To be successful as a make-up artist you must first get hired. If you are contacting all the right people and not getting the results you deserve, you may need to work on improving your personal image or your portfolio.

Prospective clients are looking for a good make-up artist. But with so many to choose from you need to impress them in other ways as well. During your make-up training at Award Studio we go over this topic in great detail. You will learn the correct way to market yourself, who the clients are in your area, how to contact them, what to say, what to charge for different types of work, how to negotiate and finally how to draw up your contracts, do invoicing and your taxes. The reality is that it's not just what you know that matters. You need to know everything that the top make-up artists know about image and marketing yourself or you don't have a chance of competing with them. One wrong move and the clients will know you are a beginner and no one wants to work with beginners. That being said, I have listed a few things below that may help.

1. When contacting prospective clients in order to try and set up an appointment with them, you should always speak to them with a friendly, upbeat voice. This implies that the artist has a good attitude. No one wants to waste time making an appointment with someone who exudes low energy or a flat voice.

2. When you answer your mobile phone it may be a client, so always give a friendly hello. If they get your voicemail they will not listen to your music as in this business time is money. They will hang up and go to the next make-up artist on their list. We will go over many more things in the class at Award Studio that are instant turn-offs to clients and shout UNPROFESSIONAL.

3. Always have your appointment book with you to check available dates and note details. You will also want the list of questions we will give you to ask clients when they call to book you, before you quote rates or agree to anything. In certain situations you can ask for time and a half, a kit fee or travel allowance. Your sheet will tell you when and how.

4. Always arrive early for your interview. If you are late for the interview they will assume that you will be late for the job as well. They can't afford to take that chance so you probably won't get the job.

5. On interviews and jobs you want to be outgoing and personable, but don't talk too much or about topics unrelated to the job. Talking non-stop gets on peoples nerves and keeps them and you from concentrating on the job at hand. However, talking too little indicates low energy or shyness, neither of which are attributes to a client. We will go into this in further detail in class.

6. It is important to always arrive well groomed, wearing little or no jewelry. You should have short nails with clear polish and the make-up you wear should be similar to the type of make-up you will be doing for that job. Most work requires neutral make-up and you will scare clients if you arrive with wild make-up colors. They fear you may do that to them and they will look inappropriate for the job. Rather than risk it they will book another make-up artist. We will discuss what type of make-up you should wear for different types of jobs during your class.

7. YOUR PORTFOLIO IS SUPREME IN DETERMINING IF YOU GET HIRED OR NOT. You can look fabulous and have a wonderful personality, but if your portfolio is not top rate you will not get hired. This cannot be emphasized enough. This is one of the main things that makes the program at Award Studio light years ahead of all the others. We not only train you with the latest make-up techniques in the industry and provide you with all the detailed information you need to market yourself, which many schools do not, but we also concentrate on building your portfolio to show clients. Some schools have you bring in your friends to photograph with your own non professional camera. Others provide you with two to five people for you to photograph. You are not a professional photographer and any professional can spot that a mile off. A few schools have someone photograph the two to five people, all in the studio, using a digital camera. The quality of digital is just not nearly good enough yet for skin tones, so then the photographs have to be photoshopped to look decent. But your clients want to see the quality of your work without retouching and photoshopping. That's the only way they know if you are any good. At Award Studio we use real negative film to show your work in it's pure form. And you can rest assured that your photographs will be done by Amy Ward, the founder of Award Studio, who has worked for Vogue, Elle, Vanity Fair, Marie Claire, Armani, Calvin Klein, Oprah, President Clinton and hundreds of others in London, Paris, Milan, Hamburg and the US. Who is taking the photographs at the other schools? Certainly no one with those credentials.

Because of Amy Ward's international experience she can create a full portfolio that actually looks like it could be published work. We provide 16 to 20 models and actors for each class to work on and have photographed for your portfolio. During the Media Make-up Class we provide 16 to 20 female and male actors, performers, musicians, comedians and children encompassing a large range of ages and skin tones. This way clients see that you can handle any situation. These are mainly studio head shots to show your work up close. In the Two Day Fashion Location Class you will spend two full days at various locations doing make-up on 6 to 10 fashion models and have about 200 shots to choose from (18-20 outfits). The location shots will look like different photographers have shot them, as different types of film and a variety of lenses will be used in different types of light at different times of the day at different locations. These are mainly 3/4 and full length editorial shots, so it looks like you've done work for magazines and catalogs. By taking the Media and Fashion classes you can easily fill a 40 page portfolio and clients will think you have had several years experience. thereby commanding professional rates right from the start. No other school offers anything that even comes close to this.

Award Studio only excepts eight students per class and students come from all over the world, so classes fill quickly. There is a nice hotel close by and students often share a room as you are in the studio from 10 am until 8 pm most days. This enables you to complete everything in seven days, in less time and for less money than you will find anywhere else. Our philosophy is to teach you everything you need to know in a reasonable amount of time at a fair price. That is why we have a AAA rating with the Better Business Bureau, (the highest rating there is).

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