I love to eat. Give me something savory, like a juicy marinated tenderloin steak, grilled shrimp scampi, garlic mashed potatoes slathered in butter, and fresh green beans cooked just right with a crisp garden salad and a glass of wine and I am a seriously happy mama.
My mouth is watering already. Yours?
We don’t go to restaurants much (unfortunately) but when we do, my pet peeve is opening up to a menu that has about 300 different options.
Being the food lover that I am, I feel obligated to make sure that read through all of my options to make sure I get whatever sounds best on the menu. I don’t want bad food on one of the rare occasions that we go out to eat, so I sit there for far too long trying to decide what I want.
And I sit some more.
And we tell the waiter to come back again, and again, and again.
Finally, we give up and just make some decision. Hopefully it is good, but it is SUCH a frustrating experience.
I much prefer menus that are smaller, making my decision easier. I’m hungry when I get to a restaurant. I want to enjoy the company I’m with, not spend 20 minutes trying to read the menu and deciding what to order.
The same thing applies to the products you offer your clients. If you’ve ever had a client procrastinate on ordering or not place an order after seeing their images, you may want to consider how hard you’re making it for your clients.
Simplicity makes it easier to buy
Let’s face it – it’s painful enough for our customers to part with their hard-earned money. The last thing we want to do is make it difficult for them to make a decision and finish the sale.
I know your lab offers a few hundred different photography products, but for most of us offering something like life-sized wall clings is not worth putting on our photography product list and will only cause our list to become more cluttered.
You need to simplify your product list.
If it’s easy to decide, people will buy far more than if it is complicated. I promise.
So what products should I sell?
There’s two answers to this, and they go together.
First, what do you really want to sell and why do you think it is important?
Second, what does your client really want?
If you absolutely hate selling greeting cards, don’t do it. Just because you CAN do it doesn’t mean you have to.
Think of the products you wish every client would buy. For me, it’s albums and a wall print. It may be different for you. But these are the things you want on your list and in your packages, and you don’t want other fluff items distracting from them.
My clients also want a way to share their images with friends and family, so I also offer smaller gift prints. If you hate how common 4×6 prints look, then only offer 5×7 and larger prints or collections of wallets for sharing. Tailor your product list to what you want your clients to buy that still fulfills their desires.
Justify why you sell each item
I like to sell wall prints because I believe that if someone is investing a lot of money to have us take photos at their wedding or portraits of their family, then they should have at least one large wall print or canvas that they can see on a daily basis that makes them smile.
I think albums are a fantastic way to tell the story of weddings or to keep multiple images from a portrait session all in one place.
Go through your list and think about why the products on your list are important to the client. If you can’t answer this question, you’re never going to be able to sell it.
But above all, keep it simple. Your clients will thank you with larger and faster sales.
What is your favorite product to offer your clients? Just leave a comment below.
