This week we've got a special bonus episode! Listen in on our interview with our friends at Retouch Up as they tell us all about their latest product launch. We're talking game-changing strategies for every high volume shutterbug out there—from wedding wizards to corporate headshot heroes. Imagine the freedom of having RetouchUp's trusted experts refine your photos, giving you more time to focus on what you love while still delivering top-tier results to your clients. We dissect how this can be a seamless addition to your packages and more. Learn more about this launch at http://retouchcards.com/
This week's episode is sponsored by our friends at Retouch Up! Use the coupon code GYST10 for a special discount!
This episode was written and performed by Mary Fisk-Taylor and Kira Derryberry, produced by Kira Derryberry and edited by Joel North.
This week we've got a special bonus episode! Listen in on our interview with our friends at Retouch Up as they tell us all about their latest product launch. We're talking game-changing strategies for every high volume shutterbug out there—from wedding wizards to corporate headshot heroes. Imagine the freedom of having RetouchUp's trusted experts refine your photos, giving you more time to focus on what you love while still delivering top-tier results to your clients. We dissect how this can be a seamless addition to your packages and more. Learn more about this launch at http://retouchcards.com/
This week's episode is sponsored by our friends at Retouch Up! Use the coupon code GYST10 for a special discount!
This episode was written and performed by Mary Fisk-Taylor and Kira Derryberry, produced by Kira Derryberry and edited by Joel North.
Welcome to a bonus episode of Get your Shoot Together, the photographer's podcast, where we discuss studio, business life and keeping it all in line. I'm Cura Dairy Berry and I'm Mary Fitz-Taylor.
Speaker 2:And who doesn't love a bonus?
Speaker 1:Who doesn't love? We've never done a bonus episode before Mary.
Speaker 2:This is our first one. We've actually never had a guest.
Speaker 1:We've never had a guest.
Speaker 2:We've never had a guest, but today we had three amazing friends from RetouchUp and I was so excited when they reached out because they have something very exciting happening and they wanted to announce it to us and us announce it on the podcast.
Speaker 1:So that's what we get to do today. We thought what better way than I just recorded the whole conversation with them telling us about it? And we thought, listen, we're just going to let you hear the conversation. So this episode, this bonus episode that's coming out this week, is just straight up our conversation with RetouchUp, and we can't wait for you guys to hear all about their new product line. So listen up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, listen, and we bantered back and forth because you don't care and I never have an opinion, but this is something that could be a really big game changer for certain business models. So I'm excited to hear what you guys think. Let us know, let our friends at RetouchUp know, because you guys know, if it weren't for them, we couldn't do this podcast, because they've been supportive since pretty much day one. We love them, we love what they do and personally, I'm very excited about this great new product. So take a listen and check it out. Well, hello guys, I'm so excited.
Speaker 2:Today we have Kira and I have some amazing special guests. I know you guys hear us talk about our amazing friends at RetouchUp all the time, and today we are graced with the team's presence. We have Eugenia I hope I pronounced that right, I'm sorry. Thanks. Trevor and Austin here, and I know that they're kind of fresh off of ImagingUSA and in a very exciting time and we're here today because there's a big announcement that we're going to get to here. I'm a little like I'm having a little anxiety, right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know, I know I'm like what is it? What is it, what is it Okay? So, guys, we have you here with us today because, yeah, we're really curious. We're just building up for us. So, lay it on us, what are you doing?
Speaker 3:Well, you know, we always have to be looking at every business, all the businesses that you serve. We're always having to look for what does the market need? What solutions are not out there that we can be providing, or best practices that can be applied, and we need somebody to guide us along those ways, the way, and sometimes nobody's there to blaze the trail. You have to blaze the trail, sure. Well, so you know when. How retouch up came about is there was a time where everybody had to do their own retouching.
Speaker 1:And of course I didn't like that, I didn't like those days.
Speaker 4:That was not fun.
Speaker 3:And so then it was a huge wave when the business leaders were like I'll source it or at least have this in your toolbox, sure, and that's the period where we are in, where there are some things. You just need to make sure that you have all the resources available to you. Your time absolutely is a resource, and there are times where nobody can step in and do what you need to do, and then there are other times where you need to just call on an industry resource or outsource it, and that's kind of where we've been and retouch up continues to serve clients that have like retouching is an important part of their workflow, right, absolutely, because before you can deliver prints, before you can deliver your final deliverables, you want to have it print ready, and so retouching is an important part of that process. So during this time we felt that there were two. We felt that we had identified two types of clients Workflow clients that would use us as a part of their everyday business, then emergency clients that would use us like AAA.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Absolutely. Those are the ones that are like okay, I've sat here for six and a half hours and I can't I give up. I'm like, well, if you had sent it six and a half hours ago, you'd have it back by now.
Speaker 1:But for the ones that are bottle-decking, the ones that are like they can retouch, they just can't do the volume of work that they have. So, yeah, that's usually me.
Speaker 3:You find yourself going to your trusted Facebook group and saying what can I do to solve this particular problem? Sure, we felt that is what explained volume users and more sporadic users. We felt that the retouching was happening and it's just that we weren't getting it, except in the cases where you were needed to be at two places at once or you had something that was just not worth digging into. There's a lot of resources. Someone could go and go to YouTube and figure out how to do a certain thing. After three hours they could do the work, or we could have been paid $5. Exactly so. We went very happily and contentedly did business like this for many, many years. Then we realized through just sometimes, when the student is ready, the teacher will appear Right. It was right in front of our faces the whole time.
Speaker 3:Many photographers do not want to get involved with print sales or retouching. We believe that in-person sales is amazing, is so important, but not every photographer can that can work with how they run their business Right. They just for various reasons. We know that it's very profitable to do prints and do the whole package. That's what clients want to be served, absolutely. They don't care about what's convenient for you as a photographer. They want to be served Absolutely Well. But in spite of industry leaders helping try to guide the way, there continues to be a large segment that are for lack of a better term I don't know if it's a pejorative or not but shooting bird photographers, okay, sure, yeah, we don't think that's a bad term, absolutely not. No, it's a valid way to do business. You can control the. You have two hours available on Saturday. You block it out. You have my full attention. You have all of my years of training available to you. But once that's done and a little bit of post work, that's going to be minimal. Once I deliver your work, we're kind of done until next time, right, right, so that I, as a photographer, can go and manage the rest of my life Right, and often that includes my day job as well. You know, true, absolutely. So I need to manage the time that I make available to you as a client.
Speaker 3:So this group of photographers has not super, super been served by outsourcing, because they become the middle person that go between between their clients being satisfied with how they look or how they feel that they come off in their photo, which has been realistically and beautifully captured, but it's through no fault of a photographer's own. A person has an opinion about how they look, or how the wind was blowing that day, or what was in the background of a scene that they picked out. You know, right, absolutely. And so we realized that for these photographers that go between time starts to be so unpredictable, because you shoot between 10 and noon at the park on Saturday, likes loves their images, but there's, oh, just a couple images could you please help with? And when you say yes, it doesn't matter if it's a couple images or a single image or the entire shoot. It takes the same amount of back and forth.
Speaker 3:And now you're in it, right, and you're not charging the camera, I admit, yeah. And so now you're, like, subject to the preferences and subjective nature of retouching between your provider. At best case, you're the third party pool that you're using, like retouch up, or at worst case, you're also having to do the retouching. Absolutely Many photographers therefore just say I don't offer retouching, here's what I do, and then here's your images. Okay, so well, there's an opportunity for serving the client. If there was a way for a photographer to offer retouching to their person, get paid for that work. And then they step back and say it's between you and the retouchers, mm-hmm. Okay, my job is to give you my expertise at capturing beautiful photography, and if you're unhappy with things about that are kind of of a personal nature, like, hey, I would love to look a little different, that's great.
Speaker 4:So if suddenly you don't want someone in the picture anymore, yeah, like a spouse out.
Speaker 2:We call that a spouse out. It can be, it happens.
Speaker 3:So if you we provided we created a standalone retail retouching website, okay, then a photographer can then refer their clients to and say I don't do that, but I have a trusted source that I could refer to you. I could recommend Absolutely.
Speaker 3:You can take it or leave it. I really I'm used to just leaving it and say I don't have an option available to you. But best of luck, right, so now it's all right. Well, an alternative is I trust RetouchUp, but I don't like to be involved in it. What if RetouchUp operated a standalone retouching website that has no ties to RetouchUp or wholesale or anything, and it's a independent retail retouching website and you can refer people to it and you sell gift cards to that service and you make a huge commission, and so you stop leaving money on the table for all this retouching that could be done, that the client is ready to pay for and wants to buy, and the only reason you don't sell it because you're willing to meet any client's needs, especially profitably, if it doesn't ruin your whole deal, right.
Speaker 3:No, absolutely Right, and so we've made this site where you can sell physical or virtual gift cards to and say these guys can help you. We have an arrangement. They understand they have copyright release on file. If I give that to you and they will do the work for you, you can directly as an end consumer work with this retouching solution. They can handle all the back and forth and get your client happy. But you've said, as a photographer, that's your responsibility, you handle it with them and I'm, instead of just here's your USB and we're done, here's your USB and your gift card. If you wanted that, then you handle after the transaction. You can handle your retouching with somebody. I recommend as a photographer, right.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:Let me understand this and I understand what you're saying. So this is obviously for the photographer, not someone who wants to be very friend not what I would do, right, because that's not my business model. But we know and, kira, I know you the majority, I think, of photographers in our industry. We look at a group like professional photographers of America. There's over 35,000 members. There's thousands of people are going to be at WPPI in Las Vegas here in a few weeks. There's the majority of photographers are operating under that model.
Speaker 2:I believe they love the art of photography, they want to go out and make beautiful pictures and they just want to get paid a fee and hand over files, whereas that's not my business model, because I love for my images to live and breathe and be printed. I understand and respect that it is others, but what you're alleviating them from is that pain point of having you deal with the conversation back and forth with the client over. Well, you shrunk my clothes or you made me look, you know my face look heavy, or I mean, I've heard it all. Trust me through. You know 28 years of this. You're just saying, hey, you know it's very personal and I want you to love them. This is our trusted resource, so use them if you want editing or artwork or retouching, because a lot of people call it different things.
Speaker 2:But my question is the gift card idea. So is this something that they could even pre-buy and make it part of their collection so you could buy it with or without it? Meaning? I have a business model and I photograph families in the park on Saturday and you can either do my $500 collection, which is the files, or you can do my $750 collection, which is the files, plus your own artist.
Speaker 3:That's a great idea. There's yeah, there is 100% flexibility. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I almost see it as like, obviously, like Mary saying it's for. I mean, I think it'd be great for your weekend.
Speaker 1:Sports photographers, volume shooters, you know, people who are really just trying to make a transaction and move on you know like so you know, there's always like um, volume headshots, volume headshots, school sports photographers, where literally they're they want to give it to them, then they can. Even there's even systems where they can airdrop the images to them right then, without retouching, and then I could see, included in this flat rate is retouching if you need it. You know what I mean. Like the option to have retouching, and then that would be.
Speaker 1:That could be something that could be really great for corporate. It could be really great, for I could see it being great in my world anyway, for if I were at a, sometimes if I do a convention as a headshot photographer, the company will pay me just to do the images with color correction, like onsite and instant delivery, but no retouching to get their costs down. So I could see it being something I could offer people can purchase on their own at the booth. You know what I mean. Like that could be. That could be a great way to use this too.
Speaker 2:So I could see a lot of uses for this, especially when you're trying to just finish the transaction right there, right, or weddings if you have a really if you have a very um hardy group where you have a lot of your wedding guests, wedding party or buying what they get the file right, because most wedding photographers now include files but they want something special done to it. It's something that I could see offering for event and wedding uh photographers as well, because the photographer is done. You know, for me as a business person, I'll be very, be very honest. I probably would roll that cost into everything, assuming everybody's going to use it. Yeah, if they use it, great. If they don't, that's on them. But I would almost just put that in my cost of goods and just roll with it and just say, oh and by the way, you have a private artist that you can work directly with and work under your direction, because that's I would spin it in a way that you know that's a very personal thing and you should be in control of that.
Speaker 1:You know, and I can also see it from the client side I recently had a client that was in here with his, with his uh, employees, who's the boss? And we were discussing retouching and everybody was there getting their their headshots done at the time and they all told me oh yeah, you know, just basic retouching, we're fine with that. They leave. He calls immediately and says about half a dozen things that he would like done to his because he didn't want to say it in front of them and he did, you know, and it was above and beyond kind of what comes with my regular retouching. So that might be a great option to you know, to to do as an add on sale or a gift with purchase, even for certain incentives.
Speaker 2:You know, at a certain level of an investment you get included. You can see a lot of ways you could spend that and make it incredibly profitable and it's and it's very easy to spend that as such a amazing client gift, client service you know what I mean Whereas in reality you're really just cutting yourself out of admin and back and forth and communication that you don't really have the time, energy or effort to do. But it's easy, I think, to spin it as an amazing benefit.
Speaker 1:Right. Well, and not even just I mean spin. Sometimes it's a negotiation tactic. I mean, there are times where obviously I would prefer to have all the images retouched for a commercial job, but there are times where, if I'm bidding against possibly other vendors to get a job, I can use the retouching gift card as an incentive or as a waiver you know what I mean but build it into the total cost as well, but line item it. I mean I can see a lot of ways to use this so that people can. One, you can be done with the transaction when it's over. Especially I see this working great for large volume. And two, you can use it as part of your quoting system or as add on or gifts with purchase, or there's a lot of different ways that I think, especially, like you said, wedding photographers might be able to get additional things out of this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it's great. I think the pain point is, and what I love about it and again, not my business model, but I, you know, obviously, Kira and I both we teach and we mentor with a lot of people who this is their business model. It's getting them from sitting behind a computer or going back and forth email or, you know, Facebook Messenger, chatting about stray hair, when they should be out networking or spending time with their family or reading a book or you know whatever. You know what I'm saying. Like, I think both of us are incredibly passionate about whatever is going to keep a photographer from doing these jobs. I mean, for me and you said it, Austin if I can spend $5 and get it done in the every day of the week, you know, because my time has got to be worth more than that, right, I mean, I hope so.
Speaker 4:Well, those are perfect, perfect examples. Beyond that, even for you and your business model, you can offer with these gift cards, the option to restore images that you restoration.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 4:So that's another option, you know, yeah absolutely. Restoration.
Speaker 2:What about, like the painter, the digital painting? Yeah, we also. Yeah, I could see that being huge. So if you photograph dance schools or cheerleader or sports, I could see you being able to offer that service. The art treatment, yeah, all day the art treatment, because that's something that your volume photographers aren't going to do. But boy, they could upsell that or add it on or whatever I mean. And now you're really giving your client something that's not readily available in the marketplace. From a volume perspective, that would be amazing.
Speaker 1:Well, I certainly didn't get into this business to put closed toes on open-toed shoes. That's not something I got into this business for.
Speaker 2:I can't believe you had to do that.
Speaker 1:Well, no, I think they did it. I don't think I did yeah.
Speaker 2:You outsourced it. But I mean, I mean, how do you wear the wrong? I don't know, I'd be like you know, let's just tell that as a half leg portrait. Well, this is amazing.
Speaker 2:I think that this is, you know, it's feeding a need we have in the industry in a lot of respects. And I also think and I'm sure you guys are, we're going to agree with this that now, right now, our consumers, they're so savvy about editing and artwork and they know that if you just use an app on your phone, it doesn't look quite right. They know the difference between real editing and face-to-earth, essentially right, and they want the real thing, because we're seeing more and more of a trend of people going back to analog. I mean, that's why my kids send albums and read books. They don't want, you know, so they want it to be as authentic as possible. So I think using verbiage and using that carrot, so to speak, of having your own artist to work with, puts the ball in their court, and I think that nowadays more than ever, especially you know Kira's old generation- Old Kira's generation, old generation, yeah.
Speaker 2:But young. They want to have control. They want to have control over that, and that's something that can drive an older photographer like me nuts, you know it's like. You know you've got to be kidding me, you know. So I think that control aspect a lot of people would be very attracted to. You know how much or how little is done.
Speaker 1:I could see this working so well for, like those beach destination photographers, you know, the ones that you hire just at a venue. You know what I mean. Like we're going to go vacation in Key West and there's, you know you can hire a photographer just to photograph you and your family on the beach, you know for an hour, and then it's boom, boom because you're not. You know, live there. You know having to do everything online or let's just be done now, and here's your retouching gift card, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and there's always that carrot and this is being. You know I'm all about making money, but that oh, and at this collection it's included, so you can add it, add it, add it, oh, but if you did that, this investment level, it's my gift to you and I think that's it's a pain in our an art treatment piece or whatever it is. It's an amazing carrot to kind of dangle to get to get your average sale up.
Speaker 3:It can increase your perceived value as the the face value of the gift card. You're paying that you're paying, you have a margin and so you're paying a lot less than the face value. So if you had a hundred or 50 or a hundred dollar gift card, it's costing you far less, which just can boost where you want to boost, you know.
Speaker 2:Oh, absolutely, absolutely, yeah, and the value is the value. It doesn't matter how much you pay for it, right? I mean, the value is the value. You know, if I, if I give away a, you know, five by seven, the value was the value. It doesn't matter how much it costs me to make it right. I mean, you know I chart when I try. We all know that I mean so I love it. So is this launching now or are you guys up and rolling? When is when's this going to? Is it happening?
Speaker 5:Trevor no, it's, it's happening. So we've, we've launched, we've kind of gathered a little bit of feedback at imaging. But yeah, we are, we are full steam ahead at this point and are ready to get the word out, answer as many questions, make it as easy to understand as possible. So I mean, even hearing your feedback now is like, oh man, there's, there's so many other use cases. We we didn't even think of ourselves and so it's so helpful to get with other great minds. You know it's just like oh, this is, this makes total sense. So yeah, so we're super excited for this to be moving forward a hundred percent and yeah, we'll be, I guess, the way I think we've seen it set out some emails, but we'll kind of do a mass push here really soon.
Speaker 1:So right now, if people are watching this maybe even after you've sent the email because we're pre-recording this where would they go to find out more info? It's just at retouchupcom. Is that going to be listed there?
Speaker 5:Yeah, there is a link there through your account. It should be just a little ad blocker on the left-hand side that you can click on Yep. I know what you're talking about Just right over. There is a great place you can go to, another website just to kind of give you more information for the photographer specifically is retouchcardscom. Oh, retouchcardscom.
Speaker 2:Of course, we can link all this and we'll add all this on our page. I'm very excited that you, trevor, you heard us just bantering and thought, oh yeah, yeah, because you guys are in this arena and we're in this arena. Sometimes we just don't know what we don't know. But yeah, I think that something that I think this industry just needs so much of is the education piece, because guys don't get overwhelmed by this. You're hearing this and it's like, oh, I think sometimes it's just one more thing I have to add to my plate. Just write it down and then work your way through it.
Speaker 2:This is just kind of a little warning, because I think we all feel this way sometimes. I really want to do that. I know Kira's right, I could make an extra $100 every time or I could make XYZ every time, but it's making the time and energy. Write it down and then start working through it and then maybe having resources, reena, reach out to Kira and I. I have a million ideas going through my head for senior photographers, wedding photographers that think this could be such a great fit. So I don't do you guys foresee having some? Maybe I don't know if you'd call it a webinar or some kind of instruction coming down the road to teach people or help them understand how to use it and not feel so heavy and overwhelming, adding something else to their plate.
Speaker 1:It sounds like you and I would be good people to do this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think I got Texas School coming up. I'm happy to talk about it there.
Speaker 1:I'm just thinking all about how. It's the kind of thing where you'd want to keep it simple, especially when you don't want to over want, like some of these things we retouch ourselves. I can see this working for a very specific business model where I take the photos, I sell this with it. I think that's a great way to approach it and it not being overwhelming, like Mary said, and or confusing to the consumer. Well, you do it yourself here, you hold my hand this way, but you don't hear. It sounds like it's a great product for somebody who really wants to move fast.
Speaker 4:Yeah, besides the banner that we already have in the site on your account, we will put a video and that's a plan. So yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 3:Speaking about just different workflows and just how we feel that this fits in and how we felt we had identified there were workflow users that retouching was essentially an essential part of their workflow and people that were retouching was an essential part of their workflow. But all this falls into. The healthiest possible industry is when everybody's doing their best to serve the needs of the consumer and the best way that works for them. We love giving options, Our personal preferred. We love when a photographer can choose to deliver prints and canvases and because we love to keep the prolabs healthy and we love to keep our education piece healthy, the healthier the industry.
Speaker 3:It really works for everybody because then, for every different kind of photographer that's out there, the resources available to them are just that much stronger, and so it was really cool to identify a specific niche need for a photographer that can take something else that they're leaving on the table. It doesn't work for them to meet multiple times, for some photographers to go over proofs and then have a delivery date, and the sales piece is different level, comfort levels and also experience levels, and it's a progression. So we're really excited to help put this into the toolbox.
Speaker 2:I love it and I can't remember the author's name. I was looking for my, I was trying to find my name but it's, it's kind of like and I can't think of his name. But you've heard this before. But the reference of you know, you look at your business in a way and you look at, you know, the sand, the pebbles and the rocks and where we should focus. In my opinion, in my opinion, retouching is same and when you spend so much time in the sand, you're not just ignoring the rock, you're ignoring the pebbles, which those are your important and very important things, meaning the things in your business that are going to actually make you profitable and sustainable. Retouching for me is sand. Acquiring or color-correcting is sand Me.
Speaker 2:Doing that is such a waste of time, energy and resources. It's not even funny. This is, you guys are the sand. You know what I mean, which is a great thing, and you're, you're absolutely right, you all. Being healthy helps us and then frame companies, album companies, labs, because there's so many of us and there's so many different business models and as long as, like you know, I don't care what your business model is, as long as your mindset is in a growth space and you're charging what you deserve and you can get it Exactly. That's I mean, that's our number one as a company.
Speaker 4:our goal is that, exactly that, just for your time, you know, so you do what you do best, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Your, you know. Let's work with the rocks and the pebbles. Let's leave the sand to you guys.
Speaker 1:Well, this is fantastic, guys. I'm I'm well. We're honored that you wanted to share it with us first, so we can help you know, get the word out about this. This is so cool. I can't wait to find out how else we can help you with this.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. We'll definitely talk about it and promote it and keep us in the loop and let us know what we can do. We are obviously big fans and want to help in any way we can. And you know, just a huge thank you to you guys, because I really think that this is going to really be a it's going to be a difference maker. I think it could really change some lives, which I know. That's where your heart is, austin. I know that that's what you guys want. You know you. You want you said it, eugenia and Trevor like you want to make six photographers do what they love to do and take on the rest. Yeah, amen.
Speaker 2:I love it. Oh, man. Well, thank you guys, and thank you for being such a big supporter of us. We love you guys. We can't thank you enough. We couldn't do it without you. And yeah, you keep letting us know what we can do to help. And I know Karen I'll here's a little bit busy, but she's about to wrap up her presidential year it's getting.
Speaker 1:It's getting less busy, so it's getting a little easier.
Speaker 2:But we're here for you guys. Thanks for letting us know this is exciting.
Speaker 3:Thanks so much. Thanks Mary, and thanks Kara, and thanks for all that you do for all the, the entire industry, and we love it.
Speaker 2:It's just chatting with friends every week. That's a fun part.
Speaker 1:We really we forget what we say. Sometimes I think people are like somebody said something that was like did I say that? I can't believe I said that Probably did yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I probably did All right. Well, we'll sign off and guys, thanks again for letting us know and we'll just stay tuned. And again, you said it was. They can look at retouchupcom or Trevor, it was, give me that again and again it was retouchcardscom, Retouchcardscom. All right, you're hearing it here One of the ones here at first. So make sure you check it out and let us know what you think. Give us a feedback. I know you guys would appreciate that as well. Thank you.