If you find yourself struggling to come up with ideas for your photography blog or social media channels, have you ever thought about using national awareness days as a source of inspiration? If not, I highly suggest giving it a try!
We all know the feeling of staring at a blank screen, desperately searching for something to write about to promote our businesses. It can be a frustrating experience, to say the least.
Fortunately, national awareness days can be an excellent solution to this problem. With hundreds of events and campaigns taking place every year, and typically more than a hundred in each calendar month, you have a huge amount of content prompts at your fingertips.
Each awareness day is a potential topic on which you can base your content around! So, by tapping into these awareness days, you can come up with plenty of content ideas in no time!
Hundreds of awareness days = content prompts galore!
By focusing on an awareness day centred around a specific theme or topic, you may discover an abundance of photography marketing content ideas – enough to fuel your marketing content plan for the entire year!
These awareness days are useful prompts to inspire your creativity and get your brain churning with possibilities. As you reflect on the theme or topic of the awareness day, with just a little effort, I’m confident that you will quickly be able to come up with a fascinating story, personal anecdote or memorable experience that you could share with your audience this week.
With the vast array of awareness days occurring each month, there really are endless opportunities to leverage them for your photography business. If you are open to the potential of awareness days and set aside some time each month to brainstorm ideas, you can tap into their power and create impactful content that resonates with your audience and builds know, like and trust. So, why not start straight away?!
Related reading: How to use awareness days to inspire photography content ideas
Grab your free guide to 2023 awareness days
Before I get onto the list of May awareness days that you might want to look out for in 2023, do take a minute to grab my free printable guide of awareness days. There are literally hundreds in there!
Part 1 features awareness days for January through to March. Part 2 is now available, and features awareness days happening in April through to June. Subscribe to get access to both, and future instalments, of the guide!
You can also upgrade and purchase the extended edition here, which is packed with more than 250 awareness days in Quarter 2.
May Awareness Days
Grabbed your awareness days guide? Great! Let’s get started!
If you’re reading this around the time this article was originally published, now’s the time to start creating content for your photography marketing channels for May!
In May, there are lots of awareness days and campaigns, so I’m confident that you should be able to find some that are relevant and could inspire content ideas you’ve not thought of yet.
Month-long awareness campaigns in May
There are month-long campaigns during May including:
- National Photography Month
- National Walking Month
- National Share A Story Month
- Local Community and History Month
- National Smile Month
- Maternal Mental Health Month
As an example of how some of these could be applied…
National Photography Month
In the month of May, you could use this month-long campaign to share information about so many different aspects of your life as a photographer. You could talk on social media and in blogs and email newsletters about:
- the photography work you do for clients,
- the projects that particularly light you up and that you’d like to do more of,
- what you love about your work and also who/what you photograph.
- your day-to-day life and what it’s like to be you (yes, people would find this interesting!),
- how you got started as a photographer
- some of the wonderful people you’ve met through your work or some of the interesting things that have happened to you during your time as a photographer.
Do you see? Coming up with content ideas needn’t be difficult or time-consuming.
There’s so much you could share, as I’ve suggested here, and while these ideas have been inspired by National Photography Month they would also be great at other times of year too, so don’t think that you can’t talk about these topics at another time.
Awareness days and week-long campaigns in May
Now, let’s focus on May awareness days and week-long campaigns. There are many key dates in May, including the following (be sure to grab the free guide or upgrade to the premium version for an extended list):
*Please note that the dates below apply predominantly to the U.K. in the year 2023, and are subject to change year on year. Although they are correct to the best of my knowledge at the time of publication, please check the dates of any awareness campaigns you plan to use.
Week-long campaigns in May include:
- Maternal Mental Health Awareness Week (from the 2nd)
- National Weaning Week (from the 4th)
- Red Cross Week (from the 4th)
- Food Allergy Awareness Week (from the 8th)
- Mental Health Awareness Week (from the 15th)
- Learning at Work Week (from the 15th)
- Water Saving Week (from the 22nd)
Awareness days in May
2nd May
- Baby Day – This is one that birth photographers and newborn/family photographers can use as an opportunity to talk about anything and everything baby-related.
Birth photographers, why not talk about how you became to be a specialist in this genre of photography? Perhaps you can recall the very first birth you photographed, or you have a relatable birth or baby story yourself that had an impact on your choice of career.
Newborn and baby photographers, Baby Day could be interpreted in so many ways for you too! As an example, you could share:
- inspirational content such as examples of your portraits captured at some of your most recent baby photoshoots,
- expertise content such as tips on how to prepare for a baby photo session,
- and, sales content such as compelling arguments for why you believe parents should book a baby portrait session (let’s not assume everyone realises the value of baby photography!)
…and so much more!
4th May
- World Maternal Mental Health Day – This is another campaign that could inspire content for photographers including those specialising in maternity, birth and baby photography, and indeed any photographers who are parents themselves.
Unlike some of the more fun and frivolous awareness days in May, this is one with an important health message so obviously, if you are going to use it as a prompt for your marketing content, be sure to take a sensitive approach.
You could create or reshare useful self-care and mental health tips for mums on your social media accounts, and recommend mental health resources that mums would find useful.
Alternatively, if you’re a mum yourself and have a mental health-related story to share, you could talk about your own experience. Or, you could perhaps interview some of your clients and ask them about their journeys to recovery, then create a blog.
6th May
- The King’s Coronation – Here in the U.K., the King’s Coronation is coming up. Have you yet considered how you might use this in your marketing content? It’s the event on everyone’s lips at the moment, so would be a great event to hook your content onto in early May.
Here are some ideas of things that you could potentially share:
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How will you be celebrating the King’s Coronation on May 6th?
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Have you got a personal story you could share about the Royal Family?
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Do you have an impressive collection of Royal Memorabilia, perhaps?
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Have you met (or perhaps even photographed) the King or a member of the Royal Family? How did that come about?
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Have you been working on any Royalty or British-themed shoots?
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Have you created portraits of babies/children/pets wearing crowns? Or have any Prince/Princess-themed images you could share?
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If you photograph wildlife, you could share any images you have of the King of the Jungle or Kingfishers etc.
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In your photography business, how do you give your clients the ‘Royal’ (VIP) treatment? (Talk about how your service is different)
The above angles are likely to interest the press too, so if you have a strong story, why not pitch it to your local media for some possible press coverage as well?
13th May
- World Cocktail Day – Drink photographers, this one is for you!
Most simply, you could showcase some of the imagery you have created for your clients recently, or share behind-the-scenes videos showing you working on a shoot.
You could also collate a series of delicious cocktail recipes which include the spirits and liqueurs your clients produce. Perhaps interview the mixologist who worked on the shoot with you – and share these with your followers.
15th May
- International Day of Families – If you’re a family portrait photographer, there are endless ways you can interpret this to come up with content ideas for your marketing.
For example, you could share why you love photographing families and showcase images from your portfolio revealing the many and varied family setups you’ve captured to date.
Or, you could talk about your favourite family portrait locations in your local area, reveal tips on how your clients can pose during a family photo session in a way that will make them feel at ease, or give guidance on how to prepare for a session.
Alternatively, use it to reveal something about you to build a deeper connection with your clients. Talk about your family, what you all like doing together and a fun fact or funny story that will make your followers smile.
16th May
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Horse Rescue Day – Equestrian photographers, perhaps you have something you could share on Horse Rescue Day – whether it be a story of a horse you’ve photographed for a client, or perhaps even your own horse?
19th May
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National Endangered Species Day – Wildlife photographers, this one could be appropriate for you.
You could share your photographs and opinions on what needs to be done to safeguard and protect animals that are at risk. Why not also highlight any relevant charitable campaigns that are making a difference and that you would love to see better supported?
May awareness days can inspire tons of content
I hope that this may have helped to show you how you can use some of the May awareness days in your marketing content this year. Of course, these are just some ideas I’ve put together and shared just to give you some quick-fire inspiration on how to apply them to your content.
Don’t overthink this! Simply cherry-pick a few of the May awareness days that speak to you and then interpret them however you wish. Remember, grab the extended version if you want hundreds more content prompts for Quarter 2 of 2023.
Remember, there are many more awareness days in May than those listed above. Download your free guide, cherry-pick a few of the May awareness days that speak to you and then interpret them however you wish.
P.S. Keep checking back to this blog for more similar articles. This is the fifth instalment of a monthly blog series that’s focused on awareness days and how to interpret them to develop photography content ideas.
Related reading: April Awareness Days
Good luck with your May content planning!
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