As we are seeing more photographers offer Level 2
products we wanted to make sure that all CCS customers
are aware of some valuable L2 information.
First, Level 2 products were designed so the backgrounds
could be used with MANY different types of sports and
activities. We have tried to not make the L2 designs
sport-specific so they are more flexible. Of course,
some designs lend themselves to particular activities
better than others, but there are many possibilities
with each. So, when deciding on a Level 2 background
design, look beyond the sample. For example: CCS may
have a soccer image in a “Chrome” design
sample, but that design could be used for football,
dance, hockey, etc.
Samples
of the L2 Replicant design- each has thebackground
color-matched to the clothing or uniform of the
subject
Second, all Level 2 design background colors are adjusted
based on the color of the uniform, clothing or costume
of the subject. This means that your Level 2 product
will always match school or team colors! As an example,
see our “Replicant” design sample images
above. (Click the images to enlarge.) This is the same
design used with several different sports & activities.
Each “Replicant” sample
has the background color matched to the clothing or
uniform of the subject. Next, the photographer has
the ability to upload a team/ organization logo. One
logo per event number is the maximum. The collegiate
or school letter shown in some L2 designs is selected
by the CCS artist. The artist uses the first letter
of the team name visible.
Third,
if you have a team name that looks something
like “U17” and do not want that used
as the collegiate letter then please contact
your customer service rep. The last
thing to keep in mind is that L2 products are custom
made pieces of artwork. There is some level of artistic
interpretation in every image. If our art department
is provided with a ¾ body shot they
always do their best to place a fade in pertinent areas
so the image looks its’ best. If a uniform has
multiple colors, they will select the most prominent
color.
We look forward to providing you with tips on our
popular L2 products in our next several newsletters! New
grad and race collages available!
We
have some new products for race and grad season! Our
multi-image collage products are available for set-up
in CORE. Right now, these are only available for ordering
on the retail websites. The race collages are available
with 3 or 4 images in the following background colors:
black, green, red, blue, purple, orange and gray. The
graduation collages are available with 2 or 3 image
in the following background colors: army green, black,
green, red, blue, purple, orange and gray. The race
collages can hold 3 pieces of title information: race
name/ title, runner’s name and finish time. The
race title is defaulted form set up in CORE. (Click
screen shot above). The runner’s
name and time are also defaulted from CORE but can
be changed/ entered by the participant placing the
order. The graduation collages hold 2 lines of title
information which are defaulted from CORE, but can
be changed/ entered by the grad during the order process:
school/ ceremony name, graduate name. Below are the
product sizes, product codes and lab prices.
LabPrints-Manage your Wedding and Portrait
Workflow with this stand alone software. by Evie Sibert
For several years Candid Color Systems has partnered
with LabPrints to
provide a tool for ordering, collage building and album
design in the PPS market. This innovative software
is not only user friendly, but it allows the photographer
to have a more streamlined workflow with a creative
edge. This software package has been totally integrated
into the CCS production workflow and the photographer
has the ability to ship to the end customer. Labprints
is a stand alone software package that assists in marketing,
ordering, album designing, and is a presentation tool
for professional photographers. From this software
you can: run slideshows of your customers, crop images,
print thumbnails, invoice customers and design albums
with seven leading album companies. This program also
offers many retouching services such as basic retouching,
extensive retouching, hair removal, glass glare removal
and sharpening. Mounting and coating can also be added
to an order.
Click thumbnails to enlarge.
A projection tool is available that projects
actual sizes from 8X10 to 30X40. This tool also has
framing options to show your customers the finished
product and how it will appear in a frame. Creative,
multi-image collages are becoming increasingly popular,
and photographers have the ability to command high
prices for these products. With LabPrints you have
the ability to choose from a considerable amount of
templates for collage building. Also, with this program
you have the ability to add drop shadows, borders,
fades, vignettes, change opacity, and add tints to
images in your collages and composites. Most importantly,
CCS individually color corrects every image that is
used in the collage.
Support for LabPrints is provided by the Candid Color
System’s Customer Support team. Also, there are
many online video tutorials and manuals that provide
instruction on ordering, collage building and album
design available through LabPrints at HYPERLINK www.labprints.com
www.labprints.com. A free 30-day trial version can
be downloaded from this website. There is a one time
fee of $149.00 for the collage/template designer and
an additional one time fee of $149.00 for the album
designer. The projection tool can be purchased for
$199 and all 3 pieces can be purchased as a bundle
for $399. There is no charge for the ordering and workflow
tool. Once you have downloaded your 30 day trial, make
sure you pick Candid Color Systems as your lab. If
you have any questions on how to get started, please
contact me at ext. 377.
You can find your customers
order status in Quicpost! Go to the “customers” tab
and search for the customer’s name, click “history” next
to their name, then click “order status".
Did
you know that CCS has provided a simple pre-formatted
email for you to send to your customers? After you
activate your event, your page will automatically forward
to the email section. Add in your email addresses either
through a spreadsheet or copy and paste it into the
text box. You will then choose to send a pre-formatted
HTML message. You can customize the subject line
to what ever you feel will grab your customers attention.
Next you will queue your email job. Remember to send
a test message before sending the entire batch of
emails!
Back to Basics for Norman Party Pics by Morgan Fenn
At a time when some campus markets are in a slump,
Norman Party Pics is up 4% for sales from August
1st to March 23rd. Norman Party Pics credits this
success to diligently focusing on the basics.NPP is not only focusing on the Greek community
but, they have broadened their bookings to ALL campus
activities. They are photographing events such as
Mr. and Mrs. Asian OU, the Sam Noble Museum Easter
egg hunt, the OU School of Law Barrister’s
Ball and many other non-Greek events. These smaller
events have opened doors for larger events in the
future.
In addition to booking more events, NPP is focusing
on shooting more images than the previous year and
is setting higher goals for each photographer. This
year alone they have shot 7,000 more images
than they did last year.
Norman Party Pics is a long time tradition on the
University of Oklahoma campus but, today more than
ever, the campus office realizes the importance of
building and sustaining the relationships with every
campus organization. In addition to shooting more
images and booking non-greek events, they are contacting
the houses weekly via telephone, email and of course,
Facebook. Facebook has been a huge asset to the contact process
for the Norman office. Facebook is more than a website,
it is the number one tool for communicating with
college students. It is so commonly used that many
college students use the term “Facebook” as
a verb. Walk on any college campus and you will hear
a student say, “I Facebooked him last night,” or “Just
Facebook me about the party.” Norman has booked
numerous events by “Facebooking” the
students. Finally, the Norman Party Pics website has dramatically
changed over the past year to become more appealing
to the eye and easier to navigate with additional
graphics in the online offers. Besides those changes,
the addition of Pearlized Paper and the digital downloads
to the Greek market have helped increase sales as
well.
The Back to Basics approach has worked for Norman
with meticulous organization, creative marketing
and friendly, consistent service!
March:
The Season for Fall Sports? by Brian Speers
If
you look
at the
calendar on
your wall
or on
your desk, it is clearly March. Depending
on where you reside you could be either shoveling
snow or mowing your lawn this weekend. Here in
Oklahoma, where the weather is schizophrenic, you could
be doing both this weekend!
But if you are a sports customer, March means football, soccer and many other
Fall sports. Though you may be consumed in the launching of your Spring sports
or Grad season, someone in your company should be actively engaged in calling
on high school athletic directors and coaches; Fall youth soccer and football
leagues; and other Fall sports that are played in your area.
The idea of booking 5 or 6 months prior to a sports
season should be as much a part of your business
as bringing cameras to an event! You wouldn’t
show up at a shoot without the proper equipment, and you shouldn’t
expect to be successful in the 2008 fall sports season
without a dedicated sales effort at this time of
year.
Though it’s easy to rationalize all the reasons
why this can’t be
done at this time, the fact remains that the early
bird really does get the worm. So,
come September, do you want to be riding the bench and watching your competition
shoot teams, or do you want to be on the playing filed reaping the rewards of
the sales seeds you’ll sow this month?
Start with a marketing plan.
Are
you targeting youth sports or school sports?
Will
you be offering PayFirst™ or ViewFirst™ systems
for selling your products and services?
What
geographical area will you be targeting?
Do
you have the proper sales and marketing materials
to promote your business
What
are you offering that makes your company
stand out from your competitors?
Once
you have constructed a marketing plan decide who will
be executing this plan. In 2007, one of our larger
Grad customers totally removed himself from the grad
season to concentrate on booking more sports at the middle
school and high school level, and had the most successful
Fall sports season in his company’s history.
Whoever becomes responsible for this effort needs to have reasonable and achievable
goals as well as accountability for the time invested in this project. By
the way, sending emails and/or brochures does not constitute a sales call. Sales
calls should only count when the person you are targeting has been contacted
either on the phone or in person. The in-person sales calls always are
the most effective, even if they are only for 10 minutes, because you are face
to face with the decision maker.
If your calendar still says March and you are thinking baseball… change
your thinking! The focus is
really September, so football and soccer are being
played! Lab Service Times for the week of 3/16 - 3/22
by Bo Lewis
Problems
with, or suggestions about The Developments Newsletter? Email us
to see if we can help.
