BlinkBid is my go-to program for writing estimates and invoices. It's tailored for photographers and filmmakers with usage rights built into the estimating workflow. Recently, they added online payments to help you get paid faster.

As much as I love BlinkBid for writing estimates, it doesn't do the the "business" things like keeping track of your books, profit & loss statements, and receipt tracking. QuickBooks does all that, and most accountants use it. So, it's a very seamless process to do your taxes. I've used QuickBooks since the beginning. It's the gold standard for small business software.

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Before I was a photographer, I was a web designer. I used to do my site in WordPress for years. It was a challenge to maintain, and custom designs were costly. I switched to Pixpa last year and am so happy I did. It's so easy to use, and the customer service is incredible. I used Pixpa to build this website you're on right now.

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I used to lose track of job inquiries and miss out on jobs. It sucked. Then I discovered ActiveCampaign, whose CRM (Client Relationship Management) saved me so much time and energy. All my clients and leads are here. I can keep tabs on my business on one screen.

Plus, it's a killer email marketing program, so you don't have to use "another" tool. I send out an email about twice a month, and every time I do, I get work. It's like printing money.

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Life before Set Hero was an awful mess of Excel spreadsheets and hastily scribbled notes on scraps of paper. To make a decent-looking Call Sheet took forever.

Set Hero makes it so easy, and you look way more professional. Plus, it sends out text confirmations to cast, client, and crew, so you know everyone got the message about their call time. It has a great free plan for small shoots to boot.

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I just discovered Piclfow and it is by far the BEST Client Gallery Software for professional photographers. Not only do your images look big, load fast, and easy to organize, but you clients can make annotations directly on the proofs. This is a game changer and it's free to try out.

Planning for any outdoor photoshoot, I have to know where the sun will be. TPE is the BEST app to figure it out! The user interface is highly intuitive. It's a paid app, so no ads are junking up the screen. It even has an Augmented Reality view to see exactly where the sun will be. I love this app!

I've tried other cloud drive storage solutions and keep returning to Dropbox. It just works. I never have trouble getting access to my files. Sharing is super easy. You can even send big files like WeTransfer. Every still photoshoot I do, I upload the RAW files to dropbox as a backup. I never have to worry about having an external drive.