Smugmug?

I'm looking for an outlet to sell some prints. I have been hearing a lot about SmugMug. What do you guys think. How much flexibility do you have setting prices. I had previously looked at Zenfolio too.

I'd love your thoughts, praises and horror stories.

Thanks!!!

Michael

What do you mean by selling prints? Its a great display place and you can sell direct, but you need to drive the traffic there. Its not like you can just throw up some awesome images and people you dont know start buying.

gonzogolf wrote in post #15982488
What do you mean by selling prints? Its a great display place and you can sell direct, but you need to drive the traffic there. Its not like you can just throw up some awesome images and people you dont know start buying.

I understand I need to drive traffic there. I will take care of that part. I'm wondering how well it works with custom pricing and getting paid etc.

I'm happy with them, zenfolio was not my cup of tea, all zen sites look the same and menu location is not constant over the entire site.

Not sure how/why people would flock to your site, your photo business customers? As gonzo said, no one will find you.

Deviantart is an other good site for more artistic things, but again, there are thousands of artists on there, chances are about zero that anybody will stumble over your work and order some.

If you have a way to point people to your site, smugmug is just fine. I've never set up pricing on my site, but I'm pretty sure you can charge what ever you want.

Good luck!

phantelope wrote in post #15982504
I'm happy with them, zenfolio was not my cup of tea, all zen sites look the same and menu location is not constant over the entire site.

Not sure how/why people would flock to your site, your photo business customers? As gonzo said, no one will find you.

Deviantart is an other good site for more artistic things, but again, there are thousands of artists on there, chances are about zero that anybody will stumble over your work and order some.

If you have a way to point people to your site, smugmug is just fine. I've never set up pricing on my site, but I'm pretty sure you can charge what ever you want.

Good luck!

I will forward my domain name to my smug mug page. I have business cards to promote my print sales. I kinda like the automation concept that smug mug seems to offer.

phantelope wrote in post #15982504
I'm happy with them, zenfolio was not my cup of tea, all zen sites look the same and menu location is not constant over the entire site.

Not sure how/why people would flock to your site, your photo business customers? As gonzo said, no one will find you.

Why are sooo many people completely clueless about SEO? https://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthre​ad.php?t=472885

Also I believe I have made my zenfolio website very consistent and customized. But yes it took a lot of work with SEO and customization. I believe smugmug is the same but you can edit the HTML on the home page with smugmug & you can only pick from per made layouts with zen though you can add your own background, font, and text colors. Though I personally think smugmug's gallery displays look dated.

Correct me if Im wrong but isnt the OP asking about the experience of using smugmug? I dont recall him asking how to drive people to his pictures or why am he is not selling any pictures.

flashpoint99 wrote in post #15982607
Correct me if Im wrong but isnt the OP asking about the experience of using smugmug? I dont recall him asking how to drive people to his pictures or why am he is not selling any pictures.

Thanks for this comment, I don't wanna make enemies here so i just let that go...

flashpoint99 wrote in post #15982607
Correct me if Im wrong but isnt the OP asking about the experience of using smugmug? I dont recall him asking how to drive people to his pictures or why am he is not selling any pictures.

You are right. But it helps to know how motivated he is and his market. There are a lot of users who do landscape/fine art work and think all you have to do is throw up some images on smugmug, people will find them and all is great. Smugmug works better for portrait, event, and similar work where you are driving the client to the site and using it for fulfillment. We were just asking to try to determine whether the OP was aware of the need to move traffic to the site.

MichaelLynn wrote in post #15982471
I'm looking for an outlet to sell some prints. I have been hearing a lot about SmugMug. What do you guys think. How much flexibility do you have setting prices. I had previously looked at Zenfolio too.

I'd love your thoughts, praises and horror stories.

I like both SmugMug and Zenfolio. Here is a little review I wrote of both of them

http://photographywisd​om.com/smugmug-vs-zenfolio-1164.html

sarahashleyphotos wrote in post #15982580
Also I believe I have made my zenfolio website very consistent and customized. But yes it took a lot of work with SEO and customization. I believe smugmug is the same but you can edit the HTML on the home page with smugmug & you can only pick from per made layouts with zen though you can add your own background, font, and text colors. Though I personally think smugmug's gallery displays look dated.

If you know CSS you can do just about anything with Smugmug. Here is a custom Smugmug site (not mine) built almost entirely with custom CSS.

http://bigwebguy.smugm​ug.com/

which looks nothing like this (also not mine) custom Smugmug site

http://candicunningham​.smugmug.com/

I've been with Smugmug for years, and generally I'm happy with them, but the one thing that bugs me the most is:

You set your pricing based on how much over your cost you want to go. Then Smug takes 15% of that for every sale. I object to that, so I don't use them for fulfillment.

Additionally, when you or a customer orders something through them, your options are much more limited than they are when you go direct to the lab, and there's no discount. So for me, there's no reason to use their shopping cart.

mmcguire wrote in post #15982633
I like both SmugMug and Zenfolio. Here is a little review I wrote of both of them

http://photographywisd​om.com/smugmug-vs-zenfolio-1164.html

If you know CSS you can do just about anything with Smugmug. Here is a custom Smugmug site (not mine) built almost entirely with custom CSS.

http://bigwebguy.smugm​ug.com/

which looks nothing like this (also not mine) custom Smugmug site

http://candicunningham​.smugmug.com/

GREAT REVIEW!! I love the CSS in those example accounts you posted, Thank You!!

Here's my site as another example of how the CSS can be customized. I didn't like how you were so limited with Zenfolio. I've been a happy SmugMug customer for about 4-5 years now with no real issues. They've also got one hell of a support group over there for anything from ordering to customizing pages.

Jason

jskwarek wrote in post #15986521
Here's my site as another example of how the CSS can be customized. I didn't like how you were so limited with Zenfolio. I've been a happy SmugMug customer for about 4-5 years now with no real issues. They've also got one hell of a support group over there for anything from ordering to customizing pages.

Jason

Looks Amazing

Thanks, didn't take much to do. If you sign up, go to the DGRIN.COM website, they've got lots of people there to help and a lot of CSS already done for you, that'll take all the guess work out of everything.

Jason