How Your Photography Studio Can Stand Out in The Marketplace
By Robert Provencher
There are five ways to stand out in the marketplace:
1-Price 2- Product 3-Process 4-Service 5-Marketing
Let's look at these areas:
Price. If you compete on price you are asking for heartache
and headaches. I guarantee it. Charge what YOU WANT, and find ways to justify
it. Never stay stuck in the price war competition. It is very frustrating.
I talk to many photographers who stay stuck and fail to work on other areas
to strengthen. I believe it often is a sign of deeper problems and self-image.
I am not suggesting avoiding competing on price altogether, but it certainly
is a prime focus for too many. Your pricing is a factor, no doubt, but to
make it the primary or only strategy is plain dumb. Likewise, don't go charging
fees and prices that don't reflect the work you deliver. There is a fine
balance. A marketing guru once said that a person's pricing is based on
his or her ability to sell that service. Your ability to sell and stand
behind your service, and charge a price that is good value and profitable
for you, is a huge factor is standing above the rest.
Product. I've always felt that if you can make people
look good and create great photos, people will tolerate just about kind
of abuse or otherwise appalling behavior that would never be tolerated in
other industries. They tolerate it because in the end you are making them
look great, and ultimately their egos and pride rule. If you are a great
photographer why not be a great marketer too? And a good person.
You will only have everything to gain by it and if you treat people badly,
in time you are bound to pay a price. How exactly? Who knows? But why be a
jerk? Likewise if you take okay photographs it will help you immensely by
being a memorable person. I know average photographers who earn good money
and get a ton of business largely because they are likeable. This factor really
helps in this business. If you take okay photographs you should be personable
and likeable, and you should create a lot of excitement with your marketing
and innovativeness.
Having said that, why not shoot for the moon. Be an awesome person to be
around and deliver awesome photographs! Your core product and the person you
and your staff are around clients will help you stand way above the crowd.
Process. When you create systems that work, you become efficient.
Create a system (many won't, so you get the conmpetitive advantage for not
being lazy), and do not take away from the system by letting employees change
it or use their own discretion. A finely tuned operation will impress clients
and you will stand out. Think McDonalds. Bing! Fries are done. Clean the washrooms.
Get the burgers moving fast. They dominate in the fast food world because,
well, they are FAST. Burger King makes a better burger with their flame broiling,
but people want fast. And clean. Go to any Mc Donald's, then go to Burger
King. See the efficiency? See the chaos at BK? Check out their washrooms.
Just not quit that clean. These and other things are all part of a system.
Create one for your studio, from answering the phone, to booking sessions.
Write it out, and discuss it with your partners and staff. Routinely. Don't
let this become a loose cannon. When you loose power because of lack of a
systematic approach, it will show in many ways to your clients. They will
notice, even the little dust bunnies.
Service. There is ample opportunity for every business to
become excellent in the area of service. It's vital to create standards, and
stick to them consistently. Use a process for the delivery of great service.
One key area is training, and training staff often. They need weekly reminders
of every aspect that you want great service to be delivered. Most business's
suffer from apathy in this area, so if you decide to be unusual, and offer
great service, you will stand out big time.
Marketing. Let's look at this one.Without a doubt the biggest
marketing sin is being boring. You can have the greatest ad-writing skills
in the world but if your offers are boring you'll likely stumble and fail.
You can have the greatest photographic talent in the world but if your offers,
copy and promotions are boring you're doomed. Being boring in any way shape
or form is considered marketing suicide.
Maybe that's why so business's fail. Simply because they use boring, run-of-the-mill,
seen-it-a-million-times, looks-like-everything-else out there marketing. I
have no doubt that this is true and it is so often ignored by so many business's
it actually creates opportunity for those of us who decide to do something
about it.
But first, let's look at the obvious question: Why do we fall into the habit
of creating marketing suicide with boring promotions, boring ads, boring offers,
boring copy etc...in the first place....? Simple. We are human beings. We
like to copy each other and copy others who we think are successful. We take
on the "monkey-see monkey-do" way of thinking.
It probably has something to do with peer pressure and other social conditionings,
fear of trying something new or radical, fear of ridicule....whatever it is,
the pressure is great. There are probably many reasons and ways of explaining
it, and since humans are basically lazy (path of least resistance) it only
compounds the problem. This is a behavior that makes no exception.
It applies equally to all industries and is so common it can be considered
the true cause of failure. It's what I like to call cannibalism.You see it
everywhere. Everyone starts doing what everyone else is doing and we all start
looking alike.
What this ultimately amounts to is suicide because the marketing that results
from cannibalism is so boring it has virtually no effect on that target group
that we are trying to get into our studios. Okay, so why don't we simply take
the opposite approach and copy the successful models such as Starbucks and
The Body Shop to name only a few. The rules they play by are simple, but they
did something amazingly simple that we too can us in our own business.
They didn't look at what all the other business's in their industry are doing
and duplicate. They didn't go to a coffee convention and notice what all the
other coffee places were doing so they could use those same old and tired
ideas. Did they?
As a matter of fact they did the opposite. They simply innovated
new and exciting ways to sell their boring coffee and boring soap products.
Think about it. They succeed, many fail. Look any other industry.
Pick any and you'll see the same behaviors over and over.
Strive to find your own voice and your own message. I know
we are all selling the same commodity with our own style of shooting as the
only way to differentiating from one another, but if we avoid cannibalism
by not copying what all the other photographers are doing and by doing something
totally different, totally outrageous (yes, going through the phone book and
calling people cold is considered outrageous in my books...could you do it??).
I'm not suggesting that we use that as a marketing strategy but as a source
of inspiration, a guide post, a virtue, ultimately asking ourselves: do I
have the guts, determination, discipline and willingness to stand above the
crowd and not look like everyone else in my field? So how do we do this? Where
do we start?
Simple, take the basics and work from there. Your offers and packages in
all your services should be exciting. Never boring. Start with your basic
menu of services. If you are a "a la carte" photo studio then get off your
high horse and create packages, at different levels.
Thinking is hard work so make it real easy for clients to understand what
it is you are offering them. And please, don't forget the golden rule: make
all your offers speak in terms of how they will benefit the client
(not an ego massage for you).
Look at everything your studio stands for. Is it unique? What areas can you
improve? How about your personality? Your shooting style? Your skills? The
studio smells? Your staff? Attitudes? Everything is a potential area for improvement
and could be polished with that extra sparkle that you could call your own,
not a copy of what you saw at the convention last month.
Inject big and small ideas. Infuse personality into all your marketing,
your personality.
Why do you think Wendy's used Dave Thomas in their ads? Simple, sales went
down when they stopped using him. He was a lovable, believable human being.
Like a warm, fuzzy uncle kinda guy, right? Not a cold, corporate and sterile
message like most ads out there.
When you stop being a cannibal and stop feeding the same message over and
over you start the right path to marketing.
You won't find the answer in any textbook. However you can follow guidelines.
The biggest job you have in your studio is that of being a marketer. A strategist
first and foremost. Your life depends it and your business too. It is the
only way to not becoming a cannibal.
I was once asked if location was important for the photographer. If it was
"the key". My answer was and is that location is a very, very small
factor, unless you are building a franchise mall-type studio and plan to expand
it. This type of store depends on location to a much larger degree.
If you focus on location and make it a primary strategy without making process',
service and marketing your main focus, you are creating a very weak plan.
Be grounded, realistic and focused on what is important and deserving of your
attention and efforts. Your success depends on it.
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