Karyn’s Story

Karyn never thought she’d have to start over.

She’d spent years building her photography business  but when a devastating cyclone tore through her area, it wiped out her entire business overnight.

She had no bookings, no income, and no idea where to even start. 

It was tough.

“I had no clients and I was like, where do I go from here?”

Starting From Scratch (One of the Hardest Things a Business Owner Can Do)

What I want you to understand about Karyn’s situation is just how far back she was starting from.

No clients. No momentum. No income coming in. A community still recovering. A photographer who had been running her business for years, suddenly back at zero.

And alongside the practical reality of that, there was the emotional weight of it.

“I wasn’t prepared financially. I had no idea what step to take next. I had a great fear of it not working, whatever I did.”

That fear, of taking action and having it fail, is something I hear from photographers all the time. And it makes complete sense. When you’ve already had a setback, the idea of trying something and having that not work too feels unbearable. Sometimes doing nothing feels safer.

But doing nothing wasn’t going to pay Karyn’s bills.

She reached out to me. We started working together. And within two months, everything had changed.

70 Bookings From One Campaign

Karyn’s goal when she joined my program was modest. She just wanted her business running again. If she could get two shoots a week, she told me, she would have been really happy.

She ran one Facebook ad campaign and generated enough leads for 7 bookings.

Seventy. From one promotion. In two months of working together.

“I followed the process and you made it very easy. I just followed your steps and it was amazing.”

Now here’s the part that made the difference, and Karyn is honest about this herself. It wasn’t just the ad. It was the phone calls.

Karyn had always called clients after they booked. This time, we called them before. That single shift in her client process changed everything.

“I think that was definitely it. It was calling them before they booked.”

She was nervous. Calling 70 people is a lot of phone calls for anyone, let alone someone who was already feeling frozen by fear of failure. But she followed the process, made the calls, and her conversion rate was extraordinary.

She now feels considerably more comfortable on the phone than she did before. She still gets a little nervous before she starts. But once she starts, she’s fine. And the results speak for themselves.

The Results? 

Karyn’s average sale is sitting at around $2,200.

Seventy bookings at that average is between $100,000 and $154,000 in future income. All from one promotion. All confirmed within two months of us starting to work together.

Her calendar is booked through to the end of April. Five months solid, for a photographer who was sitting at zero just weeks earlier.

“I couldn’t imagine it a couple of weeks ago.”

That’s the thing about building a real photography marketing system. The results can feel genuinely unbelievable when you’ve been stuck for a long time. Not because they’re exceptional or reserved for certain kinds of photographers in certain kinds of markets. But because having the right strategy changes everything about what’s possible.

Facebook Ads for Photographers – Ad Spend Breakdown (Because This Matters)

Before working with me, Karyn had paid someone else to run her Facebook ads. The last campaign had cost her $50 per lead. She got five leads. None of them booked.

With the right strategy in place, she spent $350 total and got 70 bookings.

Same platform. Same photographer. Completely different result.

This is why I’m so direct with photographers about ads: it’s not that Facebook ads don’t work. It’s that running ads without a clear strategy, a proper offer, and a follow-up system is how photographers burn money and conclude that ads are a waste of time.

When you run them properly, the return on investment is significant.

How Karyn Feels Now

“Every month I didn’t know how I was going to pay my bills. They just keep coming no matter what. Now I can make plans. I feel like this weight is lifted off my shoulders.”

Five months of bookings in the calendar. A predictable income she can actually plan around. The ability to say yes to things instead of always calculating whether she can afford them.

That’s what changes when a photography business has a real system behind it. Not just the income, though the income matters enormously. It’s the psychological shift that happens when you stop wondering where the next booking is coming from.

Final Thoughts

I asked Karyn what she’d say to a photographer sitting where she was a few months ago: stuck, scared, unsure whether to take the next step.

“Why struggle along on your own? You don’t need to. And you’ll get the investment back very quickly.”

Coming from someone who lost her entire client base to a natural disaster and rebuilt it in two months, that’s not a throwaway line. That’s lived experience.

Ready To Restart Your Portrait Business? ?

It might feel daunting when you think about taking your business from where it is now – to fully booked and profitable. But when you have a step by step system to follow, and a coach right there beside you – you find that you achieve those results so much quicker!

If you’re tired of wondering how the hell to book more portrait sessions, let’s connect and see how I can help you do it.

Here’s three ways to learn more about how I can help you: 

👉  1. SEND ME A MESSAGE   and tell me a bit about your business, challenges and goals. 

👉  2. If you’re more of a  DM  kinda person – HIT ME UP ON INSTAGRAM  and lets chat more in real time.  

👉  3.  And if you’re looking for a photography business coach who is as passionate about your results as you are- then CHECK OUT HOW WE CAN WORK TOGETHER HERE.