You may have just finished editing all of your fall weddings and sent them off to your clients and now you’re wondering how to maximize the off-season as a wedding photographer.

The first thing I would suggest when trying to figure out how to maximize the off-season as a wedding photographer is to take 2 weeks off. I don’t mean neglect your emails or DMs but just book 2 weeks off with no photo sessions.

1. Clean/Service your camera + lenses

I did this at the end of last season because I started to see some specks of dust in photos and I wasn’t able to clean it away myself. So I contacted Canon (the brand I shoot with) and sent both my camera bodies and all my lenses away to be services and professionally cleaned.

If you are electronically saavy and confident, there are lots of videos on YouTube on how to do this yourself but I am not one of those saavy people so I sent mine off.

2. Transfer Files

All year, I use one of my 2TB LaCie USB external hard drives to store all of my images and backup images. At the end of the season, I transfer all of those files onto a Western Digital My Book Desktop Hard Drive with either a 4TB or 6TB storage. I then label what I put on that external hard drive and will keep them for up to ten years. So yes, I still have external hard drives from when I first started my photography career back in 2015.

This way, I am able to free up space on the more portable LaCie external hard drives and have the ease of mind that all of the sessions from past years are safely stored.

3. Service Computer/Laptop

I never used to do this, but I am now on my 4th iMac Desktop and as the season comes to an end, my computer becomes very slow and like I said earlier, I am less than electronically saavy so I will take it to a computer place and get them to look it over and make sure it’s not going to die on me halfway through a season.

4. Education

I am constantly investing in my business. I am part of an amazing community called Social Curator that I pay a monthly subscription to which helps me with all things social media. From caption templates, Reel ideas, weekly group coaching, and SO much more!

Last year, I took a course from Jenna Kutcher called The Pinterest Lab because I was so clueless when it came to Pinterest. I also invested in a year subscription to Gemma Bonham-Carter’s Passive Project which helped me with SO many aspects of my business, it was insane.

The other thing I like to do, is go through courses that I’ve purchased in years past to keep everything relevant and fresh in my mind.

5. Set Goals

Yes, I am one of these people who writes down their monthly and yearly goals. It goes back to my upbringing when my Dad would make me write them out. He always said “If you can’t see it, you won’t believe it, and then you’ll never achieve it”. Pretty dang wise lol. So I now write them down, look at them, and more often then not, achieve them!

6. Plan the Year

This kind of goes hand-in-hand with setting goals but it’s a bit more specific. It’s how I am going to actually achieve those goals and what things need to happen in order to get there.

My assistant and I just spent a few hours planning out the month of January and I filled out 6 months worth of blog post topics. This way we can stay organized and on top of things without falling behind.

I really hope that this gives you some actionable steps for this upcoming off-season in your business. If you liked this post, you may enjoy reading 11 Best Apps for Photographers.

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