Do-It-Yourself Online Proofing Solutions
If you’re a professional photographer and looking for an online proofing system for your clients you have many choices.
You can go the “hosted” route and use a service like Pictage ($99-$250/month) SmugMug ($149.95/year), Zenfolio ($40/year) or Phosys (£35 + VAT/month) to handle everything for you (proofing, fulfillment, customer service, billing, etc.).
The other way is to “do-it-yourself” or hire a Web Developer and buy a turn-key solution. The major players in this arena are:
Pickpic ($1,249)
http://www.pickpic.com/
LightBox Photo ($1,099)
http://www.lightboxphoto.com/
Skooks Kart ($999)
http://www.skookskart.com/
PhotoCart ($279)
http://www.picturespro.com/
Rolling your own system is a cost-effective way to save yourself some money, but you’ll have to be ultimately involved with your own workflow and do everything yourself — including setting up a payment gateway (like Authorize.Net, ~$10/month) and a merchant account (like PayQuake, $14/month) to handle your credit card transactions.
You’ll also need an SSL certificate (like InstantSSL, ~$79/year) for your Web site and a solid web host (such as Media Temple, ~$20+/month) to handle all of your traffic.
If you’re even the least bit obsessed about quality and offering the best customer experience, you’ll want to choose this route (like I did). If you’re strapped for money, time, or don’t have the technical savvy the hosted route is likely your better choice.
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