Michael Mowbray (00:00:06) - And recorded live from Santa's Workshop. It's the photo Happy Hour podcast. Hey. Welcome, everybody. Come on in and grab a seat at the bar. I'm your photo happy hour bartender Michael Mowbray. And joining me behind the bar are Dan Preval and Karl Keller. It's great.

Dan Frievalt (00:00:32) - Great to be back behind the bar. That's all I can say.

Michael Mowbray (00:00:34) - It's been a while. I was thinking we just did one not that long ago, and it was like it was the day before Halloween. So. Yes. What? Yeah, been through like three holidays since then.

Dan Frievalt (00:00:46) - It's been three.

Michael Mowbray (00:00:47) - Hours. Veterans day, veterinarian's day. Uh, Thanksgiving.

Carl Caylor (00:00:52) - Was when was Arbor Day or Flag Day? Now we missed those.

Michael Mowbray (00:00:55) - That's June, I think. Isn't that for both of you?

Dan Frievalt (00:00:59) - Your boss's dog's secretary's day.

Michael Mowbray (00:01:04) - Hey, your boss had a colonoscopy day.

Dan Frievalt (00:01:07) - And that was.

Carl Caylor (00:01:08) - You, SpongeBob and Tom, you know.

Michael Mowbray (00:01:10) - So, speaking of which, that is the topic for today. Have you had a colonoscopy? Ask me, do you remember watching Scooby Doo when you were a child? You need a colonoscopy.

Dan Frievalt (00:01:21) - That kind of goes right into you. You've never been here before. We've been around a while and we know a thing or two about photography. So yeah, if it's.

Michael Mowbray (00:01:30) - Your first time here, the purpose of this podcast is we really have no idea. We are three professional photographers who have been around for a while, friends for a long time, and know a thing or two. So we get together, we have some drinks and we talk. Photography? Yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:01:47) - Sometimes. Yeah. I'm on occasion.

Michael Mowbray (00:01:49) - We usually lay down some pretty good advice and some tips when those are going to happen. Nobody knows.

Dan Frievalt (00:01:55) - Nobody knows. They used to go in with a game plan, and now they're just sporadic as it. As they pop into our heads with.

Michael Mowbray (00:02:05) - The game plan, we throw it out and we're starting to draw plays in the dirt.

Dan Frievalt (00:02:10) - Yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:02:11) - But speaking of tips, I found a new ingredient for when I do the venison tips. Know that the whiskey that we liked so much from Tennessee.

Carl Caylor (00:02:19) - Yeah. Oh, it gives a nice caramel flavor.

Michael Mowbray (00:02:24) - Caramel whiskey on venison tips. There you go. Do we have cooking tips? We have drinking tips. We have photography tips. We have life tips.

Carl Caylor (00:02:33) - Tips. Yeah.

Dan Frievalt (00:02:35) - Yeah. And don't follow us for the life tips on that great show that we've made. Sound advice.

Michael Mowbray (00:02:40) - Many bad decisions.

Dan Frievalt (00:02:43) - Yes. Yeah. Follow us. For what not to do.

Michael Mowbray (00:02:46) - We've become successful despite ourselves.

Dan Frievalt (00:02:51) - Hey.

Michael Mowbray (00:02:52) - That's the topic of the podcast. How did it become successful? I like to bite yourself.

Dan Frievalt (00:02:57) - Yeah. There you go. There you go.

Carl Caylor (00:03:01) - I like it.

Dan Frievalt (00:03:02) - Number one or tap tap things I wish I knew when I started my photography business.

Michael Mowbray (00:03:09) - Yeah. Right. I think more web stuff. That's where I've been for the last week. I wish I knew more web stuff, although when I started the photography business. There were.

Dan Frievalt (00:03:21) - There was no web. It was the only webs were in your closet. Yeah.

Michael Mowbray (00:03:26) - I was 95, so I guess there were technically some websites then, but yeah, Google didn't exist pre Google.

Carl Caylor (00:03:35) - Yeah. You got online. It went. Did you?

Dan Frievalt (00:03:37) - Yes.

Michael Mowbray (00:03:38) - How to use AltaVista to do a search? Or ask.

Dan Frievalt (00:03:43) - Jeeves. Jeez, life is such a fantasy. Oh, no, that's Arthur Nova.

Carl Caylor (00:03:52) - That was my whole point of getting into photography. I would never have to take random, stupid computer classes. Look where we are.

Michael Mowbray (00:03:58) - Yeah. No kidding. I fought with domain names, servers, services for the last 3 or 4 days. Whew. That was fun.

Carl Caylor (00:04:07) - Yeah, that sounds like fun. I didn't Jen, have to fight with somebody. Is that what she was? Oh, she just.

Michael Mowbray (00:04:13) - She was just able to buy her name. She's been trying to get her name, like, a decade because somebody else had registered it, and they offered to sell it to her, but then they wouldn't complete the sale. And then she waited another five years, and now she found out that it's for sale. So she made an offer and they counter offered, and I think they came to a decision.

Michael Mowbray (00:04:32) - And I joked all along that I was going to buy it. And she's like, oh, you're going to buy it and give it to me. And so I don't know about giving you. You wanted so bad, huh? A little ten, 15% finder's fee, I think would be fair.

Dan Frievalt (00:04:47) - I just she she preferred just to change her name. Yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:04:53) - And Jewish songs. Pretty good, I mean. Yeah.

Dan Frievalt (00:04:55) - There you go. Yes. Blend. Yes.

Michael Mowbray (00:04:58) - Yeah. So tip number one for today is go check your domain for your website and see when it renews. And if you don't have it on auto renew, set it on auto renew, which I have for all my domains, like all ten of them. Um, make sure they're auto renewing. I'm not kidding, I think I do have ten.

Dan Frievalt (00:05:17) - Oh, yeah. No, at least I buy one every other day because I have an idea like, hey, this is gonna be a great idea. I just gonna buy.

Dan Frievalt (00:05:23) - I just let one go, by the way, because I'm like, why am I keeping this? I'm not going to pay to renew it. I'm not gonna use this idea.

Michael Mowbray (00:05:31) - Oh, yeah, I've had a number of those I've had to let go because it's like, how much have I spending on these things? I'll never build. Yeah. Although I still have photography. University. Com photography with enough.

Carl Caylor (00:05:42) - Artist choice to somewhere, I don't know that one I might have to bring back up or bring up. That might be a fun one to use.

Dan Frievalt (00:05:49) - I have one that says it's worth like 1500 bucks. I'm like really? I doubt I'll get that, but I might sell it.

Michael Mowbray (00:05:57) - Yeah, it's worth whatever subway pays for it.

Dan Frievalt (00:05:59) - I'm holding on to that until times get tough. I'm going to sell that domain. Yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:06:05) - That's an investment.

Dan Frievalt (00:06:07) - It's an investment. Domains going for sale. You know, I've hit rock, but. I'm hurting.

Michael Mowbray (00:06:14) - Young youngsters don't remember the Wild West days of back when people were doing domain grabs and going out and buying everything and then holding people hostage to try to sell them their business name as a domain name.

Michael Mowbray (00:06:27) - Yeah, that was so.

Dan Frievalt (00:06:28) - Speaking of that, I don't know how true this is. Like anything you read on the internet or see on TikTok, that's true. Whatever. It's it's got to be true. But this whole AI thing. Where now a lot of domains are like I. Don't say I'm going to mess this story up, but each, like country is responsible for a certain. Dot whatever. And I don't know if it's like Antigua or something is in has the eye. So the small little Caribbean country is going to they get a percentage of all oh you're kidding that I see. Yeah.

Michael Mowbray (00:07:07) - Hopefully it's not Albania that would be. Would be owned by the Albanian mob which kind of runs oh guys campaign.

Dan Frievalt (00:07:17) - Yeah. Yeah. They got in trouble because they didn't pay the guy who repackaged the AK 47 rounds. Yeah, yeah.

Michael Mowbray (00:07:25) - War dogs. There we go. We got a drink there.

Dan Frievalt (00:07:27) - You got it. You got it, got it. Great movie, by the way.

Michael Mowbray (00:07:31) - I guess if you're just joining us for the first time and every pop culture reference is worth a drink. So and we drop a lot of.

Dan Frievalt (00:07:39) - Movie, you know.

Carl Caylor (00:07:40) - Yeah. We don't mention enough. In fact, I'm not sure if we ever mention this, but it's okay to drink along with us.

Michael Mowbray (00:07:48) - Unless you're driving. Then you should pull over and. Yeah, and maybe call it Uber.

Carl Caylor (00:07:55) - Yeah, you're a good idea, but yeah.

Dan Frievalt (00:07:57) - We're in a shower. No. And you can drink it a shower. You can prepare a.

Carl Caylor (00:08:00) - Shower, water.

Dan Frievalt (00:08:01) - Shower, shower, beer. Yeah. Just the.

Carl Caylor (00:08:02) - Water.

Dan Frievalt (00:08:02) - Don't shower beer. Prepare prepare the salad in there. Just like Kramer. Kramer.

Carl Caylor (00:08:10) - Wait. You know. Oh, well.

Dan Frievalt (00:08:12) - That's good. So I can.

Michael Mowbray (00:08:16) - Almost. I'm almost out of scotch.

Carl Caylor (00:08:17) - I'm almost out of this, too. Hey, dad, you're in Vegas. You were telling us you found some really awesome marketing ideas. What's give, man? Give what's up? What did you find out?

Dan Frievalt (00:08:26) - I did, so I was in Vegas.

Dan Frievalt (00:08:28) - I think I went there, we took a trip. I've been out there teaching several times and. Just noticed that every time I go out there and teach, I don't have time to enjoy Vegas. And I'm not a gambler, but I love all the other stuff that's that Vegas has to offer. Like, I'm a foodie, so good food and good drinks and just shows. I've never been to a show. So for some I went to a show. But yeah. Oh yeah. Wow. Because we're always I'm always out there working. Yeah. And even when I went out there, no, I don't know when I was out there. The other, like the first time I was in Vegas was for what you call vacation. But I was with a group of guys. We were like 22 years old. We weren't really going to a show. But one thing really hit me. Whenever I travel or whenever I'm always looking at how businesses run or how marketing things and as us as photographer, we say, oh, the competition, everyone's a photographer, everyone has a phone taking pictures.

Dan Frievalt (00:09:27) - How can we compete? How can we compete? Even though Vegas is luxury, they have really locked in. And there's the strip. And how do you compete like hotel? Hotel? How do you get people to go to your hotel and not to any other hotel? And it's interesting to see all the little things that they do to draw you in to that hotel. And each hotel has their own theme, or their own little thing, or their own unique restaurant or attraction that pulls you in. And so I like to take those nuggets and say, how can I apply that to my photography business? How can I be different than everyone else if Vegas can do it? How can we do it?

Michael Mowbray (00:10:10) - Plus, Vegas has evolved. If you go back 20 years, 25 years. Used to be everybody had a cheap buffet that had a really good food. And yeah, now food is expensive in every way off the strip.

Dan Frievalt (00:10:27) - Almost everything is expensive now in Vegas. It's not yet like it used to be, like, hey, we're gonna get you in so you can gamble.

Dan Frievalt (00:10:33) - And then it evolved into a destination for adult entertainment. And so they, hey, we don't need cheap food to get you in. There's all these shows and, you know, different attractions. The Bellagio fountains, the Venetian, and they're in Italy. Inspired. The fountains, the gondolas. Yeah, yeah. And it's become a foodie rich area. Like celebrity chefs all have restaurants there and craft cocktails. The big thing I've noticed and. Is all these now like speakeasy speakeasies or hidden bars, and it's fun to try and find them. They're not. Some of them are hidden. Most of them aren't hidden that well. That's where they still want you to find them. But it's like these cool. Like it's a pawnshop. But then there's a back door and you sneak in and there's a whole restaurant bar and has craft cocktails and really cool craft cocktails. Like, you know something? You're going to spend 20, 20 some dollars for a drink, or there's.

Michael Mowbray (00:11:33) - Eight guys, like passing around a bottle in a.

Dan Frievalt (00:11:35) - Garage. Yeah, either way, you never know. Yeah.

Michael Mowbray (00:11:39) - Forget about it.

Dan Frievalt (00:11:41) - Forget about. Yeah. Or even off the strip. There's so many attractions off the strip because they're trying to pull people away from the chaos. And how can they have a more of a. Like red rock. Is all about more about family. There's a bowling alley. There's a movie theater. There's views of Red Rock. There's hiking. There's a lot of things to do than just gambling or being on the strip, which is I find fascinating when you look at the business aspect and. It just Vegas in general, like you said, Michael, who would have thought someone like, hey, we're just going to take the desert? It meant create an attraction and what's going to bring people out here while gambling. And that was the first. Version 1.0 of Vegas, and now it's evolved to several different versions.

Carl Caylor (00:12:36) - So what did you find? What's the coolest thing you saw that that you're going to implement or that you're going to try to implement?

Dan Frievalt (00:12:44) - I think just in general, just thinking again, like I always try to always be the read app, stand out, be different to if everyone's doing.

Dan Frievalt (00:12:55) - X in your area do y, you know. So it's like if everyone's doing composites I wouldn't do composites in your area.

Michael Mowbray (00:13:03) - What's your hook?

Dan Frievalt (00:13:04) - What are you. What's your hook. Yeah. And or it could be like a no one's using off camera lighting. Get better at lighting and learn lighting. If everyone's doing a model team, how can my model team be different than everyone else's? Like, I started instituting the charity aspect of the model team and doing a lot of good for the community. When everyone else like, we're going to give you a free photos and we give you a free photoshoot, and it's all about how many people you bring to me. I wanted to do something like, what can we do for everyone else? It's not about me. And then ultimately word of mouth will get out and people will book you because you're doing something good. That's not really the reason why you do charity, but it is a side effect of, hey, we're making an impact in other people's lives, and we're also teaching 17 year old, you know, responsibility and something that they can do.

Dan Frievalt (00:13:54) - That is something that that generation wants to do. They want to help. They've been they've grown up in a different time than we have. So that's when you read books on the Gen Z and stuff. It's like they want to help. They want to do good things for the environment, for the community. They want to make an impact and use those core values as a way to market your business and to attract the right clientele. Yeah. Gosh, that's that sounded pretty good. It's like I did. Yeah, bro.

Michael Mowbray (00:14:26) - I'm really.

Dan Frievalt (00:14:27) - Impressed myself. Good times. Yeah, I've.

Michael Mowbray (00:14:29) - Talked to a lot of people this year where similar kind of thing nobody else in their market is doing, for example, colored gels. So they talk to me as what can what kind of kit or what kind of gear can I put together for them so they can add some color into their work so they stand out? It can be that red apple in the sea of all the green apples and their particular market.

Michael Mowbray (00:14:51) - And some people are doing that with, you know, RGB LEDs and or off camera flash, because there's still a lot of markets where people aren't using much off camera flash. It's all natural light, and you can really stand out and create a different look with off camera flash.

Dan Frievalt (00:15:05) - And it can be the littlest things that make you stand out. If you have a studio or you look at what the trend is, and then you try and buck the trend, like I said, if everyone's doing X, do you know it's like, okay, if everyone's shooting outdoor locations and studio work, got fuddy duddy? How can I create studio work that's unique that no one else can copy unless they have a studio like you mentioned, gels and fog and different things that you can do in the studio. That gives a very impactful type of image that no one else can do. Or maybe it's just meeting with every single client like I've been doing. I started out a couple of years ago. I would just book everything over the phone and I'm like, wait a minute, I have a studio.

Dan Frievalt (00:15:48) - I want them to come in to see that that help justify the price, touch the albums and see the large wall art. And that's the first impression. Why am I first impression over the phone? I want to meet with them. I want to talk to them. I want them to see the images. Yeah. Pre-sell them. I'll go over the pricing with them and show a bunch of different images. Or it's like, hey, if they're into Harry Potter. Oh, by the way, boom, I could pull up Harry Potter images if I was smart, I was I was doing this over the years. I would like take things like meta, take things so I could find them easier. Oh yeah. So that's a little bit of a challenge, especially on the fly. But what I've noticed that I've. I'm, uh. A good way to find them is using all my apps because I use my photo app and those are all. On the on the web, I guess. Still.

Dan Frievalt (00:16:40) - So I just go back to my builder and I convert. Oh, that one girl, what was her name? I could were her name or kind of what year it was, because I have them all labeled by year, and then I can pretty much find it pretty quick instead of going through the server. I'm lost going through my server. I will never find a Harry Potter image. Um.

Michael Mowbray (00:16:58) - You just.

Dan Frievalt (00:16:58) - Go. Which, by the way, I guess you just go. Shouldn't say Harry Potter.

Michael Mowbray (00:17:02) - Oh, Harry Potter images.

Dan Frievalt (00:17:04) - Yeah, yeah.

Michael Mowbray (00:17:06) - When I.

Dan Frievalt (00:17:07) - Guess you.

Michael Mowbray (00:17:08) - Love you so.

Dan Frievalt (00:17:10) - Yeah. And if you are a responsible for the trademark of Harry Potter, I'm not actually making money off of Harry Potter. It's a magical. It's a magical scene of flying books and auras. Right.

Michael Mowbray (00:17:21) - Which existed before Perry? Hotter.

Carl Caylor (00:17:26) - Yeah. B which.

Michael Mowbray (00:17:27) - Which is actually the name of a font that I have that looks just the one from that one kind of movie and book and stuff, but it's called Perry hotter.

Michael Mowbray (00:17:35) - Yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:17:36) - That one.

Dan Frievalt (00:17:37) - Perry Hatter. Yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:17:38) - What was Bewitched? The witch. What was her husband's name? Darren. What do I.

Michael Mowbray (00:17:44) - Win? Which one? They're both named Darren. You? What were their real names? Dick York and Dick Sargeant.

Dan Frievalt (00:17:56) - Which wow.

Michael Mowbray (00:17:57) - Is a great porn name, but.

Dan Frievalt (00:18:00) - That's like, yeah, it's like a shotgun of a beer.

Carl Caylor (00:18:03) - That kind of stuff never comes up in trivia at the bar. I don't.

Dan Frievalt (00:18:06) - Know.

Carl Caylor (00:18:07) - I don't know.

Dan Frievalt (00:18:08) - Or how come we can remember that stuff? Not like important stuff. Like, yeah, okay.

Carl Caylor (00:18:12) - If it was like seven at 1/25 of a second at 400 ISO and we changed to f 5.6, what do we have to change our. No, I can remember that stuff. No.

Michael Mowbray (00:18:21) - That's six clicks.

Carl Caylor (00:18:23) - Click. Okay.

Michael Mowbray (00:18:24) - It was the third stop.

Dan Frievalt (00:18:27) - That's all. Photography.

Michael Mowbray (00:18:28) - One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. There we go.

Carl Caylor (00:18:31) - Just like when you're sight in your rifle scope, you know it's how many minutes anyway.

Carl Caylor (00:18:38) - Sorry, but it was just deer season, so.

Dan Frievalt (00:18:41) - Yeah. Oh, sure. You can have stories. Here's another Vegas story in which. Oh. Is quite interesting. And it's about Steve Wynn. Steve Wynn owns the encore and the Wynn hotels and things like that. But. Interesting story is that he started at like a blackjack dealer in Vegas, and he got to be good friends with Howard Hughes and Frank Sinatra. So one of them, I think it was Howard Hughes, owned this chunk of land, a parking lot next to, I think, Caesar's Palace. And so he talked. He looked at everything, and Caesars Palace didn't know if they owned it or not. Sure if they did or not. So they never built on it. So he talked some Howard Hughes into selling it to him through Frank Sinatra. So he bought this. He went in. And this is also a time when banks are starting to try and weed out the Mafia money that was in Vegas. So they were giving loans out to people to to revitalize Vegas and get that kind of money out.

Dan Frievalt (00:19:48) - So they gave him a loan with very little collateral other than I think Sinatra saying, I got this guy, don't worry. So he bought this parking lot, and he put out a full page ad saying that he was going to build this casino, hoping that Caesars Palace would then want to buy it from him. So he flipped the land. He had no intention of actually doing the casino. So within a few months he, like, quadrupled his money. And that's how he. Became a multimillionaire, and then he invested in casinos and I think. What's the Rino and drink itself and then. No. Reno, Nevada and stuff like that. And then you came back, built the win and everything. And also he I think another side note is that he was the first person to start like MGM and a bunch of basically the six big resort hotels out there. He was the brainchild and the driving force with that, which shifted Vegas from the casino gambling into more the touristy slash mega resorts that it's known for now.

Dan Frievalt (00:20:57) - So that is a quick little interesting story. And the reason I bring it up again is like, it's about marketing. It's about what kind of thing can you put out there that sets yourself apart? Or I don't want to say tricks people, but it's like, you can you can put out some really cool imagery that attract people, or sometimes you spend a lot of time on a composite. You may not sell that composite, but it it creates a lot of buzz. It's something that's unique. So sometimes people are like, how much time do you spend out of that? Or entering competition and spending a lot of time on competition images. But then if you win, or if you get a Gia or get nominated as a Gia or the World Cup or something like that, you know what kind of marketing now? What kind of things can you pull off that marketing by doing things like that, you know? Yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:21:47) - So it's also, yeah, spin off, just from the look of that image to that maybe you spent more time on maybe it's something more creative than what you've done in the past because you're just trying to push it to the envelope.

Carl Caylor (00:21:57) - But people get talking because it's, again, like, Dan's a different, um, in heaven. He probably learned something while he did it too. So it win wins. Give it a shot.

Dan Frievalt (00:22:06) - Well, yeah.

Michael Mowbray (00:22:07) - And one of the things I learned about, uh, business out in Vegas, too, is that once the casinos get you in there, they don't want to let you leave. And they don't want to make it easy for you to leave. Even though they have to have exits. It's hard to find them because Caesars Palace is one of the best of them, because you get in there and you're like. Everything looks the same no matter what what angle you turn. And it's like, I don't even know how to get to the bathroom because everywhere I turn it looks the same. I spent like an hour and Caesar's trying to get out of it.

Carl Caylor (00:22:41) - So how do you. So what do you do? How do you equate that with your business? As far as, say, for example, business portraits and business teams photograph the groups individually and composite them so that they.

Michael Mowbray (00:22:56) - Becomes a golden handcuff that you can't really leave. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:23:01) - And they do.

Dan Frievalt (00:23:03) - Or it's touching all the center, all the senses like Vegas is going on, that the carpeting is purposely made busy so that you keep your eyes up. And then there's all the lights and the ding ding ding ding ding ding ding. It's all creates a euphoria. It creates dopamine. Hit all those noises and sounds and then the smell. Each casino has a unique smell, not mixed with the smoke sometimes, but. And so it's the lighting. It's just all your senses, the smell, the sound.

Michael Mowbray (00:23:32) - It's the pure oxygen they pump in there to give you a little bit of oxygen.

Dan Frievalt (00:23:36) - Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So. So as someone enters your studio, do you have a good smell going and do you have one yet when they, when they grab an album, you know, is it a, it's a $4,000 album. Is it beefy. Does it have leather. Does that metal.

Dan Frievalt (00:23:51) - You throw it on your lap and be like, oh, this is heavy. In fact, we're all wearing headphones. Beats is another company that's very interesting. I don't know how true this is, but you pick up a beats headphones. They're extremely heavy. Somebody's dissected of them, and they found a bunch of pieces that have nothing to do with the audio. They're just basically chunks of weight in there. So they feel more expensive than a lightweight. Yeah, yeah. So it's your senses that are working. It's all those modalities I think is John Allen would say, yeah, sure.

Carl Caylor (00:24:25) - Unless heavy is expensive, unless I.

Michael Mowbray (00:24:28) - Must be very expensive.

Carl Caylor (00:24:31) - Yeah, I was thinking about you all day because of this, Michael. I was doing this great big, heavy duty boom arm. Yes. And I'm like, oh, God, I can't. I was thinking, I'm going to take this long as I'm doing. I'm starting to do a bunch of branding photographs of different companies or different businesses up and down my area here, and I'm like, oh, this would be really cool to bring in to their place of business and actually do like their display images or their displays of displays of products.

Carl Caylor (00:25:01) - If I could just bring in this so I can like from above and but gosh, that thing is so dang heavy. I gotta talk to Michael and get a later one, because I know you guys have won.

Michael Mowbray (00:25:11) - The holy moly.

Carl Caylor (00:25:13) - The Holy moly.

Michael Mowbray (00:25:14) - Rolling moly is on sale. It's my Mo sale right now.

Dan Frievalt (00:25:18) - Oh, I got it, you know, but most mo mo mo.

Carl Caylor (00:25:22) - And how far will extend. Can I get it out over some products? Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Michael Mowbray (00:25:29) - Now, as far as when it was really long bogan ones. But I couldn't see taking that into any place.

Dan Frievalt (00:25:33) - I think that's knocking shit over. Get it in there.

Carl Caylor (00:25:36) - I can't get it in their store. I've been knocking crap over everywhere and it weighs a metric ton to lift thing up. It's great. It works. It's sturdy, it holds a lot. It reaches a long way. But again, every tool for the job or the right tool for the job and just definitely isn't the right tool for going to those locations.

Carl Caylor (00:25:56) - But I do want the lighting from there. So we got to put the light where it needs to be. And I think that tool is going to help out. So the holy moly is but is that the it really, really to me sounds like it's a stand.

Michael Mowbray (00:26:08) - It's it's a rolling boom. Yeah. It's actually a heavy duty in the boom is actually a separate piece that fits into the top, but it has the crank and everything. So you can reposition the light. Oh yeah. It's a very nice. Everybody should have.

Dan Frievalt (00:26:23) - One.

Carl Caylor (00:26:25) - I should do that. All right I got it going. Go on the go go.

Dan Frievalt (00:26:29) - Go go go. That's a good.

Michael Mowbray (00:26:30) - Good segue for me too. I just launched a brand new website. That's why I was complaining about all that name server stuff. So totally retooled. Mo light. So it's go mo like, com or Mo like com will take you to the exact same place. So whatever trips your trigger if you want to type two fewer letters, that's cool.

Michael Mowbray (00:26:48) - A lot easier, much easier to navigate. It's much easier to find things. I kept getting tired of people calling me and emailing me. I can't. I need a battery for my such and such. I can't find it at the site just if you.

Dan Frievalt (00:27:02) - Can still get those emails.

Michael Mowbray (00:27:04) - Yeah. So I was like, if you can't find it now, I can't help you. It's so.

Dan Frievalt (00:27:08) - Easy. It was so easy now, you know. Yeah. Which is another point of stress or another point of what you need to do for your client to make it easy for them to book you or to find something or navigate. Or is your website mobile friendly? I don't know what the stats are. By 75, 85% of people are on their phone when they're looking at your website. At this day and age, you need a site that's mobile.

Michael Mowbray (00:27:36) - It's about 5347 for me. So mobile versus desktop. But that's a good thing.

Carl Caylor (00:27:43) - I noticed. And for all of you, I know you know, Dan and I both use photo biz, um for our websites.

Carl Caylor (00:27:50) - And I guess I should have known this heard him talking and I maybe ignored it or it went in one ear and out the other. But, uh, they offer email campaigns as part of. Your subscription, your website. I have been doing e-commerce for years on my website for youth sports and stuff like that. So people have when they go to see their images, they have to do it by going to my website to get to that page to see their stuff, and it worked out really well to drive traffic there. But now I found out that if you generate an email list. So I ran that Halloween special where everybody came in. We did free pictures of the kids in the costumes during trick or treating, and but for them to get their free download, of course, they had to type in their email address to go do that. So now I have collected all those. I had collected 95 emails or 100, I'm sure 113, but 95 actually allowed it or whatever, however it works out.

Carl Caylor (00:28:50) - But anyhow, I did an email campaign today and on photo biz you create your email. You don't just type an email, you create an email just like you're creating a web page. It uses the same tools or same buttons or same. So you can link the button to something, a site on your A page on your website. So like you said, make it easy for people to get there. They don't even have to go to my website and then go find kids or families or whatever. I'm in this particular case, I want to sell family portrait specials or gift cards. Specifically, I want to sell gift certificates for family portraits for Christmas. So we created an email blast. It brings them right to it, and the e-commerce side of it now goes right to a button said, here's your three options. Click on it. You can purchase it right there. Boom. Done. It makes it easy to put everything you want right in front of them without them having to think. All all they're doing is like, just press a button.

Dan Frievalt (00:29:51) - It'll be an easy button.

Carl Caylor (00:29:52) - Press a button. Yep. You don't have to navigate anything anymore. It's just so cool. So check that out if you're not. If you're a photo biz person already and you didn't realize you have that, oh, me, go look at it because it's really cool. And if you're not a photo biz person and you your website doesn't have that, then you might want to look into that. So.

Michael Mowbray (00:30:13) - Forbes.com.

Carl Caylor (00:30:16) - It's not as a drinking thing because it was.

Dan Frievalt (00:30:18) - Trouble and the beauty of the other beauty of phobias, which we. Talked about, I'm sure several times, is that if you. Need to talk to someone. You get a real live person when you call.

Michael Mowbray (00:30:30) - Exactly. Yes. Instantly real people.

Dan Frievalt (00:30:33) - Yeah. Which is their unique selling point. Like I always say, they're a customer service company that happens to sell websites. Yeah. It's not. That's what I call them. I'm sure that's not what they would call themselves. But that is because in today's society where there's everything's on online or you can't get Ahold of anyone, they said, we're going to be different.

Dan Frievalt (00:30:56) - We're going to stand. We're going to be like, what's the number one pain point? People are trying to build sites, photographers who have no clue about web design, and they're frustrated because they can't talk to us. So let's that let's set up a place where we can you can talk to someone and they'll actually help you. They'll know what they're doing. They're not just reading off a script of did you did you unplug your computer? Did you reboot your computer? It's like, no, they know what they're talking about. The thing I don't know, I guess they know what they're talking about. I had so much. I set up my website years ago, so I don't have a even I don't even have an opportunity or a reason to call them, which is also a good thing. But if you're new there, we even set it up for you.

Carl Caylor (00:31:41) - I call them today. Actually had to laugh somewhere along the line as I was doing this, I saw because I'm doing a second or I did a second email right away, blast right away to another set of images or people anyhow.

Carl Caylor (00:31:54) - And I thought, oh, when I was clicking on this stuff, I noticed this thing popped up and it had analytics about how many people opened it, how many clicks you got for the different email campaigns. And I thought, oh, that's interesting. But I'm like, where did I see that? Like, I want to make sure that the new one I sent out today actually went out because I forgot to put myself. That's another thing to do. By the way, the mailing list.

Dan Frievalt (00:32:15) - Yeah, I got.

Carl Caylor (00:32:17) - It. I forgot to do that at that time. But so I called them and they always ask you okay, or it comes on because you hit okay. Do you want to talk to a specialist? Yes I do, boom. Press one and it says okay. To save time, make sure you have your account number and the last four digits of your credit card on file. So that we make sure you know, it's for security. It's in the top right corner of your screen if you really want to pay attention.

Carl Caylor (00:32:42) - And yeah, like it's on, it's like what's your account number? And I started rattling off and I said my last four digits and I'm and that is a business is. And he goes oh okay okay we got it. All good. He goes wait what number? He looks like crap. He said, I haven't heard that low of a number in it since I've been here. It's 100 dash 13 or something like that.

Dan Frievalt (00:33:06) - Yeah. You got number.

Michael Mowbray (00:33:07) - Six.

Dan Frievalt (00:33:09) - Yes. Yes.

Carl Caylor (00:33:10) - Well they started at 100 dash something. So he goes, you're like.

Dan Frievalt (00:33:14) - The first.

Carl Caylor (00:33:15) - People.

Dan Frievalt (00:33:16) - I have to look now. Yeah. I'm not going to say what it.

Carl Caylor (00:33:20) - Is, but it was it's like what right.

Dan Frievalt (00:33:22) - With the first.

Carl Caylor (00:33:23) - And the first batches of numbers. So no, it's you.

Dan Frievalt (00:33:28) - You are old. No, we didn't know. We didn't know websites existed back then. Yeah. I did a.

Michael Mowbray (00:33:39) - Lot of headshots for GE, GE healthcare over the years, and I used to have to put what was called their like their employee number, which is like an so number they called it.

Michael Mowbray (00:33:47) - Yeah. And there's always this long one. This guys was it was like 200001. And I'm like I look at him I go, I've never seen one like that. And he goes, yeah, I created the solar system.

Dan Frievalt (00:34:04) - So he was like the.

Michael Mowbray (00:34:05) - Original.

Dan Frievalt (00:34:08) - Oh my gosh. Like whoa okay. Social security number is 000000000001. Yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:34:18) - You got.

Dan Frievalt (00:34:19) - It right. You got a good boy. Yeah, yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:34:23) - I'm not gonna say we're old.

Dan Frievalt (00:34:25) - Getting there. Getting. Getting there.

Michael Mowbray (00:34:29) - Lisa got a mailing because her birthday's coming up. She got a mailing from AARP, which I always make sure to put on top of the mail pile.

Dan Frievalt (00:34:37) - Hey.

Carl Caylor (00:34:38) - John. Our insurance. Just saying.

Michael Mowbray (00:34:40) - Oh, I have to look at that.

Dan Frievalt (00:34:42) - Well, another pro tip is you do not have to be a certain age to join AARP, so it may be worth it, even if you're like 30 years old, to look at what benefits you could, uh. Yeah, you could get from joining that.

Michael Mowbray (00:34:59) - That's cheap. I don't know, I'm told you actually might actually look at it.

Carl Caylor (00:35:01) - Hey. Worth it? Just. I think it's like $125 for three years. If you did a bundle of years or something like that, it wasn't much, but it's save like 16% or some dang thing like that of car insurance. Oh well. So if you're an A member, you definitely you tell that to your insurance agent for your auto insurance because it it will most auto insurance is it will save you a ton.

Dan Frievalt (00:35:24) - So or because I photographed seniors I don't do this. But when I would when we did have a bigger studio and photograph other things. I know we joked about last time with me photographing babies. You thought that was, uh, could picture that, but yeah, you're still good. I think that was in a podcast we talked about, you know, if you generational or type of sessions where you want to encourage them to come back or create a loyalty program, create a lifetime of portraits, something to encourage them to keep coming back.

Dan Frievalt (00:35:54) - Like all these businesses have UX, they have their app, and it's like you get so many stars, you get a free drink.

Michael Mowbray (00:36:01) - You're doing the same thing with free.

Dan Frievalt (00:36:03) - Yeah, yeah, haircuts, X amount of haircuts. You got this or X amount of massages. You get a free massage. Like it could be as simple as a punch card or just again, coming back to Vegas. We landed, we rented our rental car. There was a huge line to get the rental car, and there was a big sign that said, if you're a preferred member, you can go right down and get your card. So we're waiting in line. I'm like, no, what does it take to become a preferred member? I just have to sign up. I signed up being your preferred. I jumped out of line. I left Stephanie in line just in case it didn't work. I walked down to preferred area. Got to get the car. Yeah. Choose the car. I texted her going to come on down.

Dan Frievalt (00:36:46) - We got ourselves a car. Yeah.

Michael Mowbray (00:36:48) - I don't think a costly thing, does it?

Dan Frievalt (00:36:50) - It it it costs anything.

Michael Mowbray (00:36:52) - I'm a Hertz Gold member. I can't remember last time I rented a car. I rented one.

Carl Caylor (00:36:56) - A couple of years ago and got on the preferred list. That is a couple of years ago. I did it, and then we went to Colorado back in the end of September, and I forgot all about it. We get there and I got boom! I got a text when I got off the plane and said, remember, your Hertz rental is set up for blah blah, blah, and you are gold membership, whatever. When you get there, look on the gold numbers board it was in my name is there and said, what light your car is and you go and you just choose whichever car is in that, that rule.

Dan Frievalt (00:37:30) - In that row.

Carl Caylor (00:37:31) - Yeah, it's right around you, sweetie. Yeah. The red one looks good. Let's get the red one. Yeah, let's drive out.

Carl Caylor (00:37:37) - They stop you at the thing, do your license and say, see you in a couple days. Go. It's crazy cool. So that's service. That's a cool service, Doug.

Michael Mowbray (00:37:49) - Because traveling and flying and all that stuff sucks. Anything anybody can do to make the whole thing faster, easier, more pleasant. Perfect.

Dan Frievalt (00:38:01) - Or one thing I offer is at a 5000 out of order. I will come and professionally install your portraits for you. Or if someone you know has a wall cluster that they've ordered, and I know that it's going to be a pain for them to hang it up. And I've gotten so good at it, I'm like, hey, do you want me to come install this for you? Install it for you, or I'll just say, hey, what time would you like me to come and install this for you? Take away the headaches or the negatives. I think we talked about this, about the family portrait. What kind of negatives can we take away to make it an easier experience to get them to purchase those clusters so they won't be like, oh, now I got to install this thing, right? No, I'll do that for you.

Carl Caylor (00:38:47) - Show me. Gladly. Let's go. Do it.

Dan Frievalt (00:38:50) - Let's do it. Yeah. Now other people, like. Are you worried about liability or something? With that, you might want to check on your insurance company for that.

Michael Mowbray (00:38:56) - Don't drop a hammer on the door.

Dan Frievalt (00:38:58) - I have insurance.

Michael Mowbray (00:38:58) - You'll be fine.

Dan Frievalt (00:38:59) - Yeah, I have off state insurance for photographing. Yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:39:04) - It's gotta count for something. Yesterday I did the same thing. Yesterday I got done stretching a canvass for family. I called her up, said, hey, it's all ready to go, and. Yep. So, canvas. Well, it was backordered. And it's a whole big backorder canvas thing right now. If you're if you print on your own, it's. Pain right now, but we got hers finished and gave her a call and I said, hey, can I come over and hang it? She's like, I said what? She said, well, we have construction going on right now. And I said, oh, um, is it everywhere in your house or is it just we might want to hang the portrait? And she said, we didn't plan on this, that we had a toilet that was leaking.

Carl Caylor (00:39:45) - They went in to fix it and the builder messed something up. Um, came back from work and they didn't take something down when they were trying to fix something. And. Yeah, cause all kinds of problems. So that was ding number one. Ding. Number two is there. The next company is in there ripping out the flooring, the tile on the floor because everything got wet underneath it, so ripping it out on. Couldn't get it upright. And they when somehow, when they were prying the thing up, somebody slipped with it. And the borrower never went to the Walden master bedroom.

Dan Frievalt (00:40:23) - Oh.

Carl Caylor (00:40:24) - That's a no.

Speaker 4 (00:40:26) - Oh, perfect.

Michael Mowbray (00:40:26) - Hanging in the master bedroom. Cover up the whole.

Carl Caylor (00:40:29) - What I said over at the hole.

Dan Frievalt (00:40:30) - Yeah, so.

Carl Caylor (00:40:31) - I said I was calling her to tell her that I'd be happy to come hang this stuff up for her, install it. And then I started thinking, she's probably worried about anything in her house. And I said, would it be better if I stored it here for a couple of weeks? He said, oh my God, that'd be great.

Carl Caylor (00:40:47) - So sometimes what we tend to do. Isn't necessarily what they need, so listen to them, I think. But she mentioned I could just hear her mind going here. We got builders that are creating more, prob more, stress more. And first you're asking if you can come out and then ask you, you know what? Instead of going bring it there. Do you want me just to keep it for a couple of weeks so it's safe before, while they're finishing crap up, she said right now, they'd be happy if all this stuff was done by the end of February. Oh. I know I can't even. I don't even want to imagine it. But that's another world of that we live in right now, to trying to get any kind of construction done. Yeah, on a timely fashion is a whole different world.

Dan Frievalt (00:41:37) - Yeah, yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:41:39) - Happy Christmas everybody. We're going to have your toilet.

Michael Mowbray (00:41:43) - Well, it didn't happen on Christmas at least.

Carl Caylor (00:41:45) - There you go. Something to be joyful for.

Michael Mowbray (00:41:47) - So, speaking of Christmas. Parting shot for Christmas.

Carl Caylor (00:41:53) - We need more eggnog.

Michael Mowbray (00:41:54) - I need eggnog. I don't have any.

Carl Caylor (00:41:58) - That's true. I don't either.

Dan Frievalt (00:42:00) - I had some last night, but it was expired. I had this, it didn't taste too good. I had to dump it out. A bit of a sour. Luckily, I didn't put any brandy on it. I'm like, oh, this says this. The expiration. It says sell by the 30th. But I mean, that's sell. Buy. So I'm like, I think I got a lot of leeway.

Michael Mowbray (00:42:19) - When was it open though?

Dan Frievalt (00:42:20) - Yeah. Before the 30th. Yeah. Before Thanksgiving. So yeah.

Michael Mowbray (00:42:24) - Would you open it? Yeah. Yeah. Dairy.

Dan Frievalt (00:42:27) - So I took a little sip. Yeah, I think it'll be okay. Yeah. Took another sip.

Michael Mowbray (00:42:32) - No. Oh.

Dan Frievalt (00:42:33) - Okay. Luckily, putting whiskey or brandy in it and ruined that. That was good. There was no alcohol that was sacrificed in that.

Dan Frievalt (00:42:42) - Although it might have killed the colonel. This of it, it might have been okay.

Carl Caylor (00:42:46) - No, it really doesn't.

Dan Frievalt (00:42:48) - It doesn't. Okay, so.

Michael Mowbray (00:42:50) - Speaking of folks, that's your that's your pro tip. Your parting shot is check your nog and make sure it hasn't curdled.

Speaker 4 (00:42:57) - That's good advice. Where do you.

Michael Mowbray (00:42:58) - Put the booze in.

Dan Frievalt (00:42:59) - It. Yeah.

Carl Caylor (00:43:01) - We're just to live by. Yes.

Dan Frievalt (00:43:03) - Except for Vegas, I was broke. I was trying to. Well, then.

Carl Caylor (00:43:06) - You'd be selling off internet sites or. Yeah.

Dan Frievalt (00:43:08) - So, yeah, I'd be selling off my domain name so I can afford the nog for.

Carl Caylor (00:43:15) - We always come back.

Dan Frievalt (00:43:16) - Bring it full circle. Circle? Yeah.

Michael Mowbray (00:43:18) - So the question is, are we maybe going to do one before the end of the year, do a year end wrap up, or is this the last.

Carl Caylor (00:43:23) - Celebration one we get? We always do a celebration when I mean that the end of the year, even if it's between Christmas and New Year's Eve, and it might be.

Dan Frievalt (00:43:31) - Or should you alive.

Speaker 4 (00:43:32) - Try to do a live.

Michael Mowbray (00:43:32) - We always do a live one. So we could we should.

Carl Caylor (00:43:35) - We haven't done we haven't done live one in quite some time. Yeah.

Michael Mowbray (00:43:40) - No it could be the time to doing.

Dan Frievalt (00:43:42) - Our listener can show up, we better make sure that they are.

Michael Mowbray (00:43:45) - Aware that they have. They take a little time off. Now I'm looking at the clock because we're trying to keep these under 50 minutes now, so I'm just okay, we better.

Carl Caylor (00:43:53) - Wrap it up. Seven. Six a minute, five minute, four.

Dan Frievalt (00:43:58) - Timeout, timeout. Oh, wait, that doesn't work. It was.

Michael Mowbray (00:44:02) - In bounds.

Carl Caylor (00:44:02) - Hey, y'all.

Dan Frievalt (00:44:04) - Was in bounds.

Michael Mowbray (00:44:05) - So have a great holiday. Whatever holiday you celebrate. And hopefully we'll see you talk to you, maybe live before the end of the year.

Dan Frievalt (00:44:15) - Earlier years.

Speaker 5 (00:44:18) - Last call.

Michael Mowbray (00:44:20) - You've been listening to the Photo Happy Hour podcast. Be sure to hit that subscribe button to not miss a single action packed episode, and join our Photo Happy Hour Facebook group, where we'll post links to the stuff we all talk about.

Michael Mowbray (00:44:33) - You can find my Mo Lite gear online at Gomo lite.com. That's Geo MLive.com. You can find the Facebook page under Mo Lite store, and I also run the Godox Flash Help Group on Facebook. You can find Dan's Senior Unlocked website at Seniors Unlocked Comm. That's seniors with an S at the end unlocked.com and the Facebook group under Seniors Unlocked. And you can find Carl's coaching corner at CC photo coach comm CC photo coach.com. Till next time. Cheers to you.

Speaker 6 (00:45:21) - Ah, yes. By the time you have finished listening to this podcast, you will have come to the realization that your life would be more complete if you subscribed. Reach your full potential by subscribing now.