Hello everyone,

I am wondering how long other sports and event shooters keep their galleries "active" on their site. I feel that I need to have a time limit on my galleries in order to drive my business and was interested in getting some opinions. I live in a rural comunity and primarily cover two local high schools. I have sold 1200+ photographs through Smugmug in just over 1 year; not bad but it could be much better. I wish I could count all the times that people see me in the community and say that they really have to get around to buying the pictures from this game or that game. Without a deadline they have no incentive to make the purchase and can just look at them when they want on my site.

I was thinking that I should remove my galleries (make them private) one month after each sports season has ended. What do others do with their business models?

Thanks.

Steve
www.steveknightphoto.com

I still get the same comments, however I have been able to light the proverbial match under the...
I have "Event Pricing", my galleries are priced with time sensitive incentive pricing then after a certain period (14 to 30 day after an event or season) all the prices get bumped up.
98% of my sales come in the 7 to 10 days after an event I occasionally get surprised by a random sale on an old gallery.
I also do as many others do and share profitts with the organization I'm taking the shots of. At gymnastics meets I'll donate a percentage of the proffitt to the host gym but they have to help with marketing. then the donations stop at the end of the event pricing period, this way we get closure.

Keith,

Thank you for the input! I have never considered time sensitive pricing, but it seems like a great idea. The pricing strategy that you use seems like a great incentive to help drive sales. I do end up getting a fair number of orders well after my events are uploaded, as a lot of parents wait until the end of each season to place one large order. Using a system like yours would give my customers the option of buying now at a lower cost or waiting and paying more.

Steve

Steve,
Glad to help, I took a look at your site, very nice,
Do you know where Colchester is? I'll be at a gymnastics meet there in late January. It's a little north of Burlington

Keith,

If the meet is at Colchester High School, it is located just off of Malletts Bay at 131 Laker Lane. I believe that you would take I-89 to Exit 16 (Route 7 North) and then Rt. 127 to Laker Lane. Thanks for the compliments. I see from your site that you shoot a lot of gymnastics. I imagine that you have a lot of lighting challenges to face!! Do you shoot RAW and/or use a custom white balance?

Originally Posted by Steve Knight Photo Keith, I see from your site that you shoot a lot of gymnastics. I imagine that you have a lot of lighting challenges to face!! Do you shoot RAW and/or use a custom white balance?

Lighting is a ongoing challenge, I actually just started using custom WB, the meet I did this weekend I changed almost everything about the way I shoot. Thanks to tips from here I got great results. I take @ 2000 shots a session which gets whiddled down to 1200 to 1500 keepers. 2 or 3 sessions a day 5 total for a weekend meet. So it's not practical to shoot in raw.

I'm learning all the time, there another active thread where we're discussing the whole post processing thing. I don't do any before upload other than run through and eliminate the really bad shots. I have my galleries set for proof delay, If someone orders anything bigger than 5x7 I'll look at it and see if it needs anything.