wedding photography – Bark.com Blog

The easy way to save £1,000s on your wedding

With Brides Magazine putting the average cost of a UK wedding at £30,111, it’s hardly surprising that the internet is awash with articles suggesting ways to save money when you tie the knot.

These cost cutting measures tend to focus on which bits of your big day you could do without – such as ditching the free bar, having fewer flowers or baking your own wedding cake.

But there is another way to save hundreds – or even thousands – of pounds on your wedding without cutting back on the things that will make your special day special.

How to get the best deal on your wedding day

While it’s true that hiring the best venue, photographer and entertainment for your wedding can be expensive, there are also some great deals out there that could save you a small fortune.

So the best way to save money on your wedding without cutting important corners is to shop around to find the best value suppliers – and that’s where Bark comes in.

We’ll do all the legwork for you to contact potentially thousands of pros on your behalf to get you quotes fast and free.

Save up to £800 on wedding photography

The best wedding photographers provide a comprehensive service, complete with a wedding album and second shooter to assist on the big day – and will often charge in excess of £1,200 for their wedding packages.

But there are plenty of more affordable photographers who will still do a great job of capturing your special day on film, and finding the right one for you is easy with Bark.

On average, our wedding photographers quote around £700 for wedding photography, with some offering their services for as little as £395!

Book a great DJ for half the usual price

Premium wedding DJs in London and the South East will often quote £450 or more for their services – and if you want to get the best money can buy, you might feel that’s very reasonable.

But there are also many great DJs out there who will play your wedding for a fraction of that price and still keep your guests dancing all night long.

For example, the average quote for wedding DJ services on Bark is £300 – with the cheapest DJs costing as little as £200 for the night.

Find wedding caterers to suit any budget

Gourmet wedding catering can easily set your back £35-£50 per head – so, even with a relatively short guest list, it’s easy to end up spending a ton on food and drink.

Luckily, there is a wide range of different wedding catering options out there to suit all budgets and tastes, from traditional three-course meals, to hog roasts and beyond.

Most Bark pros quote around the £12-£15 per head mark for wedding catering, with some budget caterers quoting as little as £6 per head.

Compare pros for your wedding and get quotes fast

With dozens of wedding categories at your fingertips – from wedding cakes to venue hire, wedding flowers and more – finding everything you need for your wedding is easy with Bark.

Simply let us know what you want and we’ll reach out to recommended service providers on your behalf to get you quotes fast and free.

Click the link below now to find great professionals for your wedding and start saving money with Bark today.

Top Pro Interview: “Bark is the Holy Grail – a lead producing system that works!”

Brian Wilcock always wanted to be a professional photographer. But, for much of his life, fate led him down a different path.

He was inspired to enter the charity sector when his son became disabled, and spent 12 years working for the learning disabilities charity, Mencap. So it wasn’t until 2005 that he finally had the opportunity to fulfil his lifetime ambition and become a full time wedding photographer.

Today, his company Imagination Creative is one of the most popular wedding photography services on Bark – and he’s booked over £17,000 in new business in his first eight months with us.

“I have booked 17 jobs worth a total of £17,237”

Brian first discovered Bark in February this year. Although he was initially wary because of bad experiences with lead generation companies in the past, he eventually decided to give us a try.

“When I realised that Bark had a different system that involved detailed information for individual clients I decided to give it a go,” he explains. “I’m certainly glad I did.”

placeholder — *Brian Wilcock at a wedding photography job he booked through Bark!*

He adds: “At the time of writing I have booked and collected deposits for 17 jobs worth a total of £17,237.”

When he secured his first job through Bark, Brian was pleased our service had succeeded where so many others fail.

Having worked in sales most of his adult life, he says he can appreciate the value of a system that finds genuine customers looking for your services.

“It was refreshing and encouraging to feel that I may finally have found a viable source of lead production,” he explains. “I think my favourite thing about Bark is the quality of the information received for each potential client.

“As the requests are obviously completed by the client individually, it tends to be more accurate than other agencies I have tried.”

Brian currently still uses traditional methods to find new photography clients. But, if his current rate of success continues, he says he can foresee a time when Bark becomes his sole source of business leads.

As such, he highly recommends Bark to any wedding photographer who might be thinking about giving us a try.

“Any established photographer will have tried a number of ways to find that Holy Grail – a lead producing system that works,” he says. “My advice would be to forget all the failed methods you’ve tried in the past and give Bark a try, because this one actually does work and you won’t regret it.”

Start hearing about customers in your area today, free

Bark is fast becoming the UK’s leading platform for businesses seeking new clients in a wide range of industries – from photographers to personal trainers, tradespeople and more.

With over 600 different categories to choose from, businesses of all shapes and sizes can find new customers quickly and easily with our service.

Join our network of 80,000+ registered businesses today and we’ll start alerting you to new customers completely free of charge – so you can see firsthand how easy it can be to secure new business with Bark.

Click the link below now to claim your free Bark account and start growing your business with Bark right away.

Start growing your business with Bark today

Planning your wedding is easy with Bark

Your wedding will be the single happiest day of your life. But with expectations sky high, the pressure of getting it all sorted can easily take the shine off proceedings. Luckily, Bark is here to help.

With thousands of registered pros providing everything from wedding photography to wedding makeup, venue hire and more – we’ll do all the legwork to make planning your wedding a breeze.

Placing a Bark is quick and stress-free, and with all your quotes in one place choosing the right pros for your wedding couldn’t be easier.

“What a fantastic site!” writes Emma Williams on our Trustpilot page. “I’ve used this to find room decor, flowers, photographers and hair and makeup artists for my wedding.”

She continues: “Type in what you need and the professionals come to you. It’s an easy way to compare prices and to check out people I wouldn’t normally have been able to find through search engines!”

*Another happy couple ties the knot with Bark – photo by Laine Apine Photography*

“After searching for a wedding photographer without success we fell on Bark much by accident really,” adds another happy couple.

“Very pleased we did. Within a few hours we had several contact us and through these we got just what we were looking for.”

Brides Magazine estimates the average UK wedding costs upwards of £30,000, and with big decisions such as theme or venue typically being made up to 12 months in advance, planning one by yourself can be a huge commitment.

Finding everything the old fashioned way can take months of hard work and graft, but with Bark it couldn’t be easier. As soon as you’ve placed a request on our site you can sit back and relax, and the pros will come to you.

You’ll often start receiving quotes within hours of placing your request, saving you bags of time if you’re planning in advance – and and making us great for last minute emergencies.

“Our wedding planner had to resign for health reasons two months before the wedding,” writes one Bark user. “[We] found a replacement on Bark in 24 hours! Amazing.”

“I’ve posted several ‘Barks’ over the past six months or so while planning my wedding and have found it really useful,” adds Ami Stoppard. “It makes a big difference when you’re having to organise a lot that companies are able to reach out to you, as opposed to you having to send off multiple emails.”

*Lovers kiss on their wedding day – photo by Laine Apine Photography*

With hundreds of categories at your fingertips, planning your perfect wedding is easy with Bark. Whatever you need, we’ll scour the internet to get you quotes from the best local pros available on your big day, so you can choose the one that’s right for you.

So whether you need a great wedding DJ, dress rental, wedding cake bakers, makeup artists or anything else – we can help. Click the link below to place your Bark and we’ll start contacting local pros for you right away.

Why wedding photographers love Bark

The best wedding photographers are masters of networking. They know the key to success is to be constantly meeting new people who might want to do business with you.

When you get down to it, the traditional avenues photographers use to grow their business online – blogs, SEO, social media and the like – are all types of networking. But, much like networking in real life, they can be time consuming. You can introduce yourself to dozens of new people without meeting a single potential customer.

That’s what’s different about Bark – we’re a more efficient way to market your services online. By ensuring that everyone you speak to is actively looking for the services you provide, we’re helping thousands of independent British photographers grow their businesses quickly and easily online.

“Bark.com has given me the opportunity to compete with the established photographers out there,” says Bark wedding photographer, Moritz Schmittat. “A year ago, I had a different job – now I am a full-time photographer.”

Bark helps another happy couple capture their special day on film – photo by Moritz Schmittat — Bark helps another happy couple capture their special day
on film – photo by Moritz Schmittat

“Bark users can compare my quality, customer service and pricing side-by-side with industry veterans,” he adds. “This has made it possible for me to set up a sustainable photography business within weeks after joining Bark.”

We invest heavily in online advertising campaigns to find brides and wedding planners throughout the UK – something that’s simply not an option for most independent photographers. Customers looking for wedding photography visit our site and let us know what they want, and we contact quality pros in their area on their behalf.

We’ve alerted Moritz to more than 200 customers since he joined the service in early 2015 – and he’s secured 20 wedding bookings through us in the first five months of 2016 alone.

Moritz isn’t alone, either. Photographers across the country are enjoying huge success with our service – like Adam van Bunnens, who’s been alerted to over 600 potential new customers since he joined the service in September 2015.

“I love Bark, it’s sleek and professional and great [for] Google ranking,” he says. “It is what the industry has been crying out for.”

“Using Bark is a unique, refreshing way to interact with clients and give them the photographs they desire for their special day,” he adds. “The experience is very rewarding.”

*Kissing the bride by moonlight – photo by Moritz Schmittat*

“Bark has indeed helped my business a lot,” agrees Laine Apine Photography’s Kristīne Pētersone. “I have many great quality leads coming in my mailbox – unlike some other services I have used where the budgets are almost always unrealistically low and the leads are scarce.”

So that everyone can test out our service and see how well it can work for their wedding photography business, we ensure our new pros can always contact their first three clients on us. That means joining Mortiz, Adam and Kristine today couldn’t be easier:

Simply click here and open a free account right away.

Bark has grown rapidly since our founders Kai Feller and Andrew Michael started it in late 2014. Over 60,000 small businesses up and down the country are already registered with us and helping regular people find everything from window cleaners to legal representation.

“We wanted to create a resource you can use to find local professionals for absolutely anything,” Kai explains. “That’s the vision, really – helping people find wedding photographers is just one part of it.”

He continues: “As a photographer, we’ll alert you to customers we find in your local area completely free of charge. When you see someone you’d like to help, it’s then just a small one-off fee to introduce yourself to them, and everything you make is yours to keep.”

Wedding photography has proved to be one of our most popular categories, with more people turning to us every day to find the perfect pro to capture their special day.

As such, we’re always looking for new pros to keep up with this rapidly growing demand, and if you think Bark could work for your business we’d love to welcome you on board.

We’ll alert you to potential clients completely free of charge, so you can pick and choose the ones that work best for you. We don’t take any commission, and there’s no obligation to continue using our service after you’ve used your three complimentary introductions.

So there really is nothing to lose – and potentially everything to gain.

Click here to open your FREE account and start growing your business with Bark today.

From Go Pro to going pro – how to start up as a photographer

With the recent surge in photo-sharing apps, the introduction of selfie sticks and smartphones ramping up their camera specs – look no further than the new iPhone 6S’ 12-megapixel count and 4K video recording capabilities – it’s never been easier to capture the moment and snap away.

eBay saw searches for selfie sticks rise 700% ahead of Christmas 2014

But what if you want to take it up a gear? Helping you to make the move from amateur to professional, portrait photographer David Harrison offers his top tips on entering the industry.

Finish what you start: Whether it’s uploading the best pic of your day to Instagram or getting a print made, it’s all too easy to snap away and never have a ‘finished ‘image. Keeping going and putting in that extra bit of effort will make it all worth it in the end when you have the perfect picture.
Keep busy: Motivation is key. Never put pressure on yourself to overdo it, but do make sure you keep busy and have a range of options to work on – this will make the experience more fun! It will also give you a stack of pictures to add to your portfolio.
Be passionate: Photograph what you know, what you love, what you care about and what you have access to. This will make the whole process much more enjoyable, and help you with points 1 and 2. You are unique and so is what you see, so show it!
Okay, I’m ready for my close up…
Network, Network, Network: Important in so many aspects of life – tell everybody what you are doing and, most important for your line of business, show them. You will be surprised how many people will have something you can help them with, and you may even learn something new. The more your work is out there, the more opportunities will come your way.
Keep the day job! Good photography takes time. Nobody is a pro straight off the bat and – as always in life – there’s a lot to learn. If you’re thinking of becoming a professional photographer, start it off as a hobby, learn different skills, techniques and most of all, have fun! In this way you can enjoy your photography, while learning the right skills and making the contacts to take it to the next level.
As the old saying goes, practice makes perfect

Feeling inspired but not sure how to make sense of your shutter speed, aperture or ISO? Why not have a look for photography lessons near you? Or, if you’re on the other end of the spectrum and ready to use your skills commercially, customers are requesting all manner of photography services on Bark.com, from event photography to wedding photography and even pet photography. Why not
register with us today?

For more Bark.com tips and insights, why not check out our other blogs?