In this episode of the Wealth Witches Podcast, host Katelyn Magnuson is joined by the inspiring Johanna Hribal, a former educator turned burnout prevention coach. The conversation delves into Johanna's personal journey from experiencing severe burnout as a public school teacher and photographer to creating a balanced and fulfilling career.

Johanna introduces her program, designed to help photographers and other business owners prevent future burnout by managing their workloads and setting intentional goals. She shares practical strategies for achieving a healthier work-life balance, the importance of setting boundaries, and how to maintain mental health while running a business.

Katelyn and Johanna also discuss the challenges of burnout in high-stress industries, ways to diversify income streams, and the significance of knowing your numbers to create stability. Whether you're a business owner struggling with burnout or looking to prevent it, this episode offers valuable insights and actionable advice for creating a more sustainable and fulfilling professional life.

Key Takeaways

• Recognizing and addressing the early signs of burnout.
• The importance of setting boundaries to maintain a healthy work-life balance.
• Knowing your financial needs to plan effectively and avoid burnout.
• Diversifying income streams for greater stability in business.
• Prioritizing self-care and outsourcing tasks to reduce stress and improve well-being.

Guest Bio:

Johanna Hribal is a former burned-out educator turned educator on burnout. After experiencing two consecutive years of burnout while working as a full-time public school teacher and photographer, her mental health suffered greatly. In less than a year, she paid off her debt, saved for an emergency fund, and left teaching to pursue photography full-time. Over the past two years, she has consistently booked clients without overbooking, leading to the creation of her 6-week course, Balance Not Burnout, which helps photographers prevent burnout and achieve a healthier work-life balance.

Connect with Johanna:

Instagram: @balancenotburnoutphotographers

Program: Momentum

Listeners who mention this podcast can save $400 on my group coaching program for photographers, Momentum with code WITCHES. Offer expires 12/31/24.

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Music credit: Neon Fairies by Wolves

Hello, and welcome magical creatures to the Wealth Witches podcast.

This is a place where we brew up financial empowerment and mix in a little

sprinkle of magic. I'm Caitlin Magnuson, your guide on this

enchanted journey to financial enlightenment. Here, we honor all

identities and invoke our inner witches to create holistic wealth and prosperity.

So grab your crystals, open your minds, and let's get ready to conjure some

financial clarity clarity.

Welcome back to the Wealth Witches podcast. Today, we

have Johanna Riebel. She is a guest that I'm

so incredibly excited for. She's a formerly burned out

educator turned educator on burnout. After experiencing 2

consecutive years of burnout while working as a full time public school teacher and a

full time photographer, her mental health suffered greatly, and she was

at her most unhappy. She decided she couldn't continue to live this

way, so in less than a year, she paid off her debt, saved up for

an emergency fund, and left her teaching career to pursue photography full

time. In the last 2 years, she's found a way to be fully booked each

month consistently without overbooking in any particular season.

This led to the creation of her 6 week course, balance not burnout,

which helps photographers to prevent future burnout, create a healthier work life

balance, and ultimately enjoy a more fulfilling life both within and outside

of their businesses. Joanna, thank you so much for

being here. I know I found you on Instagram and I was like, we need

to have a chat because in the accounting profession and I think so

many professions, photography with the wedding industry, we're seeing so

much burnout, so much seasonality, that roller coaster

that you were talking about of just, like, up and down. And when I'm

busy, when I have money, when this comes through, like, what do I do in

the off season? So thank you for being here. I'm really excited to have this

chat today. Yeah. Thank you so much for inviting me, Caitlin. And

I definitely since I created this account and this course, balance not

burnout, although it's targeted towards wedding industry, photographers specifically,

so many of my friends and other peers in my community who are business owners

have told me how much they relate to it. And burnout is something

that, especially in America, all of us have experienced at one

point or another. And for a lot of industries, like the wedding industry or like

you were saying, financial industries, there are definitely those seasons of

burnout that everybody goes through, and it's very difficult for

people. So I feel really passionate about helping people find more stability

so they can enjoy their life outside of their business.

Because I think most of us got into business to actually have it support our

lives and not let our businesses run our lives. So I think that's so

easy to get caught up in the loop of not remembering

that's why we did it. Mhmm. We're not Absolutely. Yeah. We're

like, I yeah. We're like, I created a business, so I don't have to be

working 247, and then we end up working even more than that, and

we're more stressed than we were working for someone else. So, absolutely,

I resonate with that. Oh, I

the last what? 4 years now? Yeah. We're going on

almost 4 years since since the pandemic. Right? And we had all of those years

of, oh, this isn't normal. This is the, you know, this is what it is.

The name here is the this is the that. And then we hit this here.

And it's like, oh, is this gonna be are we back to normal? And I

think normal is looking so different for a lot of us because we've gone through

the wedding boom, the feast and famine to the

absolute extreme over the last couple of years.

And I think it's made a lot of us realize that we're craving more

income stability. We're craving more stability in our lives.

And I would love to chat with you about what that

looks like and how we can be creating more of that and

getting getting out of that cycle of the busy versus slow

season, the feast and the famine, and that roller coaster.

Absolutely. Yeah. Let's dive into it. Wonderful. So I

know, like I said, I think we were talking before this, but I relate so

much to a lot of wedding industry professional because we have our own seasonality. We

have our own feast and famine and both cash flow wise and work wise. And

so there's a lot that we've done behind the scenes to even that out because

I don't think that that's good for nervous system regulation and for

growing a team and having because payroll's consistent. So cash flow,

if they're inconsistent. And, like, builder, I'm, like, consistent. So if you have this cash

flow, like, how are we working to

even that out, to distribute it, to feel comfortable

with what we're doing in our work, and to take control instead of

feeling like we're falling victim to the whims of

client bookings. So what have you done,

Johanna, on your side to do that in your business?

So, yes, I love that analogy of, like, we feel like we're the victim of

this burnout cycle of wait. I like to call it a roller coaster of

burnout. We're like, oh, this is just how the industry is. This is the busy

season, and this is the dead season. So a lot of wedding industry

professionals and other people have seasonal type of careers. They will have

a a period of several months where you're slowly and very quickly

increasing how many clients you're taking on. You get to a point where your

mental health is suffering. You're so exhausted. You're working all the time, and you're just

so drained that I've seen people leave their industries because of the

burnout. And then you have this dead period of anywhere from

2 to 6 months where you don't know if you're gonna be able to pay

your bills. So most people are depending on that, roller coaster on the

uphill to make all the money they need for the slow season. But what

happens is your mental health and your energy is so drained because

you're overbooking that if you weren't doing that, you could be

planning ahead and strategizing for a more stable income in the slow

season. So the first thing that I did was I figured out

how much money did I need to make to cover my cost of doing business

and my personal expenses and pay myself each month. And then

I looked at the numbers of, for me as a wedding photographer, I do a

combination of wedding photography and other types of portraits. So I said,

how many weddings do I need to book each month and how many sessions each

month to be able to meet this number? And I kind of have my

number the number that I would like to pay myself, which is kind of more

of my goal. And figuring out what that is each and every

month, first of all, is a huge relief because instead of

saying, I need to book a wedding every single weekend and

some, some months I need to book 2 weddings a weekend to be able

to survive through the winter. I can say, okay. I can

book 2 weddings per month, which means I have 2 weekends free for

myself to enjoy and rest and recover.

And then I need to book this many sessions to meet that monthly

income. It is a huge drop in the number of clients that you need to

take on. And when you actually look at the numbers of you know, if you

have proper pricing and everything, it's a lot less than what

most people take on. But most people, I think the first mistake is

that they don't actually have a monthly income goal. So that's the

first thing that in the course I help people to determine. What is your monthly

income needs and goals? What does that translate to as far

as bookings? And a lot of people find that it's so easy

to hit that goal every month where they don't have to be on this

roller coaster. They are in control. I like to give them a new visual of,

taking a little ride on a canoe where you are in control of the

oars. You might have a little wake from a little speedboat every once in a

while, but you are in control of that canoe of where it's going.

It's relatively smooth and steady throughout the entire year instead of

a roller coaster where you can kinda see the the whole coaster from

the outside before you get on the ride, but you don't know where those ups

and downs and loop the loops will be and how bad it will hurt your

neck afterwards. Right? So that's kinda the first

step is to really know your numbers, start to plan

more intentionally, book more intentionally. And then from there,

you can start to get yourself off of that roller coaster. I

knew we would get along great. One of my favorite things is to say know

your numbers because it's so easy to I think

especially in the wedding vendor industry, just put

blinders on. Right? And, like, dive in, and you're doing the work, and you're mired

in it. And you're like, well, I'm able to pay the bills, so it's fine

for now. Abs Are you are you overworking? Are you

balancing? Are you paying attention to what you actually need to be doing

instead of just, like, it's fine. It's fine until it's not. And then

everything feels like it's crumbling. Right. And here's the thing that

it's hard for us to turn away money, especially when a lot of women,

especially in the industry are or women in general who are small business

owners are sometimes the primary caretaker or financial support of

their family. And so when somebody's offering you money and

you look at your calendar and you say, well, technically, I have this day open.

I don't have anything going on. Or, sure, I could use an extra couple 100

thou or a couple $1,000. Just pull off a couple extra yeah. A

couple extra 100. But, yeah, I could use a couple extra

$1,000 this weekend if I just take on this one extra wedding, but 1

becomes 2, 2 becomes 3, and we don't have a

boundary of saying no. That's how so many of us get into that. So,

yeah, knowing your numbers and being clear on that and knowing that your pricing is

gonna support you allows you to say

no with confidence and know that you still have income coming

in, that you're gonna feed your family. You're still gonna have enough money to do

the things that you love. No. I think that that's so important. I know that

I found myself doing that too where it's like, oh, but are you in a

turn away? Didn't you set the boundary that you're no longer accepting new tax

clients? You're no longer accepting x y z. And then they pop in, and it's

like, oh, but we could. But are we gonna regret

it? Are we Right. Then be, you know, working overtime or

working outside of the hours that we wanna be working or sacrificing time with our

families or time with ourselves? And, honestly, that one's the most important for

me is I think so many of us, especially women,

tend to not set aside the time for ourselves. You know, we'll we'll do something.

We'll prioritize our family. We'll we'll prioritize our spouse. We'll prioritize something.

Where are we prioritizing ourselves in all of that as well? Because it's

so easy. I know that everyone's like, you can't pour from an empty cup, but

I also think that, like, you deserve to have a full cup just for yourself,

not to be able to be a value to someone else outside. Like,

that's an added bonus, but, like, you should be valuable to yourself. You should

be nourished, fulfilled, and

able to confidently stand with those boundaries. And like you said, I think

knowing your numbers is such an important piece of that. Because if you don't,

it's going to let you just continue to spin. Right? And

whereas you said, roller coaster and not know what's coming, and so you don't know

what's gonna be the next step. So, like, maybe you do have to take this.

So what in your experience of when it comes to the

seasonality side of things and being on that roller coaster, So

you're, like, you're working in, photography sessions or portrait

sessions outside of weddings. So that's something that can be more year

round depending on where you're at and depending on whether other

factors that come in. What other things

can photographers be doing, or other business owners listening to this,

to help stabilize their income and stabilize

their lives and their workflow throughout the year? So

there are so many ways. This is also something I talk about in my 6

week course, balance not burnout for photographers. So I'll I

spend a lot of time talking about diversifying your income. So for

me, I do wedding photography primarily, so

there's seasons for that. But then during the winter, typically, that's when it's a little

bit slower. That's when I work with a lot of small businesses. I do product

photography, food photography. Throughout the spring and fall. I

do senior photography. And in the winter, I'm more open

to doing work that I don't typically take on, like family photography,

maternity. Although, typically, I work with past clients for that. But if I

do get the occasional inquiry in the winter and I'm a little bit slower, then

I'm happy to take that on again because I have the space for it. And

it's not that I'm not putting it on top of an already full schedule

and doing things that I normally would turn away. So it's

about looking at how you can diversify your income, planning ahead for

those highs and lows if you know that you have months

that are gonna be slower. I've helped my clients in the past, my

course students, to plan mini sessions ahead of those slow

seasons. They already have everything prepared. And when they get there, they already have

clients booked, and they know they're gonna make money. And so during the

busy season, they feel a sense of relief that they don't have to

be taking on every single person who reaches out last minute in the

fall. And I also teach my clients that you can

actually generate more revenue in your business by working

by continuing to work with your past clients than by

acquiring new clients. So if you reach out to your past clients

I've had so many couples who have done their engagement photos, wedding photos. They've

asked me if I do maternity photos, newborn family sessions.

It is so great to continue that relationship and

provide more value to them in the future. They already know,

like, and trust you, and it's so easy to make that sale.

Especially, a lot of times, they come to you. So that's what I encourage

clients to do is find ways to nurture your relationships with your

past clients and not just from a point of

I'm just trying to make more money off of you. Doing it out of out

of a place of integrity, especially when it's like your dream clients, people that

you so enjoyed working with. And after their wedding day, you're like, I wish I

could just keep working with them. And the great news is that you can. There's

always an opportunity. So, you know, those are two aspects of what I teach

in the course that are relatively easy. It doesn't cost

a lot of, you know, paying for ads or anything. It's just nurturing

relationships. Absolutely. No. I think that we're a

referral based business. And not only between referrals from clients that

we absolutely adore, but continuing to work with clients. Because I think it's so

easy if you're a wedding photographer to look at and be

like, okay. Wedding's done. Like, that chapter is closed.

And if you're there's so

much less effort, I think. Mhmm. And you

even said that need is needed to be put in, that when you

can like, I love I love so many of

our clients. And we've had clients leave because they've had

something change in their business. Mhmm. That has nothing to do with us.

We've kept in touch because I still like them as human beings. Yeah. You know

how many times they'll refer someone to us? They'll come back when their needs

have changed? Like, because we're being a human being

and we're Mhmm. Existing and we're not nurturing for the future sale, but we're

nurturing because we truly enjoy them and

it's just such an amazing way to have a community that supports you

And I know, having worked with a lot of photographers over the years

for my brand and for personal and for wedding and all of that, it's so

nice to have someone that you trust, that you know, that knows you, that

can follow along, you know, as, like, through the different stages of your life. Like,

what a no brainer. Yes. And, going back a

little bit to the scaling and creating more stability, it's so much

easier to nurture those relationships when you have, let's say, 10

clients a month versus 30 clients. And some of those people

you may have just taken on last minute because you're like, sure. What's an extra

$500? What's an extra $2,000? And you're just trying to

make the sale. And so when you're just focused on, I just I'm gonna say

yes because I have a hard time saying no or because it's extra money

and why not, then there's not as much of a chance for you to

nurture because you weren't booking that intentionally. And so,

yeah, when you are booking intentionally with your clients, you're really trying to make sure

you're the right fit for them, then you do have the opportunity to continue

to nurture. And when you have a more limited amount of clients each month, it's

so much easier to nurture because you're focusing your attention on a smaller

quantity of people. Absolutely. I think that

something that can be challenging and I know that I went through this evolution in

my business from taking on anyone that wanted to work

with me in the very beginning stages. Right? Whether they were the right sit, whether

they were in our like, in the services that we offer, whether we were making

all these custom things. It was just it was exhausting, But you're getting

going. You're figuring out what you're doing. It was a really difficult

transition for a while, and I'd love your thoughts on this, but it was difficult

to stand in first, to identify the boundaries. Mhmm.

What I wanted, who I wanted to work with, what I wanted in my personal

and professional life, how those were supported, and then to

stick to it. And it can still be a little bit scary every now and

then. Right? Because I have July November are 2 slowest month of the company.

I know it. I put a reminder on my calendar. I planned I have things

during those times, whether it's downtime, revamping, courses. Like, there are things that I do

that I love. Mhmm. But it still freaks me out. And I've been in business

for 9 years now. And it's it's easy to

go. Oh, no. Do I wanna take on x y z client? Like,

because there it feels like the universe is, like, testing you during those times.

Right? Hey. Here's this carrot of a client. Like, but I don't wanna work it.

But it's but should I? But it's money. So, like, how

I have my own method, for this madness. But how do

you recommend that someone, like, a, set those boundaries or

those parameters, and then, b, like, stands within them when things can be a little

bit scary or things can feel a little bit scarce? Yeah.

That's a great question. So I'll tell you as far as sticking to your

boundaries. For me, when I left my teaching business and I started, you

know, going full time with photography, I wanted to have one day a week that

I committed to as a day off, and that was the hardest

thing for me to do. It probably took me several months to actually take an

entire day off without opening my inbox, without getting on my

computer, without working. So being flexible with yourself, making

small steps towards progress. And in those slow months,

you can be intentional about what you're doing. Even though it might be

slower, you can take advantage of that, and maybe that's the month that you go

on vacation. If every single July is slow, that's when you take a

month long vacation. And maybe you can also

be flexible with yourself. Right? Because if you're on that smooth sailing

canoe, there's gonna be occasional ebbs and flows, but it's not gonna be

extreme. So you might say, okay. Well, July November are

2 slow months. So how can I split the client load that I would

take on in those months and distribute them evenly throughout the other

months? Or how can I add on something throughout the

year or plan ahead for these months, offer something special that

I don't offer throughout the rest of the year? And so, again, when you have

a more even schedule throughout the year, you have the time, energy, and space to

create that versus if you're spending 6 months of the year pushing

yourself to your limit and then afterwards, you spend 6 months recovering, you

have no time to strategize for that. So so, yeah, being flexible with yourself

as you adjust to a new, kind of flow and rhythm in your

business and looking ahead and planning. If you know that you

have certain slow months throughout the year, try to plan something out of the ordinary

that your clients would go for or, you know, find another

way to take advantage of that slow month by taking a vacation or doing something

for yourself. I love that so much. I don't I

I actually vacation in May and take that time off, but I love using

July for revamp of everything.

Mhmm. But I think that I think both of those

options are fantastic. Like, a, what are you offering that you could be offering?

B, what can you do that's special for yourself? Where can you, like, nurture? Where

can you take we what was it?

Right around Labor Day. We have other deadlines, so that we, as a team, can't

take some time off during then, but all of our clients almost exclusively go

radio silent for, like, a 10 day window.

And what should happen? We can get the most work done

of, like, the entire year in that 10 day window, and it's always a little

bit disconcerting. Okay. What's going on? But I think everyone's, like, wrapping up

summer or school starting. Like, there's all these factors, and I think it's really easy

to to tell ourselves these stories. Right? Right. About what's going

on. And same thing with, like, small month, same thing with seasonality. Like, there's all

of these stories that we tell. And one of the things that I love about

working in the numbers world, I love data.

Shocker. I love data. And so being able to look back

at past years and use that to future

forecast is so nice. Like, every time

that I get into a chunk where I'm like, oh, God.

What just happened? Because we've done a lot. Like, we used to have huge

swings in that in our income. And our income now is more like

this and a little like this, and it's much less stressful,

but it's still you'll hit that. It's like, we can look back, and we can

see that for each of last 8 years, this has happened every time. And so

then, when I sit down and I plan the next year out, that lets

me go, okay. Cool. July is when we tend to hire staff.

It's a great time because we have capacity. Like, there's

there's time to be doing that, and it lets me

plan and integrity instead of just, like, willy nilly,

like, throwing offers out or hitting

on that client that's an Amazon seller because that's not a client type

that we work with. I love them. I'm all for it, but, like, we're not

set up for that. But without fail, I swear about every July,

we get someone that pops up. It's like, hi. I'd

love to be a client. I'm like, oh, no. Not the right

fit. Yeah. Not the right fit. Yeah. Like, thank you so much for thinking of

us, but not the right fit. So yeah. I think I think having

that roadmap, really, of, like, what you

can be doing, how you can be spending it, like because is your income fine

the rest of the year? Are you good? If you want to be having more

income stability, cool. You have a plan to make some additional offers Yeah. And some

things that are just a no brainer or add ons. But if you are good,

then, like, why would you not take some time of any sort for

yourself? Mhmm. And there are months where I will have slower

months in spite of you know, maybe I am making efforts to do

special offers and things, and I might have a slow month still. And I'm like,

you know what? I'm fine. I have enough to pay myself for

this month. I have enough to cover my expenses, and I would rather have the

time and take an extra trip or just rest at home or

just have time off. And so, you know, kind of learning

what your what your boundaries are and what you prefer and what's more

valuable to you. And, also, you know, going back to tracking,

you know, past years, that's also something else we do in the course. So we

figure out, you know, what are your monthly income goals, and we also look at,

you know, each month in the past year. How many sessions did you book each

month? When were inquiries coming in? So that you can have that

data of when are the natural ebbs and flows, what types of sessions are you

booking in these months. Because I did also see, like you said, around Labor

Day, other photographers I know were freaking out. They were like, oh my gosh. My

engagement's super low right now. And then the other day in a local Facebook

group, people were like, how are your bookings for next year? I'm freaking out. I

don't have a lot. But right now is the lull. And in October

through December or January even, people are gonna be getting engaged,

and people are gonna want photos. So people do get really freaked out

by that that little lull when the rest of the year inquiries are

flooding in. But if you keep track of these things, you will look

back and say, okay. This is exactly what happened last year.

I yes. Like, people preach it at everyone because, again,

we do the same thing. Come and, actually, 2 weeks ago, I

went, oh, wow. Things are really slow. Guess what? You had, like, 6 inquiries in

the last week. I'm like, oh, that's right. Here it comes. So

anytime I noticed something like that that happens, I add a note to my calendar

about a week before that. Mhmm. Just a little tiny, like, note reminder

on there because I live off of my Google Calendar. Like, my entire

life is in there, and it's so nice because with some

flexibility, especially pandemic time flexibility, things are

generally cyclical. As you're going to notice, these ebbs and flows

or these changes that come through literally

Labor Day every year. Everything that I run. Yes. I run

that. But it can freak everyone out because Yeah.

Is the, money tree ever gonna shake, you know, additional clients? And,

yes, like, it's for sure. Everyone's just chilling. So, like, how about we just

chill instead of, like, managing your own anxiety and your

own, like, thoughts around things, I think, is such a powerful tool to be

utilizing. Because so often we, again, kind of fall

victim to the client cycle or the client whim, when in reality, like, what are

the stories we're telling ourselves? Like, that the client

is not intentionally not reaching out to us. They've got life going on.

Like, they're doing things. They have kids going back to school. They're taking that last

big summer vacation. Then everything kind of

starts rolling. Fall, like, right Yeah. At the time we get to the middle of

September, it's like, oh, and then it just starts to slowly build.

And you're like, oh, that's right. Yeah. This is fine. So, like, instead of freaking

out the 1st part of September and end of August, we could be

easing into the busy booking season.

Yeah. And using that little quiet period to be strategic and say,

okay. Fall is coming up. I need to start planning

my for the holidays. I need to start looking at how many sessions

can I book this year, or what can I be posting to entice people to

start booking early? You know? And and taking that opportunity

and that breath of fresh air that you don't have to be answering emails all

the time and using it to your advantage. Right. Well, I'm like, is

my pricing good? Is my client onboarding system stellar? Like,

where where are there any holes? Have I run through all of it for this

year? Because I know that we've been guilty of that sometimes or if something doesn't

get tested or gets tweaked and really, oh, it was small. I won't impact anything.

Broken link on the website. Yeah. Happens all the time.

What and it's just silly and you're like, okay. Well, yeah. I love using

downtime for that, because it lets you do

something that feels feels and is proactive.

Right? You're doing something, you know, like, okay. I've accomplished this. I

wanna make the whole thing better, easier, more streamlined, And then,

you are set up in such a better spot instead of doing this

little swirl spiral in your brain and worrying about it. And then hitting

busy season and booking season and being like,

really wish I would have taken some time to implement the things that didn't go

right last year or that weren't Right. They weren't clunky. Because I think that's the

biggest thing is, well, we won't always document the things that are

clunky or that could be improved. And we've been doing that a lot over the

last 2 years. And then in July, in November, over that Labor

Day, you know, little 10 day chunk, we're actively making

changes to prevent those things from coming up this next

year. And every year is smoother and more streamlined and less

stressful and a better experience for our clients. Yes. And most

people also, when they're so overbooked and burned out,

they wait until January essentially to do any updates in their business,

including pricing, including back end stuff. It's like

January is the month that I'm gonna do all the things, and then how quickly

do they get burned out from doing that stuff? But what I've learned

through coaching, and you've interviewed my coach as well, you know, you can

be doing that stuff throughout the year. It doesn't take an entire month

to do that. You can do something small one time a week and make progress.

And I also like to recommend to people, raise your prices before the fall

because you know that people are gonna be reaching out, like, 3 times the amount

of people that normally reach out to you. You know you're gonna book it, so

raise your prices now before the fall so you don't have to take on as

many clients. And you know that if you book, if you're taking time out of

your beautiful fall weather to go be with clients, that it's gonna be worth it

for you financially. Absolutely. No. I I couldn't agree more. I

think that everyone feels that that January fresh start is the only

time. Right? It's not the only time.

I actually hate For me, January is, like, the one month

that I don't wanna be doing all of the things. I don't wanna be reinventing

the wheel. I want to be just rolling where I am because it's busy for

us. Our busy season is so aligned. Like, you know, we have booking season,

and then we have tax season, and then we have Mhmm. Extension season, and

then we have season, and they all just kind of roll

throughout the year. And for us, I I update

everything over the summer leading into the fall for the exact

same reason. Like, what are we looking at? Where are we strategically planning?

What is our like, what's our client max? What's our ideal client

range? Like, where do we have? I don't think this happens quite as often, but

I think it can happen if you're looking to take on maybe you want to

have maybe you're expecting a child this next

year. Like, how does your life change with that? How do you impact, like,

taking Right. Parental leave when you're a photographer. We've had quite a

few photographers over the last few years that have had children and that have

had to reverse engineer, like, what that looks like, and how do you have

coverage, and do you have people in place, and how do you notified

clients? Like, how are you choosing to navigate this? And there are lots of other

life changes that pop up. Maybe you wanna take 2 months off to go travel

the world. All of these things you can use to forecast, and then okay. Cool.

How am I presenting my prices, my offers, our services? Like, where

are we booking? And I think I know that our strongest area

for bringing on clients has been asking for the referral,

utilizing our network Mhmm. And reaching out to them. Like, do bookings feel

slow? Have we reached out to people that have worked with us that love us

that refer us all of their friends? Yeah. Really easy to pop in and

like, hey. We're here. We'd love to do x, y, z. We've loved working with

you. We're open for referrals. It's amazing how easy that is to, like,

generate cash flow sometimes when it feels like you're trying to get the ball

rolling. Yeah. Absolutely. And like we were mentioning

earlier with working with past clients and nurturing those relationships,

so many photographers are very timid, and they're like, well, we've already invested this much

money in me. I feel bad asking them for more. But you're not asking them.

You're offering a service that I'm sure they would love to have you,

the photographer, that they loved so much versus having to reach out to somebody

totally new with a totally different process. And so making

that little extra effort to just touch base with past clients and say, hey.

How are you doing? If there's any other ways that I can serve you and

work with you in the future, I would love to continue that relationship. If you

would like prints from your session, if you would like an anniversary photo shoot,

there's so many just easy touch points that you can have with clients that don't

have to be you know, they can say yes or no. They can just ignore

the email, and that's fine. Or they might reach out to you and remember it

later and say, yeah. She said that she does offer this type of photography, so

I'm gonna reach out again. Absolutely. Yeah. I I think it's,

again, easy to make it all about ourselves. Right? Oh, we've already paid this. Oh,

I've already they have not given you money out of

charity. Mhmm. You are providing a valuable

service and experience. Yes. You're not

begging for money. Right. Like, I I see

it happen a lot. Oh, well, I can't expose it. Or, oh, they've already or,

oh, I don't know. What what stories are we making up about our clients Mhmm.

That are pigeonholing them? Or, oh, they're not gonna want the 8 hour package. They're

only gonna want the 6 hour package. Yes. Like, can we let the client decide?

Can we maybe put it all out there for them and let them as an

adult choose what's best for, like, their needs instead of making our own limiting beliefs,

our own stories, hold true for our clients?

And I think that that happens so much more often than

we're even realizing. Mhmm. And, especially, for women,

we're very uncomfortable generally with talking about money, stating

our pricing without the upspeak or without, like, if

that's okay with you, making those kind of statements, offering discounts

before clients even ask for them, or just because a client asked for a discount,

we feel like we have to oblige, and that's just not the case. And a

lot of times too, we do assume, well, this client said their

budget was this, so they can't afford to spend any more with me. And a

lot of times, that's not the case. So, yeah, like you said, we're making up

stories about our clients or what they could afford just because we might not be

able to afford that, And MoneyMindset has a lot to do with

our bookings. Absolutely. I think one of

the biggest things that I've seen pop up is and we we see this a

lot. Right? Maybe you've sent out a proposal. You have options a, b, and

c. And the client's like, hey, I really love c, your highest priced

offer, but I have the budget for b. Mhmm.

We're not going to waffle, and we're not going to change our

prices to accommodate that. But if you're open to it and

something that we've done in the past too, is, like, where could you change your

deliverables? Mhmm. You're not doing more work for

less. You're doing an a commensurate amount of work for the price

that they're able to pay. Or, hey. Like, let's have a chat about that. Like,

what what are you wanting from this package? It's so important. Like, where can we

be meeting this rather than just compromising yourself and

your values. And then I think it's really

easy. I know it's happened to me in the past to feel resentment. Right? Because

you've done this, and then you're sitting over here in the background, like, grumbling instead

of just having stood your ground and maybe they end up walking as a client.

But then they're not the right client for you. You don't need to compromise your

values, your services, your offerings, and

it's so tempting sometimes,

especially when you're first coming into booking season for the year, and you're like, we're

gonna do this, and you get someone that's like, well, my budget is this, but

I want that. Yes. Care for options.

Yes. Preach. I talked about this recently on on an Instagram,

reel because there are so many people pleasing behaviors that we

do, and I think women, especially, like, gender definitely has an impact on the

way that we behave with our clients. We will interact with our

clients in a way, like, they'll ask for a discount, and we'll say yes because

we feel like we have to or because it's uncomfortable for us to say no.

And then we get ourselves. We show up to the session, and we're like, I

don't even wanna be here right now. It's a beautiful Saturday in October. I

could be with my friends having wine at the local winery right now. I could

be with my family and kids picking pumpkins in the pumpkin patch. And I didn't

even need this because I'm working 25 other days in October. But

I said yes to this client that's not even paying my full rate. Mhmm. And

now I feel crappy about it because I shouldn't even

have taken it on in the first place. So we feel resentment towards our client

when instead we should be feeling grateful because we're picking clients that align with

our values. We're picking clients that are that see the value in us and are

willing to pay our rates. And, you know, not every client is able to do

that. And there are times when we could be flexible and compromise if we feel

like the situation allows for it. But when we continually

do these people pleasing behaviors and then we're struggling to make

ends meet in our business or we're more burned out because we're taking on more

than we should have, that's on us. And so one thing that I like to

say a lot is it's not our client's fault that we're burned out.

It's not our client's fault we're overbooked. It's our fault. And,

you know, there's a part of it that just is comes with the territory of

when you first start a business and you start getting more and more popular

and people are booking you, and then you kinda have to reach that enough point

before you realize you need to scale back. And then you have to have somebody

who can help you learn how how to do that in a way where you

can still make the income that you need. But at a certain point,

we have to stop going through the cycle burnout every

fall and blaming our clients and posting these

passive aggressive stories on Instagram. You guys, I'm working,

like, 12 days straight with no day off. I'm editing till 2

AM, and I'm doing things as fast as I can. I've been sick, and

I'm still working. Like, I see these. I've already started to see them this

fall. And And it makes me so upset because we're making our clients feel bad

and pity us like we're the tortured artist when, really, we

chose that for ourselves.

Right?

Right? There's so many things that we could have done to prevent the situation.

And if it's happening to you every year in your business, the one common

denominator

is you. Exactly. I I know. Yeah. The the resentment is so

real. And I had kind of a a come to Jesus in my own business,

I don't know, 5 years ago where I was like, oh, my God. This is

a me problem. Like, I'm allowing this to continue to happen.

It's no one else's fault. Right? I set my prices.

They accept them, or I accept what we're you know, we've agreed upon.

I can't hold it against them because I'm resentful, and the same thing

happened with, like, raising prices. Yeah. I may like, I had clients that

were at, you know, x rates. I think we see it happen too with, like,

old clients that come back and, like, your prices have changed, your scope that has

changed, and you might feel some sort of way about where your prices are

now. You know, maybe it was someone that paid you when you first prep started,

and it was $1200. And you don't work for anything less than 5,000

now. Yeah. Okay. You get to

be strong in that, and you get to stand up for that. Because if you

and this is where I see people, like, automatically discount. But, yes, of

all the shit that comes about. Right? There is nothing worse than

when I started raising prices, changing package offerings, I had a couple of

clients that I left at, like, a grandfathered price rate. Mhmm. And that's when my

come to Jesus was I was resentful. I was irritated. I was

bitter. They had done nothing

wrong Right. In the slightest. And guess what? We had

conversations that weren't always the most fun,

and 1 or 2 of them left. And we made some package changes, and

we makes made some adjustments, and I loved working with them

again. Mhmm. That was, like, my biggest

moment of being like, okay. So anytime we look to change packages,

pricing, etcetera, everyone within their

contract window gets updated because it is so easy for that

resentment to build and to fester when, like,

you create this. Like, you set the situation. Right. You have the capacity to

modify it. Like, can we please just be doing that? Yeah. And

it hurts. It's humbling to you know, if somebody tells you,

I I just don't have the budget for this, but also separating

that from our worth, right, and saying, you know, it's

not that they don't think that I'm a great photographer or a great business owner.

They probably still follow you and reach out to work with you again because

they think they they recognize the growth and they still enjoy

connecting with you, but it might just not be in their budget. And

that's understandable. Like, I'm a photographer, and there's photographers who are out of

my budget. I love their work, and I I know that they're worth what they

charge as far as their services, but it might just not

be in my budget. And that's okay, and that could be something I save up

for in the future. I'll say, hey. I'm ready to splurge. I've been saving

for years to work with this person, and they might come back and do that,

and they might not. And that's okay because people have different priorities in our

lives, and we need to understand that that doesn't reflect on us

and our value as a person. But it it does hurt. It's hard to have

those difficult conversations when you do have recurring clients and you have to talk

about price increases. But, again, when you're feeling that resentment

in resentment inside because you know that something's off

off and that you're not feeling like you're making what your services are

worth, then it's worth having those difficult conversations instead of

continuing a relationship that is going to sour because of those

feelings you're having. Right. It's like the pain of feeling stagnant is

greater than the pain of the potential change, conflict, confrontation,

you know, anything. It'll just be a conversation. It doesn't have to be conflict or

confrontation, but I think we make up everything that goes along with that.

It's, I think, so powerful to have these conversations around

money and around pricing, especially, because

it's so easy, I think, to feel like you have impostor syndrome issues popping

up or anything else popping up. But the other thing too, and I I I

don't remember where I read this, but it was years ago, and I've seen

it come true for myself. Everyone's pricing

doesn't need to be reflective of what your services are. Like, your your pricing, their

budget, like, all of that. There's a certain clientele for

certain price points, styles, personalities,

etcetera. Right? Within that, I wouldn't

work with a photographer that charged too little in my opinion,

but too little is subject to my interpretation.

Yes. Just like I wouldn't work with someone that was necessarily way out

of my budget. I may make an exception for it in the future. I may

save. I might do whatever. Or the Caitlin of 2 years from now,

that photography that's out of budget may be what's considered my norm

or my baseline at that point. Mhmm. But it's so interesting to watch,

like, my comfort level or my, like, baseline

level and where it is year after year and how that changes.

And I I've watched it on the client side too because just because I've

watched mine change, so there's clients change at different methods, and

they can be a similar income level, but their tolerance or their expectation is

different. And so I think so many times we think that cheaper is better or

cheaper is more accessible. And it's not always depending on the clients that

you're working with because there's a perceived value that comes

with certain pricing, but it's subject to so many

different factors that the client's working with that, like, you may not be privy

to and the flightest. Yeah. That's definitely true

with photography as well because there are people who are posting on Facebook groups

like, I'm looking for a photographer under

$1,000 for a wedding day, and that's, for them, that's expensive.

Right? There's people, and that's their budget, and that's understandable.

But and they think that's, oh, I'm investing a lot of money in that photographer.

Photographer. But then that person was an inexperienced newbie or a

scammer who doesn't even show up on their wedding day, and that ended up costing

them more than if they invested in a tried and true photographer who is

dependable, has great reviews. And so some of those are experiences

that you learn with time that paying more,

not just for the product itself, but for the

care that you're going to get from that professional. And, for example, you

know, I limit how many bookings I take on so that I can take better

care of my clients. Of each client individually, I'm responsive to

them. I get their galleries turned around quickly, and I know I can

charge more for that versus somebody who's charging 2.50 a session

and or $1,000 for weddings, and they're taking on as many people as

they can. Those people are getting galleries late. They're getting excuses and

apologies on Instagram stories. They have a burned out

photographer who does not have time to enjoy their own life. And, personally,

I don't wanna work with people like that. I wouldn't hire somebody that I saw

doing that year after year who is basically just a

sad human who doesn't have time to take care of themselves. I wanna know that

I'm supporting somebody who is living their best

life. Absolutely. And I couldn't, yeah, I couldn't agree more. And I

think there may be a time and a place. Right?

If you're okay with having images

delayed, having deliveries delayed, knowing that you are one of many

instead of one of we're gonna say a handful. It's probably

a little bit bigger than a handful, but one of a small group. Yes.

I want the experience, and I'm willing to pay for the experience that comes with

being able to support someone that is able to actually make a living, and is

not the struggling, starving artist. I am over

paying people to be a a starving artist. Like, I

want you you do great work. Right? You like, you're in this because

you're talented, you're passionate, hopefully, even if you're, you

know, you're struggling with some burnout. You got into this because of that.

I want you to be able to make a good living from it. I want

you to be able to go take time, live your life, do all of the

things that I value so much in my business. Like, it would feel so hypocritical

to not support paying someone rates. But, again, this is where you

setting your rates. Yes. You need to be setting your rates

to support that and being able to articulate the like, these are our

rates. These are the clients. This is the experience we provide. Like, how much more

space did that give you to provide a stellar experience as well? Yes.

Because here's the thing too is, like, if you're charging super cheap prices, you're

taking on a high volume of clients. Maybe at the beginning, you

can keep up with it or, like, you know, when you first start start out

your 1st couple years, you're hustling and you're like, okay. This is just what I

have to do. But after a year or 2, it gets old.

And, you know, what once was really easy and you're like, okay. I can make

a quick buck by taking on more and more clients at a cheap rate, and

that's attractive to people. But then you soon you start to bring that

resentment to your clients. It comes across in your email responses to

them that are a week late. It comes across when you show up with the

with the drained expression where you don't have as much creativity.

So as much as we like to think that it doesn't affect us and we

can just keeping the cheap photographer, keeping the affordable business owner,

it's catching up to you in all sorts of ways. And if not in your

professional life, also in your personal life too. And that is a big thing

that so many people you know, a lot of people say, you know, I value

my family if you ask them. What's the most important thing to you? Family. But

how many times are they saying, well, I was gonna go to my kids' soccer

game today, but somebody needed help with a wedding last minute, and so I'm gonna

do it. And then you become the mom that's never at their kids' soccer games.

Or your family is like, well, we would have invited you, but we knew that

you probably had to work. You know, your family gets used to you working on

vacation. And that's no kind of life to have. Like, that's not the life that

I want for myself. And I think if a lot of us start to be

honest with ourselves, then we will start to acknowledge that we are

burned out, that we don't wanna live this way. We don't wanna be on this

cycle of burnout, but we don't know how to get off of that

roller coaster. Absolutely. What a fantastic,

like, segue into this. Yeah. If you

were to give any particular

takeaway or action step that someone listening right now who's

like, I don't know how to get off the roller coaster. I don't know how

to take that first step. What would you what advice would you

give them to take to be able to take that first step today?

I would say don't sacrifice the self care that will get you

through this season. I know that it the hard part of right

now, if you're looking at the rest of your calendar year, you're already overbooked.

It can be hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel. You're

like, I just have to get through this. And at this point, I'm recognizing that

I have a problem, and so this is gonna hurt going through this

season. But if you're in busy season right now

already, you know you're overbooked, then close out your calendar.

If you already if October is already looking busy for you, close out your calendar.

Get comfortable with saying no even if you have to just write a prewritten response

to your already booked. It's gonna hurt, but know that it's gonna be better for

your mental health if you say no. And saying no to overbooking means saying

yes to rest, to self care, to balance,

and prioritizing your life outside of your business, which is very important.

And I would also recommend try to outsource something either

personally or professionally. If you're already super overbooked and

overwhelmed, you can outsource something. You can outsource your calling and

editing if you're a photographer. You can outsource in your personal life, which might be

more cost effective in some cases. Hire somebody to, like, do meal

prep for you and your family or hire a babysitter so you can get extra

work done that you need to. There's so many things that you can hire

out that are not gonna cost you an exorbitant amount of money each

month if you can't afford that right now. So even just hiring

somebody to do a couple of basic you know, clean your house once a week

during busy seasons, that's one less thing on your mental load, is

gonna be helpful for you. If you have a partner, if you have kids who

are old enough that they can help out around the house, ask for support

so that you can take one more thing off of your plate.

Absolutely. I know that during our busy season, I have

meal services that deliver food, and then my husband does the cooking, and

it takes the guesswork out of it, and it's just taken care of. We're

fed. We don't have to think about it. We order for, like, 2 months

plus, and it is wonderful for

just hitting that baseline of making sure you're, like, you're nourished. Right? Because

it's so easy to just oh, I'm gonna have breakfast. Oh, I'm gonna grab

whatever I can grab. Oh, I'm gonna get Chipotle for the 7th time this week

on the way home. I mean, no judgment. Chipotle, but

yeah. We get so old here.

Yeah. We see so many of our clients,

and there there are transactions going on. And there's a lot of there's a lot

of Chipotle. We all I think like, the wedding industry

loves Chipotle, and it always gives me a little chuckle when I'm

like, Okay. Yep. Yep. I could I could tell what

someone does just by looking through their receipts sometimes on,

like, the food side of things. So I

love that. Now, Joanna, you had

a special offer that we're gonna make sure we're linking in

here. Mhmm. And we also have your social,

but if anyone wants to find you, Instagram is the best place.

Yes. And you're on there as?

At balance not burnout photographers. Wonderful.

And anyone

I am I'm so glad that we had this conversation. It was so nice to

hear someone else saying, like, know your numbers. Yeah. And

so it's so rare. I just feel like I am some broken record over here,

like, sitting in the background. Like, I know it's not sexy, but it made such

a big difference. It can be sexy. Like, let's just

let's just pay attention and, like, help prevent

the rampant burnout or repair, recover

the rampant burnout that we're seeing across so many industries, but especially in the

wedding industry, and teaching. I mean, we

have 2 teachers on our 2 forward teachers on our team now who just

burnt out and couldn't do it. My sister's a teacher. It's exhausting.

Like, we're seeing it in so many industries. So thank you so much

for being here. It's really meant the world to be able to have this discussion.

Yes. Thank you so much. And I love that you're, you know, educating other

business owners, not only on finances, but talking about these important conversations

about our mental health, about burnout, and that there is hope for people.

And that's the last thing I wanna leave off with is you can prevent burnout

in the future in your business. Even if you're in it right now, there's ways

to get through it, and there are people who can support you. And I love

that on social media now, we're seeing so many great posts about supporting

mental health. And my true passion is

helping people to live a life you enjoy outside of your business.

Even if it doesn't seem like it's possible for you right now, it is possible

with a little bit of planning and strategy. So thank you again for having me

and being able to share about this. Absolutely. Thank you.

That's a wrap for this episode of the Wealth Witches podcast. I hope our

magical money talks have left you feeling empowered and inspired.

Remember, wealth isn't just about dollars in the bank. It's about abundance and

financial freedom in all aspects of your life. I'm Caitlin Magnuson

encouraging you to keep challenging the status quo and embrace your inner witch on

this financial journey. Until next time, stay magical.

Hey there, magical listener. Are you ready to take your financial journey to the next

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