“We don’t hire you because of your beautiful, wonderful, terrific photographs,” says corporate communications director Greg Thompson. He goes on to explain that a company will hire a corporate photographer to be the “solution to their business problem.”
In a video interview by journalist Stanley Leary, Thompson offers some advice for photographers who are trying to transition from photojournalism to corporate photography.
“It’s about how you do the job, not the job you do.”
Video here on Vimeo.
If a customer needs a package to be delivered from point A to point B, they don’t care whether the courier* is talented enough to ride an odd-looking bicycle or not. The only value to the customer is the ability to deliver the package on time. The customer won’t pay more for a fancy set of wheels or any extra cycling skills because these have no value to the customer.
No matter how talented you think you are or how many awards you may have won, it’s the customer who determines the value of your photography. The customer’s perception is your reality. Unwanted value isn’t any value at all.
If customers aren’t buying what a photographer is selling, then that photographer needs to change the way they talk about their services. Somehow, the photographer has to increase the perceived value of their work. The best path for this starts with the photographer understanding their clients’ marketing needs.
(Unfortunately) no business ever says, “Let’s spend some money on photography today!” Instead, that company has to realize it has a problem and that photography is the answer.
The photographer’s own marketing job is to sell problems. Make potential clients aware that they have a problem.
And then…
The photographer has to be the solution.
For example:
There’s no point for a photographer to say, “I do great business pictures, hire me!”, if no clients are asking, “Hey, we need business photography, who should we hire?” The photographer is the answer to a question no one is asking.
But if the photographer points out:
• Not getting attention? A photograph with a print ad increases readership of that ad by 300%;
• Not standing out? Lack of credibility? No sociability with customers? Using real employee pictures on a web site makes a stronger first impression and can triple business credibility compared to using stock pictures of anonymous people;
• Low online sales? Good product photography on a web site can quadruple sales compared to low-quality pictures or no pictures at all. Bigger pictures sell more product;
• Keep reader interest and enhance brand image? Lifestyle pictures are best for creating an attitude, supporting a brand and creating interest, but not necessarily for selling product,
then perhaps a business will realize they have a problem which needs a photographic answer.
Sell problems first and then be the solution to that problem.
––
*The person in the photo isn’t a courier but a commuter in downtown Toronto.
A dozen art directors, creative directors and photo editors were commenting on what they want in a photographer’s web site. Here’s their agreed-upon list, in order, of the minimum requirements in a photographer’s web site:
1. No music.
2. No Flash.
3. Do not open any new browser windows. Do not resize or change any windows.
4. Quick to load.
5. Easy to navigate.
6. Easy-to-find contact information.
7. Great pictures.
Certainly, everyone’s tastes and expectations are different, but note that most of the above points deal with technical aspects. Having the best pictures in the world means little, if viewers have to struggle with your web site to see them.
Photographers, how does your web site measure up?
The British Photographic Council released their 56-page 2010 photographers’ survey based on information collected from 1,698 professional photographers. The 2010 survey uses data from the photographers’ 2009 business year.
The survey confirms that photographers who keep the copyright to their work earn more than those who don’t license their work. ‘Nuff said.
Some photographer comments are included in the survey:
Photography has become one of the largest, if not the largest, single want-to-have job in the UK. Anyone and everyone now feels they can be a photographer and do what they want in terms of price, copyright, deception, etc.
Colleges often produce students with no knowledge of business practice, least of all, how to cost out a job to make a profit to live and pay the rent!
The cost of entry is minimal these days, and yet some of the newcomers, especially in the social/event and wedding market, are not professionals, just keen amateurs who read one of the multitude of monthly magazines and think that because they have read the article they can go out and do the job!
The industry as a whole is over-subscribed, too many good photographers chasing too little quality work, and undermined by amateurs or semi-pro’s working cheap and producing little more than snaps.
What’s missing from this survey are questions such as:
• How do you market your business? How do customers find your business?
• Have Facebook or Twitter been beneficial to your business?
• What percentage of customers are repeat clients?
• Do you try to upsell a client? If yes, what’s the most effective way?
• Do you offer lower cost, lower production-valued version of your work? (Example: Instead of an $800, multi-lit, studio-quality business portrait, you offer a $250 available light portrait with no online proofing, minimal post production and e-mail delivery.)
Or, have you lowered production values in general so as to meet customers’ expectation of lower prices?
Or, have you increased production values so as to set yourself apart from the others and to better justify your fees?
• What would you do differently if you were starting your photography business today?
Photographers in Ontario and British Columbia (B.C.) know that their new Harmonized Sales Tax (HST) kicks in on July 1. The HST is called the “value-added tax” which sounds like a fast-food combo meal: for just a dollar more, you can up-size your tax to our new value-added tax.
Federal government page for the HST has lots of (confusing) information.
The HST will benefit businesses and government. Gee, who got left out? The consumer. Business will save billions of dollars annually; government will earn billions more in taxes; consumers will pay billions more each year. See any kind of pattern here?
In theory, businesses will reinvest all their savings, create zillions of new jobs, and then consumers will enjoy new-found prosperity. Of course, this prosperity isn’t exactly around the corner. It’s estimated to be about 10 to 16 years away.
The place of supply rules change for intangible property. A digital photo that’s delivered by e-mail or FTP to a client is considered intangible property. The new rule is that applicable sales tax will be based on the location of the customer and not the location of the photographer’s business, but there may be exceptions.
The old rule was that a photographer did not have to collect the provincial sales tax (PST) of another province unless that photographer carried on business in that other province, (i.e. had a office in that other province). Although, most provinces did want out-of-province businesses to voluntarily register and collect their PST. Otherwise, the onus was on the customer to declare an out-of-province purchase and then voluntarily pay the appropriate PST, (yeah, right).
The new rule means that if a photographer in Toronto Ontario licenses a picture to a B.C. client, the Toronto photographer would charge the B.C. rate of HST. If the client is in Prince Edward Island, the Toronto photographer charges GST only, (huh?)
Now let’s see if we can confuse you. (There are probably exceptions to everything and remember, I’m not an accountant so this may all be wrong).
• If you’re in an HST province and you sell to another HST province, you charge the customer at their rate of HST.
• If you’re in an HST province and you sell to an non-HST province, you charge only GST.
• If you’re in a non-HST province and you sell to an HST province, you charge the customer at their rate of HST.
• If you’re in a non-HST province and you sell to a non-HST province, you charge only GST.
• If you sell to a client outside of Canada, there’s usually no tax, but there might be exceptions.
• If you perform all of the photography services outside of Canada, there’s no taxes.
There are several other scenarios than those mentioned above, such as performing photography services in another province or doing an assignment in multiple provinces. Good luck figuring it out.
Remember that the Nova Scotia rate of HST increases from 13% to 15% on July 1, so send Nova Scotians your sympathies.
Finally, a moment of silence for those in Prince Edward Island. It may be the smallest province but it has the highest sales taxes in the country. They pay 10% PST on top of the 5% GST. Yes, they pay tax on a tax.
Two weeks ago, Danish medium format camera company Phase One bought digital asset management software Expression Media from Microsoft. If you can recall, exactly four years ago, Microsoft bought the software, (then called iView MediaPro), from British software company iView Multimedia.
Now here’s the good part:
• If you own Expression Media 2, Phase One will give you Capture One 5 (but not the Pro version).
• If you have Capture One, you get a free copy of Expression Media 2.
• If you own an old copy of iView Media or iView MediaPro, you get Expression Media 2. It says the offer is good for any previous version, but the application form asks for a serial number format that applies only to iView Media(Pro) 3.
This offer ends June 30, 2010.
A cynic might think that since they’re giving away two-year old Expression Media 2, then a new version is coming soon. Nevertheless, they say it’s not wise to look a gift horse in the mouth.
Advertising either works or it doesn’t, there’s no middle ground. If an ad is going to work, it will work right away. To know whether an ad is working, it must be measurable. If results can’t be measured then the ad is a waste of time and money.
I’ve been using Google Adwords for just over three months and the results, so far, are:
• the ads are served up about 2,300 times per month
• click-through rate is about 1% (21 to 25 clicks per month)
• number of actual inquiries is 10% of the click-throughs (about 2 or 3 per month)
• number of paying jobs is 0
My editorial and corporate photography is only business-to-business, so I fully-expected a low number of click-throughs. If I was a wedding or portrait photographer, I would undoubtedly receive more clicks because those are the most-searched types of photography. If my ads used the magic word “Free!”, then I would probably get more clicks.
For many photographers, including myself, the average response rate for mailers and e-mail marketing is often in the 3% to 5% range. So the response rate to my Adwords campaign isn’t too far off from these others types of marketing.
As for the number of actual inquiries received, this is dependent on the quality of my web site. As most web site owners know, a site is never really ever finished. It’s always a work in progress. My site is no different and I’m planning changes to the text. While everyone likes to look at nice photos, and despite the saying that a picture is worth a thousand words, it’s the text on a web site that does the actual selling.
The inquiries I’ve received have included:
• family portraits and pictures of (wannabe) rock bands. (Neither the type of photography I do);
• 10-day job for a clothing manufacturer. ($8400 quote but their budget was $3000);
• 12 business portraits. ($2,300 quote but their budget was about $500);
• individual business portraits. (Standard $460 quote but one potential customer was “hoping for something in the $75 range”).
I think many folks who respond to Adwords are shopping price first and foremost. It’s just the nature of the medium.
Except for one, all the inquiries I received started with, “How much does it cost for…”. The one exception started with, “Can I have more information on how you photograph…”.
Requests for photography that come through my web site after a general search and not through Adwords, usually start with something like, “Are you available for…” , “Are you interested in…”, “Can you photograph…”
For wedding or portrait photographers, these cheap Adwords-type of advertising might be somewhat worthwhile but it would never be a major form of marketing.
For an editorial photographer, corporate photographer, public relations photographer or other business-to-business photography service, I doubt that this is a worthwhile form of advertising. It may bring in a couple of jobs per year, and maybe that makes it worthwhile?
Does cheap advertising bring in cheap results? Or to rephrase, do you have to spend money to make money?
Yesterday, the Canadian government announced proposed changes to its Copyright Act. While it contains many changes for music, video, performers, schools and libraries, it also has a some important changes that will affect photographers.
(Usual disclaimer: I’m not a lawyer, so don’t believe anything after this).
1) Bill C-32, the Copyright Modernization Act, proposes to repeal Section 10 of the existing Copyright Act. This will mean that the person who takes the picture will be the Author of that photo. Sounds obvious, right? Under current law, the party that owns the film or memory card used to take the picture is the Author.
“Author” is an important legal term because: (a) only the Author gets Moral Rights; and (b) the default position is that the Author owns copyright, unless proven otherwise (more on this in section 2, below).
Note: this will also mean that if you ask someone to take a picture for you, that person will own the copyright to that picture. For example, say you go to Niagara Falls, hand someone your camera, and ask them to take your picture in front of the Falls. That person will own the copyright to the picture but you will have the right to use the picture for personal use only, (more on this in section 6, below).
Also, if you have an assistant operate a remote camera, that assistant will own the copyright, unless you have a contract to the contrary.
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