Recorded: Welcome to The ReWork with Allison Tyler Jones, a podcast dedicated to inspiring portrait photographers to uniquely brand, profitably price, and confidently sell their best work. Allison has been doing just that for the last 15 years and she’s proven that it’s possible to create unforgettable art and run a portrait business that supports your family and your dreams. All it takes is a little rework. Episodes will include interviews with experts from in and outside of the photo industry, many workshops and behind the scenes secrets that Allison uses in her portrait studio every single day. She will challenge your thinking and inspire your confidence to create a profitable, sustainable portrait business you love through continually refining and reworking your business. Let’s do the rework.
Allison Tyler Jones: Hi friends, and welcome back to The ReWork. I hope you’ve had an amazing summer and that you’re ready to dig back into your business and make this the best holiday season yet for your portrait studio. And today’s topic is going to help you do exactly that. It’s one of my very favorite topics, client consultations. I truly believe that there’s nothing in your business that can impact your success like tweaking your client consultations. This is the area in my business where I’m spending a lot of time finessing, evaluating, seeing how things have gone and how things can go better. This is one vital area in my business that I’m constantly reworking, rethinking. After every single client consultation, I’m looking and thinking, how could I have made that better, more transparent and built the relationship better? So let’s jump in to how we can retool our client consultations for this year.
Allison Tyler Jones: So let’s dig in and look at our client consultation, see where you’re at with this process in your own business and where we might be able to make things a little bit better. Today we’re going to talk about why you’re going to do a consultation in the first place. You might already be doing them, you might have considered it, you might have started doing consultations and then decided that it was just too much of a pain in the rear to have one more appointment and it didn’t seem to make any difference for you. We’re going to talk about once you decide to do it, how to do it or how to do it better, what your goals are for the consultation, huge mistakes to avoid and specific points that I’ve been working on in my own consultations recently.
Allison Tyler Jones: So let’s start with why. The reason why I insist on having a pre-session consultation with every new client that comes into my portrait studio is because I want to establish transparency and trust with that client. I want them to know that I am not out to get them, I’m not out to oversell them. I want them to know exactly how we work, I want them to know exactly what we charge. And when I know that they know that, they will have trust in me. They might decide not to book me right then, they might wait till later, but they know exactly what I do, how I do it, and how much it costs. And when you know something like that from a service provider, it provides you with a huge measure of trust. You don’t go in feeling like you need to be defensive because you’re going to be oversold. A completely different approach from the client angle. So transparency and trust is where I want my clients to feel that they are. That’s why we’re doing a consultation in my business.
Allison Tyler Jones: Also, I don’t want there to be any surprises. I don’t want them to be blindsided ever, I don’t want them to come into the view and order appointment and think that they were going to spend $500 for 100 digital files and realize that no, we specialize in finished product and we are going to put things on your wall and we want to have custom designed albums. And have them think, “Well, I don’t even have any idea where that would go or how I would do that.” And they’re just completely blown away. I don’t like those kinds of surprises. I also don’t like the kinds of surprises where maybe they knew that I did portrait work for the walls and I did custom designed albums, but they had no idea how much it costs. So transparency and trust are key. A very common way to know if you need to be doing consultations with your clients or if you need to tweak your existing consultations is you are having problems closing your sale.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay, so I call that hitting the wall. You’re hitting the wall in the salesroom. When you’re sitting with the client and selecting images, it’s just burning down. And so what that sounds like is comments like, “I had no idea that this was going to be so much money.” Or delaying tactics, “I need to go home and measure. I need to talk to my husband. I can’t make this decision right now. Can you just put up a web gallery so I can look at them on my own?” Those are all just a different variation of delaying and somebody is not ready to make a decision, they feel like they’re being backed into a corner and they need a way out. So I don’t want my clients to ever feel like they’re being backed into a corner and I really hate hitting a wall like that in my sales appointment.
Allison Tyler Jones: So that’s one wall. Another wall is maybe you are doing consultations, but you are just not converting the clients. So everybody that’s coming through, you’re talking to them, but they’re not booking. Okay, so that’s another wall that you’re hitting. So either of those walls, any and all of those comments, whether it’s in the salesroom or before you even do the shoot, there’s something that needs to be tweaked in your consultation. So that’s what I want to talk about today. Now, I think we can all agree that the more money you spend on something, the more time usually you need to sit and think with that decision. If you’re buying a very expensive car, a home, a large expenditure, you need to do your research, you need to shop around, you need to think about what it is that you’re doing. So what I found is that as my portrait business became more successful, as we started doing more higher end products like framed wall art and custom designed albums, those prices became higher because we were taking on more and more of the responsibility.
Allison Tyler Jones: But as those prices became higher, obviously the ticket price, the final invoice for my clients became higher. And so I realized that when more money is being spent, they need more time, more information to make the decision. So it’s not just something that I can have a quick phone call, I’ll meet you at the park, we’ll shoot some images and then we come and sit down and I’m expecting that they’re going to drop $10,000 with no context and no idea of how this all works. So more money is going to require more time. What I also found is that if we’re doing our consultation correctly, it is avoiding the sticker shock and it’s helping the clients see the value of what we’re doing, of what portrait art really can do for their home. It also helps them to visualize the dream. So rather than just, okay, we’re going to talk about clothes and where we’re going to meet and what background we’re going to use, we are going to actually visualize what these images will look like in your home as you’re walking past them, and how do you want that to feel?
Allison Tyler Jones: What do you want to look at? How do you want to feel when you’re walking by those images or people are coming into your home or your family’s walking by these images? The consultation is also providing context and clarity. So it’s giving them that extra time to get used to, “Okay, this is not a situation where I’m just buying a bunch of digital files for X number. This is a situation where this person is helping me figure out what everybody’s going to wear, she’s figuring out what all the personalities of my family are like and who gets along with who, who has a special relationship. And she’s communicating all of that visually, then beautifully retouching it, printing it, then custom framing it, and then she’s going to bring it and hang it on my wall.” So that’s a very different context when you’re looking at that.
Allison Tyler Jones: You obviously know when you’re comparing some digital files for X number of dollars or that experience that I just described, those two would not be priced the same. So it makes perfect sense once you explain it, but if you never explain it, if they never have the chance to go through and be educated through that process, they won’t understand what it is that you’re doing. They will just know that you’re really expensive and that they’re scared and that they need to go away. The other thing I love about spending that time with the client in a consultation is that it becomes more collaborative and less salesy. Now, the biggest obstacles that I’ve heard from portrait photographers about not wanting to do a consultation. So I have friends that used to do consultations and then they just slowly quit doing them. For a variety of reasons, which I’ll talk about in a minute.
Allison Tyler Jones: And then there’s other photographers who say, “I just can’t do it for a variety of reasons.” So some of those reasons are, “So I have no place that a client can come in and meet with me.” So that’s one of the obstacles. Or maybe you have a home studio and you don’t want the clients coming into your home. Some of you may be on either coast or in a very busy city like LA or New York where traffic and parking are a real concern. And so to have clients come for one more meeting feels like it’s going to be very difficult for them and that could be a deal breaker. But really at the bottom of most of this, just the fear that clients don’t want the consultation. So I will tell you that that can be true. It can be true that clients don’t want the consultation if they just think it’s just another meeting that could have been an email or they think it’s a waste of time.
Allison Tyler Jones: Well, how they would think that it’s a waste of time is basically how we present it to them. If it’s, “We need to talk about clothes.” “Well just send me your clothing suggestions.” “We need to talk about price.” “Well just send me a price sheet.” And so it’s very tempting to get into that mode of just emailing a PDF, sending them some form through your CRM software and thinking that you have covered it all when you really haven’t. In my mind, the most important thing about a consultation is building that relationship with the client and really understanding what makes them tick. And again, building that trust and allowing that transparency to see how we work. So how do we do it? How do we do it right in the first place? Or maybe if we’ve gotten a little bit off track, how do we get back on track or how do we start to do it right in the first place?
Allison Tyler Jones: Well, I’m going to make a few assumptions here that you’re doing something right before the consultation and that is that you’re making sure that first contact phone call with that client is really good. And I would refer you to ReWork episode number three: The First Phone Call. That’s one of our most popular, our most downloaded episodes of the podcast is podcast number three. And I think we actually recorded that while Jessica and I were sitting on one of my kids’ bed in my basement, before we knew anything about anything with podcasting. But it still is one of the favorite episodes because it’s so meaty about how you work through that first phone call with the clients, all the things that you need to say.
Allison Tyler Jones: So I’m assuming before you do the consultation that you’ve done a really good first contact with the client. And during that first phone call, you’re letting them know that the consultation is one of the appointments that you’re going to have with our portrait studio. There’s the consultation where you’ll meet with the photographer and she’s going to talk about clothing. You’re going to talk about your kids’ relationships and figure out what it is that you’re shooting for so that we can create exactly what you need and that there’s no confusion about pricing.
Allison Tyler Jones: We believe in being very transparent, we want you to know exactly how much everything is going to cost. And so all of that will be discussed and figured out during the consultation.
Allison Tyler Jones: So in that first phone call, when we talk about the three appointments that we’re setting, we’re also setting the tone for how excited or not excited they’re going to be for each of these appointments. So when we’re talking about their consultation meeting, we’re saying things like, “I’m so excited to meet with you.” This is one of my clients’ favorite times, is to really get into the nitty-gritty on the personalities of the kids, talk about the clothing, talk about your home, where this is going to hang and just get everything figured out.
Allison Tyler Jones: Another way we might say it is we meet together so we can nail down the clothes, what to wear, get an exact idea of what we’re shooting for. You’ll leave the appointment knowing the investment involved so there are no surprises. Another comment that we might say during that first contact is the consultation helps us avoid the, “Oh, man, I wish we would’ve worn that.” When the clients arrive for their session and see the art hanging on our walls and realize, “Oh, shoot, we should have done something different with the clothing.” We’re upbeat, we’re positive, we are saying things like, “This makes the process so much easier, more fun, more transparent, and much less stressful for you because we’re helping you with all the difficult parts of this, like selecting the clothing, figuring out what we’re shooting for.”
Allison Tyler Jones: Now, if somebody doesn’t want to come to you and you don’t want to meet, you’d be happy to set up a Zoom call instead. This can all be done on Zoom. The main caveat I have about Zoom is that you want to set a time when they are able to be at their computer and focused on speaking with you. So they’re not on their phone in the car, driving in the pickup line at school or driving through Starbucks. They’re focused just like they would be on any other meeting and they have time to attend to what it is that you’re saying. Because we’ll be talking about pricing, we’ll be talking about clothing, we’ll be talking about your home. So I will need to have a time where you can be at the computer, I’m at my computer, I’ll be sharing my screen and showing you many of the things that we’ve done for other clients. So those are just some of the ways about the consultation in that very first phone call in a positive way.
Allison Tyler Jones: So once we get to the client consultation, we have the goals for the consultation. So my goal, as I mentioned before, is I want to deepen my relationship that’s already begun in that first phone call. So I want to go deeper with that. I want my clients to know exactly what it is that we do, how it works, that we are creating wall art for their walls or albums or holiday cards as an add-on to those two things. I want to help my client visualize and see what I see, to see how cool it could be to walk by a large scale image of her family every day and how that is art that happens to be her family on the walls of her home. I also am going to take the time to listen and to qualify her and really hear what she’s saying. Not hear with my sales ears of hoping that this is going to be a great client and that she’s going to buy everything, but really listen to the words that she’s saying.
Allison Tyler Jones: Is she using minimizing language? Is she saying, “Look, I just need a few eight by tens. My kids are home from college, we just need something really quick. We need some Facebook images.” Or I’m really listening to what she is telling me and I’m not glossing over that like, “Oh, yeah. No, we can do your Facebook images too.” And, “Oh, yeah, I know this doesn’t seem like a really important time,” but in the back of my mind, I’m thinking, “No, I’m going to make her buy more things.” Because that’s not fair, I’m not listening to her. So I actually am picking up on those things and addressing that in the moment. Then as I’m doing that, together, the client and I are going to define the scope of work. What is it that we’re actually going to do?
Allison Tyler Jones: So if she’s saying just what I said before, “I just need some Facebook files, maybe some holiday cards.” Then I’ll say, “Well, anything that goes on the wall or in an album, you’re going to have social media files for. And then as an add-on, we certainly could create custom holiday cards for you. We definitely have a specialty in that and people totally love them. So we could do that as well as an add-on to your wall art or your album. So what do you think you’re most likely to love? Something like a large scale art piece for your wall, family gallery or is an album more where we’re headed because you want to tell the story and have more images?”
Allison Tyler Jones: And if they’re not interested in those two things, then they will say, “Yeah, I don’t really need either of those things.” So if that’s the case, then they don’t need me at this time. They might need me sometime in the future, but they don’t need me right now if they don’t need those two things because those are the only products that we’re selling. So defining that scope of work is really important. Also, as I’m speaking in this way, the client might say, “Okay. Well, now that you say that, I don’t really have any wall space, but I love the idea of a lot of different images of boys with mom and dad with the girls and our dogs and I like the idea of a storybook.”
Allison Tyler Jones: So then we know we’re shooting for an album and I can quote her that price and let her know what the options are for that. And so once the scope of work is defined, then we can actually quote numbers to them. And then we’re getting a commitment, we’re getting a buy-in. So the client is looking at me and saying, “Okay. Yes, that number sounds great. Let’s go ahead and do an album.” And then that’s what we’re shooting for. And then we can move on and talk about clothing and all of the things that need to go into actually creating this art. But if I haven’t defined the scope of work or quoted the actual numbers of those specific products that we’re talking about, then I’m making an error.
Allison Tyler Jones: If you’re a portrait photographer, you know the next few months are going to be crazy. This is our busy season. And how to make the most of that busy season is to make sure that our client communication is in order, that we are not having clients showing up with the wrong clothing, that we are not having clients shocked in our sales appointments by our pricing and needing to go home and measure or going home and asking their husband, and then sales burning down and our client’s not getting what they need and we not being able to build a sustainable business. So how are we going to make sure that this season is the most successful that it possibly can be?
Allison Tyler Jones: Well, it starts by getting on the same page with your clients so that nothing is left to chance. And how I’ve done this is that I’ve spent the last 13 years revising my own internal consultation form. Which you can download the consultation form that I use in my business absolutely free. But I realized after tweaking that form for about 13 years, that I needed something more. And it wasn’t just a pretty brochure and it wasn’t a price list with no context because we all know you can send a price list to somebody and they’re still shocked by the price because they never looked at it or they have no idea what those prices even mean.
Allison Tyler Jones: It’s happened to all of us. What I realized is I needed a single printed piece for my client to take away with them that would leave nothing to chance and that it would allow me to educate my clients about the price range of my products, it would help them to understand what we would and wouldn’t be shooting for during their portrait session. Actually creating a game plan for what is it that we’re actually going to be shooting for and let’s prioritize that.
Allison Tyler Jones: And then also something that would allow the clients to feel confident about selecting the clothing for their session and a printed piece that would allow them to share with their spouse and be able to put together the game plan for their session. So I needed it to be part brochure, part getting ready guide, part last minute checklist and part consultation form. Because my consultation form was internal, I was keeping that form, but I wanted this printed piece to go with my clients. And I wanted it to be sexy and good-looking and that they felt completely and totally cared for. So I wanted all of this in a single booklet that the client would take with them at the end of their consultation.
Allison Tyler Jones: Now, I’ve been using this, I created about five years ago, it’s called the ATJ Game Plan Booklet, and I started off by using it in my studio and I’ve been revising it for the last five years and now for the first time ever, I’m offering it to The ReWork community to use in your portrait studio. So what’s included in that? In this course, it’s a little mini course, not a big long course, there’s a video lesson with me on how to use the Game Plan Booklet in your consultation. You will also have a video recording of an actual client consultation with me and a client using the booklet in real time. And then you’ll have layered PSD files of the Game Plan Booklet that we use in our studio every day, as well as a PDF version of the latest and greatest ATJ consultation form.
Allison Tyler Jones: All of that for a one-time payment of $295. Just $295 to completely change the way that you interact with your clients, the information that they have, how taken care of they feel by making things transparent to them, putting together the game plan for the session so that everybody’s on the same page. We all know what we’re shooting for, we know how much it’s going to cost, they know what to wear. Everybody’s on the same page. This is the document, this is the booklet that has changed my business, and I want you to have it too if it works for you. So go to Dotherework.com/gameplan, that’s Dotherework.com/gameplan, and download it for your business this busy season. I know that the Game Plan Booklet will be a game changer for your business.
Allison Tyler Jones: So the consultation mistakes that I find myself making now are different than the consultation mistakes that I made when I was first starting with my client consultations. The consultation mistakes I made when I was first starting were either skipping it because the client was busy and I thought, “Oh, I told her enough, we don’t need to meet.” And that was a huge mistake because the client, you can only absorb so much information at any given time, and even though we talk on the phone and you might trot out every policy, procedure and tell them everything, until they’re ready to receive that information, it’s not going to sink in. So that’s why we divide it up, we want to have that first phone call to have a little chat, expose them to some range of pricing, and again, go back to that ReWork episode number three for the super details on that first phone call. And then once we’ve done that and we’ve set up the consultation, the consultation then is the time to get into more detail.
Allison Tyler Jones: I don’t get into a lot of detail on that first phone call because it’s overwhelming and they just tune out. So either it’ll scare them away and they will say, “You know what? This is just too hard. This is just too much. She has lots of rules.” Or, “She has lots of things that I don’t understand and I was driving down the road when I was talking to her, so there was a lot of words coming at me and I didn’t get any of it and so now I feel overwhelmed, let me talk to my husband.” And then you never hear from them again. So we are not converting people that we could have converted if we’re not doing that first phone call right and we’ve overwhelmed them with too much information. So not a great idea. So less information on that first phone call, more relationship, and then get more detail in the actual consultation.
Allison Tyler Jones: Where I continually make a mistake is I get too chatty. Sometimes I talk too much about their kids and mothering and grandmothering and I can get a little bit in the weeds rather than staying focused. So it’s a fine line. I really feel like one of the joys of my business is having a great relationship with my clients and I want to talk about their kids. So I want to have that, but we also need to remember what the goal is, is that we want trust and we want transparency and we want to expose them to how much this is all going to cost so they know how it’s going to work.
Allison Tyler Jones: Sometimes I’ve gotten too chatty and then they realize, “Oh wait, I’ve got to go.” And then I’m rushing to give them information and it goes back to too much information when they’re not really processing because they’re looking at their watch and need to get out of there. So just something for those of you extroverts, the social people that like to talk a lot, that’s something to think about. So the result when we’re too chatty is that we’re not getting that scope of work defined and not being able to properly quote them.
Allison Tyler Jones: Or another big mistake is just not talking about price at all. We think if we just build the vision for them and talk about all the fun images that we’re going to shoot and how cool the background’s going to be, “And look at this cool lighting, and you could wear these clothes and we can do it in a meadow when it’s snowing.” Or whatever, we’re creative so of course we want to talk about how we’re going to light it and the creative and all of that, but then we don’t talk about price and the result is a major sticker shock. And a tug of war that you’re in with a client, that they’re looking at these images that they helped create in that they collaborated with you on the ideas, they saw it in their mind of how it was going to be.
Allison Tyler Jones: In their mind, they already own them because it’s their children in the images, but now you’re holding their kids hostage because it’s more than they thought, they don’t want to spend that much and they were never quoted. So it’s just not a good way to go. The pre-session consultation, that is where the sale happens. That is where they are exposed to the price and realize, “Okay, this is how much it’s going to be.” And then they go away home and then they’re able to walk through their house and look at the walls and think, “Okay, it’s a lot, but it’s going to be so amazing right there.” And then they can talk to their husband about it, if the husband hasn’t been in the consultation, and they can start to sink into how that is going to be so great in their home.
Allison Tyler Jones: We all do this with things that we buy. When we first hear that number, “There’s no way I’m paying that much money for a car.” But then we test drive it and then we think about driving it and how comfy our kids will be in the back leather seats, they don’t even need iPads, they can be watching the video on the screen in the back of my seat, they can have big cup holders. Whatever. You start to think about now why we need that and you start talking yourself into it. And if it’s important to you and you want to have a really nice car to drive your kids around in, then you’re going to find a way to make that happen and you will be able to justify that expense to yourself. Very same thing with the portrait world.
Allison Tyler Jones: The next mistake that I find spending too much time on is talking about how instead of what. So again, talking about the creative part of it and not enough about what are we doing with these images. So the downside of that is we overshoot the session, we show the client way too many images and they are completely overwhelmed and it becomes a huge waste of time for me and my client. And what happens is here we’ve spent all this time brainstorming this session, we’ve shot beautiful imagery. We’re sitting there, you’re so excited to show them, they’re so excited to see them, then you drop the price bomb on them and all of a sudden it’s now a negative experience. All this work that you’ve gone to, you’ve poured your heart and soul into it, and now it’s negative. It’s not worth it.
Allison Tyler Jones: It’s so much better to talk about what are we doing with these images and where are they going to live, rather than just hoping that they’ll love them so much that they will just buy them. The result from not doing this right is a lower sale or a sale that burns down and an angry client. So what are we doing with these images?
Allison Tyler Jones: Now in the consultation portion of the program, even if you’re showing them ideas, most clients when you ask them this question, “What are we doing with these images? Or where are they going to live?” Or however you want to ask that question, they’re going to say, “I have no idea. I don’t know. Can’t we wait until we see the images?” Okay, so they’ll ask you something like that. So when a client says to me, every now and then, I will get a client that will say, “Okay, I need a 30 by 40 to go over the console table in my entry.” Or whatever, they’ll have a very specific size. That’s probably 2% of my clients. Very rare. Or maybe that’s probably an interior designer I’m dealing with, somebody that has a specific vision in mind, but usually they just don’t know. And that’s our job is to help them.
Allison Tyler Jones: And I think it’s helpful when those words come out of the client’s mouth, when they say, “I don’t know. I have no idea.” They realize, but I do have an idea, so that’s why you’re here. So that’s when I will show them, typically, my clients will buy art for their walls or a custom designed album, here’s what that looks like. And then I can start showing them samples and we can expose them to different options, a statement piece that holds a wall alone, smaller pieces that might go in a gallery, albums, gifts, holiday cards, that sort of thing. So they just can see exactly all the things that you can do with these beautiful images and what would work best for them and their family at this time in their family’s life.
Allison Tyler Jones: Now, going back to the other question the client might ask when I’m asking them, “What are we doing with these images?” They might say something like, “Well, I don’t really know. I think I just need to see the images and then we’ll decide what we want.” That’s a very common response. And so my response to that response is the truth, and we all know this, “There’s only so much good energy to go around in any given shoot. So we really need to concentrate on what is the priority concept for this year’s portrait session? What’s the most important thing to you right now? Is it the family group together, everybody together? Is it the relationship between the kids? Maybe you have a new animal and you want the kids with the dog, maybe somebody’s lost teeth. There’s an endless list of reasons and concepts of why you would want to photograph the family right now.” And so helping them to see that if we are in a session and we’re shooting everything, this huge shot list, that really nothing’s going to be special. It will just be a lot.
Allison Tyler Jones: And it spreads out that good energy across a lot of different images, rather than having a concept in mind and shooting for that concept and knowing what the end result is, where that image is going to go. So I might say something like, “If there’s no place for that image to live, then there’s no point in shooting it. If it’s not going in an album or it’s not going on the wall somewhere, that’s the only two ways that I’m selling those images so there’s no reason to shoot it.” So that tends to make it more clear and to help them decide. Because if we can, as human beings, for the most part, most human beings will delay decision making because commitment is hard and it requires you to think more and to actually come to a decision. And so that tends to be more difficult than not coming to a decision.
Allison Tyler Jones: And so delaying the decision is just, “Well, why don’t you just shoot everything and then I’ll come and cherry-pick it later?” But we all know that’s exhausting. It’s exhausting and it’s not the best use of your time and their money. The best use of your time and their money is to have the conversation about their family and determine what is the best concept for this year, what’s really special right now? And shoot that, tightly curate your edit and then show them the best of the best and pick something for the wall or an album that’s within that. And how we narrow that down is that when we get into the brainstorming process of, well, I want a shot of the whole family or I want just the kids and individuals of each kid in three outfits with our new puppy, you get the idea, is to just, again, ask that binary, those two questions. “I love it. I love that idea. Is that going on the wall or is that going in an album?”
Allison Tyler Jones: And it helps them to just stop and think, “Okay. Well, I don’t want an album because I don’t like albums, I never look at them.” You hear that from people that don’t like albums. “But are you going to decorate your entire house out of one photo shoot?” “No, don’t want to do that. I don’t live in The Guggenheim, so I don’t have tons and tons of wall space. I am not going to do every single one of those images on the wall. So what is the most important?” So it’s up to us to help them narrow that down. And it’s not a negative thing, you’re not killing the sale, you’re actually saving your sale by helping them to think about it now before you ever pick up a camera so that you’re not shooting everything under the sun and just hoping that they buy it. And then mad at them that they didn’t or they’re mad at you that they want everything because you’re talented and you’re amazing at what you do and they can’t afford all the things that you’ve photographed.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay. The other mistake that we often make is not listening for qualifiers. And again, as I mentioned before, we’re not listening for that minimizing language. So when somebody is saying, “I just want a little, I don’t want a lot.” Then I might say to them, “Look, I don’t want to overwhelm you with too many options.” This is also something that I would say to a client when they say, “Can’t we just see what you shoot? Shoot everything and then we’ll just decide.” Is, “I don’t want to overwhelm you with too many options because you’re going to come in, you love your kids, you love your family, you are going to want everything, and then probably you’re not going to like the price of that. So let’s narrow down and figure out just what it is that you need. Of course, you’re going to see more images than probably what you will buy just because if something amazing is happening, I’m not going to not shoot it, but let’s stick with just what you need. I don’t want to overwhelm you and I don’t want you to feel like you’re being oversold.”
Allison Tyler Jones: So listen to qualify. Minimizing language are things like, “We just need holiday cards, we don’t really put pictures on the wall.” Maybe they’re extremely price sensitive, maybe they want things that you don’t do. For our portrait studio, maybe they’re talking about location work when we shoot in studio. Maybe they are using words like, “I don’t need a lot. I need just a little short, a super quick session.” They’re using that minimizing language. And so sometimes that’s in an effort to not spend a lot, they want to put you in a box. They don’t realize how we work and so we need to communicate that to them. Now, the big question that I always get when we start talking about consultation and everything that I’ve just discussed, defining the scope of work, quoting price, asking them where these images are going to live, in the wall or in an album.
Allison Tyler Jones: The biggest question I get from portrait photographers, and it’s a fear-based question, is, “What if they cancel? Or what if they don’t book? Or what if they go away and they hate me?” I will tell you, in my experience, and I think this year we’re 18 years in. In 18 years, I have never had a client go away angry and hate me because I was honest and transparent with them. I have had clients go away angry and probably hating me because I created amazing, beautiful work of their kids and showed it to them and hadn’t quoted them ahead of time. And they wanted it and they had no idea how much it was going to be and they felt completely blindsided, they felt like I’d done a bait and switch. And really I had, because I hadn’t been honest upfront and quoted pricing. And so we don’t like to think of ourselves that way, but really that’s what it is.
Allison Tyler Jones: It’s like going back to the car analogy. You go to the dealership, they take you on the ride, they put your kids in the backseat, they let them watch Paw Patrol on the iPads in the seats and they get everybody excited, they say, “Oh, take the car to Disneyland. You’ll love it.” And then they come back and then tell you that it’s going to be $200,000 or something that you had no intention of paying, that we’re completely blown away by. Not fair, not right, and we don’t want to do that. So what if they cancel? Some of them will, not very many. I usually have probably two a year that will actually come in for the consultation and we’ll go away and say, “You know what? It’s not in the cards for us right now.”
Allison Tyler Jones: But here’s amazing to me that without exception, every single one of those people that cancel or go away say is some version of, “Thank you so much for taking the time. I can see that what you do is really special and what I wanted for this moment in my family doesn’t meet that level of special. So I want to save you for when it really counts. So we’re going to do something different now, but I want to schedule you for,” and then they might say, “When my parents come into town or when our oldest is getting ready to leave for college.” Or whatever. But never is it, “I had no idea you’re such a ripoff and I’m going to go tell everybody what a jerk you are.” It just doesn’t happen. They really are so grateful to have had the time and they feel obligated in a way that if they’re going to do something like create some art that’s going to go on their wall or in an album, they are going to come back to me and they do.
Allison Tyler Jones: So I would rather have them go away happy, go away fully understanding what it is that I do, so that they can come back later fully invested when it works for them. Than to have somebody that I haven’t quoted, that I haven’t been straight with, that we all think we’re buddies until they come for that sales appointment and then they realize that in essence I’ve lied to them. I’ve let them think that somehow they’re going to get something that they’re not. So it’s scary in the beginning, then you do a few consultations and then it’s not scary anymore. But it’s scary in the beginning when you’re doing consultations in this way, but then it becomes less scary. But it’s so easy to slip into these little mistakes, into the too chatty, into forgetting to quote, into maybe giving too much information in the first phone call and then skipping the consultation altogether because you think you let them know the information.
Allison Tyler Jones: I truly believe that having a really good first phone call followed by an in person, whether it’s in Zoom or actually in person together in my studio with a client, and exposing them to all the different concepts of what we can do together and then quoting them after we’ve discussed and she says, “I think I would like this. I think I would like this.” And then I’m letting her know about how much that would be, and usually I’m speaking in ranges. It just makes it so much easier, so much better, so much happier.
Allison Tyler Jones: So I want to encourage you that if you have not yet started doing consultations with your clients, now is the time. We are headed into the busy season, this is portrait season for family portrait photographers and now is the time. The time to do something new is when you’re going to have a little bit more volume so that you can start practicing and I would send you to Dotherework.com to download our free consultation form that we use in our studio that has all of these little questions, the form that we use every single day that helps us get the information that we need from our clients to create the best work we possibly can for them.
Allison Tyler Jones: So go to Dotherework.com and download that, it’s free. And then look at where your consultations can be better, whether that’s that you’re starting to do them or maybe you’ve gotten a little loosey goosey, how can you tighten it up? And the next consultation you do, once that client walks out the door or you turn your Zoom off, you think, “How could that have gone better? What did I miss? What did I forget? How can I tighten it up the next time?” And I can promise you that every effort you make to tighten up your consultation, to make it more meaningful, to establish that relationship, to become more transparent and more trustworthy, directly goes to your bottom line. It will make your business more successful. You will have better, smoother, happier sales. Better, smoother, happier clients. It just works.
Allison Tyler Jones: So look at every step in that client consultation process and decide where can you improve and implement that improvement now. I would love to hear the changes that you’re making. I would love to hear maybe some of the challenges that you’re having. If you DM me on @ATJphoto on Instagram or go to Support@dotherework.com and email me there. I would love to hear how it’s going. If there’s some seemingly insolvable problems you’re having, I would love to hear about that. Any of your successes, I would love to hear about that. So dig in, rework those consultations, I wish you the best busy season yet and we’ll see you next week. Thanks for being here.
Recorded: You can find more great resources from Allison at dotherework.com and on Instagram at do.the.rework.
