2 Brand Photography Contract Terms Your Clients Need
What your client needs from your Personal Branding Photography contract.
Are you a contract lover, or do your eyes glaze over at the thought of going over legal terms and binding details? My brain loves the details but in small doses only, so I’m going to do you a favor and keep this short and sweet!
The following things are extremely beneficial to your branding photography clients, even if they are hard to come to terms (no pun intended) with at first. These may be an unpopular opinion among photographers, but they have been extremely useful for my clients and in the end, the client experience is huge for me, so here goes...
1. the right to edit
Your brand photography contract should allow your clients the right to edit their final images after delivery. The last thing you want is your clients to feel restricted and not want to use their images because they are not allowed to adjust them. They’ll want the freedom to add a filter or preset that matches their Instagram grid (see image below that was altered from what I delivered on the left, to the client's instagram image, on the right), or create an overlay with text for the cover of their website, or even crop the images to fit a special shape.
Most photography contracts do not allow clients to alter images. At all. And very few photographers will be comfortable with allowing it because in many ways, our styles are part of our branding. But if you allow this to your clients, you will stand out and they'll know you prioritize their needs. And this way if they change their branding in the future, they may still be able to use the photos you created together which is useful to you both.
Make sure to state this in your brand photography contract and on your website as a USP so your client knows it's allowed.
2. the freedom to not credit
Do you want to constantly have to credit someone else everywhere you use your images? Every Instagram post, every photo on your website, within each publication and marketing document you create?
Do you really want to link to another person and have people click away from your site?
Or risk being challenged by the photographer by not abiding by that clause?
I don’t think so! And your clients don't want that either.
It can be bulky and cumbersome to credit someone every time they use an image from your session together so make sure that you're offering a service that does not obligate them to do so.
These terms didn't feel natural right away...
When I first considered adding these freedoms to my contract, they both took time to sink into the depths of by creative soul. They stewed there a few days while I realized how important these factors are in creating the highest level of service I could provide. They are in the interest of my clients so they became imperative to my user license.
Photography contracts like these are rare for photographers to offer, and most are not cheap to procure. I purchased my contract as part of an American Personal Branding Photography course I studied, then had it customized to fit my needs, as well as the laws of the UK, by an extremely talented lawyer. While it was a large investment at the time, I feel wildly proud that myself, my business, and my clients are all protected and on the same page. And this is why branding photography is a higher ticket service than many other genres of photography.
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