I was on Facebook the other day reading a post from a cake smash photographer. She was super excited and had posted a screenshot of her sale that day. It said something like “See - it can be done! There IS money in cake smash photography!” The sale was for just over $800.

$800 is not a bad sale. I remember my first $800 sale - I was on cloud nine. At the time $400-$500 was normal for our studio. $800 was a dream come true.

There is a LOT more money to be made in smash cake photography. Last week’s package for a Harry Potter first birthday set at our studio was $1941. The package discount we offered was $246.70 - client paid $1694.30. We had comped them the session fee as they were a returning client. Client was touched when I told her that “of course I’m comping the photo session fee - you’re our people”. It’s true, they are our people, but saying it, telling them, and giving them something - builds the relationship, builds trust. And in the sales room later, they’re going to remember I have their best interests in mind.

I’ve read a ton of books on sales - but The Selling Bible is one of the best ones. It is super old (ok, 1996, but still) - but it’s a treasure trove. Be sure to read this one as well: Hug Your Customer. The following is what I’ve boiled my education and experience down to.

BUILD RELATIONSHIPS

Start by building relationships. Tim & Bev Walden have some great things to say about this. A lot of the things they suggested were already part of my normal inclinations, but by thinking about it in terms of client relationship building, it justified things I wanted to do anyway. Treating clients as friends that had come into our home, instead of strangers into our office changed the dynamic immediately. Offer your clients a drink, meet them at the door, hug returning clients on their way in the door; if that is your norm. Crouch down to greet their young children.

Do what is normal for you, don’t fake it. If this isn’t comfortable for you, do what is. Shake hands, offer a complement, be real and be welcoming. See your clients as friends and many of them will be.

OFFER WHAT PEOPLE WANT TO BUY

If a client leaves with just digitals I didn’t do my job in the consultation.

If you don’t offer it, you can’t sell it. Leather bound albums, digital files, canvases (yes, that’s plural), framed collages, and accordian books are all sold regularly to our smash cake clients. Maybe 10% of our smash cake clients walk out with just the digitals. If a client leaves with just digitals it’s because A) they have family overseas that’s paying for their order or B) I didn’t do my job in the consultation. In our studio most families buy either an album or a framed 9 image collage and the digital pictures at a minimum. We offer digitals at a discounted rate if we already edited them for a product. And we explain to our clients that because we’ve edited the images for their album/wall collage we aren’t charging them twice for the same editing. Again, building trust.

I still can’t bring myself to sell an 8x10 for $150. I doubt I’ll ever get to that point. So I have to sell larger ticket items to get to my desired sales average. When you are discussing your products make sure you stress that the albums are imported, that the prints are framed locally. Imported sounds exclusive, locally sounds like you’re invested in your community. And both are true for us. Continue to build the quality of your business and your value in their eyes.

Take time to talk about the quality of the glass your framer uses. Ask where your client will hang their image - will it have sun on it every day? Explain how poor quality matting ages and warps their prints over time. Offer upgraded glass if they need it to protect their baby’s images. Educating your client is the key to a good sale.

Make sure that you’re showing what you want to sell. Samples are your bread and butter when you want to raise your sales averages. If you can’t put a heavy, leather bound 10” album in their hands, how do they understand the difference between an album your studio creates and the book they can print at WalMart for $29.95? I have both 8” & 10” albums in the office with full page spreads. I open them up and show my clients that a full page spread in their album isn’t just a 2” difference. They are choosing to upgrade the picture of their baby an additional 72 square inches. Help your client justify the additional purchase that they already want to make.

INVOLVE THE CLIENT

Involve your client in their smash cake set design. What can they bring? Do they want to be part of the decision making process or do they want us to handle it?

If your client wants to just walk in and have it handled, make sure you still have some (minor!) decisions they can contribute on the day of the shoot. Which hair bow or hat do they like best? Which cake stand do they prefer? Talk to them about how you made something new for this design. Or how much fun it was to go looking for the new stool, chest, etc you just HAD to have for their baby. Make them feel special. Make their experience unique to just their family, and make sure they know it.

If they want to be more involved, let them buy the outfit. Etsy is a great place to encourage them to look. Amazon works great too, and we have cute items in our Pro Shop. Caution them to try the clothes on before the day of the photo shoot. Explain how often standard sizes don’t fit. And ALWAYS have a backup outfit. Or two. Even if you use one of the outfits you supply for just a couple of pictures it gives you variations in the sales room. Same thing for hats and hair ties. I’ve added 9 image collages (framed and matted collages 3 prints wide by 3 prints high) to orders simply to showcase multiple floral hair clips. I’ll take that additional sale, thank you very much.

IPS (AND TALKing ABOUT IT IN the CONSULTATION)

In-person projection sales literally tripled our sales on the first day.

We talk about our sales process in the consultation, it covers the “oh, I thought I’d order them online” problem later, and lets us talk about the quality of our photography. Drawing their attention to the enormous flat screen TV, we tell our clients “if there was a problem you’d see it, but of course we’d never show you an image with a problem” and we laugh self deprecatingly. The first time we used the phrase it happened naturally, so we added it to our process. When a client comes in the door for their sales session we’ve already put together multiple canvases colleges, to discuss the different collage styles. We use ProSelect and love it. I have my ProSelect set up so that the slideshow goes right through the images and continues directly into the collages. This allows us to talk about their wall collage needs unprompted.

One of the tips I picked up along the way was to ask “how many would you like?” for each product - people will surprise you, and if prompting them to consider grandma makes you another $100 - why wouldn’t you? Here’s another article to read if you’re nervous about in-person sales.

PLANT sales SEEDS EARLY AND OFTEN

Talk about products in the smash cake consultation. (We never shoot without a consultation - it kills the photo shoot and the studio’s sale). Ask your client what they want for portrait products. Tell them they don’t have to make decisions before the shoot, but explain that if you’re doing image wrapped memory boxes, or canvases you need to leave more space around the subject for wrapping. Now you can explain what an image wrapped memory box is. We explain to our clients how perfect they are for all of those first year memorabilia, the lock of hair, wrist bands from the hospital, ultrasound pictures. Things that otherwise get strewn throughout the home, and eventually, lost.

Talk about how you prefer to sell canvas collages for over the over the couch because children bounce on living room furniture. Explain how you feel canvas is best for the baby’s room for safety reasons as well. Now you’re talking about an additional location in their home for artwork. You’ve opened up a new wall for them to consider. Ask them to consider what colors they decorate their home with. If they don’t have a smash cake theme in mind, why don’t they consider what will look best in their home? Do they have an open staircase for wall collage?

So many things your client hasn’t considered, all of them help you to continue to educate your client while establishing you as the professional. And it continues to prove you have their interests at heart.

During the shoot, talk about how the photograph you just took will look amazing as a torn edge watercolor, or a metal print. If Dad is at the consultation or the shoot, make sure to bring up metals. In general we’ve found metals sell far more often to families who bring Dad. Talk about how deep, dark, rich or bright vibrant colors look amazing on metal if you’re shooting them. Talk about how fantastic pastels look on torn edge watercolor paper. Show them samples when you’re buttoning up your photography session.

Always be curating a better sale.

You can make a living in photography.
- Clare

Sales - Don’t Be “Average”