Mini-Workshop | Shoot-Design-Sell with Scott Villalobos

There was a time when photographers could count on a substantial amount of income from print sales after the wedding day. However, the digital world has dramatically altered the landscape of the print sale both in importance and in value. It seems that the overwhelming majority of photographers have succumbed to the pressure of releasing either a disk, drive, or download of the wedding day images as a part of the initial sale and thereby eradicating any potential print sales. With the availability of so many retailers that charge pennies for prints, the end user has lost sight of where the value in the print comes from. What is failing to be realized is that the value of paper the image is printed on isn’t what dictates the value of the photographic product. As photographers we know that the true value lies within the memories and feelings the images provoke. For those of us who have been around for more than a few years, print sales totaling into the thousands of dollars are but a distant memory. For those who have come into the wedding photography business in the last couple of years, prints sales may not even be a part of the business model. 

With such a huge influx of photographers into the wedding industry over the last decade, the demand for our services has also diminished greatly, and yet, ironically the demand has never been higher, however, the amount of photographers offering wedding photography services has never been higher as well. Being and staying competitive is becoming more and more challenging. Adding value to your offerings is one way to increase your desirability, but it is also a sure way of lowering your bottom line. Finding ways to maximize our income with our current and future clientele is essential if we wish to  maintain a reasonable bottom line and enjoy the type of life that being an entrepreneur offers, after all isn’t that one of the major reasons why we got into the business of wedding photography in the first place? Unfortunately we cannot turn the clock back to the heydays of stellar print sales, but there is a way to increase your bottom line dramatically, to regain some of that revenue that has been lost to the tide of shoot and burn.  

Shoot, Design, Sell, is a process that will teach you, as the business owner to be fully in control of your after wedding day sales. It will teach you to think beyond the digital download as the end product and reinvigorate your after wedding sales. You will learn to not only sell wedding albums, but to shoot and design albums that your clients will love and value, and ultimately increase your bottom line.