When do you put your prices up?

[lally0724]

Hi, I have been doing wedding photography for a couple of years now, and for the 2008 season I plan on putting my wedding prices up. When do you suggest I do this? I have received a couple of inquiries now for 2008 and I'm just wondering how you deal with people who book this year for next year? If I tell them my 2008 prices now, and they see a price card from a wedding show for this year and they get upset, what do I do?
Thanks,
Lally

[picturecrazy]

I've raised my prices like 4 times in 3 months... lol.
If I'm thinking of doing it, I tell them flat out that prices are going up soon as I'm getting a phenomenal amount of interest... more than I can handle. People seem to understand this well.

[sapearl]

I've raised my prices like 4 times in 3 months... lol......

You must be in heavy demand Lloyd - or did you just feel you were undermarket? No offense, but that seems like a lot of increases in a short period of time. But if you're getting a lot of bookings that's the main way to control your flow.

[sapearl]

Hi, I have been doing wedding photography for a couple of years now, and for the 2008 season I plan on putting my wedding prices up. When do you suggest I do this?......

I'll raise my prices at least once per year, usually towards the end of the year, but that can vary depending upon a number of factors.

For example if it's getting late in 2007 and I get interest in a January or February 2008 wedding and things are thin, I may offer them 2007 pricing as incentive for a sure booking. If I'm hungry I may also offer incentives - complimentary 11x14, or wallet photos, etc. - but no discounts.

[liza]

Make sure you have a disclaimer that says prices are subject to change.

[cwphoto]

I review them once a year, usually over Christmas Hols when it's quieter.

[tim]

I review my prices once per year, or if I get too busy I figure my prices are too low so I put them up.

[Mike Fulton]

I review my prices once per year, or if I get too busy I figure my prices are too low so I put them up.
Yep same here Tim.

Normally once a year but I have raised them twice a year for several years in a row in the past. Supply and Demand if your demand is too high raise the prices to save your sainity!

[Banbert]

We are putting ours up this week and will probably do so again in a few months when we have actually shot some weddings this year and have more content on our site. 20 Was our target for this year (its our first year) and were nearly there on deposits and will be past it if the current enquiries turn into bookings which based on previous experience most will. If all these current enquiries turn into bookings I dont think we will book any more for this year unless something particularly appealing comes along that fits in well around the ones we already have. Weve just knocked our Adwords budget back to virtually nothing also as we have quite a few bookings for next year already and dont want to get fully booked for next year at our current prices.

Were very cheap atm but we honour the prices that are displayed on the website at the time of the enquiry, although we set a time constraint on this after the client meeting so that heres an incentive to make the booking once weve supplied the quote.

Its been very easy to pick up business for this year mainly I think due to our prices, so its going to be very interesting in this next year to see if we can make the transition to getting bookings because of our past work and clients rather than our prices, looking forward to the challenge though.

[Wazza]

I'd change my prices before each season. But the ones who have booked and paid for a deposit, obviously I won't be changing their prices.

What I've learnt, rather than taking quick fill in weddings, at a lower cost, really they're more stress than anything, and prices should be more!

[spcalan]

I have been in a slump here lately. With no business.
Where can you go to find people getting married?
or is it always people call you?

[sapearl]

I have been in a slump here lately. With no business.
Where can you go to find people getting married?
or is it always people call you?

Sorry to hear business is slow. That's a tough question to answer not knowing much about your market there.

People always call me but it's on the basis of advertising and referrals from those that I've already photographed. To determine why business is slow, you need to ask yourself the following:

1. Is your area economically depressed?
2. Are your prices too high?
3. Are you advertising enough and in the best areas?
4. Do you have a good sample portfolio you present?
5. Have you just started in the business?
6. Do you have a website that effectively presents your work?

These are just a few questions that come to mind - I'm sure others here can ad to it - but you might want to examine these points.

I looked at your website... it's very pleasant, nice pictures, but sort of subdued. It lacks that special kind of punch that sets it apart from others. You want something that jumps up and says: "This is why you don't even want to think about hiring anybody else!" :D I don't mean to be critical - that's just my .02 worth of opinion. I'd like to see you do better.

[Banbert]

spcalan, I dont know anything about your market or business setup and I am very much a newbie at this anyway but ive just had a quick look at your website and I think you could spend some time (or a little money if you dont do your website design yourself) on it that would reap you rewards.

You have stuff to display on your website but people have to find you first, Search Engine Optimsation counts for a lot and from first inspection of your website theres been no thought to SEO at all, no page titles, keywords that tie to content, alt tags on images, site maps etc etc !!

SEO SEO SEO, if your not appearing on the first page of google search results for your region + photographer and other key words and phrases then your losing out on a lot of potential clients that are just searching for a photographer with money in their pocket. Consider using google adwords to advertise until you get on that first page.

Your gallery starting page doesnt do your work justice, the same image for each gallery looks bad imo and made me pause before I went any further.

Alan ... SEO SEO SEO .... theres a few good threads in this forum about it I will dig em up now.

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=179549

[sblais]

I would consider raising my prices in the middle of the high wedding season. That's when I'm very busy, but also it's when I get the least inquiries (you know, it would be too last minute). I try to avoid having a client contacting me for details and then I would raise my prices before they can reserve my services.

I plan on raising them this year (around June or July as it is the big season here) as I have a fair amount of inquiries that I currently have to refuse due to prior bookings (quite a bit more than last year).

Anyone have any thoughts on this timeframe? Do you consider it good or bad?

[sapearl]

Alan, Banbert offers excellent advice about SEO. I'm probably guilty myself of not having the best SEO, but I did hire a pro to do my site. I didn't have the ability, time or energy at the end of a regular work day to create my own.

I also wondered why you used the same photo for different headings. I'm not trying to be critical, but the site does not stand up and say PRO. It looks like a very nice family sort of album site, with some very solid work that needs to be featured more prominently.

Another thought - is it possible that you're being undercut?

I'm running into this more and more which is only inevitable as I get up in years and charge more for my services. Any time I lose business and the "almost client" is courteous enough to tell me they've gone with somebody else, I ask them WHY they chose the other guy. The information I get from the answer is often worth its weight in gold from a marketting standpoint.

Lately I'm being told "Oh, I didn't want to spend that much money for an album, he's giving me some enlargements and the rest on a disk."

Another one is: "I'm getting a photo/video package deal for just about the same price you're offering." This last one is really tough to beat, and I thank them for their input and wish them well. In my area some of the Videographers will partner with still shooters, or vice versa, and offer these all-inclusive packages. That works out well if both pros are quality shooters. But sometimes it's a pro videographer who just hands his wife a basic dSLR to cover the highlights while he's running the video. The client doesn't know the difference until they see the results. Still, I can't compete against that.

[sblais]

I have been in a slump here lately. With no business.
Where can you go to find people getting married?
or is it always people call you?

SEO is not all that hard... but no one knows for sure what Google and Yahoo use to rank their pages. We try, and most of the time get good results.

One way is to have many web pages linking back to your main web site. Look at my signature. These are the keywords I'm targeting and they are linking back to my site: one very good way to get a boost in SEO.

Also make sure that the title of your main web page contains all the key words that you are targeting. But don't over do it. I think somewhere around 60 characters and more, and the search engines will think that you are stuffing keywords in there. Get a lot of text on your web page. Keep those keywords high in the page to optimize their impact. and I can probably go on for a while still!

[Scott_Quier]

I have been in a slump here lately. With no business.
Where can you go to find people getting married?
or is it always people call you?
Above and beyond all the great advise for SEO, think about the presentation, especially your first/home page.

You are a photographer. You need, I would think, to promote your best work on your home page. A small slide show of 5 or 10 images might be a good way to go.

The navigation buttons on the "sub pages" don't seem to be working for me. Might want to check out the href on those.

Your gallery page is not finished. The page has text that reads "Display a set of photos and captions. Describe what the photo gallery contains and how the photos are related." This looks like you built the page using a tool and didn't fill in all the squares.

The background on all but your photo pages is white. Change that, even if to a less bright shade of white. Black on the white background is difficult on the eyes and not inviting.

My intent was not to come down hard on you, but to help you build the tool to best present your work (BTW, looked at the Prom shots, very nice. Love the B&W shot of the pair!).