What crop for maximum sales?

nxk2000

Most of my pictures are cropped at the original aspect ratio of 36x24 which is equivalent to a 4x6 and 8x12.

Last year during my biggest event I noticed that several people were purchasing 8x12's vs 8x10's. 90% of my sales were 4x6's. Where 4x6's popular because they were the cheapest print or because they don't require any cropping at check out? It seems customers are scared of the Needs Cropping In Checkout warning. Could I increase my sales by cropping to 5x7 or 8x10 during processing?

I try to crop my pictures tight enough to make them look good but also loose enough to allow for different sizes. I find that very few customers take advantage of the cropping tool when purchasing photos.

What are your experiences with cropping for best sales?

Slap Shot Photography

mbellot

Same here. 90% don't/won't crop, but 90% of my sales are 4x6 so no cropping needed.

I have had a couple customers that re-cropped to a tighter 4x6 to isolate just their child...

I'm pretty certain its cost, not "fear of cropping", that is the reason 4x6 prints sell the most.

jfriend

The best tool you have at your disposal is "proof delay". If you set the gallery for proof delay, then you have the ability to review every print ordered before it goes to the printer. It's at that stage that you can make sure the crops are good and/or optimize the crop for the particular print size. Since you get a separate crop for every item ordered, you can really optimize each particular print ordered.

I do a lot of sports shooting and parents order shots of their kids. They will often order a whole slew of 4x6's and then a few enlargements. I find that most don't do anything with the crop at all. I don't know if they don't understand the crop stuff or they just don't want to bother or what. I scan every order and tweak the ones that need tweaking. Fortunately, it's pretty quick to scan and fix.

Since customers can order a variety of different aspect ratios, it works best if you leave a little extra room in what you upload so you can still crop for a good 8x12 or 8x10 without losing an important part of the shot. Unfortunately, that means you can display them on the web cropped as tight as you like. Maybe someday we'll be able to have a tight crop on the web, but still have extra room for print cropping.

Gringriff

I agree with the others. I have tried cropping at 8x10 and 5x7 but the 4x6 is the option I always come back to because I can crop a little loose at 4x6 and leave room for the other larger sizes. And too most of my sales have been in the 4x6 sizes, I believe mainly due to lower costs.

Allen42

Actually, I like 5x7

Gringriff wrote:

I agree with the others. I have tried cropping at 8x10 and 5x7 but the 4x6 is the option I always come back to because I can crop a little loose at 4x6 and leave room for the other larger sizes. And too most of my sales have been in the 4x6 sizes, I believe mainly due to lower costs.

I also sell mostly 4x6's, but I crop to 5x7 since I find that it offers the best compromise when cropping to 4x6 or 8x10.

Pupator

Allen42 wrote:

I also sell mostly 4x6's, but I crop to 5x7 since I find that it offers the best compromise when cropping to 4x6 or 8x10.

I no longer offer 8x10. It's a stupid size and always (almost) results in an awkward crop unless I planned for it in advance. I've sold my family and friends on the value of 8x12 - now I just have to get the frame companies to catch up!

Our hallway at home has about a dozen 8x12s framed and matted. We put them in 11x14 frames and do the mat at 1.5" on top and bottom and 1" on each side. They look nice.

twincitiesphoto

I've tried pricing some of my photos the same for either 4x6 and 5x7 to see if people would opt for the larger print when they saw there wasn't any difference in price - seems like they still prefer 4x6 but it is a very unscientific test on my part of course.