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The SM identity crisis... and what to do about it
duds
Registered Users Posts: 176 Major grins
First things first... I love SmugMug! One of my favorite companies of all time. A model for customer service in this (or any) industry. I have many, many positive things to say about what SM offers, and don't even get me started about the people that work there... RAVES all around for the finest staff I know.
:clap
Lately, however, I find myself wondering if SM is right for me. Perhaps this is because my needs have changed, but perhaps it's because I'm no longer sure for whom SM is designed. Parts of the interface seem designed for clients (those that visit the galleries), and other parts for Pros (those that post them). During this past year, as SM has made more of an effort to brand its Pro features, I've witnessed release after release of features that seem well intentioned, but not well implemented... for anyone. I wonder if this doesn't speak to a bit of an identity crisis. For example...
No company is perfect, and no company will offer a perfect array of products and services to meet the needs of every customer. To be sure, SM offers a LOT to its clients and Pros. But, while SM continues to innovate, I'm not sure that it does so with the Pro in mind. I'm also not sure that it does so with the client in mind. In fact, I'm not sure what SM's direction is lately, which makes it hard for me to foresee whether SM will meet my needs down the road.
No amount of voting on Uservoice will impact SM's vision for its services. I don't doubt that SM listens to its users for the sake of prioritizing feature implementation, but I'm not sure that Uservoice lets anyone discuss the bigger picture. I guess that's why I felt the need to post something here. I'm a serious SM fan, but I find myself doing more and more fulfillment directly through BayPhoto because the SM interface is prohibitive to my needs, and off-putting to my clients. I'd love to see SM flourish, and I'm happy to help guide the vision... I'm just not sure how to do that, nor am I sure how much longer I can wait.
:clap
Lately, however, I find myself wondering if SM is right for me. Perhaps this is because my needs have changed, but perhaps it's because I'm no longer sure for whom SM is designed. Parts of the interface seem designed for clients (those that visit the galleries), and other parts for Pros (those that post them). During this past year, as SM has made more of an effort to brand its Pro features, I've witnessed release after release of features that seem well intentioned, but not well implemented... for anyone. I wonder if this doesn't speak to a bit of an identity crisis. For example...
- I'm not sure if SM is being designed to meet the ever-changing marketing needs of its Pros. If SM truly wants to cater to Pros, it needs to provide better marketing tools. I was hopeful when SM released the Event Marketing feature (almost a year ago) but there has been little improvement since to a feature that was never quite robust enough. Client/visitor information is like gold to a Pro, but I still have no way to know who is accessing my galleries, and I have no way to contact those people. Several other photo hosting/fulfillment websites feature robust client database interfaces. Pictage, for example, keeps track of every visitor to an event, and it lets me market to those clients in any way I'd like. I can even export their contact info for easy uploading into other programs (like email marketing programs, contact management software, Facebook and more..) How can I make sure that I'm making the most of my client interactions with the tools that SM currently offers?
- As SmugMug has expanded its offerings for clients (cards that clients can order themselves, the availability of packages, etc.) it has created a much more fractured way of shopping. For example, a client cannot order prints, cards, and packages from the same interface; instead, they must visit three separate interfaces to do so. This is confusing to a client. And confusion hurts sales. In this age of sophisticated digital shopping carts, simplicity is an expectation. As product offerings have expanded, I've lost sight of SM's vision for a simple, elegant client shopping experience.
- Anyone who sells packages (on SM or elsewhere) can tell you that they're the real moneymaker. I was thrilled to see this feature released on SM. But, again, confusion reigns for the client. The "Buy > Photo Package" button is small, and hard to find. And the interface is clunky! Choosing from thousands of images on a small filmstrip is unwieldy. Even if a client adds images to their "Favorites" first, once they go to "Buy > Photo Package" there is no way (that I've found) to choose from the favorites. How can that be? While the packages feature certainly does the job, it does not do the job well; not in a way that is simple, not in a way that promotes sales, and not in a way that makes the Pro look good.
- SM's partnerships do not seem very Pro-centered.. but they also don't seem very client-centered. Relationships with Animoto, Blurb, MyCanvas and others are still very limited. Pros can create items, but selling them is complicated and, at times, not possible. And clients have no way to create many of those items on their own -- something offered by many other photo fulfillment sites, and something that would save Pros time while generating revenue.
No company is perfect, and no company will offer a perfect array of products and services to meet the needs of every customer. To be sure, SM offers a LOT to its clients and Pros. But, while SM continues to innovate, I'm not sure that it does so with the Pro in mind. I'm also not sure that it does so with the client in mind. In fact, I'm not sure what SM's direction is lately, which makes it hard for me to foresee whether SM will meet my needs down the road.
No amount of voting on Uservoice will impact SM's vision for its services. I don't doubt that SM listens to its users for the sake of prioritizing feature implementation, but I'm not sure that Uservoice lets anyone discuss the bigger picture. I guess that's why I felt the need to post something here. I'm a serious SM fan, but I find myself doing more and more fulfillment directly through BayPhoto because the SM interface is prohibitive to my needs, and off-putting to my clients. I'd love to see SM flourish, and I'm happy to help guide the vision... I'm just not sure how to do that, nor am I sure how much longer I can wait.
Matt Dudley
Matt Dudley Photography
Nashville child photographer
Twitter: @mattdudleyphoto
Facebook: facebook.com/mattdudleyphotography
Matt Dudley Photography
Nashville child photographer
Twitter: @mattdudleyphoto
Facebook: facebook.com/mattdudleyphotography
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Portfolio • Workshops • Facebook • Twitter
Matt Dudley Photography
Nashville child photographer
Twitter: @mattdudleyphoto
Facebook: facebook.com/mattdudleyphotography
Like Dudz, I'm a SmugMug fan - I love their customer service, and recent changes to Pricelists and integration tools with social media sites have been very useful.
However, it's hard to say if SmugMug is trying to compete with Flickr, as a photo hosting site for casual users and browsers, or compete with pictage / backprint etc as a pro photog delivery mechanism. It falls down in some crucial ways for both, while also retaining it's redeeming features and amazing customer service.
I guess, like Dudz, I'm still trying to figure out if SM is the right place for me.
http://www.facebook.com/rt2photo
one point that the original post left out was the need for better ipad/mobile phone aps. As a pro (even though I'm not that big), I would like my customers to be able to buy my pictures directly from their phones or tablets. some of my friends and I assume my customers too, don't even use laptops or computers anymore.
to me that might be the thing which i shop for if i do decide to move on.
I have no doubt that SM wants to satisfy their customers - but for some reason the features being rolled out are simply clunky. This kills me, because I believe that the entire company WANTS to delivery brilliance, they just don't seem to know how. Personally I have removed the SMugmug sales process from most of my galleries and not just because of the lack of international currencies. The solution to that (although in progress) is still massively clunky.
The 2 worst elements for me are limited number of fixed currencies and not able to set sales prices directly. I will guarantee you if you asked all the pros, there would be hardly any that said "I don't want to even have the option to set my client pricing directly" and although I am sure the few currencies supported now satisfy a lot of people it's unclear why using a 3rd party payment processor (there are many options available) was better than reinventing a 6 sided wheel.
I still use and love SMugmug, but it's now in spite of the features and feature developments...
Cheers - N
http://www.nzsnaps.com (talkiet.smugmug.com)
We listened to you as you asked for multiple currencies. And we added them. And I've said we expect to add more. But for now we have AUD EUR GBP CDN and USD.
We have taken a ton of feedback in the pricelist thread. And we're working on it.
We appreciate everyone's patience.
Portfolio • Workshops • Facebook • Twitter
http://www.facebook.com/rt2photo
We have attention on cleaning up the interface, making things ever-more easier, and improving the shopping experience. With our recent announcements (and also watch our http://news.smugmug.com blog today) we're doing more and more things brought up in this thread. Still, we know there's more (always!) to do. We're gaining on a lot of the improvements we've been promising and I expect the next few months to be exciting for all of us!
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Andy... OVER SIX YEARS, that's how long it took to deliver a clunky, limited foreign currency capability. Don't you dare hold that up as a success. And it's 6 years since the first request I found with 10 seconds looking - it's probably been requested longer than that.
No one of these individual issues is that important, what is important is that all the changes seem to have the same systemic problems - they are not seamless and polished, they seem to be overly complex and don't integrate well with the site as a whole, or each other.
I still heartily recommend Smugmug to anyone that doesn't want to sell photos - you have the speed, customer support ethos, and proven track record to make Smugmug a compelling option even without any ecommerce capability. The fact that it's even possible to integrate a Paypal solution into the site, and further, that it's allowed, is fantastic.
But unless you stop believing that you're producing well thought out, well designed and well implemented features that actually satisify customer needs, you're doomed to repeat the cycle.
I almost forgot... even though I do get a bit tired of the "I'm sorry I don't have a better answer for you" line, having yourself and other SM bigwigs and developers all regularly participating in these debates is outstanding. It's one of the main reasons I totally believe you want to make Smugmug better every day - that's why I'm so disappointed that something in your feature development cycle is clearly fundamentally broken.
Regards
Neil G
http://www.nzsnaps.com (talkiet.smugmug.com)
We try, Neil
And as I've been saying, there's plenty more to come. Thanks for being with us!
Portfolio • Workshops • Facebook • Twitter
Andy - stop being a nice guy, we're trying to be mad here!
http://www.facebook.com/rt2photo
Pictage's upfront investment can be $200 a month IIRC, while smugmug is $150 a year. However, and the reason I found this thread, I had very few sales on the few events I did last year and I have to ask myself why.
The first thing I noticed is marketing directly to participants/customers. I had to depend on a third party to distribute a buy link. For one event I included a flyer, and have no idea how effective that was. At the time, I had galleries featured on my home page so it should have been easy to find. I would have needed to collect emails and do it directly from my own email account. Tedious. I went to a friends wedding. Every time they re-upped their gallery, since they hadn't chosen any pictures, I got an email to buy prints. The gallery was on Pictage.
Second was the terrible interface for purchasing pictures. I started recently experimenting with how to sort the events out into smaller chunks instead of one gallery with 600 pictures in it which when you go to the storefront loads them all into one continuous page. Who wants to look through that many pictures? I find it very difficult with having to make a category and a new sub category gallery for each event, and if necessary PW protect each individual gallery. I hate having to wade through what seems like 100s of predetermined categories to find the ones I actually use. It can work, but it's clunky. With the Pictage example the parent gallery, which I logged into once, was broken down in to segments, pre wedding, wedding ceremony, reception, etc. which I can't imagine is as difficult to organize. Apparently this setup can be made better with CSS, but that requires coding for every gallery. No thanks. I also don't think the interface to order prints at different sizes and the cart area are very intuitive. I haven't spent enough time on there, but know that was my initial impression. Since most clients will only use it once or twice it needs to be easy and intuitive.
When I started looking into the Event feature, and what has me looking around today, I was hoping I could group several galleries easily under one "Event" link. Maybe I can but I haven't completed my reading to find out.
I was originally attracted to Smugmug for the price and the customization, there are some very nice sites they host. After a year of messing with it, without knowing CSS code and/or being a graphic artist, the customization benefit has really faded for me. I would almost rather have a portfolio site with periodic updates (perhaps based on a wordpress template) linked to a gallery/shopping service for client review and purchases than try to continue struggling with an integrated Smugmug approach. Years ago I had an automotive website that I made from scratch. I used a couple of different tools for editing A major frustration I have with doing the code, is having to hide it in various parts of Smugmug and not having a clear picture of what does what, and having to decode what words modify what aspects of the site. This however, is not an inherit weakness of Smugmug but just why it's not as attractive to me as it was originally.
I will most likely re-up my subscription, as it's what the budget allows, and it's rough but mostly already setup. I don't know if it would be the long term solution for me. I wonder if the cart is coming before the horse, if I had a better more intuitive website would I sell more products.
cmaldridgephoto.com
blog.cmaldridgephoto.com
I will start by saying SM CS is the best in the industry. And I really like the simplicity and how clean the customer interface is.
But my biggest gripe has always been that SM is a fragmented application. It looks like they tried to build the pro features over the amateur infrastructure and tried to keep them both. The result a fragmented and overly complicated system.
Let start with the way I create an event. Too complicated. Then, if I want to subdivide the wedding by categories I have to create a gallery for each one and upload each gallery one at a time. It requires me to be involved too much instead of using my time in something else.
Then, the customer has to stumble into the fact that, "hey, I can actuall purchase prins here!".
Then, there should be a way for client to tag images or create folders to organize their images. A feature that Pictage has and is very useful for wedding photographers but that has been in the request list of SM forever. Right now they only have one favorite folder and it not even contained in the event of the client but in another place. Totally fragmented and confusing.
Currently I am using Pictage and Smugmug trying to decide which one to stay with. I really, REALLY want to like and pick Smugmug, but it seems like the numbers are always on the Pictage side. Yes, Pictage is more expensive, but I seems to sell much more. It took me close to sixth month to sell in SM close to $400. And in Justine month I was able to sell over $1,000 in Pictage. Of course, the are many variables to that and is not an objective test at all, but it makes me wonder.
I think SM need to be redesign from the ground up for pro use. We need a cohesive, easy to use and clean application that helps maximize sales. Yes, it is great that images look gag at SM, but for me it is as equally important that I sell those images to so I can make profit.
Pictage is a great example of a well thoughout, well oiled marketing and selling application.
Patience and loyalty are a very expensive commodity. Please, do not waste them.
But the OP's post resonated with me. Smugmug works, but there are niggles. A LOT of them. And what's really frightening, is that 17 months later, the site still seems to be creaking. Perhaps even more so, or perhaps I'm just using more features and noticing more problems.
In truth, I never really thought the foreign currency and overseas labs would come, despite the "we're working it" rhetoric. I handled print orders offline and expected to do so for a while to come. But they got there in the end. And now my wishlist changes, and I wonder whether it will be another 6 years before the other stuff is done.
The recent niggles that come to mind, in no particular order:
- the mobile site. Great we have some limited branding on there now. Sucks that we don't have the same level of control as we do on the main thing.
- the downtime. This year has been...problematic. I also complain that we don't get notified about the downtime. I get all tweets from @smugmugstatus sent to my phone. It beeps like a pager when something is posted on there. That is what it's there for, and its a great notification system, but it has been rarely used for the downtime this year. Yes there's a facebook update, but thats where we go when we realise the site is down, its not where we find out the site is down then take action. Few things worse than your clients finding out the site is down before you do.
- Coupons. Just frustrating to set up in UK pounds. for some reason tax is handled or excluded outside of the discounts (I never really understood the problem), so a 10% discount coupon became a 9.7% discount. Looks bad to customers. Also means I can't offer 100% discounts; though as someone has posted on the coupons thread - it will still ask customers for a credit card even if you stuck it in US dollars to avoid the bizarre tax thing, and tried to give them away. In the end I just gave up trying.
- selecting galleries. When uploading, or adding a gallery to an event, it lets you pick categories first - great;try doing the same for adding galleries for sharegroups, it presents you with a seemingly unordered, grid of (in my case) 933 gallery thumbnails.
I get that Smugmug doesn't have deep pockets or an army of developers chomping at the bit to code whatever feature we'd like.
I'm not even sure that's the issue here. We all run businesses, we get that most of the time you're so busy laying down track for the moving train you don't feel like there's time to make sure the direction is the right one and the train is running correctly. But it is important to stop every so often, to look around and say, can we do better? are we missing any easy fixes?
San Francisco Portrait and Wedding Photographer
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Such a great quote.