Mastering Photography Mindset with Pete Coco

Pat Miller: 00:00

I'm Pat Miller, and this is The Professional Photographer Podcast. As you try to build your photography studio, it can feel like your to-do list is never-ending. Look this way, there's a bunch of work to do. Look this way, there's a bunch of work to do. Look this way, there's a bunch of work I forgot I had to do. It can be overwhelming. And if you're not where you want to be in your studio, what do you focus on? How do you know where to spend your time? On this episode of the professional photographer podcast, our guest has boiled it down to 3 things. Pete Coco believes in the Coco Trio. Three areas to spend your time: Your mindset, improving your work, and improving your business acumen, something that we should worry about every single day. How do we do that? Where should we focus inside the Coco Trio? All of those questions are going to be answered on this episode of The Professional Photographer Podcast. If you're here because you wanna get better, grab a notebook, grab a coffee, and buckle in. We'll be back with Pete Coco in just a moment. Pete, welcome to The Professional Photographer Podcast. How are you today?

Pete Coco: 01:14

I'm good, Pat. Thank you so much for having me. I'm really honored to be here.

Pat Miller: 01:19

I'm really fascinated by what you've done. You've taken all of the things that we get to worry about as business owners, and you kinda boiled it down to 3 things. So from a 30,000-foot view, what are those three things, and why are they so important?

Pete Coco: 01:34

Right. Well, thanks to, thanks to some help from you. I came up with the name for it, which is the Trio, 3 things that we focus on. And, basically, I found that in my business, what's really helped lead me to success is focusing on 3 different things. And from the 30,000-foot view, those three things are your business skills, your photography skills, meaning how good you are as a photographer, and your mindset and growth as a person. So that's kind of what they are, you know, from the far view.

Pat Miller: 02:10

And those 3 buckets or those 3 areas that we need to spend time in, we're gonna go into each one of those later in the interview, but I wanna put something on the table that sometimes gets overlooked. People see self-improvement, business improvement, image improvement, mindset, and they may think, well, that's just for people that are starting out. That's not for people at my level. Can everyone benefit from focusing on these three areas?

Pete Coco: 02:36

Yes. 100%. Because, in my daily life, if even being in this industry for a little while now and, you know, having some success under my belt, I focus on these things every day. So your, the way that you focus on them changes for sure. But the fact that you should always be you're working on your business skills, I mean, because that's, there's so much just that encompasses your work. I think that there's a lot of times where photographers get to a certain level, and they think, oh, well, okay. Well, I can I'm pretty good at this. So for me, I'm a headshot portrait photographer. So a lot of times you'll get photographers who are like, okay. I can shoot this sort of one style of headshot. I'm good to go now. And, you'll even hear people which it drives me nuts when I hear photographers say, well, I make x amount a year, and you can too, and I'm not even that good as a photographer. Just drives me nuts because, first of all, that is there might be some truth to that, but the reality is that the people who I know who are doing well as photographers are the best at what they do in their market. So even if you've reached a certain level of success as a photographer, you still have so much room to grow. There is no end in sight. One of my professors used to say, about learning music, he would say, there is no there there. And at first, I was like, what? What does this guy mean? But what it means is you never stop learning. You never stop growing. And then especially when it comes to growing as a person, I just turned 45, which is crazy to me to think that, because I was just 20, like, it felt like 2 days ago.

Pat Miller: 04:16

2 weeks ago. Yeah, Sure.

Pete Coco: 04:17

2 weeks ago. Right? But I've learned more about mindset and growing as a person probably in the last 5 years than I did in my whole life. So, yes, the short answer is it never ends. There's always room for growth. And if you're not in that mindset for growth and expansion as a business person, as a photographer, as a human being, then, generally, that means that you're, at the very best, you're stagnating. But, usually, what's happening is you're actually falling back in those areas, which is, again, there is no there there. It's part of I think it's just part of our experience as humans.

Pat Miller: 04:56

And when experienced photographers are falling backward, let's look for what that feels like. They feel frustrated? Like, how do they feel when they're not growing anymore? And that's a result of them not challenging themselves to get better and learn? What does that feel like? So if someone's watching and they feel these feelings, they may go, oh, yeah. That's because I'm not trying to get better.

Pete Coco: 05:18

Yes. I think that it's that feeling like you're stuck. And this is a thing that's actually not it's not a bad place to be, and, because we all have been there, but it's it's feeling like you're stuck. It's feeling like your work stinks. Like, we've all been there. But what it is, is basically you're on a plateau. But the good thing about that is that if you are trying and actively growing your skills, and if you do have a plan in place to push yourself out of it, then it's only a matter of time before you're on the upswing again. So, I'm a musician. I have a musical background, and I find that it's benefited me as a photographer immensely because a lot of the same ways we grow as musicians, we grow as photographers or any kind of creative pursuit. And I like to con I know that some photographers maybe don't think of themselves as artists. I think that we are artists, and I think that part of the trio which is growing as a photographer, it's really becoming your artist of your own right and finding your own voice and finding your own interpretation of what your work looks like, which every great photographer does. But that takes this sort of unending series of these plateaus and then pushing through, and then you're gonna plateau, and then you're gonna push through. The problem arises when, as a photographer who's been say you've been doing this 20 years and you're very experienced and and and you have a successful business, and now you feel like you're stuck in a rut, Things aren't doing what you want them to do. I think the problem arises when you don't have a teachable spirit about it. So one thing that we all have to do, no matter what your level is, is you have to be teachable, and you have to be your own biggest critic. And I don't mean that in a way where you're always down on yourself and being, like, depressed about, oh, I stink, and I'll never be good. It's not that at all. It's more of a balanced approach where, you know, you know, okay, I'm I'm good. I know what I'm doing. I'm here. But let me compare my work to the greatest people amongst me, the greatest photographers, and then know that, alright, I still have a long way to grow, and there's so much growth that I can do. And if you approach it like that, it's also so much more fun because now you don't feel like there's this wall or this mountain in front of you that you need to climb. You feel like, okay. I'm gonna take small steps to improve. So for sure, the trio of what we should be doing as photographers, it applies to everyone. I mean, sometimes, I think it applies more if you've been doing it a long time because it is easier to get into those ruts. I was in a rut like that a few months ago. I had a very busy month, and it was actually a great month financially. But it was a ton of very boring in-the-box corporate shoots where I was just, I just needed to do what I knew how to do well, which is take some great corporate headshots. But it wasn't challenging me as an artist. It wasn't pushing the boundaries. And, ironically, that was one of my hardest months when it came to my mindset because I felt so stuck. Even though I was doing well financially, I wasn't creating anything artistic. I wasn't doing anything that I felt was improving my craft. And this is why those three things work together. So your mindset, your business skills, and your skills as a photographer are all gonna work together, and you're gonna have to focus on 1 of the 3 every day in some level, and it's not gonna be at the same level every day. So, that's why I feel like it's totally, totally important for us to do those things no matter where we are. It's easier, I think, as a beginner in some respects because you have a clean slate, and so you can say, okay. Well, I've never taken a headshot before if you wanna be a headshot photographer or a portrait photographer. So getting someone in front of your camera, taking some pictures, and growing. The growth happens very, very fast at first. And then but, eventually, we all are gonna plateau, and then we just gotta push through that.

Pat Miller: 09:27

Well, I appreciate that reframe because I don't want people coming to this conversation thinking, well, this is beneath me. This isn't for me. I've been in business 5 or 10 years.

Pete Coco: 09:35

Right.

Pat Miller: 09:35

And reframing it that it's not solving deficiencies or fixing the things you don't know. I love the way that you put it about finding your voice and perfecting your art pursuing your passion and becoming more of who you are, which is a journey, as you know, as a musician that never ends. So I wanna get into the trio. And you're not calling it the Coco Trio, which I really think is what we need to have the T-shirts for. I mean, come on now. This is beautiful.

Pete Coco: 10:02

I like that. Cool.

Pat Miller: 10:04

You know, I think that's got some zip. Right? We gotta go get the domain name. We need coffee mugs. I mean, come on. Let's go, Pete. But I wanna start with mindset. Because sometimes in a conversation like this, we can get caught up in business tactics or photography tools, but mindset is something that doesn't get as much talk as it should. So let's start with mindset.

Pat Miller: 10:23

If someone's never worried about their mindset, where do you think they are today?

Pete Coco: 10:27

Well, it all depends on what kind of a mindset was instilled in you as a child, your experiences. So some people, I think, take it for granted because they just have a naturally positive mindset. So it's almost something that happens to them naturally. But I think that's more rare. Most people were coming out of some kind of difficulties and traumas and everything that we grew up with. So you're carrying a lot of baggage with you. So I can tell you from my own personal experience that mindset was the thing that needed to change first before I was able to have any success. And so I tell this story often how there's 2 kind of moments in my life that I that I remember very strongly when it comes to changing my mindset. And the first was, back in it was probably, like, 2017, somewhere around there, and I had just started to get into headshots. And so I was just taking some pictures for friends, and I have my own business that I was running at the time, which is a music school, and I was struggling with the business at that time. And I remember sitting in my basement, I'll never forget sitting at my computer, and I was looking at photographers' websites and trying to get some idea because I had always been into photography and music. So growing up, the 2 of them kinda were even with me as far as what I loved. And I remember there was a time where I had to make the decision, well, what do I actually wanna study in college? And I felt like music was really what I was more passionate about by a little bit, so I went into music. So I studied music in school, opened this music school, and then fast forward, I remember sitting in my basement and being, not envious of people, but feeling so down and bad for myself looking at other photographers because I thought, it's too late. It's too late for me to do it, and I think I made a mistake, and I should have been a photographer. I and the feeling was so bad that it's ingrained in my memory. It's one of those things because I just felt like I couldn't do it. At the time, I had just joined Peter Hurley's headshot crew just because I found him on YouTube, and I was just learning a little bit from the crew. And he had mentioned Bob Proctor, who is a cut like one of these, like, Tony Robbins kind of motivational speakers. And so he had uploaded this video about, you know, he said, watch this video and watch it for x amount of days because you have to change your mindset. So I was like, alright. Well, I'll give that a try. And little did I realize that it was really, around that time where I began to change my mindset from a belief of I can't do it. I'm too old. I miss the boat to believing just right in my mind, I am able to do it. I have the skills. It's not too late. I know I can do this if I put my mind to it. That I really do believe that my business, which I really started around 2020 in the ether or whatever you wanna call it, began there because I had a definite shift from feeling depressed about it, and I can't do it, and it's too late, to knowing that, alright, I'm gonna do it. And it's funny because when we talk about mindset, it's easy to get very ethereal and very, like, new age about it. And I don't think you need to necessarily, although I do think of spiritual components. It's important for me. But even if you're not into that part of it, the thing is if you think a certain way about yourself in a very natural world, physical way, you're going to act a certain way. So if you think you're a failure, you're going to act like you've failed, and you're going to project that to people. So I really believe that, for me, personally, that's kind of where it started. I don't know if I answered your original question, but that's where it began for me and how I began to shift the mindset. I do think that most people have a negative mindset, and in general when it comes to what we're able to accomplish. But every successful person I know, especially the, like, very monumentally successful people, they have a great mindset about things, and they believe in themselves. Even when they fail, they take that in your mind. And this is why this applies not again, not just to a beginner, but to someone, like, every day I work on this. Like, I had a shoot the other day. And for some reason, I just was not feeling right. And so, but now that I've been working on my business and working on my mindset and reading books and studying and also meditating and doing things like that. I knew the feeling, and so I was able to correct that feeling and say, well, I know I feel like this, but I also felt just sorta like this shoot's not gonna go well. I'm tired. I'm this. I'm that. But I was able to shift and focus myself and know that, okay. Well, this is a battle that begins in your mind.And then it's really up to you how you're going to handle it, especially when the client comes into your studio. Because once the client comes in, you don't have the luxury of being sad or depressed or worrying about whatever. You have to get the job done.

Pat Miller: 15:43

You described that this is a daily practice for you, and I heard it equated to the programming in your computer. That if every day when you boot up, you program your mind in a certain way, you mentioned behavior, you'll behave in a different way if you've got fresh instructions from that day's mindset work. You mentioned Bob Proctor. What else do you consume? Are there other podcasts or books? Like, what would you recommend that we go learn about so we can start a daily mindset practice too?

Pete Coco: 16:13

Right. Well, I think the first thing that I learned, which really, really impacted me a lot is, I forget who mentioned this, but, there is a study done that we have some and the numbers might be a little off here, but, like, somewhere around 60,000 thoughts a day.And then, like, 90% of them are, like, the same as the day before, and most of them are negative. And if you and I remember when I heard this, I thought about my own thoughts and my own life, and I was like, yeah. I could see that it's, we find we really are. And I love the way you frame it, Pat, because it is programming. So you're programmed from the time you're little, and your programming depends on how you're raised, what kind of parents you had, what religion you grew up in, where you grew up. And all of these things are put onto you, but they're not necessarily you, and they're not necessarily who you really are. And so I think, first, understanding that you're on a journey to discover who you really are is a big part of it too. And, but I can tell you for me, that was also a big thing is knowing that this is the way that I've been programmed, and I have to reprogram it. So it takes time. But I really enjoy, I do enjoy Bob Proctor. Wayne Dyer has been a big influence on me. He has a lot of great books and a lot of great stuff on YouTube, and he was another one who was a big, big person in the motivational speaking industry and Tony Robbins. So also reading, a lot of reading, not just reading. So I read the Bible. I read the Tao Te Ching. I read a lot of, like, old sort of spiritual texts for inspiration and also a lot of philosophy. And I'm no philosopher. I don't understand most of it, but I can pick up enough that I can kind of glean off of it. So I really love Emerson and Thoreau, and I've been reading some Nietzsche also, which I don't understand. But so I think that a lot it's that's that's where I am. And then also a daily practice of meditating and being mindful and just giving yourself time because the problem is our society is we're just plugged in all the time, and it's a real issue. And it's a problem I struggle with, which is having my phone connected to me and staring at it all day long. And I think this is a problem for us as small business owners too. Because if I had my choice, I would just delete all social media. I don't want any of it, but it is a necessity if you run a small business. I get so much of my clientele through these social networks, and it's building my brand and all of that. So it's so I really find that even just unplugging and reading like, I've been reading Hemingway lately, and just it just will help you to settle your mind and to just shut off all of the noise that we're constantly, constantly, into. Now to make that more photographer-specific, I love reading photobooks and looking at photobooks of different photographers. So I have a shelf in my studio here of many different photographers, and I will just look at these books for inspiration in my own shooting and also just to kind of unplug myself from scrolling on Instagram because it's just not the same looking at photography online as it is looking at something physical in a book or obviously in a gallery.

Pat Miller: 19:36

You mentioned something on mindset that I just wanna call out. That mindset helps you remember and identify with who you are. But if you're not doing the mindset work, it's not who you are. It's who you end up being because you're not focusing--

Pete Coco: 19:49

Right.

Pat Miller: 19:50

--on what you are. You miss the opportunity to become the artist that you could be or the operator that you could be or all of this endless joy that passes us by when we're just in a reactive state and we're not present. It's really a shame when you look back on it because you mentioned you're 45. And 2 weeks ago, you were 25. Well, that's 20 years of not paying attention until you decide to pay attention. And how many things did you miss? Did I miss because I wasn't plugged into who I was trying to become. I was just living in a life of who I was at the moment because I was running through mostly negative thoughts on a daily basis. So I really appreciate you sharing that. At least that's how I interpreted it. Before we get on to business operations and we get on to improving our work, I wanna hear you mentioned one story about how mindset helped you in the business, but let's just leave mindset by sharing overall. When you turned your attention to mindset, how did it impact the business? Did it give you more confidence? Did it help you grow financially? Did it help you make better partnerships? Did it give you better work-life balance? Like, give us the good stuff of what happens when we adopt mindset on a daily basis.

Pete Coco: 21:00

Yes. This is and this is the beauty of it is that once you start changing that mindset and believing in yourself, then you're going to take those steps to make it a reality. So the minute that I started to believe, okay, I can do this, then I did so many things differently. Like, I started to promote myself as a photographer. Like, even that was a huge struggle at first just especially because I was coming from another industry. Everyone in my sphere knew me as a musician and a music teacher. So just putting myself out there as a photographer at first was very difficult because you're always concerned about what people think. So the other thing is once you grow in your mindset, you care less about what others think.

Pete Coco: 21:41

So but I can tell you that, just putting myself out there, taking the steps to find people to photograph as I was learning, finding a mentor. All of these things were based on the fact that I started to shift my focus. And then when you shift your focus, you also start to make concrete goal. So then I decided, well, now I want a studio. I told you I'll just try and tell you, hopefully, it's not too long this quick story. But what happened was I did start to change my mindset, but I was still running my other business and, which was struggling, and I had some other issues with that. And then the pandemic hit, and everyone in New York here, they shut everything down. They shut down all the schools. So I was running a music school, so we had to shut it down. So the business almost failed. And that during that time, I was I I told my wife, we need money. I gotta sell all this photo gear. We need money. And she said to me, what, are you crazy? Now's the time when you should actually be doing that. And so right there, there was another shift, and I remember thinking to myself, okay. I'll give it one more shot. I'm gonna give it a try, and we'll see what happens. And then I had decided to actually start the business in the worst possible from the outside appearances, the worst possible time in the middle of a pandemic. Everything shut down. People are afraid. No one knows what's going on. But because I had that shift of my focus, I started to do the work to do it. And then it was at the time where things started to open up a little bit so you could have, like, 1 person and 1 person in a roomAnd have masks and all of that. And then I would just have my client pull the mask off when I was shooting them, and that's when I actually started the business. And then, also, the mind as you get better, the thing is your mindset will also get better too. Because, even recently, I had a client where I decided I'm gonna up my price for this client because I think I'm worth more than what I've been charging for this. So I really upped the price, like, quite a bit from what I was thinking of charging. And then the client booked it, didn't bat an eye and booked it, and so I was like, wow. This is an awesome win. But then the day of the shoot, in the morning, when I was about to meet the client for, like, a big location shoot, I started to get these thoughts. You charge too much. You're not good enough. And, you know, and, like, oh my goodness. What if I don't deliver the work? But because I have been working on my mindset, I knew already to check that thought. And so I checked the thought, and I said, you know what? This is not true. I know I'm worth that. I know it's gonna go well. It's gonna be awesome. He's gonna love the photos, blah blah blah. And that's exactly what happened. So it definitely is something where there's, like you know, you have to have those goals, and then there's, like, periods where it happens, over the long term growth. But then you're still gonna have to work on it on that daily basis, too.

Pat Miller: 24:30

I'm glad we spent so much time on mindset because it really is crucial, and we're going to get to improving our business acumen as the 3rd piece of the trio.

Pete Coco: 24:38

Okay.

Pat Miller: 24:39

But the second piece of the trio is just getting better at our work. And what do you mean by getting better with our work, with the actual imagery that we're creating? Do you mean, like, our technique, our eye, our process? Like, talk to us about what you mean about getting better as an actual photographer.

Pete Coco: 24:57

Right. I think it's all of that. So, again, I come from a background as a musician. And when I wanted to learn and I'm a bass player, so I'm a jazz bass player. So when I wanted to learn how to play jazz, the first thing you do, and every jazz musician will tell you, well, you have to transcribe all the greats. So what that literally means is you take a recording of, you know, a great jazz bass player or whatever instrument, and then you literally painstakingly learn every note on your instrument so you can play what they played note for note, and then you memorize it. Instrument so you can play what they played note for note, and then you memorize it. And the reason why you do that is because then you start to internalize the music. The other thing it does is if you're trying to learn what these greats have done, then you're not comparing yourself to a guy across town who no one ever heard of. You're comparing yourself to the best in the industry. So this is something that has been really a key, I believe, in my success because I took that same mentality when I started to learn photography, which is, I wanna find a mentor. So I really do believe in mentorship. You wanna find a mentor, but then what you do is you just copy that mentor, like, mercilessly copy their work. And if you find a good mentor, that's what they'll do is they just teach you what they do. But the goal is not to just copy them and be a poor copy of what they do. The goal is to absorb what they do and then make it part of your own unique work. So this is what I mean by, by growing and and and your technique and your work. Again, I'll circle back to what I said before, which is I see these people on Instagram, and they'll say and that they wanna sign you up for some kind of photography group, and they'll say, I'm making 6 figures a year, and I'm not even that good. And I just laugh at that because, first of all, if that's true, imagine if you were good. You'd probably be making 7 figures. You can make 6 figures and not even be good at it. And second of all, I think that's really nonsense, especially as AI comes in. And because AI is eating up, the people who are not that good first. Right? So you'll get people who who want an AI headshot, but they're not gonna they're gonna they're just not they don't care about the image. So I've noticed that as I've grown my business and I've grown my skills as a photographer simultaneously and, like, I'll do things like I'll have late night shoots where I'll invite, some photographer friends and find a person who does who's a model or an actor who wants to be photographed and just do these late night shoots with only the purpose of growing as an artist. And the thing is that, eventually, I started to post this work that I was creating, and then people started to see it on my website, my socials, and then reach out to me and say, I love this image. Can you do that for me? Right. You know? I'm a tech person or I'm a whatever. And in diff, not just actors and artists and all kinds of industries. So making, I think that one of the things my mentor, all my mentors taught me is make the work you wanna be paid for. And that's really what I did. I just started to explore the art of photography and push the boundaries of what I could do.

Here's, so that's the more artistic reason, but it does translate into growth in business. That's, again, why these things are related. Here's the other thing. I had a client I had a number of clients within the past couple of months who they just didn't, my the standard things that I wanna do as a headshot photographer, like the lighting I generally use, the coaching method I generally use, the angles I generally use did not work at all for them. So if I only have a one-size-fits-all approach to being a head, even a headshot photographer, but especially headshots and portrait photographer, then you're going to have unhappy clients at some point. And I think a lot of photographers do this. They find, like, one lighting, they get really good at it, and then they think, okay. Everyone's gonna be great in there. But in my experience, you have to have a number of different tools. I call it tools in your toolkit so that when you get a client who can't do what you usually do or doesn't respond well to the techniques you usually use or doesn't look good in the lighting you usually use, you can physically know and see right away, okay. I can tell by this person's face shape and by, their body type and by the way they're reacting to this kind of a lighting and to what they've and then to what they've told me, because I find it's you should be collaborative about it, that I need to pivot, and I'm gonna try something else. So this is why I think that as the industry shrinks in some ways because of AI, I think those of us who really are more focused on being the best at our craft, we're gonna actually do better, I hope. I mean, we don't know, but that's my hope as the industry changes because we definitely it is changing. And so that's why I always wanna be able to offer my clients something they cannot get anywhere else. It's a unique thing. Only I can do it, and so they're gonna come to me for it. And I think the best photographers out there, the ones that we know their names and that we talk about, this is what they do, too.

Pat Miller: 30:08

How often should we worry about getting better? Is this setting time aside once a week, reading 1 book a month, going to imaging every year? How frequently should we focus on improving our work?

Pete Coco: 30:20

So I would say, first, don't worry about it. Right? Because if you worry about it, then you're gonna look at it as a sort of like this task that you need to accomplish, and it becomes a bad task master. I think you should look at it as something that you want to do because you wanna grow your skills. But I would say, for me, I can tell you, I try to do at minimum, like, one creative shoot a month just for the fun of it and just to explore lighting and grow my lighting. Typically, I'll try to really do, depending on how busy I am, 2, maybe even 3, if I can. But it really depends on how busy I am that month. So the and the thing is you don't really wanna experiment on your clients. That's a bad idea. So what you wanna do is you wanna have, like, a very safe space environment where the person you're photographing understands we're experimenting. This is all for growth. You're gonna get great images out of it if you have, like, an acting client or a modeling client who's there to help you out or even if it's just a friend. And so but the trick is when you do that exploring and that workshopping, what happens is then it comes out naturally in your shoots. So for instance, it's just like practicing. Like, when we practice music, it's very much out of context. Like, sitting around playing scales all day, sitting around playing, copying and learning the music of others, Like, that is very divorced from the actual live playing of music. But what happens is when you do that, then what happens is in the actual situation, it's almost like an autopilot where it just starts to happen. And this is the other thing that I found, which is why we have to hone our skills and study our craft. Because then when you're in an actual shoot, my experience is then those things that I've done will come back almost like being in the zone, as people call it, where the things you learn now are on autopilot in a good way, and you just know. Like, so now I know. Alright. If I use a beauty dish and put it here, and I use this kind of lighting and I angle you this way, you're gonna look awesome, and you're gonna love the image. And so, but that you have to do that work. And this is why when we talk about the mindset part of it as opposed to the work part of it, like, people will just stay like, if you just you could sit around saying I'm the best in the world all day, but if you don't actually do the work to become that, you're you can say and think whatever you want about yourself, but the work part of it, the physical act of becoming great at what you do is there's no shortcut for that. But the beauty of it is it's always something again, like, I've been doing this for this is my 4th year having a full-time photo studio, and there's never a time where I feel like, okay. I don't have to learn anything anymore. I'm always, in a positive way, trying to push forward and grow my skills.

Pat Miller: 33:18

I think this is your musician coming through. Because you're saying, if I heard you correctly, get better not by making it feel like work. Get better by making it feel like play, that if you follow your curiosity rather than worrying about technique when you need those talents that you hone by playing and following your curiosity, it will organically show up when it's time to deploy it with a client. Is that right?

Pete Coco: 33:42

Yes. 100%. And the one thing I'll add to that, which also is totally related to the musician part of it, is that, what I did, in my music career without realizing it, and then I did the same thing with photography without realizing it, is it's important to find the work that inspires you to use that as sort of a starting point. Right? So I remember when I was in, I just started college, and my bass teacher told me, check out this record. And the record was the Bill Evans Trio, and the bass player is Scott Laffaro. And I was like, okay. And I'd never heard a jazz record before. And I remember turning this on in my car and just stop, I had to stop. I had to pull over because I was so overwhelmed by the music and by the bass playing. And I remember thinking to myself, I had no idea you could do that with a bass, but I wanna do that. And that was, like, what inspired me to start studying it. And it was almost like this, you know, like, sort of religious experience. And then when I started to study portrait photography, really was the same thing. There's just certain photographers' look and style caught my eye, and I was just, I was just moved by that. And then with some of those photographers, like, with Peter Hurley and the headshot crew when I started headshots, I was like, this guy's headshots are amazing, so I wanted to study with him. Then later on, I discovered one of my big influences, Ivan Weese, who is, in London, amazing portrait photographer. And I just remember seeing some of his work and saying, oh my goodness. This is amazing. I wanna be able to do this. So I contacted him and started studying with him. So, I think finding, like, find an influence is really key as well. Find work that inspires you. Dan Winters is a big inspiration for me. So I did a portrait experiment one night with a photographer friend where we took a Dan Winters portrait, and we said and I said, let's try and replicate this. So we spent maybe, like, 2 and a half hours with lights and flags and moving stuff around and in order to replicate this portrait. So if you find those people, those influences, and that work that speaks to you, then, yes, it's still work, but it takes away a lot, at all of the drudgery of doing it. Like, when I'm doing this in my studio, it does not at all feel like work. And then with most clients, once you really have honed your skills, it gets to the point where it still feels like work. You're still working, but you still have that spark of joy and that creative energy in the shoot. And even with my corporate clients, I want that. I want them like, just because you work, like, I had a client the other day. She works in IT. Okay. Well, we got some cool headshots that were, like, really LinkedIn-appropriate. But then I said, let's just try something else. And we just did this creative lighting that I've been working on that has nothing to do with corporate anything. She absolutely loved them, and there was some of the best images that she liked in the shoot. And so it's kinda like, yeah, creating, and it's the fun of it. And I think it also helps because once I know we're gonna get to the business part of it, which is always the hardest part for creatives. But if you're being creative in your shoots, it really helps to make up for a lot of the drudgery of running a business.

Pat Miller: 36:52

For sure. And it's more fun. It's more rewarding, and there's probably more money in the bank because you're following your curiosity. So let's get to the 3rd part of the trio. Right. The business acumen. So in your observation and with the others that you network with and maybe in your own business, where do people trip up when it comes to the business acumen portion of the trio?

Pete Coco: 37:11

Oh, there's so many places, and there's some things where we all trip up no matter where we are in our journey. But one thing that I've noticed with photographers and, especially with musicians too, is that if you're creative and you get into this art because you love it and it inspires you and then you turn it into a business, you have to be really, really careful, and on top of that because it's it can easily become drudgery. So, but I find that people trip up in a lot of ways. First, we trip up by not focusing on the business details. Right? So one of the things that amazes me that photographers do a lot of times is they just won't respond to people's emails and calls. Like, I will have clients, who I talk to on the phone or who email me, and then I email them right back, schedule a call, call them right back. And that it is amazing how many times they say to me, you know, I called 2 or 3 photographers. They never even got back to me.

Pete Coco: 38:10

So I think the first, it's focusing on those details, like the small things because well, all these little details add up. And it's just something like you're out of your creative mind, I guess, in a way when you're focusing on business. So some creative people struggle with that. So I think being detail-oriented, also understanding that, yes. Now if you wanna take this creative pursuit, something that you love, and turn it into a viable business, you're going to have to deal with insurance. You're going to have to deal with leases if you have a studio. You're going to have to deal with, you know, knowing how to be professional with people. Right? So simple things like knowing how to dress, knowing how to speak to people, knowing that their, the client's needs are greater than your artistic needs. Here's another thing that I find photographers often struggle with, and I think it's so silly because if someone's hiring you for a job, you must unless you've reached that level of, like if you're Annie Leibovitz, you know, like, you can do what you want. And, sure, we all aspire to get to that level, right, where we can just do what we want and whatever our, but you know what? She still has art, you know, like, guidelines from people, I'm sure, and she still has, you know, editors and people who and expectations. But I think a lot of photographers wanna just do what they wanna do without understanding, well, what's what does the client actually need? And so sometimes we have to put ourselves sort of in a humbling spot where we say, okay. Well, the needs of the client are more important than what I think my artistic vision should be. But even it's, and this to me, it's all basics, but I find a lot of photographers struggle with this, just going a 110%. Here's another thing. When you're in business and you're running any kind of a small business, and so I run 2 small businesses right now, and I have a third one that I'm working on. One of the things that you'll find a lot of small businesses do is they don't give it a 110%. They maybe give it 75%. And if you go into any local business in your town, you'll see what I mean. Like, I went to a restaurant the other day, and the bathroom in this place was immaculate. And it was beautiful. It was a beautiful bathroom. It was clean. Right? Yeah. That, and so you know, it was clean. Right?

Pat Miller: 40:37

Yeah.

Pete Coco: 40:38

That and so you know right? You already know. Like, okay. This business, they're giving it a 110% because it's so easy for especially restaurants have a dirty bathroom. I went to a different restaurant, which was also like a nice restaurant. It wasn't Taco Bell or something. It's like a nice restaurant, in a nice neighborhood, and the bathroom was filthy. And so these things are important, and they clue your client into how much you actually care about your business. So do you have, is your space clean? Is it welcoming? Like, when clients come to my space, I make sure it's clean. Like, I clean it before every client. Now I might not do a major deep clean, but I definitely, like, clean all the surfaces. I disinfect stuff. I want it to smell clean. I put everything back where it belongs. I want it to be inviting. Then when they come in, I offer to take their, you know, because I'll always be carrying stuff with them. I'll offer to take their stuff from them. I have a convenient rack where I can put all of their stuff. I offer them water. I offer them a cup of coffee. I ask them, do you need to use the restroom? Because sometimes they'll come from, you know, an hour or 45-minute drive or whatever. So these details are what will make you stand apart from everyone else who kind of phones in those details. So, and this going a 110% starts the minute you get an inquiry. Right? How quick you respond? Are you gonna call them? Like, nobody wants to call, talk to people on the phone nowadays, but I find that calling your client, and talking to them on the phone, is the best way to get them to book with you because photography is such a personal experience. Right? You're 1 on 1 with this person, especially or even if you're going to do team headshots in, for a large company. I wanna talk to the contact person. I want them to get a feeling for my personality, for the kind of person I am, for how the process works, explaining it to them, being clear about it because then they will go with you. It's so much easier for them to book you because they know, okay, not only is this person a professional, not only are they on top of if they waited 2 days to get a phone call, that already tells them, okay, well, is this person gonna show up? Is it, are they gonna deliver the work and all of this? It tells them so much. But when they speak to you, especially if you're concise, you're clear, you have a warm, welcoming personality where they feel like, alright. I would like I wouldn't mind spending an hour with this person because it seems like it'll be a pleasant experience. You're already winning the game. And then it applies to actually doing the shoot, not when they come in, but also the shoot and going the extra mile. Like, sometimes, I'll have a shoot that lasts 2 hours. Right? Like a portrait shoot where you're doing a lot of images, a lot of changes, outfit changes. And then you get to the point where in your mind, you might say to yourself, alright. I'm probably just gonna see if we can wrap it up now. I'm tired, and maybe I don't wanna do one more lighting change. It's gonna take another 20 minutes. But when you push through and you give them that extra 10, 20%, you go that extra mile, like, you're gonna have a better bottom line, you're gonna have a happier client, and then you're going to grow your business because then over time, these experiences with people compound, and then you get word-of-mouth business, and then you get repeat business from clients who had a good experience from you maybe 2 or 3 years ago. And if you don't do those things, you just, you won't get that client back, and you won't get that word-of-mouth. So, yeah, I hope that answers the question.

Pat Miller: 43:57

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. One of the things that I think is worth calling out is that no one wants to talk on the phone until they need or want an immediate answer. And you're pointing out of all you gotta do is call them, and they can't wait to hear from you because nobody else is going to is a business hack that is so simple, but people don't do. When it comes to business execution, this portion of the trio, I always think about it, especially with creatives. This is your opportunity to earn the chance to create. If you do the homework, if you take care of business, you will be able to follow your curiosity. You will be able to become an artist and take your talent as far as it can go. Where do you think the biggest opportunity lies right now for photographers?

Pete Coco: 44:43

Well, that's a tough question. I can't, I can only speak specifically for what I know, which is portrait photography. But I believe that the AI stuff, obviously, is gonna change. It's changing the world already. Right? It's changing so many industries. And it's so easy for us as photographers to look at as, like, alright. I'm tapping now. I'm gonna do something else because this is done. This industry is done. But I think now that it's been around for a couple of years and we see kind of the results it's doing, at least up until now, a lot of photographers are more encouraged about that. I look at it as an opportunity. And the reason I look at it as an opportunity is because if you are looking to have a successful portrait studio where you work with high-end clients and you deliver a high-end product and you do it on a level that the people that you want and aspire to work with, they won't even consider AI because it's like if you're running a $1,000,000,000 company, for instance, you're not gonna want the cheap AI headshot option. You're not gonna want 30 headshots for $35. And, okay, this one looks sort of okay even though it looks fake and it's and and and it has no life to it because there's no actual photo there, and the eyes are dead because there's no real eyes there. You know? So I think the opportunity lies in that finding that niche client that wants what we're able to do. And I joke around with my photographer friends, like, 10 years from now, there might, there probably will be a lot less portrait photographers out there, but the ones who are still there will be the ones creating work that is, at the level that they're able to charge a lot of money for it, and they're working with these really high-level people. And it's like, you know, you I joke with them that, you know, a status symbol 20, 10, 20 years from now for someone who's very wealthy could be, oh, well, I don't have an AI headshot. I hired a real photographer. And then, you know, and they're at their dinner party like, you got a real photographer? Oh, yeah. Of course. So, and of course, I don't know. We don't know the future. There's so much going on. And clearly, we're living in a very volatile time, not just for industry, but in every way. So I think that the best you can do is you can look at the opportunity where it lies and go for it. So for me, that's where I see the opportunity. Another opportunity that is out there to just pivot a little bit is video work. And I know most photographers look, if you're still a photographer, you look at video and you're like, I don't have the time or the headspace for that. But there is a lot of opportunity there if you start to build your skills as a videographer as well. So I would definitely say that's important too, and that's something I've been working on as well concurrently with growing my portrait studio. But I think the 1 on 1 high-end client is, for me, personally, that's what I want and what I like to do. And there's always gonna be people who want that because here's the other thing. The more we're stuck in front of our phones and the more we have like, you go to the you go to you can't even go to buy groceries without being assaulted by this annoying machine that's screaming at you to put your item on the rack. You know? Like, it's, like, so assaulting to the senses. It's so disgusting. And I think that people are kind of revolting against it a little bit now. So not only providing the work, but really what I provide my clients is an experience. And so many times, they say to me, more than they love the images, of course, you want that, but what they say even more is, this wasn't at all what I expected. I love this experience. I feel so good about it, and they leave feeling good and feeling happy. So there's an opportunity there for those of us who are focused on not just giving them amazing work, but creating this experience for them that from beginning to end is positive. It gives them some human interaction. I mean, one of the best parts about being a photographer is that every person who comes into my studio, I ask them about them. I find out their story, and you find out these amazing things about people. Not and so many people now are coming; they're coming from many different industries or they're, you know, they change their entire life. They're, you know, they change their entire life because of, they lost their job during COVID, and they pivoted, and now they're in this. Or they finally decided, I'm gonna pursue my dream. So spending time with people, getting to know them, and just having this human connection, it's becoming more and more and more important now.

Pat Miller: 49:15

Improving your photography studio can be boiled down to the trio. Mindset–

Pete Coco: 49:19

Yes.

Pat Miller: 49:20

–images, and business acumen. Pete Coco, thanks for joining us on The Professional Photographer Podcast. I appreciate it.

Pete Coco: 49:25

Thank you so much, Pat. So honored to be here.

Pat Miller: 49:28

Thank you for tuning in to this week's episode of the professional photographer podcast. I'm already looking forward to our next conversation. Before you go, can I ask a small favor? Hope so, because I'm gonna. If you like the show, please subscribe and leave us a comment wherever you're watching or listening to the episode. Your feedback is gonna help us pick the content that you want to build your photography studio. And if you're not yet a member of Professional Photographers of America, you're missing out. PPA offers incredible resources like equipment insurance, top-notch education, and a supportive community of photographers ready to help you succeed. It's perfect for photographers like you who are serious about growing their business in a sustainable and profitable way. At PPA, you belong here. Discover more about membership at ppa.com. That's ppa.com. I'm Pat Miller, founder of the Small Business Owners Community. Thanks for joining us on this journey. We appreciate your support, and we'll be back soon with more tools to help you build your business with The Professional Photographer Podcast.