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Displays

when it comes to displays. Obviously we want to create creative displays. We want unique ideas, designs, concepts. We want to look different. They're all kinds of companies, like Luma View, that produces lip prints. So those hang all over our studios in the windows of the nice thing is, in the night time they glow. So clients love this. Now our clients ask about him all the time. We've probably sold two or three. They're not something. They're so pricey. Yes, we have to look at longevity there certain things like this that are fads, that having had these up after about a year. So hanging in the window, the prince fade quite a bit. So I'm not gonna have a client spend over $1000 then a year from now, have them coming back complaining that it's faded back. So So some of these things were used for purely for display or visual appeal. And then other things are used for client sales that, in addition to using them to showcase their work, we want our clients to buy them as well. I'm gonna go...

through several examples of great display concepts. A couple of these were in our bellies and maybe show some of them are no our new ones, but I think they're so important. I talked about striking them, but to me it's the concept, and you can take this in any display across the board anywhere. I'm gonna put my images. It's the exact same scenario. We do it the exact same way. So as an example, Doctor's offices obviously are a great place to display your work, especially offices like pediatric offices. If you work with kids, you know, we've had our work in, uh, like offices. We did it work for a surgeon who did breast augmentation and everything we did for him were very art, artsy, tasteful nudes of women. But for his office, it worked really, really well for what he was doing. So obviously you want to pick the right type of work for the right type of office. Simply getting your images up is not enough. Having somebody agree to let you put your work, it's not that hard to get that I will cover how to get into these places. What's more important is the networking in the communication and the relationships you build. The most important thing. I'm going to tell you in all of the displays, and I want to make sure we get it out right now. Is that every person you see in any display you ever see? For the most part, everybody in those images has something to do with that location. So, in a doctor's office, of course, we would want to use the nurses, the nurses, kids or, in a lot of cases, with doctors office. It might be their grand babies because a lot of older women work in the reception areas or the doctor's family, etcetera. Best case is getting the employees second. Best Case is getting their favorite clients because it's the same sort of reaction. What you need to know is, if you want to create buzz, get the people that are involved in that location involved in the imagery, and that way they're excited. It's like it's like wallpaper. If you put an image on the on a wall after a while, the people forget, You know, you kind of stop seeing it. It's always exciting when they first go up. If it's your grandchild on the wall and you sit behind the desk. How many times a day are you gonna refer back to that image? How many times you gonna look at it? How many times when somebody says, Oh, these pictures are pretty? Are you going to say, Oh, yeah, I got to show you my grandson. That's a direct relationship issue that you want to think about. We want to create that kind of engagement. So doctors offices are really great. Now here's an example. This is Littleton Pediatrics. This is one. It's funny. This is my Children's practice, which we've been. My daughter's gonna be 21. So for 21 years or 20 years, I should say we've been going to Littleton Pediatrics. Now there was another photographer that hung in there when I first started, and I am not the kind of photographer that would come in and say, Take their work down, put mine up. I just assumed that it was taken and there had to be somewhere else. Go. So for about years now, I've sort of not even approached it. I just kind of go in there and say, Oh, these air old with somebody to replace these, But I never say it out loud, so I never did anything with that. Well, ironically, one of my associates that works for me. Tiffany was in the office. She was with one of her kids and she made mention to a nurse that Wow, you guys should replace these. These are kind of old. I had no knowledge of this. The nurse was like, Yeah, let me get the office manager. The office manager came in Tiffany. Within a few minutes. She's our lead sales person to so she within a few minutes had had told them all about the exciting things we could do and got them very excited about a new display, a new look and a new style. So So what? I was terrified to do. She did brilliantly. In a few minutes, she came back and said, Look, they're interested in hosting a display. So the first thing we do is we go and we look at the walls and the availability. We take pictures so we can get an idea of ratios and sizes. I will tell you now Go is Bigas. You can It's like real estate. Once it goes up, it does not come down. You own that spot. So if you can put it up there, make it is big as you can afford. Now, I will also tell you that we donate all of our displays. So I'm gonna explain to you why and how a little bit later. So first thing we did is visually went in and snap some shots so we can get an idea. Took some measurements, so we really were clear on the sizes. Then we go home and we lay it out. Now, normally, it would be a little different. Normally we would work with the office manager and we would say, Look, we'd love to use your nurses if they don't have kids. We love to use your patients. We tried that approach with them. They were very no, they said, no, no, no, we're not gonna disrupt our clients. This is we just want images that you've already taken. Well, that was disheartening for me because you realize that just cut off a whole lot of potential new clients. If they give me 15 or of their clients to let me photograph them, even with a complimentary session and a credit which we'll talk about I still have the potential to sell to new people and to meet new people. So I was really disappointed, but I was This is such a big practice. I thought, you know what? Okay, I'll break my own rule, and I will use work that I've already created. So having no choice, we went back with the measurements, and I started pulling from my own work and finding images that I felt were strong enough and putting together these little collections now interesting. From the first doctor's office you saw with all the black and whites and the the turtlenecks and you can kind of almost guess when those were taken right. That was 2008 ish when it was really into the relationships. My style has changed a ton now much more vibrant and colorful and eclectic. So this really represents mawr, what our style was. So we figured out the order and the placement. And then, of course, we placed the order through a photo, and in this case, we did gallery wraps because we didn't want to deal with frames etcetera. So we then put them. Now you can see that they're pretty long walls It's like a 20 something foot wall, those air 30 by forties, 30 by thirties and really large size prints. We want to own every square to that wall. All of the images air signed. We don't hang anything. Nothing actually leaves our studio without our signature on it, period on nothing from wallet to wall portrait. You have to sign everything. So our names are on these images, goes up great reviews. The nurses loved it. Everything was wonderful. So the end result was great. But I still was a little disappointed at the fact that we didn't get to photograph new people for this, by the way, just is enough way. I we used Bay photo for all of the for all of these displays. So a couple other things that we dio that you should note is whatever we do these displays, we don't tell the doctors or the office practice that we're gonna do this. But we always grab one of their appointment cards and, um, we usually scan it or take their logo, and then we will take the images that are in the location, usually of their clients or of them their own Children. and we will make an appointment card on, and it's kind of a surprise. We usually make 300 to 500 of these. And so once we hang the display, we turned to them. And we say it's usually very nonchalant. Oh, by the way, we made these for you. If you don't want them, you can throw them away. But otherwise they're really cute. Here you are. Well, of course they're going to keep them. They go from a plain, boring white card to this cute little card with images. But you can see on the back has our logo. So now there's a tie in for that potential client that has our card, so to speak, that matches the images that are on the wall, has our contact information. Now what happens to appointment cards? Where do they end up on the refrigerator? Right, they end up on the refrigerator. So of course, that's something that you know that your work is going to go home and make it to the refrigerator. That's gonna be another. It's one of those sticky that stickiness. It's one of those 3 to 5 contacts that people are gonna go. Oh, Yeah, I saw your work at the doctors office when I saw you at the mall and my friend had had work of yours in the house. That's how I found you. That's how most of my clients, by the way, whenever I ask a new client Well, how did hear about us? They'll say, I was at my daughter's doctor's office and then I was at a friend's house and I saw she had a big, beautiful portrait of two kids out in a field and I start to connect the dots and I'm like, You know what? It took him 2 to 3 times to find us, so that's really important. So in addition to the appointment cards, we also do with hospitals and doctors offices. We do a little card that they could hand out for us, and this is what's important if you read the taxes, says thank you for choosing Littleton Pediatrics. Here is a special gift for you. Ah, complimentary of a portrait session, it says, to show our gratitude for trusting us with their families. Help! We will help. We would love to provide your family with a complimentary portrait session. So who is giving this card out. The nurse is right, because technically it says, thank you for trusting us with your family's health. So the nice part about this is it's not us trying to sell ourselves. The nurses are super excited to sell us, so these little appointment cards have been very helpful. These little discount cards you can see that all of our doctors offices we definitely try Teoh Project there project their appointment to recreate their appointment cards because we know it's good for us. Ironically, this particular pediatrics office was so adamant about not using bottles, and then we put this this way up. It had such rave reviews that the same person we spoke to the office manager contact us and she said, Oh, my gosh, we love this. We have a second practice. We would love to do a second, but is there any way you would consider photographing our kids and the clients? So, of course, what happened is when she thought of the idea, it was a great one, and we were like, Yeah, you know what? If you want to do that, we would do that for you. Meanwhile, we would do it for everybody. But it was just one of those things where it was a control issue at first because we wanted it. She didn't want it. But once she felt like she designer came up with the idea, she was all over it. So we're working on the second version, the second office, and we have a little more control now. Hospitals were actually the beginning of my display journey. I've had a lot of small displays. I had started putting up displays both temporary and permanent for many years. My first display was actually in a consignment store, a T. That time I had six foster Children and two biological Children. And so I was always at consignment stores and I met a lady who I was there often enough that she old this door and she was asking me about my kids and what I dio. And eventually she made the connection with photography, and she gave me permission to put those images a couple images. I photographed her family, couple other kids and put them up in the consignment store. Now this was early on early Colorado. This was back in the 95 days, which even then, probably was a little pricey, but it was a good fit. Now my original clients came from that Simon store, so I'm not knocking a consignment store. However, as my prices increased, those images never came down. So there was a point where clients were calling and asking about pressing. And now we have gone from a $10.8 by 10 to 59 69 89 so forth. And then there was that that clarity that maybe this wasn't the right place. No, I didn't have the heart to come and take down the display. It was her Children. So it actually is still there. To this day, we don't get many calls. We don't. We used to drop off cards and push it a lot more. We don't spend as much time instigating or engaging with her, but I still will always give her credit for believing in me. She was the first person that was willing to open up and say, Yeah, go ahead and put your work up here from that. It was a good start, but it wasn't until I had the situation with this hospital first possible. I ever did the I did, uh, what we call a collection. It was, ah, black and white. I used to work with another artist, and we photographed this. It was, ah, four hour session. Very high end, early digital. Remember, this is before anybody else was Photoshopped. We were doing these composites, and so the sessions he started at $5000. It was a very expensive session. Very. I did a total of maybe 15 of them in a year that we did them, but they were very, very high end, and we were doing digital composite match was in your mind is like no big deal Back then, nobody had ever seen it. This was super early within year one of digital technology. And so So we did a collection for a doctor and a nurse that we're married. And, um, they must have enjoyed them because we got a phone call from the director of marketing and she said that she had seen are working, that she loved what we did. And she said she said, Would you consider um, would you consider putting up a display in the hospital? Of course. I never had something so exciting. so it's like Absolutely, that would be awesome, she said. We have two problems, she said. First of all, this was September, she said. First of all, we need to get these up before the holiday before Christmas on. Of course, that's I told you all of the money I make 1/2 of the money we make. Is it within August, September and October. So this is our worst time ever. And she's telling me that had that they need to be up before the holidays for their new grand opening and my head. I was like, OK, no problem. We could do that. And she said, The next problem is we are on a budget. We only have a budget of $10,000. Can you do this? And in my head, I was like, You know, normally we donate all of our all of our displays, and so in my head I was like, Okay, well, we usually donate. But then I started thinking and I was thinking, Okay, well, you know, she has a budget and you guys know like, what happens if you don't use a budget? Honestly, go. They take it away from you like if you don't use your budget, right? So I did the only thing that I thought was fair, and I was like, I don't want them to take this from her. So I was very kind and accepted her $10,000 so she wouldn't lose it. I didn't. I thought that was the right thing to do. So So I said, You know what? We'll make it work for $10,000. Now, mind you, that is the Onley hospital display I've ever been paid for Every display after that. And we have plenty of them. We have always donated the work, but this was kind of exciting. Now, this was the only other time in my career that I did not have time to photograph all those sessions with three months to get them all printed, framed on the walls. I had to use my old images. Resource is so I went through and I contacted clients. And again, this is sort of that black and white phase. You can almost pinpoint this to 7 4008 I'd already photographed these images, so I contacted the clients and asked them permission. A lot of these air, that collection style type image contacted them and asked them permission. Now the difference is I had to make it clear that we don't own these images. The hospital will on them, so we can't get them back. You can't buy them later. You can't have rights to them. You have to sign your rights away to these images. In exchange for that, I gave them a credit a couple $100 towards a studio session. I felt that that was fair. All of the images have my signature, and about every 3rd 1 has a little brass plaque that says Sandy puts photography. Back then it was expressions, photography and her phone number. So all of these clients agreed to let us do what they were very excited about this. This was definitely a Sephora's faras. You know, I was disappointed that I could use the nurses and doctors is the only one that ever happened with. But it was really exciting because we had a budget and we had an opportunity to create a big impact. So we quickly got the images together. We wrapped it up, got them placed, and, you know this is one of those overnight. The very next day, we put them up in the night time. The very next day, we got a first phone call than our second. And then our thirds. Of course I am freaking out. This is the coolest thing ever. This is huge. This is going to take us to the moon. So my first reaction was Oh, my gosh. We have got to get a display in every hospital in the world. We need to have them all. Somebody's gonna figure this out. We got to get out there. And then I think a few of my staff members pulled the reins. Is that okay? Maybe not the world. Maybe just Colorado would be a good start. So we started pursuing hospitals in Colorado, and within a very short period of time, we were in eight all of the major hospitals in our area with images. Now, excuse me. I want to back it up because I want to make sure you understand that, um, when we talk about these big displays and I know that their students out there that are going how do you get a display that you afford? Just play that big, so I want to back it up back to my first display. It was in a consignment store. It was three images and it's all I could afford. And so you have to look at it again. It's that darn elephant if you can't afford and a display with 10 20 images, start with two and get them on the wall. And the minute those two images making money make a commitment to say, I'm going to take that money and I'm gonna get two more images on the wall. I'm gonna find two more people to model for me and get them on the wall. So so taking baby steps Because the hospitals that were now in most of them have anywhere from 80 to 90 images Big 30 by forties and bigger. Some of them have up to 120 images in. But that's years of work and taking one wall at a time because I figure if I get there first, then you won't. So that's kind of the plan in marketing is is creating that real estate and capturing it holding onto it. So if there's somebody in a hospital in your local area. Then go find a doctor's office. If there's somebody in the doctor's office, go find an orthodontist. I mean, there's so many programs and ways to do this that work. This waas a turning point for me, though this is the first display that went up. This is Presbyterian ST Lukes. You can kind of see that this was a big circle. The maternity rooms are inside and outside the circle. So within a couple of weeks of this going up, I had a woman come in and she is one of those stories. Always tell because it's such a pinnacle moment in my career. She came in tiny woman, very small, petite, tiny, his baby ever. This baby was like this big. She was super petite. So one of the first things I always do is I always ask my client, How did you hear about us? Everybody gets asked that if there a new client. So she Why? Even if it's written down, I asked because it's good feedback. So I turned around. I said, Oh, by the way, how did you hear about our studio? And she said, Oh, she said, You know what? I had her at PSL and I saw your work. It was just beautiful. So of course, this was in the first few weeks of having this display up. So my heart's kind of racing cause I'm like, That's great And I turned around. I said, Really? I said, Well, what did you think of the display? And she said Siyam. She almost acted it out. She looked at me, she said, You know what, Sandy? She said, I have to tell you something. My labor and delivery was the single worst thing I've ever done in my life, she said. I had over think was like 24 hours of labor at home before they would admit me. And then she said, once I was admitted to the hospital, I went through a series of problems 18 hours of serious labor before the baby went into a stress and they had to take me in for an emergency C section. I was unable to deliver her naturally and she said I will never do this again, she said. This baby is a miracle as far as I'm concerned, and I will never have another child. And she said, But I have to tell you this, she said. When I was there, I was in so much pain and she said I just didn't think I was going to survive And she said I kept walking around the circle. She called it so they kept walking around the circle and I'm pulling my ivy And she said, I kept looking at these images and she said I stopped at every single picture stuff in every single picture. We just stare at those pictures and all I kept thinking is, even if I don't make it, I just want this baby to be healthy. I just want a baby like the baby in these pictures and she said, Your work is what got me through She said it was so much pain. But I kept going around and looking at your images and looking at your images. And she said, Finally I turned to my husband and I said, If I survive this, you're buying me. One of those was like, Oh my God, she literally cause me. She scared me when she said that, but it was like that's an impact moment for me because as animated as she was about that she was telling me that she literally threatened his life. She was going to get a picture because she was suffering and he was the reason. And she was getting this for me. It was cool, because for me, I went to that emotional journey of seeing her in this circle, looking at my work, connecting to those babies, connecting to that. I also saw her go through that emotional journey of making the determination that this was important to her and that she was going toe have one of those for herself. And so that was it with that, I was I got it. I was so locked into the hospital concept. That's when I got into that Holy cow. We gotta take over the world from there, we did get lots and lots of displays. Most of these displays we actually update displays every 3 to 4 years. So most of these Aaron renovation. This hospital is being worked on right now. There's also I'm not sure what's gonna come up, but Swedish is also in the process. Most important part is the people in the images. They are the doctors and the nurses. Now the question is always. How do we make that happen? Well, we contact the person in charge, and we explain to them the value of having their employees how meaningful that is, how much energy it creates, how much excitement it creates. It's free. We're gonna give them complimentary sessions and a studio credit. Let me clarify the studio credit before you write this number down. We give $100 credit, but you know how much an eight by 10 is an eight by 10 in our studio, $150 so technically that if they just wanted to take their $100 spend it, they could get about a five by seven. Most people don't the reason we give a credit and not a product. And that's really important. Never, ever, ever give a free session and a free product like an eight by 10 or five by seven, because nine out of 10 times they will just take the free product. If you give a free session in a free eight by 10 half of those people, six out of 10 will say, Oh, God, made by 10. I'm good to go when you give them a credit an actual financial value or a dollar value. They look at that money and they go home for 100 bucks. I could get a five by seven or I could take this $ I could put it towards a package. Even if it's a small package, like a three or $400 package, they say who? I could take this. Take $100 off this package and I'm getting like, five times MAWR for less money. It's something we watch every day. Our clients sitting do the math and they're like, Oh, this is a better deal. I get way Mawr and I'm not spending hardly anything. So you're looking at the going well. They bought their smallest package will to me. I would rather have some money than no money number one number to keep in mind that we run these campaigns during our slow season. These air all slow season campaigns when we teach, marketing their times to do these kind of things. Model searches, hospital displays, doctor's offices. We photographed the January, February, March and April because guess what, We're not doing anything else. January, February, March and April we might as well, making be making some money than no money. This is that kind of thing that if you do it, if you commit to it, even if you just get a few people in the door isn't a few dollars better than no dollars at all? Isn't it better to me to pick up the phone and find somebody to come in, then to sit there anxiously waiting for the phone to ring? This is the foundation. When you look at my company and you're like, How does she keep you know, up to 32 people employed? I can't wait for it. I have to go find it, and you would have to do the same thing. So so target marketing and understanding that there are certain times that certain campaigns I would never do a hospital campaign in August or September and October. There's no way because I have good paying clients that every year expect to pass session fee and they expect to pay our regular prices, and they're comfortable with that. Now, in the hospitals, we have the same thing. We have all kinds of different styles here, but this says a gift for you from Sandy, which photography this is Thank you for participating in our display program. The certificates entitles you to a complimentary portrait session and $100 credit toward your personal order. So this is obviously for the models. Correct. It's not what we leave at the hospital. Here's another. Despite this is actually the hospital that we're working on right now. You can see this is still that 9 4010 The difference is you can't see them very well, but some of these are. I don't know if you guys remember when there was sort of it was very popular. That high contrast kind of see Peotone. We call it an elegance, but it's kind of a hand colored sepia tone that was really popular in 10 4009. So that's what that display is. It's old school now, so we're taking it down, and our work that's going up is a lot more vibrant and bright and fluffy. But you do have to remember that you're working. There's a new element of design to because walls in hospitals tend to be very grey and murky and boring and blend, and you know, sometimes poppy bright colors work Sometimes they don't fact we had a wall way. It was like a like the color of pea soup, like a yellowy green color. This is horrible and we shot black and whites and they look terrible on. And we tried color and it looked terrible and we could eventually invented our own. We call it Green Pia. It's like a CP, only it's green. Looks like a great way had to shift our images to that tone ality because this wall, it wasn't one of those halls that had no windows. And so everything looked wrong in there until we made this like greenish sepia tone looked beautiful in there. So sometimes we have toe design and create things that work specifically for the walls that we are placing them on. So we do have The first card you saw was the card that we give to the models that were asking for the second car. This is the one. Once the display goes up, we do have the same thing. This one says, thank you for shooting. Choosing Swedish Medical Center. We are honored to have you, sir, to have served you and welcome your baby into the world. So this is from the nurses right now. Imagine those walls that you just saw. If everybody up there was either the nurses, the nurses, babies, the doctors, babies, their their grand babies or their clients, you know that those nurses air constantly going to be talking about photographers we absolutely see in our numbers. The minute we put up a display, it's buzz buzz, buzz, buzz, buzz, phone call, phone call, phone call. After about 6 to 8 months, it tapers off. And then after that, it's a steady flow, but nowhere near the traffic in the beginning, because we know it's like anything else superstars and diamonds in the beginning. And then people. It's kind of like wallpaper. Eventually, you just don't see it anymore. The very best thing we can do is say, Okay, guys, it's been two years. Let's redo this. Your kids are grown up. Let's get her kids and her kids, and that energy keeps going. So the replacement of those images is important, and I do want to clarify one more time. Just keep in mind that if those are overwhelming to you, if you're looking at the going Oh, how would I afford that? Or how could I do that? Take baby steps to images. Three images start small and grow big, and pretty soon you will be finding ways to make that happen. All right, other projects that we've worked on this is another hospital context. When we were really big in the hospitals, it was kind of funny because they kept calling us and saying, We've seen your work. We want to get you in here. They were always trying to outdo each other. They always said we want something different because that was very important to these hospitals. So one hospital contacted me and they said, OK, we have this idea. We want to do this, This giant mural, like 10 15 feet. Are you able to do that? And of course, I had no idea. But I'm one of those Jump and build your parachute on the way down people. So I'm like, oh, had 20 foot portrait, no problem. And then she's like, Okay, well, what we want to do is we wanted to sort of like a Winnie the Pooh. We have sort of this like soft Winnie the pooh feel we want to have. Their hospital was one years old and they said We wanna have a bunch of babies that have been born here in the last year. We kind of want them in the field, want them swimming and climbing trees and swinging. And if I had him going, I don't know a lot of one year olds that could swim or climb trees. But she's like, Do you think you could do that like Oh yeah, sure, no problem. We totally could do that, you know? So in my head, I'm trying to figure out how do you make a one year old climb a tree and swim and sit on the fence? But I'm telling her I can do it. And let me tell you, sometimes I get myself in a whole lot of trouble. But you can see these are simply and again. This is years ago because I wouldn't do it this way. Now, back then, my first thought was OK, we'll shoot it on high key, and that will extract them Now this is way before a lot of the tools. You have a photo shop now, but when we did this. This is the I had the right idea. But knowing what I know now, I would have not put them on Nike. I would have put them on like a gray neutral background so that I could extract them a lot easier or it could use green screen or something like that. But this was really hard, because when you have blown out, highlights extracting babies out is not easy. So this project that was supposed to take three months to closer to six months, we did get it done in time for a big unveiling. I had an artist that worked for me that was really into drawing. I knew I couldn't use Winnie the Pooh characters because they were copyrighted. So we had to draw something and then drop the babies. And this picture does not do it justice, because this images over 10 feet long Um, but you get the idea. Now I look at this and I shudder a little bit cause I'm ago I could do so much better now. But at the time, this was tremendous. This was the biggest part of their unveiling. They did, Ah, one year birthday anniversary. They had the TV there, radio stations there, that all kinds of press. This was the image they unveiled. We've got tons of exposure from this. It was very well received to this day. We still get clients who come in and book and they're talking about this. I would like to replace it, but 10 feet. And the headache it was I'm not gonna do it any time too soon. But it's something that it was definitely part of my learning curve. The day the first time I did this and I was showing in a show of so proud I was like, Look what we did. Now I'm like, OK, I bet you know, my 13 year olds could probably photoshopped that a little bit better, But it's that learning curve and it's staying ahead of the curve. Nobody else could do something like this. Back when we did it on DSO, we were learning as we went all right. There are other types of displays mall displays or, of course, a really great option as well. I always ask people, Do any of you have mall displays? Anybody have a display like that? Okay. Usually in a big room will have two or three people that have them all display. And I always asked like, How much do you pay for your multiple not to call them out or embarrass them? But I'm always fascinated to see the range. I mean, there's everything from $500.300 dollars to free. I mean, people have free displays out there. And if you ask them how they got a free display, they say, I just ask you. I mean, that's the key is you have to be willing to ask and get your name out there. I have been told for years that mall displays were really worth it. I just didn't at the time it was an economic thing. And then eventually, when I had the money to do it, I made a decision that I wanted to go with the best mall there. Waas. So we have a mall called Park Medals Mall. It's the high end kind of the Nordstrom's and the really she she people go there. So when I decided to do him all this plate, I knew I wanted to be in this particular model Park Meadows. So I set up an appointment to work with the director of sales, and I went in there and when I went in, this is kind of and again the story's been told. But the concept really is what's important, how I do this. When I went in and sat down, the very first thing I did with our introduced myself. I said, You know what? Can I show you something before we get started? And I did this in every display, so this applies across the board. So I sat down and I asked her if I could show her this slideshow turned off the lights. The music comes up and, of course, just like the slide shows I show you. All of a sudden it's pretty Children fading in and out and she's just watching and kind of funny. I like to watch people's faces when they watch the slide show, because I try to guess what kids they have based on where you can see, kind of like when they get excited, like I heard you. Oh, and eyeing over babies earlier in the show and you have little ones, don't you? I mean it just it's one of those things that you could you could feel so I'm watching her in her eyes. Every time little girls would pop up, her eyes would light up. So my head, I'm gonna. But she has daughters. And so sideshow finishes. She's all excited. I turn on line, I said, Well, what did you think it was like, Oh my gosh, that's so beautiful. I said, Yeah, this is what I do is Do you have kids? And she said, Yeah, I have two daughters. Ah, three and a four or three and a five year old And really, I said, Oh, my gosh, you know what we should do? We should get them. And I've got this beautiful location right now. It's just grassroot that these little white dresses, no shoes, little slip dresses just have them running to the field of anti tricycles and baskets. So I'm telling we're not even talking about marketing. I'm telling you all this and I'm watching her eyes and I can see she's like, out in the field and she's watching her. You know, you could see when people mentally check out, and she's going through this whole process of of this situation. And so, of course, she gets all excited. I'm like, Look, I would be happy to be a complimentary session. I would just love to work with you to be a lot of fun. So she's of course, now she's engaged. Now she wants to do this. So then I turned to her and I said, Well, sorry, I know I kind of said Wade there, but you can see how much I love what I do. I love telling people stories. I said, and I really believe that your mall is the right place to tell my story, to tell people what I do. I said, So I'm just curious. How much does it cost to get a kiosk? A display in your in your mall? And she looked at me and she's like, Okay, well, yeah, we'd love to have you. Ah, display is $8000 a month. I literally thought when she said it, I actually think I thought she said, like year $8000 was so much. At that time, I couldn't even fathom spending that much in a year, let alone a month for a display so kind of in my head, I was like, Hey, wait a minute. What about the stars in the diamond in the field of the little girls? Let's go back there. That was way cooler. But she was. She was definitely went straight into business mode and she said 8000. And I said, Oh, I said, Wow, I had no idea I didn't expect that, But, um, I can tell you right now that's out of my budget, I said, So is there any other options? And she said, You know, she pulls out a map and she's looking around and I said, Well, what about is there, like a hallway or room or an area where I could put some images and she's like, No, no, no, she's going through And I could tell she was engaged. She was really wanted to get me in there. She loved what I did, but she couldn't find a way to make it work. And eventually we're looking through this map and I'm like, What about the bathrooms? People go there. I mean, we could put some of the stalls and she's looking at me like I was like, OK, I guess I'm not serious, but I would have honestly, she said. Yes, I would have put images in the bathrooms, but she's like, No, that's not an option. So that was the end of it. I thought I left kind of really disappointed because there was just no way I could afford that. Well, the stars and diamonds work because a couple days later she called my cell phone and she said, Hey, you know what? I haven't stopped thinking about you and your work. I really think you belong here, she says. I went to management. I talked to them and I think we can get you a display. We got a really good deal. You can't tell anybody, but we can get you a kiosk for $4000 a month. I'm going, Okay, I can't afford 4000 either. So I was like, really kind of embarrassed, actually, because I could tell she went to bat for me and I still was a cheapskate as far as I was concerned. And I'm like, You know what? You are so sweet and trust me, we're gonna get your portrait's done, but I cannot. That's just out of me. But I said I don't know what my budget was, but I have no idea would be that far. I said That's like double my rent at the time. And so she was disappointed again. And then I thought that was the end of it. Felt worse. And then a couple days later, she called back and she said, She said, Hey, okay, now it's not a kiosk, but we have a wall on DWI can get you this wall for $1650 a month, she said. It's a three month contract. It's only through the holidays. But if you want it, this is like the best I could Dio and I said, I'll take it for a couple reasons. Number one. It was a three month contract in the busy season, so I knew I would have a little money to do it. Number two. She had gone so far in above trying to make this happen, that I figured, you know what? Worst case scenario. It's three months, if it doesn't work out, will pull it down. But at least I tried. At least I'll know the answer to the question because to go from 8000 to $1600 it was a good jump for May. So the first mall display ever put up was this one here. The lighting was already there. This is a space I had. It was not a main entrance to the mall. It's one of the side entrance. So you weren't gonna get the massive traffic? Thea other negative. The Onley would allow me one. That little circle That tiny purple brochure That was the Onley literature. They would allow me to have their So I was really nervous. But the good news Waas We were located right next to the A tm and we were also located right next to the stroller rentals. So I felt like people would go there and I figured for three months it couldn't hurt. Well, I will put it this way. We got through the three months and just from the clients we had secured from those 1st 3 months, it was very well worth staying there longer. We stayed there for a year and 1/2 Incredible relationship. Now one of the things that I did and I always teaches about community and relationships. When I first put this display up the next day, I was super excited and I wanted to see what it looked like. We had to put it up in the night with the lights off. So that morning, when the mall opened, I went and looked at it. I was really excited. So when I came, I knew that there was the stroller rental there. And we way have what we call the cookie theory. We always take way. Have a notice bunk Meyer Evident. We always cook hot cookies and take him wherever we go. So when I showed up, I had a ah box, a little box of cookies, a tin of cookies and I showed up and I introduced myself to the ladies behind the stroller rental desk. I told them who we were and what we were, and they were actually really excited. They said, Oh, people have already stopped by there Really excited, she said. One person really trying to book an appointment over here, and so that was kind of exciting. And then, you know, I told her what we were doing and how we were doing it. And she This was mid mid toe later afternoon because she turned to me. She said, Well, by the way, you're already out of brochures, and I was like, Wow, that had only been a day. So I said, I'll run to my car and get some more and I ran to the car grabs more brochures and when I came back in, she turned to me and she said, Do you know what? If you just leave a box of brochures, then I'll just put him out for you And I was like a total win. I was like, Those cookies work. So So I left there a box of rushers and then it was nice, because only every three or four weeks I would drive down with another boxer Brochures and always a box of cookies on Guy would give her. I would give these ladies the cookies and thank them, and they were kind of keeping this up. For me, success was wonderful. It was great working with them. We did this for a year and 1/ and about a year and 1/2 after we started. But a year and 1/2 after the mall called me the same person I had originally worked with, and she said, You know what? We've rented this space out So we have to have you take down your display. Are you ready to get a kiosk? It and I said, Are they less than $1000? And she said no. So I was super bombed because we had to go and take this display down and it had been very profitable up until that point, so I was really, really sad about that. But since then I had got my images in other malls whole lot less expensive. Most of my displays were like three or $400 as opposed to this one, but take it down thought that was the end of it. Until a few weeks later, after this went down, the manager called me again and she said, Hey, she said, You know what? The ladies downstairs at the stroller renter rental came up, and they said that a lot of people are stopping by looking for you, and they really think you need to get back in the mall. And as she's saying it in my head, I'm going. Actually, the ladies downstairs are missing their cookies, and they'd really like to get their cookies back so they want. They want me back in the mall. So it was kind of one of those things that what I heard and what she said were totally different. But I got it. It was that relationship. I was totally mesmerized at the fact that these women had taken the time to go and talk to them on my behalf. I didn't ask for that, didn't solicit that. And they did it because they felt it was important. So it was kind of funny because she came back and she said, Look, I can't get you the wall again, But if you can do if you can build your own kiosk, we can give it to you for $2500 a month. Now that was more than I had been paying. But I already knew the value of this location. And so this is the some of the first pictures we built a new display we built. This is before all the plants and all the pretty things came up. But the reason I want to show it here is you can see on the end of this there is a TV monitor and again this is This is I would do this very different now, but this was the first on again so far ahead of the curve, the first digital slide show nobody in our area had ever done something like that. And here we have this incredible sideshow all put to music that what we found and I would think that Ah, lunch room. I would sit there and just watch people walk around that kiosk and then they would stop. And this is like a 10 minute show and people would watch it for the full 10 minutes, just watching images float in and out. So I realized there was a tremendous impact, and it was very much worth having it here. In fact, one of the first clients we got from the small display their very good clients of ours. They spend $27,000 in the first year of coming to us on their eighth child so that client alone more than paid for this particular kiosk. Now, again, those kind of success stories are rare. I don't want people Teoh, you know, get nauseous because they feel like that's just not possible. It's totally possible, totally doable. I happen to be This display happens to be in the right place for that type of client. Other displays don't do anywhere near that near that well, but that is why we continue to invest in this particular location. Is it? It did have great value, but you also understand that the types of clients that we displayed we work with a lot of sports figures and things. And a lot of those are the people that we put in the small display because we recognize that they would be more recognizable to this particular community. So it was a win win for us. Now, in the your displays, there are a lot of literature that you have. We do have brochures that cover our studio and what we are. You also want to gather information. It's always going to have fishable drawings, fishable drawings. If you are a member of SPU, you know we have what we call the 30 day challenge and every new person that joins sq and there are a whole lot of them that purchase this book and are going to be new members, and the first thing we're gonna send you to is the 30 day challenge, and that is a challenge that was started by one of our photographers. It's now this giant thread, but it kind outlines what you should be doing. T jump start your marketing to get your business going, and displays are one of the number one things there. But fish bowl drawings are also huge, and so fishable Drawings are definitely something that we recommend you getting involved in. So for our mall displays, in addition to having the pretty images and the slide shows and things, we also have a place that you could fill out a card and drop your card in a box. It asked some questions about who you are and what you are, but it also interesting. It gives you an option of winning a prize or winning a portrait session, and each month we draw the winners. We do a legitimate drive. We're offering three prizes that month. We will draw the 1st 3 prices, but if we have 30 people that have put their names in the box, everybody's going to be a winner. We're gonna do the legal draw, which is drawing the three people and give them the prices. And then every single person after that is going to be a winner, too, because we don't know which one is the next Golden client. We don't know. We have to go through them all. One of the best things about these types of drawing is people are giving you permission on there to call them to get to call them up. And I'll tell you this. Right now, the telephone is one of the most feared and most powerful tools in marketing period. If you are not willing to pick up the phone, some of these campaigns won't work a fish ball drawing If you draw your three winners and you just send them a letter saying, Hey, you want you'll never hear from any of them. When we do drawings like this, we will pick our legitimate winners. We contact them by phone and send them a follow up letter. We take the other 27 people and we contact them by phone and send them a letter as well. They win something, whether it's a complimentary session or complementary, whatever it is they are going to be winners to, because ultimately they took the time to fill it out. Therefore, they showed interest. Why wouldn't I take advantage of this. For those of you who say you don't have a database, you don't have names, fish balls the best way in the world to do get involved in some group, some charity, some organization where you could have official drawing, maybe donate your services, start gathering names, people that will stop by and fill out. You always gonna have that. I stopped at every bowl person that just feels out everything. You're also gonna have people who are drawn to you because of your work that are gonna be interested. That would like Toa win. So So keep that in mind. Fishable drawings are really, really a powerful tool that's in the 30 day challenge. That's definitely something that we recommend is starting those Those could be small, you know, local clothing store, etcetera that you're gonna work with to do something like that. Now, in addition to the big hospital displays, doctor's office, small displays, we also do a lot of temporary displays. I think you're getting the idea that getting your work out there is critical. We think it's so important. This is one of those outside malls shopping malls, and this is something where you can always ask their always somebody that's out of business or a store that they've got the windows covered. That's just retail are That's a real estate as far as I'm concerned. So we contact them and say, Look, there's nothing in your windows. Would you consider renting us that space for a month or two until you feel it? It's a service to them because it gives us something bright and colorful toe look like and look at and it's serviced us because the price points usually pretty well. Something like that is 100 to $300 a month. Great traffic here were very careful where we place these a couple things that you may or may not be able to see. Some things we can't control, like the now leasing sign. We can't take that down, but you can see that we also have, like, this poster goes up. It's on the far side on the other side of the window, but it has that little you know, digital quick find to our website. We have different ones, like we do senior displays that will send you to our senior side. We have baby displays. It will send your baby side if we're doing a baby model service. That's a great place to get brand new clients that have never heard of you before. So we're always looking for these types of avenues to create sort of that that powerful impact marketing and approach there. Do you have questions on? We do displays. Cool, because then I'm gonna give away something to you guys and then this will be given away later. Awesome. Quite a few people in the chat rooms have been asking this entire segment. Everyone's really curious about how you sign your images and the so could you clarify if you sign actually signed the images if you put your watermark on them. And if that is on display in public space, as well as for your clients who actually purchased prints for their own personal wall? Sure, sure, but I will only tell them if they all by this program. Thank you. Think I'm kidding? Will tell you for free. Yeah, that's a really good question. And that's something that it's going to get a pen and paper because we're gonna go through. I'm gonna do tell you the whole thing. Even if it takes a few minutes, we sign every single thing that leaves are building, period. Nothing. No image will ever leave our building without a signature. Um, we hand sign anything 11 by 14 and larger. We is a digital signature for eight by tens and smaller. So 11 by 14 and larger or all signed by me on Dhere is what you're looking for. The pens we use their two types of Penn Sikora s a k u r a. So sakura pens. You want to use the extra fine point for sure. And then the other pilot, The other company, The other pen company pilot makes these pens as well their gold and silver pens. So the metallic pens, golden silver, Secura and pilot. Now those pens we use gold on color images and CP images and silver on black and white images. If something is going to be framed and in a matter, we do not sign the print. We signed the Matt, but but the image itself has a sticker on the back of it that has the copyright information. So we just depending on the size of let me rephrase that If It's a big print with a Matt. We're going to sign the print itself. Let's say it's a collage with lots of images and there's a Matt. We're not going to sign every image in there. We're going to sign the mat only, but every image is gonna have a copyright stamp on the back of it. So it is protected. So just to give you an idea ah, couple things. I'm gonna let you know some secrets to things. If you sign your prints and you make a mistake, there are two ways you can remove that ink. Now one of them there's a product called Buddies bunnies. That sounds weird. Like the Easter Bunny kind of money on a company called Called Beach makes that it's an ink remover. There's also WD 40 and I know that sounds really scary. I know your face, everybody. You can't do that. Yes, you can. Now, let me explain before you go spraying your prints with anything. I have to make this very clear. Bunnies. Make sure you say this, right? Yes, I got it. Okay, buddies, if your print is unswayed, meaning it came right out of a printer. You do not have any UV coating or any spray over the top of it. You use bunnies, which is an ink remover. Do not put it on the print. You put it on a soft piece of tissue and rub in a circle and you can take the words right off if it's a sprayed print, meaning it has a texture of spray UV coating, anything that you've paid the lab to put on top of it to protect it. Then you use WD 40. Now, don't be scared, because I know that sounds crazy. But I've been doing this for 27 years. I was taught that probably 25 years ago I never had a print come back. Same thing you sprayed on the tissue. You rub it in a small circle, it will take it off on Lee. A sprayed print. If you put monies on a sprayed print, you will take the spray right off. If you put WD on a non sprayed print, you will put oil right through that Prince. You all got that right. I'm not. I'm not gonna be charged for your princess. You make a mistake on so sick or a pen pilot pen. You want to use the extra fine point golden silver bunnies or ink remover for non sprayed prints and WD 44 sprayed prints. There was a long answer. All right, I have a question, and this is kind of more of a big picture question about just marketing yourself in general. This is from 11 life studios. Who asked, Does it ever get easier marketing net networking without feeling like you're constantly pushing your business? I don't seem to have a problem identifying the ops, but frequently freeze and don't follow through because I don't want to be that woman pushing her photo biz. And I just have heard that so many times from people that they don't know where that line is. They don't feel comfortable. How do you How do you get that feeling of being comfortable? I have. I totally can relate because there is. Everybody has to overcome that fear, and there is. I mean, we all know people out there that are just too darn pushy, and they make things about themselves. I always find that the marketing I do is, um I was from the heart marketing because I tend to find most of my business is you can see is personal related. It's all networking and it's all community, but it's also engaging. It's never and this is going to come up with a show, but it's all what's in it for them. If you walk into any display situation and this is coming it right up, welcome to display a hospital, any marketing situation and you walk in there with the attitude of how can I make their lives better with what I dio. Then those people are going to engage because everybody wants to be taken care of. If you walk into their how can I get my working here? How can I take care of me? They're going to see right through you. So I do believe in threes. I believe you should make three points of contact with people. I don't think like if you meet somebody and you have you feel like there's an energy there. A follow up call is good. And then to me, 1/ 1 is appropriate, and after that I feel like after three times I'm gonna go spend my energy and time somewhere else because there is a point where somebody's just gonna blow you off. So overcoming the fear, I believe it's confidence in what you do, and that's something that's learned. I still I want you to know that every time I go toe secure a display, I have butterflies, too. I get nervous. I have to sit in, you know, white my hands and kind of think. Okay, I can do this. It's not. It's never easy. So when they ask if it gets easier, I think it's not easier. I just think that the fruits of your success make it more enjoyable. I think it's good to know that it doesn't get us. That's good to know. I get nervous hard thing to Dio, and it sounds like what you're saying is it's really your intentions. Like if your intentions are in the right place, then it comes across eso when you do your signature. Is it like Ledge a ble? Or is it like your full on signature? No, Me personally or no, it is my name. So Sandy pushing its semi legible because of horrible handwriting. However, it's my signature. The question that will be asked and I'll just answer it now is what if you have associate photographers because that's everybody. Always ask that question. When I first started, I said My work Sandy Putsch. My company was expressions photography. When I heard hired my first associate, I didn't want to sign their work for two reasons. Kind of selfish. I don't want my name on their work because I felt like I was a little more skilled than they were. They didn't always quite get it right, which neither did I, but I didn't want to sign their work. Number two. I was concerned about what they thought, like they would be offended that my name was going on their work. So I started signing associates, works, expressions and then my work with my name, and I thought that was a good idea. That was a terrible idea. What I did is basically create two brands. So there were clients that had images in their home from expressions and some from Sandy Push. There were some that were only expressions of some that were only sandy pushed. It's kind of that logo transition that we talked about. Eventually, when I realized that my name was my brand, I had to sit down and thankfully, Helen, who's been with me 11 years she's been cheating with me 11 years. She's like, Why don't you just sign all of the work, your name? We all work under you. We all were taught by you. We represent you. Everything should have your name on it. So it was really her giving me that. Go ahead. I didn't want to disrespect her, but I felt like if we're a team here spent with me 11 years, if we're gonna brand what's brand one thing not to things. And we sort of did that. So now there's no I mean when I if I heard an associate photographer, they understand that I sign all the work because you're working for me. You also know that they have to work for me 18 months before they're gonna get that the privilege of being behind the camera to So does that. Does that sort of answer it? Let's go ahead. And that scares me every time. I don't know. I don't know. Why is that guy keep doing that over there? All right, so this what we want you to do is outlined three display opportunities with the idea of following through, getting through that scary nervous part of going in and making those contacts. So it's not gonna be that hard, but we definitely want to see you go through that process and make that happen. Alright, guys. So that was pretty easy. You just have to outline it and kind of come up with an idea of where you going to a hospital and a doctor's office and maybe a temporary display or what you do and break it down.