I've been thinking a lot this week about how much more goes into a photography business than just taking pictures. The actual portrait sessions are a very small part of my time actually. If I were to do 3 sessions a week that really is only about 10 hours a week of time between travel and the actual session. But you've heard it all before...all the time to review the images, edit the images, present the images, sell the images, produce and deliver the images really adds up.
But then there is the BUSINESS side of things that takes a bunch of time. I'm talking about the extra two hours a day of what I consider unscheduled tasks. Not that I don't always know they are going to show up, I just might not know that I'll be doing those tasks that day.
I'll give you an example. Last week I needed to call my equipment insurance company to authorize them to send the proof of insurance to my leasing company. I called on Thursday, navigated the phone menu system which did not have an option that worked for me AND did not have an option to talk to a customer service agent so I pulled the "customer service" card and managed to at least get a live person who could transfer me to the appropriate person. I left a message in their voice-mail with the appropriate authorization. The next day the leasing company still didn't have the certification so I had to call again, navigated the phone menu, got transferred, waited on hold...got disconnected, called again, waited on hold, and FINALLY got to speak to the person I needed to get this taken care of. All in all, it was probably 40 minutes of time over two days. Not 40 minuted I had scheduled on my calendar, but something that needed to get done. It may not sound like a lot but it is like the death by a thousand cuts. Each cut isn't a big deal but those little tasks can really add up to a lot of time...and you may not even realize it!
One of the types of data I like to look at is my efficiency with my time. There are weeks where I know I've spent too much time on Twitter or Facebook. But lately I feel like I've been better to focusing - especially when it comes to processing images. Now when I'm editing a session I usually try to keep all my other stuff turned off so I can really focus on it.
A while back installed Rescue Time to both my laptop and my office workstation. It is software that runs behind the scenes to track the time I spend on different applications allowing me to get a sense of what I've been working on. The results of last week's reporting are shown above. So I worked 45 hours on my computers last week. That doesn't include my two portrait sessions and the time I spent interviewing two associate photographer, any of my phone calls, and the time I spent packaging and shipping orders. So, um, yeah, I work a bunch (although my personal computer time is also included). Not surprising is that I spent most of my time is spent in "Design/Presentation" software which is Photoshop! Second is my email which is also not a surprise since I do spend a LOT of time emailing every day.
One of the interesting items was the "business/finance" category which was about 2.5 hours last week. That is the time I spend in Quickbooks, on Paypal, and on my bank website. That actually seems pretty reasonable to me. A half hour a day to manage my money, easy. The week before I spent 6.5 hours on that same category because I had gotten WAY behind on my quickbooks and had to reconcile like three months worth of bank statements which really sucked. Last week I was MUCH better about updating as I go so I shouldn't have such a big chunk of time all at once. And I finally got the syncing between my bank and Quickbooks setup so the transactions automatically get imported into Quickbooks.
Also not shocking...I spend a TON of time on Facebook. I try to check in a little during the day, and then really get updated at night. Some of that is purely personal time. But a lot of it is keeping up my relationship with clients that have become friends, networking with other photographers, managing my fan page, and managing my facebook ads.
So, what are you doing to stay efficient? Do you keep track of your time for all your tasks?
I had a question. Spending that much time on Facebook (which I have been avoiding), are you seeing a payoff though in marketing and booking clients? I took a class from a Senior/Wedding Pro Photographer and our first assignment was to set up a Facebook account because he said he received 50% of his senior business from it! Thanks.
Posted by: Debbie | June 12, 2009 at 06:42 PM
I think that most people don't realize the significance of time spent to not only attract business but also to perform your daily business requirements aside from shooting. It's scary if you look at it from a financial aspect, you have to realize this is a passion, a calling if you will of excitement, dream catching... you are likely feeling the same otherwise you wouldn't be doing what you do.
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Posted by: Craig | June 27, 2009 at 09:23 AM
I wondered the same about the amount of facebook time. Do a lot of people enquire on their? That time allocation looks pretty good though. Majority of time would be spend in photoshop. I look at that and think there might be a few things that wouldn't interest me. I know that with smart phones and such now too, you can easily make use of some down time @ doctors, dentist, in lines, waiting in traffic. I really liked this post because it gives the people like me - whom want to do this - an inside look.
Posted by: Scott Webb | June 29, 2009 at 02:23 PM