As real estate agents will often say "location, location, location", I might do the same with the word 'relationship'! As a photographer who frequently develops a client to friend, it is so important to me to be in good relationship with the people I do business with. It begins with honesty, communication and the golden rule "Do unto others as you would have them do to you". One of the benefits to having an ongoing relationship with the ones that I photograph is that I get to watch their children grow up (the only bad thing is I'm growing older with them!!).
The Hirko family is a local family who I have walked with through many changes in their lives. When I first met Andy, he was our son Christian's kindergarten teacher who switched careers and became our daughter's college pastor at church, who then became a pastor and is now our pastor and also a mentor to our son Dylan who is youth pastor at the same church. I was one of the mom's in the kindergarten class, then a helper at the college ministry and have always been his family photographer. One of the benefits to this is being great friends with him and his wife and their extended family. I know their children and have photographed them from day one. 
The photos are so meaningful to me and I believe that this makes it easy for them when they want photos because I can slip in without a big fuss and do the photos without the kids getting crazy. They know me and so it helps when it comes to the pics.
Another family is from New Jersey. It began by him calling me out of the blue wanting me to help him with an early morning sunrise photo session on the beach with his girlfriend who he wanted to propose to. We collaborated and I brought the champagne and glasses (my assistant was the wine steward) and we had a successful launch with great photos to tell the story. Wind forward four years, I have since done one more session with them and will be doing another one this July with his wife and two children! I love this couple and keep up with their lives on Facebook and the occasional communication via email. I look forward to many more sessions with them in the future!
You may be hoping to have a family photo. I would love to help you with that!
