One of the best things you can hear in a testimonial from a client is, “Thank you for the quick turnaround.”

You see in business when you miss a deadline it often has a financial impact.

You won’t instantly find success in the world of business by just setting arbitrary deadlines for all of your projects. Your deadlines need to set you up for success—they must be strategic.

Being strategic running your own business means that your deadlines are important to help you achieve goals.

For example if you were producing a video to ask donors to give and you missed having it used on Giving Tuesday. $511M was raised on the day of giving. This is a 28% increase from 2018.

Missing that deadline means you missed an opportunity to have a good reason to reach out to your audience with an ask.

Always Quick Turnaround

It doesn’t take long for one to create a great deal of content that needs to be edited. As long as you have projects that need to be edited and delivered to a client you have MAJOR RESTRICTIONS on your time.

You cannot just respond to that phone call that someone is asking you to leave tomorrow for a major project that may require you to fly around the world and work for a month.

Setting realistic deadlines doesn’t always mean you are rushing the process. The largest time killer is not starting and not how long it takes to do a project.

Starting my career at a newspaper drilled into me the importance of a deadline. We have all been watching TV when they break into your normal program and give us a “Breaking News” story.

In AMBER ALERTS they know every minute is precious. Based on the history of child abductions the longer it takes to get the news out can be the difference of life and death.

Because the news organizations know these breaking news events can happen they have a plan to execute in those situations. The way to improve the quality is to increase the time. That is done through early planning.

Lightroom, PhotoShop & Adobe Premiere Skills

You take classes and practice working on images. You get better and better in not just being able to improve the product, but also improve your time doing those skills.

“Don’t put off until tomorrow what you can do today.”

Benjamin Franklin

The largest problem most people face in business is time management. Keep a sharp eye on any timelines.

The largest issue in meeting deadlines is the gap in your timeline of you working on the project.

Don’t Be This Photographer

Know the industry standard for turnaround times

How long should it take to get wedding photos back from photographer?Average wait time for wedding photos. Typically it can average anywhere between 2-6 weeks. Of course photographers will try and get your photos to you as soon as possible, many will send some sneak peak photos of a selection that have been edited for you to view.

Don’t Be Average

• Take classes in your profession to help most of all improve your quality from Good to Great.
• Maybe use something like Loupedeck+ Photo & Video Editing Console lets you edit effectively using its intuitive buttons, dials, and sliders. 
• Do personal projects – if you are only working on clients work you cannot experiment and try to techniques and ways to improve your time and quality.
• When you take on a project carve out the time to finish the project in a timely basis. Mind the Gap!

Hope these tips and reminders will help you see that getting images to your client in a timely matter helps them make more money if this is for corporate work and for things like weddings, well the link to the video tells you that story.

The power went out the other day at our house for a few hours. When I went to check on my backup computer that I have running with multiple external hard drives plugged into it, I had to restart to get the hard drives to mount.

However, one drive wouldn’t mount. I ran on my Mac Disk Utility.

When I googled the line “File system check exit code is 8” I got a few hits.

Click on it and it will take you to an article which pretty much described my problem.

It is very effective for recovering lost data from corrupted drives that have the file system check exit code 8 error.

The software M3 Data Recovery was able to see my files on the external hard drive that wouldn’t mount. I could select all the folders and transfer them to a new hard drive. Just a few corrupt files didn’t transfer and some of the folder names were corrupted.

The good news is for $69.95 I was able to recover pretty much 99% of the files from the nonworking hard drive. I hope you never need to do this, but if you do in the future maybe you can just search my blog for this article in the future.

Surgeons doing a bone graft of lower part of leg for a little boy to hopefully help him keep his leg at the Hôpital Baptiste Biblique located in Tsiko, Togo, West Africa. [NIKON D5, 24.0-105.0 mm f/4.0, Mode = Aperture Priority, ISO 11400, 1/100, ƒ/9, (35mm = 82)]

Many believe that in terms of likes, shares, downloads and donations, video consistently outperforms all other forms of digital communication. Every campaign should include a series of inspirational fundraising videos with a simple call-to-action.

I think the strength of video is that it lets you control the narrative by pacing and the delivery of a message.

Here some statistics I came across that are worth mentioning here for you.

Important Video Stats Nonprofits Need To Know

• 57% of online donors make a gift after watching an inspirational fundraising video.
• Crowdfunding pages that are promoted by video raise 4 times as many donations.
• More than 1/2 of video views happen on a mobile device.

According to Into Focus: Benchmarks for Nonprofit Video and a Guide for Creators, a report by See3, YouTube and communications strategy consultancy Edelman:

• 80% of respondents said video is important to their nonprofits.
• 91% believe video will become more important in the next three years.
• 92% value the investment they made in video.

Liz Ortiz served for the past year as a media missionary for ABWE. She just returned at Thanksgiving to the US. Hannah Strayer has been in Togo for a few months and is a full-time media missionary for ABWE.

Together we produced this video for ABWE to help raise funds to make improvements in the Hospital that hasn’t had any major improvements since it was created 35-years-ago.

Here are some tips for telling a nonprofit story to raise funds.

1. Use storytelling to engage the audience
   1. Start with the problem. What will not happen if the donors don’t give?
   2. Make the problem worse. Be careful to not skim over the problem. If this hospital didn’t expand more than 50% of those coming each day would continue to be turned away and not helped.
2. Speak To Donors and show them how your organization makes a difference. In our video we let you hear how the hospital was evangelizing and planting churches.
3. Show The Good You Are Doing with inspiring behind-the-scenes footage and interviews with program recipients. Besides having a good interview, capture b-roll that shows what they are talking about and put this over their interview.
4. Be Passionate and show donors how they can help contribute. We showed specific needs of Autoclave, X-Ray, Outdated nursery and nurses station were things we showed. Listen to how the doctor talks about those needs.
5. Ask the viewers to contribute and tell them how.
6. Caption your videos. Did you know that 85% of videos on Facebook are watched with no sound? It’s true. If you don’t caption your videos, you’ll lose impact with your video because some people won’t bother to watch with the sound on.

Marketing of Video

The best videos cannot do their job without promoting them.

Know your audience. Target your story for a direct and specific purpose—if you don’t know who you’re talking to, the right people won’t be listening. We identified the audience before we started. Then we tailored all the content to that audience.

Use social media: Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and Instagram.

Contact people and ask them to have a watch party. For our video this can be churches and small groups. Every missionary on the field has friends and family that could have a small dinner party and then show the video around a TV.

When you have a group together ask everyone to pull out their phones and go to the video link and then ask them to share with all their friends and family. You might want to even help them by giving some examples of text to promote the video.

Other ways that people can help with the call to action is to even use the video on their birthday and try and raise funds from their friends by asking people to donate. Many people will give to a cause just because they are asking.

Know when to call in the professionals. It’s ok to use a smart phone to shoot video to share on social media, in email, and on your blog. Video doesn’t have to be polished to be effective. However, there are times when a professionally done video is best – like on your home page or at a fundraising event. Find someone who is experienced in creating the kind of video you need so the results are what you want. Call me!

Pastor Rodrigo Cisternas studying at his church in Santiago, Chile. [NIKON Z 6, VR Zoom 24-105mm f/4G IF-ED, Mode = Aperture Priority, ISO 5600, 1/100, ƒ/5.6, (35mm = 68)]

This past June I was working in Santiago, Chile. I was helping lead a workshop of storytellers. I was really focused on those stories and had no idea about the kettle that was ready to explode.

On October 14th of this year the protests in Santiago started.

Chile’s most diehard protesters may be young people, but their grievances possess a long lineage, one decades in the making. Back in 2007 the government made it possible for more to get loans to go to college.

The problem is that for many who graduated they have huge student loan debts and lousy, low-paid jobs. The issue that is very evident today is there is a major inequality gap that education didn’t help solve.

I fear that what is happening in Chile can happen here in the USA.

In Chile the privatizing health care and education has led to more choices and greater access, but it also left the poor and middle class saddled with mounting debt. The cost of living in Chile has gotten increasingly expensive while wages have remained low.

The more you read about the unrest, the more you can see their storyline in ours.

George Washington chair for the Federal Convention’s had a sun on it. James Madison reported Benjamin Franklin saying, “I have often looked at that behind the president without being able to tell whether it was rising or setting. But now I… know that it is a rising…sun.”

There is a scripture that says something similarly about unrest.

Deuteronomy 28:67

“In the morning you shall say, ‘Would that it were evening!’ And at evening you shall say, ‘Would that it were morning!’ because of the dread of your heart which you dread, and for the sight of your eyes which you will see.”

This week we need to remind ourselves of how blessed we are even in the middle of unrest.

First Thanksgiving

At the first Thanksgiving, colonists were likely outnumbered more than two to one by their Native American guests. Colonist Edward Winslow writes: “many of the Indians coming amongst us, and amongst the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men.”  The preceding winter had been a harsh one for the colonists. Seventy-eight percent of the women who had traveled on the Mayflower had perished that winter, leaving only around 50 colonists to attend the first Thanksgiving. According to eyewitness accounts, among the pilgrims, there were 22 men, just four women and over 25 children and teenagers. 

Philippians 4:6

“Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.”

I believe the whole concept of hope is born out of those who seem to have much unrest.

Every Cloud has a Silver Lining

The origin of the phrase seems to be John Milton’s 1634 poem “Comus,” which includes the line, “Was I deceived? or did a sable cloud/Turn forth her silver lining on the night?”

“I have always found that actively loving
saves one from a morbid preoccupation
with the shortcomings of society.”

Alan Paton

This is the children’s ward of Hôpital Baptiste Biblique. As you can see the children are precious. You can see the parents taking care of their children while they are healing from their sickness.

Listen to Dr. Tom Kendall, Jr. talk about their needs.

“Anything that’s human is mentionable, and anything that is mentionable can be more manageable. When we can talk about our feelings, they become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary. The people we trust with that important talk can help us know that we are not alone.”

Fred Rogers

Last night my wife and I saw the movie staring Tom Hanks as Mister Rogers in “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood”. That quote stood out to me.

As a storyteller I am often just wanting to mention often the unmentionable so that something can be done.

I was first moved in the hospital by the people and quickly was aware of how old the place looked. Don’t you think that 35 years is a long time before upgrading and refreshing a hospital?

Here is a link if you want to help support the hospital as they upgrade and expand to meet the physical and spiritual needs of Togo.

Women cooking for their family members who are patients at Hôpital Baptiste Biblique located in Tsiko, Togo, West Africa.
[NIKON Z 6, Sigma 24.0-105.0 mm f/4.0, Mode = Aperture Priority, ISO 5000, 1/200, ƒ/4, (35mm = 52)]

I went to West Africa to help tell the story of Hôpital Baptiste Biblique located in Tsiko, Togo. Built in 1985 they are in desperate need of infrastructure upgrades and need to expand. Today I just want to share what they are having to build just for the patients and families.

You see there is no hotel in the area or restaurants. When patients come to the hospital they need a place to stay, cook and take care of their family member that is admitted.

When you go to the Hospital here, you get your mother’s cooking or a relative’s cooking, because the hospital takes care of the medical care and the family takes care of laundry, food and things like bathing the patient.

The first thing that they are doing is adding more space for the patients and their families by creating a hotel with traditional outside kitchens.

They are building 4 new hotel wings first in their renewal and expansion project. They first had to do a better job of taking care of the community and put them first.

Now besides adding hotel rooms they have had to build sewage and electrical system. They cannot tie into the existing grids because they don’t exist for sewage and running a hospital where the town’s power goes out almost daily isn’t realistic. They have to have a generator and their own system that kicks in when the local power goes out.

When I was there it went out 2 to 3 times a day and the generator kicks on after 7 seconds.

It won’t be long before the patients move from this older hotel to the new improved version.

Here is a link if you want to help support the hospital as they upgrade and expand to meet the physical and spiritual needs of Togo.

Photo above: Mother and her little boy carried in kaitenge. They are staying here at the Hôpital Baptiste Biblique in Tsiko, Togo, West Africa.

African Time is when one says they will arrive at a certain time, but arrive much later.

It should be noted that almost every African (on both the leaving and receiving end) does this. So, if one does actually arrive on “American time,” don’t be surprised if a party is still getting set up, a person is still getting ready, etc etc.

Most all my frustrations with Africa were from my not allowing for myself to adjust to the way we do things in Africa or as the old saying goes, “When in Rome do as the Romans do.”

How this impacts Humanitarian Storytelling

In the United States if you plan a project you email, text and call people and plan. You put together a schedule so that when you arrive you can make the most of your time.

On all my trips to Africa [Burkina Faso, Ghana & Togo] the team I worked with had done everything to work with Americans who lived there to plan our itinerary. This last trip reminded me of African Time. Had I been fully aware I would have planned to take two weeks to accomplish what I normally can accomplish in one week in the states.

Now Africa isn’t the only place like this, but for Americans who are punctual and like to have a packed and productive schedule you might find yourself like me, with little hair left.

Most likely the host in Africa that you will work with are more than willing to help you and will start when you arrive.

I planned trips for a few months with a writer when we went to Burkina Faso.

This is a photo from that meeting where the writer went over again the plans. This is when they said what was possible the next day. Now looking back I should have noted that this is the common way and not the exception for storytelling coverage by media specialist when they come from another country to Africa.

I arrived in Lome, Togo on Friday night. They don’t drive in the country on the roads at night because it is just too dangerous. You can hit an animal and then getting help wouldn’t be until daylight.

I stayed at hotel in Lome with the plans that we had worked on to leave the next morning to drive and arrive to meet with a team that afternoon to plan.

Well I found out at the airport the night before that they had to wait and pick up more people later that afternoon. No communication to me or the rest of the team that this was happening.

In Africa this is “normal” behavior, where in the USA we would check with the guests before making plans for them without involving them in the process.

It took us 4 days to locate Faro Faro Agouda, one of our subjects, for the story. I didn’t know until he arrived that he had driven almost 4 hours to make it for our video interview.

The area of Africa that I went to there are over 43 different languages. This impacted everything you do. While you think you are clear and the person you are talking to might understand, by the time your thoughts are translated through who knows how many different languages the message can become quite different to the intended audience.

In the movie The Wizard of Oz, in which Dorothy, upon arriving to Oz, says, “Toto, I’ve a feeling we‘re not in Kansas anymore.” Is how one often feels when they forget there is a cultural difference to working in another country.

Preplanning

You can still make plans before going to Africa. They will tell you a good time to come and can tell you most of the time if the people you need for the project will be in country. As always in life you still need to be flexible for those things outside your host’s control. Accidents can happen and even family crisis that take people away.

You can still communicate your plans for the project and get as much as possible agreement before you go.

I would suggest to make most of your time to get the people to agree to a schedule before buying your airfare and booking your hotels. You see you can find out this way if they can tell you everyone is OK with the schedule.

Boots on the Ground

When you arrive you need to have planned your first meeting to basically go over in person everything that you have been planning.

From my personal experience everything you are used to doing in the States will take twice as long or longer to do in Africa. This is the culture and you must learn to work with it and not fight it.

Bottom Line

With Humanitarian work you are often in a different country and working with a different culture. You must learn to be flexible and able to go with the flow.

You still must get the storyline no matter where you are to tell a story. Continue to be persistent and ask for what you need. Just give them time to respond.

Disclaimer: I am not getting any money from TripLog and I am not affiliated with them at all.

So it’s important for you to get the most out of the tax deduction by tracking your mileage. The IRS lets you deduct some of the costs of using a personal vehicle for business purposes. Just like you can deduct the cost of business expenses such as marketing, you can also deduct your business mileage.

58 cents

Beginning January 1, 2019, the standard mileage rates for the use of a car (vans, pickups or panel trucks) will be: 58 cents per mile for business miles driven, up from 54.5 cents for 2018. 20 cents per mile driven for medical or moving purposes, up from 18 cents for 2018.

Normal commuting from your home to your regular workplace and back is not deductible. You may deduct business mileage only if you are traveling to and from a temporary work location, from one work location to another, to meet with a client, to a conference, etc.

Yes, you can deduct the mileage. As an independent contractor (received a 1099-MISC) you are considered self employed by the IRS. … You can deduct the miles driven for business. The other option is claiming all your actual expenses such as gas, tires, interest, etc.

I live in the Metro-Atlanta area and on average the round trip to a job is about 40 to 100 miles. That means on average I write off my taxes $23.20 to $58.

You can just use a notepad and write down all your mileage, your fill-ups, repairs and auto expenses and then at the end of the year spend some time adding up things into those categories that you want to use for deductions on your taxes.

I have found after doing this for more than 35 years that having an APP is so much easier.

I like that this app can be customized. TripLog has three auto start options and also a manual start for each trip.

You can use your phone’s GPS with the app to track your trips.

They even created a device you plug into the car’s USB which will pair with the phone so that you are not using data to track your trips.

Here is the video of how that works:

I use my one account on both of our vehicles. My wife tracks her mileage with her Toyota Camry and I track the Toyota Sienna.

Keeping a mileage log

The IRS tends to be strict in its documentation requirements for business mileage deductions. For this reason, you’ll need to keep a thorough, accurate mileage log each year you attempt to claim a deduction.

Your mileage log must include the starting mileage on your vehicle’s odometer at the beginning of the year and its ending mileage at the conclusion of the year. Each time you use your vehicle for business purposes, you must record the following information:

• The date of your trip
• Your starting point
• Your destination
• The purpose of your trip
• Your vehicle’s starting mileage
• Your vehicle’s ending mileage
• Tolls or other trip-related costs

You can keep a mileage log in a notebook and update it by hand, or use a spreadsheet to continuously track your mileage. You can also use a mileage-tracking app. The key is to update your records regularly to ensure that they’re precise. Additionally, the IRS requires you to keep your mileage log for three years from the date on which you file the income tax return containing your deduction.

I just recommend using an App to help you capture the data you need for reporting purposes.

Some of the most successful restaurants are those with the simplest of menus.

In-N-Out Burger

The menu itself is a prime example of In-N-Out’s intense focus on simplicity to maximize quality and minimize expenses.  Items on the menu are largely unchanged from the original restaurant stand and exhibit a rare marriage of quality and affordability:

• 3 Burger Choices: Hamburger, Cheeseburger, Double Double (most expensive at $3.40*)
• French Fries
• Beverages: Soda (4 sizes), Shakes (3 flavors), Coffee, Milk

Since its inception, In-N-Out Burger has enjoyed tremendous success, growing annual sales to approximately $400mm per analyst estimates and consistently earning a #1 ranking in the fast food burger chain segment, ahead of competitors such as Wendy’s, Five Guys’ and Fuddruckers. 

While you may have created a very complex spreadsheet to figure out your pricing, don’t show this to a client. Don’t abandon it either. You need this to help you in the future as costs change to figure your pricing.

After you do a job you may want to go back to that spreadsheet and adjust the numbers.

Keep Menu in Mind

Just like in photography you keep things simple for design purposes, this holds true for your estimate and pricing. Restaurant patrons aren’t looking to be overwhelmed when it comes to reading a menu. A clean, simple design will convert better than a list of options or large chunks of expository text. A visually pleasing design effectively uses white space and naturally guides the eye to key menu items.

Your customers are the same. Keep it simple.

Ditch the dollar signs

Pricing shouldn’t be the center of attention. One way to downplay price is to remove any associated dollar signs as they tend to elicit a negative emotional response. You want them to concentrate on the content, not the price. 

Don’t line up the prices

A list of prices that is aligned to the left or right is easily scannable, which could encourage people to choose lower-priced items out of habit. Mixing up the placement of pricing throughout the estimate will minimize decisions based on price comparisons.

Use simple, descriptive language

Try to avoid industry jargon or long sections of text that will confuse people. Yes, more and more people consider themselves experts, but simple, descriptive language in the item’s title will attract more sales. 

A photographer wrote me and asked for advice on quoting to a nonprofit. Here is my advice for them. Now there was a list of specifics, but I wanted to get to the pricing strategy rather than giving them a quote I would do. You see each person has different costs. This is due to where they live, what lifestyle they want to maintain and the cost of their gear are just a few things that influence one’s price.

BACKGROUND

I believe first you need to have your pricing for “Normal Jobs” and then for those you consider a “Charity Job”. Charity is something that you deem that you want to donate your time. You may want to give everything for free to an organization. That is up to you. I do think once you embrace discounting your price for an organization, you will have to also be sure you have enough “Normal Jobs” or this will not be sustainable.

What I am communicating here is not what you communicate to the client. This is for you to understand while you price something for them.

Once you have figured out your pricing thought process you then create packages. The price and what they are getting and not how you arrived at that price.

PRODUCTION FEES

Normal Job Price = 100% for time

Charity Job Price = 60 – 70% for time

Hard costs to you I would pass along at 100% to a “Charity Job”. Charity meaning that organization you consider a charity that you want to give your time to. As far as IRS you cannot write off your time to a charity.

My suggestion is to create your “Normal Estimate” and then give a discount. This way you are communicating your normal rates and also letting this organization know you are giving them a HUGE DISCOUNT.

Personally I think a rate of about $600 to $800 a day for your time for a nonprofit is where many I know are charging these days [This is what many of my circle of friends have told me and my personal experience]. Most of those photographers are charging $1600 to $4000 a day for their time for regular jobs.

Most in the industry will charge 50% of their rate for a travel day. That is a day that you do no work at all. If you show up and shoot for an hour after traveling most of the day–That is a shooting day and not a travel day.

POST PRODUCTION

Don’t forget to charge for the post production. Many organizations will abuse you with having multiple revisions. Making them pay for this will make them be responsible.

By the way be sure in all your correspondence that you communicate you are charging for revisions. You can have priced in the package 1 or 2 revisions, but let them know when the additional revisions are happening.

Quote your shooting fee, your post production fee and expenses in your estimate. Be sure you spell out what it includes. Just like McDonald’s does for what is included in a sandwich. If a video is expected then describe how long it is and how many revisions that includes.

For your photography I would give some range of number of finished and edited photos.

START WITH PHONE CALL

Always start with a conversation. In person or by phone is the best way to start. Ask them what their expectations are for the project and if they have a budget figure for the project. Sometimes they not only tell you clearly their expectations, but give you a price you are thrilled to work with. This almost never happens, but ALWAYS start with the idea they may know what they want and have a realistic budget for the project.

Your goal is to manage expectations. First by being sure they articulate what they want and then you in the end telling them what you can provide to them. Do your best to under promise and then over deliver.

When you finish this conversation where you agree on what you can do for them, you will put it in writing to them. However, just get some ballpark figures during that conversation to see if it is worth your time to go further. No need to spend all this time to put together a formal agreement in writing if they have no way of paying what you need to agree to going forward.

ESTIMATE

Give them 3 versions of an estimate. This is how you show them you are flexible and also help talk them into spending more on something that they will truly enjoy and use.

Don’t line item things you used to come to your price. You don’t see McDonald’s selling their Big Mac with how much time it took to make it and each piece listed. Imagine 2 – Beef patties, 10 minutes cooking, shipping costs to get the products and so on. No you don’t see that. They give information the public wants and a price. Price changes on where in the world you are buying it.

Bottom Price:
This will just give them what they barely need

Middle Price:
Add more deliverable to the package. More Photos, Another video, Blog posts, etc

Luxury Price:
Coffee table book of photos, Videos, More Photos Etc

The Sky Is the Limit:
Sometimes you can add a 4^th price for the client who could spend a lot if they wanted.

They most likely will go with the middle price every time.