How to handle clients....a few questions

[eilla05]

Please read this blog from the beginning to current. It's going to take you some time, but do it. It's well worth it. THIS post is probably the launch point for why I think you need to read his blog. Then the follow ups to it. Then everything after it about business.

I get tired of the answer "I am cheap because no one can afford me if I weren't..." YOU can't afford you when you think that way. Quit thinking with YOUR wallet and your friends wallets. They are NOT your clients, they are not luxury item clients. Value yourself and your work. Quit running a lemonade stand.

Wow very interesting blog. Still reading but already I am like wow..yes..oh wow.

 

[PhotoWrangler]

Oh and by the way..photography is a learning business. Every session teaches us something and if you are not learning I suggest you ask yourself what it is you a missing out on.

This is what every beginner tells themselves to make them feel better when they are called out for being a beginner. I know... I used to get pissed as well.

 

[manaheim]

I still get pissed for being such a beginner and I've been at this 9 years. Lol

 

[eilla05]

Then you are not priced to be a successful business, that covers costs of doing business, such as seperate business phones.

You say you are not a "huge" business. I am not sure what you are trying to say other than you are not making enough money to be a proper business. Do you have a Million Dollar Liabilty insurance plan? Have you made a business plan?

I have a business plan however I just started charging a month ago, literally. Therefore when I say "huge" that is what I mean. I just started and until I build a reputation and get more in my portfolio my cost is what it is. I have a separate business phone but not a cell phone for business. As soon as my business takes off I plan to add a business only cell.

I am not sure what your implication of not being a proper business is. You don't just start out overnight and charge $500 to clients unless you have previously been working or have a large portfolio. I am assuming based on your comments you charge way more than I do. While that might be fine for you and your business market where I am located it wouldn't fly. Even the best photographers in this town do not charge anywhere near what you are implying. I know my market and what my current portfolio and skill level are. As I build on both of those I will adjust my pricing to reflect both.

I appreciate you taking the time to comment on my thread but I feel a little belittled by them. This board is for all levels of photographers who are charging for their work be it $5 or $5000 and for help in doing so at least that is what I thought it was for. If this is the wrong board to ask the question I posed feel free to point me in the right direction.

My mother once opened a retail dance, excercise and activewear clothing store.

The day she opened she had already spent a significant amount of time computing costs for her labor, her electricity, her rent, her inventory and related shipping and storage and even her gas back and forth to work. She factored all of that into how much she needed to charge for her clothes in order ot make a profit, set the profit level she was comfortable with, and priced her inventory appropriately. On day one she opened up with the markup that she continued to charge until the day she sold off her small CHAIN of clothing stores and quit the business.

If she had worked in the manner that you (and many) photographers work, she would have been selling her clothing at a loss on day one. She would have had a LOT of customers, but they would have been people who would normally have been shopping at walmart shopping at her boutique to get high-end brands for cheap, and those customers would have been a pain in the ass... and she would have been out of business within 2-3 months because she couldn't have afforded the rent.

The point is that any business you are going to run needs to be profitable on day one or it's basically not a business. It's a hobby where someone is covering part of your costs. And when you are conducting yourself as a hobbyist, people will treat you as a hobbyist. That is to say, as if you don't really know what you're doing and don't have any real business practices to speak of.

You may well now say that you don't know what you're doing, and that's all well and good... then you are probably not really ready to do this. I'm not suggesting you have to have all the experience that you would attain from doing this professionally for years to open up your own shop, but some experience helps. Go work with/for some other pros as a secondary for a while. Ask questions. Listen and take advice seriously. Learn something... learn more than you do now, and then go for it. Absolutely go for it.

(I think) this is what bitter is saying to you. He's not kicking you to the curb ... he's telling you what your problem is. You are responding defensively to that, and I can totally understand that, but his advice is sound. You said "I'm having this problem", and bitter is saying why, and he's spot-on. It's also a broader answer than you were probably hoping for, but it's the root answer- the core- the real stuff that is not only affecting you here, but will affect you for every client.

And there ARE some pros on here... some are part time, some are full time, some were full time once and are now part time. I can tell you that all the people who say stuff like this are the ones that have done it professionally, and every single one of them started out with little or no experience... so not only are they telling you what they know as a pro, they are telling you what they know as somoene who once was not.

Take the advice seriously.

Great post. I am taking it seriously I really am. Here is what is holding me back. Being afraid I won't have business even though I think I am good enough for it. Does that make sense? Being where I am market wise charging much more than I do would most likely mean little business. It is a poor city literally i am not just saying this. Even seasoned pro's who have been in this town for years charge $65.00 sitting fees...Honestly I do appreciate Bitters comments and honestly but the manner in which he tells its make me want to kick him in the teeth...lol not that I don't agree with some of what he says but the way he says it sucks and is a put off for people on this board.

As I said to Bitter..I have called pros around my area..no one wants to take on second even for free. To them its competition and they don't want to teach the competition.

 

[PhotoWrangler]

...not that I don't agree with some of what he says but the way he says it sucks and is a put off for people on this board.

He tells the truth, and most people can't handle the truth these days. They want to be ego stroked and have information sugar coated and delivered to them on a plate of cotton candy. THAT'S what BS.

 

[eilla05]

It's simply FASCINATING the assumptions, unfounded as far as I can see, that people are making about the OP's business. Did he or she post details about expenses and margins and so on elsewhere, because I ain't seeing it here.

Photography is quite a different business than selling clothes, so manaheim's story is only tangentially related. You're selling your labor, and that's about it. You have a bunch of fixed expenses, sure, and a bunch of sunk costs, but the actual COGs boils down to whatever your time is worth plus some gas money. Whether or not you are "losing money" on day one depends almost entirely on how you are doing your accounting.

Restaurants, to pull out another example of a business, routinely lose money hand over fist for a while. There's as much reason to compare restaurants to photography as there is to compare clothing stores, and I think the comparison is in fact rather more apt.

manaheim's sentence: "The point is that any business you are going to run needs to be profitable on day one or it's basically not a business." has never actually applied to any business anywhere. Profitability isn't even a meaningful thing on day one, and if it was, virtually no business would be profitable on day one. There's too much cost up front and not enough revenue in the first 24 hours. So, what manaheim PROBABLY means (forgive me for putting words in your mouth) is that the business needs to have a viable model on day one to be a real business, which is a statement that means something at least.

It is, interestingly, also untrue. Frequently businesses will tinker with the model as they go along until they settle on one that works.

More importantly, we haven't a shred of reason to imagine that the OP doesn't have a perfectly viable complete business plan.

What we have is someone who said 'I gave my cell phone number to a client and she is calling me incessantly now, anyone got any ideas?' and everyone jumped in and said 'YOUR BUSINESS MODEL IS **** YOU SHOULD DIE' which is, not to put too fine of a point on it:

a) typical of the semi-literate ill-considered mean-spirited garbage we see on TPF from altogether too many of the frequent posters
b) completely wrong-headed

EDIT: What's REALLY interesting to me here is that some of this nonsense came from posters I do not think of as belonging to the 'semi-literal ill-considered mean-spirited' crowd at all. manaheim and Bitter Jeweler are usually among the helpful and pleasant posters here, just to pull two names at random that surprised me here.

You are correct - I really meant more along the lines of viable than profitable. Plenty of business's aren't profitable right away.

The OP said some things that are telltale signs of someone who is undervaluing their services, including implying that $500 was a ton of money and that they were not good enough to charge that. We have been around here for a while and I can tell you that's a leading forecaster. It is an assumption on our part, I'll give you... But I'd bet good money it is spot on.

And while you may not be agush over my particular anecdote, it is perfectly appropriate. Businesses are about expenses and profits, (including opportunity costs) - plain and simple. Every business has different concerns but if you spend more than you make, you fail. If you could have made more money doing something else, you have to at least question your choices.

Oh and thanks for calling me semi-literal illiterate and mean spirited. You know, you've been in the middle of just about every Nast derailed thread I've seen here in the past 6 weeks or so. Not JUST you, but you do always seem to be there. I wonder if there is a connection......

$500 IS a TON of money to 90% of the people located in my market and the other 10% already have 2 photographers in town to go to that have been here for years. I would love to live in a town where I could charge that or more but I don't.

 

[eilla05]

Oh and by the way..photography is a learning business. Every session teaches us something and if you are not learning I suggest you ask yourself what it is you a missing out on.

This is what every beginner tells themselves to make them feel better when they are called out for being a beginner. I know... I used to get pissed as well.

lol ! I learn something every session...I didn't say I learn something about my camera every session I said I learned every session...difference..I am not pissed actually

 

[manaheim]

Great post. I am taking it seriously I really am. Here is what is holding me back. Being afraid I won't have business even though I think I am good enough for it. Does that make sense? Being where I am market wise charging much more than I do would most likely mean little business. It is a poor city literally i am not just saying this. Even seasoned pro's who have been in this town for years charge $65.00 sitting fees...Honestly I do appreciate Bitters comments and honestly but the manner in which he tells its make me want to kick him in the teeth...lol not that I don't agree with some of what he says but the way he says it sucks and is a put off for people on this board.

As I said to Bitter..I have called pros around my area..no one wants to take on second even for free. To them its competition and they don't want to teach the competition.

Look at bitters post count and the number of likes... Now look at his join date. Now look at mine.

The more people try to help here the grumpier they become. We're like a bunch of old men yelling at the kids speeding through the neighborhood. (I'm sure I'll be told that's a bad analogy...)

Don't take it too seriously. Read the content, ignore the mild snark.

As far as your problem, I obviously can't know your market but I hear what you're saying. It's tough because if you increase the prices too much for the low end customers but not enough for the good customers you'll get no business. I know a guy who had a hell of a time until he got fed up, went back to IT, and tripled his fees just to tell people not to bother him unless they felt like making it well worth his while. Next thing he knew he had too much business.

There are no easy answers- I wish there were. In the meantime you might consider putting in a catch-all hourly rate for services above and beyond the contract and use that to dissuade people from bugging you.

 

[PhotoWrangler]

We're like a bunch of old men yelling at the kids speeding through the neighborhood. (I'm sure I'll be told that's a bad analogy...)

Bitter.......HE JUST CALLED YOU OLD!

 

[amolitor]

Oh and thanks for calling me semi-literal illiterate and mean spirited. You know, you've been in the middle of just about every Nast derailed thread I've seen here in the past 6 weeks or so. Not JUST you, but you do always seem to be there. I wonder if there is a connection......

You in particular were only ill-considered. The mean spirited and semi literate were other people.

I get the frustration with trying over and over to help, and as I suggested, you in particular seem to be quite pleasant most of the time. I suggest to those who cannot contain their bile and persist in yelling when asked for help that they stop trying to help. Yelling about lame businesses and fauxtography tells us more about the yeller than the yellee. And it certainly doesn't help.

Perhaps I am always in the middle because I am mighty warrior for truth and justice!

 

[manaheim]

You in particular were only ill-considered. The mean spirited and semi literate were other people.

I get the frustration with trying over and over to help, and as I suggested, you in particular seem to be quite pleasant most of the time. I suggest to those who cannot contain their bile and persist in yelling when asked for help that they stop trying to help. Yelling about lame businesses and fauxtography tells us more about the yeller than the yellee. And it certainly doesn't help.

Perhaps I am always in the middle because I am mighty warrior for truth and justice!

Yes. I'm sure that's it.

You know I remember very few people on TPF, but those I do remember fall into two categories. Truly helpful, exceptional contributors... And jerks. I made note of you very early on. I have little doubt you'll be quite certain of which category YOU fall into, oh mighty warrior.

I'm done here.

 

[amolitor]

Did anyone actually get around to answering the original question? I missed it, if so.

I've literally never done customer service work, but it seems to me that a polite but definite "this is not appropriate, you need to contact me only during business hours" is definitely called for quite early.

If a customer has a dispute over the results, which you cannot resolve yourself, you might consider using arbitration. I understand that it's substantially cheaper and less confrontational than the court system. You might consider shopping around for an arbitrator, if you're in the USA, and when things get really ugly put it out there as an option. A professional arbitrator should be in a better position than I to fill in the details.

 

[Tee]

To the OP: until you get a busniess phone, tell the customer you have business hours in which they can call.

Perhaps I am always in the middle because I am mighty warrior for truth and justice!

No...you're TPF's very own internet White Knight. Congratulations, btw, it's been a while since someone came galloping in on their horse to rescue the victim. In the 2 1/2 years I've been on here, there have been hundreds upon hundreds of threads like this. It always ends the same way.

 

[Steve5D]

I appreciate you taking the time to comment on my thread but I feel a little belittled by them. This board is for all levels of photographers who are charging for their work be it $5 or $5000 and for help in doing so at least that is what I thought it was for. If this is the wrong board to ask the question I posed feel free to point me in the right direction.

You're going to find a number of similar people here. They'll belittle you, will present their ideas as the only viable ones, and will recoil at the very thought of doing anything remotely helpful like pointing you in the right direction.

It's sad that it happens, but it does.

Generally speaking, people who do that are those who wish they were getting paid, too.

As to your questions, customers are always going to be more on the bothersome side as opposed to the "sit and wait" side. How you choose to handle the questions regarding poses, etc, is up to you, but I would be a bit more on the direct side concerning the late night (and early morning) contact. That's just not acceptable. They wouldn't like you calling them out of the blue at two in the morning, so they shouldn't be doing it, either.

Unedited photos? Not a chance. I've only ever done that once, and the client paid pretty handsomely for it. If you don't agree to it beforehand, no way in Hell do they get them...

 

[Steve5D]

It's simply FASCINATING the assumptions, unfounded as far as I can see, that people are making about the OP's business. Did he or she post details about expenses and margins and so on elsewhere, because I ain't seeing it here.

Photography is quite a different business than selling clothes, so manaheim's story is only tangentially related. You're selling your labor, and that's about it. You have a bunch of fixed expenses, sure, and a bunch of sunk costs, but the actual COGs boils down to whatever your time is worth plus some gas money. Whether or not you are "losing money" on day one depends almost entirely on how you are doing your accounting.

Restaurants, to pull out another example of a business, routinely lose money hand over fist for a while. There's as much reason to compare restaurants to photography as there is to compare clothing stores, and I think the comparison is in fact rather more apt.

manaheim's sentence: "The point is that any business you are going to run needs to be profitable on day one or it's basically not a business." has never actually applied to any business anywhere. Profitability isn't even a meaningful thing on day one, and if it was, virtually no business would be profitable on day one. There's too much cost up front and not enough revenue in the first 24 hours. So, what manaheim PROBABLY means (forgive me for putting words in your mouth) is that the business needs to have a viable model on day one to be a real business, which is a statement that means something at least.

It is, interestingly, also untrue. Frequently businesses will tinker with the model as they go along until they settle on one that works.

More importantly, we haven't a shred of reason to imagine that the OP doesn't have a perfectly viable complete business plan.

What we have is someone who said 'I gave my cell phone number to a client and she is calling me incessantly now, anyone got any ideas?' and everyone jumped in and said 'YOUR BUSINESS MODEL IS **** YOU SHOULD DIE' which is, not to put too fine of a point on it:

a) typical of the semi-literate ill-considered mean-spirited garbage we see on TPF from altogether too many of the frequent posters
b) completely wrong-headed

EDIT: What's REALLY interesting to me here is that some of this nonsense came from posters I do not think of as belonging to the 'semi-literal ill-considered mean-spirited' crowd at all. manaheim and Bitter Jeweler are usually among the helpful and pleasant posters here, just to pull two names at random that surprised me here.

A perfect post in every respect...