EP 104: The Limiting Beliefs Holding Your Photography Business Back

00:00:00 [Alison]
You are ripping things out and building things over again for who knows how many times over, doing things our peers have never had to do.
00:00:09 [Alison]
So stand tall on that, be upset, but then let that be the motivation and the fire in your belly to do it all over again.

00:00:18 [Melissa]
Welcome to Get Booked, a photography podcast.

00:00:20 [Alison]
It’s an active duty Marine Corps spouse, family photographer, and business mentor.

00:00:24 [Melissa]
And I’m Melissa, a lifestyle newborn photographer turned SEO expert for photographers.

00:00:29 [Alison]
Between us, we have twenty seven years in the industry, nine business relocations, and a lot of lessons learned the hard way through experience.

00:00:36 [Melissa]
We’re here to help you get visible, get clients, and build a business that actually books.
00:00:41 [Melissa]
Let’s go.

00:00:45 [Alison]
Hey, guys.
00:00:46 [Alison]
Allison here.
00:00:47 [Alison]
It’s just me today because quite frankly, Melissa and I ran out of recording time.
00:00:51 [Alison]
We are ending a solo episode for you.
00:00:54 [Alison]
And I wanna take this opportunity to speak directly to my fellow military spouses, especially anyone who is mid PCS.

00:01:02 [Alison]
If that’s not you though, please don’t check out.
00:01:04 [Alison]
It’s totally for you too this episode because all of these mindset shifts that I’m gonna talk about show up at some point or another.
00:01:09 [Alison]
This episode is dropping late June.
00:01:11 [Alison]
And if you are a military spouse, there’s a really good chance you are mid move right now.
00:01:16 [Alison]
If it’s anything like my moves, you are technically homeless.

00:01:20 [Alison]
Your stuff is in a truck or a crate somewhere in the world, maybe floating on the ocean.
00:01:24 [Alison]
You are either visiting family between duty stations or on a cross country road trip, or you could be sitting in a hotel room waiting for base housing to make you an offer any day now.
00:01:33 [Alison]
Right?
00:01:34 [Alison]
Any day.
00:01:35 [Alison]
I want to call out some limiting beliefs I hear repeatedly from my mentoring clients and ones I’ve overcome myself.

00:01:42 [Alison]
These are things you may not even realize you believe, and I want to take today to call them out one by one correct course, and give you a better way to think about both yourself and your business.
00:01:55 [Alison]
And that’s one thing that’s going to help you elevate and scale in ways you may not even be thinking about yet, because what we believe our base core beliefs about ourselves, whether we realize it or not, are basically our default settings for making decisions and moving forward.
00:02:09 [Alison]
Right?
00:02:10 [Alison]
So before we get into it, I want a little pep talk for my movers.
00:02:14 [Alison]
K?

00:02:15 [Alison]
But I really want to address and own the fact that moving is hard, not just logistically, but emotionally.
00:02:22 [Alison]
Your social life, your stress, your mental anxiety.
00:02:25 [Alison]
Right?
00:02:26 [Alison]
You are meeting clients you loved, referral networks that you spent years building, a community that finally knew your name, the confidence that came with being established, having a predictable income, knowing the rhythms of your place and your market and your people, all of that is being ripped out.
00:02:45 [Alison]
Just sit with that.

00:02:47 [Alison]
You know, get watery eyed if you need to.
00:02:49 [Alison]
It’s okay.
00:02:50 [Alison]
The grief is real and it should be acknowledged.
00:02:53 [Alison]
Right?
00:02:53 [Alison]
The fear is real.

00:02:55 [Alison]
The overwhelm of standing in a brand new market where nobody knows you yet is real.
00:03:00 [Alison]
It’s okay to be really upset about that and to hate it.
00:03:05 [Alison]
Quite frankly, I’ve been there.
00:03:07 [Alison]
I’ve done that.
00:03:08 [Alison]
You are ripping things out and building things over again for who knows how many times over doing things our peers have never had to do.

00:03:17 [Alison]
So stand tall on that, be upset, but then let that be the motivation and the fire in your belly to do it all over again.
00:03:25 [Alison]
Okay?
00:03:25 [Alison]
Because you’re not new.
00:03:27 [Alison]
Just because you’re new to the area doesn’t mean you’re inexperienced.
00:03:29 [Alison]
Right?

00:03:30 [Alison]
Take what you know and do it better, do it faster.
00:03:32 [Alison]
So you’re not weak for feeling this.
00:03:34 [Alison]
You are not behind.
00:03:35 [Alison]
You are not feeling.
00:03:37 [Alison]
You’re in a hard, messy middle, and that mess is not the end of the story.

00:03:42 [Alison]
Right?
00:03:42 [Alison]
As long as you get up and keep going.
00:03:46 [Alison]
For years, Melissa told me to start a Facebook group.
00:03:48 [Alison]
For years, I said no.
00:03:50 [Alison]
And then I thought about 2018 me.

00:03:52 [Alison]
Mid move, rebuilding my business, moving from Okinawa back to Virginia from scratch, just desperate for someone who had been through it.
00:03:59 [Alison]
Someone to ask them questions, get real answers and not feel so alone in the process.
00:04:03 [Alison]
Someone who wasn’t going to tell me to just start over like that was a totally normal thing to say.
00:04:08 [Alison]
I wasn’t the first person moving my business because photographers in the middle of a dime a dozen.
00:04:13 [Alison]
That’s exactly what Get Booked Anywhere is.

00:04:15 [Alison]
It’s a free Facebook community for women business owners like you who are relocating, rebuilding, or refining, and it’s the place I wish had existed when I needed it most.
00:04:26 [Alison]
Inside the group, you’re gonna find women who have been exactly where you are.
00:04:29 [Alison]
You can ask questions without feeling stupid, get real feedback without the fluff from me, from others, share your wins with people who actually understand what a big deal it is instead of a deadpan face from your husband, or connect with the community that gets the unique chaos of building something to move with you.
00:04:44 [Alison]
No gatekeeping, no judgment, no lurking alone, wondering if anyone else is going through this because they are and we’re gonna find them.
00:04:51 [Alison]
The link to join is in the show notes.

00:04:53 [Alison]
So come, it’s free, it’s active, and your people are already waiting.
00:04:58 [Alison]
Limiting belief number one.
00:05:00 [Alison]
Okay, this is this grinds my gears these days, but this is definitely something I had to address several years ago and was definitely found guilty of.
00:05:08 [Alison]
It’s just fun money.
00:05:10 [Alison]
K.

00:05:11 [Alison]
This one’s sneaky because it sounds humble.
00:05:13 [Alison]
It sounds like you’re not being but what it actually does is it’s giving you permission not to take your business seriously.
00:05:19 [Alison]
It’s giving you permission to undercharge, to underprepare, to underinvest, and then wonder why nothing’s growing.
00:05:26 [Alison]
Right?
00:05:26 [Alison]
Your business is not fun money.

00:05:28 [Alison]
Regardless of how you run your finances in your family, it can be school tuition, dentist appointments you’ve been putting off, family vacation your kids are gonna talk about the rest of your lives, regular jiu jitsu classes, investing in your kids skills or character.
00:05:45 [Alison]
It’s a thing that is you and in a life that asks you to give a lot of yourself to everyone else.
00:05:52 [Alison]
It’s yours.
00:05:53 [Alison]
Don’t discredit that.
00:05:55 [Alison]
So the minute I had a real bill, I was paying we committed to doing tuition, private school tuition for all four of our kids.

00:06:03 [Alison]
That bill was on me.
00:06:05 [Alison]
All the limiting beliefs around money and guilt, around what I was charging just evaporated.
00:06:11 [Alison]
So maybe that’s your hack to working through this one is take ownership of a bill, an investment, retirement array that you have to pay every month.
00:06:20 [Alison]
Right?
00:06:21 [Alison]
It’s amazing how how less guilty you feel when you take ownership of something as real and necessary as that.

00:06:29 [Alison]
So money is not just for fun.
00:06:31 [Alison]
Limiting belief number two.
00:06:32 [Alison]
I don’t wanna work that hard.
00:06:34 [Alison]
Fair.
00:06:34 [Alison]
Nobody does.

00:06:35 [Alison]
And and honestly, maybe this isn’t even the thought that’s going through your mind.
00:06:39 [Alison]
It’s the way you’re showing up in in your business by procrastinating, delaying, or not setting up regular routines for for working on your business, not just in it.
00:06:49 [Alison]
But here’s the you’re not starting over from zero when you’re relocating your business.
00:06:54 [Alison]
Right?
00:06:54 [Alison]
Just like I said earlier, you are starting over with everything you already know.

00:06:59 [Alison]
The craft, the client experience, the system, your brand voice, your personal approach and philosophy to how do you run your systems and sessions.
00:07:07 [Alison]
You just need the traction in a new market.
00:07:10 [Alison]
That’s a very different thing from building from scratch, right?
00:07:13 [Alison]
You’ve done that before, but you’re not truly building from scratch this time.
00:07:18 [Alison]
So the work of rebuilding smart, being the SEO, a local lead magnet, a good email list, social media, is not the exhausting hustle of chasing clients one by one, right?

00:07:29 [Alison]
It’s not the same as before.
00:07:31 [Alison]
It’s building something that works while you sleep and you’ve already done that once, I hope.
00:07:35 [Alison]
And so it’s just a matter of rebuilding that structure in a new market for a new clientele in a new place.
00:07:41 [Alison]
Yes.
00:07:41 [Alison]
It’s a lot of work.

00:07:42 [Alison]
You can get through it, and once you’re done, you’re done.
00:07:45 [Alison]
You know?
00:07:46 [Alison]
So I say, set up the time, get a regular sitter, make a library date with your spouse.
00:07:52 [Alison]
It’s on a weekly basis and just do it one step at a time.
00:07:56 [Alison]
Alright.

00:07:56 [Alison]
So limiting belief number four.
00:07:58 [Alison]
Nobody here knows me and I have to start completely over.
00:08:01 [Alison]
K.
00:08:01 [Alison]
So similar to before, you’re not truly starting over from zero.
00:08:05 [Alison]
You’re starting with everything you’ve built.

00:08:07 [Alison]
So your Google reviews are gonna come with you.
00:08:10 [Alison]
Every five star review you earned in your last city is still sitting in your profile telling your next client that you are the real deal before they’ve ever met you.
00:08:18 [Alison]
You know, that kind of social proof doesn’t have a ZIP code.
00:08:21 [Alison]
Your referral network, maybe locally it’s gonna be left behind, but in the military community, especially in the Facebook groups, it can totally follow you.
00:08:30 [Alison]
Families are PCSing constantly, but those those Facebook groups, by and large, stay the same.

00:08:36 [Alison]
The client you photographed in Okinawa ends up showing up in Quantico.
00:08:40 [Alison]
The mom you served in Virginia Beach comes out to Hawaii.
00:08:43 [Alison]
They remember you.
00:08:44 [Alison]
That’s why we have email lists to see if they have referrals of people they know that are moving.
00:08:49 [Alison]
They talk.

00:08:49 [Alison]
The military community is smaller and more connected than we probably give it credit for.
00:08:54 [Alison]
So your reputation will travel further than you realize.
00:08:57 [Alison]
So you’re not starting over.
00:08:59 [Alison]
You’re planting seeds and new soil with a full greenhouse of proven work behind you.
00:09:03 [Alison]
Now this one is really hard if you are moving to a noncommunity because it does feel like there is much less turnover in a civilian community, and everybody already knows somebody that is a photographer, a hairstylist, etcetera, etcetera.

00:09:17 [Alison]
But, again, that’s why we build the system.
00:09:19 [Alison]
Right?
00:09:20 [Alison]
SEO blogging, shoot, even retargeting ads.
00:09:23 [Alison]
Alright.
00:09:23 [Alison]
Limiting belief number five.

00:09:24 [Alison]
My market is oversaturated.
00:09:26 [Alison]
There are photographers everywhere here.
00:09:28 [Alison]
Raise your hand if you feel that.
00:09:29 [Alison]
Right?
00:09:30 [Alison]
Every single city feels oversaturated to the photographer who just moved there and doesn’t know anyone yet.

00:09:37 [Alison]
Okay.
00:09:37 [Alison]
Feeling that way inside when we’re the new girl.
00:09:39 [Alison]
Have I told you I hate being the new girl?
00:09:41 [Alison]
I really do.
00:09:43 [Alison]
I really do.

00:09:44 [Alison]
But here’s what an oversaturated market actually means.
00:09:48 [Alison]
There are a lot of photographers competing for the same generic search terms, shooting the same generic style with some same generic website that says, I captured your precious moments.
00:09:57 [Alison]
But is that you?
00:09:58 [Alison]
What is your style, your voice, your client experience, your niche?
00:10:04 [Alison]
That is never oversaturated because there’s only one you.

00:10:08 [Alison]
Like we time, you are the secret sauce.
00:10:11 [Alison]
And the photographers who do not do the work of differentiating themselves, branding, voice, showing up quickly and consistently to their inquiries are the ones who stop feeling the competition entirely.
00:10:22 [Alison]
I can attest to this because with my philosophy, fast, fun, done, I am for the mom who doesn’t need thirty minutes, an hour of perfectly posed still pictures.
00:10:34 [Alison]
Right?
00:10:35 [Alison]
They want the one, everybody look at me camera shot for their grandma, for the fireplace, but they come to me for come to me for personality and joy and the fast experience that’s not gonna make everybody roll their eyes.

00:10:47 [Alison]
Right?
00:10:48 [Alison]
I have created that brand voice, and I am targeting those clients with intentionality because that’s what I’ve come to love.
00:10:56 [Alison]
Now it takes years to get there, guys, years and years and years to get there.
00:11:01 [Alison]
So if you’re still working on that, give yourself permission to experiment, to try new things.
00:11:09 [Alison]
You can do

00:11:11 [Melissa]
it.
00:11:11 [Melissa]
Sidebar math.
00:11:12 [Melissa]
Two hours a day on social media is like sixty hours a month for content that’s gone in forty eight.
00:11:17 [Melissa]
What if just one of those hours built something more permanent?
00:11:20 [Melissa]
That’s where the blogging club comes in.

00:11:22 [Melissa]
One blog post written right can book clients for years, and our members are sharing wins every month, blog posts that book them real clients.
00:11:30 [Melissa]
And no, ChatGPT can’t do this for you.
00:11:32 [Melissa]
It writes bland posts that don’t sound like you and sometimes aren’t even correct.
00:11:36 [Melissa]
The blogging club helps you write with your own expertise and stories so people actually want to book you because they connect with you.
00:11:43 [Melissa]
So go to love.com and use code get booked to get 50% off your first month.

00:11:48 [Melissa]
Ninety days from now, you could have a blog that books clients while you sleep.

00:11:53 [Alison]
Alright.
00:11:53 [Alison]
So the last one, I just need to wait for word-of-mouth to kick in.
00:11:58 [Alison]
Word-of-mouth is a reward for doing the work.
00:12:01 [Alison]
Right?
00:12:02 [Alison]
It takes forever to take a life of its own, but it is not in and of itself the work.

00:12:08 [Alison]
And in a new city, word-of-mouth can take years, especially if that’s all you’re gonna rely on and if you’re in a civilian community where the is little to none.
00:12:16 [Alison]
Right?
00:12:17 [Alison]
As military spouses, you do not have years.
00:12:19 [Alison]
You have, hopefully, at least one year one or two years, but max three years, right, per set of orders.
00:12:26 [Alison]
You have now.

00:12:27 [Alison]
The photographers who rebuild the fastest are the ones who stop waiting to be found and start actively building the infrastructure that gets them found.
00:12:34 [Alison]
Now the ideal best time to be doing that is a year out, even six months before you actually move.
00:12:40 [Alison]
And if you’re mid move right now, that time has passed, but the next best time is now.
00:12:44 [Alison]
Right?
00:12:44 [Alison]
You have now.

00:12:45 [Alison]
What can you do now?
00:12:46 [Alison]
Can you write a blog post from the passenger seat of the car?
00:12:50 [Alison]
Can you hit publish on something while the kids are napping?
00:12:53 [Alison]
Can you take thirty minutes after bedtime to do one thing to connect with people on Instagram, potential collaborations?
00:13:00 [Alison]
What can you do now?

00:13:01 [Alison]
I would say focus on that SEO and the blogging.
00:13:04 [Alison]
The rest can come later in due time because that SEO really is gonna need time to bake in.
00:13:08 [Alison]
If you haven’t moved yet, but you have a move on the horizon maybe next year, then take this as your warning and your wake up call to get go.
00:13:18 [Alison]
If you don’t have a location of where you’re going yet, the real work will start when that that information comes.
00:13:23 [Alison]
But until then, revise your systems.

00:13:26 [Alison]
What’s working now?
00:13:27 [Alison]
What needs support?
00:13:28 [Alison]
What in your branding can be revised or refined?
00:13:32 [Alison]
What on your website needs to be updated?
00:13:35 [Alison]
Portfolio, services, is there something you wanna quit doing altogether, something you wanna add on?

00:13:40 [Alison]
Really refine your business now so that as soon as you have orders in hand to your next duty station, it’s all systems go with rebuilding that framework for your new location.
00:13:49 [Alison]
So those are our limiting beliefs.
00:13:51 [Alison]
Let’s flip it.
00:13:52 [Alison]
Your business is real and it matters.
00:13:54 [Alison]
You have skills that took years to build and they come with you.

00:13:57 [Alison]
Your reviews come with you, your reputation stays with you, and what you have already proven you can do is this.
00:14:04 [Alison]
In another city, maybe multiple cities, but you’re not starting from zero.
00:14:08 [Alison]
You’re starting with experience.
00:14:12 [Alison]
So a slow start is not a failure.
00:14:13 [Alison]
It’s a season.

00:14:15 [Alison]
Every single photographer I’ve ever worked with or watched rebuild in a new market has had a slow start, myself included.
00:14:20 [Alison]
How many times have I done this?
00:14:22 [Alison]
Now it gets faster every time, but it always starts slow.
00:14:25 [Alison]
The ones who made it through didn’t do anything magical or different.
00:14:30 [Alison]
They just didn’t quit.

00:14:32 [Alison]
They blogged when nobody was reading.
00:14:33 [Alison]
They built their email list when they had 12 people on it.
00:14:36 [Alison]
They showed up on Google before Google was showing them to anyone.
00:14:40 [Alison]
And then one day, one inquiry, one booking, one referral, and the flywheel started moving.
00:14:45 [Alison]
Right?

00:14:46 [Alison]
Who knows when that’s gonna happen for you, but it definitely won’t happen if we give up too soon.
00:14:51 [Alison]
So you can make real money in a new city.
00:14:53 [Alison]
You can rebuild faster than you think.
00:14:55 [Alison]
You can do this.
00:14:56 [Alison]
I have done it myself seven times.

00:14:59 [Alison]
And it gets better and easier and faster with every move.
00:15:03 [Alison]
Here’s your action step and I’m gonna be direct with you because I care and I do not want to see you waste another season waiting.
00:15:11 [Alison]
The best time to build this foundation was six months ago, but let’s focus on what we can do today.
00:15:17 [Alison]
Blog to book workshop recording is available now in my shop.
00:15:22 [Alison]
This was a live workshop I hosted back in April where I walk you through creating content that is for your ideal client, writing to rank, getting up in Google so that you can show up naturally, organically for free from keyword research to a 12 man local lead magnets to get to the right people.

00:15:38 [Alison]
It’s an hour and a half.
00:15:39 [Alison]
Watch it, execute it, walk through it step by step, and get all the resources you need to create a blog plan to get you found on Google.
00:15:47 [Alison]
So go grab that.
00:15:49 [Alison]
Link will be in the show notes.
00:15:50 [Alison]
The second option is definitely more one on one.

00:15:54 [Alison]
If you want someone in your corner for the bigger picture, the business structure, the pricing, the full rebuild strategy, I want you to get on my wait list for one on one mentoring this fall.
00:16:04 [Alison]
I’m closed for the summer, but I’m coming back in the fall to help.
00:16:07 [Alison]
The wait list link will be available in the show notes, and we can tackle whatever is tripping you up together.
00:16:13 [Alison]
You’re not alone in this.
00:16:14 [Alison]
You never were.

00:16:15 [Alison]
I’m here to help.
00:16:16 [Alison]
Thanks, guys.

00:16:19 [Melissa]
Thank you so much for listening.
00:16:20 [Melissa]
If you’re enjoying the show, would you do two things for us?
00:16:23 [Melissa]
First, leave a review.
00:16:24 [Melissa]
Just stars would be awesome.
00:16:26 [Melissa]
And two, forward this episode to a biz bestie, no spouse, or anyone facing moving their business.

00:16:31 [Melissa]
We’d love it if you shared this episode with even just one person.
00:16:35 [Melissa]
If you have questions, you can reach out to Allison on Instagram, Sunbelle Photog, or you can find me, Melissa, in my Facebook group, Picture Perfect Rankings.
00:16:43 [Melissa]
Check the show notes for links, and we’re so excited to have you guys here.