Anyone here offer an Ipad as part of a package?

GerryDavid

I read in a photography magazine a while back of a wedding photographer offering a wedding package that included an Ipad and thought this was interesting.

My main concern is the warranty. Do you get a gift receipt when you purchase it and pass it along to the customer, pay in cash and give them the actual receipt, or just register the warranty in their information and don't give it another thought?

Has anyone here tried this with a package? What was the customer's response?

Glort

You certainly come up with some interesting ones thats for sure!

GerryDavid

It was either in the PPA photographers magazine or Rangefinder. I know know local wedding photographer offers it with a wedding package. Im going to give it a try, but I cant just buy an ipad to try it out with first, dont have the $500 to toss into something like that until ive been paid for the package. The ipad can be customized before delivered. set the home page to your website, change the wallpaper to one of your images, toss in high res digital files *at full price* from the portrait and include promotional information somewhere, like a folder on the desktop.

Glort

If you are going to try the idea please let us know how it pans out and make sure you measure your promotions so you can track the increase you get in business from it.

I'm curious as to how this will actually work?
Are you going to maintain your current prices and take a $500 hit on your profits or are you going to add the cost of the Ipad to your current pricing or have you thought of some other way of doing it such as in a package or something?

A lot of complications come to mind with this idea, is there an online link to the article we could read to see how it has been done?

GerryDavid

I would probably raise the package price by $600 to cover the cost of the $500+ tax ipad.

System

For me, I wouldn't be inclined to pay an extra $600 for a wedding~engagement package to get an Ipad. A lot of people already have one, maybe the want one but want one with 3G or 32 gig instead of 16 gig, etc. There are many variables when purchasing an Ipad. You could maybe offer to load their Ipad with their wedding~engagement photos for a fee.

GerryDavid

For those that have an ipad already and they want the package, then you take the price of the ipad off of the package.

System

To many variables with Ipads. To my knowledge, there are 6 different models to choose from.

GerryDavid

yup, many ipads to choose from, thats why a package would have the base one, if they want to upgrade, they can, if they have one, they can take the price of the ipad off of the package or just simply choose another package.

just saying what the article said. I tried to find it online but I couldnt. im not even sure which of the 2 magazines it was in.

this is more of a marketing gimmick, and its not meant to be the only package you offer.

Cygnus Studios

GerryDavid wrote: »

yup, many ipads to choose from, thats why a package would have the base one

Just treat this like any album deal. Offer the package and allow upgrades as the client sees fit. The more options you offer the client, the more they will appreciate it.

Glort

GerryDavid wrote: »

this is more of a marketing gimmick, and its not meant to be the only package you offer.

Yeah, I think the problem is it's a bit too transparent as exactly that, a Gimmick.

I looked for the article online and couldn't find it but somewhat to my surprise, I did find that several shooters here in Oz are offering the same gimmick, one claiming to be the first in the world to offer it.

I can see some potential in the idea, but it also appears to be limited.
One problem I see with such a setup is that the value of the offered extra is very well known and peole wouldn't think for a moment they aren't paying for it anyway. To me it would then be what is the value of the package over just going and buying an Ipad anyway?
It wouldn't be hard for the people to load their own pics on one and they would probably want to create a 2nd album of all the happy snaps they got from guests as well.

For mine, if this sort of offer holds customer appeal and the clients see them as an added value, which in this case I have doubts about, and will book one shooter over another to get it, then it would be worthwhile promoting. My belief is at the end of the day they are stll going to put a lot of weight on the shooters work, opersonality and their budget. For some, the Iplod might get them over the line if they can decide between 2 shooters but chances are they will be a very minimal percentage of clients and unless a shooter has a good stream of prospects coming through the door anyway, it's not going to be much of a percentage of an increase in their business.

I could be wrong and if there was something to indicate this promo was successful at bringing in business over my competitors and solved some of the objections people have during the process of finding a shooter, then I'll adopt it tomorrow IF I can see evidence of that being the case. I'd like to see a bunch of shooters saying this worked well for me before I was convinced of its worth though.

I think all these left of field gimmicks and marketing efforts such as promoting in different places and coming up with new and wacky promos and packages and all that are well and good, IF they are workable and do bring clients in or convert prospects that would have otherwise been lost rather than ones that would have booked anyway and could have been upsold the value of the Iplod which would have left some profit in that extra for the shooter rather than just being an outright extra cost.

At the end of the day though, I wonder if people don't get ahead of themselves and should just try and stick to more conventional marketing and promotional methods and if the effort put into them would not be as, or more successful than all the other off centre ideas?

I think some times we are so busy trying to think of this and that and something else that we can't see the wood for the trees and instead of spending time and effort trying to be creative in our marketing, we wouldn't be better off just getting a solid marketing base in place to begin with and then venture into the new ideas for the cream rather than bread and butter.

Over the last 2 years I have built a very successful avenue of my business from nothing in a field I had very limited and long past experience in. I still don't have business cards or until a couple of months ago, a web site. The one I have now is just a photo odreding repository and dosen't even have a front page or any info on it.

Instead of the now normal think of having to have a website for a business as if you can't have a business without one, which is basically trying to bring the clients to you, because I picked a business where I can very easily see and target the clients, getting onto the phone and having a chat has proven very successful for me and now having established the business, I'm getting more people calling me to book than I'm ringing.
I have a friend that also has a young business that will turn $1.5M this year and he dosen't have a website or do any promotions other than drop in and see potential clients as he spots them as he's passing by.
Now obviously this won't work with weddings, but my point is, sometimes just the simple basics are not only enough, but can be more successful than the out there ideas.

It really comes down to concerntrating and trying to perfect one thing and make that work rather than racing around all over the place trying to look for the magic soloution that will unlock the door to fame and fortune.
There isn't one and the real answer to successful marketing long term in a non unique business is to just persist with the dull, boring, conventional methods first and build your foundation before trying to build the skyscraper from the top floor down.

I know with wedding work, referals from other businesses in the game and past clients has brought me in far more work than tens of thousands of advertising ever did.
At the end of the day though, a gimmick like an ipad needs to be promoted and for me, if your doing that, I would far rather add something that I can build far more added value into. We are lucky in that we have high markups on our product costs so If I'm going to put $500 into a promo, I want to be able to appear to add $2k worth of value to the client and it can be entirely practical, appealing to the clients and profitable for me to do that.

Of course if people can make the Ipad thing work and bring in more work and profit than any otehr idea they can think of, then its a good move.
I just wonder how many shooters this would work for though over more traditional marketing methods?

ssimmonsphoto

It was from the PPA magazine, maybe the November or December 2010 issue.

I find the prospect of it very appealing, but not something that my clients, at my price point, would likely find appeal in. But I could envision using it much like a digital wedding album for those that don't want an actual book, but would love to have a well thought out way to show others their special photos. If I were to offer it, I would likely make an app (or something like it) for the client with their album (pages laid out, etc.) and then have the pages flip much like in a real book. Perhaps work video clips in to it to add to the interactive nature. If you want to think about how the pricing would work, I'd probably price it similar to what my design charge is for albums. I could buy them the iPad and load it on to it if they didn't have it already or I could put the App on to a disc and give them that to load. If my photographer had offered something similar, especially if I already had an iPad, I'd likely be very interested because (in terms of my pricing) the design fee is less than the cost of the album printing itself. It could be an "affordable" way for someone to have a wedding album without having the expense of the printing.

GerryDavid

But you do not want to cost yourself profit. If they go for it with their existing ipad, instead of going for an album which would have a markup you could be giving them the same amount of work but less profit.

I am considering it as my 8th package to help sell my digital files. I priced the digital files to the point where I wont loose any sales if they buy them. I know my average sale of each picture and I will actually come out ahead if they buy the file, and with the ipad, they wouldnt want just one digital file, but the entire collection, say 30. So if I were to sell one, I'll be doing great. I even tossed in a 16x20 canvas to make it more appealing.

I have no clue how to make an app, but the page turning thing sounds very cool. Is there a free template that you just load with pictures out there?

ssimmonsphoto

You wouldn't be costing yourself the profit of the album sale if you charge the client whatever your markup would be. For example (and using simple numbers), if your traditional album costs you $500 to print and you charge your clients $800 for the album, then you could charge your client $300 for the electronic version (maybe a bit more depending on the work to make the app happen) and come out with the same profit. Make sense?

What I describe was completely theoretical and, as far as I know, there isn't something out there premade that has it. So you'd have to figure out how to make your vision happen with it (hire a programmer if you aren't as computer saavy). Obviously that cuts in to your profits, but it completely depends on what direction you want to take with it to make it happen.

I likely wouldn't go with it based on my pricing at this point since many of my brides don't order albums in the first place. But it is a fun thought none the less.

GerryDavid

I thought you just meant something like this

Normally - charging $800 for a $500 album, and then charge $400 for the prints

That you would drop the album and charge $400 for the digital prints.

But if you charge the $300 + $400, then its all good.

I have packages that I dont expect people to buy based on my previous customers, but I cant sell a package that I do not offer, and I am working on getting the type of client that enjoys spending more. Ive read here and there in marketing areas that the more you charge, the more easy going the client is in general. The less you charge, the more they expect and more trouble they give you.

ColoradoSkier

I also saw an article about this in Rangefinder last summer, shortly after the iPad came out. It was wildly successful for the studio (in Colorado Springs IIRC) that did it. My main concern now is that the iPad has a high saturation level, so it may not make sense for most people. I am currently debating adding one to a high end senior package, as high school kids are less likely to have one right now, and yet they could be an ideal consumer of it with college/ adult life looming. This is all speculation right now, I need to poll some kids and see if this is true. I also am waffling because of the pending rollout of iPad 2. That could substantially rejuvenate interest across the board if it does come out with the features people are implying it will (I know I want one).

smurfy

A similar discussion I've been following:


http://www.flickr.com/groups/weddingphoto/discuss/72157625971296488/

Glort

Loved this Quote from the OP on that thread:

" most people who can add unnecessary costs to their wedding can afford an iPad. "

And given that they will knowingly pay an inflated price for their wedding pictures, I go back to my original thoughts that you would be better off just selling them a conventional package for the same over all price that you can make some profit on the whole thing.

The comments pertaining to the technical issues, longevity and photographers responsibility to the client long term are also interesting. While the unit itself could not be expected to last forever, I think clients may have a case if they were to argue that their wedding images should be a lot longer lasting than what the Iplod will ever hold up.
You would sure as want to be giving the clients copies of their album on disk but then if your doing that, why bother with the Iplod at all?
More than one way for a shooter to promote themselves and lots of better ones I'd suggest.

Looking at some of the points raised in that discussion, I wouldn't touch that idea with a barge pole.

indiegirl

I'm offering a base model iPad to my senior reps who bring me 25 referrals by Dec. 31. Eric John did a gig at the PPA convention and does this (his idea, not mine). He's yet to have a rep meet that mark but it's a great one to shoot for - I, too, am betting on this carrot. At least for this year, anyway.

ColoradoSkier

indiegirl wrote: »

I'm offering a base model iPad to my senior reps who bring me 25 referrals by Dec. 31. Eric John did a gig at the PPA convention and does this (his idea, not mine). He's yet to have a rep meet that mark but it's a great one to shoot for - I, too, am betting on this carrot. At least for this year, anyway.

I like that idea, a lot. But then it doesn't sound like the iPad is getting loaded with images or anything, which makes this an easier, potentially smarter offer.

indiegirl

ColoradoSkier wrote: »

I like that idea, a lot. But then it doesn't sound like the iPad is getting loaded with images or anything, which makes this an easier, potentially smarter offer.

No images loaded by me. It's purely an incentive.