Organise your Christmas 2024 campaign and get a full house at your photo shoot

September is the perfect month to start planning your Christmas 2024 campaign. After having rested and disconnected during the summer, it’s time to start this new year with energy and start preparing the Christmas sessions. If you are still a bit of a novice in planning this type of temporary photo shoots, it may seem a bit rushed, but from the experience of many veteran photographers who do this type of photo shoots with children, we can tell you that if you don’t start now to give shape to this type of photo shoots, you will be quite short of time.

In order to prepare a Christmas 2024 campaign that really works, it is important that you take the time to plan and prepare the decorations, create the necessary publicity to make these reports profitable and several other tips that we will give you in today’s article.

 

September is the ideal month to start preparations for your Christmas 2024 campaign.

 

 

What do you need to consider before starting your Christmas 2024 campaign?

 

The Christmas 2024 campaign will be the last major event you will have to organise before the end of the year and to make sure you don’t miss a single detail beforehand you will have to take into account a number of considerations, for example:

• Define your goals for this year: calculate the number of photo shoots you would like to achieve this season and when you have finished, compare the actual figures with your calculations and the results obtained in previous years.
• Make a study of your audience: research the profile of clients who most request these sessions: age range, number of children, children’s ages, location, etc. This way you will be able to adapt your campaigns to this ideal client prototype.
• Plan each photo shoot: it is important that you calculate how much it will cost you to organise these photo shoots and how much you will sell each photo shoot for.
• Get your photography studio ready for Christmas: in addition to organising the type of decorations, it is important that you have everything ready in your studio to serve your clients properly. Decorate the waiting room, have Christmas sweets ready to offer to the little ones and even play some Christmas carols in the background.
• Etc.

10+1 tips to help you organise your Christmas sessions

 

 

For any children’s photographer or photographer who does other types of social photography, the Christmas 2024 campaign can be one of the strongest sources of income at the end of the year, so it is important that nothing is left to chance in this type of photo shoot.

When it comes to preparing your Christmas 2024 photographs, it is important that you take a pen and paper and start giving shape to each of the 10+1 recommendations that you will find in this small guide that we have created for you. Let’s take a look at each one of them. We warn you that the last one is the one you have to emphasize the most.

1# Decide on the theme of your next Christmas 2024 campaign

This is, without a doubt, the first step you have to take because when you start to give shape to this year’s Christmas sessions, it is important that you create an original decoration that is different from the rest and the more elaborate your resources allow you to be, the more clients you will attract to your studio.

Make sure that, within the Christmas theme, this year’s setting has quite different tones and details than last year’s. This way, you will attract more customers and build loyalty every year. This way, you will attract more customers and build customer loyalty every year.

Here are some ideas for preparing the theme of your Christmas 2024 campaign:

• Christmas Village: you can simulate a small avenue with several little houses, small lanterns and, of course, snow.
• Starry sky: use a dark background and add small points of light to simulate the stars. You can add a Christmas tree, reindeer, etc. to this scene.
• Santa’s house: this type of decoration is always popular with the little ones. Simulate the façade of Santa’s house and place a small letterbox so that children can leave their letters there.
• Living room with fireplace: another option that is also very popular, especially with parents, is to recreate a living room like in the Christmas movies, with its large fireplace and the stockings hanging around it.
• Decorated with Christmas sweets: you can use a background with Christmas tones and add gingerbread biscuits, large candy canes, candyfloss, Christmas cupcakes, etc. to the decoration.
• Winter forest: another very nice option, with the help of a ready-made background, is to simulate a fir forest in the middle of winter. You can add some logs, artificial snow and winter clothes for the children.
• Etc.

2# Get to work on creating the decorations for your Christmas sessions

Once you have a clear idea of the theme for this year’s Christmas 2024 reports, the next step is to get to work on the decorations.

You can look for a Christmas-style background to avoid creating part of the decorations by hand, or you can choose to create wooden structures, for example the front of Santa’s house, which you can then use in other years by changing the rest of the decorations.

Christmas trees are an essential part of this type of session, so if you don’t have one yet, we recommend that you get one to have in your studio. Every year you can vary the colours of the tree decoration, this way the decoration will be different every season.

Here are some of the materials you may need to create your Christmas scene:

• Wallpapers with a Christmas motif.
• Christmas tree, Father Christmas.
• Decoration for the tree.
• Lights.
• Artificial snow.
• Christmas garlands and decorations.
• Candy canes, marshmallows, etc.
• Fireplace, armchairs, chairs, tables, etc.
• Sleigh, reindeer, letterbox, etc.
• Pine branches, pine cones, chestnuts, holly leaves, etc.
• Toys and small gift boxes.
• Christmas-related items that the children can use in the sessions.
• Etc.

3# Organise the dynamics of this type of Christmas session

Once you have shaped your Christmas decorations for 2024, the next step is to decide what you want the session itself to look like. And if you don’t want to complicate this year with the decoration of the studio, you can propose 2 types of decorations to the families using the backgrounds that they sell online with Christmas scenery, this way your range of possibilities will be multiplied by 2 and you will also save valuable time in the planning.

You can offer a simple session, for example, in a background with a Christmas fireplace where the decoration will be more elaborate. And you can also offer the option of enjoying 2 sets, one with the fireplace where the little ones can put on their best clothes and another simulating a starry night where the children dress up in their pyjamas to have nice dreams or wait for the arrival of Father Christmas or the Three Wise Men.

In any case, it is important that you think very carefully about how many options you want to offer the families, whether you want to include photos with the parents, costume changes, etc. so that when it comes to organising the time for each photo shoot you are very clear about all the options you are going to offer the families.

4# Do you dare to organise an outdoor Christmas 2024 report?

Another option that is very interesting is to organise a special session in early autumn as part of the Christmas 2024 campaign, which can be done in addition to your studio photos, in the outdoors in your town. For this type of Christmas photo shoot it is important that you control the weather very well so that the little ones enjoy the photo shoot.

You can go to an area with pine trees near your clients’ garden or a square in the surrounding area, add artificial snow, some more decorative elements and tell the parents so that the children wear warm clothes or Christmas-style clothes to simulate a winter afternoon.

You can also create a magical atmosphere by taking advantage of the sunset and adding lanterns to the scene, a cup of hot chocolate or a small Christmas tree for the children to decorate during the photo shoot. And for the little ones in the house you can place a red and white checkered tablecloth on the floor and a blueberry or strawberry cake so that the kids can play and experiment with the cake in the style of the smash cake sessions but with a Christmas atmosphere.

5# Use special Christmas materials to decorate the studio and to deliver the images

 

When decorating the Christmas studio you can choose to hang some photos of this type of sessions carried out in previous years. And to make the decoration more eye-catching you can print some images in more special formats and larger sizes so that the clients can feel the atmosphere as soon as they enter your studio.

And to surprise your customers even more, every little detail is too little, so as well as offering them different products to personalise with their Christmas photos, it is also important that you take care of how you deliver them. You can wrap them in brown wrapping paper, include a pretty red ribbon and give the little ones a candy cane. Both the decoration of the studio and the delivery of the final product will make your clients leave much more satisfied with your work and you will have many more options for them to come back to you for the next Christmas season or even for other types of photo shoots.

6# Decide which Christmas products to give to your customers in this 2024 campaign

As we mentioned in the previous section, it is important that you think about what kind of products you are going to give to your clients together with the photos once the photo shoot is over.

In these cases, the easiest way is to deliver the images in digital format and that’s it, but if you want to create several packs and increase the benefits of your Christmas 2024 campaign, you can offer your customers several options. Here are some ideas:

• Printing images in professional formats or even giving the option of creating a canvas painting as a gift for grandparents.
• Creation of Christmas cards.
• Balls and other Christmas decorations to decorate the tree with one of the images of the Christmas report inside.
• Mini Christmas photo album.
• Calendar with the 12 best images from the photo shoot.
• Personalised gifts for the family: mugs, cushions, magnets, key rings, etc.
• Video with a slide show of the best photos from the session and Christmas-style music.
• Etc.

7# Hold a first test session with the 2024 Christmas decoration

To make your new 2024 Christmas decoration much more widely known, once you have created it, you can talk to a friend or family member who has young children or even raffle a mini Christmas session on your social networks to be able to do a first Christmas themed photo shoot for a small fee.

It is important that for this first photo session all the details are perfect, so ask the parents to have the children dressed in Christmas clothes, add to the decoration elements that they can play with and after the photo shoot you can ask them to leave you a first evaluation talking about your new Christmas decorations for this year.

All the photos you take in this photo shoot will help you with the promotion of your new Christmas 2024 campaign through the web, social networks, blog, ads, in-studio decoration, etc.

8# Offer all information through your website, social media and other channels

Once you have everything ready: the set, the dynamics of the session, the final products well defined and several photographs with this year’s set, it is important that you start preparing all the information. It is also important that you do not skip this step, as if you do, the dissemination of your reports will be much less and the time you will have to spend explaining these photo sessions to each family will end up taking up many hours of work.

These are the steps you can take before launching your Christmas campaign this year:

• Prepare a services page on your website with all the information.
• Create an image gallery with the best pictures from the test session. You can also add pictures from other years, but what will really interest families are the ones from this season’s set.
• Write a blog post introducing your new campaign, explaining what it will look like and showing part of the test story.
• Plan how the ads (text, photos and link) you launch on social networks and Google will be used to promote your Christmas reports.
• If you are going to activate the booking calendar through your website for this photo shoot, organise all the information you will need (photo, text, conditions of the shoot, times, days available, etc.).
• Etc.

>> 12 tips for upgrading your digital photography business in summer

9# Automate as many processes as possible in your Christmas campaigns

We know that these photo shoots are a boom among families and you have a lot of hours of work ahead of you. That’s why it’s important that before you start with them you can automate as many processes with your clients as possible, so that you’ll be able to do more photo shoots without working overtime. Here are some tips that can help you automate certain processes:

• As we have already mentioned in this post, have all the information about the sessions published so that clients don’t call you again and again to solve their doubts.
• Implement an automatic booking system through your website so that families can choose the day and time that suits them best to come to your photo studio.
• Create a private gallery for each client where, after the photo session, they can view their images, buy more photos, prints or even order more products than they had originally agreed.
• Have a space on your website where customers can leave their reviews and other families can read first-hand about their experience with you.
• Etc.

10# Organise a publication calendar for your Christmas sessions

Once you have all the information ready about your Christmas 2024 campaign, it is also important to think about how you will plan your outreach campaign. You can do this by creating a calendar to indicate the most important events, for example:

• Dates on which you are going to create the campaign itself: sets, planning, test photoshoot, briefing, etc.
• Duration of the Christmas 2024 photo shoot period. It is important that you calculate the deadlines for having these photoshoots available, especially if you offer printed products and do not want to get your fingers caught in the cookie jar.
• Day on which you will have the information visible on the website, blog article and scheduled advertising campaigns.
• Calendar of announcements that you are going to launch. For example, you can create 2 small campaigns, one at the beginning of the season announcing that these sessions are already available and another one at the beginning of November announcing that you have few places available.
• Deadlines for delivery of final products. Especially for the last reports you make, keep in mind what the last delivery days may be before the Christmas celebrations begin.
• Etc.

10+1# Promote your Christmas 2024 campaign in as many media as possible

Once you have everything well prepared and defined, choose a day to launch your Christmas campaign and advertise it in as many digital and traditional media as possible. Here are some ideas:

• Website.
• Blog.
• Social networking.
• Internet advertisements.
• Partner pages, such as businesses in your neighbourhood.
• In your own photo studio.
• Commercial spots on a local radio station.
• Paper advertisement to be distributed to neighbours and local businesses.
• Etc.

Don’t wait any longer to start organising your Christmas 2024 campaign!

As you have just seen in this article, there are many tasks that you have to organise before launching your Christmas 2024 campaign. That’s why it is important that you take advantage of these weeks of less workload to give shape to these sessions that will bring you great benefits for the end of the year.

At Arcadina we offer you a series of business solutions specifically for photographers that will make your life easier and allow you to automate certain processes with clients. If you still don’t know how they work, you can try them for 14 days for free.

 

 

 

 Before we say goodbye we would like to leave you here the interview of the photographer Gema Romero from Ilusiones Art Photography.

>> Gema Romero: ‘I love what Arcadina looks like’

And to end this little Christmas guide, we’d like to ask you a question: Have you already started planning your Christmas 2024 photo shoots? We’d love to read about your progress in the comments.

 

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