Photographers, this blog post is for you! We’re talking all about how you can spring clean your photography business.
Spring is officially here, so it’s the perfect time for a little spring cleaning in your small business! If you’re like me and want to knock out some to-do’s, you’re going to love these spring cleaning ideas!
1) Organize Your Inbox
If you know me, you know that organization makes my heart happy. I love organization from folders to labels to color-coding… So, it should come as no surprise that I’m recommending you organize that inbox of yours!
Take some time to sort through your inbox. Yes, this will take a decent amount of time to do it correctly. Unsubscribe from email lists that are no longer serving you. Create labels for clients, projects, and collaborations. Sort emails into folders for business orders and receipts, inquiries by type, educational resources, and more. Update your email signature. And hey, if you’re really feeling motivated once you dive into your inbox – add your own email templates to your inbox (hey Gmail users) or CRM, too!
2) Update Your Website & Printed Materials
Oh yes, your website is the perfect place to start! Oftentimes as creatives, we find ourselves in love with our websites after a rebrand or website redesign… Then, we get into a routine, life gets busy, and we forget to keep our websites fresh.
This spring, I challenge you to jump into the backend of your website and make some updates! Whether you’re updating photos or copy, these updates are 100% worth it – especially from an SEO standpoint. Our work grows and evolves year after year as photographers, so our websites need to reflect that, too!
One of my favorite tips when it comes to website updates? Keep a folder on your desktop for your “2023 Favorite Work” and drop files and images into the folder throughout the year. Gathering your favorite work as you create it is a lifesaver, I promise. You’re already doing the majority of the hard work for yourself. Then, when winter and springtime hit, you can easily jump into that folder and update your website!
In addition to your website, make updates to your printed marketing materials! Printed materials are one of my favorite parts of my brand and client experience. But that isn’t to say that they never need updating! Carve out some time to open up the various printed materials in your photography business and see if any updates need to be made. When the busier months hit, you’ll be glad you did this now as you spring clean your photography business!
3) Sort Virtual Files
Remember how I said I love organization? Well, here’s another idea for organizing your photography business! When it comes to your virtual files – whether you’re using folders on your computer, Google Drive, or a service like Dropbox – they need to be organized. Think of the time you may be wasting because you can’t find files or don’t remember where you saved something. Do you feel me?
In this spring cleaning season, I encourage you to set aside some time to sort your virtual files and create a better system for organizing those files in your business. The icing on the cake? Sorting your virtual files now also makes cloud backup (and data retrieval later) so much easier, too!
4) Revisit Your Expenses
This is one of my favorite spring cleaning to-do’s in my photography business!
Okay, I get it – bookkeeping is not fun for most photographers. It’s one of those crucial tasks that many don’t enjoy in their photography businesses, but we all know that up-to-date bookkeeping helps our businesses grow and thrive! So, on that note, open up your spreadsheets or Quickbooks and bank statements and take a look at your expenses. When I sit down to revisit my expenses, I like to look back at my expenses from the last year overall via the Profit & Loss and on a month-by-month or quarterly basis. This helps me see what was going out of my business account throughout the year, and then I can decide if there are any unnecessary expenses. Keep in mind that sometimes you’ll find unnecessary expenses and subscriptions during this task… And that’s okay! I would bet that most (if not all) photographers have at least one expense that isn’t necessary and could save their business money in the long run.
5) Clean Your Office
And finally, clean your office! This idea may seem like a no-brainer, but really, clean your office… If you have a home office like me, sometimes things get out of place and simply need organized or reorganized. So, go through your office and do just that.
While you’re cleaning out your office, I recommend diving into your filing cabinet, too! I know it’s not fun, but organize receipts & invoices, printed contracts, insurance policies, client documents, tax documents, business registration, etc. – if it’s in your filing cabinet, organize it! This is also the perfect time to make sure that you have photos of all your business receipts (uploaded to Quickbooks) and photography gear (added to a folder for safekeeping) as well.
Here’s to a great start to spring & spring cleaning your photography business!
