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New Member Benefits for 2009

We are pleased to announce that we have signed a deal to provide more member benefits to you all – 'We now have our consumer discount scheme up and running.

To find out the great deals you can get, just log into the member area of the main Guild website and follow the link to Amazing discounts' - Click to View

Food for Thought

Some very nice food shots from Keith and Doreen Parkes

The idea behind the shoot was to emphasis the wholesomeness and freshness of locally caught and locally smoked salmon - I think we achieved this by using natural reflected light - just using white reflectors - actually half the photographs taken outside on a fairly overcast morning.

The image taken on the slate is particularly appropriate to Caithness as it shows not only locally caught and smoked salmon but also locally quarried slate which Caithness is famous for.
The customer was delighted - even gave us a couple of free samples

Mark Fisher Training Day

Due to popular demand the Photoshop Seminar with Dave Wall on September 26th is now sold out.
The good news is the we have managed to add another date - Sunday 27th September.
Don't be disappointed book early.
A seminar has also been arranged for the Manchester area - more details soon

Click image to enlarge:

Logbuy Programme

We are pleased to see that a good proportion of you are using Logbuy – the discount partner we have joined forces with to provide you, our members, with offers on products and services.
In January, 20% used the service. Half of you used Logbuy in February and one third in March. Don’t forget to give some feedback so that they can tailor their products to meet the needs of members!
Just go to the Guild website and log in using your password and see what is on offer this month.

Marketing Your Website

If you don’t have a website, you are missing out on a great marketing opportunity – it’s a global shop front. If you do have a website, make sure you are making the most of it. The Guild’s competition in conjunction with Wedding Ideas magazine has already attracted a large number of entries, and we intend to build on the ‘perfectdaydirectory’ website to increase public awareness of the Guild and the benefits of using our members. Your listing on the Guild website is also accessed from www.perfectdaydirectory.co.uk – so you have two chances of potential customers finding you from a search on the internet. Don’t forget too that Guild members have a free upgrade to Bronze display with the National Pages, a fast growing search engine for businesses nationwide.

If you haven’t yet put the Guild logo on your site, you are missing out on another great marketing opportunity – one which shows your commitment to quality. If you have a Guild qualification, make sure you include it on your stationery and website.

Linking your site to the Guild’s may initially seem like a bad idea – why take potential customers away from your site to somewhere they may find alternatives? But in the long run, giving your customers information about the association you belong to can help to give them that extra confidence. The more of you who link to the Guild, the better the chance of our directory ranking well on Google. For more information on how to do this, just email us and we will send instructions.

Subliminal art of Selling

[As photographers, we are often quite bad at selling our work. To survive in these tough times, we need to capitalize on every possible chance we get to sell to our customers, preferably in a subtle way! Here, Clate Mask from Infusionsoft gives us advice on how to do this].

The moment a prospect decides to buy SHOULD NOT be the moment you stop selling. Selling should continue indefinitely. You should be cross selling, up-selling, and every other direction selling you possibly can. And, believe it or not, your customers will love you for it!

Here are some examples to help you understand why:

It's almost impossible to go to a fast food restaurant without having someone ask you if you would like to "Supersize That." Once that happens, it's like an invisible force is speaking to the irrational side of our brains. We have a brief moment of logic as we figure out-59 cents more, for double the food, is a great value. But, that is the full extent of our logical power. Afterwards, irrationality steps in, and rather than consider if we can even eat double the food, we pat ourselves on the back for being smart consumers.

This is the very purpose behind coupon distribution. If you are standing in front of the canned beans in a grocery store and there is a coupon attached to each can, how many cans of beans are you going to buy? You only needed one. But there's that consumer logic at work again. "30 cents off is a great bargain! I'm buying five cans!" And, you go home with more beans than you could possibly need, but a receipt that shows your "savings." What a deal!

The very best time to up-sell is right when your customer has purchased. If you're not up-selling during and after the buying process, start doing it now. Right now!

Teal - A scientific problem

An old Chestnut (or some would say nutmeg!)

An enquirer to the Guild sent us the following comment:
Our bridesmaids wore Teal coloured dresses, and the men had matching cravats. The photographer was unable to reproduce the colour Teal in the photos - it appears royal blue. Please can you advise:
1. Why this has happened,
2. The details of any company who may be able to correct this problem
3. If it is not possible to correct, what would your advice be, these were our wedding photos! Thank you

In reply, we wrote:
We are sorry to hear that you have had some problems on this occasion. Unfortunately this can be a problem with certain materials - it's all down to the difference between what the eye sees and what the camera sees in terms of light wavelength. In particular, Ultra violet is not seen by the human eye, but is detected by film - digital cameras are slightly different but still have this problem to a degree. The second problem is in the printing process, where not all colours will reproduce in the same way, due to photographic chemicals or printing inks. It may be possible to make the dresses look Teal, but at the same time everything else would have to be shifted in colour to produce that result, so that flesh tones could look green, for example.
The only way to get an exact match of colour in the prints is to send a piece of the material to the printing laboratory to see if they can produce the desired colours. I am forwarding your letter to Redwood Colour Laboratories to see if they have any solution to your problem.

Mark Winterbottom at Redwood Laboratories in Colchester confirmed my explanation with the following message:

Hi Joan
That is a real old nutmeg. How often have I tried to explain not only to the general public but to some photographers as well! The problem is that the explanation is quite scientific and can baffle the best of us.
I suggest that you forward the attached Kodak explanation and advise a look at the web link below.

www.21stcenturyshoebox.com/essays/color_reproduction.html#_Toc116325707
Kind Regards, Mark Pro Lab & Wholesale Manager www.redwoodphoto.com

Don’t forget that Redwood will answer your technical questions if you email them to us. Does anyone have anything to add regarding this problem?

From Clate Mask, President of Infusionsoft, we have received these tips on

How To Make Your Website Dynamic

Did you know...the average adult spends up to 3 hours a day more on the Internet than they spend watching television. About 70% of the U.S. population regularly use the Internet. Over 1 billion people in the world are online. And, this is a vast chunk of your market! These are your customers! But only if you have a website that draws them in.

I'd be willing to bet you already have a website up and running. And, that's great! But, have you taken that website to the next level? Far too many companies throw a couple of webpages together, put them online, and call it good. However, sites that only include basic information are not much better than having brochures.

Here are some ideas for making your website powerful:
• Include pictures and descriptions of your products (with a dynamic website, your visitors should be able to click through your products to find what they are interested in)
• Display interesting facts and statistics
• Include high interest stories (celebrity or newsworthy stories will quickly draw readers to your site)
• Include customer testimonials
• Produce blogs, forums, or user communities
Most viewers will give you about ten seconds to decide if your site is worth visiting. If you have interesting content and graphics, they'll give you a little more time. However, if you haven't used your space on the Internet to capture and retain their attention, the next thing you know, the person is gone.

Your website should attract viewers, and ultimately provide you with additional leads.