looking into closing my Business

rogerchester · September 28, 2011

My photography has gone no where. I put a lot of time in this for very little return. everyone says i love your work but they don't ask me to do work for them. I get a lot of people asking about prices but they never book. t tried to price low . then i raised them up to around the local pricing. I always try to give them a good size package for their money. My web site gets around 1500+ hits a day. I think they not buying because they can go look at them any time they want. I tried pushing my self on face book with a photography page could not get my people to click like they would just click like on my status. My smugmug member ship runs out October 9 2011. i will probably not renew.

[IMG]http://<a href="http://r-prescott.smugmug.com/Cheer-portraits/Henry-Clay-cheer-2011/18981501_DfQfT9#1484538422_d7TsMzP-A-LB" title=""><img src="http://r-prescott.smugmug.com/Cheer-portraits/Henry-Clay-cheer-2011/i-d7TsMzP/0/L/IMG3660pp-L.jpg" title="" alt=""></a>[/IMG]

angevin1 · September 28, 2011

You don't really have a question that I can see. Just venting?

Question for you, how long have you been at this?

jbakerphoto · September 28, 2011

rogerchester wrote: »

My photography has gone no where. I put a lot of time in this for very little return. everyone says i love your work but they don't ask me to do work for them. I get a lot of people asking about prices but they never book. t tried to price low . then i raised them up to around the local pricing. I always try to give them a good size package for their money. My web site gets around 1500+ hits a day. I think they not buying because they can go look at them any time they want. I tried pushing my self on face book with a photography page could not get my people to click like they would just click like on my status. My smugmug member ship runs out October 9 2011. i will probably not renew.

[IMG]http://<a href="http://r-prescott.smugmug.com/Cheer-portraits/Henry-Clay-cheer-2011/18981501_DfQfT9#1484538422_d7TsMzP-A-LB" title=""><img src="http://r-prescott.smugmug.com/Cheer-portraits/Henry-Clay-cheer-2011/i-d7TsMzP/0/L/IMG3660pp-L.jpg" title="" alt=""></a>[/IMG]

Well sounds to me like you need to change your business structure and the way you do things. I am having alot of the same problems you are having to be honest. Just think through what you can change to get the goal you want.

Some ideas...
I am a BIG David Ziser fan and he had a great 1 hr video on sales and marketing and creating clients for life and basically tells you how he gets from the first phone conversation to the portrait sales. It was really great stuff and he knows his stuff.
Creating Clients for life
http://www.vimeo.com/26993356
sales and marketing
http://www.vimeo.com/27482237

He also just posted one on social media marketing.
http://www.vimeo.com/29670335

One of the things he outlined in the social media marketing video is that you really have to tell them what your going to get by liking me. Smugmug does a great job of that on there facebook fan page. Like this page and you will be kept up to date on smugmug and eligible for contests and free stuff.
http://www.facebook.com/#!/SmugMug?sk=app_4949752878

Put photos from your portrait sessions up on facebook with a small watermark directing them to your site and tag the people. All of there friends will see the photos.

How bout you start giving them a month to order from a gallery and then you put a password on the gallery. They have to pay a reopen fee to see the gallery again. You could credit them a print when they pay to make it more fair if you wish.

mercphoto · September 28, 2011

Linky to your website perhaps? An explanation as to how you handle a session, how you expect orders to come in, etc.

mercphoto · September 28, 2011

BTW, I think you'll find most successful portrait photographers, whether they be in business for themselves or part of Sears, Penney's, and the like have face-to-face sales meetings. With Sears and such its right after the session itself. With an independant photographer its usually a week later after all the various edits have been made. You make your purchase then! Only after that might photos be up on a web gallery for viewing (and additional purchases of course).

Read everything you can on becoming a successful sales person if you want to get clients turned into customers. Your sales skills will be just as valuable if not more so than your photography skills.

bobcath · October 3, 2011

I'd like to see a link to your website too. You say 1500 hits per day, thats an amazing number, over 45,000 per month. You should be able to convert at least a small percentage of that figure. Even it it were only 0.001 percent, that would be 45 people a month to speak with. From that you should be able to convert at least 10%, so by my reckoning you should be taking at least 4 or 5 customers a month from your site alone (assuming of course that you are getting the visitors from the same country!). You need to look at your 'sales funnel' as others above have said. You should aim to speak with people / potential customers. Don't aim to compete on price alone, offer to go see clients so that you get the chance to close, face to face. There is nothing to beat a 'personal touch' for closing sales. Let me know how you do.
Regards
Bob

dbveto · October 3, 2011

mercphoto wrote: »

Linky to your website perhaps? An explanation as to how you handle a session, how you expect orders to come in, etc.

Here is a link to the OP web site. http://r-prescott.smugmug.com/

mercphoto · October 3, 2011

I'm struggling to figure out how he can offer 100 retouched photos to choose from, in packages with prints AND with a photo book, starting at $199.

bobcath · October 3, 2011

I think your shots are excellent, so thats not the issue (IMHO). You dont make it easy on your site for people to contact you. You need to be much more proactive in 'incentivising' would be callers. E.g. 'call me now for no obligation advice on your wedding'...or similar 'call to action'. As far I I can see there are no 'sales' approaches at all on your site (other than telling the price up front). You could omit the cost and ask people to phone for a 'special deal', that way you have the opportunity to engage them. Its the first step to 'customer engagement' thats the most difficult. Also you need to check the spelling and formatting on parts of your site. When people are considering who to book, good 'professional' presentation of your sales message is essential. I'll follow up with more thoughts in a week or so, need to head off for now...
Regards
Bob

SamirD · October 3, 2011

Your work is good for sure. You've covered a lot of events. You've got a watermark in place and have limited sizes to where people can't just get your work for free. You've enabled sharing to they end up on the social media sites.

When you say '1500 hits a day', is that hits or uniques or photo views? 1500 can mean a bunch of different things depending on the stat viewed. How competitive is your market? Are there people out there with 'good enough' photos giving them away for free? That plays a big part in your business strategy.

orljustin · October 4, 2011

First, I would lose the old tyme scratchy logo. Second, I looked at the cheerleader images on the front page, and all the well lit posed ones have some blurry filter applied to them, which isn't a plus. I'd stop that or use it a lot less. Some are underexposed and could use a reflector to get light on the faces. Looking at your "galleries" on that page, it comes across to me like you have a daughter in on the cheerleading team, and you follow them around taking pictures. Because all I see is "cheer, cheer, cheer" on the galleries. So, if I wasn't a cheerleader or had a girl on the team, I'd move on, thinking I was in the wrong place.

On this page: http://r-prescott.smugmug.com/pricing
You have: "Senior Photography Packages, Weddings, imformation, TEAM SPORTS"

The terms for each are inconsistent, I don't know what "imformation" is supposed to be, and why is the last all capitalized? Again, I don't know what I am supposed to look at here.

BTW, looking at the blog page, "I" is supposed to be capitalized. Every time. "As a photographer i am always looking for different ways to photograph the weddings i try to get several different angles, lighting and different posies." Plus you have sporadic spelling issues. "I even found some of my kids action figures in their. No wonder why is was so heavy, i think i have 5 lbs worth of junk out their."

All this says to me that you're not really the kind of professional I'd want to hire for a job. I would get someone proficient in site design to sit down and help you with these issues.

rogerchester · October 4, 2011

oh my you are right my site is a mess! I will change it up. I did not look at it really close. To much cheer photos not enough portraits. Only quality images with more clear options. thank you so much for your help I think I can turn this around. Please keep your advice coming I will post so of my changes. you guys are great.

Glort · October 5, 2011

mercphoto wrote: »

I'm struggling to figure out how he can offer 100 retouched photos to choose from, in packages with prints AND with a photo book, starting at $199.

Forget about that!
Check out the wedding package!

-Engagement Session
-Eight (8) hour coverage of your wedding day
-Package includes a CD w/ all images
-One (1) 10x10 Library-bound Album (20 pgs)
-DVD slide show of the wedding (3) copy's

$850.00

Man, I would pay you that to shoot wedding for me that I would onsell to my clients and make another grand plus out of them!

Then we have Print pricing:

PRINT PRICING:

8 Wallet sheet - $9.99
4X6 - $5.00
5X7 - $8.00
8X10 - $12.00
11X14 - $20.00
16X20 - $30.00

16x20= $30????

Are you serious????

I can't comment on the cheer packages because i have nothing to compare them too but the 2 examples above tell me that a highly likley reason your not doing much is because you are too CHEAP!

Now a lot of those with more forum rather than practical experience may scoff at that but i have helped several shooters and video people over the years in the same boat as you by Encouraging/ pestering/ embarrising/ berating them into putting their prices up.
So far, 100% success rate in turning things around.

If you are too cheap people don't take you seriously and can often think that there is something hidden or they are missing or just don't value your work because you don't. Like the people I have advised before, your at the point where you want to shut up shop so really have nothing to loose.
It seems to me the hardest thing you can get most shooters to do whom are not doing well is RAISE their prices but In every case I have been involved with, it has worked.
If it dosen't, well you have no sales now, what are you afraid of loosing? More frustration and dissapointement?

I agree that you shots are indeed saleable and the fact you have that many hit on your stes says you have the lead generation nailed but you need to work on the sales side.
Put the prices up and add value to your work and show people your a pro, not doing it for the fun od a weekend hobby. ( even if it is, perception is everything!!)

Now as a person always one to be subtle and careful not to cause offence,

I have to say your work is real nice but your site is a combination of a dogs breakfast and trash.
I think the background is garish, it's obviously disorganised most likely as a result of additions and updates since it was built initially but most importantly and seriously, to me it's not a site that sells but rather one that says " I'm anotehr one that got a new cam for Christmas and look at all the pretty pictures I have taken"
It need a serious makeove to turn it into a site that says " Buy your pictures here" and " Hire me".

Like mentioned above, you have all your varying work styles on the one page under pricing.
Id' divide them up and cover each subject in it's own sub web if you like.
Put the info on it's own subject info page with the galleries and the pricing on others so all the info on the topic the people are interested in in all together not some on info and other beside the other subject in pricing etc.

I would either 86 the guest book or update it beyond the 2 year old comments and rename it to something with a bit more marketing thrust to something like " What our clients say" or " client comments" .
To get personal, I don't know about having your own mugshot splathered around the site, as handsome a man as you are! It's important to build rapport witht eh clients for sure, but -MY- feeling is when I see that, the person is either a try hard or self centered. I don't think you are either of these things which kind of makes having your pic there even more questionable.

Now as I said, I DON'T KNOW about the value of this and others may have differeing and relevant comments on it but to me, I just don't see the value in it. Maybe cause I'm just an ugly bugger and to put my own pic up would probably scare away too many people!

I think the colour of the background of your site is a bit garish, i'd look at changing that to something a bit less obvious and overpowering. I'd suggest a total workover of the site, just dump it and start again. Maybe look at one of those premade sites that you just fill in the info and pics. I'd certainly not bother with flash, it does nothing to help your search engine placement.

What is the main work you are doing or chasing?
Although my experience is different to others, selling on the net is just a waste of time to me. Certainly I'd think most would agree that selling direct leaves selling off the web for dead. It would seem some of your work at very least could be sold direct, even if you organised a time with the cheerleaders with their portraits to go back and do a "Planning session" Or "Showing presentation".
I'm sure your time will be more than repaid as you can guide the sale, show people how one shot compliments the other and just help people make the most of what you have done for them.
there's no hard selling involved, just show them the options and what they had not thought of and they will buy.

Selling off the net is easy, low cost, minimaly time consumoing and has a lousy, absoloute worst sales and return rate. If you can minimise what you put on the net and get in front of people, you could be doing everything else wrong and still get 500% better than what your doing now if not more.
To me the net and the way you have your galleries is a convinent repository for people to look at their pics at convinence without having to buy them. It's also easy to copy tham and no one seems put off by watermarks or copyright info these days even when it mostly obliterates the pic.

For things like cheer and dance, I have gone back to the old fashioned proof sheets that I send out to the clubs to avoid having to put stuff on the net. They take some time to print and put together and for big groups I might do 2 books BUT, they seem to work quite well. I just run them off on my own printer with some decent but still cheap hi quality paper and bind them in cheap plastic folders.
At least that way they cannot be copied or viewed on Iphoneys etc.

While I think most of your work is good, your sports shots examples page I take it for T&I, is poor.
Really harsh lighting and pics that show you have done this work rather than shots that would impress and motivate a club or tam manager to lift the phone or send you an email and say, " Come shoot us".
Hope you realise and understand the difference because it is a big one.

Get some better shots on there if you are after that market.
I would also get rid of all the sports shots from '07 and '08 as well as the NASCAR galleries etc.
You don't need galleries of pics to show people waht you do. If your trying to book business, use a few of the best shots of each and have plenty of marketing information. the ignorant will say people don't read things, that's rubbish. If they are interested they will read all that holds your interest.
You're still reading this novel length post aren't you??

For sales galleries, I'd seperate that in it's own section with the relevant online order form that mails the order to you and has a printable form for those that want to print it out and send a cheque... if anyone does that anymore or have your DD details.

I'd also edit the well meaning comment on your contact page that looks like it was placed there as a result of this thread. not what you want the clients seeing.

Well, that ought to have put you to sleep by now, hope there is something of help to you.

Moogle Pepper · October 5, 2011

Everything that Glort said.

Wayupthere · October 5, 2011

oh my you are right my site is a mess! I will change it up. I did not look at it really close.

This is one of the big problems that we have as business owners. NO TIME!

We are so busy doing..everything.. that we can miss details. A outside look like you have allowed here is a great thing.

Don't know a thing about the Photo business so I will not comment on the pricing issues...but it is easy to say your prices are too low..but one thing I learned (totally by accident) is pricing too cheap.

People will look at 10 different prices on anything. 99% will throw out the most expensive and the cheapest first....But THEN will ASSume that the other top 3 prices are a better product than the bottom 3.
That is a sales fact.
So you might be too low.
Good Luck!

Gary

SamirD · October 5, 2011

Wayupthere wrote: »

People will look at 10 different prices on anything. 99% will throw out the most expensive and the cheapest first....But THEN will ASSume that the other top 3 prices are a better product than the bottom 3.
That is a sales fact.
So you might be too low.
Good Luck!
Gary

Great tip!

I do this all the time when buying things.

zoomer · October 5, 2011

Figure you have about 5 seconds to grab a persons attention when they hit your site. The first thing they see better be good or "next" .

The first thing I recommend if business is bad but you have a "professional quality" product is to raise your prices. The more you charge the less competition there is....of course there are also less customers there are at that price point, so your work has to be good.

If your work is true "professional quality" and can stand up to the scrutiny then raise your prices.

johng · October 5, 2011

OK, a few thoughts:
1) for your portrait work you should never be shooting portraits "on spec" - you should always have guaranteed money - sitting fee or package up front. In fact I would say you should be constructing things such that any purchase from smugmug is a bonus buy for that type of work. Same for weddings, engagements etc.

2) so, the only type of work in your portfolio that should be driven by only smugmug sales is potentially event work. I looked at a gallery of the cheer. I see you charge $5 for a 4x6. Now, if i as a customer want to buy that photo I have to pay $5 plus S&H - a couple more dollars. Looking through the gallery - Capital cup cheer > Bondurant Middle, most of the photos there see fail the test of "would I pay $5 for a 4x6". Why? For starters the framing is terrible - lots of dead space and body parts cut off at odd places. Compare that to the portrait shots. Shots with motion show a good amount of motion blur. But for the most part it's the framing that needs a lot of work. That's where you're losing your sales - I can look at those shots and say, yeah it'snice - better than my P&S shots but really not a professional quality photo. Just not nice enough I'm going to spend $5 on it.So, you have a decision to make: are you going to drop that aspect from your business or are you going to do a LOT of improvement so those shots start looking similar to portrait shot quality. ESPECIALLY true when the shots are static poses like a lot of these are. I would not expect you to get much work for cheer events based on what is currently on your site. As others have indicated, you're not going to get work for other types of shoots because it's not prominently featured. If I'm trying to find a wedding photographer - I want someone that has a strong emphasis on weddings. Your main page and your gallery page tells me you're someone that shoots a lot of cheer - at a high amateur level of competency - but the fact that you don't have any portrait or wedding work on your front page or prominent in your galleries tells me you're only dabbling in them. I'll move on.

You're not going to get wedding work by dabling. So, decide if that's what you want to do and make it an emphasis. If portrait work is what you want then emphasize that. Now, what I see on the first page is the type of shot I expect from a good team & individual (T&I) photographer. If that's what you want to do, you need to show you do more than just cheer. And for T&I work, it's all about the PRODUCTS. Products that aren't smugmug's strong suit (like trading cards, magazine covers, posters). Show that you have good poses/backgrounds for the different sports and good memory mate & trading card templates. And then, you'll get business referrals based upon how you handle the shoots. How well organized are you (and you better have at least 2 shooters), how quickly you move the kids through, how quickly you fulfill the orders (don't plan on using smugmug for that - you want to collect an order envelope at shoot time) and what is the quality of the products - no one wants to order a $20 package and get a photo where their kid is blinking or where body parts are cropped at odd places.

rogerchester · October 5, 2011

how do you suggest I get so new portraits for my portfolio. Do I offer some free photo sessions in return for use of the photos. Then give them images on a cd. I am not sure how work this. I have to have more portraits and dump all the cheer stuff it's been a wast of time event photography is not what I want to do. any advice here?

dbveto · October 5, 2011

rogerchester wrote: »

how do you suggest I get so new portraits for my portfolio. Do I offer some free photo sessions in return for use of the photos. Then give them images on a cd. I am not sure how work this. I have to have more portraits and dump all the cheer stuff it's been a wast of time event photography is not what I want to do. any advice here?

Yes a good way to build a portfolio is to offer the photos in return for modeling. I have a couple of shoots lined up where I am giving digital copies in exchange for them modeling for me.

Mark Dickinson · October 5, 2011

Here's a few things i've noticed to get you jumpstarted. Your google maps is incomplete very incomplete.

add a second category throw some more photos. Make a tutorial on editing or your process and post it. When I search you on google, I should find you in the local business center.

I keep my smugmug www.mdpstore.com separate from my site. www.markdickinsonphotography.com Two reason... people dont want to see the same thing everytime they have to go to their gallery, and then I can always keep my site clean as an entrance.

I dont think you need to quit, you need to apply yourself a little more in marketing

You have no backlinks, as they said above your into the cheer thing which is seasonal

1 http://digital-photography-school.com/15-great-jump-images (...) 183
2 http://www.cheerelitecompetitions.com/CapitalCup.html click to contact Prescott's Photography (...) 18
3 http://www.cheerelitecompetitions.com/BGStateGames.html click to contact Prescott's Photography (...) 23
4 http://www.cheerelitecompetitions.com/CheerEliteInvitat..... click to contact Prescott's Photography (...) 13
5 http://www.cheerelitecompetitions.com/CheersFromtheHear..... click to contact Prescott's Photography (...) 14
6 http://www.cheerelitecompetitions.com/HolidayInvitation..... click to contact Prescott's Photography (...) 22

Those are your backlinks

go to www.backlinkwatch.com and put in my address, www.markdickinsonphotography.com you'll see how many I have.. Time consuming but its places you might get work

zoomer · October 5, 2011

I tried that backlink tool, not sure it works.....It just sat there blinking....said processing backlink 6 of 602 and never changed.

dbveto · October 6, 2011

zoomer wrote: »

I tried that backlink tool, not sure it works.....It just sat there blinking....said processing backlink 6 of 602 and never changed.

I thought the same thing but look at the bottom of the page below the adds.

codyjbennett · October 6, 2011

Hi Roger, no time at the moment to weigh in on things to update for your site/business model, but wanted to comment nonetheless...

KUDOS to you for making an effort to navigate the waters of business ownership. It can be a beast sometimes, and it's a comfort to know that you're willing to learn and become better. Continuing to make little changes will bring about great results. I've heard it stated, "10% change = 300% results" suggesting that as you change just a bit, the end results gets much, much better (applies to sports, finances, etc, etc)!

So, no big tips at the moment, just a giant "atta-boy"! Keep it up!

looking into closing my Business

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