Cost of Leads as a Photographer and Refunds

ROGUEPhotography1927

Hey everyone. (apparently my post got deleted by thumbtack)

I'm at the end of my rope with Thumbtack. They seem to have trash customer service, it's not even in the u.s. although the owner lives in California?

My issues are as such, as a Pro Photographer, my regular rate is $4000 - 5000 per wedding. On thumbtack, I use it mainly for 3 months out to fill dates I haven't filled yet.

It costs me an arm and a leg per quote. I'll get about $300 a week of "inquiries" and each one costs about $70-130. My rate on Thumbtack is around $2000-2500.

I think the cost before even buying the cow is over the top ridiculous. It's not a guarantee. It's an open market for people to just inquire on me without putting another effort into speaking and I'm down another $100.

I get crap inquiries where the budget of the potential client isn't even in my preferences. I had a lady looking for a photographer for a max of $150 and my minimum is $500. Somehow I got charged $25 just for her to inquire with me. I've had the same person request multiple times and I get charged and then turned down from a refund. I've had people in other states request portraits from me and I don't get a refund even tho it's not in my preference but because "it is in your preferences". I've had people inquire for a wedding for a portrait and I spend $100 for their 1 hr portrait session and not get a refund.

Overall, when I started with thumbtack originally, it was $6-15 to quote someone. Small potatoes. Now I spend $1200 a month to potentially book 3 weddings? I get an extra one in order to pay for thumbtack now.

They have crap customer service who are severely limited, crap costs for our specific industry, and they don't do a great job at all. It seems like Thumbtack doesn't even care about listening to its business owners.

I'm looking for alternatives. Any awesome suggestions where people are having success at, preferably a company that is based in the u.s. that has good customer service and doesn't cost me rent to advertise.

I appreciate all the feedback folks.

Matt

@ROGUEPhotography1927 Hey, totally get it! It is a huge struggle sometimes to get the right clients to pay you for WHAT YOU ARE WORTH!

I find that Thumbtack needs to do a better job on curating the client base for the right pro. We need to have a better questionnaire the clients have to answer even before they can reach out to a Pro so the pro who's budget is out of reach, wont even show up in the results.

Also, there has to be a way for TT to allow the Pro to reject a client inquiry without seeing any contact information, only what the job is, and what the budget is. This would allow for less frustration on both sides and keep the platform balanced and healthy. Right now we are sitting ducks, I have clients reach out to do a mural who have 650sqft of coverage, and a $2k budget, which is FAR below my rate but maybe not another muralists budget. Yet, I was charged $65 for that lead that will never workout.

As far as other services, I have not found one that doesn't cost a ton up front. There are marketing opportunities out there where you pay someone to manage socials and reach out to clients, build up more client base, but they are also a decent amount of money with no guaranteed return.

DustiO

@ROGUEPhotography1927 I combined some threads re: lead costs and refunds so I could send consolidated threads to our teams to see feedback - it wasn't deleted, but sorry if you were unable to find your post.

I would ask that you please refer to our Community Code of Conduct and please refrain from using derogatory terms when referencing our team members (or members of the Community).

As far as lead prices - you have the ability to use your Max Lead Price feature to control what you pay - I would recommend setting that to lead prices that you are comfortable with. As far as refunds, I would recommend following up with an email to support for the one that was in Seattle - include any screenshots of conversations that would indicate this customer was trying to hire you outside your area.