Lessons

Lesson Info

Importance of Customer Service

From there, it's just a matter, all the other stuff we were doing is just a matter of the details. It doesn't really matter. So all the other stuff, from ides to renaming to cropping, to upload into whatever company wants that is each individual up to you guys in your business and anyone watching up to you guys that's where I say do the research and you can you can explore from there and go from there to suit your own needs with that first part that we talked about until you get sorted. If you stick with what we said, I promise you volume a simple, simple, simple it'll open up so many doors for you, it's set for one problem on the simple part, and that is what we're going to talk about again, way mentioned over and over again and that's the customer service, I want to kind of leave on it because I think it's one of the most important it is the most important part of it. I know for cody, I handle it better than cody because I have the old cop in me and I'm so used to people yelling and ...

screaming at me and calling me every name in the book anyway, and you're just like, okay, okay, you know, they move on, you know, bothers me but I kind of hide it better than cody I'm not this's my biggest problem is volume and again I touched on it yesterday because with you with normal photography you see five people weak you deal with five clients with this photography for this type of thing you can deal with twenty, five hundred three thousand in a week arm or depending on how big our larger job and there's no way to make everybody happy you're never going to make everyone else it's kind of like the whole plaque everything I mean some not everybody's going like me on every likes me online not everybody there's gonna be someone that doesn't like me for some reason I come my hair I don't want him because he's a bigger donut the mayor I mean who knows but and and that's the biggest thing for me because I didn't go into this business to do a bad job at it I don't have a studio and go to work every day to do it toe halfway do my job I do it to the best of my ability every single day when I show up at that school I take the best portrait that I can do and I want to give the best product and I want the parents and teachers wanted by to recognize that so when somebody comes to me that doesn't like to picture for some reason and they're not going to because some people just want to complain, it hurts my feelings more and it's it's not that we're messing up a bunch it's just that this shirt number, this your volume that we're dealing with, you're going to get so many people that hate you and those people that you're gonna hear from again, you're not going to hear from sure we do hear from quite a few people says, look, this is the best baseball ports I've ever seen, and I want to hug him. We all know I mean, it's literally because it's such a rare thing, and that makes you just makes your whole weak, and that makes you feel great. But then again, for that one person, you're gonna have five people, they didn't like it that are going to make sure their herd on how what a horrible job you did in your horrible individual and you're next to the devil because you're just such a bad person. The funny thing was we had a volume job, that the porches were due back right around christmas time, and things happened in our studio and orders and the labs were busy, so we didn't get that way. We don't get the pictures back before christmas that came back like a week of christmas are just the week after. And is this one of those things where way didn't actually problem? Some say hey it's going to be before kristina, we never gave my due date, but people assume you're going to be before christmas and so people would call me up and say that I just ruin their entire christmas. I was going to give these these wallets thie sixteen wallets, that didn't mean I was gonna give him a christmas presents and the one hand I'm thinking and this is the worst christmas presents ever I'm glad I'm not on your I'm glad I'm not in that family because this is horrible glad I'm not on your christmas list because I'd be getting a horrible christopher's right now and then the other thing I'm like, I mean, come on, that really could've been your only christmas present giving out of the sixteen dollars, I know you're just mad at me and you're venting and you're making up all the story, making me feel bad, but I mean it's it's just one of those things is gonna happen and you're gonna you're gonna feel like you're doing a worse job and you're doing because again, you hear from the people here from the negatives you don't hear from the positives and so you have to learn when you do volume if you've never done volume before the phone calls will start ringing but every opportunity you get when that phone rings you need to end up making it a positive sum you're not going to make theirs just that's just the law of averages but the vast majority of people they just want advanta's cody says and you need to listen to him you need to listen to him with sincerity and let them vent and then again as I said earlier ask how can I solve this problem for you don't try to solve it you ask them directly how can I solve this problem and it will open up wonders for you I mean it really well some people say I don't worry about it thank you for listening apologize I'm having a bad day we even have one lady come in that she was I wasn't there but she went all over one of the girls I mean they just was she was up and down all of them and I didn't realize it was the same person came in like two days later and we're talking we're laughing and joking and we're having a good time out in the lobby and like susie comes and she sees her and she kind of runs off into the into the office and I'm like what's going because that lady was a one that was just like what I said and then she sees susan she does look I just want to say you know I'm sorry I I was completely wrong the other day I was having a bad day and I took it out on you. That was the first person we've ever had actually come back and apologize for taking it out on us. But the reality is if she said that I get into a lot of other people are doing the same thing that just now apologizing, so you have to learn not to take it so personal. Even though this job your work is all about personal, you have to realize that some people just want to be rude, like on the internet. Some people just want a troll and cause problems. Whatever there's always that problem, you're gonna have a certain people and so try not to let it bother you so much, because I promise you it will affect your personal life. It will affect you going home with your husband, your wife, your children and their who's more important, your clients or your family, because if you let those clients affect you, you're saying those clients are more important than your kids. Your family used fishing you hunting you cooking, you're doing whatever you want to do with your life, and you've got to remember, don't let him affect you. Don't let those people be more important than your family, because the best thing about getting two volume is your family because you're going to make more money and you're gonna do it faster and easier. You have a more successful life. I'm not saying you could be rich because I don't know many rich photographers that's not we don't get in this business to be rich. We think we do, but reality is we don't but it's a really good job because there's a lot eight, five jobs that I just don't want to do anymore, and even on my worst day, it's still a better day than most of most the time I had in my previous jobs. But remember, the customer service is a big issue, so make paperwork and if trail, I don't think you're gonna have problems. We talked about this you you're pretty organized, but if you're not organized, find someone that is look online, take a creative, live class on organization skills and find ways to be curated creative, organized in your job when it comes to customer service, I have a problem informed I can't tell you how many times I've hitting fifty copies on a problem been formed as we go through fifty a week. Because people come in when we turn him in and it's like I'm missing a wallet I missed and when they call we just write it down and then we investigated a lot of problem forms, cody said they didn't order it they just thought they ordered it and so we market often we call him and let him know but also try to make that phone call back because I promise you we and we were horrible at it sometimes when we get busy we have it on our on our desk and we're like, okay, we're going to call that we call that we call that other that we never call back then they called back two weeks later they're furious and rightfully they should be so when things like this happen take care of it right then and if you're going to say you're going to call him back, call them back again so you're gonna email him e melon back and then I will do what I do I'm the world's worst in this performance I'll be working on something and I come in I got good intentions and I pull out two or three or four problem beings and I will take care of these problems and then life happens you know, the people I am on the board of directors, something I'm doing with them or client comes in that I'm dealing with in the lobby or creative live calls and they said that this you know, the information I got for the program is for when you've got to redo it and some on the phone you know constantly whatever something life happens and then this fourth for problem and sit over here on my desk and then the person calls and then they go over to the problem and try to find him and they're not there and then they then they looked like an idiot because it's my fault for leaving it so get youa system down and keep to it and do this right now figure out how to do a customer service work flow right now because it is the most important aspect of this job if you don't it will hurt you it'll hurt you worse than what you start off right now but if you handle customer service issues and you're gonna have problems no matter what if you handled him well and you handle it strong fast and easy you're going to get the job because they know you're gonna have problems but it's how you handle them and so if you get a good customer service work flow down it's going to allow you to grow your business and it's gonna take a lot of stress because that's our stress now our stress is customer service we got the workflow down we got everything else but customer service is always a battle so make sure you get that customer service because it's not uncommon feud if you make a mistake in somebody's orders not uncommon for them to be a member of the the board of the school board are the baseball league board or whatever that frozen with lines club you know something? You never know who you're doing this now on account of that person say, hey, I want to do everything I can to make sure you don't get this photo job again and you're like, come on, man, I mean, I didn't do this on purpose was eighteen dollars, yeah, this vindictive, but they are and rarely do you do a good job on somebody, and they I really hope to bat for you to make sure you get the nation because they don't care who does a job. So again, it's it's the negatives that they're going to hurt you and then finally I just kind of want to leave. I know we're coming in and I really I want to say thank you for your you guys coming here, but I really wanted kind of hit on what I just talked about volume is the most amazing thing in the photography business so far as I'm concerned it's something that I really went into, we both went into kicking and screaming if one for kodiak is again it's even though on the mouth try coast for the most part, we're all equal way have a disagreement, we vote on it and that pretty much wins. And so it was two against one cuz they want to get into it. We wanted to get into it only because we need to make money and and we still have wrong. We love the vault and we love shooting again. We hate the customer service sometimes because it just wears on you, but it got us our dream. It got us our studio, it got us that forty five hundred square foot facility that we worked twenty years for some of me and cody almost twenty years for and it happened literally almost overnight. I mean, we were able to get in there and move in because of volume. If we were doing hi it's and we do our averages, they're nice, we do two thousand dollar averages, whatever their portrait, clients and wei have a very high and business that whole bit you walking on facility looks hyeon, but it doesn't support it would not support us for four people, it just won't. And because of the community we lived in, if I lived in a big city, probably so I'd have a lot more customer base and everything else, but those limits that we knew about volume allows me to be a better father to be a better husband to be a better son it allows me to be a better person because it allows a lot of the problems that I have stressed to come off my shoulders and allows me to have that suit because susan I remember when we were arguing over something stupid just a husband wife argument that you have just regardless of what it wass and we're in our studio and I finally said, you know we just stop because what I said look around us but this is our dream and then it brought it all back to reality I mean it was just stupid stuff that husband let's argue over and that's what volume has done for us and I know vaughn could do that for you guys I know it could do for the people watching it can make your dreams come true it's hard work there's no magic pill you're gonna learn it it's hard work you've got to get out there and you gotta bust your butt on the ground and do it but the beautiful thing is if you want a retirement this could be it this is your this is your nest egg this is something that you can continue to grow build those relationships and you know what? You'll sit there and say I have nine contracts next year you look up I make twenty thousand dollars a contract that's everything and you know that's coming you had one shot and you know you have that money coming in you know how nice that is to know that we make the money to keep our studio open we might not eat but our studio is going to be open and that's the way it was for is sometimes all the time with us I mean it's tough making bills but our whole goal is we keep our studio open because that's what we know is gonna make us money and volume allows us to do that and I can't say other ones do and because there are that will but the reality is so much volume from daycare. No, we really concentrated on schools and kind of sports just the workflow because that was what we were doing with the trade of live during this workshop. But again it could be anything. It could be any type of volume not only the software but just cares about the software. The hansa is getting the volume it make so much money when you go home I want you and there's a lot of stuff that I gave you and the people watching I want to do the same thing. I want you to look in your immediate community within this the ten mile radius of you and write down all the volume jobs they're there that you can think of and keep a running list don't put it away, keep a running list when you hear something new from the gala's that the special events to award ceremonies to whatever, start writing them down, and when they come up that's what I said, figure out which ones you want to go after and continue to go after him and keep building that list, and as you get everything in that ten mile radius, then take it out to twenty miles, take it out the thirty miles and just keep building those list and keep going after it. And when you add that list up, when you add that list of how much money you make it's going to get you excited, but also make you nauseous of how much you've been walking away from all these years. That's that's the best advice I can give you is the customer service and remember, your family comes first and volume is going to make you a lot happier with you and your family. So again, thank you all so much for coming. I hope if you guys need anything, let me know again online. If you have any questions, it is up on our twitter or instagram accounts will help you out any way we can and that's why I'm going to call you coach mike forever now, right on thank you. You've been hanging around the rubbing off on you, it just, you know, and I'm not trying to get on my high horse here because I'm not saying this just to say that truly we truly mean this it's something that is changed our lives, the better we would not be in our studio and then, you know, we walk into that studio. We forget it's only been, you know, two years when we've been in that studio, we worked on it for quite a few other years. But we walk and we forget just how hard it was to get that studio now that we have it and it was volume that allowed us to do it, and if it does it for us, if we can do it, anybody can do it because we're not special. We're not anything you need. We're just person with a camera that tried to figure out problems, just like everyone here is. So when we say we don't, we don't joke. It's truly is truly us.