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What a great way to start the week. I had the pleasure of chatting with Sarah Petty of thejoyofmarketing.com and Sarah Petty Photography this morning. If you're not familiar with Sarah, she is one of the most prominent marketing gurus in the world of portrait photography, not to mention a really sweet person. I've been a huge fan of Sarah for several years, so it was exciting for me to get the opportunity to talk to her. We talked about sales, and how to differentiate yourself in this increasingly highly competitive market. You can listen to our entire chat right here, and I've also made note of some of the highlights of our conversation below.
Click to hear my conversation with Sarah
How Can a Photographer Compete These Days? One of Sarah's points that really struck me was that just because there are thousands of other photographers out there competing with us, we each only need to worry about attracting somewhere in the vicinity of maybe 200 or 300 clients a year, depending on our pricing structure and business model. The other photographers can have the rest of them! So when photographers start getting depressed about all the competition, this is a great thought to keep in mind.
So what does one do when there are so many photographers offering their work at impossibly low prices? Take the decision off of price! Let people know what's unique about your business before price enters the equation. That first conversation is important -- don't just send out a price list (like I do all-too-often!), but work on establishing rapport during that initial contact.
Sarah always does an in-person consultation prior to her sessions, which helps make sure you know exactly what your client wants before you get into the session, and helps weed out the people who are not a mutually good fit. In fact, she does the consultation, the photography and the sales presentation herself, and leaves everything else to her staff -- she doesn't handle the images anywhere in between. She pointed out that sometimes someone else is better at editing your images than you are, since they're not as emotionally attached to the images. She makes a sales plan based on the images that are left. She thinks about what will go on the wall as she shoots, knowing what the client wants from the consultation they had prior to their session.
What About Digital Files? I asked Sarah how she handles the sale of digital files. She finds much of the time that people just want the digital files so that they can share them on Facebook or elsewhere online. So she finds a way to say "yes, we do offer digital files, which we provide in a size suitable for sharing online." She then goes on to explain that because she is so picky about how her work will appear when printed, that she's just not comfortable selling the high-res files. The consumer labs you might use aren't going to make those tweaks for color and exposure, etc., and she's generally found that she's not happy with the results when the printing is out of her hands. Let them know "We'll create an amazing wall portrait for you, and you'll have the image to share online." She pointed out that if all they want is a disk of 20 high res images for 200 bucks, then you may just not be the photographer for them. She also noted that most people who buy the disk of the images from their wedding, for example, never end up printing them. She says "We don't even print the images from our own little point and shoot, do we?" So her main point on selling the digital files was that it is good to be able to say "yes," but not at the expense of how you make your money.
Sales Education. To help photographers become profitable and perhaps even save their businesses, Sarah and other big names in the industry are holding a free online sales summit on 10/10/10. Speakers include some of my favorites like Kevin Kubota and Tim & Bev Walden, plus a whole batch of others. Each is taking one little chunk of the sales process, and they're talking about 10 different things that will help you become successful. The theme is "10" and they are offering various promotions surrounding that theme. The event is free to listen to from 10am - 10pm on 10/10/10. (Totally unrelated, but I love dates like this one -- last year my birthday fell on 9/9/9!) You can also pre-purchase the recording for $59. I listened to the last two tele-summits that Sarah put together, and found valuable tips from each that I was able to implement in my own business right away.
Everyone's abuzz about charitable marketing these days, and with good reason. Charities are running on tighter budgets than ever as people's discretionary income dries up. More than ever, your local charities appreciate any help they can get.
There are all sorts of creative ways you can approach raising money for charities. One popular approach is to offer portrait sessions for which part or all of the session fee is donated to the charity. A lot of photographers, myself included, have tried this on with dog photography in the past few years. I'll tell you -- photographing dogs all day is a crazy departure from photographing kids and families, but is totally fun and rewarding. I recently ran a fundraiser for our local animal rescue organization, and you can catch the news clip of it below. I'll talk more about raising money for charity in the days ahead.
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