Selling photos...Any suggestions?

[Wendy Lynn]

Hi. This is my first time using a forum so please have a little patience.
I take pictures mainly of my kids at their sporting events; baseball just finished now on to swim team. I have been asked by other parents if I would sell my pics that I have taken of their children. I would love to be able to make a tiny profit doing what I love, but not quite sure where to start. I would like to have them view the proofs online and have them order from me personally. I don't want another site to be in control of what is ordered, printed and shipped. I want to have full control and send them off myself to be printed. Any advice would help!! :idea:

[n8]

You could always just post them on a facebook page, offer them the link, have them email you which prints they'd like, and pay you through a pay pal account. That of course assumes they are ok with setting up these accounts if they don't have them already. I've been looking in to some of these sites myself for selling photos...I don't know how much control they take, but my understanding is that some let you set your price and payment options and all.

[Frog]

or you could just email the shots to them.

[Wendy Lynn]

The only problem with emailing them is that they will be able to download and make their own copies.

[drg]

Wendy,

Welcome to Photography Review!

How much do you want to spend to set this up?

Every step you don't automate, such as with the Order Fulfillment options it seems you are trying to avoid or alter, will cost you at least a lot more time if not money.

What software do you currently have available or are you familiar with for image management?

Are you printing yourself or having a pro shop locally do it for you?

More and more professional printing services have established a customer front end that lets you control everything so among other things, you don't have prints to pay for that the customer hasn't also paid for!

Have you 'done the numbers' on what it will cost for reprints if the customer isn't happy or the 'crop' is wrong or similar?

Have you even thought of just printing one of everything in a small (4x6) size and putting them in an album and using that old fashioned type of proofing?

Email or small website proofing won't give anyone an image large enough to do much with in terms of a print. To get higher levels of protection to prevent the right-click or grab type of image will require more than a little bit of work. And money too. If I can see it on the screen, I can copy with pretty much included tools or with some piece of software from the web. Stopping this is almost pointless so it is usually easier to just not post a high quality copy that you care if it is appropriated.

Are you looking for specific software suggestions or websites?

These are a few questions and comments that might help to guide you in the next step or so of this process.

Let us know what we can try and answer.

Again Welcome to PR!

[Wendy Lynn]

The problem is that this is the first time I will be doing ANY of this. I have only shot for my personal gain. I figured since people were offering to pay for the images I would give it a try. I am still trying to learn about my camera and all it's settings. I'm looking around for some classes to take and also online courses. They don't have much a selection here in MS.
I'm sure if you looked at one of my pics and compare it to yours you wouldn't think it was anything worth selling. I'm trying, but even if they don't sell I won't stop taking pics b/c I truly enjoy it and love the lasting memories.

To answer some of your questions: I don't want to spend a lot of money at all!! If things work out then I can think about investing more. I've looked at some of the sites like Smugmug.com, but don't know which one is the best. I don't even know what would be an appropriate price to charge.

I'm sure I will have too many questions that I would need help answering and take up a lot of everyones time. I guess you can say I am Digitally illiterate, but hoping to learn lol :cryin:

[drg]

Wendy,

Sorry to not get back to you again but I've been away much of the weekend;again!

If all you want to do via the Web is 'proof' you could even use a site like flickr and just have password restricted or 'private' sets. I think Flickr still offers that option for free.

The proofs could simply be referenced via email and you could work out the arrangements for printing and delivery or:

You could go for something like Smugmug and have the prints made and sent to you and then you make the delivery or let them do the order fulfillment and deal with the hassle.

Or, you could have the printing done locally by a retailer (Walgreens, Costco, etc) and you could mark them up accordingly.

Pricing depends on if you want to make a buck or two per, or just recover you expense. If you ever, ever, plan to sell more than a few pics, charge competitively with other photographers in your area. Else you may create hard feelings, or find you have lots of requests that will eat you alive because you are inexpensive! Then everyone stops asking and well,

Bottom line for pricing is charge what they are or will be worth or just give 'a few' to friends. It costs you time and money and ability so recover that at least. Do not undervalue the work you have done.

Test several printing options or places with the same dozen or so photos in varying sizes to see what you want to be showing as your work. Then figure out (and there's lots of help here) pricing and 'management'.

Best wishes -

[Ray Dockrey]

Zenfolio is another good hosting site to use. I have the pro account and it costs me about $100 a year. It is very easy to use and you just wouldn't apply a price list to your photos. That way they could view them and pick out the ones they want, then email you thier order and you could fulfill it however you want.

I will warn you of this. A lot of parents want a whole lot for nothing so be prepared. You may find it is not worth your time messing with them.

[Wendy Lynn]

Thanks for the advice everyone! I'll let you know how it goes. Wish me luck.. :0)

[dbutler]

Also check out wix.com. It's as cheap as you're going to find since it starts off free, and it can serve to be a good proofing site. if you are looking for ANY bells and whistles, then cheap pretty much goes out the window. Good luck!

[klausson]

You can also submit your photos to either a stock photography collection, if you want to license them, or to an online collection like PrintedArt, if you want to sell your photos as finished artwork.

[hakurtz]

i started off using photobucket. you can lock the albums and password them so only the poeple who you give the pw to can access the album. i have been using them for years.

[Danbaileyphoto]

I also use Smugmug and I'd highly recommend them or one of the other services like Zenfolio. They make the selling and money part really easy, since you don't have to handle the sales at all. You just upload your shots, set prices and give the gallery link to your customers. They also allow right-click protect options as well.

The key is to make the process as easy as possible for your customers. If you already have interest from people who want to buy your photos, and it sounds like you do, then setting up a site like that could end up paying off. And if people like your work, then word of mouth will spread and you could end up shooting and selling more in the future.

[PatBranch]

I also recommend Zenfolio for this. It's what I use. I like how they let you print with Mpix. It makes uploading, ordering and printing a lot simpler than using something like Flickr and dealing with payments, shipping and printing yourself.

Here's what my Zenfolio galleries look like: http://gallery.pbmedia.us/p952499328/hf8d7307#hf8d7307

[phillane]

Does anybody have an experience with dollarphotostock.com?

[ivansovsky]

Does anybody have an experience with dollarphotostock.com?

i see this page. Its look great.

[monkey44]

Wendy -
If you want to print and sell some photos to local parents and family ( as I did in local sports programs for years) then print a business card with an email on it. Pass them out to everyone that asks ... THEN, decide how to handle each one individually after someone contacts you. Makes a minimum of work for you, no extra work posting and maintaining images that you never sell - which is a lot of work, really.

If you want to make a business of it, and earn good money, then you'll have to take the steps to maintain a good image site and stock it, and advertise it.

Hobby makes no money. Business makes money. You should choose one or the other - and then make that effort work. If it was easy, every one would do it and quit the day job ...

One piece of advice: Get your payment up front, print the best images of each subject. If the parent/buyer is not satisfied, print a few different copies and trade. After two efforts, just believe you'll never satisfy that parent. Refund the money and move on. It's not worth the effort to attempt to please every parent -- "each kid" is the best and brightest always for that specific parent - so, stay in the box and make it work for you, not for them. You will have to give up on some clients, as some will never be satisfied with any shot.

Remember: If a kid strikes out every time he bats, you'll never get a shot of him hitting a home run, no matter how much a parent pays.

But, most importantly, have fun while you're out there with those kids, as that sometimes is better than any shot you get or miss. And if you get a great shot of a kid, just print it and give it to him, and that grin is better than any dollar you'll ever receive.

[rlbmkb]

I am a beginner too, great info provided here. Thanks!

[qwenwen]

Thanks for sharing...

[PhotoGirl]

I am a beginner too, great info provided here. Thanks!

Same here, thank you everyone for your advice.

[andrwplsn]

there are great suggestions here thanks folks!

[dingoodk]

i think many sites will help you about this just googled that simple

[rish002]

If you want to sell your own shot pics you first have to create your own website. For creating website as per my opinion Wordpress will be a best option as far as you do not know coding. For doing this you will need hosting which you can get from Bluehost or Godaddy or something like that.

Now you can easily add pictures and pages to your site and let your clients know about them.