Wednesday, May 18, 2011

To Sell A Disc or Not To, That is the Question


I’ve received many emails from potential clients as well as clients themselves asking if I can put their session on a disc. I am here to address the question itself. 
What do I mean by a disc, first off?!?! 
To me, ‘selling a disc’ means selling (or including in your session) a disc of the final images from a session. These are fully edited and can either be in their full size format or sized to only be printed at a maximum of say a 10x13 or they can simply be web sharing sizes for Facebook or other social media sites. 
Do I give you a disc? That would be a negative ghostwriter. Do I sell a disc? You bet! Is it cheap? To some, heck no but to others it is nothing.  It’s not included in the session. Very rarely do I offer a session which include the disc, but it’s certainly an option for purchase.
There are benefits to selling a disc. 
It can be less work for the photographer. How hard can it be to put photos onto a disc? Not very.
The turnaround to the client is a lot faster for a very busy photographer as well as for the client.
The client can post the session from the disc on Facebook or any other social media site so their family and friends can see the photos. It also means the photographer will get great comments as well as possible clients from seeing those photos as well as their logo on their photo. 
There are downsides to selling a disc as well. 
And the drawbacks:
The photographer will lose all control of how his/her images are displayed. The client can go to the local Walmart or Walgreens to have them printed, or even worse, print them on their own home computer. This will result in terrible color, no matter how spot on the photographer's color is.
The photographer loses any further sale. Once you hand the disc over to the client, most likely you will not hear from that client again for prints or albums or anything else. 
When you purchase a disc, you will also receive a printing release, NOT a copyright release. 
I do, though, give the client a Proof disc. On this disc will be your photos from your session with PROOF displayed several times on the photo. Therefore, you can take your time looking at the disc to determine which photos you would like to purchase on print as well as put on your disc you are purchasing. 
If you have any other comments or questions, leave them below and I will get back to you. 

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