How to Price Real Estate Photography Editing Services
The looming question for every aspiring professional in setting up their own business for image editing is how to price real estate photography editing services. Sometimes we see the rates going on around the industry, visible and imitable on the internet but simply copying it could be setting yourself up to fail. See, the average price of real estate photo editing depends on several components, and these are highly controllable for every business, thereby making them differ from one another.
Table of Contents
Finally drilling down and answering the question on how to price real estate photography editing services requires you to do a canvas on prices, assuming that certain levels of what you need come in different prices. For instance, not all chosen editing applications will come at the same price. They can be free or paid and have varying prices for monthly or one-time payments. These all contribute to the way average price of real estate photo editing behaves and a good heads up on this will make you aware on what due diligence needs to happen.
The final question under how to price real estate photography editing services tackles the existence of competing prices. One professionally outsourced service will surely not be identical with one another in terms of both the service and the price. Some will have tradeoffs but definitely without the intent to shortchange the client. Understanding this unlocks a whole new paradigm on creating your own average price of real estate photo editing that not only covers your cost but attracts people to contract your offerings.
What Do Real Estate Photography Editing Services Account for?
Breaking down the cost components into bits and pieces not only helps you price them but provides the visibility for you to help understand where your biggest drivers are. See, a beginner’s real estate photography price list shouldn’t be a giveaway but also shouldn’t be too expensive. The sweet spot is where people can get to access your services while giving them the best quality and satisfaction as you begin your journey in the industry. This is to say that your good work should speak for itself and eventually the customer-base will follow.
Variable Costs
As the name suggests, variable costs are those that change depending on the work being done. The more work you do, the higher variable cost will be but so does revenue and thus, profits.
- Working Hours – Headcounts will depend on their pay scheme but more often than not you will be able to get realty editors who would want to work and get paid by the hour or by the images done. The going rate is dependent on the market and being able to pay within the average might attract people if you’re not yet in the level of paying the best in the market.
- Total Demand – More pictures, more work that needs to be done and from here, real estate photo editing price per image could be a scheme and a driver for your variable costs. Just make sure that for every photo, you have a margin that when added to the cost of everything still turns up a profit for you.
- Editing Techniques – The number of edits that needs to happen in a picture matter. It is a function of time until the work is done and can consume resources such as manpower and electricity so you better know how much time an editing technique consumes so you can price it if there are numerous changes involved.
Fixed Costs
These costs do not move. They stay the same over a defined recurring frequency such as a month and require a full payment or else the service you are getting in exchange will no longer be rendered to you. In this lump sum of payment, you do not need to dump it all onto your customer’s billing. The basic and fundamental concept of how to price real estate photography editing services is to be able to spread out the costs evenly through every image. This means your edited image as a finished product carries both variable and fixed costs so you are sure you are covered.
- Electricity – Needless to say, you need to use your computer and lights as well as air conditioning. If you want to run an on-site office, you may need to pay for water as well. Such items fall under the basic necessities you need to provide both yourself, colleagues, and fellow editors.
- Monthly Subscriptions – Most real estate photo editing software don’t come without a price tag. To be able to access most of the amazing features, you must pay monthly fees but before you jump right in, check out if they can offer some deals with wholesale packages or bulk licenses.
- Rental – This is optional if and when you decide to put up an office for everyone. Your location could be a leased space if you don’t fancy a remote working set up.
Why Do Prices Differ?
Well, the average price of real estate photo editing is anchored on these fixed and variable costs, but competition drives each other to be different. The challenge everyone is trying to answer is how can I give the most to my client or customer while not being the most expensive one out there? Then the creativity begins with trying to manage costs and introduce promotions to help cover fixed costs while earning through variable ones. The intangibles also contribute to differences in prices. Well-known names in the industry have a proven track record, thereby gaining a good share of the market and no matter how they price their services, they can still get their clients due to the element of trust.
Final Thoughts
The question to you now is, through these things, are you now able to think of pricing strategies for your real estate photography editing services? The key is to understand what costs drive the operation of the business and put a margin on top of that to make sure you are earning while covering the costs you are incurring. It will not be a good sign to give out a freebie every so often but promotions and packages do create quite a bit of a marketing stir to get the trading going and you might just be surprised by the demand this generates.