Who will be the next digital camera customer?
"Henry's been using that damn digital camera
for a year and I haven't seen a picture yet. I'm going to start doing it
myself."
That phrase, told me at a party recently, is the key
to the next big market.
Women - the soccer moms, the keepers of the family
history - are starting to venture into digital photography. Once the
almost-exclusive province of the male technogeek - Jerry Harmen coined the
phrase "digiots" - digital photography has resulted in a slew of
ephemeral photographs. Pictures that never make it onto paper can never last
for another generation, and pictures that never make it onto paper can never
generate revenue for processing labs.
Consumers are eager to adopt digital cameras for the
perceived benefits of viewing and sharing photos instantly. While it's easy
to take pictures with digital cameras, it's not really easy - or cheap - to make
prints.
The newest group of digital camera buyers is shopping
to replace their conventional film cameras, and we've got to educate them to
the need for good printing from the newest hybrid labs.
Possible selling slogans:
- Silver halide or pixels, it's all film to us.
- Film or memory cards, we can make the best prints.
- You don't dry clean your own clothes, why develop
your own pictures?
And Jim Schwarzbach's plea for honesty in
advertising…
- "Stop buying inkjet printers, we need your
money."
My best ever tool for the sale of digital cameras is a
customized CD entitled Choosing and Using Digital Cameras
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