Way back in episode 38, I introduced the three types of basic business models that are really built to succeed not just in photography, but in pretty much any field. And I call those models the donkey, the workhorse and the unicorn. And if you've never listened to that episode, I will link it in the show notes. And I actually recommend that you hit pause right now. And go back and listen to that episode first, because there's a lot to that.
And I go into a lot of detail about each of those models in Episode 38. But what I want to make sure that you do after you listen to that is, you know, don't forget to come back to this episode, because today I am sharing what I believe is an important point of clarification to that episode that I don't want you to miss. Welcome to this can't be that hard. My name is Annemie Tonken. And I help photographers run profitable, sustainable businesses that they
love. Each week on the podcast, I cover simple, actionable strategies and systems that photographers at every level of experience can use to earn more money in a more sustainable way. Running a photography business doesn't have to be that hard. You can do it. And I can show you how. So in case you need a refresher, or perhaps you didn't follow my advice in the intro about hitting pause and listening to
that episode. First. Let me just go ahead and give you the Cliff's Notes on those three business models that I was describing. So there's the donkey, and the donkey represents a business that offers lower priced goods at a higher volume, the unicorn sort of on the other end of the spectrum, and that's a business that offers higher priced goods at a low volume. And then the workhorse model falls somewhere in between the donkey and the unicorn and the workhorse is offering moderate prices at a
moderate volume. That was how I described those three business models back in episode 38. But in the close to two years since that episode first aired, it has kind of blown up, it's consistently been one of my most popular episodes ever. It's been downloaded more times than almost any other episode, I have been asked to give talks about those three models at
conferences. And I've gotten really dozens of emails over the course of that time from people who have said that, that one single episode really changed their whole outlook on their business. And I love that the way that I teach this relatively basic concept really resonates for people because that episode, and those three little mascots that I created, illustrate a concept that took me several years and a lot of unnecessary stress and struggle to kind of
figure out in my own life. So back in 2010, when I started my business, I was taught that in order to be profitable, I needed to be running a very high end boutique style business. And that I needed to be doing in person sales and kind of offering all the bells and whistles. So I built what I would now call a unicorn business model. And everything that I did was like high end luxury, all my messaging was around how that was going to be super Luxe, and all that sort of
thing. And, you know, thankfully, I was able to step into that role and do it effectively. Because it did work. I was running a legitimate aligned unicorn business. But it didn't take very long before I started to realize that that business model wasn't really the right fit for me. I just didn't know that there were alternatives, right. So there were parts of my business that I loved. There were others that never really felt quite right.
But for a long time, I just figured that was kind of the trade off that I had to make if I wanted to survive as a photographer. And as many of you know, you know, over the course of time, my personal circumstances changed. And I was no longer in a position where I was able to run a unicorn business, because it was so time consuming that I couldn't scale it up and I needed to make more
money. So I ultimately ended up kind of going out on a limb and putting this whole concept that I had been taught to the test. Thankfully, what I am here to talk about today, what I found was that as long as certain areas of my business were in alignment with one another, I could still be profitable, actually even more profitable. Even though that meant bringing my price point down just a little bit and taking away the fancy bells and whistles that didn't really feel like me. So I
flipped everything around. I went from being a unicorn model to what I now call a workhorse model. And in retrospect, that switch was really one of the best changes that I have ever made in my business. Not only do I feel much, much better about the people that I work with, and the kinds of work that I get hired to do, but I've also significantly increased my profit margins, and reduced the amount of time that I spend working on those parts of my
business that I don't love. So suffice it to say that I feel like this lesson, this conversation is a really important one for photographers to be having with themselves, you know, to be looking critically at the way that their business is set up, so that they can kind of see where the alignment might not be quite aligned, right. And that brings me to the purpose of this episode. So the donkey work horse and unicorn models get brought up a lot in conversations people love.
People love a good metaphor, and those little avatars kind of give us something to really kind of hold on to. And so we have lots of conversations about this in my Facebook group, and, and, you know, even in person with other photographers that I've talked to, and what I've noticed is that there are a few common kind of points of confusion or misconceptions about the models
that I want to address. Because when I first recorded that episode, when I first was teaching about these three models, even I hadn't really delved into, like, what made them work and what didn't work, you know, what made them not work. But in all of this conversation, and in sort of watching this play out with now, lots of people over time, I feel like there are some things that I just want to, I want to get a
little bit clearer on. So it seems that when I described the three models, some people, a lot of people get so attached to the price point piece of the puzzle, that they miss some of the other equally important components. And again, I want to just kind of dive into that a little bit because the donkey, workhorse and unicorn, do, they are somewhat tied to price point. But it's those are blurry lines, they're not hard and fast, kind
of delineated rules. So as I was saying before, a donkey business attracts customers with competitive prices. And then they rely on volume, and upsells, and strategy and all that sort of stuff in order to be profitable. Now, obviously, when I say competitive prices, that means different things to different people, right, depending on the market that you're in, depending on the cost of living, all that sort of
stuff. Now, I also want to, like make very clear that competitive doesn't need to mean dirt cheap. What it does need to mean is that the value of what you're offering is so evident that you don't need to do a whole lot of educating or explaining when people see your prices and your donkey model business, their first thought probably isn't going to be like, Whoa, wow, that's a lot of money. Right? They that's not to say that they
won't feel like a twinge. But it's not going to probably be a big point of you know, them deciding to work with someone else. Unless they are truly shopping for the absolute cheapest possible option. So, you think Walmart, you think Amazon, these are obviously donkey model businesses, right? They bring a lot of people in with the opportunity to save money. But they are, in many ways very, very profitable, because they are selling to large, large numbers of people. And not everything on Amazon or
Walmart is cheap, right? There are plenty of you bring people in with low prices, but then you've got other things and maybe they spend more money than they were planning on when they're walking around Walmart, whatever. And perhaps those are hard companies for us to relate to. I don't imagine that Jeff Bezos is listening today. And you know, large scale corporations are very different from our tiny micro businesses.
Let's talk instead about like your favorite local restaurant and maybe not like your favorite favorite, but it's your the one that you go to when you just want to grab like a quick bite with a friend. They've got good food. They're, you know, relatively convenient, whatever, but maybe it's not super fancy, right? You don't have to make a reservation. You don't have to get dressed up. And it's inexpensive enough that you don't really have to think too much about working it into your
budget. But sometimes you know if that is a really great restaurant and lots of people have that as their, you know, go to place with a for a quick bite with their friend, there are gonna be times that when you show up, there's like a line out the door or they say, Oh, it's a two hour wait or whatever. That is a small business that attracts people with some combination of a good product
and low prices. And then they make their money by bringing in large numbers of people and probably doing some upselling on things like hey, do you want to have something to drink with your meal, or can I like offer you guys dessert today are whatever the case may be. So that's the donkey model in all of its all of its glory. On the other end of the spectrum, we've got that unicorn business, right. And the unicorn business attracts customers who are specifically looking for a luxury experience.
Unicorn businesses sort of do their marketing based on the fact that they offer this high touch experience to a small number of clients at a premium price. And again, let's focus on the fact that there is no single definition of premium price. Probably the big biggest misconception that I hear about these models, is the idea that if you charge a certain amount that automatically puts you into one model or another. And the truth is that there are several factors to consider price is
just one of them. So with the unicorn model, those high prices are necessary because you're crafting this very high touch luxury experience. And that necessarily reduces the number of total clients you can take on that was why I got painted into this corner, where I ultimately needed to, to switch models, because I could only take on so many clients. So if we go back
to the restaurant example. Now, I want you to think of the restaurant that you go to when you want to celebrate something really special like a you know, a birthday or an anniversary or something like that. So you make a reservation weeks or even months ahead of time, you get all dressed up, you arrive, you don't have to wait in line, right, they've got your table waiting for you, the meal lasts
a long time. Sometimes they'll you know, greet you with a glass of champagne, or they put a candle and the beautiful dessert that you order. And as you would expect, when the bill comes, the total comes to probably quite a lot more than the one than the bill came to when you grabbed I don't know lunch with your friend after your like workout
at the gym last week, right. So if the fancy restaurant were to charge the same as that quick lunch spot that you go to, they would be out of business in like a matter of weeks, because that would not cover their cost of running the business. And if the lunch spot tried to charge the high prices that the fancy restaurant charged, nobody would go. Because you know, you're not looking for the fancy experience when you're just trying to grab a bite with a friend on your way
somewhere else, right. And you definitely aren't looking for that fancy price tag, even. And this is important. Even if you are someone who can afford to pay for the fancy restaurant meal at night. That's not what you always want. And that brings
me to the workhorse. And this is probably the most common model among photographers in general, because the shared characteristic among workhorse businesses is that they attract clients whose number one priority when they're looking for a photographer is neither the luxury experience, nor is it like I need something fast and cheap. They are looking for some other set of features or
benefits or services. And of course, that can mean many different things that might mean that they are looking for someone who specializes in a particular genre who has a particular style, who you know promises really quick turnaround, there's, you know, there are several different priorities that someone might have. And the workhorse model can be set up to focus on any number of
those things. So I have known photographers whose businesses were priced higher than some of the unicorn businesses in their area. But because they were set up for higher volume, they weren't focusing on that super luxury experience, they would still be considered workhorses. I've also known photographers whose price point was so low that you might be tempted to assume that they were set up as a donkey business, except that they're not looking for any kind
of volume. They're not built for volume and that's not the way that they set their business up. Now, I want to point out that when you see a business with Sue for low prices, that is offering a higher end experience, oftentimes, that is a red flag. It suggests that the photographer might be, you know, keen to offer this personalization and this lovely attention, but they haven't really run their numbers and they're underpricing themselves. And that leads to a lack of
sustainability. However, it is possible in under certain circumstances, that that is done deliberately, and is set up to meet the needs of that particular photographer. It is super important, I think it's very easy to look from the outside of someone's business and judge whether they are set up profit profitably or not. And we often do that just based entirely on what their, like
bottom line price is. But again, depending on your costs, depending on what you're trying to pay yourself, you can be profitable, in, you know, in a very wide range of, of numbers. So when it comes to pricing, everything is relative. And it's important not to jump to conclusions when you look at someone's numbers. So, again, the important thing to know about being set up as a workhorse is that because you're not offering some kind of super
Luxe experience. And because you're not trying to be the cheapest photographer around and compete primarily on price, it is absolutely essential that you decide what you do want your clients to find you for what you want, you know, you want to be known as like the go to photographer for fill in the blank, whatever that thing may be. And then you need to make that super, super crystal clear.
It is way, way, way too easy to get lost in the sea of competition as a workhorse photographer, whose photos and messaging are good and fine, but like vanilla, and they kind of look like everybody else's.
Because if you are not competing on price alone, and you are not trying to, you know, differentiate yourself as this photographer who is at the tippy top of the market, which does appeal to a very specific group of people, you're going to have to make it really clear to somebody that like hey, the reason you want to hire me is
this. And whether that's a genre or a personality quirk or a the fact that you've got some amazing client closet, or whatever the case may be, you have to separate yourself from everyone else. So this is a short episode. The reason I wanted to clarify some of this here today is that I want to be sure that when you think about your business model and getting it aligned properly, you aren't limiting yourself or your profit
margins unnecessarily. A while ago, there was this great conversation in my Facebook group, which, by the way, if you haven't yet joined the this can't be that hard Facebook group, go join it's facebook.com/groups/this can't be that hard. It's amazing. We've got 1000s of photographers in there now. And it's a very, it's a great sort of place to go with business questions and
things like that. But anyway, there was this conversation going on about pricing, and one of the people posted about how she had run her numbers, she knew she needed to charge a relatively high premium for her services. But she was feeling stuck because she didn't want to set her business up as a unicorn. She said she would rather set herself up as a
sophisticated workforce. And that was awesome, because I got to talk to her and the people who were part of this thread, about the fact that there are no hard and fast lines when it comes to your business business model and your pricing. First of all, obviously, what's expensive in one community or to one person may very well seem pretty reasonable to another person or in another location. And you are very much included in those people that I'm talking about when I say something may seem
reasonable or not. It's always important to remember that your money mindset, your scarcity mindset, or your abundance mindset, or the stress that you feel around money or what it is that you're used to. All of that color's your perception of what is expensive or cheap. Those are relative terms. Reasonable and unreasonable also relative, you have to realize that that does not color everyone's view the same way. And so when you set up a business, you run your
numbers. You well first you think about your preferences and your parameters, right? What you the way that you want to run your business, the number of clients you want to take on the kind of service you want to give all of those kinds of things. And then you run your numbers and you figure out how much money you need to make and want to make an order or to pay yourself well pay all of your bills, set aside money for taxes and retirement and all that sort
of thing. And then all it is, is connecting those two, you build an aligned business that puts you in the position to make that all happen, you attract to the right people who are not sensitive at the price point that you need to set, and you create a service that brings them in. So hopefully this little bit of clarification was helpful. I just wanted to get in here, but let me know. You know, send me a DM or put comments in the Instagram feed this week. I would love to hear your feedback
on this. And I hope you have a really good day. Well, that's it for this week's episode of This can't be that hard. I'll be back Same time, same place next week. In the meantime, you can find more information about this episode, along with all the relevant links, notes and downloads at this can't be that hard.com/learn If you liked the podcast, be sure to hit the subscribe button. Even better, share the love by leaving a review in iTunes. And as always,
thanks so much for joining me. I hope you have a fantastic week.