Focus on Business

Do you sell your digital files? Should you? If you do, how do you price them? These are all questions we still struggle with even though digital technology has been with us for quite some time now. The convenience of emailing, burning CDs, and the internet in general has made pricing digital files a little tricky and, in my opinion, undervalued. 

There are many photographers, for example, burning entire weddings to DVDs and that is the end of their involvement. Often times they are under charging for their service. The public’s perception of that kind of value does not help those of us  that are in retail establishments justify our pricing. And if you attempt to price your work by comparing yourself to what other people charge, you run the risk of undercharging too because they are more than likely under pricing themselves as well. 

I do offer digital file pricing on occasion. I do not, however, list files for sale in my regular portrait price list. There are a few applications for selling or even giving a client a digital file. 

I might consider I selling a file if is for product I do not offer, if the client is insistent, or if it is a business person, or commercial application, needing an image for multiple uses and/or internet use. 

After finding out what the image will be used for, and if I am okay with that, I take in consideration the size of an order that is placed and the loyalty of the client. 

When it comes to items I do offer, like graduation cards, here is what I do. If they want a file to produce their own graduation card on their own computer which is something I don’t want them doing at all. Chances are good that they do not have the skills to do it well and we are concerned how that reflects on us. Since directly saying “no” is not an ideal response, I will sell a file for a lot more money than if I designed and printed cards for them. 

If they want a digital file to take somewhere else, like a local copy store, to have cards made I am, again, loosing business on a service I can provide. Again in this case I would offer to sell the file for more than if I was doing the work. 

The key to preventing the above two scenarios from even coming up is to prevent it from happening in the first place. When spring rolls around months after their senior pictures are done, we don’t want the seniors getting mad at us at this point. So at each consultation I make a point to explain to them, even before they book their session, that I do design and print graduation announcements and that my files are not available for them to take elsewhere. My pricing brochure has another notation by the graduation card sample image that says, “Digital files are not available for purchase.” 

These days some clients assume, or even expect that digital files will be available. Communicate with them in advance what your policy is or what your expectations are. It is always best to say yes but how you control their response is the price tag you put on it. 

I think it is easy to forget that a digital file is as valuable as a negative is. One way I attempt to educate my clients is I have a statement in my pricing brochure that says, “The value of our work has not changed with the introduction of digital photography. Digital files are just as valuable, if not more so, and there is a fee for them. Our images are copyrighted, and images may not be scanned on your personal scanner. The usage fee of a digital file is similar to that of ordering a photograph.” 

If I decide to sell a file, some things I consider when determining the price is: 

• If it is just for a birthday cake or something similar, and a minimum order has been met, the image is usually at no charge. The minimum order amount is what ever number that I have predetermined as a nice size order and that I am glad to provide a file for. They are then receiving a value added service.
•  A loyal customer that I know values me can on occasion use an image with out charge and enjoy that value added service.
• If the order is not of significance, there is still the hassle factor of preparing a file, emailing it, and other little things that do add up to time involved. So I will charge a fee that covers my time.

To make them aware of the “favor” I am doing for them, I enter the amount on the invoice and then cancel it out so they can see, notice, and remember my nice “favor”. I usually type “super nice client discount” or something similar next to it to subtly point out what I am doing for them. I want them to understand the value provided so they don’t take me for granted. 

So how do you determine a price for a digital file? Consider first how much money you would loose if you did not sell a file. Again you can risk alienating a client or charging enough for it so you feel great about selling it. No one says that your price has to be logical. There are no standards to go by for this. 

Let’s look at the high school senior graduation announcement example again. If you could make $300 dollars by designing and printing 300 graduation cards, then you could sell the digital file for $300 and call it done with no extra work involved. Or $400 and that might really encourage your client to have you do the work instead. 

If you are a control freak and you could not stand the thought of what someone will do to the design of the image, I suggest you consider letting go a little bit. Consider accepting $300 over no sale at all. In addition to losing business you now have an unhappy customer too. That may not be too productive. I just don’t think most people want to pay professional rates to hire us then turn around and destroy our vision with a bad reproduction of an image. You can always talk about it first. Maybe a photo credit would be acceptable. You get paid and you still get the advertising. 

How about selling a file of an anniversary photo? I was asked this once and here is what I did. I figured out what an average sale normally is when I have done similar types of sessions. Average sales are just average sales so I rounded up a hundred dollars or so. Let’s just say that if an average sale was usually $250 I decided to charge $400. Not only were they happy, they purchased the file, and they also had me print their 16×20. They were just worried about loosing the ability of printing more if something were to happen to me or my studio. It was a profitable job and I enjoyed the couple very much. 

Just take some time and consider these options. We are not all the same, this will not work for everyone, but maybe I have helped open you up to possibilities so you will remain profitable. We can’t stay in the business we love so much if we go broke doing so! 

About Barb 
Barb Gordon, of www.BarbGordonPhotoCoach.com, is a Master Photographer, Photographic Craftsman, and Certified Professional Photographer with the Professional Photographers of America (PPA) to which she has belonged since 1984. She is a nationally published and award winning photographer, entrepreneur, speaker, and author including being published in the prestigious PPA Loan Collection 2006, PPA Showcase 2003, twice named Iowa’s Top Ten Photographer of the Year, and 2010 Iowa’s Master Photographer of the Year.