Beyond Professional

winnjewett

I have a suggestion that would solve a lot of problems. It will not be easy to implement, but I believe that a lot of pros would use this feature (and pay for it).

If smugmug were to implement an additional level beyond professional that would allow the photographer complete isolation from smugmug and other smugmug users, a lot of the problems involving the shopping cart, discounts, bulk purchases, branding, etc... would be solved.

I believe the main reason this has never been done is that smugmug appears on the credit card statement. If the pro were required to apply for his own credit card billing capabilities, the problem would be solved.

This would not be for all pros, and would cost a lot, but I think it would open up an entirely new set of possibilities.

-Winn

Mike Lane

Since 2002 Smugmug has had

Standard,
Power, and
Pro

Now introducing

Teh L33t Z!!1!!1!!11












































:hide

3rdPlanetPhotography

Then smugmug becomes a web hosting company. People would be programming on smugmug's environment risking bad development that could bring smugmug to its knees.

Smugmug could go beyond and offer a Corporate level with choices of shopping carts and more choices of those kind of services but I wouldn't suggest too much 3rd party integration. Then users would need database access and the like.

I'd prefer more options in the current professional level like coupons, discounts, packages, and those sort of things.

Just my 1.5 cents
:

kc7dji

Andy

winnjewett wrote:

I have a suggestion that would solve a lot of problems. It will not be easy to implement, but I believe that a lot of pros would use this feature (and pay for it).

If smugmug were to implement an additional level beyond professional that would allow the photographer complete isolation from smugmug and other smugmug users, a lot of the problems involving the shopping cart, discounts, bulk purchases, branding, etc... would be solved.

I believe the main reason this has never been done is that smugmug appears on the credit card statement. If the pro were required to apply for his own credit card billing capabilities, the problem would be solved.

This would not be for all pros, and would cost a lot, but I think it would open up an entirely new set of possibilities.

-Winn

Hi Winn,

Thanks, as always, for the suggestion. Stay tuned!

Baldy

Winn's right about something: the fact that SmugMug appears on the credit card bill drives much of what we do.

For example, I read a very compelling post from someone, and I'm really sorry I can't remember who and don't have time to search for her at the moment, that what SmugMug is really missing over Photoreflect is self-fulfillment. She wanted us take the credit card but let her go to her own lab to get prints made.

To many of you that probably sounds like a no-brainer and why don't we do it? Photoreflect does. It certainly seems compelling and we obviously lose business by not offering this feature.

But we're focused on keeping great customer support and we can't figure out how to support this.

"Hello, there's a charge of $450 on my credit card to SmugMug. I never heard of you."

"Ma'am, did you buy some prints?"

"Yes, from the nice woman who shot my daughter's wedding. You knew? I knew I shouldn't have entered my credit card online! You intercepted it! I'm calling the FBI and American Express to tell them this is a fraudulent charge."

(We get these calls several times a day so we're used to them. If we can keep her from hanging up in a panic, we say...)

"Actually, we host the photos for your photographer and as a service, charge the credit card. It's not fraudulent."

"But I ordered them 3 weeks ago and they never came. I tried to call my photographer and her voice mail says she's shooting weddings this weekend. I need my prints in two days."

When that happens now, we know what to do. But in this case we'd hate to give an answer like:

"Uh, erem. We'll leave messages for her too and see if she'll call us... Have a nice day."

So, our inclination is to focus on improving the things we do know how to execute where we have happy pros who want us to charge the card. It's not that we're in love with charging the card, or that we think Winn's suggestion isn't a great one, only that our existing pros have a lot of feature requests (i.e., custom watermarks, upload & proof, coupons, etc.) before the current model is really nailed.

Make sense?

winnjewett

Baldy wrote:

Winn's right about something: the fact that SmugMug appears on the credit card bill drives much of what we do.

...
"Uh, erem. We'll leave messages for her too and see if she'll call us... Have a nice day."

So, our inclination is to focus on improving the things we do know how to execute where we have happy pros who want us to charge the card. It's not that we're in love with charging the card, or that we think Winn's suggestion isn't a great one, only that our existing pros have a lot of feature requests (i.e., custom watermarks, upload & proof, coupons, etc.) before the current model is really nailed.

Make sense?

It makes perfect sense. I was probably not quite clear enough. I would still like for smugmug to handle all the printing, hosting, customer service, etc... The only difference between pro and "beyond pro" is that the photographer's name appears on the bill, and in the checkout. It is not possible to order prints from the "beyond pro" and another smugmug user at the same time.

Then, when the lady calls up and complains that she hasn't received her prints, you guys can perform your customer service magic as you always do.

-winn

Andy

winnjewett wrote:

It makes perfect sense. I was probably not quite clear enough. I would still like for smugmug to handle all the printing, hosting, customer service, etc... The only difference between pro and "beyond pro" is that the photographer's name appears on the bill, and in the checkout. It is not possible to order prints from the "beyond pro" and another smugmug user at the same time.

Then, when the lady calls up and complains that she hasn't received her prints, you guys can perform your customer service magic as you always do.

-winn

Right. But we could still have this problem:

Customer: "I ordered and paid for prints from MrBigShotPro. They're (too red/washed out/to green/any reason). I want my money back (I want them re-done)."

SmugMug: "I'm sorry, you'll have to talk to MrBigShotPro."

Customer: "He won't return my emails and phone calls - can't you PLEASE DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT?"

SmugMug: "I'm sorry, it's really out of our hands.."

Now this scenario would make us look really really bad, and it's a situation that we *never* have to deal with today. Today, we handle the customer's issue with speed, courtesy, and aplomb. And we communicate to the pro that there was a problem, and we help them fix it. Result? Happy customer, happy pro - both feeling great about dealing with SmugMug.

winnjewett

Andy wrote:

Right. But we could still have this problem:
...
SmugMug: "I'm sorry, you'll have to talk to MrBigShotPro."

...

This problem is easily solved by giving (and requiring) smugmug to have complete power to both issue and reimburse charges at their disgression.

-winn

Mike Lane

If smugmug doesn't appear anywhere at any time, on the page, in the shopping cart, on the bill, how will the customer ever know that smugmug is even involved at all?

Baldy

winnjewett wrote:

The only difference between pro and "beyond pro" is that the photographer's name appears on the bill, and in the checkout.

Do we know if this is possible? I've had a desire for this for awhile but heard it wasn't practical/possible and never had the time to research more. Do we know of companies that do it? The ones I can think of are like us — Photoreflect, Amazon, eBay, Yahoo stores...

I'm assuming they would need their own domain and an SSL certificate from someone like Verisign ($1,000/year). I have no idea whether in a situation where we provide the shopping cart Verisign would approve it or how much our liability would be.

And how, when we empower photographers to customize the cart, do we prevent them from introducing security holes? How do we keep this from becoming another phishing scheme?

3rdPlanetPhotography

Do some of you really make your customer believe that you actually do the printing and all?

I am VERY up front with my customers. I explain the entire process to them. I let them know right up front that I use a very professional Photo company that utilizes a professional printing lab. I want my customers to know the truth.

It's not logical for your customer to think that you really own all that $100,000+ printing equipment and that printing is your professional experience.

I want them to know for sure that my professional side comes from the art and creativity of capturing their photographs in a way that they are happy. I'm no expert in printing. I don't ever plan to be... but as long as they know that and that I will back up the printing any way possible to make them happy. They really don't care if the photo is printed in St. Louis, New York, or Georgia. They are interested in good professional photos.

Oh well. I've had 100% sucess rate being honest up front.

that's my 1.75. I'll shut up now... have a great night everyone.

kc7dji

Techman1

Baldy wrote:

So, our inclination is to focus on improving the things we do know how to execute where we have happy pros who want us to charge the card. It's not that we're in love with charging the card, or that we think Winn's suggestion isn't a great one, only that our existing pros have a lot of feature requests (i.e., custom watermarks, upload & proof, coupons, etc.) before the current model is really nailed.

Since you brought this up Baldy, do we have any new updates on these Pro Requests? Will we be getting some of these new features for Christmas this year (Custom Watermarking maybe....)???

Thanks for all you and the Smugmug team do for us pro's!!!

Regards,

Fred

Andy

Techman1 wrote:

Since you brought this up Baldy, do we have any new updates on these Pro Requests? Will we be getting some of these new features for Christmas this year (Custom Watermarking maybe....)???

Thanks for all you and the Smugmug team do for us pro's!!!

Regards,

Fred

Hi Fred. Thanks for posting. I think you know by now that we don't say if or when, but rather we try to acknowledge, certainly the stuff we are hearing from you guys, and tell everyone, yeah, we agree, it's a great request, we're discussing it, and we're working with the engineers on trying to get them incorporated into the system. FWIW, we heard custom watermarks a lot from our survey responses, so we really, truly do know how important it is to our pro customers. Now, it's a matter of executing and delivering.

But no matter what, these things take time to design, build, test, and implement. Sure, longer than you want, but we think it's worth it. Onethumb's been primary on software and hardware engineering, as you know. He hired an IT guy, par excellence, which will provide some much needed relief for him. So, I'm sorry I don't have a better answer than "hang in there, we hear you.." but that's our answer right now. Thanks again for posting, and thanks for being our customer, too!

All the best,

Techman1

Andy,

Thank you for replying. I know you all (I guess I can say that now since you are part of the Smugmug team) are working as quickly as possible on these new feature requests. I just like to emphasize the importance to us pro's whenever the subject comes up. This issue was addressed with me yesterday by a customer where she wanted to order a group photo, but part of the "F" from "PROOF" was over her daughter's face. She really couldn't see it very well and she was wanting me to remove the watermark or do something to assure her that her daughter's face looked great!

So, I know, that you know, that this is an important feature for us and I just wanted to add to this thread how important it really is. I'll wait, but football season is just wrapping up (High School) and I'm looking forward to adding more sports to my Smugmug site soon.

By the way, I've had numerous customers express their satisfaction with the quality of their print orders. So Smugmug is working for me and I'm hoping to really turn it up a notch or two in 2006!

All the best to you and the team at Smugmug!!!

Regards,
Fred

Mac Write

As for putting the Pros name on the credit card. My friend runs a Dial-up ISP and this company does all the backend workd and he handles e-mail, phone support etc. Now in the billing system, he can set whatever name he wants to appear on the credit card. So I assume it could be very possible for Smugmug to have "Name to appear on Credit Card" as a option in the Pro account in the future.