The Craziest Wedding Photographer Making Waves On Social Media.

all right mate welcome to the podcast thing going on thanks for having me appreciate it and why don't you quickly introduce yourself to everyone and tell them who you are cool uh I'm Jonathan cycling I'm an Auckland wedding photographer and a tick tock sensation as my mum tells me uh I love that that's awesome um well thank you for coming on uh where I wanted to start as we discussed before is where the business started like we got into like properly being a photographer full-time yeah with their business tell me that Journey with what year and when when did it happen yep sure uh it's been a few years now I think it's almost been 10 years so probably the um in the last year

of high school I picked up a camera and started taking photos of things and halfway through that year I came across what modern wedding photography was um and until that point I hadn't even thought of Photography as a career yeah I hadn't thought that it was something I could do to make money and as soon as I saw modern wedding photography I was like completely hooked on that's what I wanted to do yeah and so from that point um the work who's the photographer whose work I came across was called James day um a Sydney wedding photographer yeah and so I went actually ended up hitting him up and going and spending two months in Sydney working and learning from him and then came back

from there hit up like who I thought was the best wedding photographer in New Zealand at the time a guy called Jake Thomas and um I just bugged him until he let me come along to a wedding and next thing you know I was um I did probably about 20 30 weddings that first year photographing with both those guys um and for me I really wanted to take the time to kind of learn from someone who had gone before me to kind of give myself the confidence to go out and do it myself especially being so young so um I went and did that and then after that all finished I actually also did like a year of commercial photography um at South Seas like

to keep the parents happy I got the diploma got the piece of paper made them made the accountant dad feel feel safe and secure yeah um and then after that um Jake just was like you're up you're ready to go mate so he just started sending me referrals and off that I booked my first season probably about 20 weddings and then yeah the ball's just been rolling ever since so that's crazy yeah um non-stop since then yeah so I think my first proper season was probably 2014 2015. yeah and so yeah that would I guess that's almost coming up to 10 years of winning seasons since then so yeah just let me touch back on like uh you see something interesting for me modern wedding

photography yeah so tell me what's the difference yeah photography well I think the there's two types there's the winning photography that we do now and there's the wedding photography that your mum had okay I would say yeah and so I guess before I had seen what people are doing these days all I had in my head was just whatever I imagined waiting for to be and that would be boring stale kind of stagnant images that didn't feel like interesting or creative and then I think with the Advent of the digital camera and people just being able to experiment so much more freely yeah people were just able to really push the boundaries at a wedding because before that you know you'd have like 120 shots

for the day and that's it so you had to be very safe and you know in studio lighting and and just be very careful with how you shoot yeah and now you know some of my friends will shoot 25 000 frames per wedding um and just to really push the boundaries and kind of like find um yeah some really crazy Magic Moment sort of thing so yeah I think that's what what I'm waiting for here is it's just people absolutely pushing the boundaries of what can be done creatively on a wedding day yeah all sorts of lighting setups and just like ridiculous locations and things like that so yeah yeah why weddings uh why not like any other type of modern photography yeah well it's

because like the what wedding photography was doing at the time was like pushing the boundaries so much more than what I thought a lot of other stuff was because I think fashion photography has been like very established and it's had a clear style for quite a long time whereas weddings at the time I just could not believe that that kind of quality of work was coming out of just someone's wedding day yeah um and so I was just hooked on the style of Photography that was in the industry at the time there was things like tilt shift lenses which kind of like keep it's kind of creates that miniature effect yeah and kind of has like a certain focal plane and has different elements on

different um depth levels All In Focus together like all this trippy stuff was happening and really creative work with like LED lights and multiple exposures and things like that yeah and I think the CR for me like when it comes to creativity I think creativity is all about like if you can use constraints I feel like constraints happy to be creative like constraints yield creativity I think so a wedding day is the ultimate constraint it's like you can only you can't walk that far from the venue you've got limited options with lighting you can't just like control every element so I love like the improvisational nature of weddings yeah and then trying to pull something amazing out of your ass like like on a wedding

day like that if you do that in the studio and you've got 12 hours and you can reshoot the next day if it didn't work like that's not as impressive to me but if you know that that happened like in between them getting married and then going and having dinner that night like that blew my mind so um yeah I think that's what hooked me and I just loved like I I'm a real control freak and I think I get paralyzed when I've got too many options yeah so I think the weddings were really helpful for me like that because it's like I can't control many elements so is going to learn to work with what I've got and I think that may like for

more exciting like a more attractive field to me yeah yeah yeah yeah um okay there's heaps of stuff on us but I just want to I just want to get maybe like chronologically what happened and then we'll pick it apart yeah so okay so you did your first season that might happen how did things start to stumble yeah so um weddings is very much like a word of mouth business um you know because it's a high trust event it's like you know it's like getting a haircut but imagine getting a haircut for your wedding day it's like you do not want that to be um messed up so I think people really want someone that they know their friends have used and that they would

feel they can trust on the most important day of their lives so I shot 20 weddings each winning has 100 guests 100 guests see me doing my thing and as I'm sure we'll get to like I like to do things a bit different yeah and I kind of came into it from the start with a fresh perspective on what being a professional might look like and so then you know 20 times 100 people you've got like I don't know is it 2 000 people seeing you every year doing things differently and I was kind of standing out from what they'd kind of seen previous just getting photographers at friends weddings do and so just from that I think the word of mouth just naturally happened

and then um yeah those people oh you know this mate's getting married next year yeah you gotta get in touch with this guy I saw him last week at a wedding he was amazing and so yeah kind of just um I was just kind of busy ever since then um and there's a few there's a few yeah we can get into it but I I started um filming some viral videos right so I think my first viral video that I filmed was way back in the day it was 2014 or 2015. and I sent um I threw my phone at the time to my flatmate yeah and um he I was like just filmed this and I think I had seen this like Vietnamese wedding

photographer doing these kind of weird like rolling on the ground like playing with his legs and he was going a little bit I remember this yeah yes yes back in the Facebook days and so and it's through the phone record this and um and I just recorded one video one take that was it came home um the next day I just uploaded it on Facebook and I like went to go wash my cards you know left the phone inside and then I came back inside and I was like 80 000 views and I was just like flying up this has been Facebook videos were really popping off and so I was like okay that kind of just gave me the confidence that like I've got

something that I can do that's going to pop off uh on that kind of thing so from there I just kind of kept on creating a few more videos like that I probably only did three or four or five more videos throughout the years yeah um and just put them on Facebook and they went quite viral like probably had like over 100 million views on Facebook videos like being ripped and re-uploaded and all that kind of stuff um really popular in Russia for some reason I don't know I don't know why yeah yeah Russia just love me um I won't say anything else no comment um um but yeah so then um after those videos kind of blew up I think obviously the next thing

that came around would be Tick Tock yeah I don't know how fast you want to yeah I'm gonna put pick it apart yeah cool yeah so yeah they went um lockdown happened I was just sitting inside we didn't have much to do and I I thought I was too old at the time for tick tock like I must have only been 25 which is definitely not too old particular talk and um and I yeah so I kind of thought hey like I might as well I know I've got this library of viral content like how about I re-cut it and repurpose it into like that modern short form video content and so I just did it and yeah before I knew it like things were

blowing up on Tick Tock yeah and I think in the space of probably like yeah a few months I got to 100 000 followers and then like now I'm just sitting at 230 000 you know just I'm just coasting so I've got a bit lazy recently I've been working on the business a bit more but um yeah so that kind of has been like a pretty crazy Journey like um I thought it was too late to the game but no Tick Tock has still got heaps heaps yeah yeah it's still so early yeah 100 and yeah that's Main and so Tick Tock was like the latest kind of Reincarnation of all those viral videos um I'll I'll say one more thing and then I'm gonna

let you jump in because I don't know yeah but like um one thing I started doing is as soon as I realized that Tick Tock um was where the money was at in terms of like the exposure and the views I started every wedding I decided to bring an assistant belong to every winning yeah and give them my phone and just have them record the whole day whenever they thought something would would be interesting for Content yeah and so I was using that to create Instagram stories throughout the day as a way to kind of let people look into the experience of having me photograph a wedding so kind of creating content there then also at the end of the day I had all these

clips that I could pick through and kind of repurpose and and try and put into a tick tock concept or something like that so yeah from there I just had like heaps like every wedding almost I had something I could kind of cut together and so yeah I kind of went gangbusters on Tick Tock for about a year or so there and yeah built up millions of views and and um it really was incredibly helpful for my business as well like that was um yeah pretty amazing impact that it had there let's talk about that let's talk about the impact a bit so like um because with your audience how like what are the demographics like it must be pretty Global audience yeah I do

shoot around the world or do you just shoot no I should I shoot just in New Zealand yeah yeah okay yeah I think um when I was coming up in the winning world a lot of people traveled a lot for weddings uh but for me like weddings are the vessel for me to have the chance to help people have fun like I like to spread joy and make people have a good time and also to create images that are that are valuable for them yeah and so for me I was like never I was never under the illusion that the travel wedding lifestyle would be glamorous yeah I was just like no I just want to like stay local and especially like since covert like

I'm really glad that I made that call because um it made things a lot a lot more simple to saying in New Zealand but I'd say I think it's like nine percent or ten percent New Zealand maybe like 15 Australia yeah and then the rest is like America mostly and that kind of thing but yeah still massive and I think as well like that's the demographic in terms of like the followers yeah but you know I every wedding I turn up to uh someone will come up to me and be like hey you're that guy from Tick Tock right and like whenever I'm out and about like people come up and say hi to me in public and like I think um it's tick tock's

incredible right it's algorithm and knowing like where the user is based and then like oh this person's also here yeah they just filmed something at Auckland Museum yeah and then boom putting it in front of them so I think it's quite incredible how much it serves it up to development people in the relevant demographics yeah yeah absolutely so when you think about that then um because you're obviously already having a pretty successful career prior to that right yeah so when when did Tick Tock start 2023 29 2020 yeah yeah out well straight away when it hit New Zealand I suppose pretty much right yeah um and up until then that would have already been what seven years of going hard already yeah yeah exactly what

like what difference did it make over these next three years again and even just percentage-wise like how do you think the business grew because of tick tock or just because everything yep yeah absolutely so I think uh just to I'll go back a step and yeah a real secret about myself uh I got addicted to a game called fortnite oh yeah I don't know if you heard it yes I did yeah so I got I got pretty addicted when my partner was doing her post-grad I'm down in Dunedin I just became obsessed with fortnite and I decided I wanted to become a streamer yeah I was like building this character I did like this deal with PB Tech and stuff but then I kind of

um I realized that I don't like the streaming platform because it's like it's tied to you putting the hours in to get the output you know you have to show up every day I was like no content's the better play anyway okay so look into that game and then I realized okay I'm kind of coasting on my business a little bit at the moment yeah and it's kind of it's kind of um I had built up a lot of momentum and I'd kind of met all my heroes and achieved a lot of my goals and so I think that kind of sapped a lot of motivation from me because it's like what what do I have to aim for now um and so I became

addicted to this game and then I kind of realized at a point that like my numbers my the bookings were going down and I was a little bit less busy than I'd like to be yeah when was this what year are we this is probably um but I think it was probably two years before 2020. okay cool yep in those couple years yeah and so my numbers were kind of I was just coasting on that momentum but not building anything new yeah okay um and so then when I realized hey I want to quit I want to quit gaming I tried to cut it out of my life I tried to like do little steps and you know and the only thing I ended up

working was selling all of my gaming equipment like so it's just not physically possible for me to play games yeah and then I had all of this extra energy that like I had previously been sinking into like getting triple head shots and like winning these getting the dubs you know um but then I I I was kind of like the way I think of it is it's kind of like I was getting all my sugar and my dopamine hits from gaming and as soon as I took it out of my life after a couple months it was quite difficult but after a couple of months I kind of recalibrated and it's like where do I get my sugar from now yeah and then I was

like oh my business you know and so little things that previously hadn't been that fun or interesting to me like sending invoices or reconciling statements or whatever creating the next post yeah um there was enough sweetness in it because I was no longer on that gaming level dopamine and so that's where Tick Tock became a new new dopamine hit Source yeah and I started getting hooked on like you know going viral building these videos growing this content and just really working on like sharpening and polishing my business as well um so I kind of went through a big period of growth the last three years and kind of during covert which I think was a really good time to do it because a lot of

the people who have been in this in the industry for a while kind of um covered made things tough for everyone and so if you weren't fully in it you kind of dropped out but if you're able to put the work in through covert yep when you came out the other side you're swinging okay yeah that's why we took that off camera right like the same as us like yeah yeah I mean we started in 2020 and just hit the ground running yeah and it just made it so much easier because like yeah everyone else was like complaining about everything yes yeah well you can do one or the other maybe like get on with it or complain 100 yeah yeah so yeah it was

it was um yeah so Tick Tock blew up pretty big and and at the same time I was just really focusing on my business as well yeah and so now it's come to the point where like yeah I'm just really stoked with like where my business is at um this journey was I one thing I just love in life is like trying new things yeah and then reminding yourself that you're actually able to break through that that wall and get to the other side yeah and I think it had been a while since I had done that and so it was a cool thing where I was like I'm too old for tick tock it's already like had its peak you know and then I

just decided to just do it anyway and then realized that like I was capable of doing it and Tick Tock still had mileage in it yeah and so it was a good reminder that like trying new things is a good idea cool and that I am capable of kind of getting to the other side of things there so yeah that's awesome just quickly one question with gaming yeah did you get anywhere with it um I know I sponsored it at some point but like I kind of did like a bit of a behind the scenes like yeah I kind of went and got permission to film in like a PB Tech store dressed up in character and like but I think the thing that stopped

me is I didn't have um the ability to kind of like cut that video content together okay at the time and I think that was like a barrier for me and I think because that kind of world of streaming and YouTube is often like higher production value yeah it made me feel like that was too much of a barrier and that stopped me from creating whereas Tick Tock I from the get-go I knew when I created my first video in 2014 yeah even though I have like professional camera equipment yeah I do not want to film it on professional camera equipment because the second you see that shallow depth of field come up on your feed yeah like this is an ad you know even

if it's not it's a brand deal you know and so for me it was really important I knew from the start filming on the phone was the best thing to do yeah and so I filmed all my videos on my phones even though my partner's a videographer and has like great video kids yeah I was like no all on the phone because it has to read it's like natural and authentic and so that I think really helped me with like and even cutting videos Tick Tock together you don't do anything fancy you know it's just like a phone video yeah can edit it on your phone and I think the Simplicity of that was what allowed me to break through and make this happen whereas

the I kind of got too much in my head around the gaming and the twitch stuff because I was like trying to have the best cameras and yeah it was too much so yeah that's why I kind of was able to make it through on Tick Tock and yeah I love it yeah so cool man yeah yeah and with the tick tock like in where you're at now yeah um like how was the business now like from prior to that you said it was starting to decline you see it's had massive growth now like from a photography business perspective of your sort of goals where is it at what are you thinking what's the future yeah I I'm I'm busier than I've ever been yeah

um I'm I'm making more money than I've ever made in my business and yeah it's just it's an awesome place to be and I think when you're um making good money and at least I can speak for my business I think it really empowers you to make the decisions that you might be too scared to make if money isn't as stable so when you've got more work than you need or you're making more money than you need yeah it kind of empowers you to back yourself to make certain calls like for example I no longer shoot weddings outside of Auckland during my main wedding season and before it's kind of like hard to say no to the money but now I've got like such a

strong lead base coming from Tick Tock and all these other things have built up I have the confidence to just like really be more more um you know to I don't know be more selective about the weddings that I take and um and that's just meant a better quality of life for me so now I'm focusing on doing only eight hours of coverage at a better price point um so that I can shoot weddings back to back and not feel so burnt out and like not traveling all over the country all the time so just spending more time at home and like doing things that I love and that kind of thing so yeah that's been like a huge thing and yeah I think um

yeah my businesses are stronger than it's ever been and that's like a really cool place to be in and yeah yeah it's yeah yeah how was that like from a growth perspective like for you now like are you kind of like in a good place or have you got like some Ambitions to go push again yeah I think um so my partner has just transitioned to being full-time self-employed yeah I'm doing video Yeah is it on the Instagram the person linked um was it sorry on your Instagram you've got someone linked yes I do yes yeah okay yeah yeah yeah so yeah she's been getting into that last few years and and I'm getting busy with my couples and that kind of thing so I

think helping her build out her business and like as we transition to to like better equipment and her growing her skills I think I don't know even like the fact that I've spent a lot of time thinking about short form video content makes me curious about just delving into like helping Brands out or whatever doing some kind of deals and that kind of thing yeah um but yeah so yeah so I didn't really know where I am no so like in terms of the business stuff like um do you just like you know you know you know like someone's done something for so long like 10 years or yes you know maybe 15 years like yes they start to either get right right burnt out

until they start to think like creatively they start to look what am I pushing do you see that creativity spark still I'm getting itched because you're doing the videos and stuff or like how do you think about that for weddings sure so I think for me I'm really lucky that I've always had the desire to like make things better so every single I'm I've got a very active brain and I'm always analyzing how could I have done this better um in personal life and business and that kind of thing so when it comes to photography like you can definitely get to a point where you're coasting because you feel like you've gotta you can just turn up you just do your thing but for me

um a really important thing for me has always been to have Heroes who are further ahead than I am and so I've got um and I've become friends with my heroes over the years which has been really cool getting to pick their brains and that kind of thing so there's certain photographers whose work I just find incredible and so yeah you can always there's always someone out there doing better than you and so if you can find that person and push yourself to try and create work like them yeah I think I'm I'm producing my best work I've ever produced and it's been because I've been so focused on just trying to always do something a little bit better you know coming away from every

wedding like how could I have shot that dance for better how could I have lit things better or every wedding trying to try something new and different yeah um and so yeah the video content creation has definitely been part of that like trying to create Next Level video Concepts but I think I I haven't posted on Tick Tock for quite a while um and I think I need to get back into that but I think I've been focusing so much on the craft and and the photos which is like the primary product that I do sell yeah um yeah and in terms of growth like I think I just wanna I just want to pay off an Auckland house yeah that's that's not that's the

motivator right there I'm like if I can just be like mortgage free in like 10 years and like um yeah that would be the dream and then I can just go do what I want kind of pretty much make as much money as I can so that I can you know buy a lifestyle that's going to be really fun cool free even though it is now but I'd love to just have like even less pressure and then I think oh yeah the next Journey please there's always something else I think through covert you know it kind of like I just want to pay over house and that's it oh yeah and then the next Journey there's always something else um but yeah I think that

like so yeah through covert it really made you think like it was certain it was scary times to be in the event industry in a time where events were kind of not happening you know yeah and so there's I started going on seek I was like oh my gosh like job finder you know what what does my skill set you know match my skill set fill out some questionnaires what could I do if this completely falls through because we're trying to get a house at the time and um yeah but then I think yeah we're good we're good now yeah we're good on the money front but then so for me I'm always still thinking of like what's next because I think weddings is like

a game which you only have so much time in yeah it's kind of a Young Person's game because it's big hours it's high pressure yeah that kind of thing and I don't want to be doing this at like my mid 50s especially with my Antics and the kind of cartwheels and the moves that I do so um I think for me the next thing I've been recently wanting to dive into is comedy okay yeah I did I went into like a um second stand-up set last week yeah I love it yeah and um I think that obviously that ties in quite easily with um yeah exactly yeah and I understand how it works and I remember like I listened to a lot of comedian podcasts

and one comedian comedian was saying how like I just spent like 300 000 filming a special to release on YouTube for free and it's done like nothing for me like I should have just been focusing on Clips yeah clips of where it's at when it comes to comedians these days like it was often traditionally a big thing to do to film a whole special and put it out for free and all this kind of stuff now it's just like just some crowd work interacting with a Heckler One Clip gets millions of views and that's your next like three shows sold out you know like yeah yeah so there's so many of those guys who did it even without a crowd yes you know like you

can tell that they've just no it's like yeah so comedy I think is the next thing for me um and I think that like yeah I enjoy I love entertaining I love making people laugh and so weddings is kind of like um a really great um being a wedding photographer is a really great secret it's like a great way to make money it's a really fun way to live it's creative it's fulfilling you're doing work that matters um and you're involved in all this called like Tech staff and like art and it just combines a lot of cool things um but for me I think I I absolutely love it I love turning up to every wedding and I still love my job but I

know that it's just a really good tool to kind of give myself a base to build from and to I think I really want to try some other things as well so that's why I'm going to try hit the comedy up I love that and um yeah it's probably the biggest left field we've had on one of these podcasts oh yeah I [ __ ] love it that's so good I like I mean I follow heaps of the comedians on there yeah because I love what they've done like I love how they heck to talk and YouTube yeah they've hacked YouTube and Tick Tock yeah [ __ ] it they own it now 100 yeah like they're Andrew Schultz guy that yeah owns the world now I know it's

incredible but yeah Rife is like all right I'll stop at that guy that guy like unbelievable he can't get less than 10 million views though yeah yeah and what is he okay no I'm not gonna talk [ __ ] on Matt Ryan no but he just it's been incredible there's been a few comedians that I've watched in Australia who have kind of blown up um yeah just yeah over the last few years and I remember some of them at the start like we were at the similar follow accounts yeah and now they're like passed a million there's quite a few Australian um comics and then the funny thing is that yeah it's like they became like a tick tock I'm not sure if all them started like

this but they just blew up in Tick Tock and they're like oh I'm making people laugh I should try comedy yeah and it's just like so backwards to how a lot of other people would have done comedy in the past yeah but now they're like able because of this audience they're able to sell out shows and go on tour and I think it's so cool and they can refine jokes faster yes because you know they because like the old circuit is like you got to go every night yeah and then Australia New Zealand yeah it's not every night yeah it's once every two weeks because there isn't there's enough yeah rights and stuff yeah and so takes ages to refine your jokes yeah yeah now

they're just like every day didn't work yeah I didn't try it again yeah yeah and they've got such a good job of like building the brand that people just love they're going to turn up just wanting to like and loving them yeah I love that yeah you could do like Aussie man reviews the weddings yeah and it's like fine yeah that's a great idea I should try and like grab some inspiration from that wedding fails and just all sorts of shenanigans oh yeah yeah that's fine a good call I need to I need to get my content game again I love it um okay that took us on a site an attention but I love it um what I did want to get into in

touch of it is about like uh a lot of times when I talk to Young photographers or young people were doing stuff like this we've had a couple people on our podcasts who've tried to do wedding or photography stuff it's like when you started versus now like I don't need specifics because pricing a wedding you probably don't just have like standard things but how has pricing changed for you and your relationship to it since you started now because you probably had a really good education at the beginning which is probably different to most people but how was that yeah so I was lucky lucky enough to be guided by those mentors and so I could get quite a good Insight because a lot of people

will start winning without knowing where where to stand and where to go on that kind of thing on pricing but I think I kind of I think there's a lot of advice that old grumpy photographers will give to Young budding photographers because they're scared that they're going to take all their work they'll say like you know don't don't undervalue yourself you know you need to charge four and a half grand for a wedding even though you've never shot a wedding before you know and I I kind of call [ __ ] on that because I think that like um at the end of the day you're going to ask any of those of photographers how they started out they would have started out cheap shooting May night's

weddings and building up the confidence and the skills yet to kind of justify higher prices so I started off like like two and a half thousand dollars yeah that kind of thing yeah yeah um and now it's it's more like six also a thousand dollars for about eight hours eight hours coverage um and so yeah depending on like a few different factors but essentially that's kind of like I think that winning pricing I think the Beast of capitalism is making people pump out more work for the same price kind of yeah and so I think that like when I started people were definitely charging around six grand or so as well yeah um and now obviously six Grand's worth a lot less due to inflation

um so I think that there's certain things like Ai and different tools to make your workflow more efficient that kind of allow you to kind of shoot more volume at the same price and so one thing I've done for me has been just dropping increasing the price and dropping the amount of hours you get for that coverage so just as a starting point that at the very minimum I'm working less hard than I did before in terms of like the actual pain of a wedding day in terms of like the hours because it's a lot of time on your feet long time shooting and and for photos to edit but at least I'm getting paid like the more than I've ever been paid for the

least amount of work I've ever done and then if it goes beyond that in terms of hours then it gets even better um so I think that like yeah I'm definitely valuing my time much more than I ever have um to begin with and that just is so good for your mental health it's like ridiculous how much of a mindset change it is even it's like it's like if you tell if someone says that they don't want to do something all you have to say is like how much would it cost for me to do it for you you know like money really does can be such a motivator and like walk into a wedding day where you feel like every hour of your time

has been really well you know paid for and you feel appreciated on that sense such a different mindset from when and I think um I think it's like a quote from one of those amazing like brene Brown Ted Talk kind of things and it's talking about how like um resentment is when an unspoken boundary has been crossed and I think that's often what we do as creatives is that we will walk into a day perhaps presenting our client but it's actually on us because we didn't do a good enough job of of setting a price that we felt valued for and we can't blame them it's only on asking what we chose to quote them for so I just think that now especially longer wedding

days I've changed my pricing structure so that it's quite expensive to help me for a long day so now I turn up to a 12 hour day and I'm like this is great yeah I'm definitely going out and eating brunch three times this weekend you know and avocados um but yeah so that's kind of like yeah different mindset whereas before I think I got to a point where I was a bit scared to put the prices up yeah um and then I started but you know with inflation I started being like not as pumped to turn up because I kind of felt like I was being a charity almost yeah and so having like The Tick Tock blowing up and other things I've done in

my business to help it grow yeah I think I had the confidence that I've got such a strong base of leads coming in that I could kind of move that meter um and that's just paid off yeah really well how often for you who is price the factor that they don't go with you like what's the percentage of that drop off yeah I would say that like weddings is a small Market I think especially in New Zealand it's quite small so I think in Australia I know quite a few friends who are like you know the best photographer in Perth or Western Australia the best photographer in Melbourne the best photographer in Sydney and so they are charging like very big money and that's because

there's four million people in Sydney and you only need 20 couples a year you know whereas New Zealand and Auckland you know it's it's a whole lot smaller so I would say that like the reality is probably like 20 of my couples maybe 30 of my couples walk through the door and they're not interested in anyone else you know um and for other photores that might be like 10 but because I've been lucky enough to carve out but more of a niche but the reality is that still for most photographers a large majority of your couples could book someone else if they wanted to yeah um although I do find that like when people come to my Instagram and they kind of see like some

of the behind the scenes from weddings and like that combined with the photos and then maybe like someone recommended them to me as um me to them as well then those factors kind of combined quite a strong referral and they're pretty interested in me yeah um I see my pricing out to my couples like on the first email inquiry because I just get so many inquiries yeah and so then I find as soon as they're ready to meet me I find that probably like nine out of 10 couples will book me after a meeting yeah so they've seen it they've already sold it and yeah because it's in the process yeah they're happy with the price prices and a factor so yeah yeah cool and

there's all the social proof that you've got and stuff like that exactly yeah uh in terms of like when you started so like two and a half K instead of price range for for a shoot yeah um when you think about that like yeah you talked about being happy now with where yeah was it still the same then like were you still happy or did you just yeah oh yeah as a young person I was young you know and so to be making like a good salary off the bat and not feel like I'm working because I'm just sitting in my lounge editing photos listening to Spotify and just you know doing whatever I wanted when I wanted and then also being able to buy

all these Cool Tech products that I'm just obsessed with and then it's a business expense you know that was like the dream cool um and then I but then I think as I got older I realized okay that was fun when you're Twitty and all your mates are still in uni but you've got this income and then I started looking at things like Auckland house prices and I don't know like life just gets more expensive I think as you get older and I just realized as well yeah inflation like I was like no I need to be doing more than this yeah um and so yeah I kind of got that hustle to kind of build the business bigger and smoother and I want you

know I'd like to get to the point where like if I were to have a family or whatever's the next step like I like my business to run really smoothly and for it to be this this tool that really supports me to live the lifestyle that I want yeah um and so yeah a big part of that is yeah ratcheting up the prices and that kind of thing and you still think there's some room for you in pricing as well yeah I think it reaches a certain point I think there's like a Tipping Point I think that like where I'm at now is pretty close to the top of the market yeah and I think I'm more expensive than most of the photores I know

so um price is definitely the thing that would make me uh inaccessible for for some couples yeah and so I definitely think that like and the thing is so because it kind of gets that point the only way that you can kind of increase your your um the amount of income that you make is to book more weddings so like quantity and again that's only limited you know like shooting like 30 weddings at like six grand is like you know 180k and then shooting 50 at six grand is not that much more yeah you know so it's kind of like you you start to recognize the relationship of your time input being tied to your income and so that's where I think doing things like

maybe selling presets or a digital product like an online Workshop education that kind of thing that's like so much easier just easier to scale because if you can sell a thousand presets for a hundred dollars that's a hundred thousand dollars yeah yeah and that's kind of like half of it you know that's that's incredible that's like yeah so I think that's where I think um I'm very happy with the income I'm making now and I think for me it's more just about balancing like the the quality of life at this point and what's a manageable volume which for me is about 40 weddings a year yep um 40 I did like last year's like 50 and that was just because of pent-up Demand with Covenant

stuff and all this kind of thing so I think I'm going to try to get to about 40 weddings a year that's kind of like two a week Max through the summer through the summer yeah okay um tell me about like the the workload like is it I mean you've obviously got your partner just video but is it yeah and you've got assistance is she the assistant or no no so we have other assistants yep yep so if someone comes along with me to every wedding to film all that kind of stuff and they're kind of just there to help carry bags bring me water um change lenses that kind of thing yeah and kind of help me be present on doing the job there

cool it's most important for me was just taking photos and they can move my car they can bring me a drink bottle so I'm not doing that stuff and that's just made winning days so much easier for me as I get older you know knocking on the door of 29 you know next year um but yeah so and then in terms of the the workflow after the wedding yeah um there's there's some AI kind of tools that have been coming out the last year or so so like quite a good photo editing tool that kind of gets your images to the point where like it's almost as if your camera has really good Auto white balance really good order exposure so if you wanted to

you could just deliver the wedding like that yeah but for me because I'm still wanting to push my craft I'm I'm I'm using the extra time it's created for me to spend polishing the images to the levels before so just kind of tidying up backgrounds yeah things like that um I would probably say that in a few years time like if I would have a kid or something then I would be wanting to Outsource all of that that post-processing but I'm still doing the selecting process which is kind of choosing the the best images and that's like it's just a mentally tough task you don't actually like six to seven thousand images every wedding so it is just a lot of photos to look through

and I think that would be the thing that would Outsource next it's just part of that letting go yeah creatively I think is it yeah is that I was going to ask is that the reason you keep it from a creative perspective yeah or is it from a like both creative inequality of output deliverables yeah it is for those things and because I'm I'm young enough and and free have enough free time that I can do that extra work and like I got a friend who just um hired like a full-time um staff member doing that kind of stuff yeah and they're paying like a I think a 80 grand salary and I'm I could do that or I could buy a Tesla you know

like it's kind of hard to if you do have the spare bandwidth for time yeah it's hard to say no it's like taking on the extra money yeah but I think if I were to look at my business from like a more objective perspective yeah I'd be definitely be smarter to to Outsource the things that someone else can do yeah and to spend more time on the things that only I can do which is creating these kinds of videos and stuff and building my brand and kind of maybe working on building a digital product or something like I was talking about earlier um but right now I know it go right was that so it's a hard thing to let go because like it's like

um like in my head where I'm going now is like yeah definitely Outsource that yeah start building the community they're probably YouTube or something like that to build like where you can sell these things yeah but like the two years it takes you to build that problem yeah especially YouTube right like it's not ticked up yeah it takes a lot yeah especially in photography on YouTube yeah so long but and and then you might be painting on 80k so that's 160 Grand that you've given up yeah over two years yeah build something that might not replace that for another yeah three years yes and it's always a hard thing yeah yeah it's really tough when you run this business and you're kind of connected to

all parts of it as like a single person business kind of thing yeah and so you're kind of it's really easy to be like oh where could that 80 grand be spent otherwise you know yeah like yeah it's a it's a tough one um yeah especially in New Zealand where everyone takes that 80 grand and they put into property and that blows up yeah yeah yeah yeah exactly why would you go to business in New Zealand that's ridiculous just buy houses buy houses I love that stuff so okay well because that's what I was going to ask is like um yeah what is the future right like you obviously at some point weddings are gonna be too hard yeah or maybe even just creatively don't

test you anymore or whatever it might be whatever the reasons are yeah and then you said like maybe digital products or whatever but like yeah um where do you see the brand living long term yeah because I think tick tock's gonna You're Gonna Keep Going pushing that out just going to put it everywhere it doesn't matter to you yeah yeah um yeah I'm not too precious about which platform um I post content on but I think what does the future look like is probably I reckon I've got another 10 years in this if I wanted it um I think realistically I should probably only spend another five to seven years doing this wedding story thing yeah and before I get out of that I think

it would be a waste to not capitalize on all the experience and the knowledge and the connections that I've built and to try and create some kind of you know online Workshop or you know digital product like presets or like photo editing software something like that so I think that as I kind of get closer to those years I've still got plenty in the tank but I think as I get closer to the end of my time in the industry and that's where I'll probably start to try and phase like even more like shoot these weddings put the prices right up and then use that as a tool to kind of create carve out you know a whole bunch more time to work on a

project like that like selling an online Workshop yeah um and that kind of thing so I think that that's where his next man this business and then at the same time like I said I'm trying to get into the accommodating on the side and hey maybe I'll blow off right yeah sure and then you know I'll just I'll just tell my couples hey you know I'll just refund you double and then you can just I'm gonna go be a famous comedian or something um I don't know if that will happen yeah but yeah so I think that's where what's next to me is probably like um keep pushing the craft keep trying to do the best job I can um and then at some point

when it feels right yeah trying to capitalize on that yeah some kind of product and then um on to the next thing yeah I think yeah it does seem like to me like it's that next step of like bringing on the help is the thing like yeah it's a her I know yeah lots of creatives it's like a real hard thing for them to do and actually that's I shouldn't say creatives young business people yeah like it's real hard and um I think especially when you started at 18 yeah because you've only worked in your business really yes the only business so you don't know any other way yeah so true you just grinding it out yeah yeah it's like oh so it needs to

done yeah Jonathan's gonna do it wait there's no one else yeah so true um whereas like when I started this business um I had just gone through 12 years of running hotels for a living right yeah and I like in hotels saying needs to be done yeah go get the person to get it done yeah and so like my first I was telling you off camera like May 2020 was my first client yeah the next day I hired my dad awesome I was just like Dad I don't want to do the work that I just sold yeah you need to do it yeah he's like [ __ ] I don't want to do it I was like yeah but like I need you to do it so

I can keep selling yes and uh I need it to be used so that I can fire you if this all falls over amazing don't take me to work or something like that yeah he's like yeah whatever so you came out of retirement you worked for us awesome but then like every time we sold something yeah it was like who's next like who do you hire next yes yeah yeah and look rightly or wrongly but like it's it's helped us build this is what we've got to now yeah 16 staff awesome about to be 20 or so in the next yeah month or so but there's like we're not even at year four yet yeah cool but not that like you need that because you

don't you don't have that type of business like you can't the the main thing you sell is your time at weddings which yes increase yeah yeah but like how do you get like the rest of that [ __ ] like tell me tell me something because like yeah a lot of young photographers I talk to who do weddings yeah don't understand the full picture cool so can we like sort of like this might be a little bit boring for most people but it might be a good clip for people cool okay pre-witting yeah sales yeah pre-pre pre-sales and sales yeah how much time do you reckon you spend with people um uh like like you know doing all the back and forth to get the sales done

yeah I would say it's pretty much like a half hour meeting yep so like three like one night a week I'll do about four or five meetings with couples yep um so it's like two three hours two and a half hours yeah every Monday night um I just have five meeting slots available and if anyone wants to book me they have to meet me first yep sit down through that meeting half an hour meeting and then just a couple emails back and forth and then they'll probably be ready to book me sort of thing cool and then once they're booked then what's the pre-work before the day um pretty much nothing you don't do too much pre-work just the final final call on the week

of their winning just to go over the game plan and kind of get them to fill out a form that gives me all the information that I need from them for their wedding day um and then yeah next thing I'm shooting their wedding and they assuming and then how much in post I'd say it's like probably two-thirds of the workers after the fact yeah so NATO actually it's like 16 hours yeah yeah I think I would say I would say well I'll say every wedding is probably like 40 hours of work yeah maybe like a working week of work yeah um and that you know probably a fifth of that or less is before the day yeah you know on the day it's about eight

hours of work yep um but if possible to travel then after the fact it's probably two to three days of culling editing and doing the final curation and bits and bobs at the end so it's yes it's huge it's a lot it's huge yeah for sure it's huge for people who um like we had a girl on here yeah uh Hannah who I don't know if you saw but she did like a Tick Tock okay right yeah so people are hiring her to do make tick tocks at a wedding awesome which is cool which is great I was like yeah that's [ __ ] smart yeah just do that right especially like alongside photographers and stuff yeah I've heard about this in Australia didn't know New Zealand

was doing it that's cool well like she started doing it yeah and she told us she was like okay I've got my first wedding yeah and we're on the podcast I was like how much did you get she was like I think it was like 600 a day yeah it was 600 bucks for a 12 hour shoot yeah she traveled down to Queenstown oh man they paid for her flight and accommodation and I said what oh so you at least got something good for combinations she said no I got a hundred dollar juicy pot oh my God I was like wait that's amazing so like and she made like I don't know 50 bucks an hour on her head just like five bucks an hour

like it's good on yeah 23 or something yeah I was like yeah but like you've still got to edit all those yeah not not necessarily that she had to judge six grand and plus it was their first one yeah yeah I get it yeah like you've gotta yeah get the runs on the board and all that sort of [ __ ] yeah that's a new thing but I think it's important for them to realize like yeah I think like you go and I sat at two and a half Grand yeah that education you had from those other guys yeah so helpful yeah absolutely because like that's way higher than I hear most people start off yeah like I've heard I've heard wedding photographers go like oh yeah

I charge like 900. so I know no it's just gonna be dangerous that's that's um yeah and I think obviously like as you find like when you charge more the couple the client will appreciate and value you more you know so it's um the higher prices go the better couples you attract the more they value you you know they'll feed you they'll put you up in a nice hotel um and that kind of thing so I definitely yeah there's definitely like um yeah charging more is helpful for everyone but it's just scary to do at the start for sure yeah if you were a young photographer now and you're getting into it maybe you've done the training like you did with some people yeah where

do you think roughly like it's a good place for them to start to do what you do obviously because you've got the brand but like yeah what do you think these days is like the entry level question guys for a wedding for like a standard winning coverage like eight hours I'll be inclined to say about three thousand dollars yeah yeah I think that's important for people to hear yeah because I I've heard like I've heard them go low a lot yes yeah that's scary yeah like I know you're young but like like that's just not worth it Go Pack shells it come down yeah I think a lot of people forget about the thing called tax yeah essentially like the simple way to view it

is it's like when you get you know three thousand dollars a third of that goes to tax a third of that usually goes to your overheads and your operating expenses and then you only get to keep a third so if you want to kind of create and come for yourself you've got to kind of create three times what you want to take home yourself after the cost of running your business and paying tax and that kind of thing so that's something that a lot of people don't realize starting out luckily there's some businesses out there that make it easier for people to to do tax and that kind of thing but um yeah I think and you'll I mean they'll quickly find out they'll quickly

find out they'll quickly find out how much work is involved in a wedding yeah and I think that's why it's been one of the kind of Photography fields that has continued to be able to make good money yeah because well firstly it can't be taken over by AI yeah yeah yeah in the same way that like illustrative or um commercial photography can more these days yeah um but the fact that like a lot of people don't want to go and photograph a winning it's often the last thing on the list for photographers yeah and so the only reason you're doing it is because you're getting paid yeah and so I think there's no Illusions about how much work is involved and you know how high

um the stress levels are and the kind of expectations of the product and that kind of thing so yeah people will quickly figure out how much they want to charge and how much they feel like they can be bothered shooting a wedding for yeah I think three grand three Grands probably like a pretty yeah yeah um with your pricing yeah like your current price yeah sure how did you come to that was it purely this is what I want times three yeah like how did you model it yeah sure so I think it's really valuable to have relationships with people who are in your field but not in your backyard okay because I think certain things like um there are certain things that are a

zero-sum game I don't know if I'm using that correctly but essentially if one person wins another person loses yeah okay for example Google search rankings if someone's number one then no one else can be number one yeah so I think anyway the moral of the story there is that like I've got a relationship with a photographer who's not based in my backyard cool and that allows us a really free flying relationship to kind of exchange ideas and talk about things that are helping ourselves out yeah um and I think having that relationship has really helped me to kind of build my business and help with help each other copy ideas and and give each other feedback and that kind of stuff yeah yeah it can

be a bit more scary and vulnerable to be doing with your direct competition like you might not want to call up your agency down the road and say hey what would you guys quote and price for this job you know it's a bit more scary but if you've got a mate in Australia who's running a similar business you can talk a lot more freely and exchange ideas so um yeah this friend of mine um we worked on our pricing together a little bit and what I realized is like I said before I just wanted to be as I get older and I put a lot of myself into a wedding day I realized the hardest part of me for me was just the number of

hours I was doing on my feet and like really being so socially engaged and so I kind of dropped the bass um the middle package that what everyone wants to book to like what is a more comfortable amount of hours for me and so as a result like um you know at the very minimum I'm doing less work than I've ever done before every winning day but I'm also doing at the price point that's you know higher than we've done before and then essentially if they add more hours past that it becomes quite expensive which kind of forces more couples to kind of go for a smaller package which is what most cup weddings need um and it stops me hanging around for five extra

hours that I don't need to be there for um so that's kind of like my philosophy on the pricing is trying to get people in the door like by having a low amount of out this is getting really nerdy but essentially like by having like a lower number of hours that um I'm offering so most winning Stars will probably offer nine or ten hours yeah so I offer eight hours and the reason why is because why would I offer 10 hours if not everyone needs it no I would say probably half of couples might need nine to ten hours yeah the other half don't so why am I hanging around for another two hours that I don't need to yeah so by by default I'm

here but because they're selling 10 hours at X price and I'm selling eight hours at y price we still look on the face value competitive but realistically if I if they want me for for 10 hours I'm actually up here yeah way more expensive than other people but I'm kind of getting on the door of the initial pricing um looking cheaper yeah I'm only cheaper if you have a small number of hours and so as a result like um yeah that's got this kind of mine no I love it that's great yeah smart because um people when they get into pricing on this like you it's pricing is the secondary thing trust is the first one yeah yeah and so if they've already trusted you

and then and then they compare them Market to go well I trust this guy but I don't compare the market you're like he's on par for everyone else yes yeah even though they offer more yeah yeah the same price yeah [ __ ] let's Golf him yes exactly yeah yeah I like it yeah and it's just like yeah and I was trying to keep it simple and um yeah I've kind of been more selective of weddings like I'll only shoot um 120 or less guest weddings okay um because I just find if you've got 200 guests there's like twice as many family photos twice as many candids like it's just more work but you're not getting paid for more work you're charging on an hourly price and

so I just decided to to stop booking weddings bigger than that yeah there's a few other factors that I've kind of like honed in on like for example this is really nerdy micro [ __ ] I love it but like being an eight hour coverage like there's a thing called first looks that people do in the wedding industry yeah and that's where a couple will see each other before the Sierra money and often do the couple portraits before the wedding too which for from Authority perspective it's the worst time of day in terms of the light so my package as well is helping me to kind of force couples and I encourage them to when they ask for my two cents worth but like the closer you

get to Sunset the better the quality live light and the faster and more efficiently we can take photos the more flattering the light is and so as a result my base package kind of encourages them towards doing their photos after the ceremony closer to Sunset so all my portraits are taking a nicer light all my photos look better like it's just such it's like a win-win yeah and it's less work less of a long day for me so yeah yeah I love it that's right that's great that's right no no that's really good because like I just don't think people hear this stuff yeah especially when they start out for yeah on their own like because you're right like the creative industry is all of

them yeah not just photography videography graphic design you guys are so splintered yeah and separated and you and and it's scary to talk to each other because it's like you're going to cut my grass if you know my shirt yes which is true yeah and like I understand why creatives hold back pricing yeah Hold Back Time stuff because it's like [ __ ] I'm gonna get under the car tour whatever whatever it might be and I get there yeah but like because of that it's like a you know it's a double-edged sword right because then you also don't have the knowledge yeah of what to do and how to push it yeah and like you you're in a really good position which I think is great is

that like most of these young guys giving them advice like they're not going to compete with you because you're 10 years ahead of them yeah yeah you got 230 000 followers how many photographers actually have that yes yeah um so it's great but like they need it like yeah like these people because because not even making ends meet yeah it's tough I remember when I first got into photography my original Mentor James day he told me he because he's he was the best in Sydney at the time yeah and he still is great you know yeah so yeah and so I I saw his work and I got to Mentor with him and I think I was like oh my gosh this guy's made it

like he's got the MacBook he's got all the the fancy lenses and I was like this is so cool I was like a kid in a candy shop and he told me when I was driving to this photography catch up he's like hey I just want to let you know that like the majority of photographers I know are kind of barely making ends meet and so that was like something I've always had in the back of my head he's like I don't have any doubts that you have the capability to push through and make it to this end of the market yeah but I don't want you to be under any illusions that like you're gonna instantly be like creaming it as a photographer like

it's tough as a creative out there yeah so I kind of had that in my head that realistically like you to make good money in the wedding industry you need to be at the top yeah like five percent of the competition for sure yeah everyone else I think it's something that's really easy to kind of like be a weekend warrior and have a Monday to Friday job and shoot winnings on the weekend yes there's a lot of that and it's such an accessible industry these days so a lot of people kind of just barely getting by with photography but I knew like I needed to make this stick because I didn't I didn't get like a a University degree you know like yeah yeah um

yeah exactly yeah yeah so I was kind of committed to making it making it work and yeah yeah I love it yeah Connor's probably gonna shut me off soon so I want to get the tickets um tell me you got that one that was like 14 million just a little like yes down a little bit yeah on the steps of how many of that size have you had first of all yeah that one of the larger ones yeah that's my biggest one okay yeah tell me like I mean I know it happened on Facebook as well but yes what was that what are these like like what was Tick Tock actually like versus Facebook yeah went off what were the differences like Facebook I would

get like maybe like five inquiries a year yeah and I'd be like in Australia like hey I saw your video I want you to come share a wedding and that kind of thing whereas Tick Tock just the ability it's really weird because I I think generally you'd trust Facebook as like a more like stable platform where you kind of offer more credibility to the person's page you're viewing but for some reason a video going viral on Facebook like you would never click on that video and go oh I should hire this person whereas Tick Tock I think the ability to kind of swipe right and go to the profile and immediately say oh and I have all my my bio you know based in Auckland

you know like um New Zealand winning photographer like just information about me that makes people realize oh I'm actually like a relevant product option for them if they're in the market for a wedding photographer so I think tick tock's ability of its algorithm to like put you in front of people who are relevant like people who are young who are getting married um to the point where yeah like I said I turn up at a wedding and people always come up to me like you're that guy from Tick Tock yeah yeah um and I think yeah so I I think that this video going viral I probably had like 15 inquiries like within two weeks from there which is just just from a tick tock

video which is just crazy like that is so much like that's I should 40 winnings a year that's like almost half of my income you know like that's insane what did you book out of that like it wouldn't have been 100 right no no not 100 and I think a lot of people don't have like you know they see a video like this they don't expect me to be maybe be at the premium price point you know yeah but I I would probably say that I remember I remember I got a discount to the first couple I was like hey you're the first couple who bought me through Tick Tock I'm Gonna Give You 500 off you know like nice um and so like yeah

I think I I think in total I did this Mass the other day for a friend because he was like asking how important to talk is I've probably booked like 30 winnings from Tick Tock like I'd probably say that like and even if they haven't um booked me only because of tick tock yeah it's like one of those like accompanying trust factors that they're like whoa you were at our friend's wedding and then I realized you're that guy from Tick Tock yeah and then like I saw your photo being shared by like I don't know a winning venue like oh my gosh like we have to get you you know yeah so I think it's been amazing for like just yeah really boosting that clout

and that street cred and like even um yeah it's like it translated through to Instagram as well like people kind of yeah cross over a little bit and I was gonna ask that yeah is that how you built the Instagram a lot of um because it's quite High through yeah yes I I would say that like yeah I can't remember I was probably like 10 to 15K um but yeah a lot of it because your reels also pop off on yeah right yeah the rails pop off on Instagram too on Instagram too yeah I think I've always been viral like Yeah from from Facebook days yeah I had like 30 000 Facebook followers like eight years ago or something so that was like quite big

back in the day and that was because of viral videos so yeah I think that definitely um yeah I grew a huge amount of that following from these viral videos for sure um and I think it's it's a weird thing like for so long Instagram yeah they eloped in New Zealand Danica and Liam and um and I knew that they wanted something to go viral for sure like they're really into their memes and that kind of thing so this is me popping up gritty Miss ceremony but it was an elopement so there's only like 10 people there and after the ceremony I was like okay we have to set something up we have to do something and I've got the idea because this morning in

the morning the bride Danica she's like oh we have to do it was at the time when the gritties were really going viral with that sailor person on Tick Tock and so I was like oh my gosh like I literally was watching it last night like just loving the gritty yeah so after the ceremony finished I was like hey let's get you guys back in position and pretend that I was the celebrant and then like just pop a gritty and the actual celebrant at the time she's like oh I'm not I'm not on the social media oh Tick Tock oh what's that oh oh and then she just could not fathom the concept that like the couple would want me to do this you know

so yeah this is I kind of mocked it up um so good so good but yeah that was like you gotta hear the track too right you gotta have that I have the track I gotta Play It Again with the track it's so good then the bottom yeah and there's little signals like wedding efficient you know like American language because New Zealand would call them a celebrant and then like make it look like I was actually where does more come through I think that most of my like I'll probably get like a few inquiries a week that have seen me on a viral video or Tick Tock or that kind of thing yeah but when it comes to weddings it's such a high trust thing

that like it's a little extra word of mouth or the friends when I shot that kind of thing yeah um so I definitely find that like I I don't get many so many times from these things but these these things inform their trust in me yeah and I think for so long I I didn't it just when you have lots of followers yourself it it you just still feel like yourself you know you still feel like a normal person and so it's really hard to realize that like I I remembered when I met one of my heroes and he had 50 000 followers on Instagram I was like oh my gosh I can't believe I'm having coffee with this guy you know and it kind

of blew my mind and then I also I realized like only the last six months that like okay like that's how people are perceiving me even though I still feel like the same person who grew up in the same small town or whatever yeah it's like so weird that okay people are perceiving me because of these numbers a different way yeah and so I just started leaning into that a little bit more and yeah it's just yeah these the the clout the social media Cloud it definitely does affect how people perceive you it's crazy and I really need to Value yeah all that kind of thing yeah no I love it I think that's a a good point which I I thought it would have

been the case and I wanted to touch on it is that like for a lot of people your work spoke for you first yes and then this informs that decision as opposed to the other way around yes which like same thing for us like people see us on Tick Tock all the time millions of millions of views yeah but then they'll go they'll be like don't meet me they've seen me at event tour right they beat me in person I'm just seeing a LinkedIn post and they're going oh [ __ ] look at them on Tick Tock yeah [ __ ] we should reach out yes not because of tick tock because I know him and his other [ __ ] yeah yeah but [ __ ] they're crushing it on to talk

exactly yeah yeah I was really lucky that I had um I had the business I had something to sell yeah before I went viral you know I had the product in place which was my wedding photography um and then I started going viral in a way that related to yeah my business and I was able to convert those leads into income so I was yeah I was really lucky from the start to kind of have have that structure in place which is often the opposite of what people find themselves in it's like I'm viral how do I monetize so yeah I was lucky to kind of have this going and yeah yeah that's also something actually like because like we talked about that off camera

a little bit but I think that's right like we we're the same like we hit the business first and then we started going viral and things and even on LinkedIn like we had I had the business well I knew all heaps of people yes they started paying us money and then we started doing more and more content on LinkedIn yeah Tick Tock blow out yeah so I do think that there's like most of the people we speak to on this podcast that got all the audience and then they don't know how to monetize it yeah but even like when I speak to you now like that's an interesting conversation where you're like oh sometime in the future I want to do some other things yes

and like I don't I actually I actually reckon that you're probably going to get to a point I can see your brain like I know I meet people and I know yeah you're not going to sell presets yeah because like in a year you're going to be like [ __ ] who needs presets AI does all the presets now yeah you know like I know it but like you'll figure out something business-wise yeah yeah and it's the business brain yes that will allow you to do that thing whatever it might be you just haven't figured it out yet but it's business not yes quick money deals yes right yeah that that is something I'm really grateful for because yeah I came into this like being uh very

very intentional from the start you know and it's like if I can go viral on this it's going to convert to leads I'm gonna get bookings out of it so I think that yeah having that business background is is super valuable yeah I think I think to be honest like the the best way to kind of have a good Insight on that stuff is just to ask good questions to yourself like what am I trying to achieve here yeah like what's going to work best for that so I think that like um yeah approaching anything from business perspective and this is what my friend who I've got a good relationship with we always talk about stuff he's just got a great mind for kind of

really breaking down the Core Essence of what you're trying to do here and then therefore what's the best way to achieve this yeah and so I think yeah approaching new projects like yeah if I try to get into comedy and that kind of thing yeah just trying to hack it you know like you're saying filming yourself in your room with fake laugh tracks and that kind of thing it's definitely like you know the way to blow up and that's what these kids are doing on Comedy um so yeah I don't know what I'm saying here really but no I think what you're saying is that like I think what you're saying and what you've proven yeah is that no matter what it is that you

do next yeah you don't need to have all the steps laid out because what you know is that you'll be intentional with the business behind you but as long as you do saying that's great yes and like the work you do is good yeah everything else will follow yeah that's what you do to photography yeah it's what you'll do with comedy yeah and I think you're probably smart enough to go that sucked let's stop let's do our next thing yep I don't by the the hour and a half I've spent with you I don't think comedy is going to be an issue for you yeah um validated the reels that you've done thank you but like but that's it right and I think like a

lot of people go into it going oh I've got all these people watching me yeah how do I sell them yeah [ __ ] drinking bottles or some [ __ ] yeah as opposed to like being real intentional like what do I actually care about here yeah yeah I think that when it comes to like starting this Venture like there's the two ways you can go about it and I think you just got to do the follow the path that has the least resistance for you so if you've got an idea on like a product you want to sell you can kind of reverse engineer that and create content around selling that product and that will work fine but if you don't have the product to sell and you

don't know what to do I think the most important thing in this industry is just passion yeah and just being passionate about something and just getting good at something and then from there the money will will come you know so I think yeah yeah if someone's like wanting to get into this kind of stuff like if you're passionate about making videos if you're passionate about I don't know Drop Shipping or whatever like just follow the passion and then the the success will come the money will come later yeah um yeah I think that's probably the best approach so just get into it whatever's gonna stop stop you whatever's gonna let you do the thing yeah and not and not going to hold you back without

analyzing things focus on that and your first video will never be your best video so just create something and then yeah just keep going from yeah right yeah exactly yeah how long do I have left am I done yeah as long as you want but yeah we'll probably should start wrapping up because I think we've been on it for an hour and 20. um yeah no it's a good spot I think you're right I don't want to cut off any further than that and listen to this guy what thanks for coming on thank you man appreciate it cheers bro