I asked AI ChatGPT How To Get Clients, Here's What It Said...

As we begin a new year, budgets are going to be resetting and people are on vacation so a lot of the video industry quiets down for a bit. This can be scary for some who don't have an established business or marketing game plan. For me, it's relatively normal that Thanksgiving to mid January winds up being slow.

So I had some free time and decided to ask?ChatGPT?(an artificial intelligence chatbot) to give me twenty ways to get new clients for my videography business. Here's what it came up with along with my advice/responses (in bold) after running a video production company for ten years. Let me know your thoughts!

1. Network with other professionals in related fields, such as photographers, event planners, and marketing agencies.?This is probably my biggest path to success. I built a local crew of 7-8 people that all help each other out, hire out if they need a second hand, etc. By filling in the gaps and slower weeks working for them and obtaining a group of people I can trust to cover for me.
2. Join local business organizations and networking groups.?I joined the local chamber and in my area it was a partial bust only because the types of people that were members and poor leadership. I found a local BNI chapter that had an SEO company, a promotional products company, a done for you email/newsletter marketing company and an IT firm all of which became massive referral partners for me. Lesson learned - these can be good options but only if the members compliment your industry.
3. Attend industry events and conferences.?I've attended shows as big as NAB (if you haven't been to the Vegas one it's amazing and gives you access to big name companies) and it has allowed me to build some great connections that didn't necessarily lead to work but were good to have people in my corner. Probably something I'd hold to do on a rainy day and not a direct lead to work.
4. Create a strong online presence, including a professional website and social media accounts.?I probably spent the last ten years redesigning my site and updating every 1-1.5 years. It helped to condense my messaging and get clear on showing what services I offer, answering questions potential clients have but it doesn't directly lead to clients. I invested in SEO for two years and it ranked well but I'd get too many people reaching out for wedding video and not corporate (which is what I do). Corporate work tends to come more from referrals while family and social events seem to be 50/50 of people Googling or getting a referral.
5. Offer special promotions or discounts to attract new clients.?This doesn't exactly work unless you can get the offer in front of a lot of people. I partnered with a C-suite/business coach and made an offer to her audience that we would produce a speakers reel/pitch reel for CEOs and executives for only $500 but she was able to get 37 people to sign up for it and we filmed their pitches over 2 days. $18,500 is a great haul but again this wouldn't have happened if I didn't have access to an audience to advertise it to. Now I rarely discount my pricing for any reason at all other than they're a returning client and I want to reward them for being loyal, not because they asked.
6. Collaborate with other videographers or creatives on projects.?This definitely points back to number 1 which is to this day my best bang for the buck. You could easily Google the top 20, 30 or 50 local videographers, PR firms, marketing consultants etc. in your area and set up coffee meetings or appointments to learn more about them. I really think the network is the gold mine and the more people you can have in yours the better. Sometimes all it takes is 2 or 3 really good referral partners.
7. Create and share video content on social media and online video platforms.?I think this is good to do and I will say once my YouTube channel took off I was starting to run into people that would say, hey you're that guy that talks about live streaming on YouTube so the recognition does help people in trusting me and my work. It's not that hard to script and film 52 "shorts" that are less than 60 seconds and schedule them to go out on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn and TikTok one a week for the next year. Having that recognition builds credibility. If you're stuck creating 52 topics I'd say check out the ChatGPT I linked to above, it's pretty nifty and while it won't perfectly script out all of your videos it could easily generate your topics for you. By the way I don't get paid for mentioning it, it's a free tool for anyone to use.
8. Write articles or blog posts about your videography work and share them on your website and social media.?I think this helps for SEO on your website but I don't think that anyone is simply going to hire you just because you wrote an article. I would say save this for a rainy day activity but if you can stack up a bunch of articles that are original content it will help your website rank locally. I'd probably vote for building your Google Business profile before doing this if you want to show up in local search.
9. Offer free or discounted services to non-profits or charitable organizations as a way to gain exposure and build your portfolio.?This one is tough for me because I understand that someone getting off the ground might want to do this. Typically I would vote this one out. I don't think it makes sense to offer free services because people won't value what you're providing unless they have some skin in the game. If you have zero portfolio I would think hard about three really good companies or organizations to do portfolio work for but I would A. explain to the client here's the value of what this would cost normally so they don't take advantage and ask for another project for free or a low price and B. after those three are done DO NOT take any more work for free. If you've got three really good portfolio pieces that should be all you need to prove your worth.
10. Join freelancing platforms or job boards to find new clients.?Fiverr, Upwork, Thumbtack - it's all a crapshoot because on those platforms you're a dime a dozen. There's hundreds of video editors in other countries willing to do the same work for pennies on the dollar. ProductionHub, Mandy, etc. it's all the same even when it does get industry specific because there's hundreds if not thousands of others just like you vying for the work. Again, ok for a few portfolio pieces otherwise not profitable for the long haul.
11. Reach out to past clients to see if they have any new projects coming up.?Yes, 100% once you are established this is a great thing to do especially at the beginning of the year. Send off a quick email to every person you invoiced in the last two years.
12. Ask for referrals from satisfied clients.?I would expand this and send an email that asks for 1) a review on Google business page and 2) if there's anyone they can think of that they could introduce you to. Don't focus on asking for a referral because they might not know someone who needs you right away. Use it as a networking chance to meet someone outside your network.
13. Create a email newsletter and send it to your email list to showcase your work and promote your services.?I've avoided an email list for years only because of the amount of work it takes and I hate being on other people's email lists. I think this is a valid method for staying top of mind but I don't think it's going to be a quick path to success.
14. Partner with local businesses to create video content for their websites or social media channels.?Sure but what does partnership mean? Make sure that you get something out of it. If it's the promise of later on sending work your way, no, that's a wasted promise. Refer back to my $18.5K gig with the business coach - that's a better way to "partner" where it's a win/win. She got to give her clients a resource that was massively valuable to them at a highly discounted price and I walked away with $18K in 24 hours.
15. Offer video production training or workshops to individuals or businesses.?I think this can be a good option once you are established. I've had realtors ask me to come in and train their teams but this is something that often times means training someone to do it instead of hiring you so I'd recommend have some kind of offer like, we'll teach you how to film better real estate property tours and if you sign up with me today, my team will edit all of your videos for the next year for $X.
16. Create a strong portfolio of your work and use it to showcase your skills and capabilities to potential clients.?That's just the thing - where are you going to showcase it that you can actually get it in front of enough eyeballs that it converts into paid work? I don't think I've updated my website portfolio or my business YouTube channel in a couple years now.
17. Use paid advertising to reach new clients, such as Google AdWords or Facebook ads.?Google AdWords can work, Facebook is a little tougher because you have to target interests rather than someone directly searching for "Videographer in Chicago" but this can get pricy and again might lead to the same kind of leads we got from SEO where it was people looking for a wedding videographer and not a corporate gig.
18. Participate in online communities or forums related to videography and offer your expertise and services.?I built one of these communities (specifically?Videographers Connect?on Facebook) that has 10K people in it and this has been a great resource of referral work from other videographers. The more you participate the more familiar you will be in the group. If you ask a bunch of very elementary questions though it might not lead to work but if you prove that you know your stuff you'll stick out.
19. Use SEO techniques to improve the visibility of your website and online profiles in search engine results.?Similar to the blog posts, I've done this and hired an SEO company that got my ranking quite well for a good amount of time but I still think that managing your Google Business profile and making sure you've got some good 5-star reviews will get you on the map.
20. Offer video editing or post-production services in addition to video production.?I think this one is a given and if you're a one man band like me you already do this but consider offering editing packages for people who might want to record their own content. There could be realtors wanting to make shorts on social media or dentists that record their own testimonial videos of clients but they want someone who can spice it up a little.

All in all, I was pretty impressed with the list that an AI came up with for growing a video production business. I think it does boil down to networking and who you know, not what you know. Building a good inner circle of others in the industry that you trust locally combined with building a good outer circle of those in complimentary industries (photographer, event planner, marketing, PR firm, IT firm, web designer, SEO, etc.) has been my core method and then from there I'll do the other things on a rainy day like updating the website, some SEO work, creating content/blog posts and participating in online communities.

If you're looking for the fastest return on investment, the best method is to just meet as many people as you can, add value to their lives and become a super connector. Lead with the desire to help others first and it will pay off.

I hope everyone has a productive year ahead and if you have any big plans you're implementing in your business this year I'd be curious to hear what your plan is!