We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Halle Riveness. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Halle below.
Halle, appreciate you joining us today. Have you been able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen? Was it like that from day one? If not, what were some of the major steps and milestones and do you think you could have sped up the process somehow knowing what you know now?
I’ve always been someone who was drawn to documenting life through photo and video. At a young age I was always taking photos on family trips or making fun videos with my friends. I love the art of storytelling and went to college for communication and journalism. I’ve also loved business and throughout my whole life customer service has been a huge passion of mine -serving others through whatever work I was doing in that season. Whenever in group settings, I oftentimes found myself in leadership positions. After college, I worked in a leadership position for a fortune 500 company. Meanwhile, photography was a side hustle for me. As I grew and continued pursuing my career, and getting my MBA, my photography side hustle also continued to grow. After some doors were closed in my career, I was praying about and evaluating what I wanted to do and it was in that season that through a friend God told me it was time to stop pleasings others and it was time to go full-time with wedding photography. Making the switch took time, it wasn’t something that just happened overnight. It took years to build a business that I’m proud of and I’m so thankful that my husband gets to be a part of the journey too. Through networking, building a portfolio, marketing on social media, and creating a brand that represents us and our client experience, we have been able grow. If I could do one thing differently it would be to invest in education, having a business coach, and really going after all of this sooner. It’s been a long process, and a lot of what we’ve learned we’ve done through trial and error. I’m actually in the process of launcing a podcast to be a resource for those who are in the same boat I was back when we were starting out.
Halle, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I am a full-time wedding photographer, my husband Luke is my partner and he is a videographer, and together we are a husband and wife photo and video team. We document weddings and elopements and travel all over the United States to capture love stories. We started doing this together right out of college and through friends getting engaged and married, we were asked to document their weddings. Over time, and through word of mouth, our business grew. It was always the plan to be a side hustle, but eventually it grew enough where we had some tough decisions to make. After feeling clarity around this being what God was calling me to do, I quit my full-time job to go all in with wedding photography. And since then, it has only continued to grow. I’m now taking my background and experience in journalism and my business knowledge from getting my MBA to help other wedding creatives grow and scale their business. The Take Your Shot Collective is launching this Summer and we are excited for the podcast to get into peoples hands so they can tune in and grow with us. Our heart behind it is to help people no have to go through their creative entrepreneurship journey alone.
Is there mission driving your creative journey?
In so many industries, I see people putting out false information or “get rich quick” schemes. I feel that there is just a need for genuine people to step up and actually try and offer help and resources to those who are trying to grow. The podcast we are launching is purely for the intent of helping people get guidance and resources as they go through trying to grow and scale their business. We did so much of this on our own and it didn’t have to be that way. We also have invested in courses and education that was not helpful and the ones who were selling those “opportunities” were only doing it for themselves to make more money. It’s really hard to see that happen and to feel like you’re just a transaction to someone, so our goal is to really invest time and resources into actually helping people see results and succeed.
We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?
Without any paid advertisements or schemes, we have built our audience up to 20K on instagram and it wasn’t something that happened overnight. For anyone looking to grow on social media, remember that it is called “social” media for a reason. Be on there to connect with your audience, not just sell something. People want to be valued and heard. Engage with their work, cheer people on and encourage them. When people view you as a person and you’re authentic with what you put out there, people connect with that. I share stories about my mental health and struggles, and I share memories and funny moments as well. People get a view into our lives and get an idea of who we are, what we value, and what it might be like to work with us. It helps people evaluate whether or not they could see us being a good fit working together and it’s been really fun. Growing on Instagram has been completely organic and it’s been years of investing in others and being authentic on the platform.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://lullephoto.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lullephoto/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lullephoto
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/lulle-photo-film/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfVDaCn86tPmWd_7ZdSW_7g
- Other: We have a facebook community for any wedding photographers or videographers looking to grow and scale their business https://www.facebook.com/groups/868185064516524/
Image Credits
Image credits: Lulle Photo and Film Image credit for headshot of Halle and Luke: Tom Thornton