This June long weekend I moved my photography website from the Squarespace platform over to the emerging and innovative Fotomerchant platform that caters exclusively for photographers.
I started using Fotomerchant last year for fulfilment for my Rodeo and Campdraft event photography but maintained my core site on Squarespace.
However, the latest releases on the Fotomerchant platform with Fotomerchant 3 and a languishing and unresponsive SQSP have led me to happily jump ship.
Here are the 3 main reasons why I made the move.
Fotomerchant 3 has new and evolving templates
A great looking website is important and the recent responsive templates combined with new CSS and javascript customisation features allow you to quickly create a responsive, great looking site that suits you and can fit your style.
With some cool new templates (and promises of more to come) the Fotomerchant 3 platform and recent enhancements have resulted in a complete platform for photography professionals and prothusiasts alike.
Its not all about the templates
A good looking site is important. However, if you want to integrate your photography with either a part-time or a full-time business model then looks are only half the story.
The two key features that suit photographers that Fotomerchant provides over SQSP
Integration with Lightroom
Fotomerchant provides a cool Lightroom exporter that allows you to export images direct from Lightroom up to the Fotomerchant Galleries section. This includes the ability to select existing, or create new, Galleries direct from within Lightroom.
Fotomerchant also has integrations with standard existing sharing apps such as Dropbox but utilising a plug-in to Lightroom really means that I don't need to go through a third party to hook the two up.
My Workflow: Select images --> Create collection for new gallery in LR --> Drag selection to collection --> "Export to ..." Fotomerchant directly
Result: Immediate instantly mapped collections in LR with my Fotomerchant Galleries - Too Easy !!
Integrated Quality Fulfilment Services
Quickly and easily allowing the creation of fulfilment products with different options, as well as quality photographic fulfilment providers has made this platform a dream run. This includes digital download options as well.
I emphasise quality !! It is possible to choose fulfilment options that only include the final media types specific to the images you want to render them on.
Providers are chosen for the quality and are not warehouse-bulk operators with low quality generic photo-printing solutions only.
The Best of Both Worlds
Quality templates (and new ones planned) with Photographer specific e-commerce services and integration provide a unique solution that generic platforms such as SQSP (with its pleasing look and feel shopfronts) and Shopify (with its great web-commerce packages) fall short of. Fotomerchant combines the photographer specific needs from both with a team that keeps its user-base well informed and up-to-date and caters for this specific and large market.
Having started the journey now with Fotomerchant I am keen to see how the platform develops and keeps up with the needs of photographers in this rapidly changing world.