My question to the five specialty dealers I called was, what are you doing to build traffic in these tough economic times? One remarked that prayer wasn’t a bad idea. 
I also wanted to know whether the retailers were concerned with attracting new customers or if they were concentrating on getting the regulars 
to keep coming in the door.

Here’s how it went.

Art Esquibel
Owner, Camera & Darkroom Albuquerque, New Mexico
We’re in an odd circumstance here. The business model of making efforts to expand the circle of customers doesn’t apply. This is New Mexico; in the entire state there’s less than 2 million people, and from where I’m sitting, if I draw a circle with a 10-mile radius, I get over half of them. Beyond those 10 miles, there’s mesa. No amount of effort will expand that market.

So if you can’t grow the market . . .

We try to work on the customers we have. We have people who are very good on the follow-up: “We sold you this eight weeks ago, and we’re calling to make sure you’re still happy.” And a month after that we can call and recommend something else they might consider. It’s as soft a sell as it can possibly be. What we’re really selling here is customer service, which is difficult. After many years of banging that drum—about customer service, about demonstrating our knowledge—I’ve had to change the definition of customer. It used to be a guy who walked in the store; now we’re overwhelmed by simply being a showroom for the Internet. There are magazine articles where the consumer tip is, “Gosh, you’re interested in a digital camera? Well, be sure to go down to your local camera store, press all the buttons and then buy online.” And the people recommending this just don’t get that it’s not OK.

What do you do to address it?

We’ve become more forthright about it: “You’re in here, and notice, we do have the stuff on the shelf, and we’re taking time with you and answering your questions, and you need to remember that’s valuable.” We have to be up front about it at the counter, without stepping over a line and alienating people. My experience is that most of the people who get outraged are people who are doing that exact thing and got busted.

But you have to be price competitive, too.

You have to be. And there’s a line in there, too, where we’re fighting against the tax issue. You buy it from me and you have to pay the tax. And I believe it’s good to pay your taxes; those are the taxes that keep the fire truck running.

Is there anything in particular you’re doing—accessory deals, a package you put together? Or a tangible definition or example of service?

One of the things we always did but are now much more verbal about is the “Thank you for buying this from us. We are an authorized, honest-to-gosh Nikon, Canon, whoever dealer, and should you encounter any problem whatsoever with the camera, we will handle it for you. We’ll send it at our expense; we’ll deal with any problem; we will support the product.” Often when people buy in other places, they say, “The manufacturer has a warranty, call them.” That’s not our deal. We speak specifically to the fact that we’re here to handle the questions after the sale. Right now we have to, and want to, verbalize that. We don’t take it for granted.

Jerry Sullivan CEO, Precision Camera & Video Austin, Texas
We’re trying to expand our regional advertising, something we hadn’t focused on much before. We’ve been running local advertising, but there are several underserved markets, and we see an opportunity there to pick up some market share. We’re going to place some ads in Texas Monthly, a regional magazine, in the spring.

And we’re talking to a Web development person right now to try to use some better analytics on our website. It’s just not able to generate the kind of conversion rates I think we should have. You’ve got to be able to do the sell on the product that’s out there, and I’ve seen websites that are a lot better with certain accessories that go with a certain SKU and the way they bundle it and kit it. If you look at the big guys, they’ve got these kits, and that prevents a lot of the price shopping. And we’re also going strong with Choose Austin First [a cooperative business organization], and there are these bumper stickers, Keep Austin Weird . . . it’s a local campaign [to promote small businesses in Austin].

That’s a great slogan.

Well, one interpretation of it is its reference to the many small businesses in Austin that give the city its unique cultural identity. We’re trying to push that because if we can’t get local support, we’re going to be gone.

The ads you’re going to run in Texas Monthly, what are they calling on people to do? To attract them to the store, or to visit your website?

Both. I think it’s basically about brand awareness. We have to sell our brand. We’re a locally owned camera store in the state capital of Texas, and if you’re ever in Austin, come on by.

Vicki Flegal President, Sahara Camera Center Las Vegas, Nevada
We just moved from a location we were at for 20 years, so I’ve been out networking, getting the word to our original customers and to new customers. We moved about two and a half miles from where we were—same street, but the other side of the strip. I’ve been out to every wedding chapel in town, repassing out the cards and a little introduction letter of services we offer. I’ve been going to the concierge at the local casinos—we’re so dependent on tourists here. The tourist business here is nice, because tourists are always happy; when you’re on vacation, you’re in a better state of mind.

The concierge is important because he’ll know to recommend you if a visitor needs a memory card, a battery, even a camera?

Right. We probably sell more batteries and chargers than anything else.

And promotions in the store?

We’re always doing photo contests to get people to show their work. We try to do a different theme every 
six weeks, and we have their work hanging in the middle of the store. We’re working on a new website, and 
we’re always working on classes.

The basics? Digital 101?

And lighting. We do very well with lighting here; it’s like a little niche thing here in Vegas. We don’t know what they’re lighting; we just say if they dare to shoot it, we’ll show them how to light it and we’ll process it.

Burke Seim President, Service Photo Supply Baltimore, Maryland
We’re trying to keep our name in front of our customers at all times, as much as possible, without annoying them. We’re doing e-mail marketing on a regular basis, and it’s getting a good response. We’re also doing direct mail to our customer base, and that’s successful because they already know us and know what we can do for them that some of the big boxes or mail order places cannot. We never stop trying to attract new customers, but we really need to cultivate the existing customer base.

What might those e-mail messages say? A special offer, a package you’ve put together, a general reminder of what you’re best at?

All of the above. There are so many different kinds of customers today that you have to tailor the e-mail to suit each one and offer each type something. We have specific coupons attached to certain products; we run certain specials that we might link to a PDF that we have on our server—they can access and print out a set of coupons or a special promotion.

And some things you’re doing in the store, in person?

Well, the photography equipment marketplace is seeing some very interesting things right now as far as pricing and competition. So what we make sure we do is explain. We don’t hide. Our customers are smart, they see what’s going on; they’re very in touch with the marketplace; we make sure we confront every issue head on and explain the reasons why this or that is happening.

You’re talking about the pricing for certain cameras?

Yes. What’s happening is simply supply and demand. If someone’s got too much supply, the price tends to be less than what it should be—and many times it’s below cost. We’re very open and honest about it. And if we can’t meet a price, we let everyone know why this is happening and what we can and cannot do for them. And often we find our customers will say, “I understand, and I want to buy it from Service Photo.” We get a lot of that response. It’s great to have customers who want you to be profitable so that you’re here for them.

Leo Calagaz President, Calagaz Photo & Digital Imaging Mobile, Alabama
I read a PMA survey that said, I think, two-thirds of DSLR purchasers were purchasing an additional camera. So when I look at how to spend my marketing dollars, do I try to go after my existing customer base and try to get more purchases out of them? Or do I spend TV advertising and try, for lack of a better term, a spray-and-pray type marketing approach?

I’d go with the former.

Especially with the economic conditions right now. We’ve run a lot of cable TV [ads] in the last few years, but anyone watching TV who happens to watch the news is hearing that we’re in terrible shape and we’d better put all our money under our mattress. And then he sees a commercial for Calagaz that’s asking him to buy a camera for $500. So I’ve taken my TV schedule off in January and February.

And the money is going toward . . .?

We’ve been very successful running seminars and classes. We had three classes in January and probably had over 150 people. So what we’ve done is a variable data marketing campaign. It’s our first attempt at it. We’re sending out a mailing for one-on-one training. With all the cameras out there every button is in a different place on each camera, and menus, even within manufacturers’ brands, are different. So if someone wants to talk to one of my sales managers, one on one, they can set up a time, and we have a conference room, and they go in and for $60 an hour they sit there and talk to this sales manager.

Intensive instruction on their particular camera.

Right. I’m sending out this variable data marketing piece that will say, Barry, want to find out how to get the most out of your Nikon D60?—because we know you recently bought a D60—and on the other side we’ll talk about the one-on-one class. We’ll say, if you bring this card in and sign up for the class, we’ll give you a free one-gig memory card. And the piece will show a memory card that’s appropriate for whatever camera you have.

Talk about intensive. That’s some customized promo you’ve created.

We’re sending out about 850 of them. We’re also trying to figure out ways to get involved in viral marketing, in the social sites. How do I talk to these people? I just reduced my Yellow Pages advertising by two-thirds—if you’re 35 and below, you probably don’t ever use a phone book—and I’m looking to put that money into sponsored links on my website and search engine optimization.

Your customers are out there . . .

And what I’ve got to do is figure out how to reach them.

“We speak specifically 
to the fact we’re here to handle questions after the sale. Right now we have to verbalize that. We don’t take it for granted.” 
—Art Esquibel, Camera & Darkroom

“If you look at the big guys, they’ve all got these kits, and that prevents a lot of price shopping.”—Jerry Sullivan, Precision Camera & Video

“We’re always doing photo contests to get people to show their work—we have their work hanging in the store. We’re working on a new 
website, and we’re working 
on classes.” —Vicki Flegal, Sahara Camera Center

“We’re very open and honest. If we can’t meet 
a price, we let everyone know why.”—Burke Seim, Service Photo Supply

“We’ve been very successful running classes, so we’ve done a variable data marketing campaign and are sending out a mailing for one-on-one training.”
—Leo Calagaz, Calagaz Photo & Digital Imaging