Top 10 Tips to Ensure Your Clients Feel Appreciated: by Georgia McCabe

It is tempting in tough fiscal times to tighten up spending, use far fewer billable hours and cut to barebones services for our clients. This is a particularly easy solution in photography, where much of our profit is derived from a product that can be easily delivered wirelessly or by mail. At times we overlook the difference that we make by creating a personal connection between our studio and clients.

If you wish to maintain and even grow your customer base in difficult times, you must be better, more creative and more appreciative than other studios who may be scaling back. If you display effective methods of appreciation for clients, they will stand by you and refer you to their friends and associates.

1. Make Appreciation Part of ‘Everyday Business.’
Be thankful for the business you get. Thank your clients at the end of an interview or session and ensure they feel that you care about them personally, not just their booking. Also, thank customers for previous business when you connect with them again.

2. Create personalized invitations for promotions.
If you have the ability to use mockups of photos on your promotional materials, your clients will love it if you are able to find products the may be interested in. Not generic flyers, but specific products that may fit with their situation, the work that you did with them, or what you feel would be useful to them. You have to know your clients a bit, talk to them, but if you can catch them at the right time with the right product, they will remember it.

3. Ask for advice on a new product or service.
People love to have their voices heard. If you make some personal calls asking clients for their opinion on a new service or promotion, they will gladly ‘help out’ and may also book the service if they are interested. However, there are far too many survey calling systems out there, make your calls personal, and make them yourself. Your clients will feel as though their input is valued.

4. Make house calls.
You can create a great rapport with your clients by personally delivering their products to them. Once again, they will feel as though you personally care about their images, and appreciate them. If you simply cannot make house deliveries, include a hand-written note, with mention of a particular picture you liked, or product you thought turned out well.

5. Create engaging events centered around a service you provide.
Often, a photo marathon offering a limited but highly engaging product can be a great way to connect with your clients. Offer to go into their office and do a team photo, or headshots for a fixed price. You may get new clients, and the fun you have will stick in your client’s mind for a long time.

6. Give freebies (well, samples…)
While free items in a package can seem to devalue your work, a small promotional gift unexpectedly reminds your clients that you are thinking of them and value their business. Again, target your promotional gift (a set of 5 different Christmas cards, a keychain) to an identified interest of the customer, and send to clients that you believe will see the value in it. Again, a hand-written note can make all the difference in making the client feel appreciated.

7. Fight for their business.
This is where the rubber hits the road. In today’s market, customers may have a ‘what have you done for me lately’ mentality with their business. Ensure that your website displays any current promotions you may have, and remind customers that you are willing to adapt your services to their needs. Often just knowing that will give them a sense of loyalty to you, as they have worked with you before.

8. Be flexible with your product offerings.
This one links to the point above. Be willing to change your packages, combine services, whatever you can do to ensure that the clients are getting exactly what they want. If you are able to suit their needs, they may turn to you in times they normally wouldn’t as they see you as someone willing to work with them closely.

9. Keep the ball rolling.
Remember information clients offer about their personal lives so that you can connect to that in the future. For example, a quick note with a flyer about new sports products might be one idea, or if you have recorded their birthday or anniversary dates, create a card with an image you took of them with a message and even a discount offer. Think of all of the holidays throughout the year, valentines day, mothers day, fathers day. With all of the unique products now available you can subtly suggest a possible product like a piece of jewelry or coasters, just let your creative juices flow. With just a little Photoshop work you can easily create the product with their image on it and also put that on the card.

10. Add them to your digital portfolio.
If you have a long-standing relationship with a client, next time you present a portfolio of ideas to them, include one of their pictures in the package. Not only will it show them that they are a valued customer, but they will see that you were pleased with their previous images, and want to take more. While this used to be much more difficult with print portfolios, with the advent of digital portfolios on iPads and smaller laptops, the feasibility of adapting a portfolio for each client is much more realistic.

Overall, the theme of this article comes down to connecting with your clients, and ensuring that they realize how much you value them. This is only the surface of ‘little things’ you can do to grow your business by focusing on the connections you can create with the people you work with. We all want to be valued, appreciated and honored as consumers. This is your chance to make your studio shine, and build a reputation that you care about every client. Start today!

–

Company: Brownstein & McCabe Associates
Address: P.O. Box 5228, Englewood, FL 34224
Phone: 941-876-6428
Email: Georgia@wecouldoit.com
Website: http://www.georgiamccabe.com
Twitter: @mamagg
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/GeorgiaLMcCabe

Here’s how you can share your tips, techniques and tutorials on CurrentPhotographer.com

–

*The Current Photographer website contains links to our affiliate partners. Purchasing products and services through these links helps support our efforts to bring you the quality information you love and there’s no additional cost to you.