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Help Me Figure This Out -- Martial Arts School Shoot
kevingeary
Registered Users Posts: 194 Major grins
I'm trying to figure out the best way to organize this.
We're going to be doing a martial arts portrait shoot for two schools. We were planning on having all the students pay a nominal charge to reserve their time to prevent no-shows.
Then, we'd like to offer three packages and possibly a-la-carte pricing after that.
But I'm lost as to how to organize. My instincts say to get people to purchase a package on the spot so they don't dilly dally. I don't want to do all this work and then have nobody purchase prints, so having them choose and pay on the day of will prevent that. But if I do it that way, do I then have to handle all the ordering manually? Or can I give them some sort of code where they go in and do the ordering but don't have to pay since they already prepaid???
If that's not possible, can I make it so that they can only choose between the packages and not purchase a-la-carte? I was going to give them 36 hours to purchase a package and then take the gallery down (again, so they don't dilly dally).
Lastly, should I put all the students in one gallery or should I make a gallery for each individual student (sounds like a lot more work).
I'm not sure how best to do this. Please advise.
We're going to be doing a martial arts portrait shoot for two schools. We were planning on having all the students pay a nominal charge to reserve their time to prevent no-shows.
Then, we'd like to offer three packages and possibly a-la-carte pricing after that.
But I'm lost as to how to organize. My instincts say to get people to purchase a package on the spot so they don't dilly dally. I don't want to do all this work and then have nobody purchase prints, so having them choose and pay on the day of will prevent that. But if I do it that way, do I then have to handle all the ordering manually? Or can I give them some sort of code where they go in and do the ordering but don't have to pay since they already prepaid???
If that's not possible, can I make it so that they can only choose between the packages and not purchase a-la-carte? I was going to give them 36 hours to purchase a package and then take the gallery down (again, so they don't dilly dally).
Lastly, should I put all the students in one gallery or should I make a gallery for each individual student (sounds like a lot more work).
I'm not sure how best to do this. Please advise.
0
Comments
I think one gallery is OK.
Create the packages you want to offer.
I think if you want everyone to pay up front when they order, then you will have to do the ordering manually.
Another option "might be" to create a discount coupon with an expiration date of whatever you want your deadline to be. Create the packages for full price (same as a la carte), then make your coupon what you would want it to be to discount the package for ordering 'now'.
I haven't really looked at all the combinations for created packages & using coupons, but I bet you could figure out a combination that works for you.
Good luck.
Sherry
I am trying to structure something similar and was wondering if you came to any conclusions. I'm not convinced that my customers will be able to navigate the drag-and-drop ordering required for ordering packages. (The images are too small for a large group of similarly dressed individuals.) I have had people pay up front, but would rather not deal with the money at the time of pictures. I think that a coupon to encourage quick action, rather than shutting down the gallery would be better. We are considering structuring the a la carte pricing so that they are motivated to buy a package. I just wish they could see all of the options on one screen rather than choosing packages on one screen and individual prints on another.
I'm going to do a separate gallery for each student. I think that's the only way to work this. I'm not going to risk doing all the work for no sales, so I'm making them pay up front and issuing a credit code.
Do you know if you can create a main gallery that has subgalleries so I don't have 70+ galleries taking over my site?
I'm slated to make $2500+ this way over the course of two-three days of work (including processing/uploading) so I'm not concerned with the time it takes to create the galleries and organize this.
FYI, I use StarExplorer (a 3rd party application that costs a small amount of money) so I can create 40 galleries all at once and all with the same settings. All I have to do is type each gallery name one per line, pick the gallery settings I want for all of them and tell it to create all the galleries. Much, much faster than doing them one at a time on Smugmug.
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1. If you limit yourself to packages you might lose some sales given the number of options that you have available from BayPhoto or EZP.
2. A seperate gallery for each subject does create some extra work for the photographer but it cleary a nice option for the client. I have used another option of creating galleries either by timeframe such as "Photos from 9:00-9:30AM"; "Photos from 9:30-10:00AM"; etc. Typcially parents go to the URL for the gallery and quickly find their shots. If you have 5-6 subject per hours then the number of pics/pages in your gallery are manageable.
3. If you don't want clients to "dilly dally" then you may want to consider a discount for a prompt order and not taking the site down after a short period. (I'm always amazed at orders that trickle in months after a shoot. Consider that when clients get the actual physical prints delivered they might be tempted to go back on line and order some more.
4. Consider making the shoot and EVENT in smugmug. THis will let you capture email addresses and track some other aspects. You can add all of your galleries to the same event.
Chris