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The Art of Pricing and Presentation

So now let's talk a little bit about the art of pricing and presentation. So there's basically two ways the price and outgoing price per page or Price. Burton image. What? What what is everybody doing? Mostly for page certain number, standard pages and then a price per page? Exactly. Right. So that's saying that's a per page, right? You have your your base price, and then you have your per page price. And then we have per image. And I used to price everything per patient. Thought that was the way to go until I started hearing from photographers and how they're being successful. Uh, and today I'm gonna talk about pricing image. You don't have to. I find it's much easier to communicate to your clients. And it's much easier to go through a design consultation process than per page, because if somebody wants to remove a page from an album, they might only want to remove some of the images and put them on a different page and do this and you end up moving a lot of stuff around to get rid of...

one pager. One spread so or or have you had the bride where it took forever to explain that they can't remove just one page because they're connected to each other. But you have to remove a spread, right? But no, I just want to remove one page, like I understand it was physically impossible. So, uh, there are plenty of photographers that are extremely successful doing the per page. But I'm gonna take you through a system that's based on image. And as we go through this system, what we're reminded ourselves is everything that we're doing and talking about is what people used to do 40 and 50 years ago, right? Because he used to get a wedding album and there was like, the mat with the cuts, and you would buy each individual image to put them behind the openings in the matted pages. All right, so we're actually just We should just go listen to people that you stone studios 40 years ago because they know what's going on. So I'm gonna take you through that process. If you don't want to make the switch, that's fine. You can figure out how the process works for you, and it's not a system. This is just a way of doing things and you can be successful and take these ideas and make them your own and then create your own process for yourselves. But we must have a process around this because if we don't have a process, we are going to be able to do anything right. So you price base price plus extra spreads. Does anybody price per image? Steve recommends pricing per image. I think that you'll really like this because it makes a lot of sense. It's really easy, right? And when were figuring out our costs right? There's a lot of costs that go into and out. One is the book cost itself. How much does it cost? Of course, ourselves cover upgrade costs. All right. Additional paid cup page costs from our from our manufacturer. I feel like this is the one everybody forgets, and this is actually the most expensive. One is the retouching time. It's our time to make album changes retouch. The image is removed. Blemishes do a little liquefy magic. I never do that. Look, I'm like the master of the liquefy tool. I'm I'm a master. All right, So what we can do is if you want to change to an image based pricing scheme, which is what I recommend. Uh oh, we need to do is figure out your average number of images in an album. So my recommendation, on average of seeing thousands and thousands and thousands of albums wedding albums is about 2.5 images per page on average. Makes a nice album. And what that does that accounts for those double page spreads of 15 details or 15 dance shots or whatever, and then this double page spread of just one image right? All kind of works out. So 22 2. portrait album probably a little less, you know, probably maybe 1.5 per page. And as we are talking about albums, there's some really key communication keys. And a lot of these have come from talking other photographers. One of the free downloads is by GM Asana, who has a great, like a 90 page e book on just albums, which is great. It's more of like a just a traditional sales approach, so it's great nuts and bolts stuff. Ah, lot of the stuff has come from discussions with Steve, sometimes over drinks, so phrases and communications. This phrase is great. My good friends Chadwick and Camille of Joan etsu they talked about, I believe, in their last mystic presentation. They talked about this. I like Ooh, that's awesome. Totally stealing that. So if they're watching, I stole it. I owe you some drinks. So instead of saying your album, your wedding package includes a 20 page album or includes a 30 page album, Right? Because if I say to you, if your wedding package includes a 30 page album, what do you envision? Yeah, I do envision 60 pages. No, because I told you the 30 page album. But if I say to your wedding package includes your 1st 70 images in an album Now, what do you imagine? Yeah, you're like, Oh, the 1st 70 year included, but I'm probably gonna have more. Right. So it includes your first X number of images, and we must set client expectations. Right? Jason and Christy did this with you. Set client expectations. You can get 70 images, you can get the minimum. But I want to let you know that most clients end up spending an extra $3000. Four whatever. That math works out 60 more images in their album. That's what most client spent. Yeah, even what you just said that you can buy the minimum. Yeah. Nobody wants the minimum. No causes the minimum. So you're almost making them want mall? Yeah. By saying, Look, you can get the minimum. Yeah, but psychologically, nobody wants the minimum because I want to believe that they're better than that. How many times have you purchased the wedding album for yourself? When I got married 20 years ago. Yeah, right. So for most people, it's once, maybe two or three. Or if if they got married recently in their photographer, wasn't I didn't do it right. But the point is, we're the expert clients are the experts. We need to let them know what most people do, right? So most people end up spending an extra X number of dollars for X number of images. Right? Additional images are $50 each, $100 each, $25 each. Right. So then the clients can say OK, so it includes images. If I want to add 30 extra in their $50 east, this could be an extra $ right? And Darryl told me that most clients end up spending an extra 1500 or $2000 on their album. So now I can budget I could think about it and then I could say, OK, so if I don't end up But I want the minimum that I'm good if I want to add this much, The American had this much. This is important too, because I still this one from Melanie Anderson is great. Design consultations have a value, right? Your time is not free if you spend two hours with your client, so we want to come back and think about it. Can we come back next week? Yes, but it's $20 for another design consultation because it's two hours out of my day, right? And they have to know this up front so that they expect like they expect that they're gonna come in, they're gonna make a decision, then be done right, And this is key to This is a transparent process. We're not trying to trick anybody into doing anything. This isn't like the 19 eighties when you went in by a car and they did the four Matrix thing, right? Transparent process, right But we need to tell the clients what will happen right after the wedding. You'll go on your honeymoon. You have a freakin awesome time. It's gonna be great. All right. I'm gonna go process all of your images, and I'm gonna design the best wedding album you've ever seen. With all of your images. Could be awesome, right? And then you'll come back and we'll have a design consultation. I'm gonna get some wine. I'm gonna have some food. We're gonna sit. It's gonna party of the Soviet. A slide show. I'm probably going to design a bunch of extra images. Sometimes I'll put in almost duplicates next to each other so you can choose which one you want. You're going to remove the images that you don't want, right? You're gonna pay for any extra images. I'm gonna order your album. And in two or three weeks, Robin's gonna get here. Does that sound easy? Right. It's easy, right? Set the sign. Consultation. Right. And this is the first time you'll see your wedding. And I want you to see this story first. I want you to see the whole day all together as one story is the very first thing. So is that committees think peaks on your honeymoon. All right, I'll give you a few four by six is I'll print out on your wedding day for you, you know? Or I'll just give it to him as a surprise but doesn't meet the first time you see your album, right? This is where we finalize your album, pay for any and any extra images and then I'd order it. You know, retouch the image is and I'll order it the next day. So in two or three weeks, it'll be here. And so you know, all your friends that have been waiting for eight or 12 months for their wedding album. You have to worry about that month after your wedding, you're gonna have your album. You're gonna love it. You show your friends could be happy and just tell him what's gonna happen. This is that this is the process. It's your business. Are you running their business? Are you running your business right? So just explain to our works everybody loves easy. Make it easy for the client. They'll be happy. And we've spent all this time just like Steve said, finding their story. We have to communicate the album in the story while we're shooting. I think she's getting ready for my God. This could be great in the album, I've got the shot and then she was looking at you and I got that awesome spreading the album Oh, my God. There, when you were kissing your wife over there in the distance, the sun set behind it. Oh, my God, it's gonna be like this huge double page spread in the album. It's going so amazing the whole time we're shooting. We're communicating the final result to them. So they're imagining this album. Right? Is building up in their minds, and so they're frickin excited to see it does. That makes sense. Any question, I'm sure there's. There's always a ton of questions about pricing and stuff like, Jim, are you dying over there? You know, they really always do come in, you know, because that's that's the one thing. Any advice to people if they're in a particular part of the country, like the best way to sort of nailed down that pricing for their particular location? Yeah, don't worry about that location. So that's one thing that oh I live in a small town in the country. People won't spend money. So as they're saying that, look out the window and how many people are driving by in brand new Ford F 200 to 50 pickups, kind of people, people have the money and people will spend money on what is important to them. It's our job to communicate how important that is. So, uh, people here's one of the rules of business. It's a rule, has been a rule for centuries, will be a rule. People shop on logic. They buy on emotion, right? I just said to that, Um, what I found is that people need to borrow confidence from us as a photographer, and it's usually those of us that I don't have confidence that struggle with that. Their clients seemingly struggle with price. But if they need to borrow confidence from us in order to make a decision, we need to be confident about what we're selling. And to do that, you need to believe in the value that you're giving them, rather than thinking over camp. I'm asking them for a lot of money. It's like, well, I need to really give them lots and lots of lots of value. So then I feel good about and confident about asking them for what I need to ask him for, because our clients need to borrow confidence from us. You know, you've given anyway, like another lesson we discussed. Like if there's a fire in the house, what did they grab? We're literally providing the most valuable thing in their life, right? I have a question. You talked about sneak peeks, thes days with social media. Um, so you shoot a wedding, and then it starts that night, like thousands of guests just uploading photos. Right, Left and centre. So and Muslim are bad, but now and then, they're getting better. So they've already seen their wedding by the time they come in for the consultation. Can you talk about that? A little habit, So that's that's perfect. Have already seen their wedding, but they haven't seen their story right? They haven't seen the whole story. And you're the only one that can provide that right. Even a really good amateur photographer will be able to provide some great shots on social media. You know it and that's awesome. Let them do that. That's great, because your goal is not to provide them photos on social media. Your goal is to provide them the most epic wedding album they could ever imagine. And that's what you're concentrating on. So who who cares? Somebody posted Awesome shot to Social Media, because then you can go in for the wedding album, and then you know you can post some things, but what you can post that nobody else can post is after that wedding album comes in and you take some beautiful shots of the physical album, nobody else can post that right. And then if all of their friends see that they're like, Oh, I want that there's your referral. I want that wedding album for my wedding And William is the only guy I've seen posting pictures of albums on his Facebook page in his blawg. So he's the only one I know that does awesome albums on my call with you. So I have a question for Andrew and Steve. Yes, so I just don't know that I can afford an album, and I'm thinking about I want to maybe make my own, uh, your client Well, so I understand that and That's why all of my package includes your 1st 70 images with an album. Because it's a professional. I want toe provide you a beautiful album. But this album really isn't for you. It's for your grandchildren and I cant with a good conscious provide that, you know, let you design your own now because I want to tell your story. So that's why I include the 1st 70 images, and if that's all you want to get, that's great. I'm gonna provide a bigger album and weaken remove images to get down to 70 images. But if that's all you want, that's great. And I have a sample album with 70 images in it right here. Make one make a minimum album, right, because we're transparent. If if somebody comes in, they want 70 images in their album. Awesome. That's what I'm gonna give them. But that's not all. I'm gonna show that please is also comes down to what you were talking about before is ceding that expectation, like if you've had that conversation once, if you don't have any more conversations on the lead up to the wedding or on the day of the wedding itself, then this tends to be the result. So there needs to be points during their journey because a lot of people are booking your year year and 1/2 ahead, where you make contact with them. And every time you make contact with them, you need to see the fact that I'm going to be building your perfect album. And I'm not gonna be constrained by what you budgeted for right now because I want you to have the perfect album. So regardless of what you've got, my job is to make you want more, because this is gonna be the most amazing day of your life. And I don't want to disrespect all the work on all of the love that's gonna be in front of me and be minimized by what you originally thought you would be spending to trust me. You're gonna want more clear the credit card, honey, it's gonna go want more now. So that's any other questions here? Yes. I love the idea of having an in person consultation. A large percentage of my business are people coming in from out of town toe have a destination wedding. Um, how do you translate that into a scape session. Yes, So the photographers that I know that are in the same situation as you uh, it's the same process. So they will dio, I'll take you through the same process and you just do it over Skype instead of in person. Okay, just do like a screen share. Just do a screen share. You could do Skype. Google Plus is really easy because most people have a Gmail, and so it's a little bit easier to get up and going. Skype can be a little buggy. Sometimes on certain systems. Just do a little Google plus screen share. It's great a lot of clients that do this. What you can do is you can, if let's say they love wine, right. You can send them a nice bottle of wine and a gift with two glasses and, like a note and say, you know, this is for our design consultation on it. Don't open until you know July 25th at six PM for a design consultation, and then they can open it up and poured glass of wine, and you, you re create is closest. Possible in person is best, but the next Becks thing is is over. Video conferencing also are there coming to you like they're flying into your destination, so also seeking opportunities to meet with them in person beforehand. So even though there might be living in another city, most brides and grooms will be flying in to check out the location, meet with other vendors so really communicating with them and finding out when that's gonna happen. Because most people the biggest thing that I look for in a photographer is trust with an I trust you, and that's your opportunity to show them albums and communicate. I find out all of that. So seek those opportunities from your clients. Find out. Are you coming into town? Will you be visiting your because sometimes they're coming back because it's their home town, visiting your parents or meeting with other vendors on allowing them to have plan in their head that they're gonna have to sit some some time aside for you because then that will make that Skype session in the future easier because they've already met you and they built that confidence and trust any other questions online. John, When you're showing this album preview in person, are you using your laptop. Are you connecting to a larger display? Yeah, well, we'll talk about that. In another lesson. We're gonna actually show you a design consultation, but just like if you're buying trucks in Texas, bigger is better.