It’s Simple
Simply put, Happy Holidays to all my readers. I thank you for a great year and I wish you all the best this holiday season.
Recipe Of Light
Recently I was working with a potential client and a number of issues came up that seem to come up time and time again. The client said, “With digital, taking pictures is free or next to it. Why are photography prices so high?” They were truly under the impression that to take a photograph costs nothing other than the cost of the camera. Mostly they believed this because that is what the manufacturers of cameras want you to believe.
In fact just to take a digital photograph only takes the cost of a camera. The issue begins when you want to do something with the image you have captured. You need to upload the image somewhere and that takes a computer usually. Then what if you want to fix something in the image? Now you need software. If you want to print the image, well then you need a printer too, either yours or the local print shop.
Let’s just look at cameras for a moment. Sure you can pick up a pocket, point and shoot camera and take a snapshot. The results you get are a lot better than they were with your last film camera too, but are they professional quality? Probably not. But you could get one of those cameras advertised on TV where the guy is running around snapping pictures everywhere of the model types at the party or the models on a runway. Again, a better image than your last entry level SLR film camera but pro quality? Maybe a few of your images are better than the pocket camera. At least as a professional I hope so!
A Face Made For Radio
That would be my face. I am certainly no beauty but I don’t scare little children either. I am not a svelte, buff guy either (as you can see), and I don’t have wonderfully wavy hair that blows softly in the wind; I haven’t seen a hair on my head in years! So yeah, I am more of a fit for the radio – internet radio at that.
The good thing is I will be on the (internet) radio on June 10th! I have been asked by Michael E. Stern to be on his radio show along with Beate Chelette, my success coach, also known as The Photography Business Coach.
A Different Level
I have asked this before and I will ask it again: “Where does networking end? “
I am a member of a group called PRE (Professional Referral Exchange) that meets every Thursday for lunch and networking. PRE has a unique view on networking because at PRE networking never ends. In fact the premise is that we work as each other’s sales force; always trying to promote not just ourselves but others in the group as well.
Our PRE group is original in a number of ways, and not just because we are a group of professionals that want to help each other in any way we can. A PRE group enlists as many professionals as it can but only one representative of each business category; for example I am the only photographer in the group, Walter is the Personal Financial Manager, Dana the one Business Banker, Bob the only website designer, and so on. Continue reading
Hiring Well
I don’t know a single business person that hires the cheapest candidate available. Each candidate is hired based on their qualifications, knowledge and (perceived) abilities. You review resumes and references and then you start the interview process. If the best fit is close to the salary range you have reserved for the position, you hire them; if not you negotiate to see if a compromise is possible. After all, you are going to be working with this person for a long time and you want them to fit into your business culture and atmosphere. It is the smart thing to do.
So why not use that same business sense to hire a vendor? In many cases vendors are chosen strictly by the price of their bid. In many cases business owners/managers are so concerned about the immediate spend that they miss the value of the proposal and product offered. Does this mean that the cheapest is always the best deal? In fact most of the time the “best deal” is not a good value at all.
In my last post, ‘The Value of Quality,’ I used the automobile business as a scenario to make my point. To carry that forward let’s look at another vehicle, the Yugo. Yeah I hear all of you groaning. The fact of the matter is that towards the end of the Yugo’s life in the US there was a deal where you buy one and get one free (BOGO). It was a hell of a deal but was it of any value? Not really. Parts were almost impossible to find, the company was obviously not going to be around long and the cars didn’t have a good reputation at all. If you went for the BOGO your only hope was to use the second one to keep the first one running.
So why is it that many still go for the lowest price? If I am going to fly to the moon I don’t want the cheapest rocket, I want the safest and most reliable. I want to come back too! There may be water on the moon but there isn’t much to eat. Now if that rocket also is the least expensive, bully for me! But cost is not the major factor; quality of service and quality of product are. Continue reading
