Decorating With Portraits

Browse more than 600,000 photos from top wall décor designers. This site should more than convince those photographers out there “consumers don’t want bare walls” in their new homes, and they want photos on their walls too. Minimalism (bare walls) is not the in thing. People who want bare walls have no imagination. Most people do decorate with photos and art. Please, check out this website and see how USA home owners decorate their walls; yes, with portraiture too.

We have included other links to give you ideas on using portraiture for wall décor. Pottery Barn illustrates how to decorated with their frames. As you view their sample walls one can easily visualize how to decorate a wall with smaller prints and frames. Once you customers see what can be accomplished with your portraits they will purchase professional photo prints, but you most likely will have to show them how. Even a mom with a senior can easily decorate a wall without going over budget. Again, you must plant the idea in mom’s mind.

Family portraiture can take on a whole new venue once mom sees how you can transfer a simple wall into a family wall “icon” that is decorative yet still  tastefully showcases her family. Family portraiture no longer has to be about a large single print hanging on the wall. Cluster framing just might be another solution for those moms who cannot image a large print on their wall. Years later the framed cluster can be separated into subsets or distributed individually throughout the house. Possibilities are endless. But you must first sell the idea and then let mom’s imagination take over. If you don’t want to sell frames, simply direct them to Pottery Barn, Michael’s, etc.

Drop Shipping Helps Grow Photo Sales and Profits

Selling photo products to relatives across the country creates numerous sales opportunities for your studio.  As you begin photographing for the holiday season, keep in mind that Pechman Imaging offers drop shipping via the ‘alternate ship address’ option in ROES. This makes ordering and delivering professional photo prints and greeting cards more convenient and more profitable.

Some ideas on how drop shipping can help grow your portrait studio sales:
Take advantage of upcoming family gatherings to offer large family sittings. Offer picture greeting card specials – photograph large family groups, break the group down into smaller groups, send them proof sheets with the best pose and a simple order form.

Drop shipping allows you to get products into the hands of clients quicker.  As the holiday approaches and you photograph people from out of town, drop shipping allows you to eliminate work and add convenience to your service. Offering this service and passing it through to your client is common practice in retail and the market has come to expect it.  Thus, while offering drop shipping as an inexpensive service, the opportunity to pass along the cost is an acceptable business practice – thus you increase your sales and not your costs.

Photo Proof Books Destroy The Smartphone

Photo proof books should destroy the smartphone. Likely not for awhile but eventually Mom’s will start to realize the flashy phone isn’t as warm and fuzzy as a classic proof book.

Everyone wins with hard copy photo proof books. The recent trend in sharing pictures of your family when you are with friends is the ubiquitous smart phone. (Been trying to use that word for a couple weeks now)

A classic printed proof book with high quality photo prints can be touched, held and cherished. The feel of the proof book gives an intimacy with your family not possible with the cold electronic format.

The classic printed proof book provides your children with a strong sense of belonging and family stability not possible with the fleeting, here today, gone tomorrow characteristic of the electronic medium.

Professional photographers win with classic printed brag proof books through the increased sale and the continued happy customer who each time they share their kids with friends using their proof book will be thanking you time and time again.

Pechman Professional Photo Lab has several proof book styles available at economical prices.

The Real Magic Bullet In Marketing Your Professional Photography Business

The Real Magic Bullet in Marketing your professional portrait photography business today is YOU. Your Personality, Skills, Energy, Consistency, Persistence, Enthusiasm, Friends and Faith are the keys. Show how you are different not just claiming to be better.

Budget some time in your calendar for making contacts with potential and previous customers. Ask about new opportunities and suggest to them some ideas you have been thinking about that will help them in their business or life.

Put your marketing activities in a calendar so you don’t miss opportunities or rush to hit deadlines, causing less-than-wonderful results.

This takes a little thought and effort. Define your “ideal” clients. Consider how best to reach them — where they are, what they see and what will cause them to respond.

Your customers and prospects are constantly changing. Just because someone might have declined an offer previously does not mean they will be  unresponsive today. Some of the best jobs have been landed by just asking one more time after the sales person had almost given up any hope of making the sale work.

A very good example of an open question to ask during your next sales presentation was blogged by Jonathon Fields at FreelanceSwitch

He was contacted to write some hard-hitting marketing copy for a product on extremely short notice. After a short phone discussion he asked this magical question that helped him choose how to differentiate himself with this potential client. “What’s important about the person you choose to do this job?”

Knowing what was important to the client he was able to taylor his response to tie in his unique skills with the requirements of this job.

It is also advisable to find out “What have you budgeted for this project?”

To summarize, an enthusiastic person with amazing professional photography skill in lighting, posing, composition and very importantly personal communication and rapport with the client is the key today. Sell yourself and the emotional benefits to your customers of the services you provide.

Top 5 all Time Senior Picture Marketing Steps Techniques Strategies

  1. Reps or Ambassador Program
  2. Displays
  3. Direct Mail
  4. Word of Mouth – Referral Program
  5. 3rd Party Promotion

Any one of these techniques has generated sessions for senior portrait studios. Combining two or three or better yet all five will produce much better results.

Your Rep program is a key to get things started or the ball rolling. Your reps are the first to pass out info, get on their Facebook or Twitter and talk up the fun of senior pictures and very importantly ‘doing it right’  by having a real pro do the work. I doubt they would trust a friend to mess with their car or give them a hair cut. Since when do they let their friends sew up a new shirt or blouse for them? Your reps help you get a list of names you can send a letter and brochure of your services. This lets the senior know you are serious about their business and that you respect them enough to formally invite them to your studio. Reps are some of the first images of the year you can place on your website, blog and Facebook.

Displays help in a couple of ways. Being accepted to be part of a portrait print display is a big honor and ego boost for the student. They will want to be a part of this. We have written other articles outlining some ideas for portrait print displays and how to get locations to let you show your prints. A key point today with a print display is that is shows to potential customers the value and benefits of having real prints and having them in larger sizes that are enjoyed on a wall for many people to see.

Direct Mail is where you formally invite seniors and their families to visit your studio and discuss senior portraits. Their value and the many styles your can offer them. Show a few examples in your brochure of photography and pricing. Examples, not the entire story. Use the direct mail to drive them to your blog, website for further information. Here you can tell a little more but not everything. Enough to get them to book an appointment or call you to book. Be ready to properly handle this phone call.

Word of Mouth – Referral Program — After you have photographed a student you have a couple of steps you need to do. During and just after the session shoot a few video snippets capturing the student having a great time posing for their pictures. After the session during a sort of debrief you can engage them in a conversation that will get them in their own words to describe their thoughts on how much fun they had and how important they see this is for their family. The very people who have stood by them and loved them their entire life. After all, this photo gift can only be given by the student, they are in control. Use these videos on your blog and Facebook. Have links to these in your emails you send out to future inquiries. When you have students and parents carrying folios or proof brag books and showing them to their friends you should also have a Referral Program. As friends see these proofs they will be impressed and will ask where these portraits were taken. You customer can give this friend one of your referral certificates that offers them some kind of special discount. For every certificate redeemed your original customer gets some kind of thank you bonus. Everyone wins with this approach. You could create an electronic version of this as well. If you provide a couple of Facebook images for your customer to display do it with a request they send links or tweets to all their friends and have the friends also mention your name and special offer. When people call you, you can inquire if they saw you on Facebook or twitter and then give your first customer the bonus credit.

3rd Party Promotions – Here you work with another business to promote to the senior. This other merchant could provide a discount coupon you would include in one of your direct mail packages. Pizza shop, athletic shoe store, fast food restaurant, tux shop are a few places to check out. They could provide space for a portrait print display. You could offer them photo discount coupons they could use in marketing to their customers who purchase some special offer they are promoting.

For any of these techniques, you must have a plan in place in your studio to answer the phone and convert the call into an appointment. (See a previous blog post for a suggested technique) You also need to work on an email response that will convince email inquiries to call your studio or go to your website and book their appointment. Consider some of the styles of emails you receive after visiting a website and requesting some information. Have a series of short emails ready to send to the parents of students or short text messages you can send the student that will convince them they need to act now for senior pictures.

How To Get JR Class Officers To Be Senior Reps

Adrian Michigan Senior Portraits

Senior Portraits, Adrian Michigan

Your goal is to get them to come to your studio for mini sample sessions and get their opinion on senior pictures and current senior styles and fashions. Get these images and their comments on the class officers FB and Twitter. Post the same information to your studio blog. Do some video snippets of these sessions and interviews and yes, put them on FB and your blog. Tweet the links.

How to get started. You are going to send them a letter addressed to Junior Class President, ABC High School. Your letter should present the idea that as a class officer their opinion and thoughts are important. This letter must be flattering to them but also sincere. You would like to show them how much fun pictures can be and how much their loved ones will appreciate having a professional photo prints. You get to show their family, them and their friends how much fun and how important senior pictures are in their lives. During the session and pose viewing you want to get their opinions of senior pictures. Take some video featuring their comments and experience. After they get a few prints and present these to their families get some more reactions from them and their parents and friends. All of this can be edited tastefully and placed on your blog, Facebook and Twitter. Later these officers might be able to create a small mailing list of their friends for you, you just need to ask. You should now have samples of the next senior class online to show and stir up a little action. You will also have testimonials explaining the value and importance of senior pictures on your blog and social media pages.

Boost Portrait Studio Sales With A Portrait Fundraiser

Need to boost your portrait studio sales this year? Looking for a way to help your church or civic group raise some extra money?

Church groups, sports leagues and school bands all need more money.

This is the perfect time for a professional portrait fundraiser. There’s very little cost to start one. Community groups will make attractive profits with your professional photography fundraiser. The program and certificates are easy to sell.

Consider that Family Portraits are Earth Friendly and they are Made in the USA. Your portrait fundraiser program can offer a selection of sizes and styles that are competitively priced and attractively packaged.

Getting a group of people to work for your studio to get portrait appointments is a way of multiplying your sales efforts. You make a couple of calls to get a group (5-50) of people to go out and talk about your studio. If each person made 2 calls each, you have just gotten a lot of publicity from your only two calls.

In addition the group will make all the money they need for their program and those getting portraits will have a wonderful memory and a great savings. Everyone wins big time.

Your plan is as follows. Print a certificate that is redeemable for a portrait session and print (probably an 8×10 or it could be a small multi print package from one pose). This can sell for $9.95, 14.95, 19.95, 24.95 or 29.95, anything that you feel will be acceptable. Give the band group $5, $10, $25 or what ever it takes and you agree to for selling the coupon. You get the balance (keep enough to cover your basic costs). Explain to the group that they collect their fee when they sell and deliver the coupon. The coupons are printed stating that the balance (use actual amount) is payable to the studio at the time of the session. Be sure to also print the group name and all your contact info on the certificate. Emphasize to the group that they have no upfront investment, no bookkeeping, no responsibility to keep your money, only a sure fire way to make money for their group.  Organizations like the idea that they have no investment and even if a coupon is lost or stolen they are not responsible to you for any money. If a stolen coupon comes into your studio the customer still has to pay you your money so you are always covered and need never have to go back to collect anything from the selling group.

You can put a fairly short time limit on the coupon that would get sittings into your studio sooner. A longer time limit, say 1 year, would let the group sell more coupons. People could see using these for seniors or Christmas portraits. You could offer an ‘Early Bird’ bonus for those who choose to use the certificate earlier in the year. This gets some action early in the program and gives you the benefit of both long and short expirations.

Your Portrait Photography Fundraiser offers the following benefits: NO money upfront – you provide all the sales materials the group needs to hold their portrait fundraiser. No selling required. Many people within their group will have a family event during the year that would be perfect to commemorate with a professional portrait. The fundraiser merely allows them to obtain this portrait at a discount and contribute to their groups program at the same time. Everybody wins. Purchasers can call the studio at their convenience for an appointment.

People know and trust your portrait studio because you deliver quality professional photo prints at a great price. This program offers your customers spectacular value and is extremely easy to sell.

Today’s successful portrait studio photographers combine their photo and business skills with quality professional photo printing from a professional photo lab.

How to Increase Professional Portrait Photography Sales Today

To Increase Professional Portrait Photography Sales today you might consider adding event photography to your photo studio services.

To begin make a list of anyone you know who has children in a sport program, dance school or day care school. Contact them and ask for names of anyone they might know who would be in charge of the group. If they do not know the leader ask if they might know of another member who might know. If you do not know of people directly involved with any of these groups you would then just ask everyone you know if they might put you in touch with one of their friends who might belong to such a group. You will be surprised how few people you actually have to ask before you begin compiling a nice list of potential customers

During your conversations with friends who have children in these programs you want to learn as much as possible about their likes and dislikes of their current photography program. Are there services or products they wished they had available? Retake days or how many retakes were needed for their last photo day. How long did photo day take? Was photo day smooth or hectic? How long did it take to get picture packages and were they accurately completed?

Armed with this market research make a list of your business strengths. Focus on describing these features as a benefit to the customer. Be aware that the real customer you must impress is the group leader. Explain your services as benefits to not only the members but also how you always focus your efforts to make the leaders job ‘hassle free’ and smooth.

Now you should be ready to make your appointments. You may need to call a couple of times to get a meeting. Be friendly but persistent and offer helpful ideas during each call. Make them an offer they can’t refuse.  You might partially describe an important service or product that is so interesting or intriguing that they have to see it in person at a meeting.

Remember that you likely will not get meetings with every contact but by making enough calls you will get appointments and book some jobs. Since each job has many customers you win even without booking every jobs. Missed jobs this year will be your leads for next season. Keep lists of contact names, dates of calls and a brief summary of your conversations listing the key details unique to their group you discovered. Since you are in this for the long haul you just need to remain patient and persistent.

Your unique photography and impeccable service combined with professional photo printing is your winning combination.

Professional Photographers New Years Resolutions

Professional PhotographyThis blog posting isn’t directly about professional photo lab services or new professional photography studio techniques. This posting may though provide you with additional photographic opportunities that you will then be able to use your professional photography skills.

Today’s idea for January is for you to make a list of your top business customers. This could be a hospital, realtor, dance school, nursery school or sports league. Make a second list of the competitors of these people who you would like to gain as new customers in 2012. Next make a short script outlining what you would like to learn from these existing customers and what they have planned for 2012. Try to learn of any changes or new direction in their business.

Thank your customers for their business of course and ask how you did this year. Get a score card assessment from them of your service. Ask if they have any thoughts or suggestions as to new, additional or modified services you should be offering them.You can ask them about specific projects they have coming up that you could be getting ready to work with them on in 2012. If there is a project, determine the best time to follow up and whom should you contact.

You might inquire about your contacts personal goals for 2012 if possible or appropriate. Determine how their goals might impact your relationship.

Combine all the information you have learned from your current customers. You might have learned of some important industry or local trends.  Now looking at your new lead list, design a script outline comparing things you can offer to similar business that you already know the market is moving toward. Remember to explain these ideas as benefits to the business.

For studios who do not work with companies or groups, you might make a list of your top 5 families. Beyond the natural thank you ask about changes taking place in their family during 2012. There might be a new birth, graduation, marriage or job promotion coming up. Determine the best time to follow up with them about this opportunity.

Your big goal in all this is to solidify past customers and gain a few new ones for 2012.

Proof Books Make Profit Create Happy Customers

Proof Book

Bound Proof Books Make Profit and Create Happy Customers

How do professional portrait photographers make profit and at the same time create happy portrait photography customers? One idea is to always suggest a proof book or two as add on gifts. These are great for Grandmas and Moms. They fit nicely in a purse and are the perfect brag book to show off their children. Pechman professional photo lab has several size proof books available. Two very popular sizes are the 2×3 and 5×5 books. With ten photos included these books make a great gift. Priced from $10.25 assembled in a gift box ready to deliver these proof books make great Holiday Gifts.

Remember, if you do not ask your customer for the sale, you very likely will never get the order. Show the books, suggest the books, describe how much other customers have thanked you for selling them these books, all methods to increase sales and make profit.