selling your work online.......

[suemccartin]

I have been looking into a way to have my photos available 24 hours on a website that would allow people to order what they want and then I'd fill the orders. I'm thinking I'd use a place like ritz or walmart nearby where I can pick up the finished prints.
There are several stock photo web sites but all have discouraging things such as minimum prices or commissions, has anyone heard of this web site ?http://www.ifp3.com

It seems a little pricey but it is unlimited storage, no commissions and I guess 240 a year would only mean I had to sell two 11X14's a month to pay the site fees. What I want to do is put all the pictures I take at my school karate tests up there so that parents can look at them and order them 24 hours a day and then I'd deliver their prints at the next test or mail it if they wanted to pay extra. Most of the families in the school are computer literate, I already talked to the school owner who said he didn't mind if I handed out business cards with my gallery web address on it.

The alternative might be to show up at the test with a laptop and a portable printer but the problem with that is we usually get chased out right after the test, i.e. there's not an hour to sit there and sell photos.

Opinions appreciated?

[Rhys]

For straightforward orders you could use a cheap web hosting package - cheaper and better than the online photo printing scam artists.

Just have your thumbnail images online with reference numbers and wait for the cheque to clear before printing and posting.

[D Thompson]

You might take a look at printroom.com also.

[suemccartin]

For straightforward orders you could use a cheap web hosting package - cheaper and better than the online photo printing scam artists.

Just have your thumbnail images online with reference numbers and wait for the cheque to clear before printing and posting.

It's an idea but I bet the initial outlay might work out to more than twenty/thirty a month and if it's my own site it's going to be more work than just uploading and taking orders--that's my only concern. I work full time this is a hobby I don't want to end up taking up all my free time. What kind of $$$$ are we talking about here? I get a personal web page with my IP but I'm not sure what kinda storage I get and I'm a little scared of the setup prospect.

[Rhys]

It's an idea but I bet the initial outlay might work out to more than twenty/thirty a month and if it's my own site it's going to be more work than just uploading and taking orders--that's my only concern. I work full time this is a hobby I don't want to end up taking up all my free time. What kind of $$$$ are we talking about here? I get a personal web page with my IP but I'm not sure what kinda storage I get and I'm a little scared of the setup prospect.

OK. Adobe PhotoShop Elements II has a web page creator built in so all it'd be a case of doing is uploading to your webspace.

Most ISPs give you 15mb. You should get hundreds of small images into that! You don't want large images online or people will simply download them and print them themselves.

I pay about $40 per year for 500mb web hosting with a domain name and 2GB/month bandwidth.

[GaryS]

I think Smugmug.com will let you sell your prints online... You can create and manage the galleries, and people can then view the pics and order prints directy from there.... I've not used it myself, but it may be worth checking out.

gs

[Rhys]

I think Smugmug.com will let you sell your prints online... You can create and manage the galleries, and people can then view the pics and order prints directy from there.... I've not used it myself, but it may be worth checking out.

gs

I tried it, had the pro account at $100 per year. Not a single sale. Complete waste of cash.

[Riley]

so Rhys
you're saying that a dedicated site is better value
when considering sales etc ?

I guess what im interested in hearing is how that gives you better exposure to sales

[avi777]

Deviantart is a good site too

[Rhys]

so Rhys
you're saying that a dedicated site is better value
when considering sales etc ?

I guess what im interested in hearing is how that gives you better exposure to sales

It's cheaper. That's the thing. A photosales website will not sell your photos. You need to market your work. Joe Bloggs from Sydney is not going to buy your photos of The Rio Grande just because they're on smugmug. I fact,if they're on smugmug, he'll be looking at other photos of the Rio Grande. If you restrict what else he can view by having your own site then you're well on the way to a sale.

I personally would not recommend the web for photo sales. Everybody with a compact is trying to do that and the market is flooded. I would suggest instead that you put photos on your webspace and use it as advertising to get people to hire you to take photos.

[suemccartin]

I hear your opinions and they're all good info BUT I'm your typical couch potato I want it easy.

I kinda sorta have a captive audience because I'm the only photog at my karate school with the gear to shoot this stuff (and the skill--plenty of parents with some of the gear and absolutely no skill) and I know the owner would not let another photographer doing similar stuff just come in (we have an arrangement for the school's use of my pictures on their website and I'm also a student). At first, the photos will only be available to the students and parents, I think I'm fairly safe under the City's blanket rights (all tests are held on city property in a youth center gym) about photos but the school owner is going to add a blanket release to our test forms soon too so that I don't believe anyone can whine about images of their kids but at least at this point I don't want to sell these to anyone other that students and their parents anyway.

I think so far the best web site I've looked at is shutterfly.com. They charge 99 a year for 5 gig or 200 for unlimited storage and they do all the work of setting up the gallery with my name on it (I get my own url at shutterfly.com). They thumbnail it all, copy protect it during viewing and watermark it all, they print a message on the back of smaller prints so my copyright is protected and they offer 4X6 to 16X20 sized prints and mugs and gift cards etc. that I can set my own prices for after they get paid for the item.

I'm going to start with the small account and maybe get the bigger one when I see what it will do, just on my own now printing 8X10's on my pixma 6000D I'm selling one or two a month at the same prices people will be getting good lab printing for and I don't have to mess with delivering it. Shutterfly charges a price for the print (a little higher than what they charge folks that just want prints but not a lot higher) and 15% commission (that also covers credit card acceptance charges unlike a lot of other sites) and the customers pay the the shipping and any taxes themselves.

While I agree that hosting the page myself and dealing with my own lab may be a better way to control quality.......being lazy I much prefer the idea of having people be able to order what they want 24 hours a day without having to mess with checks in the mail or fees to take credit cards and having to run to ritz or walmart to get prints and drop them in the mail. I feel 15% commission to them is worth all that extra hassle and they pay every month direct deposit unlike some sites that won't pay till you have a set amount coming to you. As far as I know there is no bandwidth limitation and the fact that I'm getting storage (even though it isn't a whole big bunch) is another point in my book.

I figured that what I'd do is setup an email address for my business and put it on my business cards along with the url for my shutterfly gallery that way if people were having issues they can send me an email or call me and that way I can keep an eye on the work shutterfly is doing (apparently shutterfly will also deal with the customer service if anyone complains about substandard prints etc.).

I just think for me.....not having a whole bunch of experience with this....that something like this will be easiest to deal with. I know, they're making money off me but I'm paying for less hassle and that appeals to me as being worth it. So I spend a hundred on this, which is a business expense and will come off my taxes whether it goes anyplace or not.