Interview with Andrew Hellmich | GBPW Episode 104

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Andrew Hellmich.

To think that I’m coming up to 500 podcasts is just mind-blowing. What surprises me is a never-ending supply of guests to interview. There’s just so many different ways to do business and everyone’s got their own little nuances to the way they do things. I still love recording today as much as the day I started.

Andrew Hellmich

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How to Start a Photography Business is led by award-winning American photographer Krystal Kenney. Over 6 modules and 50 lessons, you’ll learn everything you need to run a successful photography business from anywhere in the world. Krystal covers everything including website design, finding customers, marketing, and much more! Join us today and elevate your business!

In this episode, I talk to the owner and host of PhotoBizX Podcast: Andrew Hellmich! Andrew has produced over 460 podcast episodes and spoken with hundreds of talented photographers in business. He’s an incredibly talented photographer and business owner who has a lot of interesting stories to share.

We talk about:

  • The key ingredients for a successful photography business
  • The biggest obstacle that Andrew had to overcome as a wedding photographer
  • How PhotoBizX has influenced his personal work

& much more!

If you’re interested in starting or developing a business of your own, I highly recommend listening to this episode.

Here is a preview of our conversation with Andrew Hellmich.

Q: One of your mottos is: “Get paid for what you love to do and you’ll never have to work a day in your life.” If someone wants to have a lifestyle like this, what three things should they know first?

Andrew Hellmich: I think the secret to living life like that motto is in the motto itself. You have to be able to get paid if you want to make a living from what you love. If you’re going to get paid for what you love to do – in this case, photography – then you have to know how to generate leads, how to convert those leads into bookings, how to make sales to those leads.

To me, they’re the three key ingredients for a successful business. If you can do those and combine them with something that you love to do, you should be able to live that life where you can do what you love and make a living from it. You have to know the business behind or you have to understand business to be able to make that a reality. Otherwise, you just end up giving your photography away.

Q: When you started your podcast, did you find that it affected your relationship with photography in some way?

Andrew Hellmich: I went through a really tough stage where I fell out of love with photography. It was still my job, but when I looked at my camera bag, it felt like a toolkit. The only time I picked that up was to go to work. The camera gear and the camera bag meant work.

There was a period – probably 3 to 5 years – where there’s almost no photos that I took of my family. I just didn’t want to take photos for fun because it was purely a job. I was shooting 60-70 weddings a year, portraits through the week, commercial jobs. It was at a stage where we were growing the business fast and saying yes to everything. I just stopped enjoying photography. I lost sight of why I actually got into it. It was purely a business and for work.

When I started the podcast, I started interviewing these photographers who were so passionate about photography. It reignited my passion. That’s what got me into the Fuji cameras, the X100, and trying different things. It totally got me reinvigorated and back in love with photography, which was awesome.

Q: What’s one of the most impactful things you’ve learned from your guests?

Andrew Hellmich: There’s so many different ways to get to the same end result. There’s so many different ways to do business and be successful. Everyone that I interview believes they’re doing it the right way, the best way. It probably is the best way for them, but it may not be the best way for the listener.

This is probably something that I learned early on when I used to attend AIPP conferences. One of the best speakers I ever saw was Jerry Ghionis. I went to his multi-day conferences, visited him at his studio, and saw him speak at AIPP.

I wanted to be Jerry Ghionis, shoot the same as him, and do business the same as him. It took a long time to realise that I was never, ever going to be Jerry Ghionis. Once I accepted that and realised there’s other ways for me to be successful, I thought, “Okay, now I can make a business that suits me, my personality, the way that I like to shoot, and the way I like to do things.”

That’s what I’ve learned from the podcast as well. There’s just so many different ways to do business to be successful, which I love.

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Taya Iv is a portrait photographer, 500px ambassador, and host of Great Big Photography World podcast.
Taya Iv is a portrait photographer, 500px ambassador, and host of Great Big Photography World podcast.
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