Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Jordan Roepke. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Hi Jordan, thanks for joining us today. Are you 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?
When I first decided to start a photography business, there were two things that I heard that really shaped my mindset. The first is from Jerry Ghionis, who is one of my favorite photographers. He said “Most photographers start a business thinking, ‘I want to be a photographer, I’m going to start a business!’. That’s the wrong mindset. You should think. ‘I want to own a business. I’m going to be a photographer!'”
The second is from Ted Forbes. “Your level of ability has nothing to do with your level of success.” I think a lot of photographers who are struggling in my field think that they’ll start making money when they get better. “If only I was better, if only I had a better camera, if only I had x,y, or z.” The truth is, people want to work with you, and they want to pay the prices you want to charge them. Not EVERYONE, but there’s a market for everything, and finding your market is key.
Luckily. I’ve been able to earn a living solely from my photography for the last 2 years, and this advice has really helped me to do so. I started by looking at my costs and what I needed to make in order to put food on the table and keep my family happy. Then I went out and started to find those clients! I don’t mean to make it sound easy, it isn’t. It’s a lot of work, a lot of time, a lot of investment in yourself and your business. But ultimately, as long as you’re clear on your goal and what you need to do to make that happen, ultimately I think that anyone who stays the course can be successful.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
Of course! I started my photography journey about 3-4 years ago, but I’d actually studied some filmmaking in college and I’ve always been a big fan of film and photography. My uncle gave me my first DSLR when I was 22, I think? A Nikon D100, a camera that I still have. Ultimately, I decided to transition into photography full time during lockdown, and so I made the necessary steps to market myself to the niche I wanted to pursue. So now, I’m a full time wedding and portrait photographer! I photograph around 35 weddings a year with my wife, and maintain a portrait studio year round as well.
I’ve taken the approach that digital images just aren’t good enough for my clients. I offer full album design and wall art services for my wedding clients, and all of my portrait clients get to choose from gorgeous pieces of artwork that are handmade in Italy from a brilliant print company called Graphistudio. I never want my clients to think, “Ok, my wedding day was amazing. This portrait session was amazing. Now I have 1200 photos on my phone I’m never gonna look at again.” I want my photos hanging in every clients home, reminding them of their families, how amazing their wedding day was, how amazing they are as people. I think having that reminder to love ourselves is really important.
From the beginning, I decided that as a photographer, I wanted to photograph people, so that’s what I do! It’s really the best job in the world!
Any fun sales or marketing stories?
When I first decided to go into wedding photography, really into photography full time period, I had absolutely no experience with weddings or anything like that. I knew that many of my favorite photographers were wedding photographers, but beyond that I had no idea what to expect. I mean, how do you even get wedding clients? I’d had a couple reach out to me because they loved my portrait work, and that ended up being the first wedding I ever booked. I think I ended up doing it for like $750? Which is nothing in the wedding industry. Anyway, I decided that because portraits were my strength, that’s what I would use to connect with wedding clients. SO, I went on Facebook marketplace, found 3 wedding dresses for sale, and purchased those, and then I put out a model call for 3 models and their husbands/boyfriends/whatever for models who could fit into the wedding dresses I had just bought. That became my first portfolio, and I immediately started running Facebook ads. Those two decisions, to style my own shoots and use them for advertising on Facebook, really helped to form the backbone of my business. I still get probably 70% of my clients through Facebook advertising.
Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?
Before I found photography, I was a professional musician for like 20 years. When covid happened, all of my touring shut down and I had to find another way to make an income. Luckily, I had kind of seen the writing on the wall with Covid when it first started getting serious, so I applied for all of the assistance I could at the time, and that carried us through, along with my wife job at the time, until we could really get the photography business off the ground. We got really, really lucky, but now I get to do this thing that I love, and my wife is still my business partner, so it worked out tremendously.
There have been a number of times that I’ve had to take a leap of faith moment, so to anyone who is maybe considering a change of job, location, anything like that, GO FOR IT!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.jordanroepkephotography.com
- Instagram: instagram.com/jordanroepkephotography
- Facebook: Facebook.com/jordanroepkephotography
- Twitter: twitter.com/jroepkephoto
Image Credits
All Photos: Jordan Roepke Photography