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“Show Notes”
Nick Gregan has been doing photography for thirty years and is a headshot photographer. Nick thinks working in a niche works well and helps build your business. For twenty years, Nick specialised in actors starting in their careers, so he worked in a niche within a niche. He says that with the camera technology, lots of people are entering the headshot market without necessarily having the relevant skills.
Nick says headshots are something everyone can do, in terms of it’s a picture of the head and shoulders. But the subtle differences between taking headshots for different people with different roles make a big difference. Marcus asks how you differentiate those images. Nick says initially he needs to get to know the client and needs to know how the client wants to be seen. Nick says the thing he also does is give people options, so he might take some images people don’t expect but might like.
Nick says acting headshots are really important; they can make the difference between getting auditions and good roles and not being noticed. He says he has helped many actors come to him when they are not getting auditions. He takes their headshot, and then they start to get auditions and roles.
Nick explains that the first image people see of you makes a big difference to the way people see you. They will form an impression of you based on that message. So your LinkedIn profile image will make a big difference in how people see you and what they think about you. Nick says the LinkedIn profile photography market is growing as people are becoming more aware of this.
Sam asks about his business model in terms of pricing and volume. Nick says he used to do ten or twelve people a week. However, he decided to put his prices up. So he photographs fewer people, but charges more for it. His ideal session is about 2 hours with an actor or an hour for a corporate headshot. Nick uses a technique called rapid rapport to quickly build a rapport with the client. The conversation starts as a conversation between him and the client, but it moves on to what is effectively a conversation between the client and the person viewing the photograph. Sometimes he does photographs for celebrities, and he has to work on these very quickly and build rapport within a minute or two. He also uses scenarios with clients to help them get into the right move and pose.
Sam asks Nick how to convey his value. He says his images do, his website does, and his blogs do. Nick works hard on SEO, keeping his website at the top of Google Search. He doesn’t have an online booking system, so people talk to him before booking. He uses this opportunity to show he is an expert. He pitched himself as an artisan and an expert who gives a luxury service. He sends these messages out on LinkedIn, Google My Business and on his website. On his website, he has a lot of location-specific pages that generate work for him. For example, “Headshot photographer Wimbledon”.
Nick is working on a book for photographers. Marcus asks if Nick can give us some tips for creating the perfect headshot.
1. Look at the light. Don’t just set it up as standard, look at it for subtle adjustments.
2. Get to know your client. Essentially, you need to let your client know that you are an expert and are confident.
3. Capture the person’s personality. Make sure they are showing emotion.
You can reach out to Nick on LinkedIn here
Or find his website here.
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“Show Transcription”
Sam: Hello, Marcus, how are you doing?
Marcus: Oh, I’m fine. I am fine. Thank you, Sam. How’s yourself?
Sam: Excellent. Very good. Yes, yes, yes. Just moved out, so a bit chaotic here, but we are here and we have a brilliant guest with us. So today, Marcus, we have with us photographer Nick Gregan. Hi, Nick.
Nick: Hi there, guys.
Marcus: Good morning, Nick.
Nick: Morning.
Sam: Welcome to the show. Would you like to introduce yourself, Nick?
Nick: Well, my name is Nick Gregan. I’m a specialist headshot photographer, and I’ve been doing this for about 30 years. And what makes me a specialist headshot photographer is the fact that I don’t do much else. I do headshot. I work in a very small niche. And I’ve heard you guys talking about niche photography in the past. And I think being a specialist in a niche really works well, because that’s what you get known for. And people come to you because you deliver a product in a niche. It’s whether you’re a fashion photographer or you might be a wedding photographer. If you get known for that niche, it really helps build your credibility, I think.
Marcus: Oh, that’s a really good point. And you say you’ve been a specialist doing headshots like 30 years, which is an incredible wealth of experience. And we’re certainly going to be diving in the world of headshot photography in this episode. Let’s just start off, Nick, if I may. Have you seen many changes in the world of headshot photography?
Nick: Well, I have over the last sort of, well, we’ve seen the change from film to digital. When we talk about niches, I was even more of a niche photographer because for probably 20 years I specialized in photograph and actors. And I was actors at the start of their careers rather than the big famous sort of selection, those sort of things. And so it was a very, very small niche.
So in that sense, that market has changed quite a lot. We’ve seen a rise of people entering the headshot market. We’ve seen a rise in the quality of the cameras, which are now, in some cases, really sophisticated computers that do most of the job for you. And so what it means is a lot of people can enter the market and call themselves a headshot photographer without the experience, without the knowledge of that skill, and not really the ability to understand what they’re doing or deliver the right product sometimes. Anybody can take a headshot. It’s just a photograph from the shoulders up, and we can all do that.
Marcus: That’s what makes it difficult, though, isn’t it?
Nick: Yeah, well, that’s it. Everybody can do it. But understanding the difference between a headshot for an emerging actor and that of a chief executive officer, or even the purpose of those headshots, but also even known even more further down, like what is the difference between the headshot for a chief financial officer, for instance, as opposed to a creative director? And do you do the same headshot for the same people or do you make those different? And so there are subtle differences, and it’s understanding what those subtle differences are.
And for instance, if you’re taking a headshot for a model, that’s one thing. But then if you get an author who’s a thriller writer, do you do the same kind of headshot for them? Or do you get an author who’s a romantic writer? Do you do the same kind of headshot for them? So it’s just trying to understand that market.
Marcus: Yeah, I get it. And how do you make that differentiation? What do you do, let’s say, if I was an author and I’m doing a moody book, how would you differentiate that from a CEO of a company?
Nick: Well, I’d want to know a little bit about you, first of all, what you do, the kind of product you deliver. And I’d also ask you how you want people to see you. I think that’s really important, that you give the client the opportunity to say, well, I want to be dark and moody. I want to be strong. I want to look hot and sexy or whatever it may be. You give the person the choice and then often the job of a headshot photographer is to deliver that photograph but also offer options so that the client sees a different picture that might not really expect to get. But then they’ve got that picture, it’s a little bit, oh, I like that. I hadn’t really thought about that picture. I didn’t really see myself looking like that, but it just kind of fits in with their market and fits in with their image. So, you know, you kind of have to do it on the fly a little bit, which is all those things. So, yes, you have to do that kind of thing on the fly and be prepared to have a range of lighting, understand poses, what kind of poses are going to work. Even though it’s a shoulders, heads up from the shoulders shot, the pause does make a difference. Absolutely makes a difference.
Marcus: Let me talk about the, definitely talk about the attitude.
Nick: Yeah, yeah.
Marcus: So, yeah, I agree. It’s a question of attitude, how you get the person to react on the camera. It’s a question of how you light it. And I guess that’s also a differentiator between doing a corporate photograph and an actor’s headshot.
Nick: Yes. So far, I’ve got a little story, if this might work, describe how the importance of an actor’s headshot works. I teach workshops and tutorials and all sorts of things. A young lad came to me mid-20s, he said, oh, I’ve got an actress, family friend, actress, to photograph next week. It’s her first set of headshots. It’s just easy headshots. And I said, well, okay, have you thought about this? Have you thought about your lighting? Have you thought about her characters that she’s liable to play, the kind of thing she’s likely cast and her castability? And I’ve said to him, have you thought about, if you make the wrong photograph, you take a photograph that’s not really good for her, have you thought about the consequences to her career? That she might never get noticed. She might never get any auditions. And a year down the line, she might think, I’m rubbish at this. I’m just no good at acting. Well, actually, she might be brilliant, but just has a headshot that doesn’t do anything for her or the wrong type of headshot. And for many, many years, I saw a lot of actors come in saying, this is my last shot of being an actor. People keep telling me to get a real job. But this is my dream. This is what’s in my heart. But I’m not getting any auditions. And when you look at the photograph, you just think, wow, no wonder you’re not getting any auditions. And so one of the best things I found, because I think headshot photography is probably one of the most underrated genres of photography. But I also think it’s one of the most instantly gratifying because you see results straight away. And to deliver an actor with a headshot and then find out a couple of months later on, they’ve got the getting auditions, the getting noticed. You just think, yeah, it’s just the right headshot, just understanding the need of the person.
Sam: Yeah. And that’s a lot of weight. There is not a photographer. I mean, you kind of you’re saying that you’ve effectively got their career in your hands. And some folks like to say, aren’t professional, aren’t specialists in headshots, they kind of generalist and they’ll do headshots. And are they going to manage that?
Nick: Well, you know, certainly in the the instance of somebody who’s maybe just left drama school, you do have their career in your hands. And if they don’t get seen and don’t get noticed, they don’t get auditions, they don’t get auditions, they don’t get work. But if you do it right for them, it does make a difference. And then it’s up to them and their acting ability. So in that particular niche, you do carry quite a lot of weight, not so much weight when you move to corporate headshots, or if you’re photographing models, because I’m in a model headshot, it’s completely different because you create an image. You’ve got a lot more freedom there to sort of create an image for which could be an editorial image, or it could be a really strong, aggressive image. You’ve got lots of even beauty photography, beauty photography is headshot photography, you have the ability there to use your lighting and be more creative, work with a makeup artist and allow more creativity come in. Some genres in the actors, you can’t really be too creative.
Sam: Okay.
Marcus: For sure. I get that. I mean, first, we refer to it as headshots. I really do not like the word actually, it doesn’t sound right at all. Let’s call them portraits.
Nick: You know, funny thing is for years, I always thought headshot photography was like a poor version of photography, you know, wasn’t as good as a fashion photographer, wasn’t as good as, you know, corporate photography, those sort of things. But actually, it’s a really, really good and professional niche to be in.
Marcus: It’s definitely grown as a genre. I think, you know, back in the day, we all knew about actors, headshots or actors’ portraits. You know, that was a vital part of their trade, as you’ve just been eloquently saying. But it’s only the business portraits is quite something quite recent. And that’s, is that your feeling as well? Do you think it’s actually quite recent?
Nick: Yes, I think it is quite recent. And I think people are now becoming more aware of the power of the headshot. And funny, if one of the talks I do is called the power of the headshot. But people, because of things like Instagram and Facebook, we’re now becoming much more aware of the image and what the image does and how first impressions count and how people make an impression on somebody in a split second. And it can take quite a while to shift that image around. So if you’re a corporate corporate, say LinkedIn, for instance, if you’re LinkedIn and you have a photograph that is chopped off with your arms sort of round somebody, you got a bit of your shoulder and you’re smiling and you’re on a beach in Bora Bora.
Sam: Or the wedding. That’s always a classic one, isn’t it? A chopped off of this is me, but it’s my wedding photo.
Nick: Yeah. Yeah. But that says something about you and somebody forms an impression about you. So it’s understanding. Every headshot, every photograph sends a message. And it’s whether you understand and are aware of the message you are sending and if you want to control your message. So that’s really important, controlling the message you sent.
Sam: So it’s almost, if you’re thinking about LinkedIn, it’s almost like you’re filling your profile and you should care about what goes in there. You’re kind of saying then the headshot that goes with that is conveying as much information, but also it does it much quicker, doesn’t it? So not everyone is going to read your profile, but everybody sees that image and makes the decision.
Nick: And, you know, even if it’s, for instance, something like applying for a job. So you put a headshot or a photograph on your CV. People look at that CV and that headshot and already informing your decision about you. It’s evolutionary. We can’t help it. We do it. You know, it goes back millions of years. So we can’t help doing that, but it’s what we do. And so you should be aware of that and people are becoming much more aware of it now. And this is why I think the corporate headshot market and LinkedIn marketing, those sort of things, is growing. We’ve got to fight against the onslaught of AI, but still there’s an absolute space in the market for traditional, what I call, I call myself an artisan headshot. I don’t call myself that. I market myself as that. And that’s how I think of myself. You know, somebody’s going to pay good on the road and pay eight pounds for loaf of bread, sourdough bread. I supposed to go to the supermarket and pay one pound. I think of myself as like the artisan baker.
Marcus: You’re a sourdough.
Sam: In terms of a business model. Now, Marcus, you know, a lot of people in the corporate side might do like Marcus a whole day brand shooting stuff, which is obviously quite a lot of money. And on that model, you kind of need less customers and each customer spends more.
So in your model, do you kind of need quite a lot of throughput because the amount you’re getting from each customer is is necessarily less, even though you’re a kind of premium headshot photographer?
Nick: Well, funny enough, I changed the way I was doing business a couple of years ago. Partly in response to what was happening with the market and the actors, a lot more people were coming on doing very, very cheap headshots. And I decided that I used to do 10 or 12 people a week. And that would be very nice. But now I found that I just didn’t want to be competing and trying to drop my prices. So I went the other way and put my prices up and thought to myself, if you understand the value of a headshot, as it certainly is an act, if you understand the value of your headshot, you’re prepared to pay for an expert headshot photographer, which is what I am. And so I do less people now, but I charge more for it. And there’s a guy I photographed a couple of days last weekend, I photographed him before, and he said, I knew I needed a new headshot, but I knew I had to save up to get the money to come and see you because I know how good your headshots were for me before. And in terms of the headshot market, in terms of corporate clients and LinkedIn, I don’t price myself low. I don’t see any point now. It’s about, I think, in some respects, it’s about valuing your service, valuing your skill and what you bring to the show. And I don’t like to photograph anybody. My ideal session is a two-hour session for an actor. And I can do a corporate client would be an hour session. But I know other photographers would do them in 15 minutes, 30 minutes. And I just, that wasn’t worth me. What really works for me is chatting with somebody, getting their personality and getting their personality across. And I use, I’ve got a couple of, this might work for you, people, the old guys. I’ve got two techniques I use. One called rapid rapport, which is a way of establishing a very quick rapport with your client and placing you in a position of, not authority is the wrong word, but confidence and confidence in its eyes. And the other thing I use is a thing called the headshot conversation, which is a technique that involves three elements. And I think if a headshot, if you’re having the headshot conversation, which is the conversation with the photographer and the client, but then ultimately it’s the headshot, the conversation between the viewer of the photograph and the person in the photograph. So, you know, you start with the conversation between you and your client, but then you’re bypassed. And so it’s the end result and the conversation they’re having with the person that looks at it. And it’s about what I was talking about a few minutes ago, that first impression.
Sam: Yeah.
Marcus: Are you quoting there from, or going on from John Burgess book, the ways of seeing about how the people know?
Nick: No, no, I don’t know that. And I don’t know it. No, it’s just something that I’ve developed over the years. And I think that, and I have, if I’m photographing that, I have a very set technique I go through to make them look in the right place, to make them connect with me, then just to start making them express their personality, those sort of things. And I repeat it because I know it works. And if I’m working, there are some elements, sometimes when I work with celebrities, and I only have two or three minutes. And very quickly, I’ve got to establish my credibility with these people, so that they pay attention to me. And I’ve photographed people in 20 seconds and done fantastic headshots with them. But I might spend a minute or two minutes talking to them first, because I think that’s really, really important.
Marcus: And I think, you know, when you, photographing an actor who is probably used to being photographed, which certainly they’re part of their stock in trade, has got to be a different attitude to photographing a business person who doesn’t want to be photographed.
Nick: Do you know something? I think they’re very similar because most actors hate being in front of the camera.
Marcus: Oh, is that right?
Nick: Yeah, yeah.
Sam: Same as the rest of, same as everyone else, same as the rest of the spectrum.
Nick: If you put an actor on stage in front of 800 people, they love it, they’re in the element. If you put them on a film set in front of 30 or 40 people, they’re absolutely fine. But one to one, in front of the camera, it’s different, because suddenly, it’s a thing that I call the cloak of character. Their cloak of character has gone and they’re really sort of bearing the bones. And one of the techniques I use is just, I give them scenarios. I behave like a director and suddenly they start responding, because that’s what they’re trained to do.
Sam: They’re backing their element.
Nick: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, they’re back performing.
Sam: Yeah, that’s what they like doing, so they’re relaxed.
Nick: And with something like a chief executive, for instance, you often don’t have a lot of time. You’ve got to try and work out what they want. And I still use scenarios with them, because everybody’s got these scenarios. For instance, we’ve all been stood in a bar and seen somebody looking at us and you kind of meet their eyes and you go, oh, hello. You know, we’ve all been in that kind of situation. And so we can relate to that. If you can place that scenario in somebody’s eyes or in their mind, suddenly, for a couple of split seconds, they go into that situation. And if you capture the photograph, then you’ve got a character and personality and emotion going on.
Sam: Amazing. I want to pick up on a couple of things we were talking about a little while ago. First, a really quick one. Has it worked business-wise, moving to the higher pricing? Has that been a success?
Nick: Yes, it has. I’m not as busy as I was, which I’m very happy about. Because there’s lots of extra work done. I don’t retouch anywhere near as many photographs as I used to. So I’m very happy. I’m probably making about the same kind of money. So, yeah, I’m good.
Sam: That’s excellent. So, I mean, it’s interesting, as we’ve talked about a few times in the market, other genres, too, about, because Marcus, I think, has talked a few times about, there seems to be a lot of photographers coming into the market. And we’ve talked a lot. Yeah, one of the ways to be different, you know, is just put those prices up. There is no point being with this mass of photographers at the bottom competing.
Nick: Quite right. Quite right.
Sam: It’s a really good way to separate yourself. And kind of linked to that, you’ve put your prices up. So how are you conveying that value so that people pay that and don’t just go, well, I’ll go for the cheap one?
Nick: Well, I obviously buy my images. I think my images do that. I hope my website does. I blog a lot. And funny, if I listened to your episode about blogging, I thought it was really interesting. And it’s one of those things that I’ve done for a long time. Because I believe it’s important to get your website up there. Now, it’s even tougher now trying to keep your website at the top of the organic searches.
Sam: Yeah.
Nick: And I’ve never used Google ads and those sort of things. I’ve never really been into it.
I’ve always thought I’d rather try and get myself up the rankings. So what was the question again?
Sam: So the question is, how are you conveying that value? You’re charging higher prices. So how are you conveying that so people realise that you’re worth it effectively?
Nick: Do you know something? One of the things I do is I don’t have an online booking system because I don’t want people to just book online internally. I want people to ring me and talk to me, at the very least email, so I can talk to people and let people know what I do, what I can do for them. And that I really am an expert. You know, I have a book on my website, which is called The Headshot Bible Road a few years ago, which is 50 tips to teach actors, 50 tips for a better headshot, a perfect headshot. And I’m actually funny enough, just in the process of writing a new one, for photographers called The Power of the Headshot. Help them take a better headshot. But I try and pitch myself as an expert, as I mentioned earlier on, as an artist.
I want people to understand that I’m not just going to smash and grab and quickly take a photograph in 30, 40 minutes. I’m going to give them an absolute luxury service. That’s how I pitch myself.
Sam: And where are you pitching yourself? Where are you putting those messages out?
Nick: Well, I put them on LinkedIn. I use my website. I use Google My Business quite a lot.
I also have, in my website, I have a lot of very specific pages, which are local pages. So I have headshot photographer Wimbledon, headshot photographer Tooting, and those sort of things. And they produce quite a lot of work. I also have some that are more central, like headshots, Canary Wharf, headshot photographer Soho. And they bring in some more of the better placed clients, bigger clients, and more of the companies. So I find that worked out well for me. That’s the only real market I do.
Sam: OK. So just to make it mark there, and just clarify something, I’ll let you come in. So just for people who are thinking how you do those pages, what you’re saying, you’ve got lots of pages that are really similar. One says headshots, Wimbledon. One says headshots, Canary Wharf. They’re not on your menu. Most people don’t see them, but they’re really targeted for that particular area. So when somebody does that search, your page appears.
Nick: Yes, that’s correct. That’s exactly right. Yes.
Sam: Just clarify that for listeners. Perfect. Marcus, you’re gone.
Marcus: Well, just as we’re coming to the end of the show, and you’ve mentioned that there’s a new book you’re working on, the headshot for photographers. Can you maybe give us three? We haven’t really talked about technical, and you know this show, we don’t talk a lot. Let’s have it. You’re an expert in this, Nick. Can we give us three things for our listeners? And just imagine they’re more advanced, you know, with the intermediate to advanced technical tips you can do for creating that perfect headshot.
Nick: First one, I’m going to say, we’ve got a lot of photographers, especially semi-pro photographers, for instance, look at the light. A lot of people don’t look at the light. They might have watched a YouTube video. They might have seen something in a book and think, right, okay, we’ll use clamshell lighting. And they set it up and they just go, what you need to do is you need to look at the light and learn to train your eyes to look at the light so that you can see what it’s doing to the person’s face. And do you need to make any subtle adjustments to make it look right? That’s the first thing, look at the light.
Marcus: The subtle adjustments, like, you know, just using, what reflects it, is it going to be silver?
Nick: Yes. Are you going to use gold?
Marcus: Good. Okay, that’s a great start. What else have we got? Give me two more.
Nick: In terms of getting to know with your client, my technique, rapid reports, a little more into it in depth than this, but essentially, you need to let your client know that you are an absolute expert in what you do so that you need to present confidence, you need to take control of the situation as well. Just a very quick one. A very famous celebrity who is known for quite forthright opinions, I photographed them about a year ago, 18 months ago, and I was going through my spiel, and they said to me, after about 20, 30 seconds, oh, I’ve done loads of photographs, just get on with it. I said they are known for their forthright opinion. So it kind of threw me a bit, and if I wasn’t confident in what I was doing and where I was going, it might have really thrown me. It flushed me, but it didn’t. I took 16 shots, and they bought four of them. So I was very pleased, and I did it in 90 seconds. So take control. Take control is not the right word, but establish your credibility and your confidence. And the next thing is, make sure you capture some of the person’s personality. Make sure their eyes are looking in the right place, they’re looking at you. Talk to them and make sure they express a real emotion. You don’t want the person standing there with blaring eyes like that that scares you. You want the right emotion for the right, if it’s a chief executive, you want the confidence and competence.
If it’s an actor, you want a bit of personality, a bit of character. If that actor is a comedy actor, you don’t want a big cheesy headshot. You want more of a twinkle of fun in the eyes. You’re trying to express personality and bring personality to the headshot. Those are the things I would say. There may not be actually technical in terms of lightning, but there are really important technical tips about what you need to do.
Sam: That’s amazing. And then we’ve had other guests as well, haven’t we, Marcus, talk about books and how much books do for you. That’s interesting. And yeah, I think we’ll maybe have to get you back on, Nick, and talk about all sorts of other things there. But we are, there’s much more to talk about, but we’re running out of time, aren’t we, unfortunately. Listeners, what we would really like from you and what would really help us is some reviews. If you can put us reviews on Spotify, reviews on Apple, whatever you listen to, if you put us reviews, just the stars, that would be amazing, as the more people do that, the more other photographers hear about the show, and the more show grows, and the more photographers can gain from it. So yes, please, please, please leave us a review. And Nick, thank you so, so much for being with us.
Nick: Pleasure, thank you.
Sam: And Marcus, I will see you next week.
Marcus: And I’ll see you next week, Sam, of course. Be there or be square.
Sam: Take care.
