Can you recognize something exceptional when you see it? How do we know? What signals are we responding to? In marketing, exceptional qualities are essential to the success of having our message stick. Being exceptional is difficult, it takes effort and hard work, but “ordinary” just doesn’t make the cut any more.
One thing is certain – inauthentic exceptionality is easily recognized.
Seth Godin, in his famous book “Purple Cow” talks about the principle of uniqueness, and how being exceptional is the major key to successful marketing in today’s world. If you haven’t read this amazing little book, then you need to, right now.
The landscape of marketing has gone through major changes over the last decade or so, as the quakes caused by the rise of the Internet, web 2.0 and the explosion of social media literally tore the traditional marketing model apart. Consumers have revolted and no longer want to see or listen to corporations blasting their message out indiscriminately to the masses.
In this new marketplace we need the consumer’s permission to market to them, but even then only if we behave and have a productive two-way conversation.
That conversation can only occur when there’s actually something worth talking about. Something exceptional, that stands out from the rest and makes itself worthy of attention.
This is the essence of the “Purple Cow.”
Sales & Marketing
exceptional business, photography marketing, purple cow, Seth Godin
Do you keep and measure the web traffic statistics from your web site to see which content is working, and where potential leaks might be sending your prospects away?
If you do, then you probably use Google Analytics, a very powerful (and free) tool for analyzing your web traffic and providing great information you can use to track, measure and even test your web content.
GetClicky
Last week, I was introduced to an alternative to Google Analytics called GetClicky, which I’ve found provides an amazing level of detail, just like Google’s offerings, but also does it in (almost) real time.
Not only that, but the presentation of the data from GetClicky is much more easily digested and understood. In other words, it seems far more intuitive than Google’s product, but with no discernible loss of information, at least that I’ve noticed so far.
Read more…
Photography Website SEO
GetClicky, google analytics, web site traffic
This morning, as I was reviewing the analytics for this web site from yesterday’s web traffic, I came across something that caught my eye and made me a little sad. After a while of having it stuck in my head, I decided to put together a short piece about it.
What I noticed was that someone, I don’t know who, had visited the site from the Google search engine with the phrase, “saving a failing photography business”. Obviously, I have no idea who that person is, and if it is you who are reading this now, then I honestly do feel for you.
Running a business is difficult and full of challenges, many of them unexpected and extremely hard to overcome. We are also in the middle of winter (at least here in the Northern Hemisphere), and business is traditionally slow at this time anyway.
That’s not a good thing if you already suffered a lean year in 2010 because of the recession, leaving you with not much in reserve to carry you through the winter slow time.
I know from first hand experience that this is a horrible thing to go through, and it can be heart wrenching to deal with the possibility of a failing business when it’s something that we’re so passionate about.
All I can say is to hang in there. Invest in your business education (you’re already in one good place by being here) – there is a lot of information out there if you take the time to look…
General
photography business, saving a business
It started with a simple question on the telephone from me to my prospect during a conversation about wedding photography: “How is your search for a wedding photographer going and how do you feel about what you’ve seen or heard so far?”
The purpose of the question, which I ask every prospect that calls me, is to get them to open up about their expectations and perhaps to tell me, without my having to ask them directly, whether they are a price shopper or serious about their choice of photographer.
Sales & Marketing
photography business, photography marketing, professional photography
Dear Self,
Have you formulated your goals for 2011 yet? Did you actually commit those goals to paper, so that you can look at them in black & white and know that they are real aspirations for the future, not just pipe dreams?
When you look at that paper, with your desired achievement staring back at you, does it make you feel a little scared perhaps? Do you feel a small shiver of doubt that you might not realize your goal and that you might fail instead?
Of course, the answer very much depends on how realistic your goals are, but I’ll assume for the sake of this post that you did indeed set yourself the task of achieving something feasible. It doesn’t have to be easy – in fact, it’s much better if it requires a stretch out of your comfort zone, but not so much of a stretch that you can’t make it if you just try hard enough…
Personal Zen
business success, motivation
Over the last few years, more and more professional photographers have come to realize that marketing is essential to the survival of their business. This is indeed true, and marketing know-how is more important than ever, but if we take a big step back for a moment to get an overview of what’s happening, it looks like complete chaos – almost like one of those mad days on the floor of the stock exchange with everyone yelling at once!
So Much Noise
The landscape of the world in which we work has changed dramatically in recent times and has become almost a battleground of marketing necessities. It used to be that print ads and direct mail were the main weapons in our marketing arsenal. Then along came the Internet, with web sites, email and blogs, and things started to get a little crazy, but still manageable.
But then a monster rose up out of the smoke and changed the game forever…
Sales & Marketing
marketing plan, photography business, photography marketing, social media marketing
As photographers we often pride ourselves on getting into the minds of our portrait subjects to try to identify, and then reveal through our images, the essence and personality of our clients.
It’s one of the defining skills of a talented portrait photographer, but how many wedding photographers can really do the same thing? There are a lot more people involved in a wedding than in an intimate portrait session, which can make this kind of deep personal connection very difficult to achieve during a wedding, except perhaps during those rare quiet moments. Then there are the time constraints that we need to be respectful of too.
Why Do We Focus Instead On Selling Books, Prints & DVDs?
When I sat down to write this post I was thinking about a recent sales call that I had with a wedding prospect, where I really didn’t do a great job of persuading her to come to the studio for a consultation. She loved my work, was exactly the kind of client I was looking for, her date was open, even the investment was within her expectations – everything seemed like a great match… but I just couldn’t get her to commit to a meeting where I might be able to persuade her to hire me. As far as knowing how to book weddings goes, I didn’t feel as though I did the best job i could.
Read more…
Sales & Marketing
emotional selling, photography sales, wedding photography
It’s the beginning of a new year – 2011 is here and January is the perfect time to think about your price list, and how much you plan to charge for your services, portraits, wedding collections and prints.
Don’t Be Scared Of Pricing
The subject of pricing our photography comes up again and again, and this is one of those areas where we seem to struggle the most in our businesses. The simple question of “What should we charge?” causes more trouble for us than almost anything else I can think of.
Sales & Marketing
photography business, photography pricing, price list
Welcome to 2011 and a very Happy New Year to you, wherever you may be! I hope you had a wonderful time celebrating the end of 2010 and that you have a very prosperous year ahead of you in the professional photography business.
It’s A Brand New Year
As we begin a new year in business, many of us are thinking in terms of renewal:
- It’s a new year!
- We get to restart the financial clock
- Goals can be set for the next 12 months
- New resolutions can be promised and (hopefully) kept
- Anticipation builds over what lies in store for us
- We look back on 2010 and know absolutely that we can do better
Of course, we felt just the same way on January 1st 2010, full of hope for a great year ahead, but for many of us that vision was soon replaced by the reality check of struggle and difficult business challenges that filled the year…
Sales & Marketing
photography, photography marketing
Recent Comments