Craft Venture: to hire or not to hire
Mar. 8 10
Happy Monday everyone and welcome to this week’s Craft Venture! I’m Brenda from Phydeaux Designs, and we’re starting a new series this week, about hiring help! In my previous day job, I had to hire or be involved in the hiring of many people. I learned quickly (the hard way) that making superb hiring decisions is absolutely essential – hiring underperforming, nonmotivated or even dishonest staff is an absolute nightmare and complete waste of your limited monetary (and other) resources. The thought of hiring a helper may be terrifying for some folks for just that reason, along with others. There is both a science and an art to great recruitment – and I look forward to sharing that with you!
I’ve heard a recurring theme when talking with handmade and vintage sellers lately. “I wish I could hire someone to help me.” Everyone has great ideas about what their helper could do: package and ship orders, do piecework, catalog/inventory stock. The possibilities are endless! Many of us are in the same place in our businesses: just on the brink of being large enough to be able to afford/absolutely need help.
I’m in the same position myself! I will most certainly need help this coming Fall and holiday season. I could have really benefitted from help during January and February while I was focused on preparations to vend at a huge annual marketplace for knitters. My focus meant less focus on my online and wholesale business. With help, I might have been better able to handle both.
Maybe you dream of help. Maybe you’ve already hired an assistant or apprentice or two. Maybe you hire seasonal help or helpers for trade/craft shows. I think at any given point, we all dream about having more pairs of hands to help with our businesses. This kicks off a series about how to find and hire the best possible help for your business, as well as things you’ll need to be aware of and/or think about (oh, say, like the “law?”).
But before we get into the nuts and bolts, we first have to figure out if we can even (or truly want to) hire help! Hiring help seems like a heaven sent dream come true, doesn’t it? I’m here to tell you, after years and years of management and recruitment experience, that YES, hiring the right help will change your life in the best possible ways. Hiring the wrong help is your worst imagined nightmare. Hiring the wrong help is super easy. Hiring the right help is a huge challenge. Guess which happens more regularly? Yes indeed, poor hiring decisions are probably more common than very good hiring decisions. Luckily, I’ve learned the hard way, through years of education and practice, how to make better hiring decisions, and I’ll share that with you in the coming weeks. Perhaps the repetitive stress of your particular art form is wearing on you, so you need to spread the wealth with some of that routine work (sewing, hammering, knitting, etc.). Or you just really need to actually eat dinner with your family, and spend time with them after dinner, and having someone do your shipping and other routine paperwork could make the difference for you.
If you opt for “easy” and make a quick hiring decision that ends up being disastrous, you’ll know why so many people don’t even want to consider hiring help. Hiring and training fantastic help is not easy! It’s a lot of work, and it’s work away from your business. It’s also a necessary investment if you truly want to grow your business. A poor hiring decision will give you sleepless nights and possibly ulcers from the stress and angst you will experience. You may need to fire that person, which – I won’t lie – is very very difficult to do. But you have to do it! Unfortunately, I also have experience (and education) in the art of letting people go, and we’ll have a post on that topic.
Before we get ahead of ourselves imaging sleepless stress-filled nights, let’s think of some good reasons for wanting to hire staff. Maybe your direct sales and/or wholesale volume has steadily increased to the point that you either have to stop accepting orders or hire help. Perhaps you finally got that call from Big Huge Retailer you’ve been dreaming about, but there is no possible way that you can fill all on your own by the date the order is needed.
There are probably a gazillion different really great reasons for hiring help! You don’t even have to hire longterm help – you can hire someone for just a day or a week or a month or a season of work.
You do have to be able to afford to hire your help – and that’s the problem for many of us. If you’re barely making a profit, how do you afford hiring someone who will need to be paid? Before you answer, “I’ll hire them as an intern without pay,” make sure that you understand your state’s laws about voluntary vs. paid labor (more on that in an upcoming post). You don’t want to make assumptions ab0ut this area – if it’s not very clear to you, talk with someone from your local Small Business Association to make sure you don’t unwittingly break your state’s labor code.
Even if you can’t afford to hire a helper, there are other ways to get help and free up more time for your business, like contracting out piecework, hiring a housekeeping service (something I dream about doing!) or sending out your laundry. Hire the kid next door to cut your lawn – you’ve just saved a couple of hours a week during growing season!
We’ll dive right in next week; in the meantime, let’s talk about hiring help! Do you have helpers? Tell us more about your experience! Do you need helpers? Tell us about what’s holding you back!
I’ll kick off the conversation with my own experience, which is that I would love to hire someone to help me with my knitting business. I would love someone to package and ship orders! I do plan to hire an accountant for my taxes this year! But – and I’m that many of you are in the same position – I’m right in that spot where I’m a little too busy to not have help, but not busy enough to be able to afford help. So I make do with myself and work really hard with really long hours, which means there are new designs I never get to or new ventures I’m not able to follow.
Share with us your experiences, as well as your questions in the comments!
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Image Credit: Chris Overworked by Before the Coffee and With a Handshake by Corey Olsen
Craft Venture: Photo makeover, part V
Feb. 22 10
Happy Monday everyone and welcome to this week’s Craft Venture! I’m Brenda from Phydeaux Designs, with another post about product photography! Last week, we talked about styling ideas for your photos. Today, I wanted to share with you some online resources to help you improve your photography skills (or learn new ones!).
The internet is full of fantastic resources for just about anything, including photography! Lost your camera manual? Turn to Google or just head to the manufacturer’s website for a digital replacement in a matter of minutes.
The internet is full of free and for-pay resources for photographers, both professional and fledgling. I wanted to share a few with you today, but would also love for you to share those that you use in the comments!
Disclaimer: I use some of these sites regularly, others not very often. I’m not a professional photographer! You may or may not agree with any or all of these sites as useful. However, if you have more sites to recommend, let us know in the comments!
In no particular order, other than alphabetical:
-Blog posts with photography tutorials: Search Google (or your search engine of choice) for blogs with photography tutorials.
-CNET Reviews: Digital camera reviews.
-Craft: Photography tips and tutorials.
-Craftgawker: Submit a product photo for publishing on their site or feedback for improvement (and then resubmit after you make those improvements – you may still get feedback, in which case, you can try for some more improvements!).
-Decor 8: Just found this great post from Holly about product photography.
-Digital Photography School: Tutorials, equipment reviews, and a community forum.
-Flickr groups: Join a group or two specific to your camera (or more general) – many photography/camera groups on Flickr include tips and tutorials.
-Google Books: You can search Google Books for limited preview or full view books on any subject, including photography.
-Make: DIY imaging!
-Photojojo: Tutorials and projects, a community forum, and a super fun online store.
-Table Top Studio Product Photography How To: Tutorials galore!
-The Storque: Etsy’s blog also has photography tips and tutorials.
-Youtube: Just search “photography tutorial” for a wealth of how to videos.
These are just a few possibilities! Share with us sites that you’ve found to be the most helpful!
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Image Credit: Happy print by Lola’s Room; Endearment Necklace by Anne Kiel Jewelry; The Camera Shop by Laura Evans
More Product Photos Help
Feb. 17 10
If you have been keeping up this last month with Brenda’s craft venture posts here on the blog, you know that the focus has been on how to take better product photographs.
And as luck would have it, I just learned of a fabulous collaboration between Tara Lutman Agacayak and Diana Brennan for a basic product photography course that would be helpful for anyone needing some extra help. The two met in Holly Becker’s (Decor8) Blogging Your Way e-course last year and have been planning this project for almost a year.
Diana, of D.S. Brennan Photography is a skilled photographer (some product photos above). And Tara is hosting the course via her site, Intarsia Concept.
I am certain this course is going to be a valuable resource. The class is eight weeks and is designed to teach people basic photo skills that they can use to take professional-looking photographs to bring more attention to their products and help in their online or print sales.
The course will begin on Monday, February 22nd and registration has already begun. For more info on course fees and a more detailed description, click here.
Craft Venture: Photo makeover, part IV
Feb. 15 10
Welcome back to Craft Venture! I’m Brenda from Phydeaux Designs, with another post about product photography! Last week, we talked about what to avoid with your photos. Today, we’re talking about some styling ideas to make your photos come to life.
A little ditty has been running through my head for the past few weeks as I think about how I want my own online shop to look. “Are these the photos I want Martha Stewart or insert-other-big-celebrity-name-with-the-power-to-affect-my-business-in-an-unbelievable-way-here?”
What if you knew for certain that Martha Stewart’s staff would be looking at your shop tomorrow? Are your photos up to snuff? You’ll get a 20 to 30 second chance if this were to actually happen; if your photos aren’t immediately engaging, your chance is shot.
Until computers are equipped with smell-o-vision or virtual reality becomes available to all, your photos are absolutely crucial to the success of your business. Your photos are the first thing that potential customers see – or don’t see! You want your photos to be those that stand out in a sea of other photos and draw customers into your virtual shop.
Because you can’t smell or feel the items in your photo, you need to bring your photos to life for your customers. Turn two dimensional into three dimensional! Show your items in use! Create movement! Taking a snapshot of your secret recipe brownies on a napkin on your floor is flat, unengaging, and unappetizing. But style your brownies so that they’re on a clean white plate with a frosty cold glass of milk with a red gingham napkin … and you’re showing someone brownies about to be devoured.
You can create depth in your photos via layering of objects and/or use of depth of field. How do you layer objects? if your item is a handbound journal, you could artfully pose it on a stack of books, with something a bit taller on top (say a cappuccino or an antique inkwell). Shooting from above and using your camera’s focus on your journal, the items below and above it become a bit blurry. You’ve created depth in your photo! And I didn’t use any big, fancy photography words to do so!
Take closeups of your items using your camera’s macro lens/feature! You should have a button or setting on your camera that looks like a flower. Use that setting and focus on the closest edge of your item. This is ideal for jewelry, allowing extreme closeups in beautiful detail.
If you make adorable infant clothing, your best photos are going to be of adorable infants wearing your clothing. Don’t have adorable infants? Talk with local photographers – see who’s willing to trade or work out some kind of deal for their photos of your items on their models.
Think about how to tie your branding into your photos. If the logo for your canine collar business is your super cute chihuahua, I hope you’re using your chihuahua as your collar model! If you design modern stationary and papergoods, a clean and simple background may be all that you need.
I think styling is really important; however, I also think it’s easy to overstyle your photos. If you have so many geegaws and props in your photo that you can’t tell what is for sell, you’ve probably overstyled. If you sell vintage toy tops, styling against a floral curtain and fresh flowers and crystal vase and pearl necklace is not only overstyling, it also doesn’t make much sense. Don’t overstyle, but be sure to style with items and in a manner fitting to your item. A vintage toy top could be perfect with a well loved vintage teddy or just a couple of worn toy blocks!
Have some fun with your photos! How can you create movement in a way that is unique, intriguing and visually engaging? If you use live models, have them move around! Dance! Leap! Work it! Take a photo of your fresh from the oven brownies, showing rising steam. Show your handmade curtains fluttering in the breeze.
Styling is where very well meaning sellers slip up and start copying other sellers’ style of photos, rather than draw inspiration from their particular style. I often encourage new sellers to look at top sellers’ shops, studying their photos, and then do something completely different. It’s tempting to take photos just like the number one vintage seller, when you sell vintage toy tops; however, you want to establish your own unique brand and look, right? Martha Stewart’s people are very likely already aware of the top sellers – don’t lose out on an opportunity the day they happen to peek into your online shop, simply due to unoriginality.
Draw people into your shop with your photos. Keep them looking because of your photos. Most important, convince them to buy from you because of your photos. Your photos are key! Make yours uniquely you, engaging, three dimensional, and immediately recognizable.
Think about your very best photos. What makes them so good? Did you consciously do any of the above? Or was it subconscious?
Put yourself into the shoes of the editor of your very favorite magazine. Now imagine visiting your online shop from that perspective. What would you change?
Image credits: Recycled Wood Bracelet by Pretty Birdie: Bright Sunshiny Day by Farouche
Craft Venture: Photo makeover, part III
Feb. 8 10
Hi everyone! I’m Brenda from Phydeaux Designs, with another Craft Venture post about product photography! Last week, we talked about photography equipment. This week, let’s talk about things to avoid with your product photos.
You’ve made the most wonderful, fantastic widget on Planet Earth. Perhaps even the known Universe. Not only are your socks knocked off by your widget, but your mom thinks it’s stunning! You lovingly photograph your widget and list it for sale in your online shop, then proceed to refresh your screen for the next few hours, knowing that you will retire early with your sales from this glorious widget.
And then … less than a handful of views.
So you take another look at your fantastic photos. What can possibly be the problem? After all, your first photo is incredible! Your widget is lovingly nestled on your shag carpeting, which you vacuumed just last month!
Rule #1: unless you’re selling a floor cushion or vacuum cleaner, avoid photographing your products on the floor.
You really like Seller Susie’s widget photos, so you made your photos look exactly like hers. Well … she sells diamond widgets, photographed on someone’s beautifully manicured hands. You’re morally opposed to both diamonds and manicures. Anyway, your widgets are so beautiful, who’s going to notice your torn cuticles and broken fingernails!
Rules #2 & 3: develop your own individual photo style and include only clean and well groomed body parts in your photos.
And your lighting was so perfect! Your camera’s flash makes your widget so pretty!
Rule #4: please … no flash.
Maybe you should just pull out your sure fire trick and photograph your beloved kitty wearing your widget. Who can resist his sweet face? With the right angle, no one will notice the stitches from his surgery!
Rule #5: unless your product is for pets, avoid using your pets as your models. And if your product is for animals, be sure to include a disclaimer that the product in the photograph is not the product that your customers will receive!
I’m exaggerating! However, I have seen all of the above in product photos (not the kitty stitches, thankfully!). On nearly every venue offering handmade and vintage goods and supplies, you will find photos that range from merely mediocre to truly unfortunate. Luckily, you will also find many photos from good to truly outstanding.
Of course, there are exceptions to any rule. However, if you’re not seeing the traffic you want for your shop, take a closer look at your photos. Look at every size of your photos that your customers are able to see, from thumbnail to highest level of zoom. Since color values vary between monitors, check your photos on multiple computers, including your mobile phone browser. Ask photographers for feedback. Moreover, act on that feedback!
Next week, we’ll focus on rules to live by: best practices and styling ideas.
What other avoidance “rules” do you recommend? Which do you wish you’d known about when you first started as a seller/small business owner? Do you disagree with any of these? Changing your perspective to that of a customer, does your mind change about any of these?
Images: Echeveria Succulent by Monkeys Always Look; Fresh Floral Ring by Oh Hello Friend; Custom Tea Dress by sohomode
Craft Venture: Photo makeover, part II
Feb. 1 10
I’m Brenda from Phydelle and Phydeaux Designs, with another Craft Venture post about product photography! We started our series last week, talking about how to create your own branded photography style.
When I first started my own Etsy shop, I didn’t know how to use my point and shoot digital camera, other than to … point and shoot. I definitely didn’t know how to edit photos, despite owning Photoshop. It took me a good six months before my photos stopped making me cringe! My photos have further evolved (and will continue to do so!). I’ve graduated to a DSLR camera, but some of my very best product photos were taken with my much loved point and shoot.
You really don’t need fancy or expensive equipment or software to take really great photos! If you have great natural light and a digital camera, you have all the tools you really need. Photo editing software is a plus, but there are many good – and free – software programs to choose from.
You also don’t have to be a professional photographer or take photography courses. The internet has nearly limitless resources for you to learn how to use your camera to take great product photos. You can complete any number of online tutorials to improve or learn how to use your camera, use light, edit photos, etc.
If you don’t have great natural light, you can buy or make a lightbox for small item photography and you can buy lighting equipment for large items. If you want to buy equipment, just search Google or ebay for terms such as “lighting equipment,” “lighting kit” or “studio lighting equipment.” I have absolutely terrible natural light in my house, so I invested in lighting equipment early on. You can pay thousands of dollars or less than a hundred for a lighting kit (if you’re not a professional photographer, look for equipment on the low end of that spectrum). If can also make your own lightbox, following online tutorials.
As for cameras, do your research, read reviews, and find the best quality you can afford at a level you will actually use. You probably don’t need tons of bells and whistles. If your camera allows you to zoom, use a macro lens, and gives you some manual control in addition to auto adjustment, you should be good! I’ve seen absolutely phenomenal photos taken with iphones and really bad photos taken with very expensive, high end DSLR cameras. My number one piece of advice is to read the reviews and remain objective – don’t let yourself get swept away with cool or sexy features you’re not likely to use.
There are infinite resources to help you learn to use your camera, lighting equipment, photo editing software, and (most important) take good photos! Next week, we’ll talk more specifically about best practices and what to avoid.
What about you? What kind of camera do you use? Do you use natural or artificial light (or both)? What advice do you have to share about camera and lighting equipment?
Image credit: Mint, 8×8 print, by Lola’s Room; Pictures of you, original illustration, by Michele Maule
Craft Venture: Photo makeover, part I
Jan. 25 10
I’m Brenda from Phydelle and Phydeaux Designs, back for another Craft Venture! We talked last week about revisiting your pricing, all part of our January series on post-holiday shop clean up and makeovers. You can’t have a makeover without new photos, which is what we’ll talk about this week!
I’ll start this week with an immediate disclaimer: I am by no means an expert in photography! But I can tell you without equivocation that when it comes to shopping online, we shop with our eyes first. The stronger and more appealing your photographs are, the more traffic you will have draw to your online shop.
Before you pick up your camera, spend some time working your way through a couple of crucial steps.
First step is to critically look at your photos! Are they a bit stale? Still have some Christmas, Halloween or even Fourth of July photos in your shop? Are you baffled about why your fantastic and beautiful widget just isn’t pulling in visitors? Or maybe you are rebranding your shop, building consistent styling across your photos? Ask someone for constructive criticism of your current photos (I recommend asking a successful online seller with fantastic photos for that kind of feedback, rather than your best customer or mom or spouse!).
Next step is to think about your brand, your customers, the story you want to tell with your photos and descriptions. You can tie all of this into how you style your photos!
That last step may be a little confusing if you’ve not previously thought about branding. A cohesive shop tells your visitors who you are and how they fit into your world. For instance, if you knit beautiful baby blankets and beanies, you have a defined group of people who will be interested in your goods. Your particular branding may be as simple as photographing your hand dyed yarn in a consistent fashion against a white background. You are only limited by your imagination and resources!
Also, think about your “back story” – the story you play in your head (not necessarily verbalized) as you style and photograph your widgets. How can you style your photos to fit your back story? Every photo I take for my own shops has my very own super secret back story, which drives my styling, lighting and even editing! Perhaps your back story is literally a story … a series of mini-stories told via product photos. Or perhaps it’s a theme that helps your create consistency and cohesion. Even a process or method for those with super photography skills! In all of these cases, your back story ends up being key to your overall branding.
You might be thinking this sounds like an awful lot of work, and it can be! Think of it as laying down the foundation for one of the most important aspects of your business and what is seen first by your potential customers: your photos.
How are you doing overall with your photography? Are you consistent and cohesive? Do you have a back story? Are your product photos immediately recognizable as your own, in a sea of similar products?
Additionally, think about the product photographs that most impress you on your favorite blogs and shopping sites. What draws you to those photos? Is it the light, the styling, something else? Think about your own photos and identify what makes them so appealing.
Images: Turquoise bear with crystal stars in paw brooch by ememem; The summer berry stack pompom headband by Yokoo
