Are Albums The Key To A Sustainable Photography Business?

 ALBUMS CAN BE THE SOLUTION TO MAKING MORE MONEY WITHOUT NEEDING MORE BOOKINGS.

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Now, I know money isn’t the end all be all, in fact I personally have many other reasons for offering albums (and I know you do too). But the reality of it is that we’re entrepreneurs and our goal is to have a profitable and sustainable business.

We’ve hustled, put in all the extra hours, late nights & early mornings, done back-to-back-to-back days of shoots, and we deserve to reach a level of success where we CAN have the lifestyle we’ve always been working towards. If you’re like me you’ve probably spent WAY more hours on your business than you ever thought you would because you wanted to achieve a certain point of success (regardless how you define your it). Whether you’re chasing a specific goal or just success in general, sometimes we forget the bigger picture. Our business is supposed to afford us the lifestyle we want to live, whether that’s spending time with family, taking time off, or working on other hobbies / projects. Instead of feeling weighed down by our business, it’s supposed to give us freedom that we would otherwise lack working a standard 9-5 job.

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OUR BUSINESS IS SUPPOSED TO AFFORD US THE LIFESTYLE WE WANT TO LIVE.

One of the most time consuming aspects of our business is generating new leads and converting inquiries to bookings. Think about all those social media strategies, blog posts, ads, giveaways, meetings, and networking events you’ve done since starting your business. You spend a lot of time preparing for where your next lead is going to come from, and it can be a lot of hard work. It’s time to shift your mindset and maximize the leads / clients you already have right in front of you.

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BUT WAIT,

Before we go to deep into this, let’s get this straight. I’m not saying you should just stop all the work your doing to get new leads and new bookings in your business. It’s an extremely important part of your workflow that you really want to have working for you (ideally on autopilot).

What I AM saying is that if one of your strategies isn’t converting to a significant amount of leads and bookings (or any at all), then maybe your time is better spent on something else like maximizing your current client base. 

YOUR TIME MAY BE BETTER SPENT MAXIMIZING YOUR CURRENT CLIENT BASE

Albums can help increase your revenue without having to invest more time in getting more leads and more bookings, which can ultimately be the most time consuming and expensive aspect of our photography business. We’ve already acquired the clients so if we’re able to add a couple extra thousands of dollars onto each package, then suddenly we don’t need to book as many weddings (or portraits) to reach our financial goals. It’s really the classic mentality of working smarter, not harder. If you aren’t yet offering albums then you’re likely leaving a lot of $$ on the table - not the most savvy business strategy.

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Now if this has you a little down, it might be because you know that albums could make all the difference in reaching your goals and you’ve just always put off getting started. That’s OK, not all hope is lost! If you get organized and set up a strong marketing strategy, you can actually offer albums to past clients (from years back) in a way that will convert to significant sales. 

SO WHAT DO YOU REALLY NEED TO ADD ALBUMS INTO YOUR WORKFLOW?

Well, there are three things that you’ll need to profitably and efficiently include albums in your business:

1. ONE hour per week to work on album design/correspondence/orders/deliveries

2. Knowledge of album design and an album software (alternatively, outsource your album designs)

3. A marketing strategy and an organized workflow that maximizes your time

Pretty straightforward, eh? I want you to know that of course there are a million excuses to put off incorporating albums into your business, but the bottom line is that once you have an organized system and the skills to create / market albums, you’ll be dedicating a very small amount of time per week to see big returns. That’s just good business if you ask me. So if you’re willing to put in the time to get yourself up and running, soon you’ll find yourself with an album workflow that runs smoothly and increases your bottom line - without increasing your investment of time.

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WITH AN ORGANIZED SYSTEM AND THE SKILLS TO DESIGN/MARKET ALBUMS - YOU’LL BE ABLE TO DEDICATE A SMALL AMOUNT OF TIME EACH WEEK TO YOUR WORKFLOW AND SEE BIG RETURNS.

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READY TO LEARN HOW TO SUCCESSFULLY SELL AND DESIGN ALBUMS?

I know that as a photographer you may not inherently have the skills to sell and design albums, that's why I created the Album Workshop.

It's a self-paced, online course that teaches you the skills you need to CONFIDENTLY sell albums to EVERY SINGLE CLIENT and DESIGN BEAUTIFUL LAYOUTS that your clients will be proud to pass down for GENERATIONS.

Albums can be the key to a sustainable business and to providing your clients with the ultimate experience. 

In the course I guide you through all the ins and outs of offering albums to help you avoid COSTLY MISTAKES and learn to sell albums in a GENUINE WAY that isn’t off-putting to your clients.

I’ll teach you my method that only adds ONE HOUR to your work week so that albums can be used to make more money, without needing more bookings.

Invest in yourself and the growth of your business, there’s no better time then now.

4 Mistakes Photographers Make When It Comes To Selling Albums

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Whether you’re new to offering albums or it’s always something you’ve included in your business - it can sometimes feel like an uphill battle when trying to communicate the value of your physical products to your clients. It can be frustrating and can often push you to a point where you want to give up entirely - so what do most photographers do? They simply move their albums to an A La Carte menu and hope that once in a while someone will order one as a nice little bonus.

If you’ve been disappointed in the results of your album sales you may be making one of these crucial mistakes. Now even if you’re making these mistakes - not all hope is lost. It can be as simple as making one little change in your business to start seeing results that make a real impact in your business.

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IT CAN BE AS SIMPLE AS CORRECTING ONE SIMPLE MISTAKE TO START SEEING RESULTS.

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MISTAKE #1: YOU’RE NOT SHOWING OFF YOUR SAMPLES

This may sound a little blunt but if you don’t have a sample album, you’re not going to sell albums. The product we’re offering is tangible and that tangibility needs to be communicated in its truest form. The easiest way to showcase the value of an album is to let your clients see it and touch it for themselves. This tangible experience allows your clients to create their own emotional connection to the wedding album and begin to envision their own photos curated across each page. The way the photos look, the way the paper feels, it all matters when your client is trying to figure out the value of the product. So the easiest thing for you to do is create a beautiful sample album that showcases your work and the craftsmanship of the actual album and get that stunning sample album in their hands!

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Even if you can’t meet your potential clients in person, this doesn’t mean that the sample album is useless. In this instance, you’ll need to get a little creative. Create photo or video content of your samples so that the physical attributes of the album can be seen and communicated as best as possible to your clients. 

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MISTAKE #2: YOU NEVER TALK ABOUT ALBUMS

You may have a sample album and you include albums in your packages, but if you never talk about albums then you aren’t communicating their value and importance which can ultimately change the perspective your own clients have for your products. Easy little things that you might overlook can make all the difference in creating effective communication with your clients. Include social media posts about albums to begin to build awareness and value of your products (it also helps remind your past clients who didn’t get an album that it isn’t too late!). Whether you’re creating Tiktok videos or Instagram posts - these are channels where you’re communicating your brand values and ideas to clients so make sure you include albums once in a while, the payoff will be worthwhile in the long run.

This mistake doesn’t only apply to social media however. In order to fully embrace albums as a part of your brand you need to include them in all aspects of your marketing, this includes any point of contact you have with clients and potential clients like meetings and email campaigns.

If you need help figuring out how to talk about albums and get that messaging clear across all your market, check out my free resource: 6 Things You Can Do Right Now To Start Selling Albums. When you complete the worksheet you’ll have developed a way of communicating the value of albums that’s true to your brand voice and you’ll have a step-by-step guide on how to promote your products. 

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MISTAKE #3: POSITIONING ALBUMS AS OPTIONAL

If you already offer albums but you’re presenting them to your clients as an “add-on” to your packages - you’re communicating to your clients that albums are optional and not something that’s intrinsically valuable to your brand. Now, that’s not really the message you want to send when you’re trying to attribute (emotional and monetary) value to your albums. The idea of something being optional says that this product is a luxurious add-on, not a valuable necessity. It’s this sort of thinking that will prevent your clients from fully emotionally investing themselves in the thought of having a beautiful keepsake.

I see this with a lot with photographers who either have sort of given up on albums or they aren’t really sure if their clients actually want albums. What they do is they put their albums in an A La Carte menu - as an option for clients to add on to their package - and then end up selling less than five albums a year.

The problem here is that you’ve (sort of) blatantly told your clients that getting an album isn’t actually an important part of the process and by making albums optional, you’ve decreased their value in the clients eyes and you’ll always be facing an uphill battle in trying to convince them otherwise. 

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IF ALBUMS ARE OPTIONAL IN YOUR PACKAGES, YOU ARE DECREASING THEIR VALUE TO YOUR CLIENTS

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MISTAKE #4: GIVING TOO MANY OPTION

The last crucial mistake you might be making is that you’re giving your clients too many decisions to make. If your clients are presented with a lot of different options, it’s going to make it really hard for them to commit to anything at all. This is a common mistake that a lot of photographers make. With all the cover materials and paper types out there, it can be easy to pass along those decisions to our clients instead of just making them ourselves.

Presenting your clients with a small selection of curated options will removed the issue of having your clients face the paradox of choice, and will ultimate covert to more album sales.

If you want to learn more about how to curate choice for your clients by simplifying your offerings - check out this blog post. It provides three actionable steps you can implement to create a curation selection of offerings - so when you’re presenting them to your clients they won’t feel overwhelmed.

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Whether you’re making one or all of these mistakes, if you invest a little bit of time in shifting your current practices - you’ll start to see a shift in your clients mentality as well. All these strategies are put in place to raise the value of your albums in the eyes of your clients. The value isn’t the cost, the value is an intangible worth and importance that your clients attribute to albums and that’s something that starts with YOU. 

So if you’ve been disappointed in your conversions on album sales take a look at your process. If it’s not one of these mistakes, then there may be a different break in the communication between you and your clients. Evaluate HOW you are showcasing and elevating the value of your albums and see where there could be improvement. Two things will happen when we’re able to communicate the value of albums to our clients more organically:

1. It will lead to more conversion of sales
2. You’ll feel more confident and natural selling albums

If you ever feel lost or need an evaluation of your album sales process, you can either reach out to me directly or check our our Facebook community that has a ton of other free resources and is a safe space to ask questions.

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READY TO LEARN HOW TO SUCCESSFULLY SELL AND DESIGN ALBUMS?

I know that as a photographer you may not inherently have the skills to sell and design albums, that's why I created the Album Workshop.

It's a self-paced, online course that teaches you the skills you need to CONFIDENTLY sell albums to EVERY SINGLE CLIENT and DESIGN BEAUTIFUL LAYOUTS that your clients will be proud to pass down for GENERATIONS.

Albums can be the key to a sustainable business and to providing your clients with the ultimate experience. 

In the course I guide you through all the ins and outs of offering albums to help you avoid COSTLY MISTAKES and learn to sell albums in a GENUINE WAY that isn’t off-putting to your clients.

I’ll teach you my method that only adds ONE HOUR to your work week so that albums can be used to make more money, without needing more bookings. 

Invest in yourself and the growth of your business, there’s no better time then now.

Curating Choice: Simplifying Your Album Offerings

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 If a person is faced with too much choice it will paralyze them and more likely than not they will simply prefer to not make the decision at all. What does this mean for offering albums? If you’re giving your clients 5 different album types with 10 different cover materials and 3 different shape - they are going to feel overwhelmed and likely walk away from choosing one at all. So the biggest favour you can do for your clients is to limit the amount of decisions they need to make and in result, they’ll be more invested in learning about your products and getting emotionally connected to the process.

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WHEN YOU ARE DECIDING HOW MANY ALBUMS TO OFFER, MY ADVICE IS ALWAYS TO SIMPLIFY.

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If, at this point, you are still feeling like, “well, Ryanne, I don’t want to limit my client’s options because I want them to have the perfect album”. I hear you, I felt like that when I first offered albums too. I figured everyone has their own style and will want to see all the options that are out there to make sure they’re making the right choice. This is NOT the reality! Let’s step back and get a bit of perspective on the situation. 

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Let’s use ordering a pizza as an example. When I go to my favourite gourmet pizzeria there are 5-7 pizzas that the chef at the restaurant has decided to put on the menu. I’m able to clearly see the differences between each kind and quickly make a decision about which one will fill my craving. I order my pizza almost immediately and head home happy.

On the flip side, if I’m ordering from a chain pizza place, I always feel inclined to create my own pizza because there are just so many options. I proceed to sit there for a LONG TIME (usually on my couch at home) debating if I’ll get a white or red pizza, what toppings I should choose, and the type of crust I should go with. I’ll find myself wasting a lot of time by overthinking how to create the best build-your-own pizza and by the time I place my order I feel a little frustrated that I took so long to make up my mind. 

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WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR ALBUMS?

I think it’s a fairly self-explanatory example, but this same theory applies to how you present and offer your albums to your clients. If you apply the same strategy as the gourmet pizzeria, simplifying the offerings and tailoring them to your clientele, your clients will have an easier time making their decision and will actually have a more positive all around experience when they walk away with your product. If you treat your albums like a build-your-own pizza place, the process can become agonizing for your clients. Decision fatigue will eventually set in from contemplating all the different options you’ve presented them. If they end up choosing anything at all, the experience will be tainted by the exhaustion of having to make so many small decisions.

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SIMPLIFYING OFFERINGS AND TAILORING THEM TO YOUR CLIENTELE WILL MAKE IT EASY FOR YOUR CLIENTS TO MAKE A DECISION AND COMMIT TO AN ALBUM.

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Let’s make it easy for our clients, we have the opportunity to guide them towards a product they will love while enjoying the process of creating it with you. What we want to do is CURATE the choices for our clients. If you think about it, your clients are clearly drawn to your style, they love your photography, and by extension of that you can infer that they trust your taste and judgement on aesthetic choices. So when you are looking through all of the album options out there, notice which options YOU are gravitating towards and which ones fit seamlessly with your brand and aesthetic. After all, you’re an artist as well as a business person, so trust your artistic judgement and really lean into what’s inspiring during the decision making process.

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SO HERE’S WHAT YOU NEED TO DO TO CURATE YOUR ALBUM OFFERINGS FOR YOUR CLIENTS:

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1. SELECT 1-3 ALBUM OPTIONS THAT REALLY ALIGN WITH YOUR BRAND

Select 1-3 album options that really align with your brand (having two options is a real sweet spot if you’re just starting out). With all the incredible suppliers out there you can find albums that suite all kinds of styles. There is everything from velvet to leather materials, pastels to deep rich cover colours, square to landscape orientation, ultra-thick to ultra-thin pages, etc. It’s all out there.

If you’re just getting started, a few great supplies you can look into are: QT Albums (USA & Europe), Queensberry Albums (New Zealand), Red Tree Albums (USA), GTA Imaging (Canada), and Dekora (Canada).

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2. CUT DOWN THE CHOICES

Limit the choices for EACH album in terms of all the specifications they can have. Each album you offer should have a predetermined size, spread count, paper type, and cover option. I even suggest limiting the colour options to avoid overwhelming your clients.

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3. PRESENT OPTIONS IN A CONCISE FORMAT

Present the options that they do have in a concise format that allows easy decision making. Whether you are using a product guide or showcasing your albums in person, point out the defining features of each album that matter most to your clients. Donald Miller (a marketing expert in clarifying your message) said if you confuse, you lose. So keep in mind, your client doesn’t need to know the full explanation of why you offer the specific albums that you do, they just want to know what aspects will benefit them and ultimately make them the happiest.

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We all know decision-making is difficult and the last thing we want to do for our clients is create added stress when they’re working on putting together something as important as a wedding album. The whole philosophy of preserving photographs is meant to evoke positive feelings and it’s important to remind ourselves of that throughout the entire album process and experience. It can be especially hard for clients to make small decisions (for example: paper thickness) because they haven’t gotten to experience all the different options for themselves. On top of that, if we are giving out clients a lot of decisions to make, we are actually making it harder for them to commit to getting an album. At that point, we are doing both our clients and ourselves a disservice. 

So when you carefully curate the album options for your clients it significantly decreases the amount of decision making they have to do, which in turn alleviates a lot of that stress they may otherwise would’ve experienced. This actually transforms the album decision process into one where your clients feel like you have helped them commit to a product that is in their best interest and gives them fulfilment.

BONUS TIP: I’ll always recommend getting sample albums of all the options you offer so your clients can understand the differences and make an easy and informed decision. 

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READY TO LEARN HOW TO SUCCESSFULLY SELL AND DESIGN ALBUMS?

I know that as a photographer you may not inherently have the skills to sell and design albums, that's why I created the Album Workshop.

It's a self-paced, online course that teaches you the skills you need to CONFIDENTLY sell albums to EVERY SINGLE CLIENT and DESIGN BEAUTIFUL LAYOUTS that your clients will be proud to pass down for GENERATIONS.

Albums can be the key to a sustainable business and to providing your clients with the ultimate experience. 

In the course I guide you through all the ins and outs of offering albums to help you avoid COSTLY MISTAKES and learn to sell albums in a GENUINE WAY that isn’t off-putting to your clients.

I’ll teach you my method that only adds ONE HOUR to your work week so that albums can be used to make more money, without needing more bookings. 

Invest in yourself and the growth of your business, there’s no better time then now.

Why You Don't Need IPS to Sell Albums and Prints

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If you know anything about me, you know that albums are something I genuinely believe in offering my clients. I know in the past I’ve gone on and on about the importance of print and why you should have printed products available for your clients, but I haven’t talked a lot about how I go about selling those prints and albums. 

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IF YOU ASK ME, IT’S A MYTH THAT YOU NEED TO DO TRADITIONAL IPS (IN-PERSON SALES) TO GET YOUR CLIENTS TO INVEST IN BEAUTIFUL ARTWORK AND HEIRLOOM ALBUMS.

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I mean, let’s face it, an IPS model is not for everyone - for many reasons. You may not have a studio space to bring clients to, you may not live in the area where the majority of your clients live, or you’re just shy and awkward when it comes to selling and there is nothing more horrifying to you than sitting in front of people and telling them they should buy a $5000 gallery wall set from you. Whatever the reason is, you don’t need to give up on selling albums and prints if you can’t get on board with IPS. 

It’s 2020 and we are in the middle of a global pandemic, virtual-everything has become our new normal and it’s the perfect wave to ride when approaching album and print sales. I think it’s time to reimagine how we “sell” to our clients. Don’t get me wrong, I definitely see the importance in showing off products to clients, getting them in their hands so they can touch and feel them, I just like to go about it a little bit differently.

Instead of following a traditional IPS model, I developed my own hybrid style of offering printed products that suites my business and personality. I’ve put together a list of just some of the ways I’ve tailored my client workflow to achieve more album and print sales throughout their experience.

1. UTILIZE YOUR INITIAL MEETING

I’ll say it again and again, get sample albums / prints to show off your products. These samples are what you will share with your clients during your initial meeting, allowing you to showcase the different options you have and help them get excited about the tangible products you offer. The booking process needs to be exciting and fun for your clients and having the option to flip through your work with their own two hands is an easy no-pressure way to sell yourself (and the products) during a crucial step of the client experience.

For me it’s all about the initial meeting. When clients are in the midst of planning their wedding it can be a really exciting time for them and I want to keep that momentum going. They’re dreaming up what their day will be like and anticipating the beautiful photographs they will have of their own wedding. In these meetings I’m going to personally ensure that the feeling of their day is captured in hundreds of perfectly imperfect little moments and then I’m also going to make sure those memories are taken care of and preserved with artisan products that are worthy of displaying their images. 

While riding the high of the initial meetings, I go through all my album options with my clients - highlighting their features, the process, and the importance of printing your photographs. It’s at this point that they will decide what product is the best fit for them and their style - already making up their mind that they are going to get prints and an album when booking an initial package. It’s not uncommon for my clients to eventually upgrade their album option post-wedding and since they already made an initial investment for an album, the cost of upgrade is often worthwhile and more affordable now that the costs of the wedding are in the past. Not to mention that once my clients receive their wedding gallery they are so excited and happy with the photos that it only reinforces their initial decision to invest in printed products and this new found excitement often pushes them to upgrade.

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2. HAVE AN ONLINE SHOP

There are now multiple gallery hosts that provide the option of having an online store. If you aren’t familiar with these platforms, check out Pic-Time or Pixieset to see how they’ve integrated online stores into their galleries. I personally use Pic-Time and their advanced store features are an easy way for me to make multiple additional sales from my clients after their session. Why is this so effective? Well, first off, most people love to online shop. Giving your clients the opportunity to browse products at home (which is probably where they will be putting any prints or albums they purchase) will help them visualize what it would look like and give them a no-pressure feeling while shopping and your clients have free reign to check out the products on their own time. Having an online shop is the ultimate way to sell without selling - having the photos and products speak for themselves.

Another great feature of Pic-Time is that it automatically mocks up samples of how the products look with that specific client’s images (see the sample Pic-Time Shop below), this tool really helps your clients visualize themselves in the product and ultimately care about it.

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Screenshot of my Pic-Time Online Shop

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3. CHOOSE YOUR PRODUCTS WISELY

Just like your photography, your products should have a style and jive with your aesthetic and brand. Chances are your clients (who already like your work) will also prefer products that align with your brand. Consider how your work looks best, is it on a deep-matte or glossy paper? Minimalist framed gallery style prints or classic wrapped canvases? Take some time to reflect on what types of products really fit your work and you’ll see how your clients will fall in love with the products as much as they have with your photography.

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4.UTILIZE PHOTOS AND VIDEOS

The key to spreading the word about your beautiful products is through your advertising and social media channels. We’re photographers, so it makes sense to utilize the skills that we have to truly elevate our own promotion material. Take beautiful images of your albums and other printed products so that you have content to share across your marketing materials and social platforms. It’s great to have photos that highlight the different features of your products so that you can share that with potential and existing clients, keeping them informed really helps them narrow down what product are the perfect fit for their home and lifestyle.

Another great way to showcase the quality of your beautiful albums is to film a video of you going through it or (even better) having a client going through their own wedding album - that’s a gold mine! Your clients will love to see the albums you are putting out there for others and it will be a gentle reminder to make sure they get one of their own as they’ll start to understand the value and importance of owning one of their own.

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5. RUN A PROMOTIONAL OFFER

Now whether your clients committed to anything before their session or not, there is still the opportunity to offer them printed products after the fact. Running a seasonal sale can give them that extra little incentive to buy now that there’s an opportunity to save a few dollars on a product that may otherwise be out of their budget. The holidays are a great time to run a sale for example as many people are often stuck on finding gift ideas and they’re more inclined to spend money during the holidays.

Consider highlighting certain products that really fit your clients style and maybe even mock up some digital samples for them to really envision and create excitement. Seasonal sales have been extremely successful for me over the past few years and I highly recommend incorporating them into your own client experience.

If you’re looking to run your own seasonal sale, you’ll want to check out my free resource, The Ultimate Promotional Offer Checklist which will give you your own step-by-step guide for running a promotional offer to your clients.

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As the world continues to shift into a digital space I believe it’s important for us as photographers to adapt our businesses as well and keep up with the ever changing industry. Although I believe the traditional model of IPS is slightly outdated, I’m certainly not saying that there is no merit to the system. Many photographers have incredible success with their IPS workflow and client experience but it’s important to understand that there are other options out there if IPS isn’t right for your photography business. There are aspects of IPS that can be evolved and adapted to fit this new online world that we are living in, it’s just about narrowing your focus and cherry picking those elements that fit your business.

Ultimately, as entrepreneurs there will never be a single one-size fits all solution for any sales method but it’s important to take the steps to implement SOMETHING into your business. Product sales don’t have to be a scary and intimidating aspect of running a photography business, if you genuinely believe in the products and work you’re putting out there you’ll undoubtably find success in selling your albums because you’ll be able to communicate the important and value they have to any and all of your clients.

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READY TO LEARN HOW TO SUCCESSFULLY SELL AND DESIGN ALBUMS?

I know that as a photographer you may not inherently have the skills to sell and design albums, that's why I created the Album Workshop.

It's a self-paced, online course that teaches you the skills you need to CONFIDENTLY sell albums to EVERY SINGLE CLIENT and DESIGN BEAUTIFUL LAYOUTS that your clients will be proud to pass down for GENERATIONS.

Albums can be the key to a sustainable business and to providing your clients with the ultimate experience. 

In the course I guide you through all the ins and outs of offering albums to help you avoid COSTLY MISTAKES and learn to sell albums in a GENUINE WAY that isn’t off-putting to your clients.

I’ll teach you my method that only adds ONE HOUR to your work week so that albums can be used to make more money, without needing more bookings. 

Invest in yourself and the growth of your business, there’s no better time then now.