TRAILBLAZER: BECKY BRODERICK

Becky Broderick has always loved photography. Beginning at family weddings with only a gifted camera, her photos quickly gained notoriety. Before she knew it, Becky had her own business. After training with some of her most admired photographers, Broderick Photography found its niche with family and infant portraits. However, she finds enough time to spend several weekends per year at dance studios, capturing aspiring dance students at their most elegant best. It’s here where Becky’s unique use of onsite sales with PhotoDay that makes her a Trailblazer. 

For over fifteen years, Becky has used a versatile and ever-fashionable “high key” style to shoot her her dance studios. The shoots themselves can be quite long, sometimes running eight to ten hours. However, they remain profitable even at that length. Becky had a hunch that shifting sales online would make these days even more profitable, and so she began looking for some kind of solution. After a bit of research, she was drawn to PhotoDay’s quick and easy workflow.

Without wanting to risk her existing client relationships, Becky experimented with PhotoDay under a new studio. Her plan was to exclusively use AdvancePay, and not take photos of any dancers who did not pay ahead. Unfortunately, perhaps because Becky wasn’t a known entity at this new studio, she did not find many takers. In the end, all of the dancers were photographed, whether they purchased an AdvancePay credit or not. Her sales ended up being fine, but not what she had hoped to find. This is where Becky decided to alter her strategy.

For her second shoot, she opted not to use AdvancePay. Instead, she went for a unique, hybrid style sales shoot. Rather than give parents an access code for the possibility of them opting in later, Becky had them opt in on-site. She also employed the use of three iPads for anyone who did not wish to use their own devices but found that most people did not need the extra assistance. This smooth process led to most parents filling out their photo orders during the event. At the end of the second day, every order placed was at the lab and all payments were processed and in transit to her bank account.

The results of this second strategy proved to be stellar – Becky accrued five-thousand dollars more in sales from that same studio the previous year. The reduced lab and staffing fees also meant even greater portions of those sales became pure profit for her. She credits the increased sales to the ease of the process, with parents being able to see, live, what they were ordering, and the fact that parents who could not attend the shoot could still order photos.

Below compares Becky’s sales on a single studio between 2018 and 2019, with the latter being after she adopted PhotoDay.

*The number of orders for 2019 is lower due to customers being able to choose from multiple costumes for one order, as opposed to one costume per order.

In addition to higher gross sales and average order value for 2019, Becky also saved $700 in employee fees and $1800 in lab fees!

Becky helps herself by helping her dance studios. In addition to earning a percentage of the profits from a photo shoot, these dance studios can also use her images to assist in their own marketing efforts. It’s truly a mutually beneficial relationship!

For now, Becky plans to continue using her hybrid sales strategy. Along with her online sales. she still frequently creates photo collages of dancers in several costumes and would like to continue accepting paper orders for those collages. As Becky has said, “it’s all about what makes the most money the fastest. For me, that definitely using PhotoDay on-site”. Every business has their own needs, and we are absolutely thrilled that Becky Broderick has found a way to incorporate the PhotoDay workflow into her business that helps both her and her studio, but also the dance community she frequents!