Kris D'Amico Photography

March 16th, 2011 by Kris

Found the following post thru someone I follow on twitter. I don’t know Jeff, but I think I’m going to start reading his blog! If you’ve got a twitter account add 10 people a day, talk to all of them at least once. You’ll be shocked what you can learn. Anyway, here’s a repost from jeffkorhan.com.

He talks about why, especially in this economy, price is new focus to buying goods and services. And then follow that with some good tips, my favorite is “What’s underground in your business? That’s what you need to be sharing – with photos, videos, and expertly scripted sales presentations.” It’s a good read, thanks Jeff. Enjoy it!

Your Price is Too High Because the Value is Hidden

If you have to pick one thing the Internet does well, high on the list is helping consumers to choose the provider with the lowest price, which unnerves many small businesses that provide a higher quality product or service than their lower priced competitors.

Why is there so much focus on price? Because everything seems to be about the same – nobody has separated themselves from the pack.

Consumers today are educated – we have the Internet to thank for that. Your job then is to use it to educate your community by showing your prospects and customers what nobody else is showing them.

This is the art of authenticity – amplifying what you do best. Read the rest of this entry »

March 13th, 2011 by Kris

We’ve been sick over here and had some pretty tight deadlines, I’ll post up some of the work we’ve been doing this past few weeks here soon. I did run across this and decided to jump on this thought and post this up tonight. Once again, this was inspired by Seth Godin’s post this evening, you can read it here. But, not the it’s long but there was one thing that jumped out at me glancing at it.

He asks, “If someone else can get us there faster, are you willing to let them?” It’s a difficult question to answer. But I think it’s an essential, dare I say fundamental principal of being a commercial artist. So often we are tied up in “get the gig, whatever it takes get the gig.” But I wonder if that mentality has hurt the industry as a whole. As artist are we not called to inspire, to create? When was the last time you partnered with another designer, another photographer, not to run lead, but as a partner in business?

I guess my core question comes from the idea that are we better together? Each creative partner playing to their strength, not clawing to get the gig, but creating a temporary team of superstars to knock it out. Have a great week and here’s to a little collaboration!!

February 24th, 2011 by Kris

I got this post off of entrepreneur and funny enough it’s not a brief article… So here’s the reader digest version, hit the “more” for the full article:

1. Write in short, strait forward sentences.
2. Only use 110 of your 140 character limit.
3. E-mail’s need to be 200 words or less; action point at the top and bottom.
4. YouTube videos 2 minutes or less.
5. Keep your phone calls brief, remember to be polite and get right to the point. Same with voicemail, leave your number at the beginning and end of the message.

There we go. The full article is here and reposted below – have a good one!

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February 22nd, 2011 by Kris

I pulled this off VPS this morning. It’s got some great tips for young warriors and it’s a good reminder for those of us who have been shooting for a few years to keep it simple and stick to the basics.

10. It always takes a plan.
I talk to photographers all the time who started a business because they love photography. So they create a simple business card, and start offering their services without any thought to the business. No matter what type of business you are trying to build, you have to start with a plan. Is your goal to bring in a part time income every month? Or do you want this to become a six figure business? By setting up goals and tasks that you can see, it’s easier to find a way to make it more successful. It also gives you something to strive for each month.

9. Understand how you will ultimately make a profit.
Even if you have a camera in place, it won’t last forever. And chances are you’ll need more equipment along the way. How about advertising and marketing costs? Insurance to protect you against damages if something doesn’t go right with a client? There are many things to think of when you run a business – not just showing up and shooting, and collecting a few dollars on the side. By putting everything on paper, you can start to see how your prices will ultimately have to cover your overall expenses.

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February 13th, 2011 by Kris

I took a long plane ride today. Being the marginal workaholic that I am 45 minutes into the flight I had killed the battery on my mac book pro. Just a side note, AfterEffects on battery power, not a great idea. But, not having my usual work crutch of my laptop it allowed me to focus on some things that just get pushed to the back burner. I know before I’ve talked about mission statements and crafting razor specific goals for your business, but it’s worth mentioning again. I strongly believe that there’s merit in revisiting and if necessary reworking all of your business goals and objectives on at least an annual basis.

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February 11th, 2011 by Kris

I’m working on 2 series right now, a three part series regarding social media for creatives and a few fresh posts on photography for non-photographers. Well in the mean time I saw this on Seth Godin’s blog this AM and I thought it was worth reposting. Stay tuned!!

“A recent study found that placebos work even if the patient is told by the doctor that the drug they’re taking has no ‘real’ medicine in it.

December 23rd, 2010 by Kris

From Seth’s Blog on Tuesday, sage advice for the new year:

“Go to work on a regular basis.

Art is hard. Selling is hard. Writing is hard. Making a difference is hard.

When you’re doing hard work, getting rejected, failing, working it out–this is a dumb time to make a situational decision about whether it’s time for a nap or a day off or a coffee break.

Zig taught me this twenty years ago. Make your schedule before you start. Don’t allow setbacks or blocks or anxiety to push you to say, “hey, maybe I should check my email for a while, or you know, I could use a nap.” If you do that, the lizard brain is quickly trained to use that escape hatch again and again.

Isaac Asimov wrote and published 400 (!) books using this technique.

The first five years of my solo business, when the struggle seemed neverending, I never missed a day, never took a nap. (I also committed to ending the day at a certain time and not working on the weekends. It cuts both ways.)

In short: show up.”

Thanks Seth!

December 14th, 2010 by Kris

There’s that time of year where we are either dead in the water or slammed and wondering if there will be one full night’s sleep this week. Yes, I’m talking about the holidays. Between personal commitments, parties, socials, and the such, we’ve got our usual work load and oh yeah, the people who are trying to squeeze one more project out the door before the year ends.

Now like many of you I fall victim to this same old year end race to the finish. Tradeshows aside, we all know that 80% of this work we do in December will not be dropped into layouts till after the first and ad spots will not be purchased most times until, in some cases February when ad budgets for the year are refreshed. Why do we kill ourselves to get it out the door? I’ve got my reasons, what are yours?

November 9th, 2010 by Kris

Sometimes our egos get the best of us, right?

Sometimes that one guy, you know that guy (or gal), gets the gig. He under bids you, they out promote you, or just sweep the client off their feet. If you’ve been in business for, oh I don’t know, a day you’ve run across this. It stings a little, doesn’t it? Especially those of us shooting in small and medium size markets where it can be difficult, if not impossible to even get clients to give us a chance to re-bid, we need to be mindful of what our attitude says about our character. How are we walking through our day-to-day workflow? What is our relationship like with other creatives? How are we checking our attitudes about the gigs that got away?

I have found that when I am hitting wall after wall with my bids, my best bet is to take a step back and say what I am doing right?

In this current economic climate, where our resources are scant, we have to remember our clients are making tough decisions about money as well. So, look at what you are bringing to the table, if it’s just a few pretty pictures then, why would you get a call back? How many times have you surfed the internet and seen some kid, fresh out of school, who’s work is breathtaking? There will always be someone who has “prettier” work. We need to dig deep and find a way to present more than pretty work, right?

I recently tipped a few pints with 2 guys who I feel are true pioneers in the creative field here in Nashville, Blake Allen and Matt Reed. Now I posed a simple question to both of them:

How do you redefine your creative vision to keep on top of the pile?

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November 3rd, 2010 by Kris

So, recently my friend, Jeremy Mitchell, had this idea for iPhone app called, Gallerytopia. I tipped a pint with him at our local pub and he gave me this interview.*

Kris D’Amico: “Dude, so where did you come up with the idea for Gallerytopia?”

Jeremy Mitchell: “So, I had lunch one day with Chuck Norris, right? And you know he only eats uncooked red meat **, so we ate over at the butcher department at Sam’s Club, but I digress. He was telling me that since he has a flash website for his photography people cannot see his images on the iPhone or iPad. He proceeded to tell me how he thought that this is a travesty and might have to ‘take care of things’ over at Apple.”

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