Archive for promotion – Page 2

Marketing Campaigns for Photographers – Create a Competition for Charity

I’ve seen lots of different promotions from photographers who have run different competitions and many that do charity work but this marketing campaign is a little different.

The biggest difference is that you will be raising funds for charity but you’ll also be making some money for your own pocket too.

 

What you need

1. Friends
Not just any friends, but lots and lots of what my wife likes to call my “photo friends”. To be more specific, you need a network of photographers either locally or nationally that photograph the same sort of subject as you (babies, pets, seniors etc).

The next thing you have to do is convince them all that you have a wonderful idea for a marketing campaign and it’s not going to cost them too much time or money.

You will need to have all the photographers on board before you begin the promotion of the competition.

2. A Charity
It does help if you choose a charity which will help you with your marketing and promotion. Ideally your charity needs to reflect your area of expertise so if you are a pet photographer then work with animal shelter, if you’re a baby photographer then a children’s hospital might be your choice.

3. Judges
They don’t have to be celebrities but it’s certainly wouldn’t hurt if they were. Obviously they can’t be the photographers entering images but if you manage to sign up a couple of industry experts with judging experience all the better. Read More→

Marketing Campaigns for Photographers – Be a Fool

“There’s an old saying in Tennessee — I know it’s in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on –shame on you. Fool me — you can’t get fooled again.”

There’s something about April Fools day which I love. It’s not recognized as a national holiday, Hallmark don’t sell ‘happy fools day cards’ (then again I could be wrong about that one) and there’s no real target market as adults and children both equally participate.

But it is jolly good fun and these days it’s not restricted to silliness in the playground or fake stories in the newspapers.

Google (or should I say Topeka) have led the way online in recent years but its not just the larger companies that have been noticed. The viral effect of social media means that any small business with the right prank can generate themselves quite a large amount of exposure very quickly.

So why shouldn’t a photography business be any different?

Well, be aware that there is such a thing as bad publicity and if you’re a family portrait photographer then tread very carefully.

3 golden rules for creating an effective Aprils Fools prank Read More→

Marketing Campaigns for Photographers – Seasonal Touches

The one great things about the changing seasons is the fact that we can all jump on the promotional bandwagon and take advantage of the numerous holidays throughout the year.

In a way people almost expect a seasonal offer. A couple of days after valentines day I got a call from a potential client asking me what my mothers day offer was! They found my website had a quick look round and after they couldn’t find anything they gave me a call. Luckily I had an offer prepared, I just hadn’t launched it yet.

There are plenty of photographers out there that will be offering all manner of deals throughout the year so it’s your goal to try and do something different. If you can’t make it different then do it better!

Here’s a couple of ideas that you could use in the coming months. Really these are ideal for portrait studios aiming at a young family.

Mothers Day

Free box of chocolates for every mum that books a session on [insert dates]

Photo-shoot and beauty treatment bundled gift voucher
Team up with a local spa and put together a special mothers day offer.

The little chef surprise
Cupcake decoration photoshoot. Client walks away with a print and a cupcake for mum that the kids decorated during the photoshoot

Read More→

H&H Color Lab: Tips to Grow Your Business Using Inbound Marketing

During Digital Photography Café’s live WPPI 2012 coverage this past month, Joseph Cristina and I had the opportunity to chat with David Drum from H&H Color Lab about how they use Inbound Marketing to grown their business.

In the below video you’ll see a great presentation about Inbound Marketing from Social Media Sensi Georgia McCabe. She gives an overview of what exactly Inbound Marketing is and also demonstrates how H&H Color Lab uses it to build trust within the photography community.

We also stopped by H&H Color Lab’s booth to check out some of their latest products including their really cool custom printed iPhone cases.

Be sure to stop by their website at HHColorLab.com to check out all of their products and don’t forget to check out all of their great educational resources. You can also connect with them on Twitter and Facebook.

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Marketing Campaigns for Photographers – The Fabulous Five

Your blog is undoubtedly the most powerful online marketing tool you have at your disposal but if you think that you can rely on SEO and cleverly written post titles to drive traffic your way then think again.

Your blog coupled with the right amount of social media sharing is an effective marketing combination. The question I am often asked is what social networks are best to promote your business and ultimately get more work.

There’s no real answer to that other than there isn’t just one. There isn’t really a typical client for every type of business but there are a few generalisations which can help you.

This marketing campaign is titled The Fabulous Five because it is about identifying at least 5 different social networks where you can drive traffic and potential clients to your site.

Why 5?
Well if you have the time to share on 10 different platforms then don’t let me stop you! Using 5 different social media platforms should be manageable enough and it also gives you a varied enough spread.

Read More→

Marketing Campaigns for Photographers – Shoot Camera Phone Videos

Firstly I have to put my hands up and admit one thing. I have been a Canon 5Dmk2 owner since its release and I still haven’t shot a frame of video with it. There are two reasons for this:

  1. I’m not a videographer and I wouldn’t pretend to be otherwise
  2. If I got interested in video then it would consume more hours in the day than already exist and I certainly don’t have time for that. Unfortunately my idea of creating an 8th day in the week is still under development.

This poses quite a problem as I love the idea of using video to promote my business. Webcams are fine enough, but really what I want to communicate can’t be done with me sitting in front of my computer.

What I want is the ability to create and edit short videos whilst on location and be able to upload and them easily.

Then I came to the realisation that I can achieve all this with my iPhone (or any other smart phone to be fair).

What sort of content should you create?

Let’s face it you’re not going to be filming a remake of Ben-Hur on your phone. The quality isn’t going to be amazing so think about what sort of content is passably at that quality.

Behind the scenes videos – We have talked about these in the past (Creating a Viral Video) but you could also shoot very quick 30 second clips that are a bit more of a taster than a full video. Most of your clips will be behind the scenes style videos.

Read More→