Nicole Rogers, a Pilates instructor in Brooklyn, recently decided to promote her teaching skills online. Below, she shares her tips for reserving your own spot on the web and getting picture-perfect photos for online and print advertising.

In 2006 I quit my job as a television producer to teach Pilates. Post-certification, I was making less than half my previous salary. I was also working two jobs—one started at 6am and the other ended at 9pm. After a year of this, I felt I needed a different strategy. After all, I left my well-paying, high-stress job not just because I love teaching Pilates, but to have a better lifestyle.  

My new strategy started by getting a job at a great studio a few blocks from my apartment in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn.  Then a friend of mine got me a job teaching mat classes at her office twice a week. Teaching in offices was lucrative and fun, so I started handing out business cards and getting friends to spread the word at their place of work, but it seemed like no one was taking me seriously. Maybe it seemed like this was a hobby or a phase. I had no desire to open my own studio, but I needed a way to market myself. A website seemed like a good first step. For some reason a website seems to connote that I’ve thought long and hard about this and that I take being a Pilates instructor very seriously. I’d noticed photographer friends hand out cards with their websites and get real feedback.