ALWAYS Ask These Questions BEFORE You Estimate Corporate Photography Jobs

I got a call once from a government agency asking me to quote on a job that would would have been a really big job a lot of money I had I spent afternoon a day putting together a bit of a quote but I had questions and I was trying to reach the person in charge and she wasn't in and I got her on the phone the next day when she came back into the office and she called me and and I ran through my questions she came to an understanding that I was putting a serious estimate together of course I was they they approached me about doing this job and she said to me and I'll never forget it she said to be honest with you we already know the photographer that we're going to hire but we need to get three estimates every time we do a job in order to fulfill our obligations of getting a triple bid on every job I was Furious I had spent an entire day I had wasted an entire day when they knew they had no intention of hiring me and they were just wasting my time and another photographer's time and I said to her very directly I said do you understand you've wasted an entire day of my time I had other things that I was working on but I dropped them to get this estimate to you because I was told it needed to be in in 24 hours and she said well I'm really sorry about that and I said but you're wasting not only my time you're wasting time of someone else who's also put an estimate together and I said have you done this before have you done this triple bid process before knowing who you were going to hire already and she said yeah we have to do this every time and I said don't you have a preferred vendors list she said yeah we do I said why don't you just get the photographer that you know you're going to hire and get them onto your preferred vendors list and just use them as a vendor so you don't have to go through the charade of a triple bid process wasting other photographers times every single time you need to do a photo shoot and she said you know I never thought of it and and that sounds like a good idea and I'm very sorry for wasting your time it's nice that she was apologetic but uh at the same time this is the incident that just kind of broke the camel's back for me and it made me develop two questions that I asked now whenever I understand like it's a job coming in that's direct to client it's not going through an a agency or a marketing firm or anything like that it's it's I'm dealing directly with a client and specifically a corporate client I will ask them two questions the first question is is this part of a triple bid process and if they say yes then the second question is do you already know who you're going to hire I asked them directly and on a number of occasions I've gotten the answer yes and I said then I am not submitting an estimate to you if you already know who you're going to hire there's no point in me submitting an estimate to you because you're just wasting my time so I always ask those two questions now if the answer to the second question is no we're soliciting three people to work with on this project and we have no idea who we're going to hire then you will get an estimate from me but if you know who you're going to hire like that's a practice that I think needs to end there there seems to be some understanding in in the corporate world that that everything needs a triple bid process even if you know who you're going to hire you still need to get two more estimates to be fiscally accountable even though it doesn't matter you're not actually looking at the number because you're still going to hire the same person even if they're more expensive than any of the other bids that you get so I always ask those two questions is this part of a triple bid process and do you know who you're going to hire it has saved me countless hours of putting estimates together for people who already knew they weren't going to hire me the same time when I've gotten no we don't know who we're going to hire I've done the estimate and I've I've gotten the job on on a number of occasions so ask the questions save yourself some time save yourself the hassle I I really think the whole triple bid process is nonsense if you know who you're going to hire or just do your research and hire the best person for the job I remember when I was working at a National Association and they had three firms pitching them for a large website Redevelopment project this was in the tens of thousands of dollars they had three firm teams come in and do full presentations and they had like full decks and they were scheduled on different days and they didn't know who they were going to hire but of those three they definitely knew one that they weren't going to hire and so in their minds they had already decided between two but they still made the third company go through the entire process of putting a pitch deck together and coming in and doing a presentation wasting their time developing a deck wasting their time putting a presentation together wasting everyone's time in the room who had to sit through the presentation not only the people delivering it but like my time was wasted because we knew they weren't going to be hired I really wish corporations would stop doing this and get a vendors list set up work with photographers that you know and trust if you do need to go through a triple bid process make it honest run it with Integrity if you want to work with the same person that you've worked with for a number of years just get them in as a vendor I have a client who I've worked with for nine years now and when I I initially pitched to them they hired me since then I haven't had to compete for a job from them with any other photographer it's good to have an established developed relationship from a corporate perspective it's good to have trusted suppliers but if you have a trusted supplier don't waste the time of other people as a photographer make sure that you're not wasting your time and ask in advance if the triple bid process is an honest process that they are participating in or if they just feel like they need to fulfill an obligation and deliver estimates from three different vendors to make it look like they've actually done their due diligence if you found this video helpful please hit the like button subscribe if this is the first video of mine that you're seeing and you think you want to see more videos like this and then check out this video here which talks about a clause that I have in all of my contracts that came directly from Steven Spielberg until next time take care