Prospecting can be challenging for so many different types of professions, especially when it comes to prospecting appropriate creative clients for professional photographers. Rather than relying on external client list build services, Wonderful Machine has chosen to cut out the middleman and become one instead. We’ve revved up our research team to include six producers that are routinely adding relevant creatives to our internal database. That database, which we’ve been cultivating since WM was founded, along with organic research and industry-related connections, is what we build our lists out of today.
We recently had the pleasure of doing just that for Megan Taylor, who was looking to build a list of clients that matched her style and skill. Megan is based in Los Angeles and shoots fashion, lifestyle, and youth culture along with some travel work. After looking at her specialties and current goals, we decided that the best way to hone in on appropriate clients would be to start with location. Considering LA as her home base, we built the list out of the Los Angeles metro area expanding into San Diego and San Francisco.
Megan has a beautiful, bright, and authentic style that would be perfect for brands like Levi’s, Urban Outfitters, American Apparel, and similar contemporary brands. We decided that focusing on LA-based designers and brands should fill up the majority of our list, after which we would expand it to include local editorials and boutique ad agencies in California.
Megan felt that the list was appropriate for her skill set and perfectly captured the types of clients she wanted to connect with, so we put our noses to the grindstone and a couple of weeks later, turned out almost 200 solid contacts in Megan’s targeted zone in the industry.
Here’s what she had to say about the results:
This totally exceeds what I was expecting, I’m so excited to begin making contact. Do you have any advice for reaching out via email and print?
And yes, we do have some suggestions on connecting with clients. For emails, avoid mass delivery and consider a more individualized approach. The same goes for snail mail, a handwritten address label or accompanying note can go a lot further than a generic laser-printed label!
Need help with building your client list? Reach out!