I don't know about you, but I am definitely a morning person. There is something almost magical about mornings- I love being the first one out of bed in the house, and sneaking out of the bedroom so I don't wake G and Nelly up. Sitting here at my desk I can hear a ton of traffic- cars whacking their mufflers on the little road that we live on, a plane flying far far overhead, and the traffic of lots of people coming into and out of Cambridge on Histon Road, the major road nearest our house. Very early in the mornings I often hear the dawn chorus of birds outside our window, and even sometimes the frogs croaking in our teeny little pond.
Yesterday I did a product photo shoot for a local company, and I photographed big wall anchors and plastic zip line thingies, and staplers and caulk and all sorts of things. I also went to G's office into their server room to do some sample industrial photos for a job that I have pending- I'm meeting with 2 potentially big clients this week who are having their websites redone by a business connection of mine in BNI. His company is called Realnet, and they do fantastic websites and google analytics for large companies. The sites are not cheap, so clients are expecting to pay for proper photography to put on them.
When you are in business, it's important to know who are the top 3 industries that you are interested in talking to. They tend to be businesses that have the most synergy with yours. So for me, when I am networking I am looking for people in these industries to talk to first:
1. Publicity/marketing
2. Web design
3. Graphic design
That doesn't mean that I don't talk to loads of other people as well. But if I see any one of those 3 on a list I try to identify them and talk to them. Because it is usually one of these 3 people who would say to a company "you need professional photography done." In the process of getting photographs done, they are in the pipeline before me because most companies need photos done for one of those 3 reasons. If I was wanting to do primarily wedding photography it might look more like this:
1. Events manager
2. Venue coordinator
3. Florist
BNI has been fantastic for me- I have learned so much about business from my fellow members. Gd lead me right to the best possible chapter for me- a strong, well established chapter with members who have been in business for on average over 10 years each. I am pretty much a newbie, though I have a decent sense for business since my parents ran one for 10 years. But I still have a lot to learn, and I'm not afraid of hitting some bumps along the way. :)
An update on the camera- we're filing our appropriate paperwork with Citibank regarding the shady dealer that I ended up with, and fortunately a friend of ours from StAG decided to use some frequent flyer miles to get a free trip to NYC so he is there right now, and I'm going to order a new camera as he has kindly offered to bring it back for me. He's done some web design, and like us is interested in starting businesses for platform work overseas. He's spending 2 years working with youth at the ch here and volunteered to redo the website. So if you do a little Google search for StAG Cambridge you'll see my photos on the front page of the website. :)
Well the traffic has quieted down now- it's amazing what half an hour's difference makes. Now I hear the birds chirping outside again, with only an occasional car going by. Tomorrow Goldman Sachs is sending out a big team of people to Anglesey Abbey to put in an eco loo for us- it's a self composting toilet basically that will go out in the forested part of Hoe Fen. It has to be delivered on the back of a truck, so I'm hoping to get photos of that today and I'll be out tomorrow helping with the group, making a path and managing whatever needs to be done. Once I get some photos of the eco loo I'll post them up.
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