7 Podcasts To Improve Your Photography Business

Since almost everyone out there who reads this forum does not know me, let me say a few things about myself. I for one love hiking and two I love podcasts. I listen to a swath of podcasts that include photography, economics, science, and an occasional scary story or two. But this article is not about that, it is about which podcasts you should listen to help your photography business.

Keep in mind I am a landscape photographer. So my entire business is around selling prints, particularly large metal ones. I have decided at the moment being to step away from education as a main form of income as most landscape photographers have stepped into it. Because of that, I will have a different business model than most of you who do portrait work. So if you see podcasts that talk about landscape photography, you can skip that section.

Now sit back and enjoy the read

Improve Photography

To be frank, it would be stupid for me not to mention the ones found on this network. Improve Photography has like four podcasts that it actively maintains. The main podcast “Improve Photography” does not often bring up business, but occasionally it drops in important information. Since Jim is/was a lawyer in a past life he occasionally drops some important key details that every photographer should be aware of for their business. Also within the Tripod Podcast, there are a couple awesome episodes about pricing and laws behind doing workshops on public lands. If these are not in your line up, do take some time and begin listening as there are goodies tucked in the episodes.

Six Figure Photography Podcast

This is a podcast I have been getting into lately. It's based out of Chicago, I do believe, by wedding photography studio that apparently does well for themselves. I am not sold on all aspects of what goes on in the podcast, but I like the bits of information I have been getting as I have been listening. Most everything he focuses on is portrait and wedding photographers, so if that is your business, this is a good place to listen.

Planet Money

This one is to break up the overreaching photography emphasis on what I am preaching right now. Sorry folks, most people in the world don't run a photography business, but there are millions of business out there. They all interconnect and play off of one each other in an ecosystem called the economy. Frankly, photography is not unique in that it provides a service that we trade for green paper. Because it is like everyone else, you can listen to other podcasts about money that can be important to you.

Planey Money is an NPR podcast that discusses aspects of the economy. They dabble in all sorts of areas, but they do teach about economic principles. Price theory, global trends that affect all of us, market movement, government tariffs, and much more. (Recent tariffs might directly affect my business as I sell aluminum prints and if you are unaware aluminum is getting tariffed.) Though this won't affect your photography the knowledge shared within can enhance your business savviness.

Art Marketing Podcast

This is a new unsung hero in the photography/art world. This is produced by a company called Art Storefronts that makes websites directly for artists and art dealers. By the way, their websites look amazing but they are not cheap. I know this because my printer uses them and have talked to them personally. Anyways back to the podcast

The Art Marketing Podcast talks about marketing techniques directly related to selling art online. And what they preach is good. I followed their techniques this past year for selling around holidays and had a phenomenal Black Friday Sale and Cyber Monday sale.  The production quality is not amazing but they know their stuff. If you are trying to figure out how to take your business to the next level just go here right now and begin listening.

F-Stop Collaborate and Listen

This is a budding little podcast that is run by a dude named Matt out in Colorado. It is a low production podcast about landscape photography, but! BUT! He has interviewed some of the most influential photographers in the landscape photography community. I mean members of Photo Cascadia, Ryan Dyre and his wife Candance who is amazing, Mark Metternich, David Thompson and so much more. He has interviewed a handful of gallery owners and talked a bit out their business model. Most of what he talks about is not business but the times he does I think he does a great job. If you are landscape photographer you should be listening to this.

Freakonomics

Humans are irrational beings. We are shaped by unseen forces. Since businesses are run by humans and their customers are humans, this podcast helps explain the strange things that revolve around them. Want to know how to save for that next lens? How do you plan for the future? Why did your photo project fail? Why is it hard to be a female business leader? Why are new ideas getting harder to come by? This helps explain the world around you. As you begin to know the world around you better, particularly the way people think about money, you begin to see how to present ideas, prices, and other business basics.

Economics is what you are doing as a business owner. No matter how much you try to stick to the title of “us creatives” you are now thinking about dimes dollars and cents. You will not be disappointed as a business owner listening to this.

How I Built This

This is a podcast done by Guy Raz where he interviews innovators on how they built their businesses. This has been insanely influential on my photography business. It also teaches you that a business can come from anywhere. Most of these people that are interviewed were not rich when they had their idea. They had fire, determination or as one might say… grit? (Freakonomics reference there).

This taught me about finding funding or just bootstrapping it. It taught me about the importance of networking, about choosing business locations, and also realizing every other person out there starting a business is just as lost as you are. Everyone is looking for answers and frankly, those answers often come just by doing something until it breaks or you get yelled at and corrected.

Bonus- The Photopreneur Podcast

This was an awesome podcast that I listened to until they hit the end of their run. In fact, I wish they would bring it back. But this podcast follows a photographer from their beginnings to how they became successful in their business. It also has great interviews by marketers on how to use Facebook and other platforms. This is a great podcast and is worth a listen to once through.

Other Podcasts

So this is just a snippet of podcasts that are worthwhile to listen too. They did not make the cut, mostly because of space and I have not heard them all. But here is a few others that are worthwhile to look at if I were you:

• Startup- Actually should be on this list, but it follows companies as they start. Some of its content is not suitable for children.
• The Sprouting Photographer- Looks Cool, might be worthwhile to take a listen too.
• The Road to Fulltime- Use to be picture monk, but now switched to this new branding. He is a real estate photographer and is talking about his success and failures of starting a business. Not my favorite podcast, but I pop in occasionally.

What podcasts have you listened to that affected your business? If you have a book, throw that out as well. Just comment below. I usually get around to responding.