Some suggestions for wedding photo sites from a client's perspective

Sorry if this is posted in the wrong forum. I was debating putting this in the open forum, but thought it might reach more pro wedding shooters here instead.

I am currently in the market for a wedding photographer. Having visited countless photographer's websites, I would like to offer my impressions and a couple suggestions when it comes to browsing these sites that I hope some of you may take into consideration.

1. The biggest pet peeve I have with about 80% of photographers sites is the over-use of flash. I get why you put the animations on your site and yes, it looks spiffy at first glance, but it gets old REALLY quick. It seems like every transition from one page to the next and changing from one photo to the next has to involve about 5 seconds worth of loading before you're hit with another 5 seconds of flash transition (and this is on a fiber optic line). It really makes trying to browse your site painful. If you really insist on using all the flash, please give us customers a non-flash option at the main screen.

1b. For one reason or another, many of the animations and links do not work with my browser. Please make sure your site is compatible not only with IE on a PC, but with OSX, Firefox, Safari, etc. If a message from your site tells me I need to use IE to view your site, I'm not going to even bother.

2. The number 2 pet peeve I have is the auto playing of music when I visit the site. Not only is it embarrassing when I'm trying to view your site during a break at work, but again it increases load times and is simply distracting. Some sites I've seen don't even have a mute button on their site.

3. Slideshow being on by default in portfolios and set to 2 second intervals. When I'm ready to see the next pic, I'll click the "next" button. Thanks.

4. Thumbnail galleries = good

If you've made it this far, thanks for listening.

-mike

While my site is in flash, it only takes about a second to load the next image: I have no default slideshow, you must click for the next image when you want it; I have no music (I'm selling photography). I cannot comment on compatability with Mac, but I suppose my site would operate just fine on one.

George Law
http://www.images123.com

George Robert Law said:

While my site is in flash, it only takes about a second to load the
next image: I have no default slideshow, you must click for the next
image when you want it; I have no music (I'm selling photography). I
cannot comment on compatability with Mac, but I suppose my site would
operate just fine on one.

George Law
http://www.images123.com

Click to expand...

Your site is perfect. Animations are snappy and complement the site rather than distract from it. No god awful music. No slide show. Very easy to navigate. The only thing I would suggest would be larger pictures. I understand this would increase load times, but how about a larger view when one clicks on the photo?

will consider your suggestion when I next update my site.

George Law
http://www.images123.com

McPhreak said:

1. The biggest pet peeve I have with about 80% of photographers sites
is the over-use of flash.

Click to expand...

At first I was wondering how so many pro photographers would put too much +FEC on their shots!

On a more serious note, I agree with the others that the bigger problem is long load times vs. flash per se.

McPhreak said:

1b. For one reason or another, many of the animations and links do
not work with my browser. Please make sure your site is compatible
not only with IE on a PC, but with OSX, Firefox, Safari, etc. If a
message from your site tells me I need to use IE to view your site,
I'm not going to even bother.

Click to expand...

This is sore spot with me too.. People think they can do thier own site with a template etc and its good out of the box.. one of the biggest problems with that is multi browser compatibility.. I only use IE to test sites I build for functionality. FF is what I and a HUGE chunk of web surfers use today. Safari is another HUGE chunk. If you pay someone to build you a site that doesnt work in all 3 (preferebly more, even some of the lesser used ones) browsers mentioned, then they didnt build you a site correctly. Every one I build works flawlessly in IE from 6.0 on, all versions of FF , etc.. Even if my customers anylitics data shows 99% FF users, it still works in IE6, 7 etc, thats just good paractice... Who knows that one person who still uses IE6 might bolt from your site and would have been a lucritive gig..

And contrary to some's belief IE6 is a 10yr old browser, but there are ALOT of people still using it. Its also about the hardest one to make everything work in and work in the others..

I agree with most of what you say, and would probably offer very similar advice.

However, one thing worth noting whenever receiving or giving advice on advertising and marketing: no matter how much WE like it, the real question is how the TARGET AUDIENCE responds to it.

They may or may not share our/your tastes in marketing. There's a real danger in a bunch of photographers giving each other advice about what websites should look like. I think we sometimes confuse what we would LIKE to work, with knowing what actually does.

I would caution then -- when getting advice about the quality of our messaging, marketing, advertising, web sites -- even our photographic work -- make sure you are looking HARDEST at how brides and couples are behaving in response to your marketing.

Notice I didn't say, "how much they like it." Liking something, and responding to a call to action are two VERY different things. Ultimately what matters, is if your web site is making your phone ring. And I would venture to say, what your friends, coworkers, competitors, and fellow photographers think will make the phone ring, and what actually works for you, may not always correspond as closely as you would think it would.

Best,
Paul
http://upstatephotographers.com

I would hope I would be considered "Target Audience" as I am not a professional photographer (just a hobbyist) and am looking to hire a photographer for my wedding in September. That was the point of my mini-rant. I'm hoping that some of the wedding professionals would find my perspective useful.

-mike

Paul Grupp said:

I agree with most of what you say, and would probably offer very
similar advice.

However, one thing worth noting whenever receiving or giving advice
on advertising and marketing: no matter how much WE like it, the real
question is how the TARGET AUDIENCE responds to it.

They may or may not share our/your tastes in marketing. There's a
real danger in a bunch of photographers giving each other advice
about what websites should look like. I think we sometimes confuse
what we would LIKE to work, with knowing what actually does.

I would caution then -- when getting advice about the quality of our
messaging, marketing, advertising, web sites -- even our photographic
work -- make sure you are looking HARDEST at how brides and couples
are behaving in response to your marketing.

Notice I didn't say, "how much they like it." Liking something, and
responding to a call to action are two VERY different things.
Ultimately what matters, is if your web site is making your phone
ring. And I would venture to say, what your friends, coworkers,
competitors, and fellow photographers think will make the phone ring,
and what actually works for you, may not always correspond as closely
as you would think it would.

Best,
Paul
http://upstatephotographers.com

--

Click to expand...

Paul Grupp said:

However, one thing worth noting whenever receiving or giving advice
on advertising and marketing: no matter how much WE like it, the real
question is how the TARGET AUDIENCE responds to it.

Click to expand...

Absolutely. This was a hard-learned lesson for me, as my personal preference is for simple HTML sites. However, when I had the fortunate opportunity to sit down and talk with a bunch of brides about what they looked for in a wedding photographer's website, it was clear that flash slideshows impress them much more.

And Mike, I'm afraid you (as a groom) are very much a secondary market! One thing all wedding photographers learn very early on is that it's brides who do 95% of the looking around, and brides who make 95% of the decisions.

Ben

--
http://www.photographybybenlovejoy.com

Paul Grupp said:

no matter how much WE like it, the real
question is how the TARGET AUDIENCE responds to it.

Click to expand...

Excellent point and thanks for reminding us.

Ben Lovejoy said:

Paul Grupp said:

However, one thing worth noting whenever receiving or giving advice
on advertising and marketing: no matter how much WE like it, the real
question is how the TARGET AUDIENCE responds to it.

Click to expand...

Absolutely. This was a hard-learned lesson for me, as my personal
preference is for simple HTML sites. However, when I had the
fortunate opportunity to sit down and talk with a bunch of brides
about what they looked for in a wedding photographer's website, it
was clear that flash slideshows impress them much more.

And Mike, I'm afraid you (as a groom) are very much a secondary
market! One thing all wedding photographers learn very early on is
that it's brides who do 95% of the looking around, and brides who
make 95% of the decisions.

Ben

Click to expand...

I don't see why there can't be any sort of compromise when it comes to these things though. I'm not trying to argue for no-flash sites. Like most everyone else, I think they look cheap. I'm just saying that most of the wedding sites go OVERBOARD with the flash and music to the point where it's detracting from the site. It's like there's some sort of contest to see who can shove the most code into their site without it completely crashing. When it comes down to it, the bottom line is that we (the target audience. Both men and women) want to see good pictures. Flash is an excellent way to accentuate your beautiful pictures when used in moderation. But when you start having load times longer than 2 seconds between transitions, it is now detracting from the experience. Now you're using flash to distract customers away from your pictures. What are you trying to say about your work then?

This reminds me most of those cheap used car ads you see on TV where the dealer dresses up in a cowboy outfit and screams into the camera. Dealers do this because all the other dealers do this and because yes, in some manner, it can be marginally effective in attracting some customers. Same with bad wedding photo sites. But I just feel that if they can make commercials that weren't so annoying, they could be so much more EFFICIENT at attracting both men and women.

The easiest solution I feel would be to keep the music and slide show on your site, if you happen to have one, but make those the option rather than the default. It's just a personal opinion, but I feel more people would be annoyed at music playing automatically (especially if they don't like the music), than if the option for music was there, but not on by default.

Hi,

Great suggestions.

I think at the end, you simply want to look at the photograph examples to guage how good the photographers are - regardless how well the web site functions.

More often, amateurs believe by making a "professional" looking web site, that'd be indication of photography skill (don't blame them, every profession think the same way). If they don't have enough photo work, they naturally spend time on the web site.

Another good way is to hunt around with your recently married friends (or have your fiance do it) and have a look at their albums. Hopefully one jumps out at you and you have found your photographer.

mw
--
http://lightroomgalleria.com

I think you really nailed it with your pionts! Flash can look nice, but I want to browse images easily and ind MY tempo!

McPhreak said:

McPhreak said:

McPhreak said:

question is how the TARGET AUDIENCE responds to it.

Click to expand...

Absolutely. This was a hard-learned lesson for me, as my personal
preference is for simple HTML sites. However, when I had the
fortunate opportunity to sit down and talk with a bunch of brides
about what they looked for in a wedding photographer's website, it
was clear that flash slideshows impress them much more.

Click to expand...

I don't see why there can't be any sort of compromise when it comes
to these things though. I'm not trying to argue for no-flash sites.
Like most everyone else, I think they look cheap. I'm just saying
that most of the wedding sites go OVERBOARD with the flash and music
to the point where it's detracting from the site.

Click to expand...

Oh, I agree with that. Personally I have a flash slideshow and HTML navigation, which seems to go down well with my target-market brides.

McPhreak said:

more people would be annoyed at music playing automatically
(especially if they don't like the music), than if the option for
music was there, but not on by default.

Click to expand...

This was the biggest thing I had to get over. Personally, I HATE sites that play music at me. Really, really hate them. But I got brides to show me the wedding photography sites that really impressed them, and guess what? All had Flash slideshows, and all played music. Not a single exception.

I showed them one site with the mute button on and they thought it was pretty good. I then took the mute button off and they thought it was great. Lesson learned!

Ben

--
http://www.photographybybenlovejoy.com

. . . and as I said, I agree with almost everything you said.

However, I'm assuming that you're a guy (which could be incorrect). In my experience, about 80% of the couples let the bride make virtually all decisions about photography. So your opinions, while certainly valuable, are not necessarily shared with the population that generally makes decisions about wedding photography.

In addition, typically the most undesirable couples, in terms of the potential for drama and misunderstandings, is one where the guy is a serious amateur photographer. When this happens, there is almost always a BIG disconnect between his expectations and desires and hers, which makes a LOT more work for the photographer.

As I said earlier, this is just a generalization -- I've had couples who are positively wonderful to work with, both of whom are serious photographers themselves. But overall, I think there is enough merit in the generalization to make it worthwhile.

Best,
Paul
http://upstatephotographers.com

First of all, the biggest disagreement I have with you is that men and women tend to have the same tastes in how things are presented. If that was true, Sports Illustrated would look just like Martha Stewart Living, Maxim would look just like Bust, Shooting Times would look just like Elle. The local gun store would look just like the local women's clothing boutique.

Overall, I think there are fundamental different things that men and women look for in wedding photography, and more importantly, you sell differently to women than you do to men. Then within the general categories of male and female, there are subgroups within each sex -- some people need different things than others. I think that's why it's possible for there to be so many wedding photographers in a given market -- because their different approaches to things serves different client tastes.

In addition, I think you are making a huge mistake when you think that car dealers and others do the "schlockey" ads because that's what everybody else does. So, so wrong. They do them because they WORK. Measurably, accountably, dollars in the cash drawer. Closed sales.

Does that mean I'm recommending that we all go out and do schlockey dumb ads? Heck no.

But it does support my point that sometimes, advertising, web sites, etc., are done differently than what we like and appreciate, because the target audience is not us.

Best,
Paul
http://upstatephotographers.com