In PDN’s “Promos I Kept” column, Deena Fayette (Y&R) mentioned two promos that stood out as being over the top. She couldn’t remember the name of the photographer who sent the first one, but she remembered Casey’s name:

“The second one, from Richmond, Virginia-based photographer Casey Templeton, is more recent and he clearly put a lot of time and effort into the piece, so much so that I did go through it very thoroughly. The piece, labeled ‘Allow Me To Introduce Myself’, is a lunchbox filled with items that relate to who he is as a both a photographer and a person was very well done. Again, I’m just not a fan of getting all this stuff in the mail. But I did keep the coaster with his name on it and I did go to his Web site and the work was pretty good.

PDN: Would you hire Casey based on that piece?
DF: I don’t know if I’d hire him…the whole thing with if I would hire someone is, I work on specific accounts where I already know what the style is or what the work is that client tends to go for, so if it doesn’t fit into that milieu, then it doesn’t really register with me. Unless, of course, it’s just a really visual, great image…”

For what it’s worth, I like the promo. But I thought I’d add this to the comment trail.

GOOD LUCK to you on your NEW brand and your new marketing adventures!

I for one just want to say thanks for sharing with us all here when you could have just sat back and accumulated back pats and kudos for your work with Casey.

As someone who spent the last year reinventing themselves for work I am now in a position where I have to plan my own marketing and it’s refreshing to get an insider’s look at this project. Well done to all of you.

Have a great weekend!

I feel like I made the right decision in enlisting Suzanne’s help just last week my self. I can’t wait to get her perspective on my port, website, etc. etc. etc.

I think it’s extremely valuable to get your marketing together.

I’ve heard way to many photogs say…”man…my photos kick the crap out of XYZ photog’s and he just shot for [Insert major corp here]. That’s B.S!!! I could run circles around XYZ photog.”

Funny thing is when I ask the photogs who say those sort of things – “So what are you doing to show it?” – the answer 9 out of 10 times is…”Well my website shows the kind of work I can do.”
I follow up with…”And what do people say about it (your website)?”
I get a lot of “Well..” – “Umm…” and a hundred other answers that basically get to the point of – YOU DIDN’T DO ANYTHING TO GET PEOPLE THERE DID YOU? NOPE.

I don’t mean just e-mail promos, I mean real promotion, thought through more than just a “Oh it’s Tuesday and I’m not busy so I’m gonna send a pretty picture to 200 random emails”.

READ – Target, plan and execute…and oh yeah, DON’T BE CHEAP. And get someone who has experience to help you!

Cheers,
Rick

you gotta get peoples attention some kind of way.

It’s interesting how we might be at a time where a (dot.com) alone is just furniture and needs an old-school jump-start.

I’d like to see the failures and less than successful too.

It’s so easy to take a star or rising star apart and say, “See! This is how she/he did it”. When in fact there may be hundreds of others with equal or better work approaches that have $165K of debt, are 37 years old and living in the folks basement, or on permanent couch patrol.

This used to mean adding $$$ to the licensing agreement.
(The photographer holds the copyright, but can’t use the images. Or did he sign away his rights too?)

That type of work falls into the category of “Corporate *photography*”. Corporate commissions have a history of being the most conservative. Dayrates/unlimited usage/lower ticket (but higher than editorial).

If that is true, the concept of working for beans (or less) shooting editorial for promotional purposes in order to get advertising commissions may need some re-examination by those that hold the belief. Shooting editorial, (low ticket or gratis) may just be a circuitous spiral to financial bankruptcy.

Great Promo Casey and thanks for posting this Rob.

Casey, this is certainly a gallant effort and you pulled out all the stops. I hope that you will check in with us in the next few months and let us know how you are doing with this promotion. I would also be interested to see what your conversion rate over the next year is. 290 is a pretty trackable number and it sounds like you were very care about who you sent your promo to.

A cardinal rule of mine is Always lead with the work. The context in which that work is shown must be equally as strong. If one of your works was hanging in the MET and you then hung it their food court, it wouldn’t garner the same attention no matter how good it was. The art world is whole other can of worms but it proves a point.

Thanks again Casey, and please let us know how things progress.

-AP