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Pricing for Boudoir: A La Carte

We gonna talk about ala carte within person doing I changed in person sales now when I was first doing like packages and shooting burning my house I was doing some in person sales it was really embarrassing how I was doing it I would have a girl on like they would just go through all the pictures that I took that day like good bad or otherwise completely unedited because I didn't have time t deal with it so now we're changing it up a little bit uh with the packages I went toe online galleries now I'm going back to lincoln in person sales and this is not same day viewing which I was doing at home this is you come back another day now julie and you talk about not shooting on the weekends well, I don't really do sale sessions on the weekends either so I first was like how are people going to come back? They don't want to come for a in person you know, mood board like a consul to make their movement what how are they gonna come back and see their pictures? But you know what? They couldn't ...

wait to come see their pictures on they would come on a tuesday or they come on their lunch hour wherever it might be everyone's in a while if I need if somebody really needed a saturday diana will do it for me she's like I'll do a saturday, it's totally fine, so I will have her do it. And I will pay her a commission on whatever she sells to make it worthwhile for her to go, but I don't do them on saturdays either. Um, so anyway, it's more high touch let's talk about the advantages it's more customized the clients actually getting with day want there's, no question about it. They choose what they want, it's less limited to get much higher, sir sales this way. So you're not already saying to them, well, you're only gonna buy twenty pictures you're saying you could buy whatever you want, you tell me what you want and you get to keep a lot more money because you get to make more money, which is a very good thing. Of course, some of the disadvantages are you're unsure of the sails up front, so if I had if I shot four clients this week and I had four viewing sessions next week, that's great, but I have no idea how much money I'm gonna make. So you have to really careful with your budget, your spending, where you're going with your equipment and your albums and all of that, you have to be really careful, andi also, you know, like months where you can't shoot us much like you know you might have a convention coming up a photo convention and you're gone for a week and you can you lose a quarter of your shooting that month you know if you have to be really careful with that um unsure of sales a front this is why the pricing properly it's so important which we will talk about it's very very important and it obviously is more time consuming because now they have to come back for a sale session for me it's another drive into my studio my studio's not really close to where I live so it's another drive into you know the studio however I have sort of kind of figured out this plan now so when I do these in person sales I usually book them for a day where another client is coming in so when that client is in hair makeup I'm doing the sale session with the client from the week before this way I'm already at the studio is not taking me any more time and if it runs over than diana will take over for me and I'll start shooting the client she'll finish the sale session and they know from the beginning van and I are like the same person like there's no difference between diana sitting there me sitting there because she's already met both of us stand has done the make up and she trusts us every once in a while, if a client specifically says, I really want to sit down with you, I will respect that, and I will make sure I have enough time for her to just sit with her, but usually they're they're happy to do it with diana also okay, still kind of what not to dio, but basically from the package is this is where my pricing change. Now you'll notice I made it a little fancier. What nicer looking my way cheesy logo is on there, which I don't have any more, but it was a lot of information I started basically doing it by photo now instead of by album, so I started with my little black books they're five by seven books with ten or twenty photos, and then we went up to classic albums, luxury albums, co tour albums, and I have some collections and portfolio boxes and a lot of wall art it's too much it's way too much, but this is what I started with and, um, quickly, I changed it, um to look a little bit more like this. One thing I want to mention is, excuse me, my session feet at this point, I started with the session fee of four fifty now don't forget I told you that my hair and makeup is about to fifty okay, so I would only make two hundred dollars from the session which really is not that much when we're talking about my rent and insurance equipment and travel and all that other stuff so it was jested to me uh maybe I should start for fifty it's alright and I quickly raze it to six fifty which by the way was the highest session fee of anybody among island like nobody or even in the city I don't think anybody was doing it for six fifty but I got it I get it and you know what? Thief for fifty or the sorry I was charging six fifty two fifty one for hair makeup so I was making four hundred dollars the four hundred dollars covered all of my expenses so if a girl never bought anything again at least I didn't lose any money. Okay, so I was paying my rent with it pay my utilities, my travel insurance all that other stuff so that other four hundred dollars was important to me. You have to really think about that and six fifty is what I would I would require up front so I would send them a contract they would send me back the contract with six fifty retainer paying full when you come in for your shoot you don't always anything you just come and have a good time okay, so the day that they come in for their shoot, I'm not collecting any money, which I really like. Question learn. Yeah. How many women were you shooting at this point when you were at six. Fifty? At this point, I'm looking for one to two clients a week. Okay, I'm gonna be really up front with you guys. I'm also a little busy traveling here and teaching, and I do have other income coming in from that stuff. I'm being really honest. I don't think anybody else really talks about this. So some of that time is taken, you know, by teaching and educating and making money there so I can afford to only take wants to clients a month because of that. But it's also work life balance a thing for me. One to two clients a week. Uh, I say a month before I met a week one to two coins a week. Sorry. So it's, about four to six clients a month. That's what I'm looking for and I was very comfortable with that. It was it gives me time to edit properly. It gives me time to do their pre shoot consoles and mood boards, it gives me time to work out. Gives me time to be with my kids at three thirty it's not like an overly heavy heavy schedule and yet I was still busy like I still felt like every day I had work to do and I was making money so it's a very comfortable place for me and again I'm traveling and I'm doing some teaching here, which is bringing another income so I'm just I'm really being up front with you guys about that yeah edit like do you keep your editing to the monday through friday hours or you up all night like I am every night I pretty much try not to touch my computer all weekend long that's that's kind of my role at this point I feel like I kind of deserved that, you know, like whatever people say to me oh it's amazing you work for yourself, you make your own schedule of my answers yeah, I traded my nine to five job for my twenty four seven one you know and I feel like as I am getting older guy, I'm going to be forty this year and my kids are getting big really fast and life is like passing by and it's like everything's happening so quickly I deserve to have weekends too even though himself employed maybe especially because I'm self employed now listen, there are times with those rules get broken last week I was up three nights from one in the morning until you know ten o'clock tonight working on creative life stuff or editing photos before I left because I knew I was gonna be here for a week you know this is reality you know this is how your life work so I'd never want to say to you yes or no it's whatever the business needs for me I d'oh I tried not to work on the weekends I would rather with work late at night when my kids are sleeping so they don't know any better then on the weekends that's that's just my theory um okay so I changed some things around the first thing you'll notice is that I added digitals okay do not be ashamed if you sell digital's you guys I don't really care I'm not here to impress anybody okay? I sell digital part of the reason why I sell digitals is because a lot of photographers started coming to me I was travelling and meeting photographers and like I want you to shoot me and they don't want to buy albums for me they want digitals so I'm okay with that and then I had a couple people come to save my husband works overseas or my husband is in saudi arabia and he's in the army and I want teo uh send him pictures I want to send an ipad with my pictures on it okay, that's. Awesome. You don't have to buy an album to my gear. People towards albums. Absolutely that's what I want to sell. But as you can see, I made sure that my digital images ten digital images are the same price as the ten image book. So I don't care what I sell, okay, if you want to buy ten images for me and they might say, you know, I do get this well, I just want them on a desk. It should be less right. No, no, it's not lest I charge you for the work I put into the images and they might say what you have to buy the album on the album I just kind of throwing is that, you know, I'm charging you for the amount of time I put into the images. I'm doing you a favor by giving you the album, which is really true if you think about it, right? So for me, I don't want to sell digitals because I make more money and digitals it's the truth, right? But it doesn't mean I should give them a break on the digital is because I want to make sure that it's it's an even selling field does that make sense, okay? Um also you notice I took away a little black book here and now I'm at seven fifty and we're going to talk about why in a minute again, I still have collections. It's still kind of messy. I did change my logo, though. Thank god. Um you'll see that. Okay, so now this is where I go from here. I need my main another change. By the way, this is all within, like a year. This is not like I don't wait till january first to make changes. I change it is I need to go now. I change it into two separate sheets. I give the examples here digital images, classic albums, luxury album here's fifteen to nineteen photos twenty to twenty five photos twenty six to thirty photos and you can add on from there. And my special, which is nineteen hundred dollars. The nineteen hundred dollars special is what I really want to sell and that's because with my session fee combined with my session feats about twenty five hundred dollars and that's really where I want to bathe at twenty five hundred dollars mark. So this one really well, the nineteen hundred dollars, went really well and you could see I'm choosing by photo not by page, not by album. Does that make sense? So, like I would sit down with them, they would come in for their sales session. We look through the photos and we pick how many pictures they love. Let's say the first round they love fifty pictures. Okay, let's, go through it again. Make sure you love them all. They take a few out now there are twenty seven photos. Okay, great. You're a twenty seven photos. That's perfect let's. Look at what your options are. I take out the price list again because they've already seen it twice by that, but I take it out again. Hear your options? A few of twenty seven photos. This is how much a classic out miss this's, how much a luxury album is which one do you think you want now? At that point, she might say twenty seven photos, I'm right on the border. I'd rather spend this let me take out two photos or she might say, oh, you know what if I'm twenty seven but I really kind of like thirty I don't know. Maybe we'll just put a few more back in that I really like because she was afraid she was going to spend too much and she'll go up a little bit, so it works either way, this is the key I took away all those little albums and my first album is eleven twenty five that is the cheapest album that I sell with all the car do you know why does anybody have an idea? Why crickets okay, that is the minimum amount I want itself the minimum so I could take out this priceless and I know no matter how many pictures she chooses, we're good there's no sales pressure from me. I'm not like no, you can't pick ten because I can't afford for you to pick ten because I'm only gonna make seven fifty if you pick ten I took away all those cheap albums, the seven fifty I wasn't making enough money on that, so I made my cheapest album, the minimum that I want my client suspend anything above that is a bonus. So when she says, jen, I really want to take out two more photos because I want to be at thiss pricing level instead of this pricing level, I don't have a canary. Is it annoying? Am I making like, you know, a little less money? Yeah, but I still know at least made my minimum and I'm in a good place and she's not feeling that sales pressure from me because there's nothing worse than connecting with the woman, making friends with her and then giving her like a hard sell that's the worst I don't want to give her a hard sell. I'm gonna say to her, whatever you pick us go with may I don't care, I'll help you and I'll be genuine, you know, there are times I've talked girls down like they picked to many of the same picture I'm like, listen, you really don't need that pick this one so much better, okay? And when I'm sending them, they're pricing, by the way, I'm on ly sending them this side. That's it. I'm not sending them decided all on. We'll talk about why in a minute, I'm so smart I'm way ahead of myself, but again set it up so that your minimum is the least expensive on the price list. Okay, okay. So what happens if, um, client cause he was his own? I only want a few photos. How do you guys handle that? Anyone have any? Have you gotten that? You know, I don't I don't need a whole thing. I don't need a whole, um I just want, like, two or three pretty pictures you've dealt with that you tell me about it a little bit. How do you avoid that? Do you? Well, I'm still kind of back at the shooting burn level where they were at the beginning so everyone gets a lot of pictures okay alright perfect still but still with my packages being three hundred fifty dollars, they'll still say you know can you do one hundred dollars and give me five pictures right now, right? So I do I get that like I just want a few photos so what I do is I'm sending them this pricing on lee and what's not on this pricing wall our prince it's not on this pricing so somebody might look at this now I'm planting a see this is what I call planting a seed I'm setting them up to buy an album I'm saying to them from the very beginning you could come in and you choose whatever album you want I'm pushing them toe albums from the very beginning this is what I want you to buy if she then says to me I only want a few pictures I will say I'm sorry I don't offer that we offer a full experience and the minimum amount that we sell us fifteen photos that's where our album start under fifteen photos makes her very sparse album it's not really an album, right? So they will say ok, no problem I don't want to do it now when a client comes into the studio and I present her with the pricing okay, let's, back up to this, and then I'll tell you about that for a second, so I keep my products to a minimum. You guys will see that I only have three options. Digital classic luxury, right? Uh, so the white house custom color one is the press printed album with the satin paper, the luster coding. I really love it. The printing on that is really beautiful. Um, and they're affordable albums, and then the luxury atmosphere nao and the reason why I used video is because I use the female one, and they have custom covers that you khun design with a naps all designed like four or five different covers for a client and let her choose which one she wants. So it feels more luxurious, even though the albums are fairly similar on the inside and the white house when I just offer in black it's just very simple, classic black, and you'd be surprised people don't really ask for a lot of variation when you don't offer it, you know, you could be like, oh, you can have fifty different covers, you can have different paper I picked what I know what I like um, white house I trust so much I often drop ship the album straight from them to my client's, it makes takes one more step out for me, especially when they're in a tight time schedule like they come in really close to their wedding or their anniversary, and I just drop ship is straight from them and that's great, um so I'm really happy with that, so again, I'm only offering two different types of albums and digitals that's it it's really simple? You don't have to have a thousand different options, so before I get into that, I do want to mention that the I want to go back to the print pricing, I do show them the print pricing after they picked their pictures, so when they say to me, okay, we've picked twenty seven pictures, I'll present them with a menu with the pricing, it has the print pictures on that side, and it has the, you know, albums on this side, and then they'll say to me, oh, you offer prince to I love number thirty two it's my absolute favorite picture, could we blow it up? Because I don't want them to go to that page first. I don't want them to even think that buying two pictures is an option, so I don't even offer it until after they've fallen in love with their photos, okay, after they picked an album. Yeah, okay, so with the in person viewing, obviously it's more high touch and I do make an an emoto slideshow for every single girl that comes in, and that is how we start our sessions, but the way I want to say I do sit on a lot, you know, with her at a laptop looking these pictures, I do not project them, they don't make them huge. I don't use a huge monitor, I want to sit nights and close and tight with her, like, almost shoulder to shoulder for a few different reasons first. Well, she's like my girlfriend now I wanted, like, be closer, I want to support her, seeing yourself sexy not always easy. I know a lot of people say, oh my god, my clients see and they cry and they're so happy I'm going to be honest that's not always the reaction often there's a, uh that's what I look like sexy cry, you know, like because we don't recognize ourselves sexy, right? Like we don't see that in the mirror like we don't stand around, make sexy faces in the mirror all the time, even though men probably think that we do right it's sort of an innate reaction that just happens when something triggers it, so we're not used to it seeing ourselves that way so there is a little bit of like that shock factor not for everybody some people are oh my god, I can play that's what I look like but but it's it's a little scary it's intimidating to see pictures of yourself in your underwear so I want to be nice to close to her I want a hugger I want you know touch your shoulder I want to be able to say you look amazing oh my god or if she says to me you know, I just don't like the way my hair looks in that picture no problem we could move the hair out of your eye for you no big deal we can photoshopped that or you know when she says that I look so fat are you crazy? You're fat what are you looking at? You tell me right now what you're looking at you know I want to be really close and nice close to her I also showed small because I'm selling albums I'm not selling prints if you show a girl a picture of herself you know on the wall at thirty by forty and then you sell an album with the picture that you know four by six she's going to go what the heck this's the tiniest thing ever so I want to show them small I want to set them up for expectations that the pictures are going to be pretty small when they get them um so I'm going to show you what it's a slide show will look like a couple things I want to mention about it it does have a song that I love it matt harvey got it all everybody always asks me that's going to put that out there it's triple scoop music which I love triple skip music I actually have a playlist with them of different songs that I recommend for different types of boudoir sessions you guys can check that out and anna moto is has been nice enough to give us a discount code for news subscriptions, which I will show you after the slide show um you'll see in the slide show I've added a lot of wording and there some quotes some words that reflect with the client wanted I like that you can customize them that that way like that you can customize them that way these slide they have different options for slide shows that when I'm going to show is called vogue I actually designed it with an emoto specifically for boudoir because I find that since we have a lot more skin showing, we needed a slideshow that kind of had a little less overlapping and whatnot so the skin tone stayed really genuine so it's called vogue and I'm going to show it to you know you need to do you can't be show that I got it. I got everything. Wait, wait. What do you mean? I got you? Wait, wait. Hey, um, so again, I make those with an emoto, and there is a code. If you guys want sign up for adam oto, the funny thing about animados? Yes, even though I work with them and I'm promoting them, I have been using animals too. Two thousand eight it's, one of the only things that I bought that I still use to this day. And I still love to this day, and I genuinely use it for every single client. I love it. I think it's fun and it gets them excited to see the rest of their pictures. I stick to about a minute long show longer than that starts getting a little long. Shorter than that is a little weird. Um, and so about a minute is the perfect. About a time again, you can customize the music for them. There's. A lot of music in the animate a library that you can choose from also. And the code is vogue fifteen. Since my my template is called boat so you can use that up until march fifteenth if you guys want teo and again, it's, sort of like, eases the client into what? Seeing their pictures it gets him excited and it's not just like okay here your pictures let's get down to business it's like creating a mood for them you know, the music's fun like I was just standing here kind of bopping around like it's a nice emotional component for any shoes so with in person sales my average price my average um session went from six, seventy five two two thousand dollars in under a year that's a big change yes just grabbing make question about the an emoto is that something that the client then receive or is that something we should talk about that in one minute and you hold that thought okay um so I went from six, seventy five to two thousand dollars and don't forget I'm not just charging more I am providing more I'm doing appreciate consoles I'm doing in person sales I'm spending a little more time with the client they're all getting hair and makeup first door included um I'm more of a connection with them I deliver a little faster because I'm only taking one two, two clients a week now I actually know their name it's amazing you have three hundred girls you don't know any of their names you're just like, okay, move on jane doe whatever you know like just keep going I have somebody else coming in so it was a much better connection and I was much happier of course making money um that way so again some tips for all the cart present your pricing in a higher end fashion I have like a menu I went to a store bought like um I meant to bring it with me and I forgot but it's like a menu that you would find in a restaurant and I printed out nice paper and I put it in there I know some people print them like with album cos they print like a little album I don't do that cause I changed my pricing so often that it needs to be changeable real quick so I just use the type that slips of paper in just make it look nice it's not that hard so terribly expensive but you don't want to just hand them a piece of paper and be like here which two thousand dollar album do you want on my little piece of paper you know you wanted to look nice and professional um be honest and build trust again sometimes the client will pick thirty images and I think she only needs twenty six of them like those extra for images don't do anything for may take them out spend a little less money I want her to be happy if spills trust I want her I don't do it all the time but I want her to be able to saito somebody else you know what? Jen sat with me and it wasn't sales at all she was so honest with me she told me which pictures were better than others you know, sometimes I've thrown a picture in if she's unsure about it but I really like it although you know what? I'm not even gonna charge you for it let me put it in the album for you if you don't like it I'm happy to take it out but I do think it belongs in there I'm honest with them that's so important don't just think about the sales and that's again why it's important to set up your priceless so it's proper share pricing from the get go I'm very honest from the very beginning you session fee six fifty and here's all of my pricing and I'll say to them you know what? On average a client will spend about eighteen hundred dollars at their sales session or twelve hundred dollars or whatever it might be just so you know what to expect ok? Because if they show up and they're not prepared to spend that kind of money that's embarrassing for everybody it's just uncomfortable position to begin um now use your slide show or your sticky album which I also use sticky albums will talk about for a second as a sales incentive so this answers your question um I if they buy the digitals you used saw if you look closely at my priceless you so I put the animal to slide show in with the package that nineteen hundred dollar package that I wanted to sell I stuck it in with that it's not anywhere else on the price list, so if they wanted it they'd have to buy that package but like if a girl's between two albums and she's not sure maybe uncle you know and I'll make you a deal if you buy this more expensive album off throw in the slide show that you saw because there's pictures in there there she's not necessarily buying, so she'll get more pictures really so it's like I'll throw that in there and also sticky albums too. If you guys aren't familiar sticky albums, they make the ipad after the phone app so you can send them an app with their own you know images on it the digital images on what nice is on and I have one I have some of my phone if you guys want to see, I'll show you later but what's nice about it is that you can send them a personalized app so they can see their pictures and then go show their girlfriends, which is like the best part you know, like I want to show instead of just going through there, I fell and they have a special act for it's customized has your logo it's a really great idea? I also really want to start I had this idea to start using for marketing so it would make my own sticky album with information aboutthe shoots and some pictures maybe even a discount code at the end and so when a client you know, book now if you book within the next twenty four hours of seeing this, you get a free eight by ten point or something like that and then you consented to them when they choir with you send them this album and then they could look through it and they have a better idea of who you are and it's kind of personal to them. So that's my new idea I'm going to try to work on that this year also so something that I've been trying as I actually put my price sheet in my contract and I have them initial it it's a good idea I was wondering what you said, what you thought if that's a great idea it's a great idea anything that you need to dio I hate that awkward like, well, I didn't know our yeah, I glanced at it, but you know, so I make that make sure that while you initialed it and you know they've seen it and it's clear it's a fantastic idea and these are the things you learn by mistakes making mistakes so like the first time that happens you're gonna go I remember lawrence learned from lauren's mistake do it now that's a great idea I love that idea I might adopt that now like that uh in case I haven't said it already your priceless should be living breathing object if you find that you're not booking clients and you need to lower your price is a little ok if your find your booking too many clients you want to raise your prices a little okay don't do what I did don't do a belly flop adjust a little here and there and you're gonna end up landing in the right spot when you need it don't wait until january first that's the biggest mistake you could make like I'm not making any money but I'll wait till january first to raise my prices just do it just do it don't be afraid of it um again you guys asked me questions about all this pricing on my facebook group and I'm happy to help you as well as many of the other photographers in there were full community to help each other out and lift each other up I'm going to ask you guys for a call of action tell me what your best selling item is help me and other boudoir photographers figure out what they can offer that there clients are happy with tweet me at jen rosenbaum with izzy. And you can use the hashtag jen's boudoir boot camp. And also, we love the hashtag shamelessly feminine. If you want to use that as well.