How To Stop Clients From Altering Your Images

We have all dealt with it. If you haven't yet, you will. Clients get so excited to share their image from their session with you. They save them from fb and post them. They will sometimes post them on Instagram and put those cheesy filters on them, ruining the hard work you have put into each and every image you have delivered to them. 

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It makes you so mad doesn't it?? You took the time to consult with them. Get a date and time worked out with them for the session. Spend more than an hour driving to the location and shooting. Going home and backing up the files, and spending hours editing them. You even maybe had to remove a few objects to perfect that image which took even longer. Then after the images are delivered, they have the nerve to slap a stupid filter on it! 

Here are a couple reasons why that happens, and what you can do about it. 

1. Do you have a contract? If you do, do you have it stated in your contract that the images are not to be altered in any way shape or form? If you don't have a contract, get it here. If you don't have it stated in your contract, go do that now. If you have a client that has taken it upon them selves to alter that image, you have kindly asked that they remove it, and they still won't listen, all you have to do is simply tell them, "You signed my contract which states you agreed not to alter my images. it is against the law." Done.

2. Think outside of your job as a photographer. Do you know how a restaurant is run? Do you know the process it takes for each and every step of running a restaurant? Probably not. Unless of course you have ran one before. But think of it this way: It is our job to educate our clients. It is our job to make them aware of the work that goes into making that one photograph or session. They don't get it. They have no idea what goes on behind the scense. Its YOUR job, to make them understand.

I'm going to share with you what I have been doing with my clients for the last 4 years and I have had zero issues since. 

I deliver the albums to my clients through Pixieset. I LOVE it. Its easy and its convenient. I am in contact with 95% of my clients on social media or text. So, I will send them a message that their album is just about ready to go out, and to look for 2 emails. 

 Related Article: How to Send Digital Photos to Your Photography Clients

The first email I send out is a reminder of what I would LOVE for them to do with that album and images. And then what would really, REALLY upset me if they did these things. I send this FIRST because they are super excited to get their album so they ARE ON THE LOOK OUT for an email from me! It has worked like a charm. I know my clients go over our contracts, but sometimes it could be a month or more till we have out session. So I send this as just a reminder.

You can click here for the PDF. Copy, paste it, and alter it to fit your needs.

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