Meet Simmi Gupta, a successful corporate professional who turned into a self-employed photographer

Celebrating the essence of being a woman, Simmi Gupta is an inspiration to those who wish to rekindle their interest and live their passion irrespective of age.

A successful marketing professional across MNC’s, Simmi wanted to pursue her passion for photography. Her irresistible desire for capturing almost everything, long hours of practice and an eye for detail has today landed her in covering brands such as Audi, Adobe, Karavaan, Steel Bird, I-Lounge, Shree Raj Mahal Jewellers and many others.

Simmi Gupta- photographer

Simmi specializes in Babybump Photography which deals in new-born, family, maternity, baby, kids photo-shoots. As a photographer, she also covers jewellery, product, corporate CXO portfolios, celebrity fashion and model portfolios, pre-wedding and special occasion’s coverage including still and experiential video photography in her other portal called Simmiclicks. She has also done the cake smash photography shoots. In a quick chat with BananiVista, she shares her journey.

BV: What inspires you to take up photography and being a photographer? Simmi: Will to pursue a passion in life. Break mundane of being just a corporate professional and to make my passion as my profession.

BV: What are the challenges faced during starting up? Simmi: Differentiation in an offering. There is a lot of competition in photography as a lot of amateurs and commercial retail studios set-up booming this space. Creating a niche, specialized service model and value-added services offering in this space come as a big challenge in this segment but once your quality of product and service registers within the customers and the user base, this profession becomes self-sustaining. However, you need to innovate at every stage.

BV: How did you get your first five customers? Simmi: Social media and digital platforms are a big help in this area. Developing your own online business web-page and website, Facebook landing, Instagram handle and also leveraging on existing apps for shared services like Urban-Clap, Just-Dial, and regional e-commerce platforms got me the first set of customers. Once you are established, a lot of referral works too. BV: Any recognition or awards? Simmi: I have never nominated my work for any awards as a photographer as I wanted to establish my brand and service excellence within my client segment and extract testimonies. Now, as I am quite established and there is a strong base of my happy customers to back my work, there are a lot of award platforms who have approached me to share my work and nominate my own brand. I will now get active on gratification platforms. BV: What are your upcoming plans? Simmi: To open up a full-fledged equipped studio chain under the brand name Babybump photography only for maternity, newborn, baby and family portfolios. To read such interesting interviews, follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Download our magazine, Spunky Indian to read exclusive stories.