What photography business software are people using?

[Photographer557]

And Why?

What do you like about it?

[bondarnes]

Even though most of you will think it is a little pricey, I use Successware because it was the most complete software that I could find in 2000. I checked out four different companies and test drove three different ones. One of the companies is out of business and one almost is. I haven't really looked at what is available now. I know that Granite Bear has various levels of business software depending on what kind of photography business you have.

My first computer system, software, and support was in the $20K range when I bought it in 1985, but it was great business software and I would still be using it today if I could have found equipment to keep running it on. It was Unix based and ran on a mini mainframe with several dumb terminals. I ran it until the hard drive crashed in 2000.

[MicWayWal]

I use Studio Plus to manage my appointments, my database of clients, my employees. It has everything you need including accounting software. It tracks everything about my business.

Client information is massive. Put as much in as you can get from them.
Session information includes who will be shooting and assisting, session subjects who will be photographed, as well as location information.
Accounting can be as detailed as you want to make it.
You can send out letters or emails to your clients in a form letter or email directly from software.
You can track orders and where each session is in your workflow production.
You can track referrels, birthdays, anniversaries.

But the best reason is it is Windows based. If you can use Word you can use this software. It takes less than 15 minutes of explaination to teach the basics to anyone. I learned it in 5 minutes and was scheduling appointments less than 10 minutes later. It is powerful.
And it imports from other software you now have and will let other software export its data to another program. Very often I export all my customer data to Excel to graph and then use for other purposes.
Go to http://www.studioplussoftware.com/ to see more and try out a trial version.

[Photographer557]

thanks for those suggestions, I will research those.

Do either one of those also do rights managed licensing of pictures or calculations for assignment shoots?

[bondarnes]

Originally Posted by Photographer557

thanks for those suggestions, I will research those.

Do either one of those also do rights managed licensing of pictures or calculations for assignment shoots?

Successware does not do either one of those.