How to Determine Your Prices as a Zazzi

Getting started as a photographer or videographer comes with all kinds of challenges. Along with the excitement of finally following your heart to do what you feel called to do, there is a lot to figure out as well. Some photographers are lucky enough to have a mentor, but for most of us it’s a figure it out as you go process. Two of the biggest questions you likely face are How to find photography clients and How to determine your prices as a photographer.

Zazzi Has The Clients Built In

One of the aspects of Zazzi we are most excited about is the ability to connect with new clients. In the past a lot of new business was based on word of mouth recommendations, but the Zazzi Photography/Videography App is like word of mouth with a giant megaphone standing on all the street corners of your local area. Your perfect customers open the app and quickly find and connect with you, without any work on your part beyond the initial setup. Zazzi keeps your booking calendar full so you can focus on all of the million other things that need to happen to keep your photography business running smoothly.

How to Determine Your Prices as a Zazzi Photographer

There are a number of factors that come into play when figuring out how to set your prices as a Zazzi photographer.

• Consider Your Costs

Every photographer has costs to running their business. These are things like equipment costs, shipping charges, travel expenses, studio rent if you opt for a studio, or anything else that you must pay for out of pocket to keep your business running. Keep track for a few months and then determine your average monthly costs.

Zazzi is an amazing on demand platform that allows you to find new clients for free, making it easy to grow your business and fill your schedule. It’s easy to create a photographer/videographer profile within the Zazzi app so you can start connecting with new clients right away with no hidden fees!

• Consider Your Time

Even if you love photographing magical moments for families so much that you would work for free, you shouldn’t! Your time absolutely needs to be accounted for. Determine the time it takes you to complete your average shoot. This includes both the time you spend actually photographing subjects and also pre and post shoot prep, like answering questions, editing photos and delivering the photos to the client. All of this should be accounted for and give you an idea of the time a single shoot requires.

When you create your Zazzi photographer profile you are asked to enter an hourly rate. An hour is determined by the length of time you will be at the shoot, but the pricing structure should also account for all the extra time you will spend delivering the final product. For example, let’s say you set an hourly price of $200. That hour shoot is going to cost the customer $200, but it will take you four hours to prep, shoot, edit and deliver the photos. In reality you are generating $50/hour ($200 divided by four hours = $50).

Every photographer knows that the type of shoot can greatly affect the pre or post shoot workload. One of the cool things about the Zazzi app is that you can set different rates for different types of shoots.

• Consider Your Experience

According to Pixpa.com, the average cost for a photographer is anywhere from $25 – $500 hour depending on experience. Again, this is hourly rate per hour shoot and has all of the pre and post shoot work wrapped into it.

When you set up your Zazzi profile within the app, you’ll have an opportunity to set your experience level. We’ve broken this down into four experience categories so you can choose which you are best aligned with.

• Hobbyist (self-taught and just getting started) 
• Student (some experience) 
• Professional (lots of experience and a large portfolio) 
• Expert (in-demand photographer with large portfolio and a local following) 

Given these numbers, you can get an idea of where you might fall pricing wise. 

• Consider Your Competition

Once you’ve determined where you would like your hourly (per shoot) rate to be, take a look at the competition in your local area. This is easy to do using the Zazzi app. Just enter your zip code and look for photographers with your same experience level. If the rate you have determined looks like it is in alignment with other photographers in your area, then you’re good to move forward. If not, adjust up or down as needed.

• Consider Your Packages

For some photographers/videographers it can be confusing to set an hourly rate, when you are used to booking based on a complete package that includes multiple hours of photographing and lots of extras (like a wedding for example). 

In order to streamline rates and make things easy to understand for clients, the Zazzi app asks you to list an hourly rate. To convert your shoot package into an hourly rate, calculate the average time you spend on a complete package. Now divide the complete package price by the average number of hours it takes to complete to get an hourly rate. When you are filling out your profile, you are asked to set the minimum shoot time required and you can adjust this minimum to whatever time frame a typical package takes. 

Average Package Price ÷ Average Time Spent on a Complete Package = Hourly Rate

For instance, if you charge $1000 for a wedding package that includes 5 hours of shooting, your hourly rate would be $200 hour, but you would set a minimum session duration of 5 hours. 

Bottom Line

These formulas and guidelines are just a starting point as you determine your prices as a Zazzi photographer. As you build up more clients in your area and have limited availability, you can obviously increase your rates beyond where you started. You can also add value to your packages by including something other photographers don’t do, like snacks for the kiddos, fun props or a free frame etc. We also know circumstances, location and experience change over time, so we give you the option to change your prices at any time. 

As you determine your prices as a Zazzi, be sure and consider your costs, your time, your experience and your competition and come up with a price that feels right to you.