The business side of photography
When a customer directly or indirectly tells a photographer that their price is too high, the photographer has to understand why the customer is saying this.
Sometimes a customer will say that the photographer’s price is too high when, in reality, the customer is undecided or confused about the offer. It’s easier to say, “it’s too expensive” than “I’m not sure how I can benefit from your photography.”
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Charles Mortimer was the CEO of the former General Foods from 1954 to 1965. During this time he doubled the company’s sales and tripled its earnings. Mortimer’s background was in marketing. He was once quoted as saying:
The surest way to over-spend on advertising is not to spend enough to do a job properly. It’s like buying a ticket three-quarters of the way to Europe; you have spent some money, but you do not arrive.
If you replace the word “advertising” with “professional photography”, the saying would still hold true.
When a company seeks the lowest cost corporate photography, that company is shooting itself in the foot, or more accurately, in the wallet. When spending on photography for business marketing, it’s not what you pay that’s important but rather it’s what you get.
Cutting corners and paying just enough to get ineffective or low quality business photography is a form of overspending because you’ve bought a ticket to nowhere.
If a job is worth doing then get someone to do it properly. – anonymous
Pictures interest people more than text.
People get information faster from pictures than text.
People can get more information from pictures than text.
People understand pictures better than text.
Pictures have greater emotional impact than text.
People trust pictures more than text.
Pictures have more credibility than text.
Emotional impact + trust + credibility => pictures influence people more than text.
People remember pictures more than text.
So what should your company use for your marketing, more pictures or more text?
Everyone wants to save money. Presumably that’s why some companies use cheap stock pictures on their web sites. But using such pictures is counter-productive. Cheap stock pictures actually push customers away.
By design, cheap stock pictures target the lowest common denominator. This means the pictures are bland, generic and very simple to understand, just like the pictures in a children’s book.
A 1988 University of Texas study, “Effects of Color and Complexity in Still Photographs on Mental Effort and Memory”, showed that: (i) viewers pay more attention to complex photos; (ii) complex images are processed by the viewer just as easily as simple ones; and (iii) viewers remember complex pictures more than simple pictures.
This means that using cheap stock pictures serves no purpose other than to save money. But spending any money for something that delivers nothing is actually a waste of money.
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In his 2011 book, Moonwalking with Einstein, science writer Joshua Foer describes how someone can increase their memory. He learned of a technique while covering a national memory competition. The following year, Foer won that same competition using this very technique.
To improve one’s memory, Foer learned that one has to associate an image with the information that needs to be remembered. The more memorable that image, the better the chance of remembering. It’s possible that Allan Paivio’s Dual Coding Theory (visual explanation here ;-) ) might help explain this.
Alexandra Horowitz, a PhD in cognitive science who teaches psychology at Barnard College in the US, wrote, “… a simple fact of human cognition: we naturally remember visual images. … The less banal, the better. Quotidian scenes are forgettable. What snags the cells of our brains are disgusting, bizarre and novel images.”
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There’s a quote attributed to French author Antoine de Saint-Exupery that, roughly translated, says:
When you want to build a ship, don’t start by gathering wood, cutting boards and distributing the work, but awaken in men a desire for the vast and endless sea.
A similar philosophy could apply to photographers who seek quality customers. Instead of passively accepting any customer at any price level, it may be better to first teach customers to understand and appreciate the benefits of quality photography. Educated customers will expect more and pay more.
There are four types of customers:
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Over the past two years, I’ve noticed that many professional photographers have abandoned their blogs in favour of using Twitter. While Twitter may be more fun, more immediate, and faster and easier to do, it makes little business sense for a commercial or corporate photographer.
While there’s nothing wrong with using Twitter for personal activities or in conjunction with a blog, it doesn’t seem to benefit a professional photographer enough to warrant leaving their blog behind.
Unlike Twitter, a photographer’s blog has (or should have) more thought invested, is better indexed by search engines, holds long lasting value, is a deeper source of information and is much better at building trust and credibility.
When a company is deciding on which corporate photographer to hire, do you think they’re influenced more by a blog post or a bunch of tweets? Which better enhances a photographer’s reputation, a blog post or a few tweets?
For a professional photographer, the marketing value of a blog (aka content marketing) is huge compared to Twitter because of a blog’s capability for search engine optimization. A blog can be worth many thousands of dollars per month to a commercial photographer.
Although having said all that, as more photographers abandon blogging, the better it gets for those who stay with it.
