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How to Get Paid for Selling Photos

October 31, 2018 By Danielle Herman 31 Comments

Do you want to get paid for selling photos? Here are a few simple ideas for how to do so.

How to Get Paid for Selling Photos

Table of Contents

  • Choose a Photo Sharing Service
  • Cultivate a Web Presence
  • Always Get Email Addresses
  • Know Your Niche
    • Model Headshots
    • Sports Photography
    • Photojournalism
    • Portraits
  • Selling Photos: Getting Paid for What You Love
      • Danielle Herman
      • Latest posts by Danielle Herman (see all)

Choose a Photo Sharing Service

You have two options when it comes to choosing a photo sharing service. You could choose a free service, such as Google, Yahoo, Flickr, or Photobucket. Or you could use a paid online photo sharing service, such as Printroom.com, Shutterstock.com, or SmugMug.com.

Using a photo sharing service allows you to have the photos that you take processed professionally. This is key!

Either type of service, free or paid, will allow you to be successful. But the ones you pay for, obviously, have many advantages. (If you’re just looking to test out the effectiveness of a photography business without incurring any expenses, I recommend you start with a free online sharing service.)

Note that the free services won’t let you you set prices on your photos. Viewers can purchase your photos, but you won’t get any money for those purchases.

You should practice setting prices on the paid services, which give you the option to do so. Most of the services suggest a basic price per size of photo.

You decide the amount of profit and include it in the price that viewers will see. With paid services, make sure to set prices for the specialty items that most of these services offer. These items include mugs, key chains, t-shirts, and puzzles.

While specialty items are useful and offer options to your customers, properly pricing your photos is one of the main reasons to use paid services. There can be exceptions, however, such as in the case of sports photography.

Cultivate a Web Presence

All photographers, experienced and amateur, who want to be taken seriously must have a “web presence.”

A web presence will help you build your portfolio, link you with potential clients, expose you to more viewers, and get people talking about and linking to your work. What’s even better, however, is that you’ll also get some form of income from your online presence.

Be aware that although it’s important to establish your web presence, you shouldn’t make the mistake of assuming that everyone is on the internet. Some people aren’t!

Even photography customers who are willing and able to view their photos online don’t typically have much confidence in e-commerce. They prefer to do business traditionally: face-to-face and person-to-person.

So a web presence is very important to have, but don’t rely on it so much that you forget about your offline customers.

Always Get Email Addresses

You should get into the habit of getting the email addresses of your potential customers. Sure, give them yours if that’s a part of your marketing strategy. But make sure that you ask them for theirs.

Why? Because, in my opinion, when people give their email addresses after I request them, they have given me permission to send them emails.

I make sure I don’t spam people, but I do send them notices when I update a photo gallery or do anything else that would be relevant to them.

As a rule, I don’t attempt to sell through email. I only use email addresses to keep in touch with my followers, to build a relationship with them, and to keep my photography brand in front of them.

Leveraging email is a tightrope that business owners must attempt to walk if they want to add another avenue of growth to their companies.

Dealing with photography businesses is something fashion manufacturer Wiseman Clothing has a lot of experience in. Niall Rice, the co-founder, agrees that spam emailing should be avoided.

If you’re going to do email marketing, or whatever term you want to affix to emailing your clients/potential clients, you should always do it sparingly. There’s nothing I hate more than having to unsubscribe constantly. But if you email me once a month, and it’s personally done, maybe I won’t unsubscribe. Yet!

Know Your Niche

Everyone likes to be original and stand out from the crowd. But when it comes to making money, your clients are looking for a particular product, so you need to meet their expectations.

The truth hurts, but believe me, that’s how it is. Here are some strategies for delivering well on different types of photography.

Model Headshots

Establish an online album/portfolio for each model and consider password protecting the photos. I personally enjoy using this service for model headshots. In my experience, models seem to have a need to look at photos of themselves for a very long time.

Having private portfolios allows them unlimited time to do so and gives them the ability to share their private portfolios with others.

Sports Photography

Establish a gallery for each team. Prior to shooting the event, print business cards (or utilize other marketing tools) that have the online gallery’s URL on them.

In the category of sports photography, customers often purchase specialty items such as mugs, buttons, puzzles, t-shirts, sweatshirts, posters, key chains, and so on.

Photojournalism

In this category, you must establish a portfolio. Your portfolio might include local community events or “slice-of-life” photos, which are photos that fall broadly within the stock photography niche.

I live in California, which offers me a wide selection of events, activities, “celebrity sightings,” and other public photography opportunities.

Having business cards (and/or other marketing tools) with my URL on them allows people who are interested in my work to follow up with me. Creating business cards with your URL is an essential first step for this category.

Portraits

When creating portraits, you should establish albums for each portrait job. In this category, setting prices is important. Of course, pricing is important in all niches, but portrait pricing has a certain quality value in my experience.

Selling Photos: Getting Paid for What You Love

Like any new business, growing a photography business requires work, drive, and ambition. Where you take your company depends on you. I simply enjoy taking photos and getting paid for it!

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Danielle Herman

Consultant at The Gap Partnership
Danielle is a freelance fashion photographer and full-time consultant for The Gap Partnership. She lives in London with her husband and two Labradors.
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Filed Under: Small Business Advice Tagged With: Ecommerce, Marketing, photo, photography, small business advice

Comments

  1. riya says

    May 31, 2019 at 2:58 am

    One of the useful information. thanks for sharing this information with us. i like taking photos now it will paid me very happy to see this article. thanks again for this post. keep your good work.

    Reply
  2. Ishan says

    February 28, 2019 at 5:20 am

    Great Blog, It helps me a lot in selling my photos. And now I can have more opportunity to sell my photos on various platforms.
    Check out – http://www.cricmama.com/

    Reply
  3. Radhika Jain says

    January 4, 2019 at 4:30 am

    Thanks for sharing such useful information with us. for people who love photography, this post is a real treat.
    Radhika Jain would love you to read ..5 Hair Care Habits You Need To Practice This 2018My Profile

    Reply
  4. Mark Technologies says

    December 4, 2018 at 6:39 am

    I too have passion for photography but never thought of getting paid for it. You have laid some pretty good tips to make it easier. Thanks for sharing.

    Reply
  5. Bablu Prodhan says

    November 26, 2018 at 4:33 am

    I am very happy to know that I can get some money to sell my photos. I think this post be helpful to the people who are occasional photographers.

    Reply
  6. Nidhima Luthra says

    November 26, 2018 at 1:39 am

    Hi

    Thank you so much for the tips. You nailed it. As a traveler, now I can earn more money for my bucket list.

    Reply
  7. Maria Perez says

    November 26, 2018 at 1:21 am

    There is a really big market for stock photos. But most photos will not cut it as high income earning stock images. Instead I often offer many of my images up for free in exchange for credit in the form of a backlink to one of my sites. This is a great way to promote your site, build up your brand and boost your website SEO

    Reply
  8. Raju puwviya says

    November 24, 2018 at 2:53 am

    very interesting post bro. you have solved my half of the problem. the tips you have mentioned in this post are just amazing

    Reply
  9. samar says

    November 21, 2018 at 1:38 am

    interesting stuff to read…… and it is also important for photographers. thanks for sharing it with us…

    Reply
  10. John Cooper says

    November 19, 2018 at 6:32 am

    Thank you for the amazing tips. Its really helpful for me, awaiting for more new post. keep updating us with an awesome content like this.

    Reply
  11. Cris says

    November 18, 2018 at 3:50 am

    Hi, very interesting post. I wanted to know whether I could earn money from my own photo gallery. Now, I know very well. Thanks to the author of this post.

    Reply
  12. Chirag Bhayani says

    November 15, 2018 at 10:25 pm

    Excellent points shared thanks for the tips. these will sure help the photographers to make money I like your blogs keep it up!!!
    keep sharing!!!!!

    Reply
  13. Juniba says

    November 14, 2018 at 6:48 am

    yeah I totally agree with you bro you need find one niche and work hard to achieve there desired result but most us just want the shortest way to success .thanks for sharing this valuable information Danielle Herman
    Juniba would love you to read ..Searching For A Good Looking, Quality Wallet With Affordable Price?My Profile

    Reply
  14. Daniel James says

    November 12, 2018 at 8:57 pm

    Thanks – that was very helpful! I’m hoping to apply some of these tips on my travel blog, I take 1000’s of photos when i travel.

    Reply
  15. Fernando says

    November 12, 2018 at 10:39 am

    Really useful tips, but, sincerely, sell content in the biggest stock photos like shutterstock still worth the work?

    Reply
    • Gail Gardner says

      November 12, 2018 at 12:27 pm

      Hi Fernando,

      I believe if you did some research on what content creators needed you could upload fewer photos and make more money.
      Gail Gardner would love you to read ..How To Decide What Blog Content To Delete; 89% Traffic IncreaseMy Profile

      Reply
  16. Darren Johnson says

    November 12, 2018 at 7:33 am

    Hi Danielle/ Thank you for the tips on how to convert photos into profit. I really like your blogs. Thank you again.
    Darren Johnson would love you to read ..Why Most Contractors Aren’t RichMy Profile

    Reply
  17. Adeyemi says

    November 12, 2018 at 1:49 am

    Thanks. I have learned something new about selling photography, I have been thinking about starting to sell images online and this article has give me a head up on how to get started.
    Adeyemi would love you to read ..9 Steps In Creating An Effective Social Media Marketing Plan In 2019My Profile

    Reply
  18. Apichet says

    November 11, 2018 at 4:21 am

    Portrait pricing is different from other categories. They have sentimental value and are more personal so these attributes affect the pricing strategy. Thank you for your tips of selling photos, they are solid ideas.

    Reply
  19. Vikas Rana says

    November 10, 2018 at 5:27 am

    Hello Danielle,

    Great Work here. I appreciate the information that you provided us, fellow bloggers and photographers. I’ve been selling my photos for over a year now. Gotta say it pays my bills and all. Kudos to you and keep up the good work.
    Vikas Rana would love you to read ..IPL 2019 Official Broadcast and Live Streaming | IPL 2019 TV Channels DetailsMy Profile

    Reply
  20. vashika says

    November 9, 2018 at 1:12 am

    We should not start with free photo sharing service. These are not good and ruin your online photo selling business. However you should start with cheap photo sharing services, a paid service is good howsoever little paid one it may be. One should focus more on unique creativity and should not copy others ideas.

    Reply
  21. harshit says

    November 8, 2018 at 1:40 am

    hi Danielle,

    It’s an excellent idea for making some bucks by selling photos. Great sharing. Hope this helps new photographers to make money by following their passion.
    harshit would love you to read ..Easiest way to add signature in outlook office 365 with VideoMy Profile

    Reply
  22. Gyan Ranjan says

    November 6, 2018 at 12:13 pm

    Thanks for giving useful tips for selling the photos, In this way, we can make money from photography work.

    Reply
  23. ANSARI says

    November 5, 2018 at 9:56 pm

    It’s a great idea for making some bucks by selling photos. Great sharing. Hope this helps new photographers to make money by following their passion.
    ANSARI would love you to read ..AMRI Bhubaneswar Phone Number, Contact Number and AddressMy Profile

    Reply
  24. Matt D. says

    November 5, 2018 at 9:09 pm

    Thanks for the tips but what niche do you recommend to get the most out of your photos? What’s in demand right now?

    Reply
    • Danielle says

      November 6, 2018 at 11:01 am

      Using the business model of selling through online portals you can target and test all styles of photography and see for yourself how the market is.

      Outside of that, this will depend on your drive and what’s around you or available. Make connections and see what is needed where you are.

      D

      Reply
      • Gail Gardner says

        November 6, 2018 at 1:30 pm

        If photographers learn to use keyword tools like Ubersuggest or content tools like BuzzSumo they can upload photos related to the most popular content.

        Content creators and site developers are the primary market for photographs. Upload what they need to sell more.
        Gail Gardner would love you to read ..Do Not Let Your Images Blow Up Your BlogMy Profile

        Reply
  25. Ryan Biddulph says

    November 4, 2018 at 4:56 pm

    Smart tips Danielle. I vibe with growing your online presence. This works wonders in any niche. If you network and make buddies you are likely to sell a bunch more photos.

    Reply
  26. Isa says

    November 4, 2018 at 4:34 am

    Its important for photographer to decide the niche and then have a good photos of it.
    You have guide it properly in your article.
    Nice work.

    Reply
  27. ammu prabha says

    November 3, 2018 at 5:28 am

    HI
    NICE That’s really very helpful post you’ve made about setting photos stuff! Appreciated! The people should focus on one niche and work continuously seeking better results. That would bring good results out of their work. and useful mesing post and same time sage and it is interest same time it was useful too me there is serach awesome message it useful for future and it can be interesting

    thank you

    Reply
  28. Deepak Gupta says

    November 1, 2018 at 7:02 am

    That’s really very helpful post you’ve made about setting photos stuff! Appreciated! The people should focus on one niche and work continuously seeking better results. That would bring good results out of their work.

    Reply

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