Hair, Makeup & Photography: One of My First Business Collaborations

One of the fun parts about being a small-business owner is finding ways to work with other businesses, and sometimes you just have to try an idea and see what happens. Earlier this summer, I got the opportunity to do exactly that with Tita’s Glam.

On July 8, 2026, we brought together hair, makeup, and photography for a giveaway. Looking back, this was actually one of my first intentional business collaborations, and it taught me quite a bit about working together, creating content, cross-promoting businesses, and all the little details that go into making a collaboration work.

How the Collaboration Started

I actually know Tita through her mom, Marta, who I met through Mary Kay. Marta and her daughter, who is also named Marta but goes by Tita, own Tita’s Glam together.

They each bring something a little different to the business. Marta is a hairstylist who specializes in services like hair color and also carries professional hair products in the store. Tita is trained in both hair and makeup and has her own line of hair products as well.

Tita was the one who originally reached out to me with the idea for the giveaway. She wanted to create some excitement around Tita’s Glam, bring more attention to the store and the products they offer, and get more people through the doors. Since I’m a photographer, combining her services with a portrait experience seemed like a really easy way for us to collaborate.

The idea was pretty simple: Tita would provide the hair and makeup, I would provide the photography, and one person would win the entire experience. So we made a video, put the giveaway out into the world, and waited to see what would happen.

Putting the Giveaway Out There

To enter, participants had to follow both of our accounts and tag people in the comments. Every person they tagged gave them an additional entry into the giveaway.

I promoted it across Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. We got some interaction on the different platforms, but TikTok definitely gave me the most engagement. And funny enough, TikTok is also where our winner came from.

And Our Winner Was Planning a Quinceañera!

Our winner had already found me on TikTok because she was looking for a quinceañera photographer. So out of everyone who could have entered this collaboration between a beauty business and a photographer, we ended up with a quinceañera!

It worked out perfectly because she was preparing for her quinceañera and needed photographs for her save-the-date and invitations.

She won professional hair and makeup with Tita, followed by a portrait session with me that included five finished images. There wasn’t a specific theme for the session, so we worked with her finished look, her outfit, and the environment we had right there at Tita’s Glam.

Her pink floral dress ended up working perfectly with all of the pink throughout Tita’s Glam. We created a combination of portraits against the solid pink background and used different areas of the shop to give her some variety.

Sometimes things just work out!

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Two Hours of Glam… and 15 Minutes of Photography 😂

This part still makes me laugh. Tita spent roughly two hours working on the hair and makeup, making sure everything was right and getting our winner completely ready for her portraits. Then it was my turn, and I think I was done photographing her in about 15 minutes. 😂 Life of a photographer!

But that’s also a fun example of what makes collaborations interesting. We each brought a completely different skill and process to the experience. Tita spent her time creating the finished hair and makeup look, and then I got to take that look and turn it into photographs the family could actually use for her quinceañera.

The Giveaway Was Free, but It Still Created Value

For me, there wasn’t any money made directly from the giveaway. I donated the portrait session and five finished images as my part of the collaboration. But that didn’t mean the giveaway didn’t create value.

I walked away with new content, portfolio images, exposure to new people, experience doing a collaboration, and eventually an amazing Google review.

The giveaway also introduced my work to someone who had already been searching for a quinceañera photographer, which I thought was pretty cool considering quinceañeras are such a big part of what I photograph.

For Tita, there was actually a direct sale that came from the experience. Our winner had a hair type that worked really well with some of the hair products Tita carries. During the appointment, Tita was able to use those products on her hair and show her and her mom the difference they made. They liked the results enough that her mom ended up purchasing some of the products to use at home.

And that’s such a good example of why I don’t think the success of a collaboration always has to be measured in one specific way. One business might make a sale. Another might gain content or portfolio work. You might reach a new audience, receive a review, make a connection, or simply learn something you can use the next time.

In our case, a free giveaway ended up creating several different kinds of value.

And Then Came the Google Reviews

One of my favorite results actually came afterward. The winner’s mom left both of our businesses incredibly thoughtful Google reviews.

And when I say thoughtful, I mean she practically wrote us essays! 😂

For my photography business, she talked about her daughter’s experience during the portrait session, how comfortable she felt in front of the camera, how we reviewed the photographs together afterward, and how happy they were with the finished images.

She also left Tita’s Glam a detailed review about the hair and makeup experience. She talked about how Tita listened to what her daughter wanted, checked in with her throughout the process, worked with her naturally curly hair, and introduced them to some of the hair products available through Tita’s Glam.

When we originally planned the giveaway, we were thinking about things like content, exposure, and getting people through the door. I don’t think either one of us was necessarily thinking, We’re going to get amazing Google reviews out of this.

But that’s exactly what happened.

What My First

Collaboration Taught Me

Because this was one of my first collaborations, there are definitely things I would organize differently today. The biggest lesson was communication.

When you’re collaborating with another business, there are a lot of tiny details that don’t seem important until you’re actually doing it.

Which Instagram account are we tagging?

Are there multiple business accounts?

Who is posting on TikTok?

Who is posting on Facebook?

What dates are we promoting everything?

Who is responsible for each piece of content?

And then there’s the content you create together. For example, we recorded a testimonial video after the experience, but it was recorded on Tita’s phone and I never ended up getting a copy.

Now I know that if I collaborate with someone again, I want us to have a plan for exchanging everything afterward so both businesses have access to the photographs, videos, testimonials, and other content we created together.

Those are small things, but they’re the kinds of lessons you learn by actually doing it.

Collaboration Doesn’t Have to Be Complicated

Looking back, I think that’s one of my biggest takeaways from this experience. A collaboration doesn’t have to be some huge production.

Tita already knew how to do hair and makeup. I already knew how to photograph people. Tita’s Glam already gave us a location. We simply took things we were already doing in our own businesses and brought them together to create one experience for someone else.

And even though the giveaway itself happened on one day, we walked away with photographs, videos, social media content, portfolio work, reviews, experience, and even a product sale.

It also wasn’t the last time I would photograph something at Tita’s Glam. 👀

Let’s Create Something Together

One thing I continue to enjoy about being a small-business owner is meeting other people who are building something of their own. Sometimes one conversation turns into an idea, and sometimes that idea turns into something neither business would have created on its own.

So if you’re another small-business owner, creative, hairstylist, makeup artist, or someone in the beauty industry and you have an idea where photography could become part of the experience, I’m always open to hearing it.

It could be a giveaway.

It could be an event.

It could be content for a new product or service.

Or maybe it’s an idea neither one of us has thought of yet.

Sometimes you just have to collaborate, create something, and see where it goes.