Clients, the pipeline and marketing

Clients

Clients → Clients lists everybody who has booked or enquired, and when you last saw them.

One person, one client. A couple who enquired last year and booked this year is the same client, matched on their email address, rather than two records that each know half the story.

Adding a client yourself

Clients are added automatically when somebody books or enquires. To add one by hand:

1. Under Add someone, fill in their Name.
2. Add their Email — optional, but nothing can be sent to them without one — and

Phone, How they found you and Anything worth remembering if you like.

1. Press Add them.

To bring a whole list across from another platform, see [bringing your work across](/importing-clients).

A client's page

Press a client's name to open their page. It shows:

• Paid to date, and how many bookings and invoices they have;
• Releases — press Model release (their permission for you to use the photographs) or Print release (your permission for them to print the files at a lab). It is sent to them to sign online, like a contract;
• Bookings — with an Invoice button to raise an invoice for a booking;
• Invoices;
• your Notes;
• Marketing — whether you may email them offers (see below);
• Their page — one link with everything for them on it: gallery, invoice, contract, questionnaire. Send it once and it stays current as you add things. Replace this link stops the old one working; gallery and invoice links they already have keep working;
• Their data — see below.

Clients do not need accounts. Everything they open is a link of its own. Nobody is asked to make a password to look at their own wedding photographs, which is the most common reason a client never opens a gallery at all.

When a client asks for their data

Under Their data:

• Download everything about them gives you a copy of what you hold, to send them.
• Erase their details removes their name, contact details and anything they wrote. Invoices and signed contracts are kept, without their details attached, because tax and legal records require it. This cannot be undone.

The pipeline

Clients → Pipeline shows your enquiries laid out by stage:

Where a stage has quotes in it, the screen shows what they are worth.

Nothing changes on this screen. To move somebody along, change the status on Enquiries.

Who has gone quiet

At the top, Gone quiet lists the people about to slip away, longest wait first:

• Enquiries nobody has answered after two days.
• Quotes sent a fortnight ago with no answer.

Press Open to go to the enquiry or quote. This list is the most valuable thing on the screen, and the reason to open it on a Monday.

The screen also shows what share of the last year's enquiries became bookings.

Marketing, and who you may email

Clients → Marketing. Photographers get this wrong in both directions — some never email anybody, some email everybody — and the rules are not complicated.

Each client has a consent state:

Only the first two are counted as people you may contact, and that is worked out for you. The top of the screen shows how many you may contact, how many have **no consent recorded, how many are too long ago, and how many have opted out**.

To record a client's answer yourself — for example, they told you in person that emails are fine — open their page, choose under May you email them marketing? and press Save.

Two things worth knowing:

• Two years for a past client is a reading of the law, not a number in it. The Spam Act does not set one; two years is the usual position and it errs towards the client, because somebody who used you once four years ago has not agreed to a newsletter for ever.
• An opt-out is final. Once somebody has opted out you cannot put them back on the list from the panel, and booking them again does not change it. They would have to ask you, and you would want that in writing.

Mailchimp

Meridian does not send newsletters itself. Your list stays in Mailchimp, where you write and send.

1. Under Mailchimp, paste your API key — a private code that lets Meridian

talk to your Mailchimp account (in Mailchimp: Account → Extras → API keys) — and your Audience ID (**Audience → Settings → Audience name and defaults**).

1. Press Connect.

Anybody who unsubscribes in Mailchimp is brought back every night, so they are not on a list you send tomorrow. Press Bring unsubscribes back to do it now.

Segments

A segment is a group worth writing to. It is a rule, not a fixed list, so it stays current as you shoot.

1. Under Segments, type a name in Name it, such as "Last year's couples".
2. Choose Who is in it:

- Everybody who has had a shoot - Shot with me this year - Have not booked in over a year - Enquired but never booked - Have ordered prints - Wedding clients - Everybody who may be contacted

1. Add a Mailchimp tag if you want a different tag from the name.
2. Press Add segment.

The Size shown only counts people you may contact. Press Send to Mailchimp to add them to your Mailchimp audience with that tag. See enquiries for why "Enquired but never booked" is often nearly empty.

Suppliers

Clients → Suppliers is the same idea for the people you work with: second shooters, editors, venues, planners, celebrants. See suppliers.