Entering a Dying Market? (Photography)

[Mike Carr]

Smartphones are killing the photography industry.

According to this video, camera sales are down over 90% in the last decade.

However, there's still a thriving niche community on sites like DPReview.

As an avid photographer myself, I'd love to try and serve these folks.

So it got me wondering...

Has anyone successfully entered a dying market?
(Or, are there famous marketing examples you can point me to?)

Looking forward to the discussion! Thanks for reading

 

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[addV]

What about targeting the DIY photography amateurs market?

 

[Mike Carr]

What about targeting the DIY photography amateurs market?

Yeah, I know some people earn well by selling photography training to amateurs, including the $200+ I've personally spent on courses! There are a few smartphone photography blogs that position themselves well.

Even though the broader market is shrinking, the fact that there are still plenty of amateurs looking to get better could be enough to sustain a business. Also interesting that the amateur market attracts a much older audience, at least from what I can tell. I'm 23, and none of my friends own a camera. Their smartphone is enough.

 

[Ronak]

The big successes that you hear about are often targeting a growing subset of a larger dying industry. The market for home DVD rentals has been shrinking for over a decade, but Redbox has been growing. Digging deeper, they are actually in the DVD vending space. Shutterfly is another example in the photo printing niche--when's the last time you developed a roll of film? But online photo printing is actually growing, albeit slowly.

Ultimately, it depends on how big your ambitions are. For most small businesses, it probably doesn't make a significant difference as long as you can find a steady audience/demand. The bigger issue is finding a market that actually spends money, isn't saturated with competition, and there's some value add to your product/service that solves a real need with a reachable audience-- typical CENTS stuff.

 

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[Cameraman]

Has anyone successfully entered a dying market?

Yes, the Photography market.

Sell shovels to the miners or in this case training to enthusiasts.

What I wouldn't do is try to earn money selling photography. The microstock industry killed that model around 2005-10.
There are a lot of ways you could potentially develop a reasonable income if you segment the market. Unfortunately, a lot of them don't scale well and you could end up trading time for money (not a good idea).

Your answer might be in your own question given as you say there is a thriving community on DPReview. Have a look at how they monetise this.

 

[Walter Hay]

Has anyone successfully entered a dying market?

It seems that you are only looking at the market for equipment. Is the market for photography dying?

There are many segments in the photography market, and if you are a skilled photographer maybe you can use your skills in one of those sectors that you haven't thought about.

SUGGESTION: I don't know anything about the real estate market in Portugal, but I do know something about it in other countries.

Have a look at sites advertising properties for sale. Are the photographs done professionally or has a RE Agent taken black side margin room shots with a smartphone? Are there aerial photos of the property? Buy a drone equipped with a good camera that transmits the image to your smartphone or computer so you know when to click.

Have a look at sites advertising properties for rent. In my experience most Rental property managers are bone lazy, and provide smartphone shots that don't encourage viewers to want to inspect the property NOW. That could be an opening for a professional selling their services to RE Agents.

In either case, you could set up to educate RE agents on how to improve the quality of their presentations and by that means impress potential sellers or landlords.

Walter
P.S. My daughter is a brilliant photographer, and after each of her numerous world trips she prepares a book as her own souvenir, complete with text. The quality rivals many travel books that I have seen. Her books are saleable, but she has no entrepreneurial spirit.

 

[socaldude]

I’m a photographer mostly as a hobby.

I just bought the latest Sony 70-200mm G II lens. I paid $3k for it. I’m good at taking portraits.

Cell phone sensors still have not come close to full frame sensors. There’s still a lot you can’t imitate or copy with a full frame mirrorless camera.

 

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[Mike Carr]

It seems that you are only looking at the market for equipment. Is the market for photography dying?

There are many segments in the photography market, and if you are a skilled photographer maybe you can use your skills in one of those sectors that you haven't thought about.

SUGGESTION: I don't know anything about the real estate market in Portugal, but I do know something about it in other countries.

Have a look at sites advertising properties for sale. Are the photographs done professionally or has a RE Agent taken black side margin room shots with a smartphone? Are there aerial photos of the property? Buy a drone equipped with a good camera that transmits the image to your smartphone or computer so you know when to click.

Have a look at sites advertising properties for rent. In my experience most Rental property managers are bone lazy, and provide smartphone shots that don't encourage viewers to want to inspect the property NOW. That could be an opening for a professional selling their services to RE Agents.

In either case, you could set up to educate RE agents on how to improve the quality of their presentations and by that means impress potential sellers or landlords.

Walter
P.S. My daughter is a brilliant photographer, and after each of her numerous world trips she prepares a book as her own souvenir, complete with text. The quality rivals many travel books that I have seen. Her books are saleable, but she has no entrepreneurial spirit.

That's a great suggestion Walter, thanks!

Compared to America, the real estate photography here is very subpar. It's like you said, filled with smartphone shots that don't give a sense of the place at all. There's also a lot of cool new technology they're not utilizing like 3D walkthrough cameras. I will look into this further and practice my technique as real estate photography is not something I've really tried before. (Edit: Mike Kelley has some great resources on this for anyone interested).

Your daughter's photo book does sound like it would be sellable! Now that you mention it, I do see a lot of photobooks where I live since it's a touristy area. I'll also check out how they're presented, see how my images stack up, and what I could potentially do to skew value in my favor if I were to put together a photo book.

 

[Mike Carr]

I’m a photographer mostly as a hobby.

I just bought the latest Sony 70-200mm G II lens. I paid $3k for it. I’m good at taking portraits.

Cell phone sensors still have not come close to full frame sensors. There’s still a lot you can’t imitate or copy with a full frame mirrorless camera.

That's a great lens. I'm considering buying it for my monochrome converted Sony A7S kit (Edit: Now that I'm thinking, this conversion service is a nice niche business one guy created. Here's his website).

I agree with you the quality just isn't there yet, especially when you put a cell phone shot on anything bigger than a cell phone-sized screen. Also, even if smartphone cameras caught up I still wouldn't enjoy using them. I love the tactile feel of a good camera.

 

[Mike Carr]

Yes, the Photography market.

Sell shovels to the miners or in this case training to enthusiasts.

What I wouldn't do is try to earn money selling photography. The microstock industry killed that model around 2005-10.
There are a lot of ways you could potentially develop a reasonable income if you segment the market. Unfortunately, a lot of them don't scale well and you could end up trading time for money (not a good idea).

Your answer might be in your own question given as you say there is a thriving community on DPReview. Have a look at how they monetise this.

Yeah, the microstock industry has plunged for photography from what I can tell. Although video seems to still have a slight opportunity for anyone looking to get into it. Even still, it's a long shot.

Good point about DPReview. I believe they make most of their money from affiliate sales. There is a big market for that since even though the crop of customers is smaller, a photography purchase routinley exceeds $1,000.

 

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[Mike Carr]

The big successes that you hear about are often targeting a growing subset of a larger dying industry. The market for home DVD rentals has been shrinking for over a decade, but Redbox has been growing. Digging deeper, they are actually in the DVD vending space. Shutterfly is another example in the photo printing niche--when's the last time you developed a roll of film? But online photo printing is actually growing, albeit slowly.

Ultimately, it depends on how big your ambitions are. For most small businesses, it probably doesn't make a significant difference as long as you can find a steady audience/demand. The bigger issue is finding a market that actually spends money, isn't saturated with competition, and there's some value add to your product/service that solves a real need with a reachable audience-- typical CENTS stuff.

Interesting example with DVDs and photo printing, I never though of that before.

In a way the photography market has actually grown since now most people have a decent camera in their pockets at all times and take more pictures then ever. I'd like to create a small CENTS business and I do think there are enough photo enthusiasts out there that love spending money on the right product for their hobby.

Digging into the forums there's always a lot of buzz surronding new editing software, especially now that it's becoming more AI-driven. I don't have any coding experience but I'm adding it to the list of potential opportunties! I also live in a touristy place that attracts a lot of photographers so giving photo tours or camera rentals are also options I've considered.

 

[Mike Carr]

For a photo printing business, I don't think you can get better than VAST.

I love how they differentiate their process with the website copy. Super clear and easy to understand.

 

[Bouncing Soul]

I’ll make an important distinction the snobs tend to miss, never have so many great cameras been sold. My iPhone 13 can take WAY better photos than great digital cameras did 20yrs ago.

Why does this matter?

About 23yrs ago a guy, who later became a friend after I worked on a licensing deal with him for his tech, started writing some code to improve his early days digital photos in post. He turned it into a little company that was bought by a bigger company who saw the market these new mobile phone cameras offered and how software was going to be critical in getting good output from them due to their mechanical compromises for form factor. He’s been an executive at that company ever since.

I have a nice SLR setup driven by my desire to take great indoor youth sports photos of my kids and their teams. I recently purchased Topaz AI, which reminds me of my friends days. I am just a customer and have no idea what his business looks like but that SW is very interesting to me.

I suggest you consider what these people in the smaller and smaller SLR niche are using their cameras for, what challenges might be created by trends like the transition to mirrorless and figure out some service for them. If SW, try to see if you can tailor your product to make it attractive to mobile phones and other ubiquitous cameras you think of or think are a rising trend.

Good luck!

 

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[Maxkaz]

I do not know where this market is "dying", more like restructuring. I.e. I sometimes use rentals for photo/video equipment to film events. This can`t be done good enough with a smartphone. Same with my astro-photo friends. So it is more about finding your niche now imho

 

[Xavier X]

These things can go either direction, but with the current trajectory of AI image generation, stock photography-related businesses will suffer. Both the photographers and the platforms (iStock, Dreamstime, etc.).

There are already AI-generated images indistinguishable from real ones. In two years, they'll even be better and many kinks would've been worked out. Stuff like poor rendering of fingers.