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, mini-workshops and behind-the-scenes secrets that Allison uses in her portrait studio every single day. She’ll 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’m really excited for today’s guest because he’s one of my favorite people in the entire world. He’s my nephew, Ross DeCesare. He was on the podcast many moons ago when he was about 17. We did a podcast together called What A 17-Year-Old Knows About Social Media That You don’t. But he has grown and evolved and he has lived in another country for two years and he’s back after spending two years in Santiago, Chile.
Allison Tyler Jones: And he is back with us today, and he’s back working with his mother at the DeCesare Design Group. And they have just been through a process where they have been interviewing, working with and vetting some commercial interior photographers to photograph their projects. And the reason why I had him come on a podcast about portrait photography is that he’s telling me about his experience with these photographers. And I’m like, oh, this directly relates to what we are dealing with every day, and I think we can learn from this as portrait photographers. And there are some of you that probably shoot interiors or commercial work and you can learn from this yourself. So welcome, Ross.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Hello. Well, so yeah, we photograph our homes when we finish them, and we spent all these years designing them, building them, and then we want to photograph them so we can get them published and then we can have that in our portfolio on our website and for social media. It’s a hard process to find that photographer, but also that photo shoot, three days, four days, early mornings, late nights. And so you want someone that you can work with well, that knows what they’re doing, that has good experience and yeah, it’s got to have the right fit.
Allison Tyler Jones: Photographing interiors is a completely different skill set than what we’re doing with portrait photography in that obviously you’re not dealing with a subject that can respond to you. So let’s just back up for just a second. When you’re hiring a photographer to come and photograph these projects for you, you’re looking for several things. You want to document it because you’ve spent three to four years building this house, and then the clients go live in it and you may never see it again.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally. Or they might ruin it, their kids or they might sell it. That happens a lot.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah, for sure. So you want to be able to show your work and have your portfolio. So you need it for portfolio, for your website, you need it for social media, and then you also need it for another thing that maybe some people don’t think about, which is as scouting shots, if you will, or actually having shots that could be published in a-
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally.
Allison Tyler Jones: … shelter magazine.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Editorial publishing, yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. Okay. So there’s a lot of needs there and a lot of usage needs there.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yes. Lots of things to consider.
Allison Tyler Jones: So in the past, and this is not the first time that you have looked to hire photographers, this might be the first time you have been tasked with doing this for your mom, but DeCesare Design Group has hired a lot of photographers, worked with a lot of photographers over the years. So talk about that. What has been good? What has been bad about that experience?
Ross Tyler DeCesare: There’s lots of things. Usually since the beginning of my mom’s career, she did some commercial work and really, editorial publishing was different back then. You do scouting shots, you did some of them just on your phone. We just finished the home. You take some pictures and then you send those to the magazine and they fly someone out, their photographer. They have someone on staff or on contract, and they come out and shoot the whole home the way they want to with our input for their magazine. And then we get those pictures back. But social media wasn’t around as much, so that was a completely different process. And then kind of magazines started not wanting to pay for it, ’cause that’s a lot of money. And when you’re a national magazine and you have 15 magazines, you don’t want to pay-
Allison Tyler Jones: And publishing-
Ross Tyler DeCesare: $50,000 and…
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah, they’re not making the money that they once did. Yeah.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally. Social media, this new thing, and then what are we doing with magazines? So that kind of was a new thing that was happening. And my mom, Caroline, had a photographer that she used. We used them a lot frequently, learned how to work really well with him, and that was awesome. We still use them, but sometimes you want something new. It’s a different way of working. Or also that photographer is really busy doing other things-
Allison Tyler Jones: Not as available-
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Not as available.
Allison Tyler Jones: … doing a lot of personal projects right now.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Personal projects, commercial work, and so just trying to find other people to work with. It’s an interesting thing, especially keeping in mind that now magazines aren’t flying people out. They really can’t afford this huge fee to pay for the images. And then we need it for social media. So we need our content. We need not just 10 good shots of the house, we need 30 multiple angles. We need videos-
Allison Tyler Jones: Details.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: … detailed, whole new account.
Allison Tyler Jones: Multimedia. Yeah, it’s really interesting. So as you’ve come into the business, and you and I were having the conversation which led to this podcast, which was you were saying, “Oh my gosh…” Because Ross actually listens to a lot of The Rework stuff and he knows what it is that we do here. And so he was saying, “Man, as I started looking at these different photographers and interacting with them, I realized what a wide gamut there is of not only what they’re charging, but how professional they are or are not.”
Ross Tyler DeCesare: The interaction with them, the client interaction, yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: And just how he’s been grateful to have had the experience with Caroline DeCesare, his mother, and listening to us talk about-
Ross Tyler DeCesare: You.
Allison Tyler Jones: Well, listening to us talk about how we’re always trying to up-level the business, make sure that it’s professional, make sure that it’s transparent. So let’s go through and we’re going to talk about three different specific photographers, and we’re not going to mention them by name, but three specific interior photographers that Ross talked with and what that situation was like. And then who he eventually hired and why. So I’m just going to kind of interview you about that.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Okay.
Allison Tyler Jones: Good? Okay. So the first person, he was somebody that had worked with before and was talented, did a great job, and probably the least expensive of these three that we’re talking about. Ostensibly the least expensive. It seemed the least expensive, but when it came down to it, you felt like they were kind of high maintenance. And so what did you mean by… You said, “Oh my gosh, they’re just high maintenance.” What did you mean by that?
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah, well, I think something that I’ve learned from you and seeing your business is that you value your worth in your work, and I think that’s something you’ve tried to convey in Rework is like you have this talent and you can sell it. And so to see this photographer, he’s not valuing his worth for some reason, is what I’m feeling. He’s also super high maintenance, but not charging the right way. So then he feels like he can’t perform and he feels like we’re kind of doing him a favor.
Allison Tyler Jones: Or he’s kind of doing you a favor because he’s not charging you.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: In both ways.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. And so then what you were saying when we were having the conversation is that to use an example of high end maintenance thing, I kept saying, well, what do you mean by high maintenance? That they would call and say, “Hey, I am going to be in the Western United States on these months. Do you have any projects that I can photograph?” That’s good because being on top of it, that’s anticipating needs reaching out to… Caroline knows when she has a project coming up, and so this photographer is reaching out saying, “Hey, do you have anything that I might be able to photograph?” But TMI, too much information was then disclosed by the photographer then saying, “Well, I have other jobs that I’m doing out there and it will save me money if I can and shoot at the same time.” So the client doesn’t care about saving you money or not. So they could have just left it at that, left it at, “Hey, I’m going to be in your area on this day. Do you have anything that I can shoot?” Amazing, great, wow. Way to be proactive.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: But then to disclose like, “Well, the reason I’m doing is because I don’t charge for travel and it saves me money, and that’s why.” So sometimes I think we can be a little TMI and then also being hard to schedule because of that. Well, it’s not really working out with my schedule. So you’re not anticipating the needs of the client.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Right. You’re a professional, I’ll pay for your travel if you’re coming out from where you live, it’s far away. Other photographers, we have to fly out, so him not charging for it then creates this whole complication for his business. That’s what I saw. It doesn’t really… Don’t charge for your travel. That’s easier for us, then it’s cheaper. But just looking at it in the aspect of my Rework lens, like talking to Allison, talking to you, I was like, why would you not charge for it? And your running yourself through loops.
Allison Tyler Jones: Well, I can tell you why because they’ve been talking to other photographers, sitting around for coffee saying, “Nobody will pay for travel anymore, so I have to do it this way.” And they’re telling themselves a story that isn’t necessarily true because obviously a good client like you that is paying regularly… First of all, an interior designer who is doing actual work is not an influencer redesigning the same nightstand 25 times on their Instagram feed. Actually, a working interior designer knows that they charge for their time and their work and they know that other creative professionals do too. And they know that travel is not free, so you’re willing to pay. I think it’s hard… You were saying it’s hard to work with somebody who is, quote unquote, ‘giving’ you a deal against your will and then also kind of holding it against you and then not being able to do the job in the time that you want, when you need it. And so then you’re being held up by all their other projects because they’re not charging for travel.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Right, totally. And also part of that, another part of the way he works is this kind of I’m going to seem like I’m doing you a favor or we’re going to do it your way, but then it’s actually going to have to be my way, gives the false illusion to that.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. So what you were saying about that was that there’s specific shots that you need, and you know what they are. Like, we need the range wall in the kitchen. We need the bed in the primary suite. There’s just certain things that are always needed, and there’s a style and a level of professionalism that you guys want your work to be shown as. And so this photographer was saying, “Sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, absolutely. I’ll work however you want.” And then you would get into the actual shoot… Let’s just back up from that for a second. This is not a situation where DeCesare Design Group sends the photographer over to the client’s house as they’re getting their kids down the driveway. It’s like you send in cleaners, you send in what? What’s involved in a photo shoot?
Ross Tyler DeCesare: A photo shoot. We usually tell the clients they have to be out of town from Saturday to Saturday, and we come in and we get cleaners in there over the weekend and we come in and declutter. We don’t move them out, but we get rid of all their stuff. We hide all their stuff, we tuck it all.
Allison Tyler Jones: Well, you tuck all the things that you don’t want.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Exactly.
Allison Tyler Jones: Like personal photos, things like that.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally. Kids clothes, kids toys, the weird knife block on the counter, whatever.
Allison Tyler Jones: The paper towel holder.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: The paper towel holder. And then we come in after we’ve done that, then we come in and we bring truckload of books or plants.
Allison Tyler Jones: Accessories.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: The house is fully furnished. It has everything it needs, but just a little bit of extra accessories that we’re switching their personal stuff out with. Their coffee table books with just different non-personal coffee table books. A cool huge floral and a big, huge pot that kind of highlights the kitchen.
Allison Tyler Jones: Fresh floral.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Fresh floral.
Allison Tyler Jones: Bread, fruit.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Props.
Allison Tyler Jones: Props, yeah.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: Got it. And then not only that, but then also a team from… The project designer, her assistant, and then movers, because movers are going to have to sit there and for every shot, you’re moving the stuff in and out because the photographer… You don’t expect the photographer to do that.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Right.
Allison Tyler Jones: You have a crew that’s doing that.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally. And the lighting, you never know how the lighting’s going to be, and the camera might be sitting right where the living room couch is to get the kitchen. So we have to move the couch just for ease. So it’s a huge process and we have a way we want to do it. We know how we want to do it, and we take the photographer’s input. We’re collaborating with them. But if we were talking about you, it’s like you’re not going to promise someone in a consultation that you’re going to go shoot outside in front of your office. You’re not going to say, “We’re going to do whatever.” You’re going to say, no… You’re going to show up. You’re going to be in my studio-
Allison Tyler Jones: Specializing in studio portraits, yeah.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: And we’re going to do in studio. I rather have the photographer say, “You know what? I like to just kind of figure it out on the day of and see test lighting there versus have your whole team prepare and decide shots ahead,” which is…
Allison Tyler Jones: Not how you work.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Not how we work. Because Caroline, the principal, my mother, is not on site for the photo shoot. And so we prep, we meet with her, we see what she wants, and then our team executes that. So there’s no room for, oh, let’s do something completely different ’cause we don’t have that input from the principal.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. Okay. So interesting. I love it. So what you felt like when you had worked with this, ’cause this is a photographer that you have worked with before, is that he was saying, “Yeah, yeah, no, I can work however you want.” But then he wanted to be a little bit more loosey goosey and you really needed these shots nailed down ahead of time. It would’ve been better for him to just say, “I don’t work like that. Find somebody else.”
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally. The thing that keeps happening is consistently is saying, “Well, I just want to learn how you guys work. I want to learn how you guys do it.” We’ve been trying to tell you, but you’re not listening. It’s like you’re not open. You are giving the false thing that you are open to work together and collaborate, but then you don’t want to do it the way we want to do it in the end.
Allison Tyler Jones: As a photographer, I can tell you that probably he doesn’t actually realize that he’s doing that. He probably does think that he’s open. And then when you get there, you know what I mean? It’s not a bait and switch truly, but I think we can think about that. Are you really listening to what our clients are telling us? And are we letting them think that they can do something that they can’t do? Because there’s amnesia on both sides, on client side and on photographer side. So that’s just an interesting thought. Another thought about this person is you said that he was really kind of bugged that your mom wasn’t there, was wanting to be besties with her, was wanting to really spend a lot of time being social or whatever, and you were like, “Dude, we just need to get this done.” And you’ve got a whole machine there to support him and make it happen. But maybe he was wanting something out of it that…
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah, wanted a professional best buddy relationship, but we’re paying you. It’s a professional relationship. We can have a working relationship, but we’re here to get the job done, not necessarily to hang out and go get drinks together.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right, right. And so that’s something that as a photographer, you need to be aware of that if you need more of a relationship with your clients, like a personal thing, like, oh, I want people that will let me travel with them and we want to hang out and we want to eat dinner together and we want to do that. Then that’s a different kind of client than somebody that’s like, look, I am happy to collaborate. I want your…
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Opinion and expertise.
Allison Tyler Jones: Opinion and expertise because your mom is not a lighting expert. None of those girls are, none of her designers are. They know what the expertise is required, but it’s like, look, I’ve got to have the best. I need this shot. Now if you said, “Hey, let’s do it. If you did it from this angle, it would look really cool.” Then you would probably take that totally. But if it’s like, let’s get some other props in here that we didn’t plan ahead of time. All of this has to be planned ahead of time in your world. So it’s kind of just a misalignment in that you guys roll in hard and you’re super professional and this person is a great photographer. He’s published. All of these photographers that we’re talking about are great. They’re good.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Amazing.
Allison Tyler Jones: And they’ve all been-
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Wonderful.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah, they’ve all been published, so this is not anybody that’s a slacker or not good. It’s just a misalignment.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally. We’ll a hundred percent use them again in the future. It’s just interesting to analyze this with this scope of lens of how are you treating your clients and how are you working together.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. And I think it’s also interesting when you think of, okay, when somebody doesn’t use you again, why is that? And so you can look at that and say, okay, well, the reason is… Because if it had been all simpatico and everything was great, then you would never have been calling anybody else. The reason that you were calling is ’cause you’re like, okay, this part is great and this part is great, but dude, we can’t figure it out in the day. We got to be more dialed in than that and more planned than that. The takeaway from that is being extremely transparent up front and saying, if you need me for this kind of a situation, we’re going to sing Kumbaya. We’re going to be best friends. We’re going to go for drinks after, And then it’s going to be loosey goosey. We’re going to have a great time shooting and it’s all going to be super creative and amazing. Okay, that’s great. That’s a different interior design firm than your mom’s.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. But again, you’ll use them again.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Be up front with your rules and tell us how you want it. We’re going to tell you how we want it and if it works, if it doesn’t work, there’s other people.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. Okay. So number two, the next photographer that we’re talking about is he’s famous, pretty famous and very well known. And so you couldn’t actually… We’re going to call this person Talk To My Agent. Okay? This is somebody that you couldn’t actually get a hold of.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Nope.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay. You had to talk to their agent. They were the highest price, but wasn’t the thing that knocked you back. That wasn’t the thing. Because if it was somebody that wanted to work the way that you worked and totally got it, they would be working with you right now. Okay? So you felt lucky too?
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Well, I had to. It was scheduling with the Pope or trying to get a hold of Oprah. I had to call an editor in chief of another magazine and be like, “Hey, I see that 10 years ago you worked with this guy. Could you email introduction…” But not even email introduction to the agent. You know what I mean?
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: The editor in chief of the magazine doesn’t even have the guy’s number.
Allison Tyler Jones: I have Patrick. It’s not Patrick. Just so we know his name is not Patrick. Okay. Devil Wears Prada.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: But we can call him Patrick.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay. All right. So extremely professional. So you had to talk to the agent, you had to submit your work.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah, we had to.
Allison Tyler Jones: The type of thing that you wanted him to photograph, send him projects to see if he was even willing to shoot it.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yes.
Allison Tyler Jones: Then you had to wait two weeks to hear back from that. So part of this I’m totally loving.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Oh no, best client, that rep, that agent, amazing. She was on top of it. Emailed me every week, “Hey, just checking in. Have you been able to talk with the clients to get this?” Just on the ball, just really knows what she’s doing. The bid they sent over, perfect cover sheet had everything I mentioned included, highlighted questions, the image usage rights, detailed pricing, fluctuated with date. Just amazing, actually the best.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. So awesome.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: That agent is awesome.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. Okay. So the big selling point for this photographer was what?
Ross Tyler DeCesare: This is where the tricky part is, the big selling point is that because they’re so well known, it’s almost like a, oh, if he photographs your project, you’re published, front cover of AD.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. Guaranteed to be published,
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Guaranteed.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: And oh, well, okay, that’s maybe worth purchasing. So talking with him, I made sure to… Well, not with him, with the agent, I made sure to ask really deep questions on what does that look like? Walk me through your process, which I don’t think she had ever been asked before. That was the only thing she didn’t really know as well, which is interesting for training employees, what are you going to say when someone does ask for the process? She was like, “Well…” I was like, “No, from the very beginning, how are you going to send me the bill? When are we paying? The day of the shoot,” scheduling all this. But the end part was you’re promised, guaranteed almost to be published with his name. So I’m like, “Walk me through that. Tell me about that.”
Ross Tyler DeCesare: And she said, “Oh, well, it’s almost guaranteed. We’ll do anything to get something published. We’ll waive a fee, we’ll do this, we’ll do that.” Because like I said earlier, this kind of shift in magazines, magazines used to pay photographers for their images. Now magazines are like, they can’t afford that. So photographers are having to lower their standards or just work another way, find a way to make money another way and not have to charge magazines. Because magazines won’t-
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. Well, the designers are paying the money now.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Right. Magazines will not pick up a project if they have to pay for it. So we’re in the process of hiring this guy for this house we just finished. And I’m at an event at a dinner and I’m talking to another editor in chief of a national magazine, and I go, “Hey, we’re talking about this project that we’re collaborating on.” And she’s like, “Oh, who are you going to have shoot it?” And I said his name. She goes, “What?” She was taken off guard. She’s like, “We cannot afford him. We don’t…” That’s not exactly what she said, but that’s what the end result was. She’s like-
Allison Tyler Jones: It’s kind of like, yeah, don’t do that because it’s going to cost us money in addition to you.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah, it’s going to cost-
Allison Tyler Jones: There’s an upcharge.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: … all of us money and it is $10,000 if you make the front cover, we have to pay him. We don’t talk to you guys about the photos. He tells us what photos we get. It’s like through the agent on the back end. And I was like, I didn’t say this to her, but I said in my head, this is very interesting ’cause I was just talking to her agent and…
Allison Tyler Jones: None of that was disclosed.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: None of that was disclosed when I thoroughly asked for how that went.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. So in that regard, again, probably not malfeasance, it’s probably just the agent didn’t really know exactly how it worked, but it was disappointing for you because there was a lot of extra hoops for you to jump through, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing when you’re working at that level. If you are working at the highest level, if you’re Annie Leibovitz, you can afford to have a few more hoops to jump through to get to you because you’re in demand. But when you are not transparent or you haven’t trained your…
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Staff.
Allison Tyler Jones: Or your agent.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Your agent.
Allison Tyler Jones: I’ve really got to train my agent better.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: You need an agent.
Allison Tyler Jones: So that they can communicate that to other people. It can feel like you had a little bit of a bait and switch there. So in that regard, and tell me if I’m wrong, it sounds like the reason why you didn’t go with them wasn’t because of the money. It was because of you felt like you didn’t have full transparency and that there was something weird going on in the back end with the publishers.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally.
Allison Tyler Jones: That maybe you weren’t going to be able to get what you wanted out of that.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: A hundred percent. And we were talking to the person and I just thought, well, okay-
Allison Tyler Jones: What person?
Ross Tyler DeCesare: To the agent and to the editor, and then we were talking to other clients of his that have shot with him and kind of this just like, oh no, don’t really go in that direction. If I would give you advice, don’t go there. Because other designers had photographed their legacy project with him and couldn’t get it published because the publisher didn’t want to fork out that money to pay for it. And it’s sad. You don’t want that. And I think the correlation I kind of made to maybe portrait photography was if your clients are going to talk to other people, so what is your client experience? And if your client experience is bad or not as honest or open, people are going to hear that. People are going to see that. On the other hand, if your client experience, like yours is Allison, is amazing and you take care of all the details, people want to come back, then that gets you clients.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. Well, and or if you hear something because nobody’s perfect. I mean, we try to make it great, but just your business, my business, there’s times when we’ll drop the ball and we didn’t get it right. A picture just fell off a client’s wall today.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Literally today.
Allison Tyler Jones: And we literally just picked it up on the way over to record this podcast. So things happen, but it’s how you handle it. So in this instance, if this guy had been tuned in enough to know maybe he didn’t get the project… So if you’re doing any kind of commercial work or have already had a big conversation with somebody in a consultation and you felt like it was pretty good, I feel like this guy wanted to work with you, saw your work and was like, yeah, yeah, let’s do this. It was very aligned. He’s extremely professional. And then it doesn’t go through. Well, then that’s the time to get on the phone and say, “Hey,” maybe he makes the call, or maybe he has the agent call back and say, “Why did you not book us?”
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Which didn’t happen. I was thinking of that. I emailed her and she was reaching out, “Hey, do you have the client schedule when you’re going to shoot this?” Because it’s hard scheduling with our client. You got to get them out of town for a week. And I emailed her and said, “No, we’ve just chosen for this time to not go with you.” And she didn’t respond, actually, now that I think of it, she never responded.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay, so interesting.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: But she was so on the ball emailing me all the time.
Allison Tyler Jones: So interesting. So then that’s probably somebody could be like, oh, well, idiots. Because I mean, nobody wants to hear no, but when the last time somebody didn’t book with you, did you follow up and say, “Hey, I thought we were gelling, is there something that we could have done better?” If they don’t tell you, most people that don’t book with us because our consultation is so in depth, and we sit there and have a whole relationship before the hour is over, if they call back and cancel, they will say why. They’ll usually say something like, “You know what? It was more than I thought, and we do want to book with you, but we’re going to wait until it’s a little bit more of an important time.” Or, “We loved it. Thank you so much for spending the time, but we just can’t afford it right now.” So that’s fine, but if we don’t get that feedback, seek that feedback, it’s only going to help you.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay. So then the third photographer, it was the one that you’ve ultimately ended up booking with for this project that is being photographed soon here. And this photographer, the things that you said that you just loved were, the response time was just crazy, right?
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah, I could get him on the phone.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah. Well, you emailed him. He emailed you right back.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: And then you said that by the time you had a call, he’d looked at your website. He totally knew what the deal was.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: No, totally, much more delightful. Like Allison said, email them, got right back to me and he sent me over a brief summary of what we talked about. And then once I confirmed that we wanted to go forward, he sent me a bid, got that approved, and he sent me an invoice. And then he reached out to me like, “Hey, what hotel should I book?” Good, personable. I was talking to him, he commented several times how he feels. What did he say? I have the email right here.
Allison Tyler Jones: Well, he was excited to work with you.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: “Thank you for considering me. Pleasure speaking with you. This is how I do it. I’m happy to change some things around if that doesn’t work for you.” Just transparent, clear. And then this home that we’re photographing, it’s a cabin in Idaho and it’s dark, really dark. There’s not a lot of windows or the natural light coming in isn’t best for the photos. And so I talked to him thoroughly through that, “Hey, we’re going to have tight rooms, we’re going to have dark lighting.” And he is like, “Oh, I’ll make sure I bring extra lights free of charge. Usually I only bring two, but I’ll bring four and I’ll get that bright tripod so we can get in the powder room and be right up against the door and locked in.” We collaborated. We were able to work and talk through it. And that’s hard to do if you maybe don’t have a consultation or a client coordinator or an agent that’s blocking you.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. And I’m looking at the email that he sent you too. And there are just a couple of things that really stood out to me is just things like, “I’ve typically found it easiest for my clients if I bill in this way.”
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally.
Allison Tyler Jones: Okay. So it isn’t like, this is what I am doing and I am so great and you should just be grateful to work with me. It’s like I found it easiest for my client. So he’s talking about, “Here’s what I’m charging.” He’s going to tell you what he’s going to charge, but he’s saying that this is how it benefits you. This is why it’s easy for my clients. And then he’s immediately talking about how many shots he can do typically in a day plus extra quick details and interiors. It’s a rough estimate, depends on the level of coverage and camera ready spaces. So, and then he goes into your usage rights would include… And then if you have anyone else that’s interested, like a third party that wants to be in on it, here’s how we’re going to handle that. So this guy has been around the block. He knows how these interior designers will get in there, and there’s probably some builder trying to get in and get the pictures for free or whatever.
Allison Tyler Jones: And so he has got out ahead of all those frequently asked difficult questions. And rather than being reactive, he’s been totally proactive into letting you know, “Here are the things that are important to you. Most of my clients have found this. Here’s what I can do in a day. Here’s what your usage includes, and then here’s some things that you probably thinking about and this is how I work with those things.” And so that’s all in that first email, probably in your first conversation as well. And that is… I mean, why do we shy away from transparency?
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Right. Well, and the thing that I loved is I called him and I asked him all these questions and I took notes, but he sent me this email with all of this.
Allison Tyler Jones: Just reiterating.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: And he said he was kind of shocked on the phone by how many questions I was asking. I guess normal people don’t ask that many questions. I know I’m not normal, but I was asking him these details. And he is like, “Oh, yeah.” And he had the answers, but he’s like, “This is what I send to most clients, so I’ll just send that over to you and that answers most questions.” But he had that prepared for the clients that don’t even ask the questions. And the other two photographers and multiple others that we didn’t talk about, they talked about those things. But I never got a, here’s brief summary of what it is and how it works for me. The first one, it’s kind of like, we’ll figure it out.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Well, and then every time we try to get something published, another person that we didn’t talk about, another photographer is like, “Well, I guess we’ll allow it this time, but just make sure that…” And it’s like, okay, what are the usage rights? Let’s get them in writing. Let’s sign next to it. If you don’t want us to publish it, great. Sorry, we missed an opportunity. We’re discussing. But this person says, “You have uses rights to publish, ask for permission before.” And then we do that.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. And I think many times with creatives, we think, well, they didn’t ask so good, then they don’t care. It’s like, no, sometimes they don’t know the questions to ask. They don’t know your business. And they don’t know that if in your instance, if the interior designer is paying you thousands of dollars to photograph this room, that she can’t just turn around and hand those photos off to the builder or carpet manufacturer or the furniture manufacturer or whatever, because those are images that they’re being sold a usage license for their specific use. But if you don’t know that, and many photographers don’t know that, they’re saying unlimited use, well, buckle up ’cause then they-
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah, I’ll use them.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah, you’re going to use them. So it’s better to have the conversations ahead of time and really nail it down than this loosey goosey of, oh, we’ll just figure it out because your chicken. Either you haven’t figured it out yourself. You don’t want to, quote unquote, ‘make’ somebody mad. Your rent’s due and you need the money.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Right.
Allison Tyler Jones: It’s like, no. If you have those things dialed in ahead of time, you’re going to get clients like my sister who have their own process in their business with the way they work. They command top dollar, they’re great at what they do. And going back to the person that you hired where he said, “Look, I won’t charge you to bring extra lights,” but if he had said to you, “Okay, you know what, in this instance it’s a very dark interior-”
Ross Tyler DeCesare: $500.
Allison Tyler Jones: “It’s going to be an extra $500-$1000 for me to bring more lights.” You’d be like, “Great.”
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Put it on the invoice.
Allison Tyler Jones: Whatever you need.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah, yeah.
Allison Tyler Jones: We’re investing a ton in this, and we want you to bring your A game. And so we’re not trying to make this the cheapest. We want to make it the best that it possibly can be. Now, of course, you’ve not unlimited budgets.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally.
Allison Tyler Jones: But you would’ve paid for that other guy that was Mr. Top Dollar, Mr. Call My Agent. It was just like it wasn’t easy to work with and you felt like it was hard. The first one, not enough transparency and not an alignment in how you were working and what you needed from them. And then this last one was kind of an alignment, was like all the things said and not cheap, not the cheapest for sure.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: No. And back to that usage rights, it’s just if you tell me what you’re going to do, if you say it’s this and this, you have unlimited right or you have limited usage to publishing, marketing, and sharing of the photos up to two people. Great. We agree on that. But when you’re not upfront about that, that one person, it’s just, well, what am I getting into? And then you have to ask every time. I’d rather have an agreement ahead of time, and then I know what I’m getting myself into. And that person is expressing that we charge $45 or $450 a photo when a magazine wants it. Great. Now I know what magazine I can go shop it to, or I’m not going to hire you because I don’t want to take that risk. I want it to get published, that transparency from the front.
Allison Tyler Jones: Love it. So any last thoughts going through this process that you learned that you could take away for any business, whether it’s portrait photographer, interior designer?
Ross Tyler DeCesare: I think it’s what my mom has always taught me is you just have to value your worth and your time and make sure you’re charging for that in the right way. And you’re upfront about it, right? No one’s asking… Or some people do ask, but I’m not asking you to fly across the country for free to take these pictures or to do this. But some people will do that and some people will take advantage of you. And if I see that you see your worth and that you’re confident in your work and that you know how to do it and that you’re doing it the right way or trying to or seeking advice, it’s like a green flag, right? Red flag, green flag. That’s a plus to me, because I realized that you truly do value your work, and you’re not just… It’s not the Louis Vuitton bag for $5. You’re paying for what you’re getting.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. Because the Louis Vuitton bag for $5 you know there’s something wrong with that. It was either fell off a truck wink or it was made in Vietnam or whatever. It’s not real. So then you worry about those people. You’re like, wait a minute, is our equipment going to be bad? It can’t possibly be this cheap. So I think sometimes photographers get into that mode of everybody only cares about the bottom line. They just want the cheapest thing. And that is absolutely not true. For what you are looking for this project as you set out to find a new photographer to work with, you wanted somebody that had a process, that was equally committed as you are, willing to bring their A game. Because I think most photographers don’t even realize what you guys will roll in with and how you’ll help.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Yeah, no, they’ve never, every photographer we started to work with after they’re like, okay, that makes sense why, they get it after. It’s hard to explain before. We are going to do all of this, and so this is why we need to work with you.
Allison Tyler Jones: Right. Yeah. That you’re willing to do so much pre-production, which is what mostly photographers are used to having to do all of that themselves. So yeah, it’s just, again, it’s not right or wrong, it’s just, are we aligned? So I think as we go forward into working with our portrait clients, and then this definitely applies to commercial, headshot work, any of that sort of thing is to just, like you say, value your work, value your worth. Know that what you’re giving to that client is going to help. If it’s commercial work, it’s helping their brand of their business looking more professional. If it’s portrait work, it’s celebrating the legacy of their family and that you’re willing to bring your A game, to have a process, to be upfront, to be transparent, and that attracts. You cannot attract a high-end client that is willing to pay top dollar if you don’t run a business that way.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Totally.
Allison Tyler Jones: Well, you’re the best.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: No, you.
Allison Tyler Jones: Thank you for being here. I love you so much.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Love ya.
Allison Tyler Jones: Yeah.
Ross Tyler DeCesare: Bye.
Allison Tyler Jones: Thank you for being here for this season of The Rework. We are heading off into the summer and we are taking a break, and we will be back in August. So have a wonderful summer. Get a tan, read some good books, eat some good food, see some fun things. Spend time with people that you love, enjoy yourself, and we’ll see you in August.
Recorded: You can find more great resources from Allison at dotherework.com and on Instagram @do.the.rework.
