You cannot sell photographs to people who do not appreciate photography.

I am not a consumer photographer, but have spent over 50 years in the commercial side.

What I see happening in consumer work, is that too many photographers are doing the identical work.

There's no difference between dozens of photographers in one area, and literally thousands of photographers doing what they see thousands of photographers doing on IG... over and over again.

The potential client sees this work, equates it with IG - in other words the SAME STUFF they do themselves and find it has no value.

You can only sell the arbitrage of what they perceive as value versus what they perceive as something they can do. And one of the biggest problems is too many photographers are making photographs that their clients CAN ACTUALLY DO.

Setting yourself apart, doing work they cannot do, having a vision that goes beyond "my stuff looks like this other IGer and she is rocking it" is the key.

One photographer I know is only shooting black and white portraits and half the gig is done on film.

He can charge what he wants because people see his work and KNOW they cannot do it, and it doesn't look at all like the internet gurus who create the same thing over and over.