Scott
Christiansen, CCS Sports Success Story with ViewFirst™
by Dan Hays
Scott
Christiansen of Memory Lane Photography in Champaign,
Illinois has been a customer of Candid Color
for about 35 years. During that time, he
has been mainly involved in the Party Picture market at Sororities and Fraternities
and in doing weddings.
Scott
recently attended a CCS Sports seminar in Indianapolis and brought two of his
staff. After the seminar, Scott booked a local highschool sport
using the ViewFirst/ Speculation method and CORE for Sports software.
He shot several poses of each player and team shots and kept the players contact
information in the same sequence he shot them. He then keyed in the contact
information to an Excel Spreadsheet and imported the information into CORE. Next
he I.D.’d each player and posted the images. He sent out an e-mail
to each player with a link to that player’s proofs.
It’s important to note that the school is not in a wealthy area of town
and the football team had not won a game. Scott was able to book the Football
team for team and individual and he did action shots at one game. He also
did the Golf team, the Cheerleaders, the Soccer team, Cross Country, Girls Tennis,
Volleyball and Swimming.
He generated a total of $3268 in sales with a 55% gross margin (Sales minus finishing
cost).
Here are some other interesting facts:
The
Golf team consists of eight players
- Seven of eight placed orders.
The
Cheerleading sales were half of the
football team sales. Note: Cheerleading,
drill teams and pom pom squads generally
buy well.
The
swim team bought more pictures than
ever before. Parents called Scott
to thank him for taking the pictures
and posting them before they placed
an order.
Scott
shot a slate with each players name before he
shot them to be sure he would be able to I.D.
them correctly.
Scott made a 4’x6’ print of the football squad group which the coach
displayed in his classroom and moved into the hallway for gameday. Other
customers who have done this over a period of time report that participation
and sales have increased.
Below are his results so far from all of the sports he has photographed at this
one high school.
Congratulations
to Scott for embracing a new market and quickly
booking and executing most of the fall sports
at a local high school. He has now
set the stage to grow more business at this high school and at others in his
area.
If you are interested in attending one of CCS’s sports seminars, please
click here for
cities, dates and details. Safeguarding
Your Business By Backing Up Images and Data
There
are certain pieces
of data which
we collect in
the course of
photographing
jobs which are irreplaceable. First among those are the images we take. We
must safeguard those images in the most fail safe manner possible.
First,
the memory cards should be labeled, preferably slated, and put in a labeled safe
container for transportation. The system by which those steps are accomplished
should be consistent and every one should be well trained on the process.
Second, as soon as the images are back in the office, the images should be copied
to a DVD or to a hard drive or other reliable storage device. Some customers
are so paranoid about this, that they copy them in the field before returning
to the office.
Then the images should be FTP’d to CCS. This should then be checked
to be sure it was successful. Performing a process but failing to check
that the desired process was accomplished is daring fate to mete out a punishing
lesson.
Other data is also important and should be safeguarded. Sequence cards
from graduations and sports shoots, e-mail addresses which have been collected,
Photo Match receipts containing bar codes and e-mails, and pre pay envelopes
are all critical to maximizing sales or, in some cases, having any sales which
can be realized.
This data must be labeled, protected, delivered to the right person and place,
and then organized, input, and the processes monitored for exceptions.
Failures to perform these important steps can result in
a loss of reputation as well as sales and can ultimately lead to a loss of clients.
Do not become
complacent about the mundane, even boring tasks that protect your business from
disaster. It is much less trouble to do the right thing initially than
to apologize and redo the work that was ruined because of a lack of discipline Using
Collages as a memorable "Thank You" by Dana
Hill
Ed
Kempf of Impact Photography continues to use
the QP+ collage product with his clients as
a complimentary “thank you” for
some of his big-spenders. Here is what
one of his recent clients had to say about
their family session and online sales experience, in
which they spent over $500,
“THANK YOU... the picture taking process was "painless" and the
photos turned out great. We said it would be worth the drive to Iowa every
few years just to have you take our family photo!! Now that's a compliment. Loved
your website too, and the fact you processed and sent our pictures so quickly. "
Thanks again.
Dan & Cindy Prendergast
Ed is convinced the collage product is a great public relations “wow” factor. According
to Ed, “Also we are banging them out for our corporate customers and
other " Special " Special Events - if people are not using
these to showcase their work and P.R. their customers they are NUTS ! Coming
Soon Many
of you have seen the Fat Head type products
on television and similar products sold online.
CCS has recently received and is finalizing
testing on some very unique equipment and
supporting software technology that will
produce these giant wall graphics. But
even better than the Fat Head products, we
use your image!
CCS customers will
be able to include these custom wall cutouts
in their offering very soon!
We
are working on a trademarked CCS name for
this new product and plan to offer this in
the Sports, Grad, Party Pics, Groups, Prom
and Race markets. There
will be five sizes available ranging from approximately 14” to up to 70” in
height. The product will be shipped in a tube and the material is an all-weather “re-stickable” vinyl.
Please look for a special edition CCS Developments newsletter in the next week
announcing product details. Product
Enhancements
Sports
Trader Cards The
font size on sports trader cards has been
increased along with a heavier drop shadow
to present a more impactful design. Please
see the Previous and Current examples below.
Previous
Current
Graduation
Plaque A
slight change has been made to the Grad Plaque
text. The text is now centered within the ‘plate’ area,
with no carriage returns on blank entries.
Below is a previous and current example with
no text in the ‘Title’ text node:
Previous
Current
NEW
LEVEL TWO DIGITAL SPORTS FLYERS!!
We've
had a lot of sports customers asking for
a flyer that shows off the NEW Level 2 Design
Options, and we now have a flyer just for
that purpose! Ask
and ye shall receive!! These flyers are 8.5"X11" and printed on uncoated
paper that can easily be run through your laser printers for overprinting/customizing
the backs with your company information or even order forms. They are printed
one-side in full color and packaged in 500's for ordering. Download the order
form here:
Initially for this first run, we will plan to print these in bulk EVERY SIX MONTHS.
If the DEMAND is greater than expected, we can come back and change that to every
3 months depending on how many are ordered, similar to the Digital Sports Envelopes
and Flyers. We'll keep you posted on that! Order yours today.
ORDER DEADLINE IS FRIDAY, OCTOBER 19th, 2007!!!
It’s
time to reprint some of our existing marketing
materials again.
Please dowload order forms
at the links below for our School
Portrait Pre-Pay Envelopes & Flyers,
School Portrait Day Stickers and the
BLANK Perforated Card Sheets that
are used to make your own custom passcards. Save
at least 75% over office supply stores prices
on these card sheets!!!
Each
order form has all the information about each product! Order for your needs today!
Quick Retouching is Now Available
in Prom Market by Danette
Rieinbold
Of all the graduates that were offered
Quick Retouching last year during grad
season, 7.5% took advantage of the retouch
option. That may sound like a small percentage
but think about this. That number represents
nearly 55,000 graduates that paid anywhere
from $10 to $15 for this service.
A service
that:
•requires
no inventory
•has no direct
labor cost
•can’t
be mis-shipped
•requires
no additional postage
•has an 80%
net margin
And now that same service is available
for posed prom images, too.
So, what exactly is Quick Retouching?
Quick Retouching lightly softens facial
complexions including blemishes and wrinkles
as well as brightening teeth and eyes,
while enhancing the overall quality of
the finished photos.
CCS is strongly recommending that the
above underlined description of Quick Retouching
be utilized when describing this service
to your clients on your order forms or
on your website. Any other description
may create expectations that the service
does not cover. For instance Quick Retouching
will not remove:
•stubble
•shine
•shadows
•uneven light
•stray hairs
•glare on
glasses
•background
The
target market for this retouching service
is prom and dance portraits or posed packages. Did
you know that nearly 85% of people between
the ages of 12 and 24 develop Acne at some
time? That is why we believe this product/service
will be most beneficial to those that photograph
dances in the middle school and high school
market.
Your cost from CCS for offering this product/service
is $3 per face. Since most dance portraits
are of couples, the charge to you would
be $6. Keep this in mind when pricing
this product add-on.
So what are you waiting for? Add this
service to your offerings for your current
or upcoming dance season. Besides gaining
additional revenue you may be offering
something that your competitor probably
doesn’t!
Pearlized
Portraits will now be available in the
QuicPics market and QP+ beginning
October 19th. This finish option
is available for prints, magnets and the
photo statuettes at 50% more than the lustre
finish lab price of those products.
Level 2 Prints in QP2
On Oct. 30 CCS will be releasing the Level
2 Prints in QP2 Sports. This release
will include both logo and no logo prints. The
process for the logo on L2 prints is that
same as for memory mates (i.e. email your
artwork file to your Customer Service Rep
or to titles@candid.com, along with your
account number and what the file will be
used for - memory mates, L2 prints, etc) If
you don’t assign a logo, we will
use the first initial of the team.
There will also be 5 new styles of L2 prints
available:
Vortex
Halo
Psionic
Catalyst
Stellar
Logo prints and the new styles will be
coming soon in CORE. Candidnet
Tips:
by Joni Brown
Candidnet
has two training sections that you and your office staff
may find valuable, Software Training and Photography. Software
Training contains information on a variety of software
platforms including CORE, FTP, Lab Prints, Maestro, QEMS,
QP2/QP+, and Timestone. Each section provides guides,
set-up information, templates, helpful links, webex recordings
and downloads.
The Photography section provides a wealth of information that can be used to
train new photographers. You will find Calibration Images as well as Camera
Guides, FAQs a Posing Guide and Training Guide in this section of Candidnet. We
have camera guides for the following cameras:
The Photography FAQs include card corruption, converting a Sunpak 544-555, Maintenance,
and Resolution vs. File Size. We hope these tools will help assist you
in your training needs. If you have any questions about the materials on
Candidnet, please contact customer support. Lab Service
Times for10/07/2007
- 10/13/2007 by Bo Lewis
Problems
with, or suggestions about The Developments Newsletter? Email us
to see if we can help.
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