Best Business Practices for Photographers from Rocky Nook is updated and expanded version of John Harrington's bestselling books on the topic. In this third edition, Harrington combines information from Best Business Practices for Photographers and More Best Business Practices for Photographers to create a complete and comprehensive guide for photographers.

Learn how to start, maintain, and grow your business and achieve financial success as well as personal satisfaction. Filled with valuable details and written in a friendly and conversational tone, Harrington covers key points of the professional photography business and provides today's best practices. Whether you're just starting a photography business or are an experienced photographer looking to gain knowledge or improve your finances, Best Business Practices for Photographers is for you.

Covered Topics

• How to establish your business (Sole Proprietor vs. LLC/LLP vs. S Corp)

• Whether or not you need a physical brick-and-mortar location

• Planning a shoot

• The value of internships

• Setting your fees

• Pricing your work

• Why you need insurance

• Surviving an IRS audit

• Contracts for editorial, commercial, and corporate clients, as well as weddings and rites of passage

• The art of negotiation

• How video can be incorporated into your business

• Marketing, branding, and social media

• Publishing a book of your work

• Practical finance advice and guidance, from working with accountants to setting up QuickBooks

• How to protect your work

• Releases for models, property, and more

• How to handle a breach of contract

• Licensing your work

• Digital asset management

Table of Contents

• You Are a Business: Now Let's Get to Work

• Professional Equipment for Professional Photographers

• Planning and Logistics: Why a Thirty-Minute Shoot Can Take Three Days to Plan

• After Staff: Transitioning to Freelance

• Working with Reps, Assistants, Employees, and Contractors: The Pitfalls and Benefits

• Setting Your Photographers Fees

• Pricing Your Work to Stay in Business

• Overhead: Why What You Charge a Client Must Be More Than What You Paid for It

• Who's Paying Your Salary and 401(k)?

• Insurance: Why It's Not Just Health-Related, and How You Should Protect Yourself

• Accounting: How We Do It Ourselves and What We Turn Over to an Accountant

• Insights into an IRS Audit

• Contracts for Editorial Clients

• Contracts for Corporate and Commercial Clients

• Contracts for Weddings and Rites of Passage

• Negotiations: Signing up or Saying No

• Protecting Your Work: How and Why

• The Realities of an Infringement: Copyrights and Federal Court

• Releases: Model, Property, and Others

• Handling a Breach of Contract: Small Claims and Civil Court

• Resolving Slow- and Non-Paying Clients

• Letters, Letters, Letters: Writing Like a Professional Can Solve Many Problems

• Attorneys: When You Need Them, They're Your Best Friend (or at Least Your Advocate)

• Office and On-Location Systems: Redundancy and Security Beget Peace of Mind

• Digital and Analog Asset Management: Leveraging Your Images to Their Maximum Potential

• Licensing Your Work

• Care and Feeding of Clients (Hint: It's Not About Starbucks and a Fast-Food Burger)

• Education, an Ongoing and Critical Practice: Don't Rest on Your Laurels

• Expanding into Other Areas of Creativity

• Charity, Community, and Your Colleagues: Giving Back Is Good Karma

• Sole Proprietor versus LLC/LLP versus S Corp

• Brick-and-Mortar Locations

• Pros and Cons of Insourcing and Outsourcing

• The Value of Offering Internships

• Principles, Standards, and Ethics

• Cognitive and Subconscious Thinking and Photographers

• Marketing: An Overview of Its Importance

• Your Brand and Your Image

• Do You Need to Have a Niche or a Style?

• The Wordsmithing of a Linguistically Accurate Language Lexicon

• Social Media: Etiquette, Expectations, and the Law

• Professionalism on the Job

• The Client Experience

• Establishing the Client's Needs for Level of Production (and Associated Budget)

• Price Is What You Pay, Value Is What You Get

• Using the eCO for Online Registrations

• Licensing Your Photography: Managing It Yourself

• On Being Published

• Publishing a Book

• Fine Art, Art, and Selling Prints: Valuation

• Working with Nonprofits, Foundations, and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs)

• Valuing Video (or Motion) Production as an Adjunct to Still Photography: Know Your Limits

• Step-by-Step: QuickBooks and Downloading Credit Card Statements and Charges