I called my client and asked if she had considered that she must give her clients a reason to book her or why they would want to license images from her and nobody else. Her answer made me actually laugh. She said, all her clients or potential clients need to do is to look at the images and they are pretty self explanatory. This is a very typical answer.
Here’s the deal with this. Of course your images are better than the competition but you still have to tell your clients why you are the better choice. You can’t expect somebody to look at your images and convince themselves that you are the right one, you have to tell them. Please follow your mothers advice and ‘use your words.’
On your blogs or Facebook or any direct advertising please stop just showing one image with your name. That tends to not work. Give your clients a specific call to action and a reason as to why they need to call you or book you. Make it about them and not about you.
- My images are unique because they do this for you…
- Your experience with me will give you this…
- Working with me helps you in these ways…
- This is what I do for you that the competition doesn’t do for you…
Once a photographer said in a LinkedIn forum that she felt her images were like a pearl in a oyster. Apparently she was prepared to sit locked in her shell for some unknown duration of time in an undisclosed location waiting for one courageous diver to find her.
You must and I repeat, you must tell your clients why you are right for the job. Even if the other person sees it they need you to provide all the arguments so that they can fight for you in the creative meeting.
Summary:
Copy on your website is very important. If you don’t know how to write, enlist the services of a professional writer. You can find good copywriters on Elance.com and it’s much cheaper than you think. Unless you know how to write great ad copy leave this to a professional, it’s an investment well worth it. If you are a non-native English speaker you cannot write your own copy. Hire someone. Give your clients the reasons to book you, don’t expect that one image does all the talking for you.
The photographer’s blog is an opportunity to communicate to a client to help them understand and become familiar with your thought process and method of working.Hopefully clients will be impressed with your knowledge as well as your images.By adding good relevant copy search engines will also be able to find and index the pages.