CHAPTER 3
Defining Your
Visual Value
If you could hear the messages on my phone service, you
would get a bird’s-eye view of the changes in our industry. “Selina,
I’m calling because for years I had a profitable business servicing
ad clients. My clients were loyal, I was busy, and I never needed to
market. Now my clients are retiring, companies have merged, and
business is dead. I need to sell my work but I have no portfolio.”
Then there was the message from a new photographer. “Hi
Selina. Help! I have been told that my images look too stocky
and I don’t know what to do.”
Talk with photographers and they will tell you that today’s
market is the toughest that creatives have faced in decades.
Clients are less relationship oriented and more assignment
driven. The availability of inexpensive and, in some cases, high-
quality existing photography has drastically cut into an assign-
ment market that was already sagging under the weight of too
many suppliers. Every day photographers are asking me,
“When did the rules change? How do we create and maintain
profitable businesses? What do clients really want?”THE VALUE EQUATIONWhat clients want is value. While value may look slightly
different to clients depending on the specific market, the
components that make up value do not. Vision, service, andChapter 03.qxd 6/27/07 9:01 PM Page 16