negotiating

Sales Strategies for Photographers

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Antone’s Department Store in Zebulon, North Carolina, November 1939. (Marion Post Wolcott/Farm Security Administration/US Library of Congress)

This same store today sells beauty supplies.

(This post is mostly for new photographers doing corporate or commercial photography rather than retail photography.)

Unlike a department store which sells hundreds or even thousands of products, a photographer basically sells one product – themselves – and that comes in a very limited supply. A retail store’s business model is based on volume. A store has an unlimited supply of products to sell to dozens or hundreds of customers each and every day. A store gets a steady stream of money from lots of small purchases.
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Negotiating Need

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I received an email from a local photographer about my previous post. This photographer couldn’t see anything wrong with doing 70 business headshots for $1,000 (i.e., $14 per portrait). She said she “would be thrilled” to make $1,000 in one day. She said she’s been a professional photographer for ten years.

Sigh.

After a couple of e-mail exchanges, it was clear this photographer didn’t know the difference between revenue and profit. She knew nothing about overhead costs, didn’t track any of her expenses and didn’t even have an Ontario business licence. But yet she’s a “professional”.
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Anybody for nothing

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The 1969 American cult film Putney Swope, a satire about the advertising world, corporate corruption, politics and more, has horrible acting and lots of great quotes. It also has this scene which has been posted on many photography sites:

I can get anybody for nothing.

The running gag in the film is that the commercial photographer appears at inopportune times always showing his portfolio but not getting any work.

A satire is something that pokes fun at a vice, foolishness or human folly. Feel free to interpret what the photographer represents.

 

Negotiating from the get-go

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You might think that negotiating is about the client and photographer haggling over price. But negotiating involves much more than that.

Earlier today, I went shopping for a new suit. At a clothing store, the salesperson didn’t ask what kind of suit I wanted but instead she asked why I needed a suit – at what type of events would I be wearing the suit. [Help the customer get what they need and don’t just sell to them.]

Instead of letting me choose suits from the long racks of clothing, the salesperson selected just two suits for me. [Make it easy for the customer to decide and avoid overwhelming them.]

“I think you’d look great in either of these two. Which do you prefer?” she asked.
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Check your focus

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When pricing a photo assignment or negotiating with a potential customer, the photographer’s frame of mind matters a lot. The photographer could be thinking along the lines of “If I get this job, I’ll make $4,000,” or they might be thinking, “If I don’t get this job, I’ll make nothing.”

The former train of thought (being “promotion focused”) is about trying to maximize gains. The latter (being “prevention focused”) is about trying to minimize risk and prevent loss.

Overall, neither type of focus is better than the other and we often switch from one to the other depending on the circumstances. But research has shown that when pricing or negotiating, being promotion focused tends to lead to better outcomes (e.g. earn more when selling or pay less when buying).
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Contract Negotiation

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How does a photographer negotiate their contract?

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio, has a Rolling Stone magazine exhibit which includes two letters from 1982 between Rolling Stone magazine’s (then) chief photographer Annie Leibovitz and its publisher Jann Wenner. No idea why the letters are dated March 1982 and Leibovitz signed the contract as being March 1981 (perhaps a typo or bad handwriting?).

Not sure if it was related but Leibovitz left the magazine the following year.

On Wenner’s web site, (9th thumbnail), there’s a self-portrait of Wenner and Leibovitz from 1973 when she was named the magazine’s chief photographer.

 

Business advice for photographers

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The American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP) has a few dozen videos to help professional photographers improve their business practices. Topics include negotiating, marketing, pricing, paperwork, licensing and copyright.

These videos were produced for American photographers and so there are a few legal and business issues that either don’t apply or are different here in Canada. However many of the concepts and principles are equally applicable to Canadian photographers.

 

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