If you’ve been working as a photographer or videographer for any amount of time, you already know the cycle. Book a client, do the work, deliver, get paid, start over. The busy months feel great. The slow months are terrifying. And no matter how good your work is, you’re always one dry spell away from stress.
There’s a better way to build a creative business, and most photographers never discover it: retainer clients.
A retainer is a monthly agreement where a business pays you a set amount for ongoing content creation — photography, video, or both. Instead of chasing new clients every month, you build relationships with businesses that need fresh visual content on a regular basis. They get consistency and quality. You get predictable income and the ability to actually plan your life.
I’ve been a professional photographer for over 20 years. I’ve shot weddings, conferences, commercial work, real estate, and content for local businesses. The retainer model didn’t just change how much money I made — it changed how I felt about my business entirely. Once my recurring revenue covered my base living expenses, the stress I’d been carrying for years physically left.
This guide covers everything you need to know to build a retainer-based photography and video business: why it works, how to prepare for it, how to find clients, how to price and structure your services, how to close the deal, and how to keep clients long-term.
If you’re looking for a broader overview of growing a photography business across multiple strategies, I wrote a companion article that covers that: How to Grow Your Photography Business. This guide goes deep on the single strategy I believe has the most potential to transform your income as a creative: retainers.
Why the Traditional Photography Business Model Is Broken
The traditional photography business runs on one-off transactions. A client hires you for a shoot, you deliver the photos or video, they pay you, and the relationship is effectively over until — or unless — they need you again.
This model has several fundamental problems that become more painful the longer you work as a photographer.
Income Is Unpredictable
You might make $8,000 one month and $1,200 the next. There’s no way to forecast your income with any reliability, which makes everything harder — budgeting, planning, investing in equipment, and simply sleeping at night. When I was shooting weddings, the summer and fall were packed with bookings. But surviving winter could get genuinely stressful. January through March I’d watch the bank account drain, hoping inquiries would pick back up before things got tight.
You’re Always Starting Over
Every completed job puts you back at zero. You have to market yourself, network, follow up on leads, and convince new people to trust you — over and over again. The time and energy you spend finding clients often rivals the time you spend doing the actual work.
Your Business Is Fragile
If a single external event disrupts your pipeline, you’re in trouble. I experienced this twice. In 2008, the financial crisis killed six of my 38 booked weddings and dried up new inquiries. Then COVID eliminated the conference photography work I’d been doing consistently for 12 years. Both times, income I was counting on vanished because of something entirely outside my control.
There’s a Natural Ceiling
In a one-off model, your income is directly tied to the number of jobs you can physically complete. There are only so many weekends in a year, only so many hours in a week. If you want to earn more, you either raise prices (which has limits in any market) or work more (which leads to burnout).
The retainer model addresses every one of these problems.
What a Retainer Actually Is (And What It Isn’t)
There’s confusion in the photography world about what “retainer” means. Some photographers use the term to describe the nonrefundable booking fee they collect to hold a date for a wedding or event. That’s not what we’re talking about here.
A content retainer is an ongoing monthly agreement where you serve as a business’s dedicated visual content creator. You’re not just a photographer they hire when they need one. You’re their content partner — someone who understands their brand, plans their visual content needs, creates that content on a regular schedule, and delivers assets they can use across their marketing channels.
A retainer is not a discount for repeat bookings. It’s a fundamentally different service. In a one-off relationship, the client tells you what they want, you create it, and you’re done. In a retainer relationship, you’re embedded in their business. You’re proactively identifying content opportunities, planning shoots, executing them, and delivering assets that serve their ongoing marketing goals.
This distinction matters because it changes how you position yourself, how you price your services, and how valuable you become to the client.
Why You Should Be a Hybrid Shooter
Before we go further, let’s talk about the single biggest thing you can do to maximize your value as a retainer content creator: shoot both photo and video.
Businesses in 2026 don’t just need photos. They need short-form video for Instagram Reels and TikTok. They need video clips for their website. They need behind-the-scenes footage for Stories. They need product videos for e-commerce listings. And yes, they still need professional photography for their website, Google Business Profile, social media posts, email newsletters, and print materials.
If you only offer photography, a business has to hire you for photos and someone else for video. That’s two relationships to manage, two schedules to coordinate, two invoices to pay, and two different visual styles to try to make look cohesive. It’s a headache for the business owner.
If you offer both, you become the single solution for all of their visual content needs. You show up once, you capture both photo and video during the same session, and you deliver a complete content package. That’s enormously valuable and it justifies higher pricing.
If you’re primarily a photographer who hasn’t worked with video yet, the learning curve isn’t as steep as you think. You already understand composition, lighting, and storytelling. Modern mirrorless cameras shoot excellent video. Start simple — 15 to 30 second clips of the same subjects you’re already photographing. You don’t need to become a filmmaker. You need to be able to capture clean, well-lit video clips that a business can post to social media.
If you’re primarily a videographer who doesn’t do much photography, the same logic applies in reverse. Your retainer packages will be more valuable and harder to replace if you can also deliver professional stills alongside your video work.
The hybrid creator who delivers both photo and video in a single retainer package is positioned to earn significantly more and retain clients longer than someone who only offers one or the other.
What Local Businesses Actually Need
Understanding what businesses need — and why they’ll pay monthly for it — is the foundation of building a retainer business. Let’s break it down by what they’re trying to accomplish and what you’d be delivering.
Social Media Content
This is the number one need for most local businesses right now. Every business knows they should be posting to Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, or whatever platforms their customers use. Most of them are doing it badly or not at all because they don’t have the time, skills, or equipment to create professional visual content while also running their business.
A restaurant owner is busy running the kitchen. A salon owner is cutting hair. A gym owner is managing memberships and training clients. They don’t have time to pull out a camera, stage their product, shoot it, edit it, write a caption, and post it. And when they do try, the results usually look like what they are — an afterthought squeezed in between actual work.
You solve that problem entirely. You show up, capture a batch of photo and video content, and deliver ready-to-post assets. Their social media stays active and professional without them having to think about it.
Google Business Profile Content
This is one of the most overlooked opportunities. Google Business Profiles have become one of the most important tools for local businesses, especially as AI-powered search increasingly pulls information, images, and reviews directly from these profiles. Many businesses have either no photos on their profile or a single photo of the front of their building — which tells a potential customer nothing about the quality of what’s inside.
A restaurant with beautiful photos of their food in their Google Business Profile is going to attract more customers than one with just an exterior shot. A salon with images of their work, their space, and their team is going to build more trust than one with a stock photo. These are easy wins for your retainer clients.
Website Imagery
Many businesses built their website once and haven’t updated the photos since. They’ve added new products, new services, new team members, maybe even renovated their space — but their website still shows images from three years ago. Updated website photography is a natural part of an ongoing content retainer.
Product Photography for E-Commerce and Delivery Platforms
If your client sells products online — through their own website, Amazon, Etsy, Facebook Marketplace, or TikTok Shop — they need professional product photography. If they’re a restaurant on DoorDash, Uber Eats, or similar platforms, they need appetizing photos of their menu items. The businesses using phone photos for these platforms are leaving money on the table, and they often know it. They just haven’t found the right photographer to fix it.
Email Marketing and Print Collateral
Businesses that send newsletters, run email campaigns, or produce printed materials like menus, brochures, or direct mail pieces need fresh imagery regularly. A retainer that includes content for these channels adds another layer of value beyond just social media.
Internal and Employer Branding
This is increasingly relevant for mid-sized businesses. Companies use photography and video for recruitment, internal communications, team celebrations, and culture documentation. A retainer can include coverage of company events, team headshots, and workplace environment shots.
How to Prepare Your Business to Offer Retainers
You don’t need a perfect portfolio or a fancy website to start landing retainer clients, but you do need to be prepared. Here’s what to get in order before you start reaching out.
Build a Relevant Portfolio
You need examples of the type of work you’ll be doing for retainer clients. If you’ve done any commercial work, product photography, food photography, or social media content creation, pull together your best samples. If you haven’t done this type of work before, create some spec work. Visit a local business you like, ask if you can take a few photos in exchange for giving them the images for free, and use those as your portfolio pieces.
You don’t need dozens of examples. Five to ten strong images showing you can create the kind of content businesses need for social media and marketing is enough to start conversations.
Get Your Gear Ready
You don’t need a lot of equipment for retainer work, but you need to be able to deliver professional results consistently. A capable mirrorless or DSLR camera, a versatile lens (a 24-70mm zoom or a couple of prime lenses covers most situations), a basic lighting setup for product work (even a single speedlight and modifier), and a way to capture clean audio if you’re doing video with interview or voiceover elements.
Free Resource: Ditch Auto – Learn To Shoot In Manual Mode
If you’re adding video to your offerings, make sure you have a stabilizer or tripod for smooth footage and understand the basics of shooting video with your camera — frame rates, resolution, and audio capture.
Understand Your Costs
Before you can price retainers, you need to know what it actually costs you to do business. Factor in equipment depreciation, software subscriptions (editing, cloud storage, delivery platforms), insurance, transportation costs, taxes, and the time you spend on non-shooting tasks like communication, planning, editing, and delivery.
A common mistake is pricing retainers based only on shooting time. But a retainer includes planning the shoot, communicating with the client, traveling to their location, shooting, culling, editing, delivering, and potentially revising. If you price only for the hour behind the camera, you’ll undercharge and resent the work within a couple of months.
Create a Simple Proposal Template
You don’t need a printed brochure or a page on your website (in fact, I’d recommend against publishing retainer pricing on your website because every client’s needs are different). What you need is a clean proposal template that you can customize for each potential client.
A good proposal includes a brief description of the client’s content needs as you understand them, the deliverables you’ll provide each month, the pricing (I recommend offering three tiers — we’ll cover this in detail later), the term of the agreement, and the payment schedule.
I provide a sample retainer proposal for free as part of my workshop replay resources, which you can access at the end of this guide.
Set Up Your Workflow
Think through how you’ll manage multiple retainer clients. When will you schedule shoots? How will you deliver files? How will you handle feedback and revisions? What does communication look like between shoots?
For most retainer photographers, a monthly rhythm works well: a planning check-in at the beginning of the month, a scheduled shoot (or multiple shoots depending on the package), delivery within a set number of days after the shoot, and a brief feedback loop before the cycle repeats.
The more systematized this becomes, the more retainers you can manage without the administrative side becoming overwhelming.
How to Find Retainer Clients
Finding potential retainer clients is more systematic than you might think. It starts with auditing your local market to identify businesses that need visual content and aren’t getting it.
The Local Market Audit
Open Google Maps and look at the businesses in your area. Start with categories that have high content needs: restaurants, cafes, and coffee shops; salons, barbershops, and spas; gyms, yoga studios, and fitness centers; boutiques and retail shops; real estate offices; dental and medical practices; auto dealerships; breweries, wineries, and distilleries; hotels, lodges, and vacation rentals; and service-based businesses like contractors, landscapers, or cleaning companies.
For each business, check three things.
First, their Google Business Profile. How many photos do they have? Are the photos professional or clearly taken with a phone? Is the only image a shot of the building exterior? Businesses with sparse or low-quality Google Business Profile content have an immediate need you can fill.
Second, their social media. Go to their Instagram and Facebook pages. Are they posting consistently? Is the content quality good? When was their last post? If they haven’t posted in months or their content is clearly amateur, that’s a signal.
Third, their website. Are the images current and professional? Do they reflect what the business actually looks like today? Are there pages with missing images or obvious stock photography?
Scoring Opportunities
Not every business with bad photos is a good retainer prospect. You need to assess both the need and the ability to pay.
A high-opportunity prospect is a business that has been established for at least a couple of years, has a physical location and employees (indicating revenue and budget), is clearly active but has inconsistent or low-quality visual content, and operates in an industry where visual marketing directly impacts customer decisions.
A medium opportunity is a business that’s posting regularly but with mediocre content. They know they should be doing this — they’re trying — but the quality doesn’t match the quality of their actual product or service. These businesses often already understand the value of content; they just haven’t found the right person to create it.
A low opportunity is a business that either already has professional content (someone’s already serving them) or is too small or new to afford a retainer.
Where to Look Beyond Google Maps
Don’t limit yourself to digital scouting. Pay attention as you go about your daily life. The restaurant where you eat lunch that has terrible photos on DoorDash. The gym you work out at that posts blurry mirror selfies to Instagram. The boutique downtown with a gorgeous storefront but a website that looks like 2015.
Also look at local business groups, chambers of commerce, and networking events. These are gathering places for business owners who are actively thinking about growing their businesses — which means they’re more likely to be receptive to a conversation about content creation.
Leveraging Your Existing Network
If you’ve done any photography work at all, you have past clients, contacts, and acquaintances who might need retainer services or know someone who does. A past wedding client who now runs a small business. A friend who opened a restaurant. A local business you’ve frequented for years and have a rapport with the owner.
These warm connections are easier to approach and more likely to trust you than a cold outreach to a stranger.
How to Price Your Retainer Packages
Pricing retainers is both an art and a science. You need to cover your costs and earn a fair income while also offering a price point that makes sense for the businesses you’re targeting.
The Three-Tier Approach
I recommend building custom proposals with three pricing tiers for each potential client. Here’s why this works: when presented with three options, people tend to gravitate toward the middle one. The top tier shows them what’s possible and makes the middle feel reasonable. The bottom tier serves as a starting point for clients who are cautious or budget-constrained.
Starter Tier: $500 to $1,000 per Month
This is for small local businesses with basic content needs. A typical starter package might include one shoot per month lasting one to two hours, delivery of 20 to 30 edited photos, three to five short video clips (15 to 30 seconds each), and basic content planning.
This tier works well for small restaurants, cafes, independent retail shops, and service businesses that need to maintain an active social media presence but don’t need a high volume of content.
Mid Tier: $1,000 to $2,000 per Month
This is the sweet spot for most retainer relationships. A mid-tier package might include one to two shoots per month totaling three to four hours, delivery of 25 to 45 edited photos, six to ten short video clips, content strategy input (helping them plan what to shoot and when), and optimization for multiple platforms (social media, website, Google Business Profile).
This tier is appropriate for established restaurants, salons, gyms, boutiques, professional service firms, and any business that’s serious about their visual marketing.
Premium Tier: $2,000 to $3,000+ per Month
This is for larger businesses or those with aggressive content goals. A premium package might include multiple shoots per month, 40 or more edited photos, 10 to 15 or more video clips including longer-form content, comprehensive content strategy and planning, social media posting management (an upsell beyond just creating the content), and coverage of events or special promotions.
My first small retainers were around $300 a month for a few months at a time. The retainer that changed everything was $2,400 a month for product photography and social media content creation — that relationship lasted four years. Start where you’re comfortable, deliver exceptional value, and your pricing will naturally increase as you build confidence and a track record.
Pricing Principles
Price based on the value of what you’re delivering, not just the time you spend shooting. A business that pays you $1,500 a month for content that helps them attract new customers and stay competitive is getting enormous value relative to what they’d spend hiring a marketing agency or a full-time employee.
Don’t discount your retainer pricing to win clients. A retainer already represents good value for the client because they get consistency, a dedicated content partner who knows their brand, and professional work at a lower per-session cost than one-off bookings. You don’t need to discount on top of that.
Factor in all your time, not just shooting. Planning, communication, travel, editing, and delivery all count. If a starter retainer takes you six hours per month total (including everything, not just shooting), and you charge $750, that’s $125 per hour — which is reasonable for professional creative work.
Contract Terms and Payment
For new retainer relationships, I recommend starting with a one-month trial followed by a three-month, six-month, or one-year commitment. The trial gives both sides a chance to see if the relationship works without a long-term commitment. After the trial, the longer commitment gives you income stability and gives the client a reason to commit (you can offer a slightly better rate for longer terms if you choose to).
Collect payment at the beginning of each month, before the work begins. This is standard practice for retainer relationships across every industry. Use a simple agreement that outlines deliverables, pricing, payment terms, usage rights (the client should have full rights to use the content you create for them across their marketing channels), and the term of the agreement.
How to Close the Deal
You’ve identified a prospect, you understand their needs, and you know what you’d charge. Now you need to start a conversation and convert it into a signed agreement.
Making First Contact
The most effective approach for local businesses is to walk in and introduce yourself. This feels intimidating, but it’s the most direct path to a conversation with a decision-maker.
Your introduction should include who you are, a specific observation about their content (not a generic pitch), and an offer to show them examples. Something like: “Hi, I’m a local photographer and videographer. I noticed your Google Business Profile only has a couple of photos and your social media hasn’t been updated recently. I help businesses like yours create professional content that keeps your marketing fresh without you having to think about it. Can I show you a few examples of what I’ve done?”
If in-person outreach isn’t your style, send a DM or email. The same principles apply: be specific about what you noticed, be brief, and include two to three examples of relevant work.
The key is specificity. Saying “I noticed your Instagram hasn’t been updated since October and your DoorDash menu photos could be refreshed” is infinitely more effective than “I’m a photographer and I can help with your content.” The first shows you’ve done homework and understand their business. The second is generic and easily ignored.
Leading with a Trial
Don’t lead with your full retainer pricing. Lead with a trial — one shoot that gives them a taste of what ongoing content creation would look like.
Depending on the situation, this trial might be paid (if the prospect clearly sees the need and is ready to invest) or complimentary (if you want to build a relationship with a business you believe has strong retainer potential but needs convincing). In either case, frame it as: “Let me do one shoot for you. I’ll create enough content for a week or two of social media posts. If you love it, we can talk about doing this monthly.”
This removes all risk from the prospect’s perspective. It also gives you a portfolio piece you can use regardless of whether they become a retainer client.
The Proposal Meeting
Once a prospect has seen your work and expressed interest in ongoing content creation, present them with a custom proposal. Walk them through the three tiers, explain what each includes, and recommend the one you think is the best fit for their needs (usually the middle tier).
Let them ask questions. Address concerns about cost by framing the value: “If this content helps you attract even two or three additional customers per month, the retainer pays for itself. And you’re getting professional content handled for you so you can focus on running your business.”
Don’t rush the close. Some businesses will sign on the spot. Others need a few days to think about it. Follow up once after a few days if you haven’t heard back. Be professional, not pushy.
Handling Objections
The most common objection is price. When a business says your retainer is too expensive, it usually means one of two things: they don’t fully understand the value, or the specific tier you proposed doesn’t fit their budget.
For the first scenario, reframe the cost in terms of what they’re currently spending (or losing) by not having professional content. A restaurant that loses even a few customers per month because their online presence is weak is already paying more than your retainer would cost — they’re just paying it in lost revenue instead of investment in growth.
For the second scenario, that’s why you have three tiers. If the mid-tier is too much, the starter tier gets them started. Getting a client at $500 per month is better than no client at all, and many starter-tier clients eventually upgrade once they see results.
How to Deliver and Keep Clients Long-Term
Landing the retainer is only the beginning. Keeping clients month after month — and year after year — is where the real value of this business model lives.
Overdeliver in the First Month
Your first month sets the tone for the entire relationship. Go above and beyond. Deliver more than they expect. Be easy to work with. Communicate proactively. The goal is to make them think “I can’t believe I didn’t do this sooner.”
Learn Their Business
The longer you work with a retainer client, the better you understand their brand, their products, their customers, and what content resonates. Use that knowledge. Bring ideas to them instead of waiting to be told what to shoot. The moment you start proactively suggesting content that drives results for their business, you become irreplaceable.
Create a Content Calendar
Work with each client to plan content at least a month ahead. What products or services do they want to highlight? Are there seasonal promotions or events coming up? Are there new menu items, team members, or offerings to showcase?
A simple shared document or even a monthly email thread where you align on the upcoming month’s content makes the process smooth and ensures the shoots are productive.
Track and Share Results
If you can show a client that their social media engagement increased, their Google Business Profile views went up, or they received positive customer feedback about their online presence since you started, you dramatically increase the chances they’ll renew and potentially upgrade their package.
You don’t need fancy analytics. Even simple observations like “your last three Instagram posts got twice the engagement of your average posts before we started” are powerful retention tools.
Communicate Consistently
Don’t go silent between shoots. Check in with clients regularly. Send a brief recap after each delivery. Ask how the content performed. Share any observations or ideas you had between sessions.
The goal is for the client to feel like you’re a part of their team, not just a vendor who shows up once a month. That emotional connection is what keeps retainer relationships going for years.
Know When to Raise Prices
As you deliver more value and the relationship deepens, there will come a natural point where a price increase is appropriate. Maybe you’ve been at $750 per month for a year and you’re now delivering more than you originally agreed to. Maybe the client’s business has grown and their content needs have expanded.
Be transparent about it. Frame it around the increased value you’re providing and the expanded scope of work. Most clients who are happy with your work will accept a reasonable increase rather than risk losing you and having to start over with someone new.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
Underpricing to Win Clients
It’s tempting to offer rock-bottom pricing to land your first retainer. Resist this. A retainer priced too low will feel like a burden rather than an opportunity because you’ll resent the work relative to the pay. Price fairly from the start.
Not Having a Written Agreement
Even with the friendliest client, get everything in writing. Deliverables, pricing, payment terms, usage rights, and the length of the agreement. This protects both of you and prevents misunderstandings.
Taking On Too Many Retainers Too Fast
Each retainer requires time for planning, shooting, editing, delivering, and communicating. Before taking on a new client, honestly assess whether you have the capacity. It’s better to have four retainer clients you serve excellently than eight you serve poorly.
Doing Only What They Ask For
If you only create what the client specifically requests, you’re behaving like a one-off photographer with a recurring invoice. The value of a retainer content partner is that you bring ideas, spot opportunities, and proactively create content that the client wouldn’t have thought to ask for. That’s what makes you irreplaceable.
Neglecting Your Own Marketing
Once you have a few retainers generating steady income, it’s easy to get comfortable and stop marketing yourself. Don’t. Retainers can end — businesses close, budgets get cut, ownership changes. Always be nurturing your pipeline so you’re never caught off guard.
The Math That Changes Everything
Let’s make this concrete.
If you land three retainer clients at an average of $1,000 per month, that’s $3,000 per month in predictable recurring revenue — $36,000 per year. Add a fourth at $1,500 per month, and you’re at $4,500 per month or $54,000 per year. Layer in one premium client at $2,400 per month, and your recurring base is $6,900 per month or $82,800 per year.
That’s before any one-off bookings, additional projects, or other photography income. Your retainers cover your base living expenses. Everything else is upside.
Now compare that to the traditional model where you need to book 50 or 60 individual jobs per year just to make the same income, with zero guarantee that any of those jobs will materialize.
The retainer model doesn’t just pay better. It lets you breathe.
Get Started: Free Workshop, Proposal Template, and Course
If you’re serious about implementing the retainer model in your photography or video business, I’ve put together a free resource package to help you take action.
It includes the full replay of my live workshop “From Sporadic Bookings to Recurring Revenue,” where I walk through the retainer framework, demonstrate a live local market audit using Google Maps, and help photographers identify specific opportunities in their areas. You’ll also get a sample retainer proposal that you can customize for your own clients, and free access to my How To Start A Photography Business course.
Access everything here: https://jeradhillphoto.com/l/sporadic-bookings-recurring-revenue/
Frequently Asked Questions
What’s the difference between a retainer and a repeat client?
A repeat client hires you when they need something. There’s no commitment, no schedule, and no guaranteed income. A retainer is a formal monthly agreement with defined deliverables and consistent payment. The retainer guarantees the client your availability and attention, and it guarantees you predictable income.
How many retainer clients can one photographer realistically handle?
It depends on the scope of each retainer and how efficient your workflow is. Most solo photographers and videographers can comfortably manage four to six retainer clients alongside occasional one-off work. If your retainers are smaller in scope, you might handle more. The key is to never take on more than you can serve well.
What if I don’t have experience with commercial or business photography?
You don’t need years of commercial experience. You need to be able to create clean, professional photos and video clips that a business can use for social media and marketing. If you can shoot a well-lit product photo, capture an appealing image of food or an interior space, and record a steady 15-second video clip, you have enough skill to start. Your first retainer will teach you more than any course could.
Should I offer retainers to businesses in my niche or any business?
Start with businesses where your existing skills are most relevant. If you shoot food photography, restaurants and cafes are natural targets. If you do portraits, salons and real estate offices might be a good fit. But don’t limit yourself unnecessarily — the skills that make you a good photographer transfer across industries. A well-composed photo of a product is a well-composed photo regardless of whether it’s a cocktail or a pair of shoes.
What if a client wants to cancel after the first month?
That’s why you start with a trial. If the trial goes well and they sign a multi-month agreement, you have a commitment. If a client wants to cancel mid-agreement, your written contract should address this — typically requiring them to honor the remaining term or pay an early termination fee. In practice, if you’re delivering good work and communicating well, cancellations are rare.
Do I give the client full rights to the images and videos?
For retainer work, yes — include full usage rights as part of the agreement. The client is paying you monthly to create content for their business, and they need to be able to use that content freely across all their marketing channels. This is different from event photography or fine art, where licensing models might apply. For retainer content creation, simple and clear usage rights build trust and remove friction.
Can I do retainer work remotely, or does it have to be local?
Most retainer work is local because it involves being on-site to photograph products, spaces, people, and events. However, if a client primarily needs product photography and can ship products to you, or if they need content that can be created in your own studio, remote retainers are possible. That said, the easiest retainers to land are with businesses in your immediate area.
How do I handle it when a client wants more work than the retainer covers?
This is a good problem to have. When a client’s needs exceed the scope of the retainer, present it as an opportunity: “I’m happy to cover that — it falls outside our current agreement, so I’d add it as a one-time project fee of $X, or we could upgrade your retainer to include this type of work monthly.” Always handle scope expansion with transparency and clear pricing.
What if I’m a videographer who doesn’t do much photography?
You’re in a strong position because video is in extremely high demand. But adding photography to your retainer offerings — even basic product or social media stills — makes your package significantly more valuable. Most businesses need both, and being the one person who delivers everything is a major competitive advantage. The photography skills needed for retainer content are well within reach for any competent videographer.
How long does it take to land the first retainer client?
This varies widely, but if you’re actively auditing your local market and reaching out to prospects, landing your first retainer within 30 to 60 days of starting outreach is realistic. Some photographers land one within their first week of trying. The key variable is how quickly you start reaching out. Every day you spend perfecting your website or designing a pricing guide instead of talking to actual business owners is a day you’re not getting closer to your first retainer.
