Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Mackenzie Madson. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Mackenzie, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to hear your thoughts about making remote work effective.

In my business, I’m primarily a photographer, and also do some graphic and web design. Naturally, this is all based from home for me, so there wasn’t a transition to remote work. However, remote work in general has its pros and cons in my eyes – of course there’s a level of flexibility that you can’t always get with an in-person job, and working in the creative field, I’ve found that my ‘hours’ are extremely flexible. I’m able to work on projects here and there as it fits with my life, not completely adjust my life around work. On the flip side, it’s easy to let work become controlling of my free time because it’s so easy to pick it up and work on it anytime. This has at times become tough for me to balance, because I find I don’t set aside designated time to truly relax. I also find that the mental load can be a lot, constantly thinking through where I’m at with projects, what’s up on my to do list, how and when can I fit in certain projects around my full time job/life/etc – it’s a delicate balance. I think a non-obvious benefit is the confidence I’ve built up over the years that I can do a lot when I set my mind to it, and seeing how little steps can make a huge difference over time, in terms of skill level and interaction with clients.

Mackenzie, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I’m primarily a lifestyle photographer with a focus on genuine emotion, vivid but true to color images, and client connection. My absolute favorite session type is family sessions with young kids, but I also shoot and enjoy families of all ages, senior sessions, newborn, weddings/couples, and business lifestyle branding sessions. I find so much satisfaction in connecting with clients and bringing their sessions to life. During sessions I always encourage natural connection and movement, to bring out their most genuine emotions and create captivating images.

I went to school for graphic design and graduated from UW-Stout in 2013, and worked for a handful of years after graduating as a graphic and web designer. I currently do freelance branding and website design in addition to photography, which can work great hand in hand with my photography work when my clients utilize both photography and design services.

Overall, I just love to create things. I’ve tried to narrow down a niche in the past but I love variety and thrive on multitasking. I enjoy doing so many different things that being able to work with a wide variety of people and businesses, and being able to create something awesome with them, is really enjoyable to me.

We’d love to hear the story of how you turned a side-hustle into a something much bigger.

I’m currently in the thick of transitioning my business to more of a ‘main income’ part of my life, and I’m working through what exactly that looks like! I had my first baby on January 1 of this year so a lot changed in a short amount of time – I went from working full time during the week plus photography and design around that, to now being a stay at home mom still going through a maternity leave while also trying to maintain and prepare my photography business for a busy summer – while also not really knowing what that will look like! My photography business started over 10 years ago as a hobby – I was asked to take my cousin’s grad photos – and I shared them on my personal Facebook page. From that, I started having other friends request sessions, and after about 2 years of casually doing (way underpriced) sessions ‘just for fun’ and being way over worked, I decided it was time to reformat my pricing. I increased my pricing 5x and of course saw a decrease in session volume, but it was a necessary and welcome change, as I was so overwhelmed with the amount of work I was doing (again, this was supposed to be just for fun, and was consuming ALL of my free time around my full time job). I since have done a few more pricing increases; each time I am able to re-evaluate my business expenses and my time to ensure I’m charging correctly for me and my business. It’s always nerve wracking increasing prices, but knowing that there’s a reason for what I charge is huge, and has made it doable to handle the workload around working full time. What that looks like may be changing again soon with a little one, but we’ll see!

Can you tell us about what’s worked well for you in terms of growing your clientele?

I’ve completely built my business over 10 years through social media and client referrals. This has definitely been a long term process and I had the benefit of establishing my business slowly because it was essentially for fun in addition to my full time job. Posting sessions on social media and tagging clients, sharing all kinds of sessions consistently, and having great interactions with clients all lead to consistent inquiries and client referrals. My biggest advice in this regard is be consistent, authentic, and share your work! Specifically, if you have one area that you’d like to do more of (whether it’s a type of session/specific service/specific type of client), share THAT and you’ll speak to your ideal client.

Contact Info:

• Website: Mbelichphotography.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mackenziebelichphotography
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mackenziebelichphotography/

Image Credits
Mackenzie Belich Photography