Without a doubt, the COVID19 pandemic will have a long lasting impact on life as we know it, and we are only beginning to see the changes…there is so much more to come. From the way we interact (both socially and professionally) to how we conduct business, the way we educate ourselves and our children to how we practice our faith, all the way down to how we go about purchasing daily necessities to comfort items and everything in between. We are already seeing the impact on the global economy, unemployment rates and social norms. Without a doubt, we will survive and move on, the question is simply in what shape and form.
As a direct result of the technology and times that we live in, media coverage of COVID19 and its impact has been overwhelming. For whatever reason (as a general rule, Fotility does not wade into politics), the vast majority of the media coverage has been focused on the negative. This is just how society consumes information, it is what it is. As a growing and thriving small business in San Diego, we wanted to share how the COVID19 pandemic has allowed us to make positive adjustments to our business.
Being a full time, professional photography and videography studio, Fotility is a proud part of the gig economy, and as such, our team and staff are considered gig workers. We watched carefully as news of COVID19 entering the US broke, and we immediately implemented COVID19 procedures to protect our staff and our clients. We continue to monitor and adjust our procedures as COVID19 has spread, resulting in Fotility only taking on new bookings to support essential businesses. As our pre-booked weddings and events started cancelling (obviously, we experienced a 100% cancellation rate), we pivoted, purchased more equipment, and started offering Matterport 3D Tours to allow the essential real estate industry to safely show homes online. In addition, we established a relationship with DoorDash, which allows us to support local restaurants by photographing their food items to be displayed on the DoorDash platform, thereby increasing their online orders.
Fortunately, these adjustments have allowed us to maintain a significantly high and constant number of bookings, week after week. So when our government approved and launched the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), we elected not to participate or seek assistance. Our thoughts were (and still are) that the PPP should be used for companies in need, and although our business has been negatively impacted, financially we’re doing just fine. As California begins to ease restrictions, we are slowly starting to accept non-essential business, while still practicing safe social distancing guidelines. The great news is that we are slowly starting to see more non-essential future bookings being made!
One area we couldn’t make adjustments for was our fundraising efforts for local schools and community organizations. As an active supporter of various schools, teams and the Sripps Mesa Fireworks, ALL of the fundraisers that we setup for these programs were cancelled. We were disappointed that this resulted in the loss of thousands of dollars in donations to the organizations that we support, but what really breaks our heart is the loss of memories that so many of the students experienced, and especially the graduating Class of 2020. We reached out to all of the principals, coaches and teachers that we work with and offered them each one (1) free senior portrait session to award to a Class of 2020 student. We’re thrilled that we have quite a few free senior portraits on our shoot calendar now, and wish we could do more š
Now, on to the long term, positive impact that the COVID19 pandemic has had on Fotility! When we’re not shooting for essential businesses, we have been hard at work enhancing our business to better serve our clients as we start to get ‘back to normal’. The following changes are either in full effect or in progress:
- We’re running ads now! Up until this point, our growth has been almost 100% organic. Recently, we’ve started investing in social media ads on Facebook, Instagram and Google!
- We’re now using an email authentication service, which will help ensure delivery of all of our emails to our clients (and keep them out of your SPAM folder!). This includes booking confirmations and notifications of your final images.
- We’ve added Matterport 3D Tours and Aerial/Drone Services to our real estate services!
- We’ve streamlined our website to be more mobile friendly. Changing the workflow and text on our website was a significant change, but we reconize that a good majority of our website traffic comes from mobile devices. So we shortned the amount of text on our website, made it easier to find the service you’re looking for, and simplied our online booking process.
- We’ve significantly enhanced our online booking forms, allowing you to add pertinent information when placing your order with us. This includes information such as email delivery address, selecting your own password, student id, jersey number etc. This enhancement is active for most of our fundraising services, and is in the process of being migrated over to all of our non-fundraising bookings as well.
- We’ve created dedicated brands, websites and social media profiles for specific services, such as real estate (FotilityRE), food photography (FotilityFD), product photography (FotilityPR) and fundraising (FotilityFR). Our primary social media (Fotility) will now only display our portrait photography services.
- We’ve improved our videography processes, including adding teleprompter services for our BPV, interviews and podcast videography services.
- We’ve added new videography editors, and are in the process of redefining our videography services to maintain consistency on delivery timelines, format and quality.
- We’ve started to implement a certification process for all of our team (assistants, photographers, videographers and editors). EVERY team member will soon be required to take an online course and pass a certification quiz PRIOR to representing Fotility. The certification program is slated to officially launch on 07/01/20.
- We’ve changed our uniform! Our team members will now be dressed business casual, and will always be wearing a Fotility ID card around their neck.
- We filmed and are in the process of editing videos for our Posing Tips, Headshots, Fundraising and Business Promo Videos! Look for these videos to be launched within the next sixty (60) days!
As you can see, the Fotility team has been keeping pretty busy during this quarantine! We’ve been supporting essential businesses, offering support via some free portraits sessions to the Class of 2020, and have made some significant, long term changes to our business model. Much of these changes came about or were pushed to the forefront due to this crazy COVID19 pandemic, either by forcing us to make adjustments or granting us time to finally do some of the things we’ve been talking about. We’re blessed, and we look forward to working with you all in the future!