3 Tips For a Successful Spring Sports Program

Spring often breathes new life and new hopes in many volume sports photography businesses. At this time of year, you are back from some of the country’s largest conferences of the year, full of ideas for new technology and products. You’ve just finished setting your business’ annual goals. Now is the time to execute. Just like that first big completion in the football game, many sports photographers hold their breath as they look to see if the market is going to accept these new ideas, and hope sales will go up because of it. At H&H, we want to help you continue to innovate and grow your business. Regardless of what your goals are, there are a few key steps to help you avoid fumbling the first snap. STEP 1:…

0 Comments

Spring Pre-Season Checklist

Free Checklist 6-Week Checklist to a Successful Spring Season FREE 35+ point checklist from H&H Color Lab where we help you get ready for the spring season. Are you ready for spring? Are you, really? At H&H we want to help you have a good spring season and help you grow your business. And yes, we know it's winter. We know you are so busy that you're not even sure if your kids remember what you look like. So, we put together a checklist to take the stress out of preparing for spring season—all while you are still taking care of the business you have today. Hope you enjoy. This checklist will help you prepare for: Confirm picture dates for spring. Design & print your spring sports flyers. Setup hhimagehost…

0 Comments

What I Learned From My First Dance School

Volume photography was not something I intentionally set out to pursue. I was roughly 5 years removed from volume when Scott and I were asked to photograph a dance school. We got the opportunity to interview for the job thanks to a friend who worked the front counter at a dance school. The school had just fired their photographer and my friend raved about us to the owner.  We had a great first meeting and by some miracle, they chose us! At this point, regardless of all my previous experience in volume photography, I still had no clue how to photograph dance. To learn, Scott and I headed to a convention in Las Vegas with eyes on one lecture where we hoped to learn volume from the pros.  As luck…

0 Comments

How to Be More Successful in School Sports

SPOILER ALERT: It’s not just about the photos! Having a successful sports picture day involves more than knowing how to take good group and individual photos. Call me crazy, but I like to be financially rewarded for our hard work. And for that to happen, it is important to plan ahead and make it easy for parents to buy our photos. The problem is that it's really hard to get the coaches, players and parents all organized for school sports photos. And this can equate to us not getting the sales we need to justify the time spent photographing their sports. We have systems in place for all the other photo opportunities throughout the year. These systems  successfully convert parents into buyers, it just happens to be tougher with school…

0 Comments

Which Volume Photography Workflow Should I Choose?

Workflow. This 8 letter word terrifies some and makes others look like rockstars. When it comes to volume school and sports photography one of the biggest hurdles is matching images to data for thousands and managing the mountain of orders that ensue. Wondering what’s the best way for you to get the right data matched to the right image? At H&H we don’t limit you to only one option. There are several good choices. The right one will depend on a few factors. The most important one is what you have in hand before picture day. But you need more than just knowing what your best option is. You need a reliable checklist that will help you make sure every time you place an order, no detail is missed. One…

0 Comments

Why Do You Want Employees In Sports Photography?

Soapbox time! First of all you don’t need them if you don’t want to scale your business and you want to work REALLY, REALLY hard - FOREVER!! Ok, now that I have your attention, let’s talk. Where do you want to be in 5, 10 or even 15 years? No, don’t check out yet. Give me 60 seconds. Dream with me for 1 minute. It’s OK, I won’t tell anyone you took 1 minute to yourself to work on your business. Ready? Go… That wasn’t so scary. Kinda cool, actually. You didn’t do it, did you? OK, fine. Let’s move on. Now ask yourself the next question… How will you get there? Combined, we have been managing employees for over 30 years. So yes, it’s a bit easier for us.…

0 Comments

The Christmas Reveal

At Mac Brown Photographers Christmas is one of our favorite times of the year. While Christmas mini sessions have been a huge hit at the studio, our July Christmas reveal was the biggest game changer to our Christmas marketing program. WHAT’S THE MAGIC BEHIND YOUR CHRISTMAS MARKETING PROGRAM? On the last Friday in July we open the phone lines at 9:00 a.m. to start booking Christmas appointments.  In the weeks leading up to this, we are sending out reminders and a countdown calendar on social media.  We release just the titles and descriptions of the sets with a reminder that we will post “sneak peaks” of some of the sets in August and September to help with clothing selections.  Our clients are all sitting ready for 9:00 a.m. Our phone…

0 Comments

Why You Need a Season Debrief

At H&H we say we are more than just a lab. But what does that even mean? Sure, when you partner with H&H you get best-in-class products and technology at your fingertips. But who else, besides yourself, knows as much about your business and has a vested interest in your success? Who else has the experience and perspective of working alongside thousands of businesses like yours? H&H Color Lab is your resource. And you’re leaving money on the table if you are not making sure you at least familiarize yourself with all those resources at your disposal. Many of our customers request a seasonal download. It’s just good business. It helps dot the i's and cross the T's. Not to mention it helps both of us continue to improve. You…

0 Comments

6 Tips to Build & Stay a Healthy Husband and Wife Sports Photography Team

My name is Megan Sockel, and have been married to my husband, Scott, for 11 years. We have 2 kids and have been running a business together for the past 12 years. How can we possibly be together so much? So many of my friends have said to me they could never work with their spouse and they would drive each other crazy. That may be true in some cases. Being together ALL THE TIME is a unique lifestyle. I do know from my own experience that marriage is HARD. Additionally, having a business partner is also hard because you can't just do what you want. But, why is it so hard to be together all the time?! I think it comes down to being able to "let go". Let…

0 Comments

Winter Pre-Season Checklist

Free Checklist 6-Week Checklist to a Successful Winter Season Are you ready for winter? Are you, really? At H&H we want to help you have a good winter season and help you grow your business. And yes, we know it's Fall. We know you are so busy that you're not even sure if your kids remember what you look like. So, we put together a checklist to take the stress out of preparing for winter season—all while you are still taking care of the business you have today. Hope you enjoy. This checklist will help you prepare for: Confirm picture dates for winter. Design & print your winter sports flyers. Setup hhimagehost online sports price list & events. Order new picture day samples. Help you test and check your systems.…

0 Comments