Setting up a website for online sales

Hi folks,

Over the past couple of years, I've been sharing photos taken in the local area to my town's facebook page. This consists primarily of dry plate photos. I get tons of positive feedback, and have had several people ask if I sell prints and/or suggest that I set up a website to show off my work and to facilitate selling prints. Understanding that I'm not a professional photographer (and haven't really actively marketed my work), I've still been able to sell a handful of prints ad hoc when people reach out to ask and have a fistful of cash on them. I also have participated in a couple of local galleries and have sold a print or two that way.

So recently I posted a photo like I periodically do, and again had a couple of people ask about purchasing prints. This time, I figured I might take a closer look at setting up a website that I can advertise and/or direct people towards in order to facilitate them buying prints. It would also help standardize my pricing and all that.

Understanding that my day job consumes a very significant amount of my time, so that my hobby time is precious, my goal is to research the best / most painless way to set up a website with a simple, easy-to-maintain gallery, an "about me" page, contact page, and an online shop where they can "add to cart" a print, select a print size, checkout, and pay me to make and ship the print.

Another key aspect is that I really only want to sell prints that I make myself in the darkroom. Most photo ecommerce sites seem to team with a lab to make the prints digitally. I don't want to do that at this point.

I can design multi-million dollar optics for major programs, develop cutting-edge algorithms in Matlab, but website building and publishing is entirely outside my wheelhouse. I've searched the archives here, and just didn't quite find what I was looking for (or my Google Fu was weak). There are lots of examples of websites showing photo galleries, and lots of advice about marketing your work (and not just relying on magical website traffic to sell your prints). A google search overwhelms me with options, but I've looked closely at sites like zenfolio, clikpic, etc., which get close to what I want, but I'm just not sure what's right for me. I've also looked at wordpress with a theme, but I'm not sure how to proceed in setting up a website via that method and/or the time necessary to get up that learning curve. I also want to avoid "over-engineering" for my basic requirements.

So I post to tap into the collective knowledge of photrio ... what can you suggest I take a look at to meet my simple requirements for a gallery, a couple extra info pages, and a ecommerce page that people can order hand-made prints through, sending me payment and an email that says "get off your butt and make so-and-so print in such-and-such size and mail it to this address"?

Thank you!
Jason

Hi Jason,

I'm sure you're going to get a lot of suggestions from others but I'd like to suggest you check out Format.com. It's an online portfolio site which has only recently added online stores. The store operate in the way you've mentioned - you print and ship the orders made via the site. I've been using them for a year or so just for a (rather meager) portfolio and on the occasions where I needed to contact them I have been really impressed with the customer service...it sems to me that they are always online and ready to help. If you want more info, you can use the chat feature on the link provided or you can email them at info@format.com.

jason

you might look into etsy
it is free and easy and pretty much
a template and you just upload a jpg like you already do
you direct people to the page and from what i get they
send you and email if someone is interested in your prints
you make them and you mail them out.
it is low key and easy, and no website building, domain name buying or lab involved.
and if you want to get a lab involved at some point i think they let you do that.

good luck!
john

John I have tried etsy but my store is neglected. Etsy always seemed set up better for crafts. I can revisit, though. I have a cool store name "Photographica".

Julie, I'll check out that lead.

Thanks,
Jason

There's always Squarespace, too. I've not used it, but there is a free trial period which is actually free...no credit card required. Their templates look pretty slick.

Make sure, if you haven't already, to register your images with the copyright office.

hi jason
what i have found is no matter what route
*I* take to set up a web-store and sell stuff
the sites like etsy or imagekind or artsamerica or
smugmug or whatever .. just let me put my stuff up
and i have to do everything else which is marketing and a PITA.
a better solution since you seem to have an audience ?!
would be to have a handful of prints already made, matted and framed
and bribe/pay commission a shoppe in your local area to gladly displays and sells them for you.
that way you don't have to deal with anything except replenishing
what they have to sell, from your stockpile of prints you already have made*
to put in mats that are precut into frames that you get inexpensively ...
and of course the shop has a xerox ( color to show the delicate grey scale of glass plates ! )
showing the handful of images you have plates of
and a business card with your etsy address in case they want to look on their phone after they leave.
the only advantage of a website is that you have international recognition/visitors, and it is phone ready.
you can have your etsy site and its address on a business card
( whatever that company is that advertises 500 cards for 10$ ).
have fun !
john
ps if my work had local/art fair appeal like yours id be taking my own advice !
* when i worked for a portrait photographer there was a trick about making multiple prints
you did one for the blueprints, then you made a few, and put them back to back between your fingers
( 2 at a time ) and kind of alternated pinky then pointer/middle &c and shuffled them a few times to get them
all soaked/ then rocked the tray / developer so they all developed at the same time ...
that way you have a handful ready to mat/frame and you don't have to deal with single-printing...
we used to process 14-16 prints at a time like this, it worked great ...