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Super Monday Class

I am so excited that I get to share the Science of Photography Business with fellow photographers at an upcoming class!  Sunday October 12th I will be teaching a day long course on the Science of Photography Business in Baton Rouge, LA.

During the class we will cover:

  • How to take home a nice paycheck from your photography business month after month with consistency.
  • How to scientifically price your photography so that clients want to buy more and you can feel good about talking price to potential clients.
  • How to market your business on a shoe string budget and why the biggest part of marketing isn’t what you think it is!
  • What 5 essential elements every photography website needs so that clients book you right then and there.
  • How to gain confidence about your photography and your business so that you can charge what you are worth and never feel bad about it another day in your life.
  • and How the right business mindset can make all the difference!

If this sounds like something you’d like to learn, you can sign up here.  Register by September 30th and it is only $99.  This class is through the PPA, so you will also gain credits toward your PPA degree by joining us for the class.

Class Date: Sunday, Oct 12th
Time: 9am – 4pm
Location: 7809 Jefferson Hwy, Baton Rouge, LA 70808
What to bring: Note taking material, current marketing material, price list, and if you’d like to purchase lunch it will be $10 or you can bring your own lunch.

Sign Up

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Business of Gratitude – Week 4

My gratitude went off-course at the end of May, so I am now taking 7 days to finish up the month (a little late).

20- I am grateful for mis-haps and mistakes.  They are the best teachers that I could ask for.  They also give me courage to do something I am afraid to do (more on this in a full post).

21 – I am grateful for slow days.  There are some days when my bookings are thin.  Perhaps this should stress me (sometimes it does)…but today I am going to be grateful, because this gives me time to regroup and prepare for the busier months.  It also gives me time to foster creativity!

22 – I am grateful for doors that close.  Although scary, they incite creativity and ingenuity, and bring out my courage to climb through the window instead.

23 – I am grateful for my community.  I am now a part of a community of Artists, called N the Art Space, and it is awesome to be surrounded by creativity around every corner!

24- I am grateful for creativity.

25- I am grateful for the people I meet.  I have met clients that I think are amazing people!  People I would have never met if not for my business.

26- I am grateful for challenges.  Photography challenges me in a whole new way that I’ve ever experienced.  It challenges me to shut off the analytical part of my brain, if even momentarily, and life in the moment.

27-  I am grateful for challenges (again).  Running a photography business challenges me socially.  I am a painfully shy person, but my business forces me go outside of my comfort zone and socially interact in ways I normally wouldn’t.  It’s scary as hell, but it’s worth it!

 

29-  I am grateful for chocolate.  seriously.

30- I am grateful for other Artists.  It is amazing to be surrounded by artists that are talented and creative.  I love how everyone’s art is unique and I appreciate other artists and their view point.

 

Business of Gratitude – Week 3

May 13- I am thankful for other photographers!  They make the world beautiful with their images!  I am thankful for Tara McGovern, who took my families photos and I am sooo beyond thankful to have images that represent my families love for each other.

May 14 – I am thankful for free time.  No sessions today, but I am happy to spend time on the studio.

May 15- I am thankful for Friends.  I meet some amazing and wonderful people in Seattle, and I feel better for having met them 🙂

May 16- I am thankful for my studio.  I love it.  I can see a vision of what I want it to be, and I love it even more.

May 17-  Today I am thankful for Scooby Doo.  My daughter watched about 10 episodes while I painted the studio.  But I am thankful for shared loves with my daughter.  I loved Scooby Doo and the whole detective thing when I was a child, it’s funny how some things are genetic.

May 18- I am thankful for family.

May 19- I am thankful for books.  They provide an endless well of inspiration and fit an entire universe inside my head.

The Business of Gratitude – Week 2

 

May 7 – I am thankful for southwest airlines, and smooth travels across the country 🙂

May 8 –  I am thankful for Julia Kelleher and all her wisdom!

May 9 – I am thankful for Creative Live.  It’s such an awesome concept for education and learning!  I am the biggest dork about learning new stuff, I NEVER want to stop learning… and creative live is one awesome way to keep learning new stuff.

May 10 – I am thankful for my daughter.  She is exactly what I need.  She is daring and adventurous and not afraid of life!  She made me ride a huge ferris wheel in Seattle, and I probably wouldn’t have seen the sights if it wasn’t for her.  She helps me see things in the world that I’ve been too afraid of before her.

May 11 –  I am thankful for my mom.  I argue with her constantly… but god do I love her.  I am thankful I have a mom that cares for me (even if it’s a little too much care sometimes).  I am thankful I have a mom that would travel across the country with me, but most importantly, that she follows me wherever my dreams may take me 🙂

May 12 – I am thankful for home.  Thankful I have a place that feels like home.  I know what it’s like to feel home-less, and I know how good it is to be home 🙂

Less Jam is More

Have you browsed through a print lab website lately?  There are LOTS of options these days.  It’s not just prints, it’s gallery wrapped canvases, flat canvases, framed canvases, metal prints, pearl prints, matte prints, standout prints, bamboo prints, mounted or not mounted…. and that’s just the prints.  Don’t get me started on albums, photo purses, photo mugs, and photo toilet paper!  (what, no lab has come out with photo toilet paper yet??  you just wait!)

The point is, there is a CRAP TON of options out there.  Yay!  Options are awesome, right?!

That is what I thought until I read of research done by Sheena Iyengar of Columbia University and Mark Lepper of Stanford.  They did a study at a grocery store selling jam.  In one case they offered shoppers a chance to take a taste and purchase 24 different flavors of jam.  Then, repeated the exact same thing but with only 6 flavors.

As photographers we say, “but I have a client that loves organic pepper jelly jam, so I need to offer it”.  So we start adding to the list of jams: strawberry, blueberry, grape, pineapple, raspberry, pepper jelly, pomegranate, and then of course you have your organic versus non-organic varieties.  We try to suite everyone’s tastes by selling everything under the sun.

So what happened in that grocery store test?  Well, to start with more people stopped at the table when they offered 24 jams.  So yes, people do like the idea of more options.  It sounds very appealing, doesn’t it?  BUT… only 3% of customers bought jam when there was 24 flavors and 30% bought when there was only 6 flavors.  So by simply reducing the number of options (not changing the quality) they sold ten times more jam!

TEN TIMES more jam people!  That is a lot of jam.  And a lot of lovely portraits in our metaphor.  Imagine not having to bring in more clients through marketing, but simply making more money per client.  Sounds nice doesn’t it?

So, I beg you for the love of jam to reduce the number of items you offer in your price list.   Pick your most favorite and stick to it.  Instead of offering 3 print finishes, you pick out your favorite finish and then all prints have the artist’s favorite finish.  Cut out any pita (pain in the behind) products that you complain about having to order.  I hated ordering gift prints, so I simply got rid of them!

Please share what items will be getting the axe off your price list below. Anyone else have an equal loathing of gift prints?  What’s your least favorite item currently on your price list??

 

The Business of Gratitude – Week 1

May 1- I am thankful my business affords me the luxury of vacations.  (I’m at Disney world right now!)

photograph of cinderella castle at disney world with fireworks

May 2 – I am thankful my business gives me time with my family on my own terms.

May 3 – I am thankful my business forces me to get outside of my comfort zone.  Today is Baby Grand, and I am forced to meet 500+ pregnant moms.  I would never say “Hi” to this many people without my business to push me 🙂

May 4 – I am thankful for my new studio.  I moved my stuff over today and I am beyond excited to get settled into the new studio!

May 5 – I am thankful I have amazingly awesome clients!  Seriously, they are understanding when something goes wrong and are wonderful people through and through.  I am honored to have these people as part of my life.

The Business of Gratitude

You are not going to believe this, but I have found a magic pill to all my business woes.  But it probably isn’t what you’re thinking… it’s not some new class or a thick book or even a workshop worth more than your left kidney!

It’s free…and simple.

gratitude

Seriously.  When I am stressed about spending money on something for my business, or worried about if I’ll have enough bookings, or fretting over my sales averages, gratitude is the answer.

It’s very simple.  As soon as a fear, a concern, a doubt, or a stress pops into your head immediately begin to list what you are grateful for in your business.  You’re going to be amazed, it works like magic!  I’m talking unicorns, fairies, and harry potter kind of magic.

But here is the catch – it takes practice being grateful.  It’s not always our default setting.  It’s a lot easier to complain than to be grateful.  So in an effort to stretch my gratitude muscle, I am starting a 30 day Business of Gratitude Challenge.

30 day Business of Gratitude Challenge

During the month of May, post 1 thing everyday that you are grateful for in your business.  You can post it to your blog, facebook, twitter, or anywhere you like.  Use the hashtag #BusinessofGratitide if you like.  By the end of the month, we’ll have rainbows coming out our ears we’ll be so full of gratitude magic 🙂

p.s. want grateful brownie points?  Don’t just proclaim your gratitude, but act on it!  Donate your time, skills, or money to those in need as a display of your gratitude this month.

grateful

Meet George

Have you seen Julia Kelleher’s Creative Live?  If you haven’t I HIGHLY recommend it!  I loved it so much that I am flying to Seattle May 8th to see the next of Julia’s Creative Live.  EEEeeeee!  I’m so excited!

One of the awesome concepts Julia introduced in her first class is “George.”  George is her name for that inner critic that tells you all the reasons why you’re going to fail, all the reasons why you shouldn’t try that new project, and all the ways you’re not good enough.  In a nut, George sucks.  Call it resistance.  Call it your critic, your worst enemy, whatever.  But I love how she calls it George because it makes it sound like this voice is NOT me.  It’s some other separate entity that I can vanquish.

I realized today, while fretting over my new studio, that my George is an oversized, annoying, pocket-protector-wearing accountant that lives in the basement.  He chimes in with his calculations anytime I am thinking of doing anything even slightly daring.  When I want to jump off the diving board my George stalls me with measuring the depth, taking the pH of the water, checking the temperature to see if it’s just right, and running through a few trajectories before I make the jump.  Then he scares me motionless with calculation after calculation proving why this is a risky move.  He gives me calculation paralysis.

So I decided that if George exists, then I should also have someone else in my head.  Someone gunning for the other side.  A cheerleader that tells me “you can do it!”  Georgette maybe?  She thinks the world of me, like a mom.  She thinks that every idea I have is the next great idea. She’s exhilarating and full to be around.  When George tries to come up from the basement with his calculator, she can shove him right back down and lock the door.  Yeah, I need a Georgette!

I also decided that this George character, for all his calculating, is often wrong.  And that maybe when he is scared of something, that is a good idea!  George is the world’s worst at shooting down ideas.  When he doesn’t like something, it’s a good chance that it would be a good thing for me to try.  He’s like an opposite compass, he always points south!

So, do you have a George?  What is your George like?  And what about your Georgette?  Have you got one of those?  I think we need to cultivate us some cheerleading Georgettes, don’t you?!

How to Instantly Get More Bookings?

Researchers in California studied how price affects our perception of similar items.  Participants in the study were all given the exact same wine, but told they were different prices.  Low-and-behold participants consistently choose the wine with the higher price tag as their preferred wine!  But it was the exact same stuff!

wine prices affect the taste of the wine

They went a step further and used brain scans during this experiment to find that the area of the brain that is lights up when we feel pleasure relating to taste or odor responded when the participants were told the higher price.  Isn’t that crazy?!  Although people may act like and say that a higher price is “bad” or “painful”…in actuality their brain believed the higher price wine would taste better, and so it responded as if it did taste better.

This is very important to remember as photographers because we often hear that prices are too expensive so believe we should lower our prices.  The truth is that when someone books a cheap photographer, although it might be good for their budget, they are expecting cheap photographs.  It’s ingrained in our brain that cheap = poor quality and expensive = best quality.  By charging a higher price, your photographs suddenly look better and are appreciated more.

Now I am sure there are limits here.  If one wine tasted rancid, I am sure their price points wouldn’t have mattered.  So I still believe you must deliver quality photographs and quality service.  But all things being equal between you and another photographer, customers will believe the higher priced photographer is better.

I have seen this psychology in action.  In a bold move, I raised my prices above all other photographers doing the same thing in my area.  I have to tell you, it was scary!  I was afraid people would not book me because they could easily find other photographers in my city with a cheaper price.  Instead, I found my bookings quickly and suddenly increased!  Not only did I have more customers, but they were awesome customers.  They appreciated my photographs and were not in any way difficult.

I found that when I had lower prices, I got more trouble clients that wanted me to bend over backward to make them happy.  Honestly, it wasn’t their fault… they had an expectation that because my prices were lower that I wasn’t sure in my art.  They felt the need to use pintrest (to an excess) because they weren’t sure if I would be inspired enough to make unique art for them.  They questioned policies and products because I seemed amateur with lower pricing. When my prices went up, my clients no longer questioned me.  They said lovely things like “you choose, you’re the artist!”  I was elevated to the status of artist instead of a commodity.

So, let’s have a little experiment…raise your prices for ONE month and see what happens.   It’s only one month, so don’t freak out!  Does that sound scary? Please share your thoughts below: what makes you scared to raise your prices?  Have you tried it before?  What has been your experience with raising prices?

What Simple Price List Change Can Increase Your Sales Average By 36%?

increase sales by 36%I recently ran some number crunching to see how my sales averages have changed as I changed my price list.  There were some correlations that I expected to see – like as I increased my bottom package, my sales average would also increase.  Those things I expected.  But what I DIDN’T expect is that a tiny recent change to my price list would have such a drastic effect.

So recently I made a change to my price list that I thought made perfect sense.  I wanted to give my clients the option to have a canvas or an album as a large package.  I wanted to make everyone happy and give more options… so I added a 4th package.  Seemed very simple and harmless, right?  I’ve even heard of some photographers recommending 4 packages so that there isn’t a middle package.  In my head, this all made perfect sense and I thought my 4 packages were just beautiful.

3 is the magic numberBut I started to notice that I wasn’t getting the same kinds of sales.  It felt like people were just always going for the lowest package, and I didn’t feel like I suddenly had cheaper clients.  So, I looked to the numbers.  The numbers don’t lie.  And I found that over the course of all my price list changes the ONLY change that made a big different (36%) was going from 3 to 4 packages.  That’s right, by adding in that innocent, harmless 4th package I lost 36% of my average sale.

When I looked back at my price list with this data, it was suddenly clear to me – my customers were confused!  That forth package sent them over the edge and blew their mind with options.  They were so scared and confused, they just went with the lowest package because it seemed the safest.  It most likely wasn’t even the package they really wanted!  Quite the opposite effect than what I expected!

I have quickly corrected my pricing and now I happily have 3 packages 🙂  What about you?  Would slicing off extra packages give you extra money in your pocket?