Seattle PASS Tour

I admit, when I heard that Showit would be going on tour, I probably asked Andrew if they would be coming to Seattle, on a daily basis. Andrew is tech support and overall Showit master and Josh and I have gotten to know him through the Showiteer Facebook page. If you didn’t know, Showit users have the MOST amazing community (both in person and online) and the Facebook page is a great place to start. If you haven’t already joined and you use Showit you should.

When they announced the dates and Seattle was the 1st stop on the tour, we rallied our Seattle SHARE group (a local group of Showit users who network, collaborate, and… share) and helped the crew with ideas for the locale. Josh went down and actually toured the venue The Last Supper Club which we actually shot at a few years ago. We love helping out the Showit team, so when they asked if they deliver some stuff to our house to take to the venue, we were more than happy to help. In fact, Monday afternoon, at the last minute Josh was driving through our neighborhood trying to track down our fabulous UPS driver to get the last couple boxes, so we could head down to the venue to help set up early. The UPS driver knows us well so he hooked us up and away we went.

We had such a great time helping out and hanging out. Taking photos of the set up, the step and repeats (what’s that… well it’s exactly what it sounds like… you know… red carpet, backdrop with logos where you see celebs posing, they walk some more, stop, pose, repeat… get it… Showiteers are celebrities, didnt you know????) Although I was taking photos for the event, I did take notes because I was looking forward to this for so long.

This wasn’t just a seminar, keep that in mind… it wasn’t speakers hanging out in a private areas, going on, hocking their items to sell, then running off. This was like having 5 friends get up in your living room, share their insightful information and then hang out with you the rest of the night. There was no “rockstar” mentality floating around from ANYONE. If anything, the guests were treated like rockstars with some amazing hook ups from the sponsors. (more later)

Now let me just give you a brief rundown of what I learned:

Promise Tangeman. First of all, I have to say, I LOVE her in a non-scary, stalkerish way. Promise is beyond talented and honestly just a fun, friendly person, as is her amazingly talented musician husband Brian Wurzell. We were so happy to have finally met them both in person. Now, we actually have a Sitehouse StyleGroup from Promise on our website right now, but we anxiously await the day we will be calling on Promise to design our custom site. But, until then, her Sitehouse StyleGroups are KICK ASS… yeah I said it. Promise touched on Identity and Branding and how to use them in the design of your site. Mostly it helps you know “you” and that’s great when it comes to the design process.

Identify strength, Embrace personal style, and most important Have confidence in you and your business. She gave helpful websites that she herself uses for inspiration while going through the design process.

Zach and Jody Gray. What an amazing couple they are! So full of energy and passion. You can tell right away they truly CARE about what they are saying, they are genuine, and they truly want to share their information and knowledge to better other photographers. There is nothing in it for them but the hope they help someone. Josh and I can relate to them as a husband and wife photography team. The way they relate to their clients is exactly the relationships we are trying to create with ours. They hit on some amazing points that just because the wedding is over, doesn’t mean the relationship ends. I know for us that is so true, as we are still friends with past clients. Zach and Jody touched on important moments in the “relationship.” Connect, Court, Continue… they explained exactly how they interact with their clients from day #1. Sharing information as to where they buy their goodies, forms they send to their clients, and how they deal with phone calls. It really was beneficial for us.

David Jay. I have long been an admirer of David Jay, having learned about him at WPPI a few years back and then finally making the jump to Showit a year ago. (BEST MOVE EVER) Over the past 6 months, we have interacted with David through the Showit Live daily shows and online in the facebook groups. So, we were really excited to be able to spend time with him in person. What we like about David is his commitment to growing the community. Sure he is the “name” behind the business of Showit, but that’s nothing compared to his involvement in the actual community. I think more than anything, the community is the one thing for me I really enjoy. I have found a group of people that share and interact in such a nurturing way that it has helped me personally as well as in our business.

David was there to talk about PASS, the new digital delivery system which will eliminate the need of burning, packaging, and shipping out DVDs. David hit the nail on the head when he said sometimes he forgets to go mail something right away and I do too. I hate when my clients have to wait an additional day because I forgot to go to the Post Office. Now, with a few simple steps, I can share their photos with them right away and they can download them anywhere. There is SO much more to PASS then just digital delivery. I strongly urge you to go to a tour stop to learn all about it. If you don’t deliver digital files to clients, then this might not be the business model for you. But, if you do… there isn’t a reason I can imagine for not using this process to get them the images in a timely manner.

The night was fun! Full of meeting new people, mingling with old friends, and networking with fellow professionals. If you have a chance to go to the tour, GO!

KISS is joining the tour for a few stops to talk about their new free album designer S.W.A.T. I have used it and… Hello… designing an album in less then 30 minutes… who doesn’t want to do THAT???

What freebies do you get?
PASS credits to the tune of $200 (cha ching)
$100 towards a KISS album (cha ching)
$300 on Pixifi, a studio management tool, we use this and it rocks supreme… (cha ching)
and
save $80 on Showit with a Sitehouse  Design (you need to email them for more info on that, but hello sitehouse, showit CHA CHING)

here are some photos from the tour

Cool booklets that almost didn’t make it… but thanks to Josh they did…
Promise is even COOLER in person
Zach and Jody are the cutest couple
David looking tenderly at Flat Kevin
David break downs PASS

Some Step and Repeat fun…



Karen and Isaac Stott… ( we <3 them)

 

Here are photos that our friend and talented photographer Holli True took of us at the tour with our buddies after the event before everyone left on the bus… (THANKS HOLLI) you can read her blog post about PASS here

Josh and I with David

Josh and I with Zach and Jody
Josh and I with Promise and Brian
The Studs!!!!!
(Jeff True, Andrew Barlow, David Jay and Josh)

If you want to see if PASS is coming to a city near you check it out here.
If you think Josh and I are super cool people and want to learn more about us and our photography biz check us out here.
If you want to book us for your event just from reading this blog post, we aren’t opposed to that either, click here.
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P.S. DON’T BE LIKE US AND FORGET BUSINESS CARDS! (DOH)… LOL