Loaded with marketing tips, success secrets, spelling mistakes,
'cuss words, odd-ball ideas and the occasional insult.
For the professional portrait and wedding photographer
January 2007
The Profitable Studio Newsletter
************************************
HOME
| "It takes 20 years to make an overnight success." |
What's the best thing you can do
for your photography
business RIGHT NOW?
Read this newsletter in its' entirety.
**************
Newsie bits
**************
Greetings everyone. Welcome to the new year. How was your last year? Was it a good year? Did you meet your goals? Did you meet all your expectations. Did you achieve all the things you wanted to achieve? Was it a so-so year?
As usual, at the beginning of each and every year, I like to sit down and do my goals. I even get my family involved and my 11 year old daughter is starting to "get it."
It's also a great time to look back at what you accomplished in the previous year. Success can be a weird thing. It can frustrate us to no end and at the same time intoxicate us. Sometimes to the point where we become less than what we were meant to be.
If you had a good year, congrats! Be warned however not to take anything for granted and don't let your guard down. One of the biggest and most common mistakes people make when they achieve some success is they take it for granted, or in some other twisted way let it go to their heads. They "rest on their laurels."
Most boating accidents happen when arriving to port. Do you know why this is? I've heard it said that most accidents happen because the crew and Captain will momentarily let their guard down. They assume they've made it home, all is well for that brief moment. Their guard is down. And they ignore the dangers that lurk.
It's true with our photography businesses. If you've had a good year. Great. Look at the things that you've done and do more of that. Don't make the mistake of assuming success will always be there for you. There is a graveyard of broken dreams, and people who crashed and burned after having an instant flash with success. Think of all the movie stars and musicians. The one-hit wonders. Longevity eludes so many. Success is not your birthright. You need to keep the ball rolling.
The people who made it thought they were famous for life, but by next year they were yesterdays has-been. Oftentimes, what happens is they assume that success will be there forever. This is a fatal and deadly error, and you must not let it happen in your own studio. Take nothing for granted and if and when you succeed, savour it. But don't let it go to your head. In reality it becomes a huge responsibility.
Likewise if we had a bad year. If things didn't work out the way we wanted them to, we can whine and complain, or be big about it and treat every experience as part of our learning and growing journey. Never ever say : "if only". NO regrets, only lessons. Always say: "next time."
School is never out, no matter where you are at. We are constantly learning and growing. The danger happens when you become your own worst enemy and think that you made it. Photographers are notorious for this. It's called ego. We cannot chance anything anymore, since the "magic", the "wizard" and the "genie" is out of the bottle. This applies moreso now than ever, since digital cameras are proliferating the landscape and have made photography accesible and easy or EVERYONE. So we need to keep on top and offer something that the avrage Joe can't offer- be it in our innovative packaging and/or astonishing portraits.
If you are just starting out, or recently new to the game, or an old pro like me, you are always a student. Student of photography, business, marketing or personal development. Never wait for INSPIRATION. Act, and it will come. Never assume success will be your best friend forever. It's a fickle friend. It likes attention. It brings more friends if you treat it right.
On that note, here's the goal setting forms from last
November's Inferno Workshop where I had everyone fill out there own
goals and dreams. Now it's your chance to start the new year off with
a clear, vivid and personal vision. Your chance to act:
GOALS WORKBOOK DOWNLOAD
You can't get to where you're going unless you know where you wanna go!
**********************************
Are you going to the Annual
Professional Photographers of Ohio Convention in March 2007?
Are you a wedding photographer? Do you want to hear some very revealing
information on a step-by-step system for creating outstanding wedding
photographs that brides love and will beat a path to your door, eager
to book you out? If so, come out and hear James Hodgins and myself
in a very revealing presentation on Sunday, March 4th, 2007,
at 5:00PM.
The first 150 people in the room will receive a valuable GIFT CD worth a bucket full of money. Sponsored by Bay Photo Lab
**************************
Please, buy my book. I need money for clothes......
"EXPOSED: The
Naked, Uncensored Truth to Running a Successful Photography Business"
it ready! You can order the book by going here.
I will post more details on soon (when I squeeze in the time!). It's
only $19.95 + $2.95 shipping, 170 pages
Recent email I received: "Rob, your book arrived here recently,
and I am impressed!I'm only in ch. 2, but I already have several things
underlined. Also, the quality of the book itself surprised me. I expected
something less, but see that it is a REAL, bound book. How cool!Thanks
for sending it. I know I'll enjoy it. -Tracy
p.s. Oh, I drew some shorts on you. I do have a family, you know.
:-)"
*****************************************
"The more we live by our intellect, the less we understand
the meaning of life."
~Leo Tolstoy~
Here's a few samples from recent shoots:
Not many sessions this month. Time to recharge...keep
reading....
HERE'S A FEW IMAGES FROM MY TRIP TO BARBADOS AND
OUR SAILING EXCURSION ON THE ROYAL
CLIPPER:
Bonus for us: When our travel agent saw that slide
show, she showed it to the national head office people and they
requested a version they could use for their website. SURE! No probs.
I will make sure to back link to my studio with the proper search
terms embedded. We all win!
I really hoped for an all expense paid cruise :)
SLIDE
SHOW HERE
Check it out here
******************************
Photography Marketing Strategies
******************************
Using Video for clients. Tina and I have
been planning out a strategy for using videos as marketing tools for
our photography studio. It's time. Videos can be very effective in many
ways. We plan on creating vids to help educate and inspire clients and
prospects a like. Topics such as "Your our studio", "What
to wear when planning for you session", and "Is a wall portrait
right for me." We have this information that we already been using
for years and years. We se it live in the studio all the time, why not
make it more accesible via email and the web?
Some vids will be easily accesible right off the website, others will
be available by email request (autoresponder).
*********
PROMO CARDS:
Referral cards.
Here's another cool idea we're implementing. Customized cards that clients
receive when they pick up their order. It's a referral card, of sorts.
We give them out to clients who we want more of just like them. Birds
of a feather.
******************************************************
Want to learn how to market to and photograph babies
and children?
Earn as much as $75,000.00 a year or more with my online, instant download
program.
See
details here.
"I can teach anybody how to get what they want out of
life.
The problem is that I can't find anybody who can tell me what
they want."
~Mark Twain~
***************
Success Corner
***************
This month, an email from Ski.....
"Hi, Rob... I have spent a great deal of time redesigning my web site (using yours as a model) and I have a couple of questions for you.
1. I posted a question about whether
or not I should put my pricing on my site. Several No BS members responded
by saying that this is a good idea because it pre-qualifies people (so
the $8.98 Wal-Mart people don't waste my time). one of the No BS members
suggested that I only place prices for 11x14 and lower on my site.What
do you think about this?
2. This same person told me that I should have testamonials on my home page. I disagree...I have a page for that. Unashamedly, I have modeled my site after yours. I value your opinion.Thanks! Ski"
Well, you ask 100 people, you get 100 answers. thats one of the downsides of forums. too many opinions and where togo? Sometimes you just gotta do what u think is right. work it and it works, as they say. there are no hard fast rules. I believe it far more important to have goals, a plan and ACTION. that matters more than anything. that aside. prices are ok, but the way i do it is strictly be email. they need to send an email for them. but better yet, work on getting well positioned in the marketplace, so when your name comes up, the "brand" that is your studio is "quality". and quality costs.
Rob
"Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. Security
does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole
experience it.
Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than exposure."
~Helen Keller~
***************
Testimonials
***************
I posted a lighting tutorial on glamor
style lighting that I recently created for a couple young ladies. This
is the kind of stuff I would create in the studio if I were shooting
senior photography, as the basis for some "standard" type
poses. Note that these are regular, everyday clients. Here's a few samples
from that post and following is an email I received from one on the
members over at No Bs Photo Success.
If you want to check out a photography forum like none other, now's
the time.
"Rob, those new lighting vids with the "plain Janes"
/ normal young ladies!! are fabulous. Millions of ideas flow from them
as well as the lighting. Thanks for them. Those backdrops - used to
paint them with a roller in the early eighties too! That mirror flexible
material - did I hear right that you called it Flexi or Plexi Mirror.
Must look around here in Perth for some. Never thought of that. Thanks
again, DavidA"
GURU CORNER:
Sometimes he's too weird for the masses to be called a guru,
but Robin Spencer is definitely one of the sharpest tools in the
shed:
From Robin Spencer:
"I love to see a business with a unique idea. On a
recent trip, my wife and I hit some craft markets to pick up a few
souvenirs, I mean you just can't have enough coconuts carved to
look like a monkey head right?
Within a few minutes I quickly realized that most of the booths
sold basically the same stuff, same leather items, same wood items
and the same pottery. You only had to visit about 4 booths
and see all of the products available in the entire market. It didn't
matter if the market had 20 or 40 booths or the huge market in Havana
with 300 booths they all had basically the same items available
at each booth.
So when you wanted to buy something it would all come down to who
had the cheapest price, all prices were negotiable. People would
look over the items then walk to the next booth hoping to find the
same item a couple of pesos cheaper.
My wife discovered one guy who sold the same stuff as everyone else,
but for no extra cost he would take a red hot makeshift soldering
iron and write anything on any wood or leather item.
Might be your name and the year, or the name of the person getting
the gift, whatever you wanted. But he was personalizing each item
free of charge. Didn't cost him a cent to do it, he had nice penmanship
and was quick, only took a few seconds.
He actually had people lining up to buy his "personalized"
items. I stood there a little while stunned by the simplicity of
his marketing idea, noticing that not one person tried to barter
a better price.
Robin Spencer"
My REPLY......Robin, funny you should mention that. Recently I was in Martinique and had the same experience. When I hit the souvenir shops it's my same observation. It seems customization as a way of offering something unique and inovative from the rest is a key strategy, and anyone anywhere can take advantage of it, especially in our photography business.
Why don't most people "GET" this???? Why? I don't know, but in it there is a powerful tool for us to take advantage of. Oh, it does take some willingness to be bold, different, consistent, innovative, disciplined and somewhat visionary......:)
Anyhoo, here's a pic I took of a guy
who sold personalyzed bracelets for little girls and such. My daughter
bought 5 pieces from this guy for her friends back home. After walking
around and looking at countless other souvenir shops, this guy had
our business.
************
Seems Robin gets around. Seth Godin, the published maketing guru even posted a story Robin had emailed recently. It's a good read. I emailed Robin back and asked him if he was going to send his story to all at Subaru.
Thank You
Robert Provencher
Hold on to your hats and take names! I will tell all! Muchos gracias!
"Life is truly a ride. We're all strapped in and no
one can stop it….
I think that the most you can hope for at the end of life is
that your hair's messed, you're out of breath, and you didn't
throw up."
~Jerry Seinfeld~
NEWLETTER ARCHIVES
***********************
Email me: If you're excited, euphoric, lost, confused, happy, sad, depressed....
I'd love to hear from 'ya!
I love a challenge, compliments (true or otherwise), comments, feedback, ideas, contributions,.........
I reserve the right to use any and all emails on this newsletter.
info@profitablestudio.com