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Archive 2012 · Take a look at the website?

  
 
ghdarnell
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Take a look at the website?


Just redid the website. We are in our first 6 months of wedding photography, so I am not expecting miracles by any means. But would like to get your opinions!

www.rightstartphotography.com



Aug 06, 2012 at 08:23 PM
jneilosu
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Take a look at the website?


I would ditch the name. I fear in a year you'll wish it was something more personal to you (i.e. your name).




Aug 06, 2012 at 08:32 PM
HubbardJA
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Take a look at the website?


Remove the counter, calendar, and raise your prices some.


Aug 06, 2012 at 08:39 PM
ghdarnell
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Take a look at the website?


HubbardJA wrote:
Remove the counter, calendar, and raise your prices some.


Raise prices? Really? I felt like we weren't good enough yet!



Aug 06, 2012 at 08:41 PM
HubbardJA
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Take a look at the website?


ghdarnell wrote:
Raise prices? Really? I felt like we weren't good enough yet!


Are you happy with the weddings you're shooting now?



Aug 06, 2012 at 09:24 PM
ghdarnell
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · Take a look at the website?


HubbardJA wrote:
Are you happy with the weddings you're shooting now?


I'm not shooting any weddings now lol



Aug 06, 2012 at 09:36 PM
HubbardJA
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · Take a look at the website?


ghdarnell wrote:
I'm not shooting any weddings now lol


ok... start reading here. You can thank me later.

-Jayson

Edited on Aug 06, 2012 at 09:41 PM · View previous versions



Aug 06, 2012 at 09:40 PM
Marcus Watts
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · Take a look at the website?


I agree about the name.

Script fonts are usually a bad choice for links as they are too small to be clear. Also makes your bio and the testimonial page hard to read.

Put a photo of yourself in the about section of the site. People connect with people (also why you should change the name).

The white frame, make it a darker gray to be a lot more subtle.

And yes, if you are not going for at least double what you are asking for a wedding you will be out of business soon enough.

Your work is fine.



Aug 06, 2012 at 09:40 PM
D. Diggler
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · Take a look at the website?


ghdarnell wrote:
would like to get your opinions


I don't see your location or sevice area listed prominently.



Aug 06, 2012 at 09:49 PM
D. Diggler
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · Take a look at the website?


ghdarnell wrote:
would like to get your opinions


I see in your About Me section that you listed not once, but three times, that you have a "PASSION for photography". Everyone says that.



Aug 06, 2012 at 09:54 PM
ghdarnell
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · Take a look at the website?


Marcus Watts wrote:
And yes, if you are not going for at least double what you are asking for a wedding you will be out of business soon enough.

Your work is fine.


Can you explain that to me?

Corrected the font, you are right, it looks so much better!



Aug 06, 2012 at 10:43 PM
jneilosu
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · Take a look at the website?


Do the math. At a grand a wedding, you'd have to shoot 75-100 weddings a year to provide for much after taxes, overhead, etc.


Aug 06, 2012 at 10:48 PM
ghdarnell
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · Take a look at the website?


jneilosu wrote:
Do the math. At a grand a wedding, you'd have to shoot 75-100 weddings a year to provide for much after taxes, overhead, etc.


I am not worried about that because it isn't my only job. I work two jobs and outsource the editing, so it's not the "making money" part I am worried about yet. I am more interested in getting more bookings/just making sure my website looks good and professional. I just turned 20 so alot of the concepts about marketing and everything I have to read 5/6 times, sometimes they are difficult to me.



Aug 06, 2012 at 11:02 PM
ghdarnell
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p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · Take a look at the website?


I hope I don't sound like a stuck up kid! I definately don't mean to. I hope to do this full time someday, I am just testing the waters, but I am totally motivated and super ambitious. When I want something I live and breathe it


Aug 06, 2012 at 11:03 PM
Marcus Watts
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p.1 #15 · p.1 #15 · Take a look at the website?


No reason why you can't charge proper rates now just because you have other income. Your dream of going full time will happen sooner than later if you do.

You won't book more just because you are cheaper.

Plus your local photographers are more likely to help you along with business advice and referals if you are not undercutting them.



Aug 06, 2012 at 11:24 PM
Ian Ivey
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p.1 #16 · p.1 #16 · Take a look at the website?


It's fine to shoot some cheap weddings early. Your tight selection of wedding images is a good move. I think your wedding gallery, though small, conveys a good message, and probably warrants a higher price on the site (i.e., for folks who find you that way). If you shoot some cheaper weddings by attracting brides in other ways, e.g., CL, no harm done having a higher price on the site.

Your site navigation is challenging. On the ABOUT page, scrolling is not intuitive -- you have to click the stylized arrows at the top and bottom of the scroll bar. There's no scroll wheel functionality, and clicking the scroll bar itself does nothing. That's annoying; not sure whether you can change the coding, but adding responsiveness to scroll wheel input would be a good move, at least.

When I went to page 2 (images 9 and 10, I think) of the wedding gallery, it took forever to load the images, and I gave up. Could be a fluke. I'm using Chrome. (It eventually worked, but I clicked on the thumbnails to no avail a dozen times.)

For pete's sake, get rid of the handwriting font for body text. It's tough to read more than a few words in that font (and fonts like it). Find a serif font you like and use it for body copy, if your site allows you to do that. Use Georgia if that's all your templates allow -- at least everyone has it.

Google your city name and wedding photographer (e.g., "Downingtown wedding photographer" or try the largest city name near you) and read the ABOUT pages for the first 20 or so wedding photographers. Get a sharp pencil, and jab yourself in the arm every time someone writes the word "passion" within three words of "photography." Have bandages handy. Also have a box of tissues; you'll probably shed tears of frustration after realizing how unintentionally narcissistic the entire industry tends to sound when we talk about ourselves.

Then, make your ABOUT page different from all of those same-sounding pages. This is probably the hardest part of sorting out your brand and branding, and you may not be quite ready for it, but at least find some way to talk about your clients and your value proposition to them, rather than your abbreviated autobiographies and personal history of photography, which does nothing to set you apart from any other 20 year old with a camera + kit lens.

Find a way to include your city or region in searchable text on EVERY page of your entire site, and in EVERY blog post. I had to scroll down your blog several entries and look carefully to figure out where you are (and I'm not sure I got it right). That's death for a web site. Anyone, anywhere in the world, can find your site, and not have a clue whether you're local or 1000 (or 10,000) miles away. Talk about your location all over the place. EVERY PAGE, preferably multiple times. This is especially true for you ABOUT and CONTACT pages, which should both have prominent text telling people where you are and what you do.




Aug 06, 2012 at 11:47 PM
Ian Ivey
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p.1 #17 · p.1 #17 · Take a look at the website?


One other thing: be careful about comparing clients. One of your blog posts describes a session as "one of my favorite couples sessions to date." This phrase includes the phrase "one of my favorite couples..." which is what my eye saw at first. And even once I realized you were simply saying you had a lot of fun with them -- that the session, not the couple, was one of your favorites -- it still seemed to be a comparison of the couple to other clients. Try to find non-comparative language to describe the fun you had.


Aug 06, 2012 at 11:53 PM
Marcus Watts
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p.1 #18 · p.1 #18 · Take a look at the website?


There is a thread here https://www.fredmiranda.com/forum/topic/1090210/ where members posted their about me pages. Have a look at the thread and you will see just from the discussion what some of the deadly sins are.


Aug 07, 2012 at 12:09 AM
mirrorrim
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p.1 #19 · p.1 #19 · Take a look at the website?


I had trouble finding your contact us tab. You mention to "contact us" in your pricing page for more info, and nowhere on the site is a link! Finally figured out you have to click on what I thought was a design feature is actually an arrow to scroll over to your contact us tab.


Aug 07, 2012 at 12:59 AM
ghdarnell
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p.1 #20 · p.1 #20 · Take a look at the website?


This is some great advice guys, thank you! I fixed the text and I like it a lot more, especially because it eliminated the need for scrolling in the About Me section.

I am a little frustrated since I hired someone to write it for me, so it will take a few tries to tweak it to make it acceptable!



Aug 07, 2012 at 02:00 PM
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