In today’s image-saturated world, photography clients are inundated with digital files they often forget to print. That’s where photographers have a major opportunity to stand out, tell a deeper story, and elevate their brand through thoughtfully curated printed products. Learning how to create marketing campaigns around printed products can help gain new clients, repeat clients, and increase sales averages.
Often, photographers and their clients see printed products as an afterthought, something to mention in a price sheet or add as an upsell after the session. However, when these products are the centerpiece of your marketing strategy, everything shifts. They become the reason someone books, the incentive for them to return, and the memory that keeps your work on their walls for decades. To turn these products into profit and, more importantly, into lasting client relationships, you need more than just a pricing guide. You need a plan.
Products Are Your Difference Maker
For many photographers, creating marketing campaigns can be very seasonal. Popular times of year, like the fall and the winter holiday season, keep photographers busy through the fourth quarter of the year. Other popular calendar events, such as Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, and graduations, are peppered throughout the year to keep busy. Annual holiday promotions can be great, but they can also be lost in an oversaturated marketplace. When there’s a celebration on the calendar, every service provider and retailer is flooding inboxes with promotional messages, and some may get lost in the crowd.
Learning how to create marketing campaigns around printed products lets you control the timing of campaigns, and as a result, you may find more space to get noticed when all the offers sound the same.
Of course, you will want to participate in marketing during popular times of the year, but what if your messaging were different? Featuring a printed product alongside the opportunity to be photographed during the peak of fall colors makes your messaging different. Try something like:
“Each family that participates in the Festival of Fall Portraits Sessions will get a beautiful framed artist’s canvas that will show off the family’s favorite autumn image from Main Street Park. Make this an annual tradition, and you’ll have your very own family gallery on display in your home. ”
This sounds more elevated and interesting than:
“Each mini session is 15 minutes long. If you are late, that will eat into your session time, so arrive 30 minutes early. Wait in your car until it’s your turn. These sessions can only include immediate family, no clothing changes, no pets.”
Finding Your Products
When exploring how to create marketing campaigns around printed products, you’ll need to curate the products that you would like to offer. If you are planning several campaigns a year, select a variety of options to encourage clients to come back for different items.
McKenna offers a range of beautiful, distinctive print options—Art Blocks, Metal Curves, Christmas Ornaments, Barn Wood, Accordion Books, Folios, and traditional photographic prints. When pairing a session type with a product, make sure the connection to the product makes sense. Barn Wood Minis with might go hand in hand with fall sessions, where Metal Curves and newborn images may seem a little disconnected.
The Purpose of Printed Products
If you want to know how to create marketing campaigns around printed products, you will want to start with the “why” of offering printed products. Printed products can help to build smart, emotional, and effective marketing campaigns. The secret isn’t just about what you offer—it’s how and why you introduce these items to clients.
Use Tangible Samples to Sell the Experience
Printed products don’t sell themselves online; they need to be seen, touched, and experienced. Having studio samples like Metal Curves or a handcrafted album isn’t just good practice; it’s essential. Show product options before sessions, consultations, and after the session wraps up.
When clients can physically engage with the quality and presentation of printed products, they begin to imagine them in their own homes. They move from wondering “Why would I want this?” to “How big should I go?” You’re no longer just delivering images; you’re delivering artwork.
Integrate Print Into Your Brand, Not Just Your Packages
Photographers who build their brand around printed work automatically stand apart from those who don’t. When print is woven into your collections, your messaging, your visual branding, and your social presence, it communicates a level of professionalism and care for how your work is experienced. Rather than waiting until the sales session to mention Accordion Books or Art Blocks, make those products visible from the start—on your website, in your Instagram highlights, and through client testimonials.
Printed products should be a core part of the narrative you tell. When you position your work as something to be displayed, not just stored on a phone, clients perceive more value from the outset.
Time-Sensitive Offers
When planning how to create marketing campaigns around printed products, urgency is the key to getting clients off the fence. By designing your promotions around a short window or a limited quantity, you introduce a compelling time-senstive offer giving clients a reason to act now. For example, offering a complimentary ornament set for the first five bookings for a holiday-themed session. This campaign creates both value and scarcity. People are more likely to commit when the offer feels exclusive and fleeting.
This structure not only drives action but also helps you control your calendar and fill slow months in advance. The point isn’t to pressure; it’s to motivate in a way that feels rewarding.
Build Profit Through Strategic Add-Ons and Upsells
Your product offer should be a simple, standard starting point for more product sales. This doesn’t mean hard selling. It means planting seeds early and showing clients what’s possible. Include a small product in your base offering, like 3-5×7 Double-Sided Prints, and present an upgrade to select more prints and an Image Box as the logical next step. Use language that affirms their emotional investment: “You’ll have all your favorite images in one place,” or “Most of our clients choose to put a photo on the cover of the box to make it more of a display piece.”
When the products are high quality and meaningful, clients don’t feel like they’re being sold to—they feel like they’re being served.
How to Create Marketing Campaigns Around Printed Products
Let’s get to the fun part. Let’s look at how you can tailor specific campaigns around printed products to benefit your brand and your bottom line.
Early Bird Senior Portrait Sessions
Want to get your calendar filled sooner rather than later? Create an incentive to book sessions by including a bonus 4×5 Accordion Book with 6 images in the first 10 Class of 2026 Sessions. Be sure to use product images and video in your marketing so clients see the value of the offer.
Bold Black & White Prints
VIP Tweens
Proud Pet Parents
A Day in The Life
Invite families to participate in an activity that they enjoy while you document it. This could be a trip to the zoo or just playing games, and sipping cocoa on a snow day. Include a family album with an acrylic cover with 25 images as a keepsake from the session. Give clients the option to add images and spreads to he album as well as duplicate copies for gifting.
Legacy Summer Portraits
Celebrate all the generations in the family with a portrait session this summer. Include a 16×20 Framed Canvas with the session. Additionally, have specially priced options for duplications and personalized albums as an add-on after the session.
Children’s Themed Sessions
Your imagination is the limit when you create themed sets and props to tell a special story. Try your hand at creative sessions like: Fairy Tales, Sports Portraits, Vintage Looks, Pajamas & Pillow Fights, Super Heroes, or even Underwater Sessions. These stylized photo shoots attract clients looking for unique images and one-of-a-kind experiences. Create urgency by offering a set of three Double-Sided Prints to the first 5 sessions that book and encourage them to fill an Images Box with all their favorites.
Attract and Retain Clients
Print is not dead—it’s your secret weapon. When you position McKenna’s premium printed products as part of your brand experience, you turn clients into collectors. Plus, you elevate your business above the crowd. Now that you know how to create marketing campaigns around printed products using intentional product positioning and strategic upsells, you can use printed products to drive bookings and create loyal fans, who will love the lasting memories you help create.
This blog was written by Maureen Miller, CPP, contributor for McKenna and contributor to marketing and client experience at Zookbinders. With 25+ years as a professional photographer, Maureen owns and operates her successful studio, Maureen T Miller Photography. She is an advocate for making money and doing what you love. Her motto is, “Photography is a BIG DEAL!”