We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Dijana Szewczyk a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Dijana, looking forward to hearing all of your stories 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?

It’s a very well known fact that being an artist is not very well paid job, so once I discovered my passion for photography, it took me a bit to realize I need to do things differently if I want to actually support my family with this job.

2017 I bought my first semi-professional camera and I started doing A LOT of free photoshoots. My goal was to expand my reach, get my name out there and learn how to take the best images in order for people to actually pay money for my work.
At the same time, I have found several 6 figure photographers on social media and I stared paying attention what are they doing.

How they walk to their audience, how they carry themselves, what are they offering that is making people pay thousands of dollars for their work.
Within a year and half of starting my journey, I reached 6 figures.
At the moment, 6 years in, I am earning multiple 6 figure business, have 4 employees and I am constantly booked out 6+ min advance.

What made this possible is countless hours of working for free, networking constantly, using every social media to its full extent and lastly, offering incredible experience to my clients. That is the most important thing, I believe, that got me where I am right now. Genuinely caring how all of these women feel when they walk into my space.

Dijana, 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?

My name is Dijana, pronounced as Deanna and I am in my mid 30’s. Photography was my passion and joy way before I learned I can actually make it into a profitable business. I still have 100’s of CD’s and few floppy disks (I can’t believe I am admitting this) with weirdest photos I was taking so long ago.

I have a full house of children (17, 15, 4 and one year old) and a wonderful husband Dan who supports me every step of the way on my mission to make every woman see herself in a new light.
I am here to show girls of every age, size, shape, color, and sexual orientation that they are beautiful and powerful women who can do absolutely anything!
I am here to listen, support and yell at you if I hear you talking bad about yourself. You’re amazing and it’s my job to make you see and celebrate that!

My business revolves about making women feel worthy, beautiful, seen. It’s not about snapping photos and sending them on their way, but rather learning what is their story, what they need from this experience and doing my best to ahem them walk out of my studio feeling on top of the world. Sessions always come with wardrobe, hair and make up and full guide and posing, so clients can come, relax and have fun.

It’s really important to me to make sure clients feel comfortable as they go into this experience, so it’s expected I’ll be making awkward jokes and hyping clients up all.day.long.

How did you build your audience on social media?

I think the hardest thing about social media is that is ever changing and you can’t relax. We, as creatives, believe if we post/show our work clients will see it, love it and hire us, but it’s so much more than that.
First of all, you need to act like a business owner. Your art is your business and your social media is your outreach. How you treat the audience, the amount of hours and effort you put into your content and overall branding will make a huge difference in what you are going to see in your growth.

For me personally, I am active everywhere. All the time. 24/7. I know what my ideal client is like, what they like, what they follow. I am constantly educating myself on current algorithms and trends and ensuring I post variety of work to show clients I can photograph all body types and ethnicities and well in studio, outside and any variation that speaks to them.

To get your audience growing and be on brand, start getting ideas and motivation from your peers, post as often as you can, be real with yourself and your audience on what you can offer and don’t be afraid of mistakes. Done is better than perfect. I’d rather have 100 mediocre posts that will draw 50k followers than 10 incredible posts that will be seen by 3k followers.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

My goal is to show it’s possible. I come from very modest background, and an *almost* 3rd world country. Moving to USA with no money, family or idea how am I going to make it, I was determined to prove myself and others I can. It’s all a hustle, all day every day and I am not saying it’s realistic for many. However, my goal is to make women who are in a similar situation as I was, see that you can be successful, independent and have the career you will enjoy.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.dijanaszewczyk.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/dijanaszewczyk
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/dijanaszewczyk
• Other: Tiktok: https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMJocy7XD/

Image Credits
Dijana Szewczyk