The first six months of the year are often a busy time for photographers. It’s when schools are about to wrap up, wedding season kicks off, and families start thinking about portraiture for gifts, and much more. Mini sessions are great to boost your income and generate leads and new clients for your photography business. Never done a mini session? Don’t fear, they are fun and a great way to connect with a lot of people in your community who can turn into lifelong customers.
This guide offers tips for preparing for mini sessions. We’ll discuss what mini sessions are, popular options when creating them, and how to set up mini sessions on your website so you look like a pro.
What is a mini session?
Mini sessions are short photography sessions that typically last around 20-30 minutes. They're perfect for capturing quick snapshots of families and loved ones, seniors, sports teams, holiday or seasonal portraits, pets – you name it! They are done in a limited time frame to maximize the number of clients you can see in a short period of time (often a single day). Mini sessions tend to follow a theme and all happen at a single location.
What kind of mini sessions are popular?
The themes of mini sessions vary based on your clients. When you host a mini session, you’ll want to do some research to see what is popular based on your location. You know your clients better than anyone else, but these are easy options to get you started.
Holiday mini sessions
Holiday mini sessions are one of the most sought out and popular ways to celebrate and capture the memories of holidays. You can prepare sets, props, and wardrobe options to make these sessions a hit for your clients.
For example, if you hold Halloween mini sessions you can tell your clients to come dressed up in their costumes.
Holiday ideas:
Create a package that includes a digital and printed holiday card for holidays like Christmas, Hanukkah, and Easter.
School / senior mini sessions
Want to focus on students? You can hold mini sessions for prom, back to school, and graduation celebrations. Sure schools have photographers, but sometimes families want other options to have as keepsakes.
Student ideas:
Families enjoy using yard signs to promote their graduate. Include a yard sign in your mini session package as a great incentive.
Family and portrait mini sessions
Just want to do families, couples, children, or newborn photos? You can hold mini sessions in-studio or on location. You can choose any number of themes for family and portrait mini sessions. Outdoor Fall sessions, Mother’s Day mini sessions, and Valentine’s Day mini sessions are some popular choices.
Imaginative / artist portraits mini sessions
There’s an artist in you, and you have the ability to transform your customers into something magical. Be it fairytale-inspired, mermaids, elves, or color smoke sessions, you can create a unique experience for your clients that they’ll love to share with others.
Preparing for a mini session
Okay so it is time to set up the mini sessions you want to offer. How should you go about that? Let’s jump right in.
Maximizing your time & money
When you set up a mini session, you should first decide how long each mini session will be, how many hours you want to hold sessions for, and as a result how many you can hold in a single day. Say you are trying to shoot 10 portraits in a single day at 15 minutes allotted per session, that's only 2.5 hours worth of work. But what if you want a full day's worth of work, 8 hours at 15 minutes a piece? That’s ~30 sessions. That might be too exhausting or overwhelming to keep up with (and doesn’t account for any breaks).
How you set your mini sessions depends on your end goal and your availability. You can do it all in a single day or spread it out over a weekend, or even multiple weekends.
As you set the cost of your mini sessions, remember these are not discount services but unique events that are done in a shorter amount of time. The price will likely be lower than a standard session because you are spending less time with each client. For instance, a standard session fee might be $500, which includes the session and 5 digital images, and a few small print options.
Your mini session might be $250 for the session fee, plus a single print and digital image options.
Once you have determined the appropriate package and fees, you are ready to craft your shooting schedule.
For example: You could do a 2-day event for 4 hours a day, and offer 16 spots each day. At $250 each that's an $8,000 weekend if you fill all 32 spots. Now before you run off and set that price, make sure you calculate any marketing, printing, materials, or overhead costs for the mini sessions (this includes location fees and new props).
When setting the price for your mini sessions, it's also important to take into account who you serve, what competitors are charging, and what your target audience is willing to pay.
Don’t stress too much over this part. Set a goal. Set a schedule. Set a package. Set a price. And try it out. You can always adjust for your next round of mini sessions.
Pro Tip: You can market your mini session events using the PhotoBiz Studio Management tools. You can set up landing pages, email your past clients via the Email Marketing campaigns, and then share those resources through your social media channels.
Collecting bookings for a mini session event
Set up the Scheduler for mini session appointments
Scheduling a mini session is easy with the right software and tools. PhotoBiz’s Studio Management tools give you everything you need to create a mini session booking calendar for your event. You can collect payment as people book, and you’ll get notified when someone books. Plus, you can send automated email reminders about the event with the option to add the event to their personal calendars.
By collecting payment up front when people book a mini session on your website, you can avoid chasing people for money.
In the PhotoBiz scheduler, you can manage registration for a mini session using the custom dates option when creating a new service. During set up, you can set the custom dates and times you are offering mini sessions, and even block off time when you are not available (such as to make sure you take a break).
You can also upload an image to represent your mini session event, add descriptive details to attract customers, and offer add-ons (costumes, special props, make up, hair, etc.) if you want.
Learn how to set up mini sessions with the PhotoBiz Scheduler
Mother’s Day Mini Session Example: Offer the option to add on wardrobe styling, or even hair and make-up as a perk to pamper your clients. It can make the day extra fun and less stressful for them.
Once you have the event set up you’re ready to display it on your website.
Website landing page for mini sessions
You can easily craft a landing page for your mini sessions with PhotoBiz. There are a few ways you can do this:
Option 1: Mini session event hub. Create a page that allows your customers to see all the mini sessions you are holding throughout the calendar year. They can select the one(s) they are interested in, and book them.
Option 2: Dedicated landing page. Creating dedicated landing pages for each mini session event can allow for more content beyond a calendar for booking. You can show off details of the event, highlight sample images, and even include frequently asked questions. Recommended for targeted marketing and social media pages.
Pro Tip: Need help explaining mini sessions to your customers? Here is a quick example you can adapt to help your customers know what to expect. You could incorporate content like this on your landing pages.
What is a mini session like?
- Book a time
Select a time from the spots available on the calendar. There is only one spot per time. - Prepare for the shoot
Review my guide about what to wear and expect during the mini session. - Your session
We’ll spend 15-minutes together as I photograph you (and your family). Please arrive 10 minutes before your scheduled time. - Final reveal
Review your images and select the ones you print or download as digital files. XYZ is included, and you can make additional purchases.
Contracts for mini sessions
Contracts can help people know what to expect and provide a reference to what has been agreed upon. They also provide protection for you and your business. You can create and send digital contracts with PhotoBiz’s Form Builder. There is a digital contract template to help you get started. Once you modify the content within it for your needs, you can send it to your client to digitally sign.
Learn how to create a contract with the PhotoBiz Form Builder
You can send contracts out as needed and also use Email Automation (part of the PhotoBiz Marketing Suite) to send out contracts automatically when someone books a mini session.
You can create a whole series of automated reminders based on events set up in the Scheduler, like mini sessions. We recommend doing an automated email series for each mini session event you have. You can modify the email content to be specific to that event, such as to include a link to a contract.
Learn how to set up email automation for the PhotoBiz Scheduler
Pro Tip: Tag your contract with your event name and year. When clients complete the contract, the tag will get added to their contact record. You can then send emails to everyone with the tag! Using tags makes organizing contact lists for mass email campaigns much easier.
Learn how to use tags with PhotoBiz forms
Marketing your mini session
Now that you have your mini session booking calendar, landing pages, and contracts set up, you are ready to market your event.
Pro Tip: Allow ample time for marketing your event so you can book all your time slots.
Email marketing
You can use the PhotoBiz Marketing Suite, to send email campaigns to your contacts. The Email Builder is connected to our CRM tool. Here you can use tags to organize your customers and leads (both the ones generated through interactions with your website and those you manually upload). You can use our email templates to get started, or create your own from scratch.
Pro Tip: Include a button in your email with a direct link to your mini session landing page to drive customers to book a session.
Social media marketing
You can get really creative with marketing your mini session events on social media. There are a number of tools available from social media platforms that can help drive customers to your landing page.
Instagram/TikTok: Create videos or Reels that promote your mini sessions. The videos could preview the session theme and/or help customers know what they can expect.
Pro Tip: Add a link to your mini session’s landing page to your profile to drive people to your website.
Learn how to set up a landing page for your social media profiles
Facebook / LinkedIn: Share your mini session events with your followers and encourage them to share with their friends, families, and colleagues to help build up interest in your event. We also recommend sharing the event in local Facebook groups and “parent groups”.
Pro Tip: Include a link to your event landing page and pin the post to the top of your page for easy access to visitors.
Follow up with your clients before (and after) your event
In addition to using emails to share contracts and market your event, you can use them to remind people who have booked mini session appointments about what to expect. Because you included tags on your Scheduler events and digital contracts, you can easily identify who to send the emails. A reminder email like this can help make your mini session event go smoothly.
What to include in your email:
- Say hello and thank you for booking
- Reminder about the event theme and what’s included in the session
- Location, date, and time
- Recommendations on what to wear, parking details, etc.
- When they can expect to see the photos
- Your phone number, for day of questions
Pro Tip: Automate this email reminder to send a certain number of days before the event!
Sharing and selling photos from mini sessions
Once you’ve hosted your mini session event, you get to share the images with your customers. You can use the PhotoBiz Client Proofing Galleries to create private client galleries. They are fast and easy to set up, plus great for sending to your client to view on their own or for in-person presentations.
Depending on your workflow, you might want to consider the following options as you set up your proofing galleries:
Workflow option 1 (proof unedited images):
If you edit images after your clients make selections, you can disable downloads when you initially share the gallery. You can encourage your clients to select their favorites and then export the list of favorites, edit the files, and share the final images for download.
Pro Tip: Create a new gallery within your client’s proofing event to send them the edited images. This organizes the images and makes it really easy to identify the edited images. To encourage additional sales, you can also set up a price list of products and packages people can purchase directly through the client proofing gallery.
Workflow option 2 (proof edited images):
If you edit images before your clients make selections, you can allow them to download images and make purchases from the moment they receive the proofing gallery. After they purchase the prints they like, you can send the files to the lab of your choice for printing.
Learn more about:
Setting up your ecommerce
Setting up your price list
Post event follow up
The fun doesn’t end when the event is over and images are selected and printed. Mini sessions are a great way to connect with new customers. Keep the conversation going after the event to keep them engaged by inviting them to future mini session events, sharing more about your services, and building a relationship.
Now you’re all set! Mini sessions are a fun way to connect with your customers and craft unique sales opportunities for your business. Not only that, it connects to many types of clients in a short amount of time who may become recurring customers. PhotoBiz makes it easy to book and sell online with our powerful Studio Management tools. To learn more about how PhotoBiz can help your business, check out our Product Guides.
Need help? Call 866.463.7620 or live chat with our support team. We are happy to help!
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