6 tips to help you outsource wedding album design

Designer Dawn

Time and time again I hear photographers say they can’t afford to outsource wedding album design. “I don’t make anything on albums because my prices are too low”.

It is easy to convince yourself that you will save money or even make money if you just design it yourself. Album design is time consuming. It requires additional expertise and creative vision. Even with album design software and stylized templates the task can be daunting and will still require a fair amount of modifying if you are going to provide a unique high quality result your clients will rave over. Not to mention time spent making revisions.

Often I see sites or products for photographers that promote a workflow that will help you design albums in record time. Album design deserves as much attention to the creative process as the skill you have accumulated over years of practicing and editing photography. Outsourcing to ‘my wedding album designer’ provides relief from the time you are spending during post production yet ensures the quality time is spent creatively displaying your client images on pages that give the high end carefully planned look your clients expect.

6 tips to help you outsource wedding album design

1. Properly mark up the album to cover fees for the album designer
2. Make sending album images for album design a priority
3. Take advantage of the time you save
4. Commit to 10 albums earning you a discount on additional albums submitted that calendar year.
5. Send your designer referrals and earn discounts off future album design
6. Guest blog for your designer and have your designer guest blog for you improving both of your rankings resulting in more inquiries and more bookings

designed by designer dawn images by Sanaz fahimi of butterfly photography

• Properly price the album

For many photographers the album represents additional income. If you design the album or outsource to a professional designer it is important to price the album properly in order to avoid subtracting business profits.

• Make sending album images for album design a priority

Don’t let procrastination ruin the momentum. Include uploading the album images to your designer right away. While you move on to more business tasks your clients album design is moving along. Otherwise you will risk that your client will settle into “life as usual” and now everyone loses motivation. The effect will snowball and suddenly profits are spent and there is nothing left to pay for the album to be produced. It’s a headache you can avoid. Think of all the additional back and forth correspondences you will prevent when everything runs smoothly by simply sending the images immediately. Your designer will produce your designs quickly without rush fees preventing additional profit loss. The album is designed, edited, approved, and off to print ready to ship. Your client is happy and ready to recommend you to their friends.

• Take advantage of the time you save

Outsourcing album design means you are saving yourself not just time spent designing, but also time going back and forth making client changes. The reasonable fee for outsourcing to your album designer is easily recovered by not only properly marking up the album price, but also using the saved time wisely. Choose tasks that will make you more efficient.

• Earn quantity discounts on future album designs

Once you have submitted 10 orders for album design services you will earn yourself a 10% discount on the rest of your albums designed that calendar year. The extra discount will help increase your profits.

• Help spread word of mouth

As you know the best form of advertising is word of mouth. If you refer new clients to ‘my wedding album designer’ you will earn incentives by helping with business growth. Share your experience through social networks. Add comments on blogs and forums and include links to your site to help you gain more traffic to your own site as well.

• Become a guest blogger for ‘my wedding album designer’

Improve your own SEO (helping increase your own client bookings) while at the same time guest blog which will help add value to the ‘my wedding album designer blog’ which educates other readers and provides a wonderful resource for other photographers looking to outsource their wedding album design needs.