Customer communication and offline sales

drode

Over the last few months, I've been building a small portrait business. Senior pix, Kids pix, engagement pix, etc.. In addition, I'll be selling HS sports prints. Shooting HS sports is a passion and hobby. It's doesn't make much money but it's fantastic marketing portraits.

Here's the way I work in a nutshell. I charge a portrait session fee up front (cash/check). Included in that session fee is a small set of prints. After the shoot, the images are retouched and uploaded. The Smugmug / lightroom integration is fantastic and really helps me be efficient.

Here's where it starts to get clumsy. The customer goes to a private gallery to review the photos, request changes and select images for prints. There is no way for them to communicate change requests or selections to me. They're stuck copying the image name into an email or a text and sending it to me. I'd be OK with 100% online self-serve ordering. However, I have no way to give them credit for the prints included in the session fee. A coupon code would be great but I don't have a way to give them 100% credit as there is a cost for the prints and shipping. Doing the session fee + prints online is not awful but I'm not giving away 15% of my session fee to Smugmug.

Ideally, I'd want to give them a coupon code for a certian amount (my prices) and I'd get charged for the print costs or be able to keep some money on account to cover the costs. This gets the customers online ordering through the cart and it's an easy step for them to add more prints or to come back later and re-order.

The, hopefully easier problems, is communication. I'd be OK with a way for them to use a check-box to approve images and comment box for change requests.

See http://www.rodephoto.com/Client-Area/A-Macer/ for an example of a recent portrait session gallery. The customer had to copy down the image names and email them to me. This is unacceptable.

I'd appreciate any advice or tips on how I might do this. If I can't get this critical business process clean and simple, I need to rethink how and where I host and sell my images

jfriend

It sounds like you might want to use an "Event" and "Favorites" for the customer to indicate their selection to you. I've never understood why we couldn't use favorites with normal galleries, but as it is now, you have to create a separate "event" to use favorites.

I don't know coupons well enough, but I'd be surprised if there wasn't a coupon offer that would do what you want with the prepaid prints (amount off coupons or print credit coupons, perhaps) - though I think if you do it through Smugmug, it will cost you the 15% Smugmug commission.

drode

My prints are all priced with the smugmug 15% in mind, so I'm not too concerned by adding a a few more to the order. I don't want to increase my session fee by 20% to cover the smugmug commission. I like getting cash up-front for that part.

Cygnus Studios

drode wrote: »

My prints are all priced with the smugmug 15% in mind, so I'm not too concerned by adding a a few more to the order. I don't want to increase my session fee by 20% to cover the smugmug commission. I like getting cash up-front for that part.

If you are charging for your time and effort, why charge extra for the prints? We charge to capture the images and set up the galleries so that prints are ordered at our actual costs. The clients love it, it saves us a ton of bookkeeping and is easier all the way around.

The only time we add to the cost of the print is in our art section. All of our clients pay actual costs. It has been a great marketing tool for us.

drode

That sounds like a good strategy. My prints are fairly inexpensive but I'm not sure I want to price them at cost. My session and print pricing is still evolving and I'm still learning with every client, so everything is fair game.

Cygnus Studios wrote: »

If you are charging for your time and effort, why charge extra for the prints? We charge to capture the images and set up the galleries so that prints are ordered at our actual costs. The clients love it, it saves us a ton of bookkeeping and is easier all the way around.

The only time we add to the cost of the print is in our art section. All of our clients pay actual costs. It has been a great marketing tool for us.