Whether it’s Black Friday, Christmas gifts, or simply clients wanting to wrap up their projects before the holidays, the end of year is  great  for product sales, and a great time to drive new business.  It can also be a time of frantic emails, tight deadlines and a few too many late nights. But it doesn’t need to be! The secret to a smoother, more successful holiday season is to START NOW. Here are five things you can do  right now  to save on hours and stress later. 1. Order your samples early Decide what products you're going to offer and order samples, To View More >>

There's no substitute for display samples that your customers can touch and feel, but you can give your clients a wider "trade show experience" in your marketing materials and website with our new stock image downloads. They're free to use anywhere you're selling. Download our PSD layouts, add your own imagery to our layout shots, and you'll have a virtual product complete with your own photography! Maybe you can even help your clients envisage their purchase by using images from their own shoot. It's quick and easy in Photoshop, and we'll To View More >>

Wow, what a busy couple of weeks. The marketing team obviously thought we were getting a bit lethargic under our winter coats, so threw a special in your direction. The result is that Mid-Winter Christmas feeling going on and our departments all humming – the lab, the press people, the design team and the bindery going "gang busters". The tech support team certainly had the cobwebs blown out by all the questions from customers old and new. It's great to see so many people having a go at Workspace. Thanks for your business! I hope you'll be experiencing that Christmas feeling in a few days when To View More >>

In the context of professional people photography here are a few things that surprise and puzzle us. How often the images are released from the studio before the sale is finalised. How the album planning/sales process can take months, sometimes years. How there's often no attempt to up-sell after the event. How the album is treated as a cost, not a marketing tool. How album planning is treated as an obligation not an opportunity. How studios go with the crowd, instead of standing out from it. None of those maximise your opportunities, and there are probably less of those to go round right now. To View More >>

I know the word "networking" gets bandied about a lot. I used to roll my eyes and put in the same category as "politically correct" and "multi-tasking" but in reality it's where business is today. Once upon a time a photographer could rely on the quality of his images and word of mouth. Maybe a bit of advertising in the Yellow Pages and the odd display in the local mall. Next minute, along comes the internet and screws it all up. Suddenly you have to be on Facebook, Twitter and this that and the other. As a photographer you have a major head start at this. First, you have cool images to show To View More >>