Every business wants to make more money and raising your prices is one way to do that. I have spoken with many photographers over the years and while there is not a single way that this should happen…there are a couple of good practices.
*Setting a goal for how many weddings you want to shoot will allow you to know when it is good to start to think about how to get to the next level.
*Be consistent with your pricing. Make sure you are not giving in on what you are charging, you are worth it and if you stick to your pricing that you feel you are worth…you will get the client’s that appreciate you. This is not for someone in their first two years of business, you need to book as many weddings as you can to build a referral base.
*Have 3 packages. The middle one should be your target package and the top one your goal. The top package should be priced well above the other two.
*Build value into your packages and products. Make sure you have albums in your packages that you can up sell, so provide 20 sided albums then sell them 20-40 more on the backend. This will allow you to pay for your album from the proceeds after the wedding..
So when is it a good time to raise your prices?
When you have booked 3/4 of the weddings that you want to shoot for the year. If you are wanting to shoot 20 weddings in 2008 and you have already booked 15…this is a great time to raise your prices. You will establish your new pricing and get referrals from the last 5 weddings you are booking at your new prices…this will help you book at that level in 2009!
How to raise your prices?
You can sometimes keep your prices the same and still make more money. Take the album out of your packages, that can create a $1200-1600 swing. Now you are not giving the album away in your packages, so you will be saving on the cost of the album and then making money on it after the wedding.
Pull the DVD of images out of your packages! You should not need to include the DVD of images in your offerings after the first two years in a market. You will be getting referrals and those are golden–no more giving away of your images. This is something you can now charge for after the wedding. A good time for this is on their first anniversary or when the their album is complete.
Make sure that your top package is priced well above the others. As you start booking it more than the middle package, make that price your middle package and raise the top packages price.
While these ideas might not be for everyone, they certainly should help in giving you ideas on how to get to the next level!
The next tip will be on Marketing– advertising vs viral.
Great article, I really needed to hear this today, thank you.
J’s Reply:
Hey Carlos, No problem and thanks for stopping by the blog. I find that too many people right now are thinking about how to give things away instead of valuing their work enough to charge for it!
I think that adding perceived (yet inexpensive to you) value is important to add to the bottom line. I recently began adding a DVD with photos, video, wedding music, honeymoon etc to wedding packages. The key was using a quality DVD label so the disc looked special and professional. I used the Dymo DiscPainter disc labeler to make full color image labels with text. The labels typically feature a picture from the wedding. It answers the same question one could ask if clients would rather receive a beautiful photo album or a bunch of pictures banded together with a rubber band? Which could you charge more for? A beautiful disc label is a key income producing tool.
J’s Reply:
Hey W, I agree and even the packing that the DVD comes in is important. I too like DVD’s as a product due to the cost…it’s inexpensive. Thanks for visting and commenting.
Thanks! Very good advice. It looks like it is time for me to stop offering 10% off my packages! I am going to print this out to keep me focused!
J’s Reply:
Hey Heather, Yes…value what you are doing and so will your clients. If they see a 10% off right away, they are more likely to think that you are willing to bargain further. You can always pull a discount out of your pocket later on, but your images certainly will be driving people to contact you!