TRAILBLAZER: BECKY DESENTI

This article has been amended since its initial publish date with updated sales information.

MEET BECKY

For years, Becky Desenti was the mom with the camera. The mother of four and a competitive cheerleading coach, Becky was constantly around sports and athletes and she always had her camera. One day, in a frustration familiar to any young athlete, one of her sons said, “Gosh Mom, you’re worse than the paparazzi, you’re the momarazzi!” And with that, Becky’s future business was born.

What started over 5 years ago with a volleyball league has grown to 10 client organizations that keep her busy throughout the year. Momarazzi Studios has enjoyed steady grow as Becky is constantly thinking up new, innovative ways to engage with and excite her customers.

Although Becky still has a soft spot for competitive cheerleading, her clientele includes senior portraits and teams in all sports. Today, she captures over 2,000 athletes across three seasons – so 6,000 unique sales opportunities. Because she’s seeing many of the same kids throughout the year, her focus on developing strong relationships in the community has been key to her success.

Becky is known for her creative composite photos. Her work combines her passion for action sports with a touch of magic, bringing to life a piece of graphic art that truly captures the inner athlete.

WHY SHE SIGNED UP FOR PHOTODAY

After a recent health crisis, Becky found it difficult to run her business the old way – with heavy boxes of order forms and physical deliveries. She realized that her current business model was not sustainable for her. Thanks to the loyalty of long-term clients, Becky was able to put some stopgap measures in place to keep her business running, but knew she had to find a better way. “Anyone could have come in and taken my clients,” says Becky. “I knew I had to find a way to help my business run more efficiently.”

Along came PhotoDay. The reduction in paperwork made PhotoDay a perfect fit for Becky’s needs and AdvancePay was the perfect partner for her composite shots. “Parents were becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the idea of having to pre-order pictures they couldn’t see,” says Becky. “AdvancePay lets me take the deposit I need to create the composite without tying parents up in expensive packages that they might not want. I actually find that putting down a small amount with AdvancePay makes parents more likely to place a bigger order later on.”

THE “BECKY METHOD”

Before PhotoDay even had the AdvancePay feature, Becky invented a manual, offline way to capture $10 from each athlete before she snapped the camera. In return for the $10 cash payment, Becky issued each person a unique $10 coupon code that could be applied toward a future order in PhotoDay. This $10 created some “skin in the game” commitment from the parent while covering many of her upfront costs. It’s this forward-looking, fearless innovation that makes Becky a true trailblazer.

RESULTS

Becky is thoughtfully introducing PhotoDay into her business – one client at a time. Already, she has seen a huge savings of time and money for her PhotoDay jobs.

At a recent photo shoot Becky was capturing 100 kids over two days. By her estimate, Becky saved $100 on order forms alone. More importantly, she saved $10/hour on an onsite assistant to handle order forms as well as countless hours of her own time previously spent managing order forms and customer data.

Thanks to multi-pose and FaceFind, Becky has seen up to an 87% higher AOV compared to the same jobs done the “old way”.  The highest order included digital downloads for 15 different poses – a $434.97 purchase! Her average order value on PhotoDay is $62.67! (Data updated 2/2/21)

In the fall of 2019, Becky shot a football and cheer league that housed an estimated 120 athletes. With this league, every single one of her 99 opt-ins came from either a cash deposit from her “Becky Method” or through AdvancePay – racking in an astounding $1, 430 just in pre-pay! Of her 79 orders for that league, she saw $4,830.76 in sales, with an average order value of $61.60. With her combination of unique strategies, Becky has seen consistent sales and order values as she continues to utilize PhotoDay.

Almost as important to Becky as the money is that the lack of order forms saves her physical space in her house, and eliminates handling of personal information like credit card data. She also loves putting the decision about which photo to choose back in the hands of parents.

“Organizations love it, too,” says Becky. “There’s no more waiting for everyone to get their order in before the organization can start earning their fundraising percentage of the profits. Parents get their orders faster, and I save precious time. This system really has benefits for everyone.”