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Southern Exposure is the official publication of SEPPA
Citation preview
Chairman of the Board Doug PeningerdpeningerSEPPAonlinecom
President George SingletongsingletonSEPPAonlinecom
1st Vice-President Kevin Jiminez kjiminezSEPPAonlinecom
2nd Vice-President Mary Fisk-Taylor mfisktaylorSEPPAonlinecom
Secretary-Treasurer Janet Boschker jboschkerSEPPAonlinecom
Salon Exhibition Chair Jessica Vogel jvogelSEPPAonlinecom
Executive Director Rick GibbonsExecutiveDirectorSEPPAonlinecom
Delaware Paula Mignagna
District of Columbia Anthony MarilJoe Tessmer
Florida Jackson Koontz Kaye Newsome
Georgia Spencer Smith Jason White
Maryland Lidia Miller Steve Clark
MississippiAlabama Wesley Ellis Gil Brady
North Carolina Ellis Williamson Rose Mary Cheek
South Carolina Patty Hallman Gregg Martin
Tennessee Jeannie Forehand Barbara White
Virginia Jim Carpenter Robert Holman
West Virginia Pat Dodd Brentv Kepner
state president SEPPA representative
S outhern ExposureSouthern Exposure magazine is an
onl ine publ icat ion of SEPPAand is publ ished monthly
EditorVictor ia Kel ly
vkel lySEPPAonl inecom9198180726
Ad Sales amp Business ManagerRick Gibbons
ExecutiveDirectorSEPPAonl inecom8669824856
Art icle amp Ad Submissions5th of every month
OnLine Publ ication20th of each month
SEPPA3710 North Main StreetHigh Point NC 27265
8669824856
Acceptance of advert is ing does not carry with i t endorsement by the publ isher
Opinions expressed by Southern Exposure or any of i ts authors does not necessar i ly
ref lect the posit ions of the Southeastern Profess ional Photographers Associat ion
Associat ion f inancial information avai lable upon request
Delawarewwwdelawarephotographerscom
District of Columbiawwwppsgworg
Floridawwwfpponlineorg
Georgiawwwgppacom
Marylandwwwmarylandppacom
MississippiAlabamawwwppmanet
North Carolinawwwppofnccom
South Carolinawwwppofsccom
Tennesseewwwtnppacom
Virginiawwwvppaorg
West Virginiawwwppwvorg
SEPPA is a regional affiliate of the
Professional Photographers of America and hosts an annual
District Image Judging To learn more about PPA
click HERE
Corn Dogs Olive Oil and Pink Mashed PotatoesChristine Walsh-Newton M Photog Cr CPP
In 1983 I worked for a concession stand company traveling from street fair to street fair across the state of Ohio for five months peddling corn dogs In exchange for work-ing a number of ungodly hours that had to be against some kind of labor law I re-ceived a paltry weekly sum and all the corn dogs I could eat They were hot filling and affordable I sold them by the thousands Thirty years later the sight of a corn dog still turns my stomach
Hold that thought
Tucked in the woods on the shore of a lake is a little bistro In the middle of nowhere Ohio its a small treasure to the locals A bit on the pricey side with a delicious menu it became ldquothe placerdquo to go when there was something to celebrate Birthdays anni-versaries post-wedding parties from a table of two to a family group of twelve or so wed appear several times a year for a nice evening of food and wine
On one of these occasions the menu had slightly shifted as it sometimes did It had become trendy to stack food items into a tower and my medium rare filet mignon was served on a bed on dirty mashed potatoes and topped with the vegetable of the day
Individually the items were delicious but I preferred cutting into a nice maison-but-
tered steak without having to scrape mashed potatoes off the bottom and green beans off the top I ate the meal with no complaint but decided that next time I should order the items to be served unstacked
A medium-rare steak well lets just say pink mashed potatoes arent very appetiz-ing
The next time I ordered that meal from the little bistro on the lake I asked for the items to be unstacked When the meal was delivered it was on three different dinner plates One for mashed potatoes one for the steak and one for the green beans Our table for two already con-tained two water glasses two wine glass-es two salads and two plates of appetiz-ers Suddenly it needed to hold four more plates one for my husbands meal and three for mine
I caught the snicker of the wait staff while I tried to arrange the table and finally had to place one of the plates of food on top of my water glass and was forced to hand my salad plate to the waiter even though I hadnt finished
Clearly I was considered one of ldquothoserdquo customers that had somehow offended the chef (well call him ldquoRichardrdquo) with my request
Now maybe this strikes you all as a little funny but at the time it wasnt I had pleasantly and discreetly asked for my meal that way and the resulting effort or-chestrated to embarrass left such a bad taste in my mouth (pun intended) that our visits there eventually stopped and we havent been back in a number of years
Hold that thought too
The other day I was shopping for some imported olive oil at a small store in my area A lovely lady Kimberly had opened an olive oil and vinegar shop somewhat unusual for our area but her extensive knowledge of her product line and her ex-cellent level of customer service has won her a loyal customer base
As I shopped I noticed that the olive oils from Italy were missing and asked if I could speak with her as there was a particular reason I wanted some Due to some trucking strikes on the west coast her shipments had been held up for an additional week and the oil I was looking for wasnt available
She asked about the intended recipient of the gift their food and cooking tastes and recommended a substitute oil from Peru I sampled it listened to her explain the qualities and subtleties of the oil and was convinced it would do nicely in place of the oil from Italy I bought the Peruvian oil with no regrets and went happily on my way
And now hold that thought as well
Andthis has to do with photographyhow
I began to think about our businesses And how the boutique studio model has become popular We want to be refined elegant specialized and serve the upper-most clientele in and out of our area
Sometimes we do a bang up job of it like Kimberly But sometimes well sometimes we act just like Richard And we chase our
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
clients away
I began to think about our clients And how sometimes they ask for something that is not exactly what we have or wish to provide
Maybe the client has brought in 39 Pinter-est pictures of poses so tacky we want to jam our fingers down our throats Setups weve seen a jillion times Props we are SO OVER
Stylistic concepts as common and ordi-nary as a corn dog
Weve been there weve done that and we have the t-shirt and the keychain But yet heres a bright shiny new client face that wants the tacky corn dog pose Be-cause they havent seen it a jillion times They like it They often love it And some-times its ldquothe poserdquo The one they abso-lutely have to have and plan the whole session around
It happens all the time Ive been reading a lot of questions on some of my forums and online groups asking for advice in how to deal with these kinds of clients Im a little bit horrified when I see requests of this nature treated w ith disdain with contempt with a ldquohow dare you insult my artistic integrity with your request for tacki-nessrdquo attitude
An attitude so thick with indignation that I dont believe for a minute that the pho-tographer is able to completely hide it from the client
And I wonder if the client winds up feeling like I did at the bistro on the lake
ldquoBut thats not my stylerdquo they whine
And the photographer in the industry forums is coddled and placated and their attitude is echoed and approved of by others Advice to charge extra fees de-lete the images refund the client money and a variety of other creative solutions are often given
And Im thinking to myself ldquoAre you kid-ding merdquo When did a client request become an issue An insult A situation worthy of this level of angst and unrest
In the olden days before digital before there was a home studio in the basement of one house on every street there was one maybe two photography studios that served an entire town Studios that you could walk in and ask for a certain kind of photography and get what you asked for No one told you that you were asking for something that wasnt ldquotheir stylerdquo Requests for something special were not countered with policies and rules and ad-ditional fees Did you want family photos Wedding photos Anniversary graduation or first birthday photos Pictures with your cat your car your tennis trophy
Unless you were a total creepster asking for something crass andor illegal your request was usually granted
But these days were acting a little spoiled A little bit full of ourselves A little bit like that bistro chef who stuck his nose in the air and made sure I felt as if I were asking for a corn dog in his culinary king-dom
The next time a customer asks for some-thing that makes you want to roll your eyes or asks for something slightly different than what you offer hold that thought
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
Are you going to act like Richard or are you going to act like Kimberly the lady who couldnt quite offer what I wanted but worked with me to find a compromise that pleased us both
Somewhere along the line it seems that the customer has been made into the enemy The last time I checked those customers were the key to photographers being able to support our businesses selves and families
Along with the dream clients that hand over artistic control to us its just a fact of life that we are going to have a higher percentage of average every day clients whose tastes are more common and whose need for creativity and specialty is not as high as others
But they walked through OUR door They chose US
They have shown that they do indeed care who they choose as their photog-rapher Just because their photography requests and ideas do not completely match our own is not a reason to throw down the ldquotheyre not my clientrdquo glove
Lets get over ourselves and step up to the plate and deliver some stellar customer service
Like Kimberly we can take this opportuni-ty to work with our clients and offer them some creative additional options Lets utilize our knowledge and skill set to serve each client as best as we can to fulfill their requests and make them happy
If we dont they may very well never be our client again
Christine is a portrait photographer and owner of Gallery C in Dover Ohio She is a co-author of ldquoThe Daily Book of Photographyrdquo and authors ldquoWootness The Big Girl and Guyrsquos Guide to Starting a Photography Businessrdquo
find us (and like us) on Facebook
SEPPAonline
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
Some time ago I wrote an article about ldquoSquarerdquo and how it had changed how I pro-cess credit cards in the studio
At that time Square basically had one function it processed a credit card and did a payout to my bank in about twenty-four hours The percentages were right for my stu-dio and so I happily trashed my big machine that was tied to a phone line in the studio and saved myself some money
Fast forward a couple years and Square has added some new trickshellipso in the interest of sharing these with you Irsquom offering you an update on Square and how Irsquom using it
BIG IDEA 1
It doesnrsquot happen very often but occasionally I end up needing to generate an in-voice for someone to pay online Most recently this happened with a substantial or-der for holiday cards The client lived out of town the cards were going to be drop-shipped and she preferred to pay via credit card What to do
ITrsquoS HIP TO BE SQUAREVictoria Kelly Cr Photog CPP
You now have the capability of generat-ing an invoice via Square
Just go into your dashboard and in the ldquoSalesrdquo dropdown menu select ldquoInvoicesrdquo
The invoice itself is pretty simplehellipyou fill out a few fields (client name email) decide on payment terms from a handy dropdown menu and then select your item from the library that you probably setup when you started using Square
If your item isnrsquot in the library no problem Just key in the wording you want to use and the price Square does everything else for you
You may remember that Square charges a larger fee if you key in the credit card number
With a Square-generated invoice itrsquos the client who is keying in their own number and itrsquos my understanding that Square treats this as a ldquoswipedrdquo card so you are charged the lower fee Cowabunga
BIG IDEA 2
I have been using online scheduling quite successfully for sometime now Itrsquos great for yearbook appointments headshots preview appointments and other odds and ends Letrsquos face ithellipif someone wants to schedule their appointment in the stu-dio while theyrsquore sitting at the computer at midnighthellipI want them to be able to do so
I had noticed that Square was now offer-ing online booking and was intending to
get that piece up and running after the holiday craziness
I booked a holiday gig for the Sunday be-fore Christmas and needed online book-ing FAST So I went into my dashboard set up my staff and the session itself added it to my blog as a clickable link and I was in business
The system will let your clients book an appointment change it or cancel it With each action there is an accompanying email that goes out to the client
One of the best parts though is that it will send an automatic text message to your clientrsquos cell phone reminding them of the appointment I donrsquot have to remember to do that and we all know reminders cut down on no-shows
Irsquove been using Square for a couple of years now and it has made reconciling bank statements and tax time a breeze Square generates a spreadsheet that I can import into QuickBooks and my ac-countant is all smiles when I hand him a single report showing all of our credit card transactions by month for the entire year
NowhellipSquare isnrsquot for everybody Again you should review your business practices and make a comparison between what yoursquore paying with a regular merchant account and what you would be paying with Square
But if you dohellipIrsquom thinking you just might be surprised And then you can hum ldquoItrsquos hip to be Squarerdquo all through the day
BIG IDEA 1
BIG IDEA 2
Victoria Kelly contrsquod
Come on nowyou know you want one of these tickets
How you ask Itrsquos easy
Be one of the first twenty-five registered for FLASH2015 and wersquoll
GIVE you one (Really)
Pretty simple eh
Visit the SEPPA website atwwwSEPPAonlinecom and
click on registrations
Cye Gray and Scott Garlock
($49) Shooting Safari May 2 9am-4pmPlatform May 3 930am - 11am
Wersquove often heard it said that a picture paints a thousand words
For Cye Gray and Scott Garlock preservationist photographers that is absolutely true
Cye and Scott are interested in OLD THINGS And by ldquoold thingsrdquo wersquore talking buildings and places Their mission is to photograph the forgotten buildings and places you might not think of every dayto research the storiesto capture the essence of the people who lived in them worked in them and maybe even called them home
Join Cye and Scott on the FLASH Shooting Safariit will be an adventure where ldquothinking outside the boxrdquo means taking a walk back in time
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
Delawarewwwdelawarephotographerscom
District of Columbiawwwppsgworg
Floridawwwfpponlineorg
Georgiawwwgppacom
Marylandwwwmarylandppacom
MississippiAlabamawwwppmanet
North Carolinawwwppofnccom
South Carolinawwwppofsccom
Tennesseewwwtnppacom
Virginiawwwvppaorg
West Virginiawwwppwvorg
SEPPA is a regional affiliate of the
Professional Photographers of America and hosts an annual
District Image Judging To learn more about PPA
click HERE
Corn Dogs Olive Oil and Pink Mashed PotatoesChristine Walsh-Newton M Photog Cr CPP
In 1983 I worked for a concession stand company traveling from street fair to street fair across the state of Ohio for five months peddling corn dogs In exchange for work-ing a number of ungodly hours that had to be against some kind of labor law I re-ceived a paltry weekly sum and all the corn dogs I could eat They were hot filling and affordable I sold them by the thousands Thirty years later the sight of a corn dog still turns my stomach
Hold that thought
Tucked in the woods on the shore of a lake is a little bistro In the middle of nowhere Ohio its a small treasure to the locals A bit on the pricey side with a delicious menu it became ldquothe placerdquo to go when there was something to celebrate Birthdays anni-versaries post-wedding parties from a table of two to a family group of twelve or so wed appear several times a year for a nice evening of food and wine
On one of these occasions the menu had slightly shifted as it sometimes did It had become trendy to stack food items into a tower and my medium rare filet mignon was served on a bed on dirty mashed potatoes and topped with the vegetable of the day
Individually the items were delicious but I preferred cutting into a nice maison-but-
tered steak without having to scrape mashed potatoes off the bottom and green beans off the top I ate the meal with no complaint but decided that next time I should order the items to be served unstacked
A medium-rare steak well lets just say pink mashed potatoes arent very appetiz-ing
The next time I ordered that meal from the little bistro on the lake I asked for the items to be unstacked When the meal was delivered it was on three different dinner plates One for mashed potatoes one for the steak and one for the green beans Our table for two already con-tained two water glasses two wine glass-es two salads and two plates of appetiz-ers Suddenly it needed to hold four more plates one for my husbands meal and three for mine
I caught the snicker of the wait staff while I tried to arrange the table and finally had to place one of the plates of food on top of my water glass and was forced to hand my salad plate to the waiter even though I hadnt finished
Clearly I was considered one of ldquothoserdquo customers that had somehow offended the chef (well call him ldquoRichardrdquo) with my request
Now maybe this strikes you all as a little funny but at the time it wasnt I had pleasantly and discreetly asked for my meal that way and the resulting effort or-chestrated to embarrass left such a bad taste in my mouth (pun intended) that our visits there eventually stopped and we havent been back in a number of years
Hold that thought too
The other day I was shopping for some imported olive oil at a small store in my area A lovely lady Kimberly had opened an olive oil and vinegar shop somewhat unusual for our area but her extensive knowledge of her product line and her ex-cellent level of customer service has won her a loyal customer base
As I shopped I noticed that the olive oils from Italy were missing and asked if I could speak with her as there was a particular reason I wanted some Due to some trucking strikes on the west coast her shipments had been held up for an additional week and the oil I was looking for wasnt available
She asked about the intended recipient of the gift their food and cooking tastes and recommended a substitute oil from Peru I sampled it listened to her explain the qualities and subtleties of the oil and was convinced it would do nicely in place of the oil from Italy I bought the Peruvian oil with no regrets and went happily on my way
And now hold that thought as well
Andthis has to do with photographyhow
I began to think about our businesses And how the boutique studio model has become popular We want to be refined elegant specialized and serve the upper-most clientele in and out of our area
Sometimes we do a bang up job of it like Kimberly But sometimes well sometimes we act just like Richard And we chase our
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
clients away
I began to think about our clients And how sometimes they ask for something that is not exactly what we have or wish to provide
Maybe the client has brought in 39 Pinter-est pictures of poses so tacky we want to jam our fingers down our throats Setups weve seen a jillion times Props we are SO OVER
Stylistic concepts as common and ordi-nary as a corn dog
Weve been there weve done that and we have the t-shirt and the keychain But yet heres a bright shiny new client face that wants the tacky corn dog pose Be-cause they havent seen it a jillion times They like it They often love it And some-times its ldquothe poserdquo The one they abso-lutely have to have and plan the whole session around
It happens all the time Ive been reading a lot of questions on some of my forums and online groups asking for advice in how to deal with these kinds of clients Im a little bit horrified when I see requests of this nature treated w ith disdain with contempt with a ldquohow dare you insult my artistic integrity with your request for tacki-nessrdquo attitude
An attitude so thick with indignation that I dont believe for a minute that the pho-tographer is able to completely hide it from the client
And I wonder if the client winds up feeling like I did at the bistro on the lake
ldquoBut thats not my stylerdquo they whine
And the photographer in the industry forums is coddled and placated and their attitude is echoed and approved of by others Advice to charge extra fees de-lete the images refund the client money and a variety of other creative solutions are often given
And Im thinking to myself ldquoAre you kid-ding merdquo When did a client request become an issue An insult A situation worthy of this level of angst and unrest
In the olden days before digital before there was a home studio in the basement of one house on every street there was one maybe two photography studios that served an entire town Studios that you could walk in and ask for a certain kind of photography and get what you asked for No one told you that you were asking for something that wasnt ldquotheir stylerdquo Requests for something special were not countered with policies and rules and ad-ditional fees Did you want family photos Wedding photos Anniversary graduation or first birthday photos Pictures with your cat your car your tennis trophy
Unless you were a total creepster asking for something crass andor illegal your request was usually granted
But these days were acting a little spoiled A little bit full of ourselves A little bit like that bistro chef who stuck his nose in the air and made sure I felt as if I were asking for a corn dog in his culinary king-dom
The next time a customer asks for some-thing that makes you want to roll your eyes or asks for something slightly different than what you offer hold that thought
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
Are you going to act like Richard or are you going to act like Kimberly the lady who couldnt quite offer what I wanted but worked with me to find a compromise that pleased us both
Somewhere along the line it seems that the customer has been made into the enemy The last time I checked those customers were the key to photographers being able to support our businesses selves and families
Along with the dream clients that hand over artistic control to us its just a fact of life that we are going to have a higher percentage of average every day clients whose tastes are more common and whose need for creativity and specialty is not as high as others
But they walked through OUR door They chose US
They have shown that they do indeed care who they choose as their photog-rapher Just because their photography requests and ideas do not completely match our own is not a reason to throw down the ldquotheyre not my clientrdquo glove
Lets get over ourselves and step up to the plate and deliver some stellar customer service
Like Kimberly we can take this opportuni-ty to work with our clients and offer them some creative additional options Lets utilize our knowledge and skill set to serve each client as best as we can to fulfill their requests and make them happy
If we dont they may very well never be our client again
Christine is a portrait photographer and owner of Gallery C in Dover Ohio She is a co-author of ldquoThe Daily Book of Photographyrdquo and authors ldquoWootness The Big Girl and Guyrsquos Guide to Starting a Photography Businessrdquo
find us (and like us) on Facebook
SEPPAonline
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
Some time ago I wrote an article about ldquoSquarerdquo and how it had changed how I pro-cess credit cards in the studio
At that time Square basically had one function it processed a credit card and did a payout to my bank in about twenty-four hours The percentages were right for my stu-dio and so I happily trashed my big machine that was tied to a phone line in the studio and saved myself some money
Fast forward a couple years and Square has added some new trickshellipso in the interest of sharing these with you Irsquom offering you an update on Square and how Irsquom using it
BIG IDEA 1
It doesnrsquot happen very often but occasionally I end up needing to generate an in-voice for someone to pay online Most recently this happened with a substantial or-der for holiday cards The client lived out of town the cards were going to be drop-shipped and she preferred to pay via credit card What to do
ITrsquoS HIP TO BE SQUAREVictoria Kelly Cr Photog CPP
You now have the capability of generat-ing an invoice via Square
Just go into your dashboard and in the ldquoSalesrdquo dropdown menu select ldquoInvoicesrdquo
The invoice itself is pretty simplehellipyou fill out a few fields (client name email) decide on payment terms from a handy dropdown menu and then select your item from the library that you probably setup when you started using Square
If your item isnrsquot in the library no problem Just key in the wording you want to use and the price Square does everything else for you
You may remember that Square charges a larger fee if you key in the credit card number
With a Square-generated invoice itrsquos the client who is keying in their own number and itrsquos my understanding that Square treats this as a ldquoswipedrdquo card so you are charged the lower fee Cowabunga
BIG IDEA 2
I have been using online scheduling quite successfully for sometime now Itrsquos great for yearbook appointments headshots preview appointments and other odds and ends Letrsquos face ithellipif someone wants to schedule their appointment in the stu-dio while theyrsquore sitting at the computer at midnighthellipI want them to be able to do so
I had noticed that Square was now offer-ing online booking and was intending to
get that piece up and running after the holiday craziness
I booked a holiday gig for the Sunday be-fore Christmas and needed online book-ing FAST So I went into my dashboard set up my staff and the session itself added it to my blog as a clickable link and I was in business
The system will let your clients book an appointment change it or cancel it With each action there is an accompanying email that goes out to the client
One of the best parts though is that it will send an automatic text message to your clientrsquos cell phone reminding them of the appointment I donrsquot have to remember to do that and we all know reminders cut down on no-shows
Irsquove been using Square for a couple of years now and it has made reconciling bank statements and tax time a breeze Square generates a spreadsheet that I can import into QuickBooks and my ac-countant is all smiles when I hand him a single report showing all of our credit card transactions by month for the entire year
NowhellipSquare isnrsquot for everybody Again you should review your business practices and make a comparison between what yoursquore paying with a regular merchant account and what you would be paying with Square
But if you dohellipIrsquom thinking you just might be surprised And then you can hum ldquoItrsquos hip to be Squarerdquo all through the day
BIG IDEA 1
BIG IDEA 2
Victoria Kelly contrsquod
Come on nowyou know you want one of these tickets
How you ask Itrsquos easy
Be one of the first twenty-five registered for FLASH2015 and wersquoll
GIVE you one (Really)
Pretty simple eh
Visit the SEPPA website atwwwSEPPAonlinecom and
click on registrations
Cye Gray and Scott Garlock
($49) Shooting Safari May 2 9am-4pmPlatform May 3 930am - 11am
Wersquove often heard it said that a picture paints a thousand words
For Cye Gray and Scott Garlock preservationist photographers that is absolutely true
Cye and Scott are interested in OLD THINGS And by ldquoold thingsrdquo wersquore talking buildings and places Their mission is to photograph the forgotten buildings and places you might not think of every dayto research the storiesto capture the essence of the people who lived in them worked in them and maybe even called them home
Join Cye and Scott on the FLASH Shooting Safariit will be an adventure where ldquothinking outside the boxrdquo means taking a walk back in time
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
Corn Dogs Olive Oil and Pink Mashed PotatoesChristine Walsh-Newton M Photog Cr CPP
In 1983 I worked for a concession stand company traveling from street fair to street fair across the state of Ohio for five months peddling corn dogs In exchange for work-ing a number of ungodly hours that had to be against some kind of labor law I re-ceived a paltry weekly sum and all the corn dogs I could eat They were hot filling and affordable I sold them by the thousands Thirty years later the sight of a corn dog still turns my stomach
Hold that thought
Tucked in the woods on the shore of a lake is a little bistro In the middle of nowhere Ohio its a small treasure to the locals A bit on the pricey side with a delicious menu it became ldquothe placerdquo to go when there was something to celebrate Birthdays anni-versaries post-wedding parties from a table of two to a family group of twelve or so wed appear several times a year for a nice evening of food and wine
On one of these occasions the menu had slightly shifted as it sometimes did It had become trendy to stack food items into a tower and my medium rare filet mignon was served on a bed on dirty mashed potatoes and topped with the vegetable of the day
Individually the items were delicious but I preferred cutting into a nice maison-but-
tered steak without having to scrape mashed potatoes off the bottom and green beans off the top I ate the meal with no complaint but decided that next time I should order the items to be served unstacked
A medium-rare steak well lets just say pink mashed potatoes arent very appetiz-ing
The next time I ordered that meal from the little bistro on the lake I asked for the items to be unstacked When the meal was delivered it was on three different dinner plates One for mashed potatoes one for the steak and one for the green beans Our table for two already con-tained two water glasses two wine glass-es two salads and two plates of appetiz-ers Suddenly it needed to hold four more plates one for my husbands meal and three for mine
I caught the snicker of the wait staff while I tried to arrange the table and finally had to place one of the plates of food on top of my water glass and was forced to hand my salad plate to the waiter even though I hadnt finished
Clearly I was considered one of ldquothoserdquo customers that had somehow offended the chef (well call him ldquoRichardrdquo) with my request
Now maybe this strikes you all as a little funny but at the time it wasnt I had pleasantly and discreetly asked for my meal that way and the resulting effort or-chestrated to embarrass left such a bad taste in my mouth (pun intended) that our visits there eventually stopped and we havent been back in a number of years
Hold that thought too
The other day I was shopping for some imported olive oil at a small store in my area A lovely lady Kimberly had opened an olive oil and vinegar shop somewhat unusual for our area but her extensive knowledge of her product line and her ex-cellent level of customer service has won her a loyal customer base
As I shopped I noticed that the olive oils from Italy were missing and asked if I could speak with her as there was a particular reason I wanted some Due to some trucking strikes on the west coast her shipments had been held up for an additional week and the oil I was looking for wasnt available
She asked about the intended recipient of the gift their food and cooking tastes and recommended a substitute oil from Peru I sampled it listened to her explain the qualities and subtleties of the oil and was convinced it would do nicely in place of the oil from Italy I bought the Peruvian oil with no regrets and went happily on my way
And now hold that thought as well
Andthis has to do with photographyhow
I began to think about our businesses And how the boutique studio model has become popular We want to be refined elegant specialized and serve the upper-most clientele in and out of our area
Sometimes we do a bang up job of it like Kimberly But sometimes well sometimes we act just like Richard And we chase our
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
clients away
I began to think about our clients And how sometimes they ask for something that is not exactly what we have or wish to provide
Maybe the client has brought in 39 Pinter-est pictures of poses so tacky we want to jam our fingers down our throats Setups weve seen a jillion times Props we are SO OVER
Stylistic concepts as common and ordi-nary as a corn dog
Weve been there weve done that and we have the t-shirt and the keychain But yet heres a bright shiny new client face that wants the tacky corn dog pose Be-cause they havent seen it a jillion times They like it They often love it And some-times its ldquothe poserdquo The one they abso-lutely have to have and plan the whole session around
It happens all the time Ive been reading a lot of questions on some of my forums and online groups asking for advice in how to deal with these kinds of clients Im a little bit horrified when I see requests of this nature treated w ith disdain with contempt with a ldquohow dare you insult my artistic integrity with your request for tacki-nessrdquo attitude
An attitude so thick with indignation that I dont believe for a minute that the pho-tographer is able to completely hide it from the client
And I wonder if the client winds up feeling like I did at the bistro on the lake
ldquoBut thats not my stylerdquo they whine
And the photographer in the industry forums is coddled and placated and their attitude is echoed and approved of by others Advice to charge extra fees de-lete the images refund the client money and a variety of other creative solutions are often given
And Im thinking to myself ldquoAre you kid-ding merdquo When did a client request become an issue An insult A situation worthy of this level of angst and unrest
In the olden days before digital before there was a home studio in the basement of one house on every street there was one maybe two photography studios that served an entire town Studios that you could walk in and ask for a certain kind of photography and get what you asked for No one told you that you were asking for something that wasnt ldquotheir stylerdquo Requests for something special were not countered with policies and rules and ad-ditional fees Did you want family photos Wedding photos Anniversary graduation or first birthday photos Pictures with your cat your car your tennis trophy
Unless you were a total creepster asking for something crass andor illegal your request was usually granted
But these days were acting a little spoiled A little bit full of ourselves A little bit like that bistro chef who stuck his nose in the air and made sure I felt as if I were asking for a corn dog in his culinary king-dom
The next time a customer asks for some-thing that makes you want to roll your eyes or asks for something slightly different than what you offer hold that thought
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
Are you going to act like Richard or are you going to act like Kimberly the lady who couldnt quite offer what I wanted but worked with me to find a compromise that pleased us both
Somewhere along the line it seems that the customer has been made into the enemy The last time I checked those customers were the key to photographers being able to support our businesses selves and families
Along with the dream clients that hand over artistic control to us its just a fact of life that we are going to have a higher percentage of average every day clients whose tastes are more common and whose need for creativity and specialty is not as high as others
But they walked through OUR door They chose US
They have shown that they do indeed care who they choose as their photog-rapher Just because their photography requests and ideas do not completely match our own is not a reason to throw down the ldquotheyre not my clientrdquo glove
Lets get over ourselves and step up to the plate and deliver some stellar customer service
Like Kimberly we can take this opportuni-ty to work with our clients and offer them some creative additional options Lets utilize our knowledge and skill set to serve each client as best as we can to fulfill their requests and make them happy
If we dont they may very well never be our client again
Christine is a portrait photographer and owner of Gallery C in Dover Ohio She is a co-author of ldquoThe Daily Book of Photographyrdquo and authors ldquoWootness The Big Girl and Guyrsquos Guide to Starting a Photography Businessrdquo
find us (and like us) on Facebook
SEPPAonline
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
Some time ago I wrote an article about ldquoSquarerdquo and how it had changed how I pro-cess credit cards in the studio
At that time Square basically had one function it processed a credit card and did a payout to my bank in about twenty-four hours The percentages were right for my stu-dio and so I happily trashed my big machine that was tied to a phone line in the studio and saved myself some money
Fast forward a couple years and Square has added some new trickshellipso in the interest of sharing these with you Irsquom offering you an update on Square and how Irsquom using it
BIG IDEA 1
It doesnrsquot happen very often but occasionally I end up needing to generate an in-voice for someone to pay online Most recently this happened with a substantial or-der for holiday cards The client lived out of town the cards were going to be drop-shipped and she preferred to pay via credit card What to do
ITrsquoS HIP TO BE SQUAREVictoria Kelly Cr Photog CPP
You now have the capability of generat-ing an invoice via Square
Just go into your dashboard and in the ldquoSalesrdquo dropdown menu select ldquoInvoicesrdquo
The invoice itself is pretty simplehellipyou fill out a few fields (client name email) decide on payment terms from a handy dropdown menu and then select your item from the library that you probably setup when you started using Square
If your item isnrsquot in the library no problem Just key in the wording you want to use and the price Square does everything else for you
You may remember that Square charges a larger fee if you key in the credit card number
With a Square-generated invoice itrsquos the client who is keying in their own number and itrsquos my understanding that Square treats this as a ldquoswipedrdquo card so you are charged the lower fee Cowabunga
BIG IDEA 2
I have been using online scheduling quite successfully for sometime now Itrsquos great for yearbook appointments headshots preview appointments and other odds and ends Letrsquos face ithellipif someone wants to schedule their appointment in the stu-dio while theyrsquore sitting at the computer at midnighthellipI want them to be able to do so
I had noticed that Square was now offer-ing online booking and was intending to
get that piece up and running after the holiday craziness
I booked a holiday gig for the Sunday be-fore Christmas and needed online book-ing FAST So I went into my dashboard set up my staff and the session itself added it to my blog as a clickable link and I was in business
The system will let your clients book an appointment change it or cancel it With each action there is an accompanying email that goes out to the client
One of the best parts though is that it will send an automatic text message to your clientrsquos cell phone reminding them of the appointment I donrsquot have to remember to do that and we all know reminders cut down on no-shows
Irsquove been using Square for a couple of years now and it has made reconciling bank statements and tax time a breeze Square generates a spreadsheet that I can import into QuickBooks and my ac-countant is all smiles when I hand him a single report showing all of our credit card transactions by month for the entire year
NowhellipSquare isnrsquot for everybody Again you should review your business practices and make a comparison between what yoursquore paying with a regular merchant account and what you would be paying with Square
But if you dohellipIrsquom thinking you just might be surprised And then you can hum ldquoItrsquos hip to be Squarerdquo all through the day
BIG IDEA 1
BIG IDEA 2
Victoria Kelly contrsquod
Come on nowyou know you want one of these tickets
How you ask Itrsquos easy
Be one of the first twenty-five registered for FLASH2015 and wersquoll
GIVE you one (Really)
Pretty simple eh
Visit the SEPPA website atwwwSEPPAonlinecom and
click on registrations
Cye Gray and Scott Garlock
($49) Shooting Safari May 2 9am-4pmPlatform May 3 930am - 11am
Wersquove often heard it said that a picture paints a thousand words
For Cye Gray and Scott Garlock preservationist photographers that is absolutely true
Cye and Scott are interested in OLD THINGS And by ldquoold thingsrdquo wersquore talking buildings and places Their mission is to photograph the forgotten buildings and places you might not think of every dayto research the storiesto capture the essence of the people who lived in them worked in them and maybe even called them home
Join Cye and Scott on the FLASH Shooting Safariit will be an adventure where ldquothinking outside the boxrdquo means taking a walk back in time
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
tered steak without having to scrape mashed potatoes off the bottom and green beans off the top I ate the meal with no complaint but decided that next time I should order the items to be served unstacked
A medium-rare steak well lets just say pink mashed potatoes arent very appetiz-ing
The next time I ordered that meal from the little bistro on the lake I asked for the items to be unstacked When the meal was delivered it was on three different dinner plates One for mashed potatoes one for the steak and one for the green beans Our table for two already con-tained two water glasses two wine glass-es two salads and two plates of appetiz-ers Suddenly it needed to hold four more plates one for my husbands meal and three for mine
I caught the snicker of the wait staff while I tried to arrange the table and finally had to place one of the plates of food on top of my water glass and was forced to hand my salad plate to the waiter even though I hadnt finished
Clearly I was considered one of ldquothoserdquo customers that had somehow offended the chef (well call him ldquoRichardrdquo) with my request
Now maybe this strikes you all as a little funny but at the time it wasnt I had pleasantly and discreetly asked for my meal that way and the resulting effort or-chestrated to embarrass left such a bad taste in my mouth (pun intended) that our visits there eventually stopped and we havent been back in a number of years
Hold that thought too
The other day I was shopping for some imported olive oil at a small store in my area A lovely lady Kimberly had opened an olive oil and vinegar shop somewhat unusual for our area but her extensive knowledge of her product line and her ex-cellent level of customer service has won her a loyal customer base
As I shopped I noticed that the olive oils from Italy were missing and asked if I could speak with her as there was a particular reason I wanted some Due to some trucking strikes on the west coast her shipments had been held up for an additional week and the oil I was looking for wasnt available
She asked about the intended recipient of the gift their food and cooking tastes and recommended a substitute oil from Peru I sampled it listened to her explain the qualities and subtleties of the oil and was convinced it would do nicely in place of the oil from Italy I bought the Peruvian oil with no regrets and went happily on my way
And now hold that thought as well
Andthis has to do with photographyhow
I began to think about our businesses And how the boutique studio model has become popular We want to be refined elegant specialized and serve the upper-most clientele in and out of our area
Sometimes we do a bang up job of it like Kimberly But sometimes well sometimes we act just like Richard And we chase our
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
clients away
I began to think about our clients And how sometimes they ask for something that is not exactly what we have or wish to provide
Maybe the client has brought in 39 Pinter-est pictures of poses so tacky we want to jam our fingers down our throats Setups weve seen a jillion times Props we are SO OVER
Stylistic concepts as common and ordi-nary as a corn dog
Weve been there weve done that and we have the t-shirt and the keychain But yet heres a bright shiny new client face that wants the tacky corn dog pose Be-cause they havent seen it a jillion times They like it They often love it And some-times its ldquothe poserdquo The one they abso-lutely have to have and plan the whole session around
It happens all the time Ive been reading a lot of questions on some of my forums and online groups asking for advice in how to deal with these kinds of clients Im a little bit horrified when I see requests of this nature treated w ith disdain with contempt with a ldquohow dare you insult my artistic integrity with your request for tacki-nessrdquo attitude
An attitude so thick with indignation that I dont believe for a minute that the pho-tographer is able to completely hide it from the client
And I wonder if the client winds up feeling like I did at the bistro on the lake
ldquoBut thats not my stylerdquo they whine
And the photographer in the industry forums is coddled and placated and their attitude is echoed and approved of by others Advice to charge extra fees de-lete the images refund the client money and a variety of other creative solutions are often given
And Im thinking to myself ldquoAre you kid-ding merdquo When did a client request become an issue An insult A situation worthy of this level of angst and unrest
In the olden days before digital before there was a home studio in the basement of one house on every street there was one maybe two photography studios that served an entire town Studios that you could walk in and ask for a certain kind of photography and get what you asked for No one told you that you were asking for something that wasnt ldquotheir stylerdquo Requests for something special were not countered with policies and rules and ad-ditional fees Did you want family photos Wedding photos Anniversary graduation or first birthday photos Pictures with your cat your car your tennis trophy
Unless you were a total creepster asking for something crass andor illegal your request was usually granted
But these days were acting a little spoiled A little bit full of ourselves A little bit like that bistro chef who stuck his nose in the air and made sure I felt as if I were asking for a corn dog in his culinary king-dom
The next time a customer asks for some-thing that makes you want to roll your eyes or asks for something slightly different than what you offer hold that thought
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
Are you going to act like Richard or are you going to act like Kimberly the lady who couldnt quite offer what I wanted but worked with me to find a compromise that pleased us both
Somewhere along the line it seems that the customer has been made into the enemy The last time I checked those customers were the key to photographers being able to support our businesses selves and families
Along with the dream clients that hand over artistic control to us its just a fact of life that we are going to have a higher percentage of average every day clients whose tastes are more common and whose need for creativity and specialty is not as high as others
But they walked through OUR door They chose US
They have shown that they do indeed care who they choose as their photog-rapher Just because their photography requests and ideas do not completely match our own is not a reason to throw down the ldquotheyre not my clientrdquo glove
Lets get over ourselves and step up to the plate and deliver some stellar customer service
Like Kimberly we can take this opportuni-ty to work with our clients and offer them some creative additional options Lets utilize our knowledge and skill set to serve each client as best as we can to fulfill their requests and make them happy
If we dont they may very well never be our client again
Christine is a portrait photographer and owner of Gallery C in Dover Ohio She is a co-author of ldquoThe Daily Book of Photographyrdquo and authors ldquoWootness The Big Girl and Guyrsquos Guide to Starting a Photography Businessrdquo
find us (and like us) on Facebook
SEPPAonline
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
Some time ago I wrote an article about ldquoSquarerdquo and how it had changed how I pro-cess credit cards in the studio
At that time Square basically had one function it processed a credit card and did a payout to my bank in about twenty-four hours The percentages were right for my stu-dio and so I happily trashed my big machine that was tied to a phone line in the studio and saved myself some money
Fast forward a couple years and Square has added some new trickshellipso in the interest of sharing these with you Irsquom offering you an update on Square and how Irsquom using it
BIG IDEA 1
It doesnrsquot happen very often but occasionally I end up needing to generate an in-voice for someone to pay online Most recently this happened with a substantial or-der for holiday cards The client lived out of town the cards were going to be drop-shipped and she preferred to pay via credit card What to do
ITrsquoS HIP TO BE SQUAREVictoria Kelly Cr Photog CPP
You now have the capability of generat-ing an invoice via Square
Just go into your dashboard and in the ldquoSalesrdquo dropdown menu select ldquoInvoicesrdquo
The invoice itself is pretty simplehellipyou fill out a few fields (client name email) decide on payment terms from a handy dropdown menu and then select your item from the library that you probably setup when you started using Square
If your item isnrsquot in the library no problem Just key in the wording you want to use and the price Square does everything else for you
You may remember that Square charges a larger fee if you key in the credit card number
With a Square-generated invoice itrsquos the client who is keying in their own number and itrsquos my understanding that Square treats this as a ldquoswipedrdquo card so you are charged the lower fee Cowabunga
BIG IDEA 2
I have been using online scheduling quite successfully for sometime now Itrsquos great for yearbook appointments headshots preview appointments and other odds and ends Letrsquos face ithellipif someone wants to schedule their appointment in the stu-dio while theyrsquore sitting at the computer at midnighthellipI want them to be able to do so
I had noticed that Square was now offer-ing online booking and was intending to
get that piece up and running after the holiday craziness
I booked a holiday gig for the Sunday be-fore Christmas and needed online book-ing FAST So I went into my dashboard set up my staff and the session itself added it to my blog as a clickable link and I was in business
The system will let your clients book an appointment change it or cancel it With each action there is an accompanying email that goes out to the client
One of the best parts though is that it will send an automatic text message to your clientrsquos cell phone reminding them of the appointment I donrsquot have to remember to do that and we all know reminders cut down on no-shows
Irsquove been using Square for a couple of years now and it has made reconciling bank statements and tax time a breeze Square generates a spreadsheet that I can import into QuickBooks and my ac-countant is all smiles when I hand him a single report showing all of our credit card transactions by month for the entire year
NowhellipSquare isnrsquot for everybody Again you should review your business practices and make a comparison between what yoursquore paying with a regular merchant account and what you would be paying with Square
But if you dohellipIrsquom thinking you just might be surprised And then you can hum ldquoItrsquos hip to be Squarerdquo all through the day
BIG IDEA 1
BIG IDEA 2
Victoria Kelly contrsquod
Come on nowyou know you want one of these tickets
How you ask Itrsquos easy
Be one of the first twenty-five registered for FLASH2015 and wersquoll
GIVE you one (Really)
Pretty simple eh
Visit the SEPPA website atwwwSEPPAonlinecom and
click on registrations
Cye Gray and Scott Garlock
($49) Shooting Safari May 2 9am-4pmPlatform May 3 930am - 11am
Wersquove often heard it said that a picture paints a thousand words
For Cye Gray and Scott Garlock preservationist photographers that is absolutely true
Cye and Scott are interested in OLD THINGS And by ldquoold thingsrdquo wersquore talking buildings and places Their mission is to photograph the forgotten buildings and places you might not think of every dayto research the storiesto capture the essence of the people who lived in them worked in them and maybe even called them home
Join Cye and Scott on the FLASH Shooting Safariit will be an adventure where ldquothinking outside the boxrdquo means taking a walk back in time
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
clients away
I began to think about our clients And how sometimes they ask for something that is not exactly what we have or wish to provide
Maybe the client has brought in 39 Pinter-est pictures of poses so tacky we want to jam our fingers down our throats Setups weve seen a jillion times Props we are SO OVER
Stylistic concepts as common and ordi-nary as a corn dog
Weve been there weve done that and we have the t-shirt and the keychain But yet heres a bright shiny new client face that wants the tacky corn dog pose Be-cause they havent seen it a jillion times They like it They often love it And some-times its ldquothe poserdquo The one they abso-lutely have to have and plan the whole session around
It happens all the time Ive been reading a lot of questions on some of my forums and online groups asking for advice in how to deal with these kinds of clients Im a little bit horrified when I see requests of this nature treated w ith disdain with contempt with a ldquohow dare you insult my artistic integrity with your request for tacki-nessrdquo attitude
An attitude so thick with indignation that I dont believe for a minute that the pho-tographer is able to completely hide it from the client
And I wonder if the client winds up feeling like I did at the bistro on the lake
ldquoBut thats not my stylerdquo they whine
And the photographer in the industry forums is coddled and placated and their attitude is echoed and approved of by others Advice to charge extra fees de-lete the images refund the client money and a variety of other creative solutions are often given
And Im thinking to myself ldquoAre you kid-ding merdquo When did a client request become an issue An insult A situation worthy of this level of angst and unrest
In the olden days before digital before there was a home studio in the basement of one house on every street there was one maybe two photography studios that served an entire town Studios that you could walk in and ask for a certain kind of photography and get what you asked for No one told you that you were asking for something that wasnt ldquotheir stylerdquo Requests for something special were not countered with policies and rules and ad-ditional fees Did you want family photos Wedding photos Anniversary graduation or first birthday photos Pictures with your cat your car your tennis trophy
Unless you were a total creepster asking for something crass andor illegal your request was usually granted
But these days were acting a little spoiled A little bit full of ourselves A little bit like that bistro chef who stuck his nose in the air and made sure I felt as if I were asking for a corn dog in his culinary king-dom
The next time a customer asks for some-thing that makes you want to roll your eyes or asks for something slightly different than what you offer hold that thought
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
Are you going to act like Richard or are you going to act like Kimberly the lady who couldnt quite offer what I wanted but worked with me to find a compromise that pleased us both
Somewhere along the line it seems that the customer has been made into the enemy The last time I checked those customers were the key to photographers being able to support our businesses selves and families
Along with the dream clients that hand over artistic control to us its just a fact of life that we are going to have a higher percentage of average every day clients whose tastes are more common and whose need for creativity and specialty is not as high as others
But they walked through OUR door They chose US
They have shown that they do indeed care who they choose as their photog-rapher Just because their photography requests and ideas do not completely match our own is not a reason to throw down the ldquotheyre not my clientrdquo glove
Lets get over ourselves and step up to the plate and deliver some stellar customer service
Like Kimberly we can take this opportuni-ty to work with our clients and offer them some creative additional options Lets utilize our knowledge and skill set to serve each client as best as we can to fulfill their requests and make them happy
If we dont they may very well never be our client again
Christine is a portrait photographer and owner of Gallery C in Dover Ohio She is a co-author of ldquoThe Daily Book of Photographyrdquo and authors ldquoWootness The Big Girl and Guyrsquos Guide to Starting a Photography Businessrdquo
find us (and like us) on Facebook
SEPPAonline
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
Some time ago I wrote an article about ldquoSquarerdquo and how it had changed how I pro-cess credit cards in the studio
At that time Square basically had one function it processed a credit card and did a payout to my bank in about twenty-four hours The percentages were right for my stu-dio and so I happily trashed my big machine that was tied to a phone line in the studio and saved myself some money
Fast forward a couple years and Square has added some new trickshellipso in the interest of sharing these with you Irsquom offering you an update on Square and how Irsquom using it
BIG IDEA 1
It doesnrsquot happen very often but occasionally I end up needing to generate an in-voice for someone to pay online Most recently this happened with a substantial or-der for holiday cards The client lived out of town the cards were going to be drop-shipped and she preferred to pay via credit card What to do
ITrsquoS HIP TO BE SQUAREVictoria Kelly Cr Photog CPP
You now have the capability of generat-ing an invoice via Square
Just go into your dashboard and in the ldquoSalesrdquo dropdown menu select ldquoInvoicesrdquo
The invoice itself is pretty simplehellipyou fill out a few fields (client name email) decide on payment terms from a handy dropdown menu and then select your item from the library that you probably setup when you started using Square
If your item isnrsquot in the library no problem Just key in the wording you want to use and the price Square does everything else for you
You may remember that Square charges a larger fee if you key in the credit card number
With a Square-generated invoice itrsquos the client who is keying in their own number and itrsquos my understanding that Square treats this as a ldquoswipedrdquo card so you are charged the lower fee Cowabunga
BIG IDEA 2
I have been using online scheduling quite successfully for sometime now Itrsquos great for yearbook appointments headshots preview appointments and other odds and ends Letrsquos face ithellipif someone wants to schedule their appointment in the stu-dio while theyrsquore sitting at the computer at midnighthellipI want them to be able to do so
I had noticed that Square was now offer-ing online booking and was intending to
get that piece up and running after the holiday craziness
I booked a holiday gig for the Sunday be-fore Christmas and needed online book-ing FAST So I went into my dashboard set up my staff and the session itself added it to my blog as a clickable link and I was in business
The system will let your clients book an appointment change it or cancel it With each action there is an accompanying email that goes out to the client
One of the best parts though is that it will send an automatic text message to your clientrsquos cell phone reminding them of the appointment I donrsquot have to remember to do that and we all know reminders cut down on no-shows
Irsquove been using Square for a couple of years now and it has made reconciling bank statements and tax time a breeze Square generates a spreadsheet that I can import into QuickBooks and my ac-countant is all smiles when I hand him a single report showing all of our credit card transactions by month for the entire year
NowhellipSquare isnrsquot for everybody Again you should review your business practices and make a comparison between what yoursquore paying with a regular merchant account and what you would be paying with Square
But if you dohellipIrsquom thinking you just might be surprised And then you can hum ldquoItrsquos hip to be Squarerdquo all through the day
BIG IDEA 1
BIG IDEA 2
Victoria Kelly contrsquod
Come on nowyou know you want one of these tickets
How you ask Itrsquos easy
Be one of the first twenty-five registered for FLASH2015 and wersquoll
GIVE you one (Really)
Pretty simple eh
Visit the SEPPA website atwwwSEPPAonlinecom and
click on registrations
Cye Gray and Scott Garlock
($49) Shooting Safari May 2 9am-4pmPlatform May 3 930am - 11am
Wersquove often heard it said that a picture paints a thousand words
For Cye Gray and Scott Garlock preservationist photographers that is absolutely true
Cye and Scott are interested in OLD THINGS And by ldquoold thingsrdquo wersquore talking buildings and places Their mission is to photograph the forgotten buildings and places you might not think of every dayto research the storiesto capture the essence of the people who lived in them worked in them and maybe even called them home
Join Cye and Scott on the FLASH Shooting Safariit will be an adventure where ldquothinking outside the boxrdquo means taking a walk back in time
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
Are you going to act like Richard or are you going to act like Kimberly the lady who couldnt quite offer what I wanted but worked with me to find a compromise that pleased us both
Somewhere along the line it seems that the customer has been made into the enemy The last time I checked those customers were the key to photographers being able to support our businesses selves and families
Along with the dream clients that hand over artistic control to us its just a fact of life that we are going to have a higher percentage of average every day clients whose tastes are more common and whose need for creativity and specialty is not as high as others
But they walked through OUR door They chose US
They have shown that they do indeed care who they choose as their photog-rapher Just because their photography requests and ideas do not completely match our own is not a reason to throw down the ldquotheyre not my clientrdquo glove
Lets get over ourselves and step up to the plate and deliver some stellar customer service
Like Kimberly we can take this opportuni-ty to work with our clients and offer them some creative additional options Lets utilize our knowledge and skill set to serve each client as best as we can to fulfill their requests and make them happy
If we dont they may very well never be our client again
Christine is a portrait photographer and owner of Gallery C in Dover Ohio She is a co-author of ldquoThe Daily Book of Photographyrdquo and authors ldquoWootness The Big Girl and Guyrsquos Guide to Starting a Photography Businessrdquo
find us (and like us) on Facebook
SEPPAonline
Christine Walsh-Newton contrsquod
Some time ago I wrote an article about ldquoSquarerdquo and how it had changed how I pro-cess credit cards in the studio
At that time Square basically had one function it processed a credit card and did a payout to my bank in about twenty-four hours The percentages were right for my stu-dio and so I happily trashed my big machine that was tied to a phone line in the studio and saved myself some money
Fast forward a couple years and Square has added some new trickshellipso in the interest of sharing these with you Irsquom offering you an update on Square and how Irsquom using it
BIG IDEA 1
It doesnrsquot happen very often but occasionally I end up needing to generate an in-voice for someone to pay online Most recently this happened with a substantial or-der for holiday cards The client lived out of town the cards were going to be drop-shipped and she preferred to pay via credit card What to do
ITrsquoS HIP TO BE SQUAREVictoria Kelly Cr Photog CPP
You now have the capability of generat-ing an invoice via Square
Just go into your dashboard and in the ldquoSalesrdquo dropdown menu select ldquoInvoicesrdquo
The invoice itself is pretty simplehellipyou fill out a few fields (client name email) decide on payment terms from a handy dropdown menu and then select your item from the library that you probably setup when you started using Square
If your item isnrsquot in the library no problem Just key in the wording you want to use and the price Square does everything else for you
You may remember that Square charges a larger fee if you key in the credit card number
With a Square-generated invoice itrsquos the client who is keying in their own number and itrsquos my understanding that Square treats this as a ldquoswipedrdquo card so you are charged the lower fee Cowabunga
BIG IDEA 2
I have been using online scheduling quite successfully for sometime now Itrsquos great for yearbook appointments headshots preview appointments and other odds and ends Letrsquos face ithellipif someone wants to schedule their appointment in the stu-dio while theyrsquore sitting at the computer at midnighthellipI want them to be able to do so
I had noticed that Square was now offer-ing online booking and was intending to
get that piece up and running after the holiday craziness
I booked a holiday gig for the Sunday be-fore Christmas and needed online book-ing FAST So I went into my dashboard set up my staff and the session itself added it to my blog as a clickable link and I was in business
The system will let your clients book an appointment change it or cancel it With each action there is an accompanying email that goes out to the client
One of the best parts though is that it will send an automatic text message to your clientrsquos cell phone reminding them of the appointment I donrsquot have to remember to do that and we all know reminders cut down on no-shows
Irsquove been using Square for a couple of years now and it has made reconciling bank statements and tax time a breeze Square generates a spreadsheet that I can import into QuickBooks and my ac-countant is all smiles when I hand him a single report showing all of our credit card transactions by month for the entire year
NowhellipSquare isnrsquot for everybody Again you should review your business practices and make a comparison between what yoursquore paying with a regular merchant account and what you would be paying with Square
But if you dohellipIrsquom thinking you just might be surprised And then you can hum ldquoItrsquos hip to be Squarerdquo all through the day
BIG IDEA 1
BIG IDEA 2
Victoria Kelly contrsquod
Come on nowyou know you want one of these tickets
How you ask Itrsquos easy
Be one of the first twenty-five registered for FLASH2015 and wersquoll
GIVE you one (Really)
Pretty simple eh
Visit the SEPPA website atwwwSEPPAonlinecom and
click on registrations
Cye Gray and Scott Garlock
($49) Shooting Safari May 2 9am-4pmPlatform May 3 930am - 11am
Wersquove often heard it said that a picture paints a thousand words
For Cye Gray and Scott Garlock preservationist photographers that is absolutely true
Cye and Scott are interested in OLD THINGS And by ldquoold thingsrdquo wersquore talking buildings and places Their mission is to photograph the forgotten buildings and places you might not think of every dayto research the storiesto capture the essence of the people who lived in them worked in them and maybe even called them home
Join Cye and Scott on the FLASH Shooting Safariit will be an adventure where ldquothinking outside the boxrdquo means taking a walk back in time
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
Some time ago I wrote an article about ldquoSquarerdquo and how it had changed how I pro-cess credit cards in the studio
At that time Square basically had one function it processed a credit card and did a payout to my bank in about twenty-four hours The percentages were right for my stu-dio and so I happily trashed my big machine that was tied to a phone line in the studio and saved myself some money
Fast forward a couple years and Square has added some new trickshellipso in the interest of sharing these with you Irsquom offering you an update on Square and how Irsquom using it
BIG IDEA 1
It doesnrsquot happen very often but occasionally I end up needing to generate an in-voice for someone to pay online Most recently this happened with a substantial or-der for holiday cards The client lived out of town the cards were going to be drop-shipped and she preferred to pay via credit card What to do
ITrsquoS HIP TO BE SQUAREVictoria Kelly Cr Photog CPP
You now have the capability of generat-ing an invoice via Square
Just go into your dashboard and in the ldquoSalesrdquo dropdown menu select ldquoInvoicesrdquo
The invoice itself is pretty simplehellipyou fill out a few fields (client name email) decide on payment terms from a handy dropdown menu and then select your item from the library that you probably setup when you started using Square
If your item isnrsquot in the library no problem Just key in the wording you want to use and the price Square does everything else for you
You may remember that Square charges a larger fee if you key in the credit card number
With a Square-generated invoice itrsquos the client who is keying in their own number and itrsquos my understanding that Square treats this as a ldquoswipedrdquo card so you are charged the lower fee Cowabunga
BIG IDEA 2
I have been using online scheduling quite successfully for sometime now Itrsquos great for yearbook appointments headshots preview appointments and other odds and ends Letrsquos face ithellipif someone wants to schedule their appointment in the stu-dio while theyrsquore sitting at the computer at midnighthellipI want them to be able to do so
I had noticed that Square was now offer-ing online booking and was intending to
get that piece up and running after the holiday craziness
I booked a holiday gig for the Sunday be-fore Christmas and needed online book-ing FAST So I went into my dashboard set up my staff and the session itself added it to my blog as a clickable link and I was in business
The system will let your clients book an appointment change it or cancel it With each action there is an accompanying email that goes out to the client
One of the best parts though is that it will send an automatic text message to your clientrsquos cell phone reminding them of the appointment I donrsquot have to remember to do that and we all know reminders cut down on no-shows
Irsquove been using Square for a couple of years now and it has made reconciling bank statements and tax time a breeze Square generates a spreadsheet that I can import into QuickBooks and my ac-countant is all smiles when I hand him a single report showing all of our credit card transactions by month for the entire year
NowhellipSquare isnrsquot for everybody Again you should review your business practices and make a comparison between what yoursquore paying with a regular merchant account and what you would be paying with Square
But if you dohellipIrsquom thinking you just might be surprised And then you can hum ldquoItrsquos hip to be Squarerdquo all through the day
BIG IDEA 1
BIG IDEA 2
Victoria Kelly contrsquod
Come on nowyou know you want one of these tickets
How you ask Itrsquos easy
Be one of the first twenty-five registered for FLASH2015 and wersquoll
GIVE you one (Really)
Pretty simple eh
Visit the SEPPA website atwwwSEPPAonlinecom and
click on registrations
Cye Gray and Scott Garlock
($49) Shooting Safari May 2 9am-4pmPlatform May 3 930am - 11am
Wersquove often heard it said that a picture paints a thousand words
For Cye Gray and Scott Garlock preservationist photographers that is absolutely true
Cye and Scott are interested in OLD THINGS And by ldquoold thingsrdquo wersquore talking buildings and places Their mission is to photograph the forgotten buildings and places you might not think of every dayto research the storiesto capture the essence of the people who lived in them worked in them and maybe even called them home
Join Cye and Scott on the FLASH Shooting Safariit will be an adventure where ldquothinking outside the boxrdquo means taking a walk back in time
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
You now have the capability of generat-ing an invoice via Square
Just go into your dashboard and in the ldquoSalesrdquo dropdown menu select ldquoInvoicesrdquo
The invoice itself is pretty simplehellipyou fill out a few fields (client name email) decide on payment terms from a handy dropdown menu and then select your item from the library that you probably setup when you started using Square
If your item isnrsquot in the library no problem Just key in the wording you want to use and the price Square does everything else for you
You may remember that Square charges a larger fee if you key in the credit card number
With a Square-generated invoice itrsquos the client who is keying in their own number and itrsquos my understanding that Square treats this as a ldquoswipedrdquo card so you are charged the lower fee Cowabunga
BIG IDEA 2
I have been using online scheduling quite successfully for sometime now Itrsquos great for yearbook appointments headshots preview appointments and other odds and ends Letrsquos face ithellipif someone wants to schedule their appointment in the stu-dio while theyrsquore sitting at the computer at midnighthellipI want them to be able to do so
I had noticed that Square was now offer-ing online booking and was intending to
get that piece up and running after the holiday craziness
I booked a holiday gig for the Sunday be-fore Christmas and needed online book-ing FAST So I went into my dashboard set up my staff and the session itself added it to my blog as a clickable link and I was in business
The system will let your clients book an appointment change it or cancel it With each action there is an accompanying email that goes out to the client
One of the best parts though is that it will send an automatic text message to your clientrsquos cell phone reminding them of the appointment I donrsquot have to remember to do that and we all know reminders cut down on no-shows
Irsquove been using Square for a couple of years now and it has made reconciling bank statements and tax time a breeze Square generates a spreadsheet that I can import into QuickBooks and my ac-countant is all smiles when I hand him a single report showing all of our credit card transactions by month for the entire year
NowhellipSquare isnrsquot for everybody Again you should review your business practices and make a comparison between what yoursquore paying with a regular merchant account and what you would be paying with Square
But if you dohellipIrsquom thinking you just might be surprised And then you can hum ldquoItrsquos hip to be Squarerdquo all through the day
BIG IDEA 1
BIG IDEA 2
Victoria Kelly contrsquod
Come on nowyou know you want one of these tickets
How you ask Itrsquos easy
Be one of the first twenty-five registered for FLASH2015 and wersquoll
GIVE you one (Really)
Pretty simple eh
Visit the SEPPA website atwwwSEPPAonlinecom and
click on registrations
Cye Gray and Scott Garlock
($49) Shooting Safari May 2 9am-4pmPlatform May 3 930am - 11am
Wersquove often heard it said that a picture paints a thousand words
For Cye Gray and Scott Garlock preservationist photographers that is absolutely true
Cye and Scott are interested in OLD THINGS And by ldquoold thingsrdquo wersquore talking buildings and places Their mission is to photograph the forgotten buildings and places you might not think of every dayto research the storiesto capture the essence of the people who lived in them worked in them and maybe even called them home
Join Cye and Scott on the FLASH Shooting Safariit will be an adventure where ldquothinking outside the boxrdquo means taking a walk back in time
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
BIG IDEA 1
BIG IDEA 2
Victoria Kelly contrsquod
Come on nowyou know you want one of these tickets
How you ask Itrsquos easy
Be one of the first twenty-five registered for FLASH2015 and wersquoll
GIVE you one (Really)
Pretty simple eh
Visit the SEPPA website atwwwSEPPAonlinecom and
click on registrations
Cye Gray and Scott Garlock
($49) Shooting Safari May 2 9am-4pmPlatform May 3 930am - 11am
Wersquove often heard it said that a picture paints a thousand words
For Cye Gray and Scott Garlock preservationist photographers that is absolutely true
Cye and Scott are interested in OLD THINGS And by ldquoold thingsrdquo wersquore talking buildings and places Their mission is to photograph the forgotten buildings and places you might not think of every dayto research the storiesto capture the essence of the people who lived in them worked in them and maybe even called them home
Join Cye and Scott on the FLASH Shooting Safariit will be an adventure where ldquothinking outside the boxrdquo means taking a walk back in time
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
Come on nowyou know you want one of these tickets
How you ask Itrsquos easy
Be one of the first twenty-five registered for FLASH2015 and wersquoll
GIVE you one (Really)
Pretty simple eh
Visit the SEPPA website atwwwSEPPAonlinecom and
click on registrations
Cye Gray and Scott Garlock
($49) Shooting Safari May 2 9am-4pmPlatform May 3 930am - 11am
Wersquove often heard it said that a picture paints a thousand words
For Cye Gray and Scott Garlock preservationist photographers that is absolutely true
Cye and Scott are interested in OLD THINGS And by ldquoold thingsrdquo wersquore talking buildings and places Their mission is to photograph the forgotten buildings and places you might not think of every dayto research the storiesto capture the essence of the people who lived in them worked in them and maybe even called them home
Join Cye and Scott on the FLASH Shooting Safariit will be an adventure where ldquothinking outside the boxrdquo means taking a walk back in time
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
Cye Gray and Scott Garlock
($49) Shooting Safari May 2 9am-4pmPlatform May 3 930am - 11am
Wersquove often heard it said that a picture paints a thousand words
For Cye Gray and Scott Garlock preservationist photographers that is absolutely true
Cye and Scott are interested in OLD THINGS And by ldquoold thingsrdquo wersquore talking buildings and places Their mission is to photograph the forgotten buildings and places you might not think of every dayto research the storiesto capture the essence of the people who lived in them worked in them and maybe even called them home
Join Cye and Scott on the FLASH Shooting Safariit will be an adventure where ldquothinking outside the boxrdquo means taking a walk back in time
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
Ann Monteith
Business May 1-2 9am-4pmPlatform May 4 8am - 11am
Did you know that most businesses fail within the first five years
Is it a lack of vision commitment passion
If yoursquore an emerging professional (and even if you arenrsquot) you owe it to yourself to make this investment in the success of your business whether yoursquore a residential gallery or storefront
ldquoAnn Monteithrdquo is the name everybody knows when it comes to getting down to the basics of a studiorsquos success
Shersquoll show you the way when it comes to analyzing your numbers planning your business strategy and how to say ldquonordquo when it comes to dropping those product lines that just arenrsquot profitable
Separate registration required visit Annrsquos website wwwannsworkshopcom
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
save the date
May 1-5
Charlotte NC
