As we wind down the year, we put together a far-ranging episode with tips on how to succeed despite whatever personal failings you might have (LOL).
From web tips, to what you can learn from the folks in Las Vegas, there's plenty of insight and nonsense to go around.
Photo Happy Hour is brought to you by MoLight, Seniors Unlocked, and Carl's Coaching Corner.
Your Hosts:
Michael Mowbray, M. Photog., Cr., owns Beautiful Portraits by Michael in DeForest (Madison), Wisconsin, and MoLight. Learn more at:
https://www.beautifulportraits.com
https://www.gomolight.com
Dan Frievalt, M.Photog., M. Artist, Cr., owns Frievalt Photography in DePere (Green Bay), Wisconsin, and runs Seniors Unlocked. Learn more at
https://www.frievaltphotography.com
https://store.seniorsunlocked.com
Carl Caylor, M. Photog., Cr., ASP-Fellow, Kodak Alaris Mentor, owns Photo Images by Carl in Iron Mountain, Michigan, and also runs Carl's Coaching Corner. Learn more at:
https://www.photoimagesbycarl.net
MoLight offers more than 20 different MoLight -brand softboxes and modifiers.
As we wind down the year, we put together a far-ranging episode with tips on how to succeed despite whatever personal failings you might have (LOL).
From web tips, to what you can learn from the folks in Las Vegas, there's plenty of insight and nonsense to go around.
Photo Happy Hour is brought to you by MoLight, Seniors Unlocked, and Carl's Coaching Corner.
Your Hosts:
Michael Mowbray, M. Photog., Cr., owns Beautiful Portraits by Michael in DeForest (Madison), Wisconsin, and MoLight. Learn more at:
https://www.beautifulportraits.com
https://www.gomolight.com
Dan Frievalt, M.Photog., M. Artist, Cr., owns Frievalt Photography in DePere (Green Bay), Wisconsin, and runs Seniors Unlocked. Learn more at
https://www.frievaltphotography.com
https://store.seniorsunlocked.com
Carl Caylor, M. Photog., Cr., ASP-Fellow, Kodak Alaris Mentor, owns Photo Images by Carl in Iron Mountain, Michigan, and also runs Carl's Coaching Corner. Learn more at:
https://www.photoimagesbycarl.net
MoLight offers more than 20 different MoLight -brand softboxes and modifiers.
Episode 80
Michael Mowbray: [00:00:00] Hey and welcome everybody. Come on in and grab a seat at the bar. I'm your photo happy hour bartender, Michael Mowbray and joining me behind the bar are Dan Frievalt and Carl Caylor.
Carl Caylor: Happy
Dan Frievalt: little
It's great.
Carl Caylor: Woohoo.
Dan Frievalt: great to be back behind the bar. That's all I can
Michael Mowbray: It's been a while. I was thinking we just did one not that long ago and it was like, it was the day before Halloween, so
Carl Caylor: What
Michael Mowbray: been through like holidays since then.
Dan Frievalt: iT's been three
Michael Mowbray: Veteran's Day, veterinarian's
Dan Frievalt: Day,
Michael Mowbray: Thanksgiving.
Carl Caylor: Where's, wait, when was Arbor Day or Flag Day? That Now we missed those,
Michael Mowbray: that's, it's June, I think, isn't it? I think they're both
Dan Frievalt: Your boss's dog's secretary's day.
Carl Caylor: day.
Michael Mowbray: boss had a colonoscopy day. Ooh.
Carl Caylor: That was, they used to be on Bob and Tom's show, so
Michael Mowbray: Speaking of which, that is a topic for today. Have you had a colonoscopy? Do you remember watching Scooby-Doo when you were a child? [00:01:00] You need a colonoscopy,
Dan Frievalt: That kind of goes right into if you've never been here before, we've been around a while and we know a thing or two about photography.
Carl Caylor: Yeah.
Michael Mowbray: If it's your first time here the purpose of this podcast is we really have no idea. . We are three professional photographers who have been around for a while, friends for a long time, and know a thing or two. So we get together, we have some drinks and we talk photography, yeah.
Carl Caylor: Sometimes on occasion.
Michael Mowbray: We usually lay down some pretty good advice and some tips when those are gonna happen.
Nobody knows I.
Dan Frievalt: Nobody knows. They're, they've, we to go in with a game plan and now they're just sporadic as it, as they into our heads.
Michael Mowbray: we come with game plan, we throw it out and we're starting to draw plays in the dirt.
Dan Frievalt: yeah.
Carl Caylor: But speaking of tips, I found a new ingredient for when I do the venison tips. Remember the whiskey that we liked so much from Tennessee?[00:02:00]
Michael Mowbray: yeah.
Carl Caylor: Oh, it gives you a nice caramel flavor.
Michael Mowbray: Caramel whiskey on venison tips. There you go. See, we have cooking tips, we have drinking tips, we have photography tips, we have life tips.
Carl Caylor: drinking tips.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah,
Carl Caylor: Yeah.
Dan Frievalt: Don't follow us for the life tips though. I'm not quite sure.
Michael Mowbray: we've made
Dan Frievalt: sound
Michael Mowbray: many bad decisions.
Carl Caylor: Yeah.
Dan Frievalt: follow us for what not to do
Michael Mowbray: We, we've become successful despite ourselves. Hey, that's the topic of the podcast. How to become successful despite yourself,
Carl Caylor: Yeah.
Dan Frievalt: There you go. There you go.
Carl Caylor: I like it.
Dan Frievalt: Number one or top, top things I wish I knew when I started my photography business.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah. I think more web stuff. That's where I've been for the last week. I wish I knew more web stuff, although when I started the photography business, [00:03:00] there were
Dan Frievalt: There was no web.
Michael Mowbray: It was 90,
Dan Frievalt: only webs were
In your closet.
Michael Mowbray: yeah, it was 95, so I guess there were technically some websites then. But yeah, Google didn't exist. It was pre Google.
Carl Caylor: Yeah. You got online it went
Michael Mowbray: Yes. Had to use Alta Vista to do a search or ask Jevs.
Dan Frievalt: Oh, geez. Life is such a fantasy.
Oh no, that's Alta Nova
Carl Caylor: that was my whole point of getting into photography. I would never have to take one of them stupid computer classes.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah.
Carl Caylor: Now look where we are.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah, no kidding. I Fought with domain names, servers, services for the last three, four days. Woo. That was fun.
Carl Caylor: Yay. That sounds like fun. I didn't Jen have to fight with somebody? Is that what she was
Michael Mowbray: Oh, she just she was just able to buy her name. She's been trying to get her name for a decade 'cause somebody else had registered [00:04:00] it and. They offered to sell it to her, but then they wouldn't complete the sale. And then she waited another five years and now she found out that it's for sales, so she made an offer and they counter offered and I think they came to a decision and I joked all along that I was going to buy it.
And she's oh, you're gonna buy and give it to me. I was like I don't about give it to you . You want it so bad, huh? A little 10, 15% finder's fee I think would be fair.
Carl Caylor: I just still
Dan Frievalt: would she prefer just to change her name?
Michael Mowbray: Yeah.
Carl Caylor: Len Jewish sounds pretty good. I mean that
Dan Frievalt: There you go. Yes.
Carl Caylor: Yep.
Michael Mowbray: So tip number one for today is go check your domain for your website and see when it renews. And if you don't have it on Autorenew, set it on Autorenew, which I have for all my domains, like all 10 of them. Make sure they're auto renewing. I'm not kidding. I think I do have 10.
Dan Frievalt: Oh yeah. No. At least I buy one every other day. [00:05:00] 'cause I have an idea like, Hey, this is gonna be a great idea. I'm gonna buy, I just let one go, by the way. 'cause I'm like, why am I keeping this? But I'm not gonna pay to renew it. I'm not gonna use this idea
Michael Mowbray: Oh yeah. I've had a number of those I've had to let go. 'cause it's like how much am I spending on these things I'll never build. Yeah. Although I still have photography university.com photography with an f.
Carl Caylor: I have artist choice too, somewhere. I don't know
That one. I might have to bring back up though, or bring up. 'cause that might be a fun one to use for
Dan Frievalt: I have one that's that says it's worth like 1500 bucks. I'm like, really? I doubt I'll get that, but I'm like, yeah, sell it
Michael Mowbray: Yeah, it's worth whatever somebody pays for it.
Dan Frievalt: I'm holding onto that. Until times get tough, I'm gonna sell that domain.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah.
Carl Caylor: It's an investment.
Dan Frievalt: It's an investment. Domains going for sale. You know I've hit rock. I'm,
Michael Mowbray: Yeah, young youngsters don't remember the wild West days of back when people were doing domain grabs [00:06:00] and, going out and buying everything, and then holding people hostage to try to sell them their business name as a domain name. Yeah, that was
Dan Frievalt: So speaking of that I don't know how true this is, like anything you read on the internet or see on
Michael Mowbray: It's true.
Dan Frievalt: whatever, it's, yeah it's gotta be true. But this whole AI thing where now a lot of domains are like ai . I don't see, I'm gonna mess this story up, but each like country is responsible for a certain dot whatever, and I don't know if it's like Antigua or something is in, has the.ai, so the small little Caribbean country is gonna, they get a percentage of all the AI sales.
Yeah.
Michael Mowbray: Hopefully it's not Albania. That would be That would be owned by the Albanian mob. Which kinda runs,
Carl Caylor: Look guys, we got another one.
Michael Mowbray: yeah.
Dan Frievalt: they got in trouble 'cause [00:07:00] they didn't pay the guy who repackaged the AK 47 rounds.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah. Yeah. War Dogs. There we go. We got a drink
Dan Frievalt: There. You got it? You got it. Great
Michael Mowbray: by the way, again, if you're just joining us for the first time every pop culture reference is worth a drink and we drop a lot of them.
Dan Frievalt: Movie. Movie quote. Yeah.
Carl Caylor: we don't mention enough. I'm, in fact, I'm not sure if we. Mentioned this, but it's okay to drink along with us.
Michael Mowbray: Unless you're driving, then you should pull over
Carl Caylor: driving or something. Yeah.
Michael Mowbray: and maybe call an Uber
Carl Caylor: yeah, that would be a good idea. But
Dan Frievalt: Or in a shower? No, you can drink in a shower. You can prepare a salad
Carl Caylor: water it
Dan Frievalt: shower.
Carl Caylor: Just don't water it down
Dan Frievalt: Shower, beer. Prepare. Prepare the salad in there. Just like Kramer
Carl Caylor: K Creamer, Wait you know that's another one.
Michael Mowbray: We've hardly
Dan Frievalt: multitasking.
Michael Mowbray: scotch.
Carl Caylor: I'm almost outta this too. Hey [00:08:00] dad, you were in Vegas. You were telling us you found some really awesome marketing ideas. What's Give man? Give. What's up? What'd you find out?
Dan Frievalt: I did. So I was in Vegas. Stephanie and I went there. We took a trip. I've been out there teaching several times and I. Just noticed that every time I go out there and teach, I don't have time to enjoy Vegas and I'm not a gambler, but I love all the other stuff that's that Vegas has to offer.
Like I'm a foodie, so good food and good drinks and just shows. I've never been to a show's the first time I went to a show, but yes, I know. 'cause we're always, I'm always out there working. And even when I went out there, no, I don't know when I was out there. The other, like the first time I was in Vegas was for
I would you call vacation. But I was with a group of guys. We were like 22 years old. , we weren't really going to a show. But one thing really hit me whenever I travel or whenever I'm always looking at how businesses run [00:09:00] or how marketing things, and as us as photographers, we say, oh, the competition, everyone's a photographer.
Everyone has a phone taking pictures. How can we compete? How can we compete? Even though Vegas is luxury, they have really locked in on, there's the strip and how do you compete like hotel, after hotel. How do you get people to go to your hotel and not to any other hotel? And it's interesting to see all the little things that they do to draw you in to that hotel.
And each hotel has their own theme or their own little . Thing or their own unique restaurants or attraction that pulls you in. And so I like to take those nuggets and say, how can I apply that to my photography business? How can I be different than everyone else? If Vegas can do it, how can we do it?
Michael Mowbray: Plus Vegas has evolved. If you go back 20 years, 25 years, used to be, everybody had a cheap buffet that had, really [00:10:00] good food and
Dan Frievalt: Yeah,
Michael Mowbray: now food is expensive unless you get way off the strip,
Dan Frievalt: almost everything is expensive now in Vegas. It's not yeah, like it used to be like, Hey, we're gonna get you in so you can gamble. And then it evolved into a destination for adult entertainment. And so they, Hey, we don't need cheap food to get you in. There's all these shows and, different attractions, the Bellagio fountains, the Venetian and their in Italy inspired.
Michael Mowbray: The gondolas.
Dan Frievalt: fountains. The gondolas. Yeah. Yeah. And it's become a foodie rich area. Like celebrity chefs all have restaurants there, and craft cocktails. The big thing I've noticed, and I. Is all these now like speakeasy, speakeasies, or hidden bars? And it's fun to try and find them. They're not, some of 'em are hidden.
Most of 'em aren't hidden that well, that's, they still want you to find them, but it's like these cool, like it's [00:11:00] a pawn shop, but then there's a backdoor and you sneak in and there's a whole restaurant bar and has craft cocktails and, really cool craft cocktails. You know something, you're gonna spend 20, 20 some dollars for a drink.
Michael Mowbray: there's eight guys like passing around a bottle in the garage
Carl Caylor: eh
Dan Frievalt: yeah. Either way. You never know
Michael Mowbray: Forget about it.
Dan Frievalt: Forget about. Yeah. Or even off the strip, there's so many attractions off the strip because they're trying to pull people away from the chaos and how can they have a more of a like Red Rock? I. It's all about, more about family. There's a bowling alley, there's a movie theater, there's, views of Red Rock.
There's hiking and there's a lot of things to do than just gambling or being on the strip. Which is, I find fascinating that when you look at the business aspect and. And just Vegas in general, like you said, Michael who would've thought someone like, Hey, we're just gonna take the desert and [00:12:00] then create an attraction.
And what's gonna bring people out here, while gambling and that was the first, version 1.0 of Vegas. And now it's evolved to several different versions,
Carl Caylor: So what did you find, what's the coolest thing you saw that, that you're gonna implement or that you're gonna try to implement?
Dan Frievalt: I think just in general, just thinking, again, what, like I always try and do I always preach, be the red apple. Stand out, be different. Do if everyone's doing X in your area, do y. So it's like if everyone's doing composites, I wouldn't do composites, in your area.
Michael Mowbray: What's your hook?
Dan Frievalt: What do you, what's your hook?
Yeah. And it, or it could be like, if no one's using off-camera lighting, I. Get better at lighting and learn lighting. If everyone's doing a model team, how can my model team be different than everyone else's? Like I started instituting the charity [00:13:00] aspect of the model team and doing a lot of good for the community when everyone else is we're gonna give you free photos and we're gonna give you free photo shoots and it's all about how many people you bring to me.
I wanted to do something like, what can we do for everyone else? It's not about me. And then ultimately. Word of mouth will get out and people will book you because you're doing something good. That's not really the reason why you do charity, but it is a side effect of Hey, we're making an impact in other people's lives and we're also teaching 17 year olds, responsibility and something that they can do that is, something that
That generation wants to do, they wanna help. They've been, they've grown up in a different time than we have. So that's, when you read books on the gener, gen Z and stuff, it's like they want to help, they wanna do good things for the environment, for the community. They wanna make an impact. And use those core values as a way to market your business and to [00:14:00] attract the right clientele.
I.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah,
Dan Frievalt: that's, that sounded pretty good.
Michael Mowbray: it did. Oh.
Carl Caylor: we should write that down.
Dan Frievalt: impressed myself sometimes. Yeah.
Michael Mowbray: I've, I've talked to a lot of people this year where similar kind of thing. Nobody else in their market is doing, for example, colored gels, so they, they talk to me as what can, what kind of kid or what kind of gear can I. Put together for them so they can add some, color into their work.
So they stand out and can be that red apple in the sea of all the green apples in their particular market. And and some people are doing that with, RGB LEDs and, or off-camera flash. 'cause there's still a lot of markets where people aren't using much off-camera flash.
It's all natural light, and you can really stand out and create a different look with off-camera flash.
Dan Frievalt: aNd it, it can be the littlest things that make you stand out. If you have a studio, or you look at what the trend is and then you try and buck the trend. Like I said, if everyone's doing x, do y, it's okay, if everyone's shooting [00:15:00] outdoor locations and studio work got fuddy duddy, how can I
Create studio work that's unique that no one else can copy unless they have a studio, like you mentioned, gels and fog and different things that you can do in the studio that gives a very impactful type of image that no one else I. Can do, or maybe it's just meeting with every single client like I've been doing.
I, I started that a couple years ago. I would just book everything over the phone and I'm like, wait a minute. I have a studio . I want them to come in to see that the, to help justify the price, touch the albums, and see the large wall art. And that's the first impression. Why am my first impression over the phone?
I wanna meet with them, I wanna talk to them. I want them to see the images. Yeah. Pre-sell them, go over the pricing with them and show a bunch of different images. Or it's hey, if they're into Harry Potter, oh by the way, boom, I could pull up. Harry Potter images. If I was smart as I was doing this over the years, I would like [00:16:00] tag things like meditate things so I could find them easier.
Michael Mowbray: Oh yeah.
Dan Frievalt: so that's a little bit of a challenge, especially on the fly. But what I've noticed that I've, I'm really a good way to find them is using all my apps. 'cause I use my photo app and those are all on . The, on the web, I guess still. So I just go back to my builder and I remember, oh, that one girl, what was her name?
I could remember her name or kind of what year it was. 'cause I have 'em all labeled by year. And then I can pretty much find it pretty quick. Instead of going through the server, I'm lost going through my server. I will never find a Harry Potter image.
Michael Mowbray: just go.
Dan Frievalt: by the way, I guess
Michael Mowbray: You just go
Dan Frievalt: I shouldn't say Harry Potter.
Michael Mowbray: Akio, Harry Potter images
Carl Caylor: Yeah.
Dan Frievalt: Yeah.
Michael Mowbray: When guardian, let's see. osa.
Dan Frievalt: yeah. And if you are responsible for the trademark of Harry Potter, I'm not actually making money off of Harry Potter. It's a magical, it's a magical scene of flying books [00:17:00] in auras.
Michael Mowbray: That's right, which, existed before Perry Hotter
Carl Caylor: Yeah. Bewitched.
Michael Mowbray: Which is actually the name of a a font that I have that looks just the one from that one kind of movie and book and stuff, but it's called Perry Hotter
Carl Caylor: That one.
Dan Frievalt: Hotter
Carl Caylor: hotter. What was Bewitched? The witch. What was her husband's name?
Michael Mowbray: Darren,
Carl Caylor: Okay. We
Michael Mowbray: What do I win? Which one? They were both named Darren. What? What were their real names? Dick York and Dick Sergeant,
Carl Caylor: Wow.
Dan Frievalt: Wow.
Michael Mowbray: is a great porn name, but
Dan Frievalt: That's yeah, , that's like a shotgun of a beer there.
Carl Caylor: kind of stuff never comes up in trivia at the bar.
Michael Mowbray: I don't know,
Carl Caylor: I don't know.
Dan Frievalt: Or how come we can remember that stuff, but not like important stuff like,
Carl Caylor: Yeah. Okay, if it was at F 11, at one 25th of a second at 400 ISO and we would change to F 5.6, what do we have to [00:18:00] change our ? No one can remember that stuff,
Michael Mowbray: No that's six clicks. Click . Each one's a third. Stop. Click. That's how I do it. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. There we go.
Carl Caylor: just like when you're citing in your rifle scope, you know it's how many minutes?
Per minute
Dan Frievalt: clicks,
Carl Caylor: Anyway, whole different story, but it was just deer season, so
Dan Frievalt: Speaking of stories, here's another Vegas story, which
Carl Caylor: ooh.
Dan Frievalt: Is quite interesting and it's about Steve Wynn and Steve Wynn, owns the Encore and the Wynn Hotels and things like that. But interesting story is that he started as like a blackjack dealer in Vegas and he got to be good friends with hi Howard Hughes and Frank Sinatra.
Carl Caylor: Oh.
Dan Frievalt: one of them, I think it was Howard Hughes, owned this chunk of land, a parking lot next to I think Caesar's Palace. And so he talked, he looked at everything [00:19:00] and Caesar's Palace didn't know if they owned it or I. I'm not sure if they did or not. So they never built on it. So he talked Howard Hughes into selling it to him through Frank Sinatra.
They all talked, so we bought this. He went in and that this was also the time when banks were starting to try and weeded out the mafia money that was in Vegas. So they were giving loans out to people to, to revitalize Vegas and get that kind of money out. So they gave him a loan with very little collateral, other than I think Sinatra saying, I got this guy, don't worry.
So he bought this parking lot and he put out a full page ad, saying that he was gonna build this casino, hoping that Caesar's Palace would then wanna buy it from him. So he flipped the land. He had no intention of actually doing the casino. So within a few months he like. Quadrupled his money. And that's how he [00:20:00] became a multimillionaire. And then he invested in casinos in, I think what's the Reno and
Michael Mowbray: Henderson.
Dan Frievalt: and then no more Reno, Nevada and stuff like that. And then he came back and built the win and everything. And also he, I think another side note is that he was the first person to start, like MGM and a bunch of Basically the six big resort hotels out there. He was the brainchild and the driving force with that which shifted Vegas from the casino gambling into more the touristy slash mega resorts that it's known for now. So that is a quick little interesting story. And the reason I bring it up again is it's about marketing.
It's about what kind of. Thing, can you put out there that, sets yourself apart or I don't wanna say tricks people, but it's like you can, you can put out some really cool imagery that attract people or sometimes you spend a lot of time [00:21:00] on a composite, you may not sell that composite.
But it, it creates a lot of buzz because it's something that's unique. So sometimes people are like how much time do you spend outta that? Or entering competition and spending a lot of time on competition images. But then if you win or if you get a G or get nominated as a GIA or the World Cup or something like that, you know what kind of marketing, not, what kind of things can you pull off that marketing by doing things like that?
Spinoff. Yeah. Residual. Yeah.
Carl Caylor: get spinoff just from the look of that image too, that maybe you spent more time on, maybe it was something more creative than what you've done in the past. 'cause you're just trying to push the edge of the envelope. But people get talking 'cause it's, again, like Dan's a different and heaven forbid, you probably learned something while you did it too. So it win-win. Give it a shot.
Dan Frievalt: Yeah.
Michael Mowbray: one, one of the things I learned about business out in Vegas too is that once the casinos get you in there, they don't wanna let you leave and they don't wanna make it easy for you to leave. Even though they have to have exits, [00:22:00] it is hard to find them.
Caesar's Palace is one of the best of them.
'cause you get in there and you're like, everything looks the same no matter what. What angle you turn and it's I don't even know how to get to the bathroom because everywhere I turn it looks the same. I spent like an hour in Caesar's trying to get out of it.
Carl Caylor: how do you let, what, so what do you do? How do you equate that with your business as far as, say for example, business portraits and business teams?
Photograph the groups individually and composite them so that they have to
Michael Mowbray: a golden handcuff that you can't really leave. Yeah.
Carl Caylor: when the staff changes and they do
Dan Frievalt: Yeah. Or it's touching all the senses. All the senses. Like Vegas is king on. Purposely made busy so that you keep your eyes up and then there's all the lights and the dinging, no dinging ding, dinging, ding, dinging. It's all, creates a euphoria. It [00:23:00] creates dopamine hits, all those noise and sounds.
And then the smell, each casino has a unique smell. Not mixed with the smoke sometimes, but , and the, so it's the lighting. It's just all your senses, the smell, the sound,
Michael Mowbray: It's the pure oxygen they pump in there. They give you a little bit of euphoria. Yeah.
Dan Frievalt: Yeah. Yeah. So as so as someone enters your studio do you have a good smell going on , do you have, when you, when they touch, when they grab an album, is it a, it's a $4,000 album.
Is it beefy? Does it have leather? Does that metal, you throw it on your lap and be like, oh, this is heavy. In fact, we're all wearing headphones. Beets is another company that's very interesting. I dunno how true this is, but . They're, you pick up a Beat's headphones, they're extremely heavy, somebody dissected of them, and they found a bunch of pieces that have nothing to do with the audio
They're just basically chunks of weight in there. So they feel more expensive, than a lightweight.
Carl Caylor: than light.
Dan Frievalt: Yep. Yeah. So it's your senses that are working. [00:24:00] It's all those modalities. I think as John Allen would say,
Carl Caylor: It. Yeah.
Michael Mowbray: Sure we'll go with that.
Carl Caylor: hEavy is expensive. Unless
Michael Mowbray: I must be very expensive.
Carl Caylor: Yeah I was thinking about you, Dave, because of this Michael. I was I was doing this shoot with with my great big heavy duty boom arm.
Michael Mowbray: Yes.
Carl Caylor: And I'm like, oh God, I can't I was thinking I'm gonna take this long because I'm doing I'm starting to do a bunch of branding photographs of different company, different businesses up and down my area here.
And I'm like, oh, this would be really cool to bring into their place of business and actually do. They're display images or there are displays of boutique displays of products. If I could just bring in this so I can light from above. And but gosh, that thing is so dang heavy. I'm like, I gotta talk to Michael and get a lighter one because I know you guys have one.
Michael Mowbray: The Rolly moly.
Carl Caylor: the
Michael Mowbray: Rolly Moley is on sale. It's my mo sale right now.
Carl Caylor: Oh, I [00:25:00] gotta go try
Michael Mowbray: Mo. Mo Mo.
Carl Caylor: And how far will it extend? Can I get it out over some
Michael Mowbray: Oh yeah.
Carl Caylor: okay,
Michael Mowbray: nOt as far as one of those really long boggan ones, but I couldn't have seen taking that into any place.
Carl Caylor: can't,
Michael Mowbray: Be knocking shit over
Carl Caylor: get it in their, I can't get it in their store.
I'd be knocking crap over everywhere. And it weighs a metric ton to lift the thing up. It's great. It works, it's sturdy. It holds a lot and it reaches a long way. But again, every tool for the job or the right tool for the job, and this definitely isn't the right tool for going to those locations.
But I do want the lighting from there. We gotta put the light where it needs to be and. I think that tool's gonna help out. So the rolly moly is but is that the it Rolly moly to me. Sounds like it's a stand. It's
Michael Mowbray: it's a rolling boom. Yeah it's actually heavy duty and the boom is actually a separate piece that fits into the top, but it has the crank and everything so you can reposition the light. [00:26:00] Oh yeah. It's a very nice, everybody should have one.
Carl Caylor: should do that. I gotta go and go on the go go. Sale
Michael Mowbray: And that's a good segue for me too. I just launched a brand new website, that's why I was complaining about all that name server stuff, so totally retooled mo light. So it's gomolight.com or molight.com will take you to the exact same place. So whatever trips your trigger if you want, type. Two fewer letters.
That's cool. Lot easier. Much easier to navigate. Much easier to find things. I kept getting tired of people calling me and emailing me. I can't, I need a battery for my such and such. I can't find it. It's like it's on the site. Just if you can't.
Dan Frievalt: gonna still get those emails.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah. . I was like, if you can't find it now I can't help you
It's so easy. It's so easy now. Yeah.
Dan Frievalt: Which is another point of. iNterest or another point of, what can you do for your client to make it easy for them to book [00:27:00] you or to find something or navigate, or is your website mobile friendly? I don't know what the stats are, like 75, 80 5% of people are, on their phone when they're looking at your website.
At these day and age you need a site that's mobile
Michael Mowbray: It's about 53 47 for me. So mobile versus desktop, but that's for
Carl Caylor: The other thing I noticed, and for all these I, I know. I know Dan and I both use PhotoBiz for our websites, and I guess I should have known this. I heard 'em talking and I maybe ignored it or it went in one ear and out the other. But they offer email campaigns as part of subscription to your website.
I have been doing e-commerce for years on my website for I. Youth sports and stuff like that. So people have, when they go to see their images, they have to do it by going to my website to get to that page to see [00:28:00] their stuff. And it worked out real well to drive traffic there. But now I found out that if you generate an email list, so I ran that Halloween special where everybody came in, we did free.
piCtures of the kids in the costumes during trick or treating. And, but for them to get their free download, of course they had to type in their email address to go do that. So now I have collected all those. I had collected 95 emails, or a hundred, I'm sorry, 113, but 95 actually. I. Allowed it or whatever, how, however it works out.
But anyhow, I did an email campaign today and on PhotoBiz you create your email. You don't just type an email. You create an email just like you're creating the webpage , and use the same tools or same buttons or same. So you can link the button to something, a site on your, a page, on your website.
So like you said. Make it easy for people to get there. They don't even have to go to my website and then go find kids or families or whatever. I'm, in this [00:29:00] particular case, I want to sell family portrait specials for, or gift cards. Specifically, I want to sell gift certificates for family portraits for Christmas, so I created an email blast. It brings them right to it. And the e-commerce side of it, now, it goes right to a button that said, here's your three options, click on it, you can purchase it right there. Boom. Done. It makes it easy to put everything you want right in front of them without them having to think out. All they're doing is, oh, like this.
Press the button. Oh, like that. Press a button. Yep. They don't have to navigate anything anymore. It's just. So cool. So check that out. If you're not, if you're a PhotoBiz person ready and you didn't realize you have that oh me go look at it. 'cause it's really cool. And if you're not a PhotoBiz person and you your website doesn't have that, then you might wanna look into that. So
Michael Mowbray: photobiz.com.
Carl Caylor: that's gonna count as a drinking thing because it was
Dan Frievalt: Promo [00:30:00] and the beauty of the other beauty of PhotoBiz, which we've. Talked about, I'm sure several times, is that if you need to talk to someone, you get a real live person when you call.
Michael Mowbray: yes.
Carl Caylor: Instantly.
Michael Mowbray: Real people.
Carl Caylor: Yeah.
Dan Frievalt: Real people, which is their unique selling point. Like I always say they're a customer service company that happens to sell websites, , it's not that's what I call them.
I'm sure that's not what they would call themselves, but that, that is because in today's society where there's everything's on. Online or you can't get ahold of anyone. They said, we're gonna be different. We're gonna stand, we're gonna be like, what's the number one pain point People are trying to build sites, photographers who have no clue about web design and they're frustrated because they can't talk to someone.
So let's. Set. Let's set up a place where we can, you can talk to someone and they'll actually help you. They'll know what they're doing. They're not just reading off a script of did you re, did you unplug your computer? [00:31:00] Did you reboot your computer? It's no they know what they're talking about.
And the thing I don't know. I guess they know what you're talking about. I had so much I set up my website years ago, so I don't have a even I don't even have a opportunity or a reason to call them, which is also a good thing, . But if you're new, they'll even set it up for you.
Carl Caylor: I call him today. Actually had to laugh because I, somewhere along the line as I was doing this, I saw. Because I'm doing a second, or I did a second email right away, blast right away to another set of images or people anyhow. And I thought when I was clicking on stuff, I noticed this thing popped up and it had analytics about how many people opened it, how many clicks you got for the different email campaigns.
And I thought, oh, that's interesting. But I'm like, where did I see that? Like I wanna make sure that the new one I sent out today actually went out. 'cause I forgot to put my, that's another thing to do by the way.
Michael Mowbray: The mailing list.
Carl Caylor: iT got it. I forgot to do at that time, but, so I [00:32:00] called them and they always ask you, okay, it comes on 'cause you hit okay.
Do you wanna talk to a specialist? Yes, I do. Boom, press one. And it says, okay to save time, make sure you have your account number and the last four digits of your credit card on file so that we make sure we know it's for security. And . It's in the top right corner of your screen if you really wanna pay attention.
And the guy, , the guy gets on, he's what's your account number? And I started rallying off and I said, in the last four digits, and I'm, and the phone, the business is, and he goes, oh, okay. Okay. We got it all good. He goes. Wait, what number? . He goes, oh crap. He said, I haven't heard that Lova number in since I've been here.
It's 100 dash 13 or something like that.
Dan Frievalt: Yeah.
Michael Mowbray: your account, number six,
Carl Caylor: exactly. they started at 100 dash something, so he goes, you're like one of the first people that have
Dan Frievalt: Why I have to look now
Carl Caylor: Yeah. [00:33:00] I'm not
Dan Frievalt: see what mine is,
Carl Caylor: but it was, it is like one, one of the first in the first batches of an account. Numbers that know it's all he goes, you're still
Dan Frievalt: are old
Carl Caylor: still alive.
Dan Frievalt: We didn't know. We didn't know websites existed back then.
Carl Caylor: Yeah.
Michael Mowbray: I, I did a lot of head shots for ge GE Healthcare over the years, and they used to have to put what was called their, like their employee number, which is like an SSO number, they called it. And it was always this long one. And this guys was, it was like 2 0, 0, 0 0 1. And I'm like. I look at him, I go I've never seen one like that.
And he goes, yeah, I created the SSO system. So the original
Carl Caylor: Oh my gosh.
Michael Mowbray: Oh, okay.
Dan Frievalt: Social security number. 0 0, 0. Zero. Zero
Carl Caylor: So 0, 0,
Dan Frievalt: zero.
Michael Mowbray: yeah.
Carl Caylor: 2. Got it. All [00:34:00] right.
Dan Frievalt: Boy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Carl Caylor: I'm not gonna say we're old, it's
Michael Mowbray: Getting there.
Dan Frievalt: goodness.
Carl Caylor: there.
Michael Mowbray: Lisa got a mailing because her birthday's coming up. She got a mailing from A RP, which I always make sure to put on top of the mail pile
Carl Caylor: Hey, car insurance. Just saying,
Michael Mowbray: Oh, I might have to look at that.
Carl Caylor: oH.
Dan Frievalt: Another pro tip is you do not have to be a certain age to join A RP. So if it may be worth it, even if you're like 30 years old, to look at what benefits you could
Carl Caylor: Yep.
Dan Frievalt: could get from joining that.
Michael Mowbray: cheap. I don't know. We actually might actually look at it,
Carl Caylor: way worth it. Just be, I think it's like $125 for three years if you did a bundle of years or something like that. It wasn't much, but it saved like 16% or some dang thing like that of car insurance.
Michael Mowbray: Oh wow.
Carl Caylor: an a RP member you definitely, you tell that to your insurance agent for your auto insurance 'cause it.[00:35:00]
It will most auto insurances it. It will save you a ton. So something to
Dan Frievalt: Because I photograph seniors I don't do this. But when I would pho, when we did have a bigger studio and photograph other things, I know we joked about it last time with me photographing babies. You thought that was a good picture. That, but
Carl Caylor: I still
Dan Frievalt: I think that was in a podcast. We talked about it, if you have generational or type of sessions where you would wanna encourage them to come back, create a loyalty program, create a lifetime of portraits, something, to encourage them to keep coming back. Like all these businesses have them Starbucks. They have their app and it's you get so many stars, you get free to drink,
Michael Mowbray: Your 10th
Dan Frievalt: Same thing with
Michael Mowbray: free.
Dan Frievalt: Yeah, haircuts, X amount of haircuts, you get this, or X amount of massages, you get a free massage. Like you, it could be as simple as a punch card, or just again, coming back to Vegas, we landed, we went to get our rental car. There was a huge line.
[00:36:00] To get the rental car.
And there was a big sign that said if you're a preferred member, you can go right down and get your card. So as we're waiting in line, I'm like, what does it take to be, become a preferred member? I just have to sign up, be beep. I signed up. Bing, you're a preferred. I jumped outta line. I left Stephanie in line just in case it didn't work.
I walked down to a preferred area,
Carl Caylor: Choose
Dan Frievalt: to rent the car. Choose the car. I texted her going, , come on down.
Carl Caylor: We
Dan Frievalt: got ourselves a car.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah I don't think it costs anything, does it?
Dan Frievalt: It didn't cost anything.
Michael Mowbray: I'm a Hertz Gold member. I can't remember last time I rented a.
Carl Caylor: I rented one a couple years ago and got on the preferred list that, this is a couple years ago I did it and then we went to Colorado back in the end of September and I forgot all about it. And I, we get there and I got, boom, I got a text. I got off the plane and said, remember, your hertz rental is set up for blah, blah, blah, and you are[00:37:00] gold membership, whatever. When you get there, look on the gold members' board. So my name is there and it said, what lot your car is in? You said, go and you just choose whichever car's in that.
Dan Frievalt: In a row. Yeah.
Carl Caylor: The red one.
Okay with you sweetie. Yeah, the red one looks good. Let's get in the red one.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah.
Carl Caylor: just drive out. They stop you at the thing, do your license and say, see you in a couple days. Go. It's crazy. Cool. that's service. That's way cold service.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah because traveling and flying and all that stuff sucks. Anything anybody can do to make the whole thing faster, easier, more pleasant, perfect.
Dan Frievalt: Or one thing I offer is at a 5,000 order, I will come and professionally install your portraits for you. Or if someone you know has a wall cluster that they've ordered. And I know that it's gonna be a pain for them to hang it up. [00:38:00] And I've gotten so good at it, I'm like, Hey, you want me to come install this for you?
I'll, install it for you. Or I'll just say, Hey, what time would you like me to come and install this for you? Take away the headaches or the negatives. I think we talked about this, about the family portraits. It's what kind of negatives can we take away to, to make it an easier experience to get them to purchase those clusters so they won't be like, oh, now I gotta install this thing.
No, I'll do that for you.
Carl Caylor: . Just show me. Point me to the wall. Let's go do it.
Dan Frievalt: That's do. Yep. Now other people are like, are you worried about liability or something with that? You might wanna check on your insurance company
Michael Mowbray: Yeah. Don't drop a hammer on the,
Dan Frievalt: I have insurance.
Carl Caylor: so
Dan Frievalt: Yeah. I have offsite insurance for photographing seniors. Yeah.
Carl Caylor: Absolutely. It's gotta count for something. Yesterday
Dan Frievalt: I'm not.
Carl Caylor: I did the same thing yesterday. I I got done stretching a canvas for family. Called her up, said, Hey, it's all ready to go. And yep. Stretch a canvas. And it was backordered and it's a whole big [00:39:00] back order of canvas thing right now.
If you're a print, if you print on your own. It's a pain right now. But, we got hers finished and gave her a call and I said, Hey can I come over and hang it? She's I said, what? She said we have construction going on right now. And I said, oh is it everywhere in your house or
Is it just where you might wanna hang the portrait? And she said we didn't plan on this. They, we had a toilet that was leaking. They went in to fix it and. The builder messed something up came back from work and they didn't tighten something down when they were trying to fix something.
Dan Frievalt: Ooh.
Carl Caylor: And yeah.
Caused all kinds of problems. So that was dinging number one. Dinging number two is there, the next company was in there ripping out the flooring, the tile on the floor, 'cause everything got wet underneath it. So ripping it out couldn't get it upright and they. Somehow when they were prying the thing up, somebody like slipped [00:40:00] with it at the bar, whatever.
It went through the wall of their master bedroom,
Dan Frievalt: Oh.
Carl Caylor: So now
Michael Mowbray: Perfect. You can hang it in the master bedroom, cover up the.
Carl Caylor: so I said, I'm like, so I said, I, I was calling her to tell her that I'd be happy to come hang this stuff up for her, install it. And then I start thinking. She's probably worried about anything in her house right now.
I said, would it be better if I stored it here for a couple weeks? He said, oh my God, that'd be great. So sometimes what we intend to do. Is it necessarily what they need? So listen to them. And I think, but she had mentioned, she, I could just hear her mind going here. We got builders that are creating more problem, more stress, more.
And here's . You're asking if you can come help and then ask if you know what, instead of going bring it there. Do you want me just to keep it for a couple weeks? so it's safe before, while they're finishing Crap up. She said right now they'd be happy if all this stuff was done by the end of February.[00:41:00]
Michael Mowbray: Oof.
Carl Caylor: I know I can't even, Ima I don't even wanna imagine it.
But that's another world of that we live in right now too. Trying to get any kinda construction done
Michael Mowbray: Yeah.
Carl Caylor: on a timely fashion is a whole different world. Yeah.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah.
Carl Caylor: happy Christmas everybody. We're gonna have your toilet
Michael Mowbray: iT didn't happen on Christmas at
Track 1: least,
Carl Caylor: there you go. Something to be joyful for.
Michael Mowbray: So speaking of Christmas, parting shots for Christmas,
Carl Caylor: We need more eggnog.
Michael Mowbray: I need eggnog. Don't have any yet
Carl Caylor: that. That's true. I don't either.
Dan Frievalt: I had some last night, but it was expired I had to, it didn't taste too good. I had to dump it out. a bit of sour.
Michael Mowbray: Sure.
Carl Caylor: Oh
Dan Frievalt: Luckily I didn't put any brandy on it. I'm like, Ooh, this says this, the expiration, it says sell by the 30th, but that mean that's sell buy. So I'm like, I think I got a little leeway.
Michael Mowbray: When [00:42:00] Was it open though?
Dan Frievalt: Yeah, before the 30th, yeah, before Thanksgiving.
Michael Mowbray: Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. Once you open it, you, yeah. Dairy.
Dan Frievalt: So I took a little sip. I think it'll be okay. Took another sip.
Michael Mowbray: No,
Carl Caylor: No,
Dan Frievalt: not good. So I luckily I didn't put any, whiskey or brandy in it and, ruined that. So that was good. I, there was no alcohol that was sacrificed in that, although it might've killed the curled ness of it.
It might've been okay.
Carl Caylor: No, it really doesn't.
Dan Frievalt: It doesn't. Okay. Speaking from
Michael Mowbray: folks, that's your,
That's your pro tip. Your parting shot is check your and make sure it hasn't curdled
Carl Caylor: It's good
Michael Mowbray: you put the booze in it.
Carl Caylor: Yeah. Words to live by
Michael Mowbray: yes.
Dan Frievalt: I got back from Vegas. I was broke. I was trying to,
Carl Caylor: then you'd be selling off internet sites or
Dan Frievalt: I'll be yeah. I'll be selling off my domain name so I can afford the nog for
Carl Caylor: See how we always come back.
Dan Frievalt: Bring it full circle.
Carl Caylor: uhhuh,
Michael Mowbray: So the question is, [00:43:00] are we maybe gonna do one before the end of the year? Do a year end wrap up? Or is this the last
Carl Caylor: gotta do a celebration one and we got, we always do a celebration one. I mean that, end of the year, even if it's between Christmas and New Year's Eve, that
Dan Frievalt: Or should do a live, could do a live
Michael Mowbray: could always do a live one, so
Carl Caylor: we could, we should, we haven't done, we haven't done a live one in quite some time.
Michael Mowbray: yeah. Could be the time to do one.
Carl Caylor: could
Dan Frievalt: our listener can show up. We better make sure that they are available
Michael Mowbray: That they have, they take a little time off. And I'm looking at the clock here 'cause we're trying to keep these under 50 minutes now, so I'm just
Dan Frievalt: Oh, we better wrap it up.
Carl Caylor: seven, six a minute, and five a minute. Four
Dan Frievalt: Time out. Time out. Oh wait. That doesn't work.
Carl Caylor: doesn't work
Michael Mowbray: was in bounds.
Carl Caylor: Hey y'all.
Michael Mowbray: So have a great holiday. Whatever holiday you celebrate and hopefully we'll see you. . Talk to you maybe live before the end of the year, so cheers.
​