Name of your website?Richard Blinkoff Photography
Your name?
Richard Blinkoff
Your Location (city, etc)
New York
Please give us a short summary of your website?
Richard Blinkoff creates high quality portraits and headshots for actors, models, dancers, classical musicians and vocalists, and other performers. He shoots from a large daylight studio located in the Chelsea district of Manhattan. All photographs are in digital black and white or color, fully retouched and printed in-house so that the quality is totally controlled by the photographer. Special rates and discounts are often available.
What inspired you to launch your own website?
Though about 40% of my incoming business is repeat or through word-of-mouth, I needed to introduce my work to the very large community of performers in New York City and its surrounding area.
When did you launch your first website, and what was it?
My first website was html only and showed black and white headshot and portrait photography. I started that in 2000. As color, digital photography became more the standard in the headshot area, I needed to show more of that part of my work. I contacted LiveBooks last year and contracted to have them develop my current website.
How did you decide on a name for your website?
The website presents my vision in a very simple, straightforward way, and so the name is simply "Richard Blinkoff Photography".
What makes it different from other, similar offerings?
My home page immediately shows the viewer a headshot in each of four different age ranges - child, teenager, adult (18-35 years) and mature (over 35). Very few headshot and portrait photographers choose or are capable of working across such a large age range. I find that, by not specializing by type or age, my everyday is challenging and my work stays much more exciting.
What is your eventual goal? (To sell it, keep it for income, secure a book or other mainstream media deal?)
I've had a long and profitable career in New York City in commercial fashion and beauty photography (35 years total). The headshots and portraits that I do now are done for money, of course, but more important they keep me active in the practice of photography, which I love, and challenge me daily in my interactions with all my clients. I get a tremendous thrill out of making the people who trust my work happy with their results.
How does your investment of time and money balance against your success?
Time and money are always a part of pursuing a career. Sometimes I'm amazed at how quickly they pay off and get me to a higher level. Other times, I work for very long hours and spend a lot of money and it seems like I'm going nowhere. Overall, after 35 years being a professional photographer, I think that I've been very blessed and have nothing to complain about.
If you had an unlimited development budget for development, how would you change your site?
I love my LiveBooks site, but it is a template using mostly Flash, and there are some things that it won't allow me to do. If I had an unlimited budget, I would have worked with an independent designer and gotten exactly what I needed.
If your site got really big, really quickly, would you be able to keep up with the demand?
Go ahead. Help me get really big, and I'll show you that I'm up to the challenge.
What unexpected costs and headaches have you had to deal with?
They're not unexpected, but the cost of keeping up with the latest in digital hardware and software is a huge challenge. As for headaches, it's very difficult to decide how to best spend your money to optimize and advertise you website and where and when to get involved in other kinds of promotion.
What has been your biggest challenge?
As I get more successful, it's hard to stay away from repeating what I've done before and allowing my work to become repetitive and routine. I need to keep getting excited about the person in front of my camera. The hardest thing is to make each and every client excited about himself so that his very best comes through in my photographs.
What method has been most successful for promoting your website?
I am just beginning to get serious about search engine optimization and I have yet to invest a lot of money to guarantee my placing on search results. I think a very high percentage of persons looking at my website find it because of word of mouth and advertising in other media.
How has running your website differed from your expectations?
It took me a long time to get the work together, find a format I liked and then get the site up and running. That first week, I actually thought that since I could finally see my site on line the whole world must be watching. Little did I know that the hard work was only just beginning.
How long have you run the site already, and how long will you continue to keep it up if you don't enjoy big gains in traffic, income or popularity?
My current site has been up since this past spring (April 2007). For now, it is the best way I can think of to contact new people who would benefit from my work. If I find a better way in the future, then this site, or the whole internet approach, may have run its course, and I will move on to something else. But for now, this is it.
Replace this with a question of your own
How do I get everything I want in life without having to work hard for it? and if I could get it that way, would I want it?
What is your website address?
Richard Blinkoff Photography
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