CSIT155_F18_CDahmann

Now days streaming is becoming the dominant source of entertainment. Whether it's streaming your favorite music in your car or streaming videos at home, you're bound to be streaming something throughout your day. Lets start with music sites. I personally have been using SoundCloud pretty much since its inception years ago. It's a great platform to discover new music or find music you already love. It's also a great place for new artists to upload music in order to get noticed. In fact, there's there's an entire generation of artist dubbed 'SoundCloud artists', due to the fact that they all started their careers from using SoundCloud to project their music out into the world. SoundClouds simplistic design allows anyone to stream their favorite music anytime, anywhere. Another huge streaming platform that's blown up over the past year or so is Twitch. Twitch is a live stream platform that allows its users to broadcast themselves live to their follo...

Another social media platform I could use that I think would be beneficial for my business would be LinkedIn. Not so much so to gain clients or business but rather to connect with other professionals within the industry. As a photographer I'm always looking for other photographers/ videographers to work with on projects. The way I see it is you can never know to much especially in this day and age where technology is constantly evolving, and the more people you work with the more you're able to exchange knowledge and establish connections. As far as the rest go, I'm not a huge fan of google plus, I've also heard that it'll be shutting down soon anyway due to some major info leak. Yelp is probably another great platform to be associated with but I don't necessarily think that it would be a great fit with my business just because I'm not an establishment. I feel that yelp is more often than not used to look up reviews for businesses that have store fronts or...

Taylor Bantle Leslie Montano Andrea Esquivel

To be quite honest I didn't even know that newsletters were a thing. I mean obviously I've heard of newsletters but I never realized how useful they could actually be. Upon do some research I found a few successful photographers who swear by sending newsletters, and from them I was able to come up with many ideas for a news letter of my own. First there's the obvious which is having a news letter that has special deals for shoots and would be sent out every few months or so. I could also do a bi-weekly inspirational newsletter which contains beautiful images curated by myself. Along with that I could sprinkle in tips and tricks for editing and using Photoshop. I could also do a themed newsletter where I edit a few photos in a similar manner, create presets, and include the presets and the photos in the newsletter. So many ideas its hard to settle on one. But one thing I have learned for sure is that newsletters can be another powerful tool to engage customers.

To be quite honest I've never really took to blogging and always thought of blogging as sort of a digital diary/journal that's open for others to see. I especially have never seen how it could benefit myself and my business as a photographer. But in recent times, especially with the emergence of vlogging, I'm starting to see how it may be of benefit. Although I don't necessarily see myself starting a blog, I do have some ideas stirring around in my mind of how it would be structured. One possibility would be to organize my blog into the different types of photography that I currently involve myself with (Portraits, Surf, lifestyle, etc.). This would allow prospect clients to see the diversity of my work and allow them to make a well informed decision on whether I am the right fit for their photographic needs. The other direction I would go in would be simply to make it a travel blog and organize it by each place I visit and what I shot there. It would probably be more o...

How personal do you want to get? A question I personally ask myself when posting any of my art, and a question I still struggle with even now. Of course if your profile is personal, regardless of the platform, you can post whatever, whenever without caring. But when it comes to business, you'd better watch your step. Each business is different and has different needs, therefore how personable they can get on their social media depends on those needs, and of course their audience. For example I myself am the sole face/personality of my business therefore how personal I can get is completely up to my discretion. Adding some personality to posts I've found can help boost engagement with your audience and establish rapport which will ultimately lead to better business. Also having and creating a personality for yourself will help set you and your business apart especially if your doing business in a saturated market. Obviously if you are representing a company and its social media,...

Once upon a time, back in my high school days, I had a twitter which I could always count on to give me a good laugh. It was the source for all the memes for my friends and I. Now, after all these years, coming back to it hits me right in the feels. Using it from a business stand point should be interesting because when twitter comes to mind, memes and more memes is all I can see. Since I'm already familiarized with twitter from past experiences, it wasn't hard to find what i was looking for. When I started searching I had two things in mind, potential clients, and potential partners to collaborate with. With that being said, that's exactly what I made my two lists, Potential clients and People to Collab with. I could see why people use lists, more than anything its just an organization tool that can be molded to anyone's needs. In my case I could use it to list photographers I look up to and would want to collaborate with in the future, using lists to help me hold myse...