Digital Portrait Sales?

StudioVoxPop

Hi there--

I'm in the process of setting up a portrait business and I have some questions about what I should actually give my client.

Essentially, my plan is to have clients come in, get their portraits taken, and pay a sitting fee. Then, the clients will be able to access their images in their own private gallery and order prints as they see fit.

My question is what do you do if a client wants digital copies of the images? In this day and age of online profiles, I imagine it must come up a lot. Do you sell the client a CD of the images? Have the client pay a digital download fee for each image? What kind of mark up should I place on this type of digital download?

I'm just looking to get some feedback on how other pros approach this.

Thanks for reading!

Justin

JDub

I sell the original CD. If they want one image, as an original, they pay a digital download fee. Nothing for free anymore.

My workflow:
shoot the session
show the proofs right after the session
take the print order
send to lab by the time they get in the car
have the prints shipped to the customer
followup with a phone call

I also do a session where I will edit the proofs, then invite them back to see the proofs/take the order.

I have gotten screwed a few times in 13 years of doing this, so what I do now, is NO online gallery until you buy a print. The "newness" wears off if they look at the online gallery 500 times before making an order.

Hope this helps.

Angelo

Justin:

You might find some help here: http://dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=61023&highlight=digital+downloads

StudioVoxPop

Angelo wrote:

Justin:

You might find some help here: http://dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=61023&highlight=digital+downloads

Hey Angelo--

Thanks for the link but it's about stock photos. I'm more interested in what and how pros are charging their clients for digital copies of their images.

Hope things are sunny in LA! We're having a nice one in SF.

Justin

mercphoto

StudioVoxPop wrote:

Thanks for the link but it's about stock photos. I'm more interested in what and how pros are charging their clients for digital copies of their images.

First of all, realize that you don't NEED to offer digital files if you don't want to. Your original question seemed to imply that you weren't 100% convinced to offer this, or wasn't sure how to say "no" if a client requested it. You can say no if you don't want to sell the files. Or you can price them high. Two reasons to price them high. One is because they do have a lot of value to the client, thus price accordingly. Two is to defer people from choosing this route because you'd really rather sell prints.

My new wife and I recently had a professional portrait session. No digital files offered, she was not cheap, but it was well worth what we paid for prints. She does offer CD's in her wedding packages, but they are not cheap (nor should digital files be cheap either).

She did the session in her studio, including one wardrobe change for us. A week later we came in for viewing the re-touched photos that she selected for us to see and we placed the order. Whomever made the point of not having the online gallery before a print order has a very good point about the "newness" wearing off and clients not ordering. I saw this same phenomen with racing photos. Plus, some people simply want to browse and look for free. Also don't make the mistake that a "budding professional" did with my aunt's friends and offer up too much choice for your client. Having them wade through 400 photographs (I'm not exaggerating in her case) to pick a few out for purchase is not professional and is counter-productive to getting sales. Its called choice paralysis.

Angelo

StudioVoxPop wrote:

Hey Angelo--

Thanks for the link but it's about stock photos. I'm more interested in what and how pros are charging their clients for digital copies of their images.

Hope things are sunny in LA! We're having a nice one in SF.

Justin

I thought D-files were covered in that thread as well. Sorry.

StudioVoxPop

mercphoto wrote:

First of all, realize that you don't NEED to offer digital files if you don't want to. Your original question seemed to imply that you weren't 100% convinced to offer this, or wasn't sure how to say "no" if a client requested it. You can say no if you don't want to sell the files. Or you can price them high. Two reasons to price them high. One is because they do have a lot of value to the client, thus price accordingly. Two is to defer people from choosing this route because you'd really rather sell prints.

My new wife and I recently had a professional portrait session. No digital files offered, she was not cheap, but it was well worth what we paid for prints. She does offer CD's in her wedding packages, but they are not cheap (nor should digital files be cheap either).

She did the session in her studio, including one wardrobe change for us. A week later we came in for viewing the re-touched photos that she selected for us to see and we placed the order. Whomever made the point of not having the online gallery before a print order has a very good point about the "newness" wearing off and clients not ordering. I saw this same phenomen with racing photos. Plus, some people simply want to browse and look for free. Also don't make the mistake that a "budding professional" did with my aunt's friends and offer up too much choice for your client. Having them wade through 400 photographs (I'm not exaggerating in her case) to pick a few out for purchase is not professional and is counter-productive to getting sales. Its called choice paralysis.

Hey thanks for the advice. I do think I need to have some sort of digital option as I will be dealing a lot w/ people who will want to post the images on their own personal websites. I think I just need to figure out a good pricing structure for these digital files.