The Beginner Photography Podcast

Build a Social Media Strategy That Works for Photographers with Angela Shae

• Raymond Hatfield

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#544 Angela Shae is a Wedding photographer turned social media expert. She discusses her early interest in photography, the pressure she felt to pursue a more traditional career, and her eventual decision to follow her passion. She candidly reflects on the difficulties she faced due to lacking technical knowledge initially and the pivotal moments that led her to mastery and success in the industry. The conversation delves into her transition from photography to creating "Social Templates," her innovative solution for helping photographers manage social media more efficiently while reflecting on the balance between personal life and professional pursuits.

KEY TOPICS COVERED

  1. Angela's Journey into Photography - Angela describes her spontaneous decision to pursue photography over a traditional career in the medical field. She outlines the challenges of initially lacking technical skills and how mentorship and practical experience helped her overcome this.
  2. Navigating Parenthood and Professional Life - Angela shares her struggle to balance being a young mother of two while maintaining a thriving photography business, highlighting the pressures and strategies she employed to manage both roles.
  3. Social Media Strategy and Reels - The episode culminates in Angela detailing her creation of "Social Templates" to assist photographers in navigating social media trends, particularly focusing on the value of Instagram Reels for reaching a broader audience.

IMPORTANT DEFINITIONS & CONCEPTS

  • Social Templates: A tool created by Angela to streamline the process of creating engaging social media content, particularly Instagram Reels, ensuring photographers can maintain a consistent online presence.

DISCUSSION & REFLECTION QUESTIONS

  1. How can photographers find a balance between following their passion and meeting practical life obligations?
  2. What are the potential pitfalls of turning a passion into a profession, and how can one mitigate them?
  3. In what ways can social media tools like Social Templates help streamline photographers' marketing efforts?

RESOURCES:

Grab a free month of Social Templates with Code BPP - https://beginnerphotopod.com/reels
Follow Angela Shae on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/angelashae_/

Learn What Camera Settings to Use in our free guide!
https://perfectcamerasettings.com/

Sign up for your free CloudSpot Account today at www.DeliverPhotos.com

Connect with Raymond!


Thanks for listening & keep shooting!

Angela Shae:

As business owners, there needs to be clear boundaries, between like work hours, client communications, how much you shoot, setting time aside for personal time. I think that's probably if I could talk to younger photographers, that are just starting out or maybe not younger, just like people that are transitioning from hobby into business is to have boundaries that won't make them burn out.

Raymond Hatfield:

Hey, welcome to the beginner photography podcast. I'm your host, Raymond Hatfield. And today we're chatting with wedding photographer and owner of social templates, Angela Shea, about creating a social media strategy that will attract raving fans, but first the beginner photography podcast brought to you by cloud spot, sell your photos through prints products, and of course, digitals, you can set up a storefront in minutes and start earning more with every gallery you deliver. So grab your free forever account over at deliverphotos. com and only upgrade when you are ready. If you follow me on social media, you probably already know that I'm not great at it. I tend to overthink everything. I mean, what to post, where to post it, how to actually make an impact instead of just chasing followers. But at Imaging USA, Taylor Jackson introduced me to Angela Shea, and within minutes, I knew that she had this social media thing figured out. Not only does she really understand the roles of the different platforms, but she explained it to me in a way that, well, it just made sense. And since then, I have been making an effort to post more on Instagram stories. And to my surprise, it has been a bit easier than I expected. It's even sparked some, like, real, fun conversations. One of the things that I love to do is go to new restaurants and try out their nachos. So I started posting some of them on my Instagram stories, and surprise, surprise, y'all started sharing with me some of your favorite nacho spots. What does that have to do with photography? Uh, nothing. And that's okay. My rebuttal before would have been, What does this have to do with photography? And how is this helpful? But Angela shared something with me that really changed perspective, and you'll hear about it in today's episode. Now, as I mentioned earlier, Angela is the founder of Social Templates, and, Social Templates is, it's a game changer of a tool for photographers, that offers customizable, done for you, Instagram real templates, that are designed to get more eyes on your work. Now, before trying out Social Templates for myself, and then later actually signing up for it, I struggled to know the difference between, a reel and a story, and any time I tried to make a reel, it took forever to edit, anything decent. And then at the end of the day, it's like, wait, I got into photography because I like to take photos, not spend hours on editing videos that, will probably only last for 15 minutes in this social landscape. But I think social templates, for me has completely changed that. Because now you can create these really beautiful, polished, beat matching reels. And what I'm about to say here, I don't take lightly. You can create them And I thought in the beginning, maybe there'd be like, 20 or 30 different templates that you have to just keep reusing. And, but no, like Angela is uploading new templates, uh, with trending audio every single week. So there's always something new. So in today's episode, Angela is going to break down how to build an easy and effective social media strategy, whether you're in business or just shooting for fun, how to identify and then connect with your target audience. And how to leverage Instagram Reels and Stories to grow your presence and attract those new fans of your work. If you want to step up your social media game, if you really want to get into Reels, As you'll hear from this interview, reels are really at the cornerstone of what Angela believes a photographer's social strategy should be. So if you want to check out social templates, you can, use my link by heading to beginnerphotopod. com forward slash reels. beginnerphotopod. com forward slash reels. R E E L S. They'll take you to a page where you can sign up and just try it for 30 days for free. So again, if you're listening and you're interested and you think, Hey, maybe there's something that I want to check out, beginnerphotopod. com forward slash reels to try it out for yourself. All right, let's get into this interview with Angela Shea. Angela, my first question for you is, when did you know that photography was first going to play an important role in your life?

Angela Shae:

Oh man, that's a hard one. I think since I was a child, I wanted to take pictures and be in pictures. we back when we had, the little point and shoot that you would develop at Walmart. we would set up backdrops at home with my sisters and we would just like shoot a ton. And then in I was applying to be a dental assistant, for like the program and I was walking to the dean's office to submit all my paperwork and literally like it was like a movie scene I like stopped halfway and I was like, there's absolutely no way I could be a dental assistant. Like this is not happening And didn't submit my application. I had all the prereqs done around and went and took a Photography elective class just for fun

Raymond Hatfield:

What? Why?

Angela Shae:

I just it was always such a creative person and my parents really wanted me in the medical field and I just like Could not even

Raymond Hatfield:

Mm.

Angela Shae:

that stuff. And I was the first oldest child of four. And so I had, I felt like I had to like live out my parents dreams, and do like all these things that they wished for me. We were also an immigrant family, first generation. So there's like a lot of pressure there. And so when I went into graphic design, I actually ended up applying for a graphic design program. And, like, I didn't, I couldn't even afford a camera. The instructor was so kind and just lent me his own camera. there was this class of 30 people and I was the only person that couldn't afford a camera. And he was like, here, use mine. And so then I just, I've never, like, not, wanted to shoot since then. Well, no, that's not true. Later, if I share my story, I'll tell you. But from then on, I like jumped into photography headfirst, launched my business at 19. started shooting like senior portraits for, cause I was really young. So like all my sister's friends needed senior portraits and then a few of them ended up like getting married really early. So I like shot their weddings and it just kind of like snowballed really quickly so yeah, that's I guess like that's how I ended up in photography. It was a little bit by accident I didn't plan for it. I'm also a very spontaneous person like I just follow my heart for better or for worse, you know and so I just Yeah, it just kind of happened

Raymond Hatfield:

I have to ask, this may be a tough question, what was your parents reaction when you decided not to go to school for, being a dental hygienist, but go for, to be a photographer?

Angela Shae:

They were, I think, confused and disappointed. they just were like, okay, well This is like just didn't understand for a long time. So then, I was in graphic design I actually still lived with my parents the first year that I was in graphic design school so i'd be like on the dinner dining table like cutting out newspaper clippings for like collages I was making and they just were like this is college like what's happening? Like they just didn't understand For a long time, even after I was traveling all over America from coast to coast shooting weddings, they still would ask me like, so when are you going to get a real job?

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh, wow.

Angela Shae:

and I think they never took it seriously. and I still don't know if they take my business social templates that I have seriously. Like they're like, Oh, you're like on Instagram. Cool. Like, I don't know, like, I don't think they really, really understand what

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah,

Angela Shae:

doing.

Raymond Hatfield:

we've had such a huge shift in technology over the past, like not very long that like, even my mom, who I would consider to be relatively savvy, like there's sometimes I talk to her and I'm like, what is she talking? Like, what does, how does she not understand this? Like, this has been around for decades at this point. And, that's totally understandable, but, let's go a little bit deeper into that. Right. I want to go back to those days of learning photography. First of all, how cool that you were like setting up model shoots at home with just a disposable camera. That sounds like so much fun as kids. How did you learn though the photography side of it, as far as the technicals, right? Like the point and shoot disposable camera. That's all easy. I think we can all figure that out. But one of the biggest issues that new photographers have is getting to learn the technical side of photography. Was that difficult for you as well? Haha,

Angela Shae:

creative. And understanding the technical side of things is like extremely hard for me. So when our photography instructor was trying to explain the difference between shutter speed and aperture, I absolutely had no idea like what he was talking about, like why we're turning these dials. I would do the exercises where you would take like, a photo at like different apertures and like compile them together to see the difference. And I would do all the work. But in my head it wouldn't click and it sounds so silly saying it out loud and I actually feel a little bit dumb. You know, like how do you do these exercises? And it still doesn't make sense in my head. So the first few weddings and shoots actually probably for the first two years, I literally just shot on aperture priority. didn't understand ISO for a very long time. Like why do you change this number? I just thought that you would change this number to add more grain. Oh my gosh. I've never publicly like

Raymond Hatfield:

purely a creative, purely a creative effect, yeah, that's hilarious.

Angela Shae:

And so it honestly I felt like a fraud for a very long time because I didn't really understand how to use my camera my images were coming out great because I had great composition I knew how to edit them so they don't look cheesy. But it wasn't until I was second shooting for a photographer, we became really good friends, that I was like, I really looked up to him. His name is Daniel Usenko. Actually, he's the founder of Pixaloo, the smart albums company now. So it's been fun to see his journey as well.

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh

Angela Shae:

coming up. Come second shoot for me if you'd like. And so it was like very exciting because he was actually, we, actually in a different state. I lived in Oregon at the time. He was in Washington and he was offering, like, this is someone I, like, really admired and somehow he noticed my work and was like, I think, you're on the right track. Come shoot these weddings with me in New York and San Francisco. And so, like, for a whole year, he took me to all these weddings as a second shooter. But I was so embarrassed that, like, when we showed up to our first wedding, we were shooting this insane wedding in Brooklyn, like Botanical Garden, they shut down the whole garden for us. And he was like, you know how to shoot in manual, right? And I was like, Oh yeah, absolutely. And so he,

Raymond Hatfield:

no. Wow.

Angela Shae:

a couple clarifying questions, I literally had to learn on the fly during that day, that wedding. and for the most part, it just like, I just figured it out and I never went back. Like, that wedding, I switched it to manual and never went back since. Like, it was like a turning point for me. Somehow everything kind of started to make sense. Things clicked. He was always like not far away. So if something was like looking a little bit off, know, I could always ask him. But I don't remember asking him very frequently, so it was, I don't really know how to explain this. Like that, it was just kind of a weird thing that happened for me. Like it just one day clicked. What is Aperture? Okay, it does this thing. Why do you use ISO in certain scenarios? and so I don't think most people have the same journey.

Raymond Hatfield:

Um,

Angela Shae:

So if you do, please share with me.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah, I definitely don't think that most people are getting requests to be a second shooter all around the country. That is very unique for sure. But I will say that even though, I went to school for cinematography, so like I learned all the technical side before I learned the creative side. And when I first started shooting weddings, I thought to myself, Oh, I can figure this out. Like it's just technicals. Like I got no problem here, but I was so nervous that I put it in aperture priority myself as well, because as you know, there's just a lot of moving parts during the day for those first few weddings, but then I did the same thing. I went to a wedding, just put it in manual. And I was like, let's see if we can figure this out. And just like you said, you put it in manual once and then it just stays there forever. So I appreciate you sharing that. I think a lot of listeners think. I wish, guests would share one tip that would just make it all click for me. but what you just shared basically was like, no, you got to put in the work. Like I can share the information, but until you actually go out and do the thing, that's the only time when it will, quote unquote click for you. So, that's super helpful. So thank you.

Angela Shae:

I think that I also stayed in the safe zone of shooting an aperture for so long because there wasn't that pressure. But in that situation, it was like my mentor kind of questioned my ability, like, Oh, do you know how to shoot manual?

Raymond Hatfield:

It's do or die. Yeah.

Angela Shae:

I had to challenge myself to be like, okay, I get out of my comfort zone? So sometimes I think we can get stuck in a comfort zone.

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh, for sure, for sure, I am actively trying to always find ways out of my comfort zone, even though my whole personality is just like, no, just stay comfortable. Like this is nice. Anyway, that's a whole nother story. So how do you go from, shooting weddings, right to starting social templates. Tell me how social templates came to be. Tell me what it is. And, yeah, I want to know how it can help photographers.

Angela Shae:

like that was just something I always wanted, was to be a young mom. and so I had two babies and was full, in, in my photography, I shot till I was like seven months pregnant with like both of them. and then would be back on the road shooting at like six weeks postpartum.

Raymond Hatfield:

Wow.

Angela Shae:

juggling being like a mom with two under two. and still feeling like I'm so young and I want to like find myself and find my creative outlet. And at some points felt like I was living two separate lives. Like I had like my photography outlet and, all these like creative shoots that I was doing and going to and projects I was working on. And then like, I also wanted to be the best mom I could be ever. That was like top of my mind all the time. And so I would be with the kids during the day and edit at night. So my editing hours were usually from around 9 PM to four in the morning. That's when I

Raymond Hatfield:

Cheese. Peace.

Angela Shae:

know, fall and holidays. And then all of a sudden I realized I just missed summer again with my kids. And it was just like this over and over like pattern that I was stuck in, to a point where like the anxiety started creeping up where I never felt like my work was good enough. I started just being really hard on myself with like, after every shoot, the drive home would be like, I should have taken that photo. I should have done that. I could have done that. Why didn't I think of this? Then I would sit down to edit

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah.

Angela Shae:

And at one point I had like a panic attack where I was like, okay, I can't keep doing this. I can't keep going this way. I started to hate photography. not photography itself. Like I just started despising like this, this, I can't even pinpoint exactly what it was, but like everything about it just felt like crippling to me. I would be in my moment at the shoot, like I would be loving it and then I would come home and when I'd go to edit, like I would just be so unhappy with myself. And then one dinner conversation, literally one dinner conversation. Obviously this has been building up for a while. My husband and I were like, okay, like this is, we, something needs to change. Something needs to happen. And I always dreamed of doing a season of life, by the beach. So we were like, pack up and like just go somewhere for a quote unquote season, like a year to two years. And kind of, I don't know, get a reset. So that same week we sold our house. closed on it within 30 days, packed up our life and moved down to Southern California.

Raymond Hatfield:

wow. Wow. Wow.

Angela Shae:

took a year long sabbatical. I shut down my website. You couldn't find me anywhere as a photographer anymore. Like I still flew back and finished shooting like all the weddings that I had on the books. but it was very dramatic. It was like I ran away from myself and my old life and my photography business. we didn't tell anyone. that we were moving. and so like we told our parents, but our friends kind of just found out the week we were leaving. We're like, by the way, we're uprooting our life and go in a different state. And, um,

Raymond Hatfield:

you say you were spontaneous in a good way, in a bad way, you weren't kidding. Yeah, wow.

Angela Shae:

I just, I don't take life too seriously. I think like, I just, go with the flow with things and so took that year long sabbatical. We bought annual passes to Disneyland And I went to Disneyland every Tuesday for an entire year with my kids. So I think we went like 50 times that year and just kind of wanted to figure out like what I was going to do. Like, am I going to go back as a branding photographer? I going to raise my prices and only take like a limited amount of weddings? but I still, like I did, it didn't feel right to go back to like what I was doing and I knew I couldn't keep going with the same pattern. And so my photography friends, like I've already built a community of photographers at that point, started reaching out and being like, Hey, so like, where are you? What are you doing these days? What's going on? can you help with my social media? And so, fairly quickly, I ended up managing 20 Instagram accounts, for other creatives, photographers, it was like preset companies, styling mats, fine art photographers, a lot of fine art photographers, and so I was managing their Instagram for them. So this was like 2017 when the perfectly curated grid was at its peak. and I was really good at that because I came from a world of blogging and submissions and style me pretty if anybody, but he still remembers those

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh yeah. Transcript Rev. com Page of

Angela Shae:

of On the back end, this is like pre AI when I would go, through their entire Instagram account and pick out phrases that sound like this photographer. And so I would like compile all these phrases that we would use to like make it sound like they wrote the captions and, then TikTok and Instagram were competing and Reels came onto the space. And so once Reels were. Like exploding, all of my clients wanted custom reels. And so once I started creating custom reels, I was no longer, just curating their grid. It was like so much work trying to create a reel. And it was one reel that you could create for one client and post it once. And that was it. it felt like a waste to create something and post it once and never be able to reuse it again. And it was all manually done. we didn't have like templates we were using and I was looking for something where we could use the trending music, but all the template apps out there didn't provide the turning music. And that's what the clients wanted. And so. Out of sheer, desperation for a solution, I ended up launching social templates, which is the solution that I was looking for.

Raymond Hatfield:

Wow.

Angela Shae:

and so social templates today is, it's not another app. It's a private account on Instagram for photographers, for members to access that have templates that are created right inside of Instagram using Instagram features, the trending music that's already licensed on Instagram, and we add new templates. trending, new templates every single week. So every week there's like new content, fresh ideas. We help with like onscreen hooks and things like that. And so originally just came out of like me needing a solution that did that for me and I couldn't find one. And so then we launched social templates and it's been growing and photographers are loving it. And it's been such a fun journey because I, I never imagined myself here if you would have told me, like when I was. Even taking my sabbatical, like that, this is where I would end up never in a million years.

Raymond Hatfield:

There's so much there. Oh, wow. Yeah, that's, it's hard to condense, a number of years into just a few short moments. I appreciate you sharing that. I want to figure out though. Because you said, you told me that you fell out of love with photography, right? do you still find today that you don't love photography the way that you did before? I don't even know if that's the right question. Does that question make sense?

Angela Shae:

Yeah. honestly, I think I'm on a journey to discovering like what it is for me on a personal level. if I take on client work, that still triggers anxiety. So that's like a part of me that hasn't healed.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah, no, no. I just want to know photography in general, right? So whether it's family stuff, whether it's your life, whether it's, you know, whatever it is, what's your view on photography today?

Angela Shae:

Yeah, when we travel for, like, abroad, I always bring my film camera, and I shoot film for myself as a souvenir to bring back. So, I definitely love photography. I don't know if I could ever not, like, appreciate it. I love looking at art. So yeah, I feel like, I still love photography, there's just a part of me that needs to heal, and maybe

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah.

Angela Shae:

at some point, like, I'll come back to it in some other capacity. I know that I don't want to get paid for photography work, because

Raymond Hatfield:

Hmm.

Angela Shae:

that's like, something triggers something, But as far as like creating art and like even the way that I document my family on an iPhone simply using an iPhone. It's always very thoughtful

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah, you can't be a photographer and not look at your iPhone camera and try to take a good photo. Right? So I totally get that. I appreciate you sharing that because I, that opened up the story loop for me. That was like, wait, how does she get back to photography? How does she get her love back? And I think that you touched on something that is really important. And honestly, a big worry for a lot of new photographers, which is they love photography now, while it's their hobby, while it's their creative expression, but the idea of taking on clients scares them and makes them feel like they're going to fall out of love of photography. And I think that if you would have asked me, five years ago, if that was even possible, I would have said no. But today I absolutely understand that. And you sharing that as well, just solidifies it. I guess you really just have to be self aware of the kind of person you are and start to recognize those triggers inside of you. Does that sound right?

Angela Shae:

Yeah, and I think mean I was just like you I remember saying I will never not love shooting weddings I was so passionate about it. I enjoyed every aspect of it even the editing like In the process, when I was in the thick of it, like I genuinely loved it and couldn't imagine myself not loving it. I think where I probably messed up was boundaries.

Raymond Hatfield:

Mm.

Angela Shae:

as business owners, there needs to be clear boundaries, between like work hours, client communications, how much you shoot, setting time aside for personal time. I think that's probably if I could talk to younger photographers, that are just starting out or maybe not younger, just like people that are transitioning from hobby into business is to have boundaries that won't make them burn out.

Raymond Hatfield:

Beautiful. I couldn't have said it better myself. That is one of the hardest things to, to figure out. And it's like, I can't tell you one thing to do because like, it's going to be different for everybody else, So again, you just got to feel that out for yourself. So, let's get back to, social templates. Let's get back to social media, right? Social media is, is very important today in 2025. It's been important for probably 10 years or so. And I'm guessing that it's going to be important, for the foreseeable future as well. So, talk to me about. And why they're more important for photographers right now, at least, than posts and carousels and stories.

Angela Shae:

I don't think reels are necessarily more important than carousels, the algorithm is always changing, and we've seen

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah.

Angela Shae:

perform worse, we've seen carousels perform better. so I, I don't want to dismiss carousels. I think carousels are very important. but reels have this other ability for you to connect with your viewers that, um, still images don't. You're able to share a little bit of behind the scenes. it's paired with music. It's if you're using, a good template, like social templates, we beat match everything for you. So it makes it like exciting and engaging. and reels have the ability of being shown to non followers versus a lot of times when you post something to your feed, only your followers see it. So in the current state where we're at with social media in 2025, Reels is the easiest way to reach people that have never heard of your company before. I never heard of you as a photographer. If you're trying to connect with new clients, find your audience. That's why you want to be making reels is you have the opportunity to show up on the explore page. And there's two places you can show up either on the explore page where there's like everything, that's curated to like someone's interests or just within, like the reels tab, like when people scroll through reels. And so not taking that opportunity to connect with new potential clients, I feel like it's a little bit silly. Like it's there for you use it. Yeah, I think a lot of photographers just don't take advantage of the fact that it's there.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah, well, speaking candidly and personally here, I know for me, it's like, from the progression of social media, there was Instagram, which was always, photo first in the beginning, then there was Snapchat. And then there's Tick Tock. And it's like, both of both Snapchat and Tick Tock are very video forward. It makes sense. You know what the point of these apps are. But when it came to Instagram, Instagram was like. It was all of the things, right? And for me, I found it extremely confusing. I didn't know what was where I should be focusing my time. and I think what it came down to is that I didn't have any sort of strategy because I didn't understand what all these different tools were. So, I'm still not great at Instagram. I'm going to be asking questions just out of pure ignorance today. Help us start to build some sort of strategy, right? Like for the beginners out there who are listening and wondering, can we just post whenever we feel like it? What would you say to them? How do we start to go about building a social media strategy?

Angela Shae:

I hope that like this doesn't get dismissed because a lot of times I feel like this, like photographers tend to brush over this, but I feel like I have to say this first before we like dig into the technical stuff.

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh, here we go.

Angela Shae:

For the strategy, you have to know exactly who you're speaking to. Like your messaging has to be dialed in just like with any marketing. You can't. Just throw spaghetti at the wall and hope it sticks with like, okay, let's jump on different trends. Let's try this reel let's put this out there. Let's just do reels that show off my images without understanding who you are talking to and what is your messaging in. And that's going to be so different for all photographers, right? So for some photographers, you might be looking to connect with future brides. You want to book brides, maybe, that are getting married in the South. You need to narrow that down to know exactly who you are trying to talk to. If you are a senior portrait photographer, you might not be talking to the high school kids. You're probably talking to the moms that are going to book these sessions. And so your messaging would have to reflect that. Like, if you're talking to the mom, If your reel needs to resonate with the mom that wants to book the session. Obviously you can. You can communicate to both. You can make reels maybe that connect more with the senior, seniors that are graduating so they can send them to their mom, but understanding like who is making these bookings, how you're going to talk to them, do you need to give mom a reason why they need to have senior portraits done, or do you need to give them ideas of what to wear and locations, so understanding your messaging first, is at the core of your Instagram strategy, and I believe a lot of photographers are missing this.

Raymond Hatfield:

That's great. When it comes to a marketing point of view, that's said a lot, but I don't think understood very well. And the way that you just laid out that example I found was very helpful. So okay, now that we have to know who we're talking to and what our messaging is, help me walk through, the differences between posts, carousels, stories, reels, all those things. And should we be implementing all of them? Like, where do we get started?

Angela Shae:

Yes, so static posts that just have one photo, I would recommend you don't do that. I'm not going to post those at all right now. Like they're not going to do much for you. So

Raymond Hatfield:

Hmm.

Angela Shae:

three things you want to focus on. Reels, carousels, and stories. So reels are kind of like your lead magnets. You're going to create a reel that is going to be short and engaging. If you're creating a reel that is too long, it's not going to get watched all the way to the end. So the most important metric on a reel, to keep in mind is the watch time you want people to watch it all the way to the end and to restart watching it again So watch time is the most important thing and then saves and shares and we can like revisit this more in depth later but when you are creating these reels, you have to think about them being kind of like the top of the funnel type of content that are used as lead magnets to drive people to your profile and from there drive them either to binge the rest of your content or go to your website. The way that reels need to be packaged is, they need to have a hook on screen that talks to your ideal client. And that will like bring them in. So giving people a small sampling of your work instead of doing an awkward full slideshow of your photos, like a portfolio slideshow. I I think this is like something to understand with like reel strategy, the way people consume reels, oftentimes they're watching Netflix and they've scrolling reels. their attention is, separated. They might be at the grocery store at checkout, they're scrolling reels. That's just like how people are engaging with reels. And you have to understand that there's like literally seconds of their attention that you can capture for them to potentially pause and go over to your page, maybe get curious, maybe they do need a photographer in the future. They're not ready to like make that commitment now, but you want to get reels to funnel traffic into your account. carousel posts, that's where you can showcase your highlights from a session, your best work, your portfolio work, where you tag your clients, your clients can reshare that. That lives on your profile. So once people find you through a reel and they come over to your account, now they're able to see some of these mini galleries, I'll call them, that are carousel

Raymond Hatfield:

Yes,

Angela Shae:

okay, this is, I feel like I can go on this forever, but stories, have to be broken down into like, you don't have to sh a lot of times people feel like they have to share everything about their life. And I feel like we talked about this with you when we met, met at imaging, choosing just a few, like three to four different areas of your life or routine that you consistently share. That other people will be able to connect with that creates these connection points where you can talk about, like certain similarities that make you human, that, will potentially have common interests and that will get people to be emotionally invested in you as a human and your brand. And then they like, people like to spend their money, know, when they're emotional spenders, they want to spend their money on something they feel good about. And so if they. So if they don't know this photographer, they're more likely to want to book with them because there's already that emotional connection established through stories. And I feel like I just touched like surface level and everything so we can

Raymond Hatfield:

no, you did, but like, I almost, This is gonna sound ridiculous from a podcast host. I almost don't want to go deeper, right? Because I feel like there's a million strategies that we can do when it comes to, all of these from reels to posts, to stories, which you totally opened up my eyes when it came to stories. I started posting more about, my nachos. every time I'd go get nachos, I started posting more about those. And you were absolutely right. More people engaged with that content than anything that I shared about photography before. So that is super helpful. I know that that works.

Angela Shae:

I'm

Raymond Hatfield:

Uh,

Angela Shae:

to hear that.

Raymond Hatfield:

The problem is I don't have nachos every day, right? If I did that'd be a problem So I have to figure out what those two other categories are as well, but I'm working on it. I'm working on it but I do want to go back to reels because what I loved is that it seemed like as you said reels are shown to non followers and it gets people interested into your content So once they click on your profile then they're going to want to either bend your content or check out your stories and become more invested in who you are. I've seen a lot of reels. I don't click on everybody's profile. How do we start to get people down that funnel of watching our reel to actually taking action and checking out what we do?

Angela Shae:

So providing value. have to provide some sort of reason for them to stay. So it doesn't always have to provide a value. You have to choose if you want to entertain. and to help them provide value or connect with them in some other capacity. So lot of times photographers, they're just like not there to entertain, right? There's other of companies that are there to be like relatable and to entertain. So where photographers often win is educating and you don't have to be an educator to be able to provide value in your content. Right. Let's go back to like our original example of, senior session, right? Yeah. You can simply talk about should schedule your senior session at golden hour. And that, you know, if someone is considering a booking, So if you're in a senior session, now you are an authority in that space and you're able to, get, but not only saying it, like you have to think about the wording. So you have to have an on screen hook that will get people to pause, either tap to read the rest of your caption, like if you have all the information there, um, Or to go over to your account or you have them have a trigger word where you say comment guide and I will send you this guide and you can even send them a link directly to your website where they go to your website and they are now reading this guide that's living on your website again, getting exposed to your brand. But it's the way that you say it. Here's maybe you word it differently where you say the one thing I wish senior photographers knew when scheduling their session, right? That creates about married in national parks? Did you know this one rule? Maybe there's something about you needing to get some sort of permit. Maybe it's something about packing walking shoes, or seasonal closures or whatever it is. It's creating curiosity and providing value that gets people then interested in what it is that you have to say and you create authority in that space, as someone who's an expert in elopement weddings. And see new portraits. In family sessions.

Raymond Hatfield:

Okay. So, I appreciate that. That definitely helps out. As somebody who's an educator, I educate photographers from time to time. I know that it can be difficult to always be providing value, right? Like always be educating. I guess one, do we have to do that? Like with every single post and then two, what tips do you have to come up with ideas for, for these educational posts? Cause that's great. No,

Angela Shae:

that was generational, whatever. You can share, like, a storytelling let's say the groom forgot his vows at home before the first look and the photographer is there to capture it and instead of like rushing back to get the vows, he ends up. They end up having like a private moment and he tells her everything he's feeling from the heart, right? The photographer can share that little moment like this thing happened, but we were able to capture this like moment Okay, I'm like struggling with an example. Hold on

Raymond Hatfield:

I thought that that was a great example. I did. I, really, I'm just looking for ideas that are not necessarily, full on education. And that was, those are two good ideas right there. We, as photographers come up with these. Like, we're in people's lives, right? We see these stories. It's our job to capture these stories. I can absolutely see how we can turn the images of these stories into, text or audio and share the photos in a reel. Is that what you're getting at here?

Angela Shae:

I feel like yes, you've summarized that perfectly. So using stuff that you've experienced at a shoot and sharing a previous client experience that can connect with a future client. So you know, we're all human sharing their stories and someone can resonate and then seeing maybe how you handle this experience or even sharing, like, look at this trend that this couple implemented into their wedding or like this new thing that they tried. A lot of couples will bookmark that and send it to their bridesmaids or their family. Like, oh,

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh.

Angela Shae:

thing that we're loving, that we're seeing. Maybe we should, you know, it's the how champagne towers became a thing because someone shared that trend and everybody wanted a champagne tower. Um, and so, and then also with maybe even using your images of how you photographed, Like if you photographed a wedding with very creative bridesmaid dresses, they were all an interesting color palette you could make like a whole reel talking about like these bridesmaids made wedding dress like, non boring bridesmaid dress ideas, and all of a sudden now you're sharing their story and your images and inspiration for someone else. Does that

Raymond Hatfield:

And you're attracting the clients, yeah, especially like if you want to be that edgy or alternative photographer as well, like that's a perfect piece of content to share, right? Because you know, they're not just going to David's bridal, you know, whatever it is, like getting the off the rack, dress, but they're really trying to do something unique and fancy and, And if those are the couples that you're going for, that's totally going to resonate with them. That goes back to knowing who you're trying to talk to and knowing what your messaging is. That's perfect. Perfect. Hahaha.

Angela Shae:

someone gets engaged and they start looking for wedding ideas, or they even pause their scroll for a second, as they're looking through some sort of wedding content, the algorithm will just keep feeding them more and more of that stuff. Right. Like I started looking for food recommendations in Paris. And now that's like all I'm getting just because like I paused and bookmarked a couple of those things And so you have to understand that once a bride or even like bride and groom their bridesmaids their family members They're starting to research and save and share say like wedding ideas The algorithm will keep feeding him more of that content. If you're not creating any content that the algorithm can feed them you're like missing out on opportunities to get in front of these people

Raymond Hatfield:

Okay, well there is where you get me because Angela, I'm telling you, I've made reels before and man, they take a lot of time and effort and energy. How do we get to a place to where making reels is, is effortless? Please help me out here.

Angela Shae:

Well, I mean if you're not creating like custom podcast like bits if you're a photographer, I feel like I mean social templates is the easiest and fastest solution and i'll just talk about that because I have seen it work for so many photographers that are using our social templates. It's plug and play, right? You already have content on your phone from a wedding. You have some behind the scenes of you working an event. as simple as grabbing a video, and putting a strategic hook on screen. That is going to connect with your audience. So with social templates, we already beat match it for you. We tell you, you need one short little clip and 15 photos, populate those in here and post directly to your feed. I also would encourage photographers not to overthink it. So a lot of times photographers, so this is aside from social templates, because I strongly believe everyone should be making reels. If you don't have professional photos to share right away. Like you don't have sneak peeks and you have like a small behind the scenes video, a five second video of golden hour and it's just like a beautiful setting. Use that little video and add an on screen hook and share that without the images. You're going to funnel people into your account. They're going to come to your account and there's going to be other work that's saved to your account, your carousels, maybe your other reels. And so posting consistently, and that doesn't mean posting every day. It means that you're showing up regularly. Not like you're posting for a week and then you disappear for three months. so you

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh, that doesn't work. Oh, dang it. That's what I've been doing.

Angela Shae:

algorithm.

Raymond Hatfield:

shucks. Okay.

Angela Shae:

and I think the other thing I have to mention this, tip for new people on social media, if you are not thinking about this yet, this is super important. So with Reels, when you're at an event, whether it's a family session that you just shot or a wedding, and this obviously will be better results for weddings versus smaller sessions, but it should be implemented all the time. You share some sort of sneak peeks or previews or even little video BTS snaps in a reel, which should be You know, in social templates, we even have reels that will be like, add six little videos in here from behind the scenes. And that's it. Like, you don't even have to use photos in every single reel you post. But you post something within that 24 hours, maybe at the end of the night, we've had photographers tell us that they're able to like get to their car at the end of the night, grab a social template, post something. So it's really manageable to be able to do a same day or the following morning. But everyone that was at the event. going to be wanting to see something. They want sneak peeks, they want previews, people that weren't invited to the wedding, college friends, people that couldn't make it, parents are wanting, gonna want to reshare stuff for their friends to see it, bridesmaids, groomsmen, everyone is going to be looking for content to share. Like, if they're not sharing their own content, if they didn't, maybe they were too busy. Two in the moment, they didn't capture it. Maybe people are just like re sharing more content from that event. You have the opportunity to get in front of all of their audiences that night. So that's like the best marketing time that you could be spending on getting in front of new clients, right? Everyone is going to be re sharing your work if you are the first one to deliver something. Even if it doesn't have the edited images yet. Here's a sneak, like I just shot this wedding. It was amazing. Venue is so and so. you're getting all these friends from all these people's accounts that weren't even there that you're getting in front of. Obviously you're not guaranteed everyone's going to follow you, but at least people are going to be watching your reel and it's going to be signaling to the algorithm that this is quality content. People are interested in it. The watch time. Is, you know, long, like they're watching it over and over and the algorithm is going to push your reel out to more people that weren't even at the sweating. So kind of living off of that, like post event hype. That you're able to, generate a lot of that organic traffic to your page. Same with like, sharing that content with wedding planners and florists and anybody else that was involved. Also inviting someone as a collaborator to the reel. Now your reel, if they accept the collaboration, is going to appear on their feed permanently. So if you create a reel and you invite the bride and groom as a collaborator, now it's living on their feed permanently and people can watch it. Go, and now you're like attached to their page forever and they can find you. Same with planners. If you're working with planners, and they accept a collaboration, and I know sometimes the higher end planners are a little bit more picky about this, but it's always worth a shot. Like, you are able to funnel their traffic to your account now.

Raymond Hatfield:

I didn't even know that was a thing. See, that's how little I know about Instagram. I didn't even know that you could collaborate with people. Like, that's genius. That is, I mean, one of the things that helped me out so much as a wedding photographer was, now maybe this was before Reels, this was before TikTok, you know, all that stuff. But It was simply just sharing, like, five photos on Facebook, like, the night of the wedding. Because the last thing that you'd want is to have, like, the bride's cousin, who may also kind of be into photography, take, a good photo and then that becomes the profile photo or like the photo that gets shared before yours. if you can capitalize on that attention, you win. So being able to have it, as a real, have people share it, have people watch it over and over again. genius. I love it.

Angela Shae:

A hundred percent. And for those who are maybe newer to Instagram, this is a feature that hasn't been around that long. So don't be, like, the collaborator. So when you go to tag someone, you go to tag them, there's like a new menu that pops up where you can invite them as a collaborator. So I would

Raymond Hatfield:

Genius.

Angela Shae:

to tag everyone that's involved, even if it's a family shoot and there was a boutique that they bought the dress from, right? Tag the parents, tag the kids. Tag the boutique, maybe you're shooting at a venue somewhere, and then invite people as collaborators and that's within the tagged features.

Raymond Hatfield:

Perfect. Another thing that I think it's overlooked in, when it comes to social media is the size of your following, right? Like, there's oftentimes a pressure to grow your following, get a lot of engagement, get a lot of likes on your posts and videos. But just like being paid in exposure, followers doesn't necessarily equate to more bookings. So do you have any tips for how we can create content that will bring in, paid clients and not just focus on likes and follows.

Angela Shae:

Yeah, I think it kind of ties back to what we've already talked about is providing value and giving them a reason to follow you before they're even ready to book. It could also be you sharing your work while also having You know, on screen hook. And I think that's the other thing is please remember, you need to have text on your reels. A lot of photographers forget this. They're think that like just a beat match slideshow is enough. You have to think about where the consumer is consuming or like the viewer is consuming this content and they just probably watched a cooking video right before this. And now they're watching somebody's family slideshow. It feels awkward. It feels like, oh, this probably isn't for me. Why am I watching this family slideshow? But if you talk about, something specific that they can connect to, then they have a reason to follow you. that's like probably the best way to put it is giving people a reason. Maybe you have creative shoots, ideas for creative family sessions. Hey, your family session doesn't need to be in a golden field. Let's keep it casual and do it at home. Someone might be interested in that. Okay. Like, awesome. This is the third time I've seen them share a family session at home. I'm curious. I want more of that. Maybe I want a family session at home. So I feel like that's like kind of the best way. I'm not sure if I'm answering your question, but that's probably the best way to generate these people into your account. And then, I would encourage you to have trigger words on your posts. And

Raymond Hatfield:

what does that mean?

Angela Shae:

work right now in 2025. I don't know if like in two years that's still going to be like what we're going to be doing, but for the season that we're in and social media, you can use many chat, many chat. com and that's like a Instagram approved automation bot that can like once somebody comments a trigger word. So you'll see that a lot comment guide and I'll send you, you know,

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow.

Angela Shae:

send them like a little PDF, or you can send them a link to your website. It could be a Pinterest board that you send them. But what happens is when you have a trigger word, you either manually send it to them, but most people use many chat for this. I would encourage you to use many chat cause you can miss these messages. But when you spend some time, putting together, maybe you even have photos from these venues that you shot at. And now you're sending them a DM. So Instagram establishes that you and this person have had some sort of connection interaction. People that you talk to in your DMs are more likely to see your work at the top of their feeds, right? That's like when you get on Instagram, you see your friends post first, you see your parents post, you see your siblings, the people that you have conversations with Instagram will show you their content and prioritize it. And even within the story highlight bubbles, their stuff will be at the front. So if you are generating these conversations within the DMs and you're giving people value, you're not obviously not being spammy with it. You're not like sending them like links to book here by this course or whatever. but you're providing something of value to them. you're able to potentially even follow up like, Oh, I saw you're interested in the guides for New York. We also have this other, I don't know, Pinterest board with inspiration for decor. I don't know, trending 2025 wedding trends or something like that. And so then you start having these conversations with them and maybe eventually they're curious to book. So that's just something to keep in mind that having conversations in the DMs will also prioritize your content for these people.

Raymond Hatfield:

You just blew my mind again. I didn't even know that that was a thing. And I feel so overwhelmed right now that there's so much, that I need to learn. So, know that we are, we're coming to the end of our time here. And my brain is going in a thousand directions at a million miles an hour. So let's do this. let's try to summarize everything that we talked about today, okay. In a quick, few sentences If you had to start over again and today as a photographer, what would your Instagram strategy look like?

Angela Shae:

I would share a lot of behind the scenes on stories. I think that I would prioritize that because I've seen like results from that. I don't know if that would be. Like the main focus, but I know for sure that every time I would be out shooting a wedding planning for a shoot I would share my process with photography like to show myself as an expert and as someone that knows what they're doing someone that's constantly working to show people that I am working to be at the top of their mind. And then also sprinkling in some of like my personality. and then also I would focus on posting reels consistently, meaning at least, two, three times a week, whatever feels manageable for me to sustain. I would definitely look for.

Raymond Hatfield:

Silence. You

Angela Shae:

Ben and Katie wedding, separate folder behind the scenes from their separate folder. That way, when I go to create a reel, now I'm not scrolling through 25, 000 photos to get to this wedding I shot because you know, travel, family stuff. this will save you so much time when you're sitting down to actually make the reel itself. so I would organize my content. I would have a system in place, right? The same way that we have that we're delivering content. You deliver a gallery, you back it up, you send, you know, whatever process you send it in there, I would have social media in that flow somewhere, where there's like a system to it. I would post immediately. I would post the same night or the same morning, from events that I'm at. And then during the week I would create content that serves my clients in some sort of way by providing, by sharing my work and heavily sharing my work. But also in that, showing like my expertise, like here's, you know, how I would photograph a flat lay or things that you need to remember to have in your flat lay. So I would focus on that. So I would focus on reels, focus on stories, and carousels, would probably be like highlight, little mini highlight galleries. Just that.

Raymond Hatfield:

That is perfect. So that is nice. It is succinct. I like the ideas about, folders right there. That's very smart. I've so many times just scrolled trying to look for a single photo. That's genius. I don't know why I didn't think of that. I feel like we could talk forever. cause this is a, not only is it a huge topic, but it's also ever evolving. So let me just say you're always welcome back on the podcast to talk about brand new things, in social media, in Instagram, all the things. but we are out of time today. So Angela, before I let you go. Let listeners know where they can discover more about you and of course social templates as well

Angela Shae:

So we are on Instagram at socialtemplates. co. That's our public account for everyone. Once you sign up on our website, you'll get access to a private account for members only. but our website is also socialtemplates. co. So it's pretty easy.

Raymond Hatfield:

A huge, huge, huge thank you to Angela for coming on in, breaking down everything social strategy related, super helpful. So here is your action item for the week. Angela said that reels are currently the best way to get your work discovered on Instagram by non followers, AKA future fans. So your action item for this week is to make, well, just one reel. I did this for myself for a shoot that I recently did for my daughter's softball team, and I can tell you, uh, a doubt that it has performed better than any of the clips that I posted from, interviews here from the podcast with world class photographers. In fact, let me look at my phone. I'm going to tell you the numbers right real quick. Okay. So if I go to my Instagram page and I just check out my reels, the average reel from an interview with, well known world class photographers are getting like, 208 views, 186 views, 163 views. No, this one's got 277, 242. 219. Wow. This one has 468. Okay. Now the real that I made with Angeles social template has gotten 1, 267 views. And if I look at the analytics on who watched this, 69. 4 percent of the people do not currently follow my page, And it's super easy. All you got to do is next time you're out shooting, just grab a few seconds of behind the scenes video of you shooting. This could literally just be like your camera in your hands as you're walking down, I don't know, a trail, for a nature photo walk. It could be your subject in front of your camera with some lights set up. It could be you at a wedding. I mean, anything. Just two to three seconds of video. And in fact, that's even easier if you have an iPhone and you're taking live photos. It will automatically just turn that into video. Then pick 10 to 15 of your favorite photos from that shoot. And then compile them together within social templates. And you're done. You don't have to overthink this. Like, that's it. It automatically edits it together. It does the beat matching for you for trending audio. And it's done. So if you really want to turn reels on easy mode, I encourage you to give Angela's social templates a try. Again, their plug and play the music has already picked and it edits them beat match. So they look great. Easy peasy. So to try it out for yourself, just head to beginner photopod. com forward slash reels that's R E L S and Angela set it up that if you use the code BPP, when you sign up, you get a whole month for free. In that month, you could easily make like two or three months worth of social reels, and then schedule them out, give it a shot, post one reel, and then you'll find out how easy it is to post reels consistently for an entire month. And you might be surprised by the results. All right. That is it for today. Until next time. Remember the more that you shoot today, the better of a photographer. You will be tomorrow. Talk soon.