake made by most photographers is only creating marketing content that generates awareness. They neglect to create content that turns that awareness into a deeper interest and then a booking.

Your content should take potential clients on the full journey - not just halfway.

Just write the ideas down as you think of them - thinking for a moment beforehand about whether they belong in the awareness section or the conversion section.

Awareness content is created for those who haven’t really heard of you yet and conversion content is created for those who are interested in you but still need to be persuaded that you’re the right photographer for them.

But that’s only part of the process.

4. Brake down your quarterly plan into a weekly and daily plan

We’ve all felt the sting of creating content that doesn’t get seen. What’s the point in all that time and effort if it doesn’t result in eyeballs on your work?

That’s why you need to distribute and repurpose. This all falls into place next.

So let’s look at how you can use your quarterly content plan to create weekly and daily plans.

I do this week by week but some prefer to batch their content and do four at a time. Whatever works for you.

Choose a content topic from your quarterly plan and decide on a great title and call to action.

Think about your distribution schedule which ideally should be the same every time you create a piece of content:

In this example, our headshot photographer posts her video to YouTube and embeds it into her blog on Monday.

She then uploads the same video to her Facebook page on Tuesday.

On Wednesday she uploads 15 second snippets from the video to Instagram stories.

On Thursday she sends the video out to her email subscribers.

Then on Friday she shares links to the blog post on her socials.

Maximum distribution without spamming at all and without too much extra work.  

Remember your audience are all in different places at different times. Give them the best chance of seeing your content!

And if she was VERY clever she’d hire a virtual assistant to take care of the uploading and distribution side of things for her.

5. Repurpose your content on social media

You should be getting as much out of your piece of content as possible on here too.

Think about the different ways you can use your piece of content across one or two weeks.

Look at the social media opportunities our headshot photographer has created from her one behind the scenes video.

She is going to create a GIF from it and use that to start a conversation with her audience.

She’ll upload the entire video to Facebook with a story about the client featured.

She’ll use a photo from the shoot featured in the video and promote a headshot offer she’s running.

And, of course, she’ll also link straight to the blog post from her social media platforms.

LOTS of her social media content for that week is coming from one piece of work. And again, a lot of this can be outsourced to a virtual assistant. This will become a well oiled machine if the process is the same for each piece of content.

The gaps can then be filled with the personal and impromptu stuff that works so well on social media and allows her potential clients to get to know, like and trust her on an even deeper level.

This is how creating blog posts and videos lead to bookings

It’s all about powerful, strategic content planning that takes your audience on a journey and gives them those 7-11 touch points they need before they’ll get in touch with you.

Yes, it’s a lot of work but it’s EVERGREEN work that you can use again and again and again. It can also be used to create high converting Facebook ad campaigns.

Content marketing has a tipping point. It takes time and strategy to build up to results but once you start seeing them you’ll likely get a snowball effect happening. Before long you’ll have so much content out there that you’re appearing for in search results that you can start to take your foot off the gas in terms of content creation.

It’s a lot of work at the beginning and the rewards come down the line a bit so content marketing is not right for every photographer. It’s only right for photographers in it for the long haul.

Is that you?

And if you’re wondering if I’m going to give you these content planning templates for photographers - of course I am!

You can download them below!

And before you go, I have another gift for you - The Ultimate Photography Business Plan. It includes templates and lots of examples to get you that clarity of strategy so that you can finally focus and grow your dream photography business without overwhelm.