Scottsdale, Arizona-based headshot photographer Tony Taafe went from selling $60,000 in his first year of business to $250,000 in his third, and he wants to help other photographers do the same thing.
Taafe knows a few things about sales. Before becoming a photographer, Taafe was an award-winning sales associate in the UK for luxury car manufacturers Audi and Bentley. Those companies spent thousands of dollars teaching Taafe how to sell a luxury product, so when he became a photographer and saw the standard portrait photography sales model, he realized how much money his peers were leaving on the table. He decided to take what he had learned from luxury car sales and put it to practice in the photography world.
Tony Taafe
I recently got the chance to interview Taafe and pick his brain about some of the techniques he thinks are vital to increasing the income of portrait photographers. One of the first things I noticed about Taafe's approach is that it is client-focused. At the beginning of our conversation, he said: “people buy based on how they feel,” which is a maxim commonly understood in sales. Customers don't necessarily by products, they buy how a product makes them feel: younger, more beautiful, part of the in crowd, nostalgic, confident, etc. So, if a photographer wants to cultivate good feelings in their client, they have to give the client a fantastic experience. The photographer should clearly understand what their client needs and wants and should pay close attention to how the client feels and behaves during the process. Taafe said that if a photographer's goal is nothing but profit, they will quickly run into roadblocks. The goal must be taking care of the client, being responsive to their needs and desires, and giving them a fantastic experience. The money follows.
Client experience above all.
Shared with permission of Tony Taafe
The next thing Taafe does is something many portrait photographers find surprising, if not outright terrifying: he includes the client in the culling process at the end of the session. Rather than send clients home with a proofing gallery or having the client come back to the studio at a later date to see and choose their finished images, Taafe sits down with the client once the session is over, and they take 10 to 30 minutes to narrow down the portraits together. The client then purchases their favorites at the end of the session. Taafe says there are several benefits to approaching the selection process this way.
- If the client has questions or concerns, the photographer is on hand to answer and guide them — never to make decisions for them, Taafe says, but to help them when they're struggling over choice, to guide them through the process, and help them feel confident in their choices.
- Too much time between the portrait session and the image culling and purchase allows feelings to cool and doubt to set in. Many clients appeal to friends and family for advice when choosing images, and those differences in opinion and potential disagreements could hurt the client’s confidence. Doubt makes clients spend more conservatively.
- Finally, allowing clients to choose their own images gives them responsibility and a sense of ownership in the process. Rather than just receiving the photographer's picks, they’re taking home images they chose. In moving to a client-assisted culling process, Taafe says it's important for photographers to remember that clients don’t look at images the way a photographer does, and their favorites may not be the photographer's favorites.
After including clients in the selection process, one of Taafe's biggest recommendations is getting rid of packages and package pricing. His reasoning is that creating packages sets a limit on what the client is likely to spend, because clients are unlikely to add additional images to the package they have already purchased. The cost of your most expensive package is, in essence, the most a client will ever spend with you, because they’ve set mental expectations based on your guidance. Of course, there may be exceptions to the rule, but income works on laws of averages. Instead of using packages, Taafe recommends going with a session fee and a per-image price. He says this helps remove limitations clients might feel about how many images they buy. The way he suggests setting up the pricing helps you make your current average every time a client works with you.
Shared with permission of Tony Taafe
His suggestion is to charge a flat session fee and allow clients to buy images a la carte. This way, the bar to entry is lower, and there is no upper limit on what a client can spend. Since they haven’t already invested in a package with a set number of images, they can just buy what they want. This makes them feel more in control of the situation, a psychological bonus, and takes the imaginary cap off how many images they can buy. I asked him what I suspect most photographers would ask: “wouldn't this set up make clients hesitate, paying for a session upfront knowing no images were included? Wouldn't that feel like more of a risk to a potential client?”
His answer was that this question is more of a mental block for photographers than it is an actual issue for clients. Out of all of the people he has photographed, Taafe says he has never been asked this question. He told me that photographers will often try to put themselves in the client's shoes, but are making assumptions based on inside information. Photographers need to remember they are far more familiar with the photography business than clients are and shouldn’t look at the process assuming clients will think the same way.
When I asked him what he suggests as a good average for session fees and image pricing, he said that that will vary widely based on the market, but a good rule of thumb is to take your current sales average and reduce that by the price of a single image. Then, make your average price (minus the cost of one image) your new session fee and the difference your new price per image.
Shared with permission of Tony Taafe
So, to keep things simple, say your average income per session is $250. Make $50 the price per image, and make $200 your session fee. Then, as soon as the client books, you’re already almost to your current average. And once they’ve bought an image, which they’re almost guaranteed to do, Taafe says, “everything beyond that is profit.” And those little additional sales stack up over time — in Taafe’s case, to the tune of an additional $50,000 between 2018 and 2019. And while his main business is headshot photography, he says these are principles that extend beyond that genre and can work across the board.
To summarize Taafe’s advice:
- Make client experience and customer service your number one priority.
- Remove packages and use a session fee plus per-image pricing that will get you to your current average with no extra work.
- Include the client in the culling process to preserve their emotional connection to the images and help them feel empowered in the process.
These are some of the steps Taafe used to increase his profits nearly four-fold in the first three years of business, and he is convinced that other photographers can do the same. But I'm convinced that the most important part of Taafe's approach, what may make photographers fail if they miss it, is that he truly cares about taking care of his clients. Speaking to Taafe, it was clear he wants clients to feel heard, to know that their wishes are respected, and that they aren't just a cog in the wheel of a photographer's income. I think if photographers get this step right, the rest will fall into place.
Do you use or have experience with any of these techniques? What has your experience been?
If you want to learn more about Tony, his sales method, or check out his work, you can find him here. You can also see Fstoppers headshot tutorials with Peter Hurley here.
Lead image shared with permission of Tony Taafe
Guessing Tony averages more than 4 images. And there’s corporate work.
Yeah I guess so. But then again that's if he can book at least one headshot a day.
It’s about time this damn article got written! Using Tony’s process my sales went from $300-$500 per person to $600-$1000 per person. Game changer for sure!
Happy he shares it with the world! It works !
Only in where you live, he would be laughed out of his studio if he tried that method where I live here in appalachia. Demographics mean everything. His method may work where people don't care about how much they spend, but when you are in a poor state where people care more about their mortgage than a picture, they want as much as they can get for their money. There is not one formula that works everywhere on everyone. So don't let this article fool you, Demographics is the key to pricing.
Tony's method isn't unusual in portrait photography. Let me explain.
I'm an amateur photographer. My day job is a university professor of medicine. My university needed a head shot of me for its website. Our internal university photography shop (yes, we have one, two full-time photographers and they hire others for specific jobs) set up an appointment for me, accommodating my very busy clinical schedule. The woman who shot my portrait was thoroughly pleasant, chatty, completely professional, and willing to show me her process. We spent about 45 minutes shooting (white background so that the web people could do as they wished, three Profoto strobes, soft box, shooting tethered into Lightroom). At the end she and I together went through the images, and we narrowed it down to about a dozen that we both really liked. My choices were certainly different than the ones she was suggesting, but no problem, we talked, and I could see that she was educating herself on what was important to me. She then said, "it's your portrait for the university. Which one would you like?" I chose one, second-guessing myself the whole way. She was reassuring, told me that I made a great choice, and then did a fair bit of post-processing right in front of me. Dang, she was excellent, and I felt very good afterwards.
So she did what Tony did --
-- involved me every step of the way
-- allowed me to help cull and select images
-- provided me with a superb experience before, during and after the shoot
Now I didn't buy a package; after all, the university was the customer here. But what this photographer did was what Tony is suggesting to all of you -- get the customer involved, make it an excellent experience, give the customer control, and remember that customers see things differently than you do.
I’ve met Tony, and he’s a genuine fellow. Yes, there’s a lot of “do this and make money fast” types out there, but he’s not one of them. He’ll be the first to tell you that no method is for everyone on either side of the lens, but there’s a bunch of us can already vouch that TNT is very effective, efficient, and helps serve up an excellent client experience that works really well for both us and our clients. And Tony is a generous guy for not hoarding what he’s learned and applied, but really dug in to lay out his method to share with his knowledge to bring everyone up. I’m not alone in voicing my appreciation.
My sales and my approach as a photographer have both increased in performance because of this method. It puts more of the onus on me to produce better work and provide a variety of looks which mean my clients get a ton of value. When you provide more value and pay attention to what they want and need it just works awesome. Thanks for sharing your knowledge on this Tony!
peter rath what about me buster! I’m up over 300% using Tony’s TNT Method, which I was skeptical on firing up. He convinced me and man was I shocked with the results. You want to look me up on Alexa or can the thousands of photographers that have benefited from my teachings vouch for me? Why don’t you fire up a free account on www.headshotcrew.com and shoot your work my way. I’d love to see what kind of cash you are bringing in and the quality of your product.
Well, that’s from a definitive source. I’m sure ‘peter rath’ would go bonkers about that one client you had last month!
I massively appreciate all the comments, guys. Good and bad! It’s all good.
And of course Nicole for doing such a great job writing this. Here’s the link if anybody wants to check this Method out some more. https://headshotcrew.com/tutorial/tnt-method?aff=29341
I have always said that it's important to give clients a few options as possible. It keeps everything simple and they don't have to try to figure out what they want or need. That being said I think his stite is just made up of too much text. Certainly not my style and even though being a photographer and wanting to read it all I do get lost along the way.
But then again if it works for him according to what he says he makes then great.
I'm happy that at least he doesn't give out 80 images with every $400 package like another headshot photographer that I know who hosts workshops and such lol.
The method is a clear solution to your customer's problem. A simplified offering as to not confuse your customer. And it keeps it very simple!! And it works!
I’ve been a headshot photographer for about 10 years. You might say I was set in my ways. I’ve been raising my prices 10% each year for the last 5 years because I believed that’s all that the market would allow for and I was worried that increasing my prices would lead to less business. Every year it scared me, and every year it more or less worked out in my favor.
Enter @tony and the blueprint. I was skeptical. I didn’t love the idea of having to edit 5-10 images per session. I didn’t love the idea of not really knowing how much money I would make on each session before showing up and I didn’t love the idea of deviating from what I had been doing. It was my baggage and at the end of the day, I don’t think I wanted to be wrong.
6 months later, my average session price has doubled and I didn’t have to raise my prices and deal with the fear of pricing myself out of the market. It also allowed me to start incorporating portraiture into my headshot sessions profitability.
Not only is the tutorial great, but Tony has been helpful after the fact as well. He’s got a support group for people that have purchased it and offers affordable one on one coaching for those that need a little more help. Thanks Tony!
Awesome. Doubling is good!
Probably worth pointing out that this article, and all the "positive" comments (even from Hurley, whom I admire greatly) are simply designed to sell a course for $250.00, which the subject personality of the article conveniently links to in one of his comments.
Nothing wrong with the above, but not to be confused with serious photography news, or an actual news article not associated with making a lightly veiled sales pitch to buy YET ANOTHER photography course.
Roger, when I talked to Tony about this interview, we were both very clear that we wanted the article itself to be helpful and useful to the readers. I'm certainly not writing a sales pitch. I want to write things people can get real world application from, and this is an area Tony has expertise in. Why not take advantage of his knowledge for the benefit of readers? Many of the people who get interviewed on Fstoppers have offerings on their websites and in other places, it would be silly not to interview them simply because they sell additional knowledge in other places.
Thanks for responding Nicole. It's important to note that I'm not commenting on the quality of your writing, indeed your writing was well done and informative.
But it's also important to note that there is a very clear manipulative element to the article (whether you intended there to be one or not), in that it does indeed very subtlety market a $250.00 photography "business" course. This is simply a fact, reinforced by Tony and his very obvious post offering a link to purchase his course just a few comments above this one.
Manipulative articles tend to polarize people into two groups ... those who don't wish to be manipulated on a website proclaiming to be a news aggregator and content generator, and those who are firmly in the camp of the "marketer" and who don't hesitate to proclaim their success with the sellers $250,00 business course ... and that's exactly what's happened in these comments.
It just reinforces that it's always important to identify articles that are (however subtly) ultimately asking for money ... from those articles that are actual "hard news" or original content created specifically for the website.
Roger, commenting with a link for people to click *if* they want to learn some more is about as far from manipulation as you can get. I’m sorry man, but you’re way off with this. I’ve helped a ton of people with this information without taking a penny from them, and i’ll continue to do so. I haven’t “asked” you for anything. It’s baffling that you’re so sensitive to somebody offering information in such a non invasive way. This extra info is there if you want it, and not if you don’t.
Yeah, let’s have helpful articles from people who have not been successful and who have not thought carefully enough about their advice to produce an educational resource. More high school photographers. More people who just got their first DSLR. *snark*
This is an interesting take, I didn't even realize there was a $250 course on business.. I got what I wanted from the article which was an alternative way of increasing profits and some thought provoking material on pricing structures.
It's always amazing to me how people hate on the success/good fortune of others. Something to ponder; this successful photographer is attempting to share what he knows and to help others. Whereas the bitter haters are attempting to demean him and throw out stupid demands like "show me your tax statements" for proof.
This right here is an almost perfect example of some of the behaviors that differentiate those who are successful from those who are not.
I would say it's a perfect example, Daniel.
Some people decide that it's impossible to make money in photography and that thinking creates that reality...for them.
Seeing someone else succeed in a way that they've made impossible for themselves is painful. Their comments reflect their pain...and their lack of understanding of how much money really exists out in this world.
THIS. Perfectly said.
I doubt the customer experience would be that great with the haters.
I jumped on the TNT train as well. I was skeptical, like most. But, I've seen my income rise steadily since implementing the process.
If you're skeptical, take a few months and try it!
Thanks for dropping the knowledge, Tony Taafe!
I changed to a session fee + image fee model this middle this year and more than doubled my monthly income. I used to shoot $250 per headshot and changed it to $99 for the session + $150 per image. My simple linkedin session where someone really only wants one image still only nets me my minimum $250 but I get several clients a month who purchase multiple images. My top sale from one session was $2000 dollars - for actress headshots. I get a couple higher spenders each month and really made realize how much was I throwing away with a fixed package model. Plus the flixbility of the model means I can entice clients to book or buy more by waiving the session fee or throwing in a free image on top. Gives you a lot more sales options. I apply this same model to my family sessions.
That's really interesting. I'm curious as to what your reasoning was for making the session lower cost and the final image price higher? Care to share?
I went that route to avoid the 'I am paying X amount for the session and getting nothing for it??" objection. People don't even really think about the session fee as a result of it being a pretty trivial amount. The image is where the value is and where I need to spend time retouching - so I prefer to deliver fewer images with higher cost per image. Even with the 'high' image fee I get quite a few people that purchase 3-4 images which is 450-600 on its own. Had a guy come in before xmas and buy 4 images - $700. I am planning on raising my session fee this year to $199 and keeping my $150 image fee and see how that works. This would make my minimum $350 which is where I would prefer things. I have enough google reviews I think I can get away with it without loosing too much business - 36 reviews, and multiple first page google appearances. For people who want or need cheaper sessions I plan to just offer mini group sessions on some weekend and just bunch them all together to save on costs and schedling hassles.
I've been imitating Peter Hurley for a few years and headshot photography is now my main business. I used the three package method and was doing pretty well (I thought). After reading of Tony's TNT method, I switched to mostly his method (too much fear to totally go all in) and now it's rare for anyone to purchase only one image (except company paid shoots).
For corporate clients, where company is paying for the person, I've tried to get them to personally buy more; however, so far no success.Executives are different, they come in wanting several images.
When I have an individual client who purchases the session, so far, they almost always buy more than one retouched image.
To explain how I have not gone all TNT, here is what I offer.
"No Limits" Session: Up to two hours, multiple clothing changes, multiple lighting looks for $ 320. $ 70 per retouched image.And yes, I know it's not really "no" limits. Marketing hype, let it go :).
"LinkedIn" Session: 20 minutes for $ 270 includes one image; however, I make it clear they can purchase more.
If I was all TNT, I'd eliminate the LinkedIn option. Fear stops me.
MUA is optional on No Limits session, plus $ 200.
Tony's TNT method is a full customer experience. He is not alone in offering that to clients, there are other successful businesses in many genres do something similar.
Website rank may or may not be an indicator of a business success. For me, it seems to help, online search is the third best source of business for me.
I've received several nice headshot jobs from Yelp; however, I agree most are price shoppers.
I don't believe Tony is "selling" a get rich quick scheme. He is suggesting that we can earn more from each customer if we get out of our own mental space and allow clients to purchase more. As long as we think $300 + $65 is a lot of money for headshots, our clients will think the same too. It takes a lot to offer what Tony does, so it's not getting rich quick. Other prominent portraits photographers discuss how photographer's internal limits create barriers to higher sales.
If I think my client needs one headshot and guide them in that direction, they will almost certainly buy one. If I let them buy more, that's okay. I'm not forcing them to buy more. Should I assume I know what they want / need? That's presumptuous and I've been doing it for along time!
Do I like teaser articles that are selling something. No. Does this article push a sale. Only a bit. The basic outlines of his method are there for free and that's enough to learn from it. However, here is how I react to that. If it's looks useful and interesting, I'll investigate more. If it's too much sales, I'll ignore it. No more emotion or reacting needed from me.
Thanks for sharing your experience. Really appreciate the insight.
I agree with Mike here and I have had a very similar experience myself.
I moved away from packages earlier this year started using Tony's method. By the way, he didn't keep it to himself before the tutorial existed. He talked about it it openly and taught people how to implement it.
My sales from individual clients went up 56% compared to 2018 and it would have been more if I'd switched earlier. I did not really do any other major marketing or pricing moves, so I think I have pretty accurate data about how it worked for me.
That’s true. I implemented TNT as much as I knew from what Tony shared with me personally a year and a half ago.
Everyone is a critic, knows better and takes shots at someone who lays out their plan. I give him credit for sharing and putting an emphasis on customer service. As I've said in the past, what direction does the money flow?
Or better yet, home many photographers does it take to read a Vogue Magazine? Three, one to turn the pages while the other two argue that they could have shot that...
"Or better yet, home many photographers does it take to read a Vogue Magazine? Three, one to turn the pages while the other two argue that they could have shot that..."
LOL!!! Awesome!
As I have learned from Tony personally and as he has shared on the Crew before the tutorial, I have grown my photography business and individual headshot sales. It is now pretty common for me to sell 4+ images. I’m at $400+$100/image, so a $1000 sale isn’t uncommon. My top sale was for $2100 + a tip.
When the tutorial came out, I bought it immediately. There’s a lot of good stuff in there.
If you are sceptical, you’re the one losing out. Think bigger.
Just charge four times as much as you normally do, job done.
Sales skill is a big part of any business and if Tony has been trained by Audi and Bentley that is going to be a pretty sophisticated program, if those closing tips are in the class, $250 is chump change in the long run.
A few days late here, but fantastic approach by Tony, and some nice discussion... albeit some of it toxic. I'm in the process of getting myself off the ground with a full-on photography business, and this has me thinking long and hard about a pricing approach. A limitation I have at the moment is the lack of dedicated studio space, but I cannot let that stand in the way.
And yes, getting over the misconception that prices for quality images are high in the eye of a customer. It's also about finding your ideal customer.
I must admit to having been a bit hesitant to move to the TNT method, thinking that especially for headshot clients it would seem odd not to include at least one image. But even after just a few weeks of doing this, I wouldn't think of turning back. You're leaving money on table if you don't convert to this sales model! Since going with TNT, my sales have generally doubled each session. Today, by way of example, I had two headshot clients and ordinarily, that would pull in $500 for the day. Instead, it was a $1,000 day. I'll take that!
And for those of you who are doubters -- just keep on doubting and keep limiting your own potential. It WILL work, unless you tell yourself it won't and if you don't elevate your game to offer clients the type of killer images and variety that have them wanting to buy what you produce.
Tony Taafe This method is great. I've worked in a similar way before and, when done right, really works.
My biggest difficulty is to include makeup artist and stylist in this flat rate. How do you do it? Does this fixed rate include these services? Thanks.
Hey Marcelo, that’s great to hear. It really does work. There’s a TON of info to give here, but to answer your specific question, the MUA and stylist isn’t included in the rate. I do have some freelancers who I work with for those services, but the client pays them directly. Hope this helps!
That's great! Yes, it helps a lot. Thanks!
What do you do for those who can't decide on more than one, or want their agent or acting coach to give them their opinions?
Hey Patrick, when you say they can’t decide on more than one, what do you mean?
Good point On the second part, there are rare exceptions, my rule is if the decision maker isn’t in the room, then they can’t really decide. But 99% of the time, the decision maker is the one being photographed. So even with actors, they can decide for themselves if they want to, a lot of new actors would just rather their agent chose. But that would be one of the occasions that I’d send a gallery to their agent. I do find that actors don’t/can’t spend much on headshots, though. So I don’t shoot them very often.
Where I'm from, people always ask how many images to they get for your advertised price. When you say 0, that is the cost of the session fee and they have to purchase what they want in addition to the fee, they look at you like you are crazy and walk out. Demographics mean a lot in this business. I am in Appalachia and they want something for their money. No one around me is going to pay a session fee AND then have to purchase something else, they want a product for their fee like their images on a cd, etc. So regardless of all the decent reviews, it all depends on where you do business. There is not one formula for every one in every area. Photography instructors fail to realize that, that demographics mean more than they think. Where I live, they WANT packages and a lump sum. They don't look at it like a limitation, they look at HOW MUCH they will be getting for their money they are paying you. Tony would be on Welfare if he tried to do business like that here in WV.
So don't do it. I don't have a gun to your head, my friend.
I’m also sceptical of “I’ve made 6 figures and you can too” type of stuff without proof, I don't know Tony, however, scepticism is a balanced journey and not for lemmings.
For those complaining that this is a disguised sales pitch or asking how does this help for struggling photographers who can’t afford courses? Here’s the deal in digital land….
Someone packs their knowledge into a course. The creator gets exposure by giving a chunk of knowledge for free. So readers can judge if it’s of value before you buy. In this case, I think, Nicole has done a great job in extracting and summarising some really interesting ideas.
No pay wall. No requirement to buy. What a brilliant win-win to get insights for no more the price of an internet connection. There is so much of this amazing stuff for free -
It certainly made me think about my pricing (again for free)
As for proof, I don’t know his earnings, but in terms of success on Google or Alexa rankings. Alexa is like ball game stats. Interesting, but the most important stat is the result.
In real time, right here, right now, I just Googled “headshot photographer Scottsdale” and the result is…. Tony is no 1 in natural search, no 1 in Maps and finishes ahead of Yelp. That’s a slam dunk me thinks. It won’t always be and will vary during the day and with location - but I tested enough to know the results are consistently good.
Then I checked his work and it looks good.
So on balance of probabilities… I’d give the benefit of doubt with full realisation that most of his success is probably down to sheer determination and energy.