Today we’d like to introduce you to Mike Hurley.
Hi Mike, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
My journey started back in high school when I needed an extra elective credit in my junior year so I decided to take a black and white photography class. From there, my passion for creative imagery was ignited. I took my camera with me everywhere I went and would shoot countless rolls of 35mm film. After high school and college I began photographing weddings which became a big part of my life. I really enjoyed spending the day with couples and their families while capturing one of the most important days of their lives. It never really felt like work because I truly enjoyed every minute of it. As time went on, the studio I was working for began to offer videography services and my focus shifted to filming and editing wedding videos. After my time with the studio came to an end, I decided to branch out on my own and began booking weddings along with helping businesses create photo and video content for their marketing endeavors. I slowly moved away from weddings and focused solely on supporting businesses with my expertise in creating photo and video content that they could use on their website and across social media platforms. Today, my focus is on guiding small to medium sized businesses on understanding the importance of video to stay visible and relevant as well as implementing videos that can help them save time, educate customers and promote their product or service.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Entrepreneurship is definitely not a smooth road. There are challenges each day and all we can do is handle them the best that we can. During the covid pandemic, my business was completely event based and I lost nearly all of my bookings during that time. Luckily, I was able to shift my services and I was able to begin live streaming events for some of my clients who had rescheduled.
We’ve been impressed with Cleveland Video Pro, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
I have always been a creative minded person who enjoys helping others. I understand that there are so many different parts of running a business and I do my best to support fellow entrepreneurs/business owners who realize that they need to use video to promote their product or service but they just do not know how. This is where I can help by understanding their struggles and creating a video creation plan that is easy to implement.
We’d love to hear about how you think about risk taking?
As entrepreneurs we took a risk just by betting on ourselves and starting a business. Sometimes the risks that we take work in our favor and sometimes those risks do not work as we had planned. The important part is how we react to those times where risks do not work. In those times, I look back at what went wrong and learn for the future. I would not call myself as a “risk-taker” but sometimes you have to take that risk to push yourself and your business to the next level.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.clevelandvideopro.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/clevelandvideopro
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/clevelandvideopro
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/clevelandvideopro
