The business side of photography
Many photographer web sites tend to be black, white or grey. For those who want to add some colour to their site’s design, the usual go-to sites for colour inspiration are Colour Lovers and Color Combinations.
A site that makes colour swatches almost fun is Color.Hailpixel.
To help you understand colour harmony for web sites, photo shoots, and portrait photography, there are two similar sites: Color Calculator and Adobe’s Color Wheel.
Some photographers still insist on pricing below cost or competing only on price. In the race to the bottom, these photographers will always win, or lose, depending on how you look at it.
If a photographer sells very cheaply or works for free, hoping that customers will one day agree to pay much more or that a huge volume of work will magically appear, then this photographer will be greatly mistaken.
On April 6th, CPI Corp., the company that owned and operated all of the Sears portrait studios and about 20% of the Walmart portrait studios, in the USA, shut down its US operations. Its Canadian in-store studios are, so far, unaffected.
CPI, (in)famous for its dirt cheap portraits and free prints, was ….. (wait for it) ….. losing too much money. It owes about US$174.8 million. Creditors gave the company until April 6th to repay US$98.5 million. So CPI is a winner in the race to the bottom!
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A photographer might shoot an event and immediately transfer the digital files to a USB stick or CD. They will then hand that stick or disc to the customer. This is called a “dump and run” or a “shoot and burn.”
A dump and run means the photographer has left the job unfinished and the customer has to complete the work themselves. This photographer is either unwilling or unable to do the necessary editing and post-processing.
If a photographer offers a dump and run then you should do the same. Dump the photographer and run away. You shouldn’t be expected to finish the photographer’s work.
Would you go to Tim Hortons if they sold only packets of coffee and cups of water and expected you to make the coffee? What if your doctor handed you your test results and expected you to interpret them on your own?
A dump-and-run photographer is one who dumps their responsibility and runs away from their work. Why do business with such a photographer?
If you’re shopping for a box of Cheerios breakfast cereal, it’s possible to shop price because Cheerios is exactly the same at every store.
When shopping for shoes, you look at, touch and try on every pair that catches your eye. Shoes usually vary from store to store and shoe shopping is based on look, fit, feel and price.
How do you shop for a commercial or corporate photographer?
Every professional photographer works differently so how do you compare? You can’t see the photos before they’re made so how do you choose something before it exists?
Is the $4,000 photographer twice as good as the $2,000 photographer? Will $750 pictures work as well as $2,000 pictures?
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Many (most?) photographers struggle with pricing their services. Price too high and customers will think the photographer is gouging them. Price too low and customers will think the photographer does inferior work. Either way, the photographer loses.
Some photographers think that if they lower their existing prices, their business will increase. Their plan is to charge less and make up for it with volume.
But this means the photographer is going to do the same work and provide the same level of service, all for less money. Then they’ll do it many times over again, always for less money, and somehow it’ll earn them more money. But these photographers fail to understand three things:
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Who Pays Photographers? is a fairly new blog with a spreadsheet listing rates received by photographers for, mostly, editorial assignments. It’s based on anonymous submissions but looking at a few entries, the numbers do seem accurate.
Keep in mind that better rates can sometimes be had. Don’t be afraid to ask for more. In many cases, I’ve been able to get 50% to 100% more than what was initially offered by a daily newspaper or magazine. In cases where I couldn’t, the solution was to say “no thanks.”
A similar site for writers: Who pays writers?
One of the interesting(?) features available to web site owners is the ability to see what search phrases are used to find their site. One such phrase used several times to find this site is: “photography companies hiring photographers”.
Very few “photography companies” have staff photographers:
• Newspapers. But the newspaper industry is collapsing and the hiring of photographers is rare. The number of staff news photographers in the USA is expected to drop by 30% over the next seven years. Canada should be similar.
• Government. A few government offices have staff photographers but this has been mostly replaced by freelancers and occasional contract work. It’s surprising and short-sighted that governments don’t have staff photographers and photo departments.
• The military. But I doubt it’s much of a photography company :-)
