Another view-from-my-office photo taken on 01 July 2017.
Five brief suggestions for pricing your photography services:
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Value is a two-way street
Over the past month, I lost photo jobs to:
1) A photographer who quoted $1,200 for a two-day shoot, in two cities 100km apart, consisting of 22 business portraits, 11 environmental portraits and up to 66 finished images delivered.
2) Someone who quoted $1,500 to photograph a four-day business conference.
3) The “best professional headshot photographer in Toronto” who, according to the customer, quoted $3,000 for 120 business headshots. That’s $25 per headshot.
(When you have a quote turned down, try to ask the customer what the other photographer quoted. Sometimes the customer will refuse to divulge what they’re paying but tell them that you’d like to know where your price stands.)
Was I disappointed not to get these jobs? Yes.
Am I upset? No.
I am wondering how these photographers make any money.
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Give Yourself a Hand
On January 1, 2019, Ontario’s minimum wage will rise 31.6% from today’s $11.40/hour. How much of a raise are you going to give yourself on January 1?
The average full-time, hourly-paid, Canadian employee makes $58,136/year, assuming a 40-hour week.
If you consider yourself average, then you should be earning the same $58,000 PLUS enough to cover all your overhead expenses. For example, if your annual overhead is $25,000, then you need to earn about $83,000 per year. Job expenses are not included in that sum.
Using the same example as above, if you do 100 jobs per year, then your average invoice should be at least $830 plus expenses. If you do 50 jobs per year, then your average invoice should be at least $1,660 plus job expenses. I said “at least” because (a) your fee should be based on the value of your work and not on time or a flat rate, and (b) employees get paid benefits and you don’t.
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Splitting a Photographer
Splitting Time
Sometimes a photographer might be asked to split up a work day into non-consecutive hours. This can happen with weddings, business conferences and other full-day events where the customer wants the photographer to cover only certain parts of the event. The customer usually expects the photographer not to charge for any downtime.
For example:
• A bride might want the photographer to cover her afternoon wedding ceremony from 1:00pm to 2:30pm and the evening dinner from 6:00pm to 10:00pm. The photographer would then have a 3-1/2 hour split in their day.
• A business conference organizer might want the photographer to cover the opening speeches from 9:00am to 10:30am, a keynote presentation from 1:00pm to 2:00pm and an evening reception from 6:00pm to 8:00pm. In this case, the photographer has two blocks of downtime.
Worth Every Cent
When someone asks you to work for free, they want photography that’s good enough, pictures that are better than nothing, photos that are worth what they’re paying.
When someone hires you to work for pay, they want photography that’s good, pictures that are better than anything, photos that are worth what they’re paying.
Photo Pricing Software
Let’s say you want to buy a box of breakfast cereal. You can go to any number of grocery stores and see, pretty much, the same boxes of cereal on each store’s shelves. You might choose based on which box of cereal looks best and its price.
This is exactly like buying stock photography but instead of grocery stores, you visit web sites. You choose a photo based on which stock picture looks best and its price. You’re still choosing a product (a photo) from a store shelf (a web site).
Let’s say you want breakfast. You can go to any number of restaurants that serve a wide variety of breakfasts. What should this breakfast cost you? Well, you can’t answer without knowing what you want for breakfast, who will prepare it for you, how it will be served and where all of this will happen. Is it a fast-food breakfast at a takeout store or a more elegant breakfast at a five-star hotel?
This is exactly like buying assignment photography. Just as every restaurant breakfast is different, every photo assignment is different. You hire a photographer to create a custom product.
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Photography value and quality
When hiring a business portrait photographer or other corporate photographer, you might be tempted to shop by price. You may think that the lowest price means the best value.
With some tangible products, the lowest price can be the best value. But this doesn’t apply with services like photography and especially not when quality matters.
What’s the difference between value and quality?
Value: Usefulness or importance.
Quality: How good or bad something is. A degree of excellence.
Ideally a photograph has both high value and high quality but that’s not always the case. For example, a poorly exposed, out-of-focus family photo can be very valuable to you.
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