Branding and other insights from the Professional Photographers
Sunday, June 13th 2010 @ 8:02 PM
Neil and I are attending a two day conference put on by the Professional Photographers of Oregon. The membership is heavily wedding and portrait photographers but there are art photographers, students, and aspiring professionals in the mix. Sometimes you learn as much from visiting with people after hours as you do in the classes. Other times you hear someone speaking to a subject that you have heard a hundred times over and something new pops out. "Wait, what was that? I have never heard that before!" Here are a few of my aha's from today.
Jen Thompson is a photographer from Redmond, Oregon who is both a graphic designer and a portrait photographer. When it comes to branding, she really knows her stuff.
Branding is not your logo or your business card or your tag line. It is the entire package of who you and your business are: your story, what you stand for, how your clients feel about you, what people say about you when they leave your business. Your website, business card, tag line, studio packaging, the way you dress, the look, smells, and sounds that they experience when they walk in your door must be consistent with that brand.
Everything that the client experiences from the sound of the voice on the phone to the thank you note that they get after the session must be consistent with your brand.
Boutique studios are very trendy right now but what are they? Boutique refers to a business that offers unique products, unique promotions, unique pricing, unique presentation, creates a unique perception.
Competing on price, offering what everyone else does, cheap packaging, trying to land every client, and skipping over the details is NOT boutique.
Jen makes sure that everything she puts out is unique and looks and feels expensive. Her business cards are round, for instance. They stand out from the crowd. She sends out a welcome packet when a clent books a session that costs her $10 each. She wants them to open it and think, "Oh crap, I am going to spend a lot of money, but it is going to be worth it." After the portraits are delivered (she hand delivers everything to the client home) she mails a heartfelt thank you note and referral cards with a potograph from their session on them. She also sends a thank you gift to them. It is never a photographic product and how much she spends on it depends on how much the client spent. Often it is an item of jewelry, like a bracelet for the mother with the children's names engraved.
She expects her clients to spend a lot of money so everything about their experience with her should be amazing!
Bill Sorenson is a fabulous photographer/businessman that we have known for many years. We have heard him speak many times and hired him to come to our studio for one on one consultations. He is sucessful because he LOVES to market and sell. He absolutely gets a kick ou of it. He shared something with us today that I had never heard before.
Whenever you do a family portrait, the most difficult person to please is the mom. "I'm too fat, my eyes are too squinty, my hair is flat on one side", etc, etc. She is also the primary decision maker and the person that it is most important to please! If the first image that she sees from the session is includes her and she is unhappy with the way she looks, that is all she will be able to think about. She isn't in love with the portraits because she isn't in love with the way she looks. Bill has a great solution to this but first, here is the way to photograph the family inorder to maximize the sale:
You need to photograph the dfferent breakdowns of the family in a way that they lend themselves to creating wall groupings of three images. In a typical family of four, for instance, photograph each child individually and then together (one grouping of three right there). Then Dad with the kids, Mom with the kids, Dad alone, Mom alone and Mom and Dad alone (two more potential groupings of three or one grouping of five.) Of course you do the entire family together, as well, which is the main reason they came in and will be the main portrait.
When showing the portraits, start with the youngest child first. They are often the cutest but always the least photographed. The parents need a portrait. Next you show the other portraits of the children, then Dad alone. When showing one of the portraits of the children, you explain about what you can do for retouching. It is important that Mom knows that you will make them perfect BEFORE she sees herself.
Finally, you show the portraits that include Mom. When she starts to criticize herself, you tell Dad, "Tell her you love her!" and remind her of the retouching that you can do.
By showing the photographs in this order, you are keeping primary decision maker in a positive mood, saying "yes" for as long as possible before she has any reason to think, "I hate the way I look."
Thanks, Bill!
When showing the portraits, start with the youngest child first