How Important Am I as a wedding photographer brand?
Sounds like an interesting title eh? Well read on to find out just How Important I think I am!
Branding
My brand is important to me, very important. It's what sets me apart from other photographers with the same name. And yes some people actually have the temerity to be called Andrew Miller! One is in Ireland, Wicklow I think, another in the USA. So my branding, my logo, is important in setting me apart from them when people search for Andrew Miller Photography.
That's my logo. It's important to me... but without the help of other companies that banding is irrelevant.
Other Companies?
Yeah, like my camera manufactuer. I orginally used Canon and bragged about using top of the line professioanl Canon gear. Now I use Fuji and brag about how light they, how amazing the JPGs are that no one took a blind bit of notice when I swapped from a huge Canon to small Fuji.
Like Adobe who provide me (at a cost of course!) the sofware I use to edit and rtetouch my wedding photographs, create the videos, create the proofs for my flyers, pop-up banners and the like.
Like Apple who provide me (at a cost!) with the iMac and Mac Book Pro that I use
Like Fundy who provide me (again at a cost!) with an amazing peiece of software that allows me to design and edit wedding albums in a variety of shapes and sizes easily and quickly.
Like SanDisk who provide me (guess what goes here...?) with memory cards that are second to none.
Godox who I use (and pay for) for all my on and off camera lighting equipment.
And I could go on and on and on.
In short I'm not emabarrsed to mention these names and talk about them. I'm not scared my wedding couples will think it is so much easier to buy a Fuji XT3, a Godox AD600pro, an iMac and a subscription to Adobe LR and Adobe PS and set themselves up as photographers. They are part of who my brand is built on. I'm not arrogant enough to think I could have done all this without help from other companies.
So, my branding is important. But so are the companies with whom I have worked and continue to work. I don't hide the Fuji logo on my cameras. I don't hide the Apple logo on my Mac Book Pro, I don't hide the SanDisk logo on the memory cards or the portable SDD I use, nor do I hide the GODOX signs on my lighting (and I have a very large range, from FF350 to TT685, to V850 to V860ii to AD360, AD200 and AD600pro.)
And in the same way I talk about the company that prints my stunning wedding albums - nPhoto. I'm on You Tube talking about them from Photokina in 2018. Any of my couples could search for my name and find me. In fact I have a non photogaphy coaching client who has a picture of me from Photokina 2018 on her office wall along with a few other people as part of the office "motivators" board. Yeah, go me!
Any couple could search for wedding album companies, find nPhoto and get in touch. However nPhoto has a vetting process before you are allowed access to purchase products from them. You need to prove you are a professional photographer. Imagine if Fuji / Canon / Nikon did that before you were allowed to buy the professional cameras? Or Apple did that before you were allowed to buy iMac's / iMac Pros etc? Or Adobe checking your website to make sure you were a professional creative person.
When is a logo not a logo?
So yeah, I don't hide the fact I use nPhoto either. I love the new branding they have (and it doesn't say nPhoto - just has a similair design to their logo, very creative marketing I think). However when I put my logo all over the bags I stand out way more than what looks like a random pattern. Unless you KNOW what the nPhoto logo looks you have no idea what the branding on the bags means except it's shiny and looks nice. Your brain puts the two together and comes up with the wrong answer.
But my logo, my branding stands out first. To my wedding couples the bags just look nice, expensive and shiny.
I'm important. But so are the suppliers that make me important, and I'm not embarrassed to say so.
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