Answer, you.

Chances are we don’t know you. How are you introducing yourself to your photographer?

After photographing my very first wedding I was exhilarated. Fifteen years later I still feel the same way. Two families take me in as part of the celebrations throughout the weekend. There’s a buzz of excitement that comes from being a part of this central day in these people’s lives and knowing that I have it for them to relive again and again. I used to be an auditor. Trust me, job satisfaction matters. As does appreciation.

While a good proportion of initial inquiries from brides come on the phone, email is the easiest way these days for most people to get in touch. Especially if they are coming direct off of the website, or the blog here. In this connected world however, how we put our first step forward can appear very disconnected and cold if we are not careful. It is all too easy to cut and paste into twenty emails.

Photographer Aric Hoek sums it up best (and inspired this piece) here when he asks “Who do you think I am going to contact first?”.

Checking messages first thing in the morning, a large majority of emails that come in have the title “wedding packages”, and basically say “if you are available for our date, send packages and prices”, and not much else. ie Get in line. There’s a certain ring to this that sounds like “well of course you would want our business, we’ll let you know whether yours was the best deal”… Isn’t there?

And I really do want the business, (Here’s when i didn’t….) most of the time. I have two girls that while they don’t eat a whole bunch right now, there’s a bunch of clothing in my future that I never knew existed.

There’s a whole different warm glow that comes over when the next email, for the same date, reads something like: “We’ve both looked at your website and have seen one of your albums and love your work. We hear great things about you, and are interested in having you at our wedding. We would like to come in to meet with you to talk about our ideas about the day. Look forward to hearing back from you.”

Hello!!

The world around is a reflection of ourselves. So, which one do you think gets the first, more conversational, personable response? When someone appreciates what I do, I just want to go out and do some more for them, find a way to make it work, even better. Don’t you?