Walt's Photos a photo blog of Walt Sorensen

(This is a reprint of a series of notes I wrote on Facebook in 2009) In our last episode our subject started to set up a foundation for their business. They picked up a few services like a website, cell phone, Internet service. They also joined the local chamber of commerce and a trade organization. We brought our total business start-up cost to $1110 and reoccurring annual cost to $821. In this episode we will further explore marketing and the cost of running a business. So what marketing should we do for this wedding and portraiture business? Lets start with some traditional marketing, Yellow pages ads. For yellow pages we have to ask which one we'll advertise in. Which one, our subject asks confused. Yes which one, there are several yellow pages books, To name a few: Dex, The Yellow Book, The us yellow pages, super pages, etc. Second we need to decide where the ads will run since every area has a different book as well. We also need to decide what kind of ad we'll place: jus...

(this is a reprint of a series of notes I wrote in Facebook in 2009) So our subject is finding out the real costs of doing business and decided to scale back to a home based business when faced with the cost of a retail location and build out. In this episode I thought we would talk more about incidental costs to running a business. We started with a minimum hard cost of $229 dollars to set up an LLC and get a business license. Our subject decided they would accept credit cards, requiring a merchant card service and equipment. The merchant card service cost $300 for the Equipment and $8 per month, not to mention the transaction fees. For the moment we'll focus on the hard costs totaling $396 the first year and $96 every year after. Do you want a website? Oh yes, our subject chimes in. Do you really need it? I would say you can not get away with out having a website since a website can bring you business and could be an invaluable marketing tool. To have a real website you need a do...

(this is a reprint of a series of posts I wrote on Facebook in 2009) So everyone thinks it is so easy to start and run a business, Really??? I tell them. Do you know everything about what it costs? Do you know what Businesses pay in rent or their licenses? etc... The answer to these questions is almost always no, spoken with a downward glance and an change of subject. Well I'll fill you in on some of the details. Let's start from the beginning as if we are starting a new photography business. Question one, what type of photography will you be doing? portrait, wedding, commercial, journalism....Oh yes I'll be doing that kind of photography, says our subject. Wait a second, I tell them Each of these example areas is a dedicated field in photography that have unique markets and skills. Pick one of these areas and focus on it. After some debate our subject says they want to do weddings and maybe portraiture, and maybe commercial. (thinking to myself, didn't I just explain t...

I just got done reading an interesting article on "good enough" http://www.wired.com/gadgets/miscellaneous/magazine/17-09/ff_goodenough?currentPage=1 I got to thinking about all the changes for good or ilk that are currently happening in the Photography industry. The odd thing is how many people think what's happening is totally new. Truth is photography is such a new medium that it is breaths a culture of change and trends. The most over whelming change that is currently happening is the Digital "good enough" revolution. Everyone imagines themselves as photographers; now with a cheap digital camera, and easy to use digital editing software almost anyone can be a "good enough" photographer. Now I'm not talking being a real professional photographer, just a better than a Walmart or Kiddie Kandids photographer. This revolution shouldn't surprise anyone who lived through the Digital desktop publishing revolution. In the desktop publishing revolu...

I've been working for the past two weeks with Zhao Suikang 赵穗康 to install his art work at the J. Willard Marriott Library on the University of Utah campus. Here is a short series on that work during the installation phase. I'll be posting more images once the final clean up is done.