Being a good or even great photographer these days is not even close to enough.  There are so many struggling artists out there and one of the contributing factors to this phenomenon is the right brain left brain thing.  I wasn’t born creative, I had to teach myself that part. The one thing I did learn very quickly is that photography is so much more than lighting, posing and composition.  Running a profitable sustainable business has to do with fundamentally managing your client’s emotional expectations and getting potential clients to become paying ones.  This has to do with Nero-Linguistic programming, body language, non verbal communication and so much more that was out of my comfort zone.  Until I decided to stop focusing on only the photography aspect of my business.  It changed everything.  Why am I telling you this? Because I have just returned from PhotoPlus17 recently held in New York and I was so inspired by so many talented people there.  One stand out was Chase Jarvis, now most of us photographers know Chase as one of the founders of CreativeLive, a free live training site with very talented educators.  Now Chase is continually educating himself and pushing to do better, achieve more and help the photographic community excel in there craft. In 2013 I presented a class on targeting the higher end market and my love affair with CreativeLive had begun, since then I have bought a few classes (latest one was a vintage gem by Zack Arias on Studio lighting – very cool) that were not my particular area of expertise and I have picked up a few nuggets from some great educators.  Just because you may feel that you have mastered your genre of photography shouldn’t mean complacency. Get out, attend events, expos and meet-ups.  Networking has become such an integral part of my marketing you need it to become part of yours too!