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Sales Strategies
Web site as Portfolio: Interview with liveBooks
By Maria Piscopo

Your web site is often “first contact!” for prospective clients. Your web site must make a prospective client feel comfortable and ease the anxiety that many clients when considering a different photographer. For some thoughts on building your portfolio on a web site, we are interviewing Michel Costuros, Founder/Director of liveBooks at http://www.evolutionStudio.com.  Remember that your site is a promotion tool and all the basic marketing rules apply along with all the new technology you are facing!

Maria Piscopo: What is your background? How did you get into this business?

Michel Costuros: I was finishing my BFA at the San Francisco Art Institute in 1997, at the beginning of the web boom. The primary motivation behind my art work was to communicate to an audience. I saw the web as an interactive gallery space that would enable me to communicate to a global audience. I fell for the web - hook, line and sinker.

I taught myself how to make a portfolio site for my artwork, and shortly after other artists started paying me to build sites for their work. I have continued to make websites for artists ever since. It wasn’t until very recently that the technology to make a web site that the artists themselves could have complete creative control over became readily available. When it did, and we solved the technical challenges, it was then that I knew that my dream of creating a web site that would put complete creative control of the content in the hands of the photographer was going to be realized. At that moment, liveBooks was born.

MP: What exactly does liveBooks do?

MC: A web site created using the liveBooks editSuite empowers the owner to update all the content on the site in minutes. Most notable is our lightBox tool which enables them to see the whole sequence of a portfolio presentation on the webSite and edit it by simply arranging the images by drag and drop. They can even edit individual images giving them control over the pairing of images on a page.

The process of editing the site is intuitive and enjoyable, empowering the creative process rather than hindering it. Also, the liveBooks web site is able to present images of exceptional quality at image sizes up to 920 px x 562 px, equivalent to 12.7 x 7.8 inches printed. Despite their size the images download very quickly, and in a fashion that rarely leaves the viewer waiting.

MP: What are the biggest problems or obstacles you have seen photographers run into when starting up and then maintaining their own web site that you had to solve?

MC: There were three main problems:

• Keeping the site current. This process, for most, was expensive, time consuming, and a real pain in the butt. A web site was little more than a static brochure and you were dependent on a web designer to make updates.
  
  
• Presenting images at a size and quality that moved the viewer. It is the opinion of many editors and art directors that the majority of photographer web sites do not present the images at a size and quality that enables them to make a positive decision about the work.

• Intuitive navigation. It is a real challenge for a designer without years of experience making photography sites and the benefit of feedback from those who buy images for a living, to develop a site and portfolio navigation that meets the end users every need.

 MP: What extra “bonus” features can a photographer get with a liveBooks web site?

MC: Our clients can choose to have their site customized in many ways, but we always remind them to keep it simple. Clients want to clearly see and remember your images, not your web site. Our Custom Books feature is a big favorite. With it a photographer can quickly create custom webBook for a client, assign it a password, and publish it to the web. They also have the option of downloading that webBook as a beautiful PDF that they can then email to a client. The whole process can be done in 5 minutes.

 MP: We then asked several photographers to comment on how they have used liveBooks for their web site.

Bob McNamara, www.bobmcnamara.com: I do like that the design of the site is simple, the navigation is easy and the clients can get in and out without wading through unnecessary pages.  The fact that the design is somewhat "locked" in place keeps me focused on my images and not playing with the site design.

Lyle Owerko, www.owerko.com: If everything worked as well as LiveBooks I would triple my ability to shoot. I don't even want to manage portfolios anymore. The site allows me to instantaneously communicate my work to clients and inform them about recent images and achievements. 

Francis Hills, www.figjamstudios.com: As a photographer, everything is about presentation – whether off or online. It’s important for me to be able to change images when I need to – not to be at the mercy of a web designer. The flash driven interface means that the site loads and performs very smoothly, but equally importantly, means that visitors are unable to ‘right click’ and download my images.

I’m a big fan of the template-driven ‘drag and drop’ owner interface. It’s instant gratification – I can drop my images in, switch their order then, when I’m happy, reload the page and there’s the site! I was talking to someone about liveBooks the other day and describing the ease of change. After we’d chatted it reminded me just how simple it was to change the site; so I went running back to my studio and made some changes to my site – just because I could.

MP: Michael, Any tips for our visitors on preparing to launch a portfolio web site?

Michel Costuros: Ask yourself where you see your business growing over the next three years? How can the web site support and facilitate that growth? Choose your web site developer very carefully; your web presence will depend on their reliability and expertise for years to come. For a web site to truly bring in business, it needs to be up to date with your latest work. Estimate the time, money and hassle factor involved in updating your site. It is wise to have your web site built using a modular architecture so that you can easily add new features and functionality to the site over time. I would advise going with a dynamic web site with an edit suite that puts the creative control of your global web presence in your hands.
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