The Pro Photo Business Forum

However you decide to get the word out that your services as a wedding photographer are available, at some point, the phone is going to ring. If you are a beginning wedding photographer, you should know by now that your camera is not your most important piece of equipment. Make no mistake, your phone is your most important piece of equipment. Your ability to use it correctly will play a great part in your success or failure as both a business owner and wedding photographer.

If you’re just starting out, then I would suggest that you role play first with someone. Practice how you will greet your callers.

First, make a list of every question you can think of that will be asked of you. Make sure you can answer each of these questions without hesitation. If you hesitate in your answers, you may come across as a novice.

Keep in mind that each time you answer the phone you might be seconds away from making the biggest sale you have ever made. Smile before you pick up the phone. Have a pen and paper at the ready. Write down the caller’s name and use the name throughout the conversation.

Make a phone script and constantly change it to perfect your phone skills. Keep track of how many calls you convert into consultations. Only change one thing in your phone script at a time so you can better identify if the changes you have made are working for you.

Let’s go over some questions that might be asked of you and some suggested responses. When someone calls, for the most part, they will always ask one of the following questions:

• Do you have my date available?
• How much are your packages?

It is important to understand why these two questions are asked more than any other question. The people who call and inquire about your wedding photography services have more than likely never shopped for a wedding photographer before now. This means these are really the only two questions they can think of to ask. While you need to give the person calling you the answers to their questions, keep in mind if you answer with a direct response the conversation will be over.

When someone asks if you have their date available, inform the caller that you are looking up their date. While you are looking up their date, tell them you would love to know how they heard about you. Always ask how the caller heard about you and keep records of this information. This will help you to calculate cost per lead.

If the caller asks about their date first, their second question will be about price. It is important to understand that the caller really does want more information than just your price. They want to be educated as to what they can expect. They want to know all the questions they should ask in order to protect themselves and hire the best photographer they can within their budget.

Divert the conversation slightly. Ask a few questions yourself. Can I get your name? How did you hear about us? Can I tell you a bit about our products and services? Have you thought about what you would like as a final product? These are all great intros into a long passionate conversation.

Your goal, however, is to have a face-to-face conversation. Tell them that they really need to come in and see some of your award winning albums in person in order to get a real understanding of what you are all about.

Ask the caller where their wedding and reception are taking place. Have you photographed at either or both of the facilities? If so, tell a story about the last time you photographed at the facility in question. Inform the Bride-To-Be if she and her fiancé would like to come into your studio to further discuss their needs, you will have a slide show presentation ready of the last wedding you photographed at the facility in question.

Give them two or three times that you are available to meet. If you only offer one time, they will either say yes or no.

As you begin to photograph weddings, and begin to start blogging about your experiences, your online presence will gain momentum. This is not enough. The next step is to have other wedding professionals refer your services. This marketing technique can also be found in my e-book “Actions You Can Take to Promote and Protect Your Studio.”

Since we know that couples book their facilities before they book their photographer, make sure to take very flattering images of every reception facility where you find yourself. Make prints of these images, making sure to tastefully include your company name and contact information on the image itself, and then send the images to the facility free of charge. Include an invoice with the images. Show the value of the images on the invoice, and then show a 100% discount. List the reason for the discount as “professional courtesy”.

If the images are of good enough quality, it is possible the facility manager will use your images as a sales tool to reserve couples for their facility. In essence, the facility manager becomes your agent. When you have made your vendor images, be sure to deliver them in person. Use the opportunity to build a professional relationship and contact. Let them meet you face to face. Let them experience your passion and professionalism.

Now that you have this general idea of vendor prints, put it to good use. Send images to the florist. Who made the cake? Who made the dress? Who sold the wedding bands? Send them all images they can advertise with. I’ll bet they would love to show your images.

Do a search on Google for one of Houston wedding facilities, The Courtyard on St. James Place Houston. You will find that my studio, Solaris Studios, is listed as one of the top 10 listings. This is accomplished by including the wedding facilities name in our blog entries, throughout multiple blog entries.

When writing a blog entry about a specific facility you photographed, make sure to include the name of the facility. With any luck, when someone searches for that facility name on Google, your blog and site will appear in the search results. More than likely anyone searching for that facility is also in need of a wedding photographer. You can take this tactic one step further and include the company name of every vendor that participated in the wedding you photographed. Talk about who made the cake. Talk about where your client got her dress. Talk about where they got their rings. Talk about the florist. This may help your blog show up in search results for other search terms other than your own. If you haven’t photographed at a certain facility, but you want to shoot there, write a blog entry about that desire. Write the entry with the knowledge that once you post the entry, people searching for the name of that wedding facility on Google may now see your blog entry come up in their search result.

There is one more thing that you need to consider when writing a blog entry with the intention of including wedding vendors in the entry with the hopes of having your company name show up in search term results. Couples planning a wedding purchase and reserve the services of the wedding vendors they require in a certain order. Understanding this pecking order will make you more efficient.

The first thing a typical couple will reserve when planning their wedding is the location of their ceremony. The second thing they will reserve is the location of their reception. Sometimes the ceremony location and the reception locations are the same.

With their facilities safely reserved, they can then begin to shop for additional vendors. The reason couples do not begin shopping for vendors first, and locations for their wedding second, is because most wedding vendors require a retainer to reserve their services, and in most cases these retainers are nonrefundable.

Whether they know it or not, next on the couple’s shopping list should be the vendors that can only be at one place at one time. The photographer and the band are normally at the top of this list and I would say for most couples the photography is of course more important.

So what does this information tell us? It tells us when we make our blog entries we should always include the names of the facility where we photographed. Of course, we can include the names of the florist and the cake maker in our blog entries, but when it comes to the pecking order of how our clients shop, we know that they are going to normally purchase the flowers and a cake after they have reserved the services of a photographer. This means that you will get very few referrals from florists and cake makers. Your largest source of referrals is going to come from facility managers and catering directors.

If you know the name of the catering director or facility manager, make sure to include the person’s name in the blog entry and make them aware that you have done so. Let them know you are marketing their services. Simply send an email to the catering director with a link to your blog entry.

Happy blogging.

The following tip, and many others, can be found in the free eBook listed on the right column of this site. I hope you find it useful.

As a wedding or event photographer, make sure to take very flattering images of every reception facility that you find yourself in. Make prints of these images, making sure to tastefully include your company name and contact information on the image itself, and then send the images to the facility free of charge. Include an invoice with the images. Show the value of the images on the invoice, and then show a 100% discount. List the reason as “professional courtesy”.

If the images are of good enough quality, then possibly the facility manager will use your images as a sales tool to reserve couples for their facility. The facility manager in essence becomes your agent. When you have made your vendor images, make sure to deliver them in person. Use the opportunity to build a professional relationship and contact. Let them meet you face to face.

Now that you have this general idea of vendor prints, put it to good use. Send images to the florist. Who made the cake? Who made the dress? Who sold the wedding bands? I’ll bet they would love to show your images.

One last thing to keep in mind with vendor prints is the pecking order in which a wedding is planned. A couple will almost always book their ceremony and reception facility first as this solidifies the wedding date. After their facilities have been reserved, the bride and groom will begin to look at vendors that can only be in one place at one time. These include the band, the officiant, and, of course, the photographer.

What does this tell us? It tells us that the most beneficial people to give vendor prints to are the facility managers and the facility catering directors. For me, referrals from cake makers are few and far between.

While photographing an event, make it a point to find the facility manager and introduce yourself. Ask for their business card. When you make an appointment to drop off the images to the facility, try to schedule your meeting with the manager you met. During your meeting, ask if the facility has a preferred vendors list that they hand out to their perspective clients. When you return to the studio, send a thank you card to the manager, thanking them for their time. Direct them to your website so they can see the quality of your work. This will make them more willing to add your company to their preferred vendors list.

The following tip, and many others, can be found in the free eBook listed on the right column of this site. I hope you find it useful.

Can you imagine the nightmare of double booking the same date? While this is a very obvious problem to avoid, what is important is to understand how this can happen, and more importantly how to avoid it.

Perhaps it’s late because your prospect couldn’t meet until after they got off work. At the conclusion of your consultation your clients reserve the date. You create a contract, collect your retainer and have the contract signed by all parties. You’re tired and fail to place the date as booked in your calendar, or the date gets erased from your calendar.

This can happen for a variety of reasons: human error, a computer crash, a malicious employee, or more.

Another couple comes along inquiring about the same date. You check your calendar and see that the date is still open. The couple comes into the studio and books the date.

This time you successfully place the date into your calendar.

The date of the wedding soon arrives. You show up at the second couple’s wedding and receive a phone call on your cell. It’s the first couple wanting to know where you are! Not only will you more than likely be sued by the first couple, you will be so off your game at the event you are covering, you will probably produce less than professional results.

While this situation is very unlikely to happen, it is your responsibility as the owner of your studio to make sure that it doesn’t happen.

To prevent this disaster, keep all of your open contracts in a safe. Every month, on the first of the month, pull them out and compare them to the booked dates on your calendar. If you come across a contract that has no correlating reserved date on your calendar, you have just prevented yourself from a possible double booking.

Now, do this process in reverse. Check your calendar, and look at each weekend for a booked date. For each booked date you find, make sure you can locate a signed contract that correlates to the date. This will prevent you from booking a wedding and marking down the wrong date in your calendar. It also ensures you have possession of all your active contracts.

Each day we clean the studio. All the lights are put up, and the cords wound and put in their places. The cameras are placed in the safe. Our presentation room is cleaned.

This way, when our first session of the day comes in, we start fresh. The selected background is rolled out for just that client. The lights are put out for just that client. The camera is assembled for just that client.

It may not be the most efficient way of doing things, but for that customer, we are providing custom customer service.

Lucky you. You’ve received an inquiry about your wedding photography services. Nice!

You immediately reply back via email… only to be greeted by the sound of crickets. A day later you reply again, and still nothing. One more time? Sure. Why not.

At some point though, you’re going to draw the line and give up on that lead. You walk away scratching your head wondering where you went wrong.

But wait! Don’t through that lead away. Why not refer the lead to your friends? You do have friends in your area that shoot wedding also don’t you? Why not refer that lead to your friends? They may have better luck, and refer you back in turn.

You photograph a portrait session.  You sit down to review your work so they can make their selections.  The couple selects their favorite image, and leaves the rest.

“We really like all of them.  Can we just order this one for now and come back to you to order more?  How long will you hold our images for?”

Sound familiar?  Of course you make the sale of the one image, and you try to sell additional images, but there are times when it just doesn’t happen.

“I understand.  You would like to come back and order the other images you marked as your favorite at a later date.  Please understand, our policy is to only archive the images our clients order from.  There is no need for us to store images that no one wants.

Each week we continue to photograph more and more clients, and as we do we must make room on our server for those newly created images.  Out with the old, in with the new.  More than likely, at our current rate of production, we will have to remove your images in about xyz weeks time.  Would you like us to contact you a day or two before we have to remove your images from our server?”

“Yes.  Please please contact me.”

“Not a problem.  I would be happy to do so.  In fact, why don’t I go ahead and program an email to go out about four days before we anticipate having to remove your un-purchased portraits.  Would that be OK?”

On a bit of a different note.  Would you like a free eBook?

By Aric C. Hoek, owner and creator of Ten Houston Wedding Photographers

Many fledgling photographers out there often ask if they really need to have a blog, so I can only imagine what they would say to having a monthly newsletter. But the fact is, if you want to convert your past clients into repeat clients, then a newsletter is your first step.

Start your photography business out on the right foot. Add every client you have to your mailing list.

Here are some ideas of things you can put in your newslettert.

1. Offer a free family portrait session to the first ten people who contact you.
2. Show examples of an executive portrait you just completed.
3. Make a special on wedding album sales for people who did not purchase a wedding album.  Do you think you can sell a wedding album with a single email?  If you have a large mailing list, you may be able to sell more than one if you use the right language in your newsletter.
4. Create three annual family portrait specials, each in a different quarter.  Portraits in the park, beach, Mother’s Day.
5. Announce efforts you have done with a local charity.
6. Post an image from your last bridal, engagement, or family portrait session.  Talk about them in detail and educate people as to why it is a good image.
7. Create a photographic tour of your studio.
8. Have you acquired any new photographic equipment?

A newsletter reminds past clients that you are still out there.  While you may be extremely passionate about your photography and craft, the truth is they have already forgotten about you.  Your past clients are just as passionate about their own craft and have little time for anything else.  More than likely, they are not thinking about you.

Start a newsletter today.  Right now! I use Mail Chimp, and it’s FREE.

By the end of the day today, create a newsletter and contact your old clients and let them know you are thriving.  Provide links for them to refer you to their friends.  You’ll be pleasantly surprised what you can accomplish with a well constructed news letter.

You might even want to start a separate newsletter just to communicate with the other wedding vendors in your area.  Tell them about the continuing education you are doing.  Share vendor shots that you have recently taken.  Share links to entries in your blog that feature a certain vendor.

A newsletter can be a powerful tool, or, you can just go about your business trying to generate all new clients each and every month and forget about your past happy clients.

Your call.

By Aric C. Hoek, owner and creator of Ten Houston Wedding Photographers