Orange County Photographers Offer Tip: Profit through the Use of Mini-Sessions

Apr 12
18:01

2009

Stephen Honda

Stephen Honda

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During a slow economy, many photographers need additional revenue to survive. They can do this by shooting mini-sessions.

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In a down economy many people see photography as one of the non-essentials that can be trimmed back in order to make the monthly budge work. They may still value photography and love your work they simply don't have as much money to spend right now. When a photographer hears this scenario,Orange County Photographers Offer Tip: Profit through the Use of Mini-Sessions Articles he may be tempted to lower his prices to bring in the work. A better alternative is to offer mini-sessions.

A mini-session is simply a very short photography session. To make this model work a photographer must schedule several mini-sessions during the time of what would normally be a regular session. The session fee is either reduced or removed. This can be a win-win for both the strapped-for-cash client and the photographer. During an economic downturn many clients are not looking to purchase enough pictures to decorate their house, they are simply want to capture their family at this point in time so there is not a gap in their family portfolios. By shooting 3-4 clients during the time of a normal session and offering standardized packages or 10-15 images, a photographer can make it well worth his time through shooting volume. 

If the photographer is organized he can quickly edit the 40 images in about the amount of time it takes to edit a normal session. It does a take little more effort to collect from 4 families instead of just  one, but if the photographer is offering standardized packages the work load gathering orders is reduced. My experience with mini-sessions has been that 70% of clients just order a standardized package of around $400. So if I do one mini-session with three families and they all purchase standard  packages, $1200 worth of revenue results. However approximately 30% of the time there is a family who, after seeing the images, purchase far more. A guess on average is they purchase $1200 dollars on average. In this scenario the average revenue for one mini-session is far more.

Often, clients who would like to save money with a mini-session will communicate the offer to friends to try and get enough people to fill a session. This can result in an expanded client base for the photographer.  

Thus, by offering mini-sessions, a photographer can bring in significant revenue and at the same time offer a product that is within the budget of many who are struggling with the economic downturn.