Patina Studio
Overview
Our business, Patina Photo, is one of New Zealand’s most influential wedding photography businesses. We have been operating for over 12 years, garnering numerous industry awards and a reputation for consistent, high-touch service.
While my wife and I are both lead photographers. I also directed the business operations —developing scalable systems, branding strategy, and streamlined processes. I approached Patina not just as a creative service, but as a design-led business optimised for resilience, clarity, and customer care.
We grew Patina into a respected brand known for its thoughtful experience design, seamless workflows, and strong client relationships. Our hybrid team handled over 50 weddings per year while maintaining 5-star reviews and timely delivery.
Categories
Operations
Automation
Project Detail
Strategic Planning Driven by Live Metrics
I designed a live dashboard using Airtable to visualise key metrics across sales, delivery, and marketing. This became our single source of truth and helped inform:
Quarterly and annual strategy planning cycles
Prioritisation of marketing initiatives (e.g. referral campaigns, price testing)
Early detection of issues like delivery delays or seasonal dips
The system allows us to make decisions based on real data, not gut feeling.
Connected Operations Hub Across Tools
I built an operations hub using Airtable as the core source of truth. Using Make, it is connected it to our tool set:
Notion for team task tracking and SOPs
Studio Ninja as our customer portal
Koalendar + Google Calendar for scheduling and availability
Xero for accounting
The hub enables cross-tool automations like: sending reminders, updating job statuses, and triggering internal workflows. This dramatically reduced admin time and improved consistency across the customer journey.
Turning Conflict Into Loyalty
Most clients were delighted with their galleries, but we occasionally had a disappointed customer. We valued this feedback, and saw an opportunity to improve our processes and to make things right with the customer.
One good example was a couple who were unhappy with their final edits. After some email back-and-forth, I suggested a video call to better understand the issue. This helped me understand the issue was that sky looked washed out.
I re-edited key images, boosting colour and contrast in a way that stayed true to our style but met their expectations. We were also able to tweak our editing process to handle similar situations better.
The couple were thrilled and have referred new customers to us. It showed how human-centred communication that can transform upset couples into fans.
On-Brand Content with AI Support
To help our admin contractor write in our brand voice, I built a custom GPT, Patina Writer, trained on our past blog posts, emails, and guides. This tool was especially valuable during busy seasons when we needed quick, on-brand communication without bottlenecking through us.
We also used programmatic SEO to target long-tail keywords. Using Airtable + Make + templating scripts, we generated hundreds of local guides and supplier review pages. As a result, we saw a 100% increase (averaged over 12 months) for New Zealand based organic traffic to our website.
Patina Studio
Overview
Our business, Patina Photo, is one of New Zealand’s most influential wedding photography businesses. We have been operating for over 12 years, garnering numerous industry awards and a reputation for consistent, high-touch service.
While my wife and I are both lead photographers. I also directed the business operations —developing scalable systems, branding strategy, and streamlined processes. I approached Patina not just as a creative service, but as a design-led business optimised for resilience, clarity, and customer care.
We grew Patina into a respected brand known for its thoughtful experience design, seamless workflows, and strong client relationships. Our hybrid team handled over 50 weddings per year while maintaining 5-star reviews and timely delivery.
Categories
Operations
Automation
Project Detail
Strategic Planning Driven by Live Metrics
I designed a live dashboard using Airtable to visualise key metrics across sales, delivery, and marketing. This became our single source of truth and helped inform:
Quarterly and annual strategy planning cycles
Prioritisation of marketing initiatives (e.g. referral campaigns, price testing)
Early detection of issues like delivery delays or seasonal dips
The system allows us to make decisions based on real data, not gut feeling.
Connected Operations Hub Across Tools
I built an operations hub using Airtable as the core source of truth. Using Make, it is connected it to our tool set:
Notion for team task tracking and SOPs
Studio Ninja as our customer portal
Koalendar + Google Calendar for scheduling and availability
Xero for accounting
The hub enables cross-tool automations like: sending reminders, updating job statuses, and triggering internal workflows. This dramatically reduced admin time and improved consistency across the customer journey.
Turning Conflict Into Loyalty
Most clients were delighted with their galleries, but we occasionally had a disappointed customer. We valued this feedback, and saw an opportunity to improve our processes and to make things right with the customer.
One good example was a couple who were unhappy with their final edits. After some email back-and-forth, I suggested a video call to better understand the issue. This helped me understand the issue was that sky looked washed out.
I re-edited key images, boosting colour and contrast in a way that stayed true to our style but met their expectations. We were also able to tweak our editing process to handle similar situations better.
The couple were thrilled and have referred new customers to us. It showed how human-centred communication that can transform upset couples into fans.
On-Brand Content with AI Support
To help our admin contractor write in our brand voice, I built a custom GPT, Patina Writer, trained on our past blog posts, emails, and guides. This tool was especially valuable during busy seasons when we needed quick, on-brand communication without bottlenecking through us.
We also used programmatic SEO to target long-tail keywords. Using Airtable + Make + templating scripts, we generated hundreds of local guides and supplier review pages. As a result, we saw a 100% increase (averaged over 12 months) for New Zealand based organic traffic to our website.
Patina Studio
Overview
Our business, Patina Photo, is one of New Zealand’s most influential wedding photography businesses. We have been operating for over 12 years, garnering numerous industry awards and a reputation for consistent, high-touch service.
While my wife and I are both lead photographers. I also directed the business operations —developing scalable systems, branding strategy, and streamlined processes. I approached Patina not just as a creative service, but as a design-led business optimised for resilience, clarity, and customer care.
We grew Patina into a respected brand known for its thoughtful experience design, seamless workflows, and strong client relationships. Our hybrid team handled over 50 weddings per year while maintaining 5-star reviews and timely delivery.
Categories
Operations
Automation
Project Detail
Strategic Planning Driven by Live Metrics
I designed a live dashboard using Airtable to visualise key metrics across sales, delivery, and marketing. This became our single source of truth and helped inform:
Quarterly and annual strategy planning cycles
Prioritisation of marketing initiatives (e.g. referral campaigns, price testing)
Early detection of issues like delivery delays or seasonal dips
The system allows us to make decisions based on real data, not gut feeling.
Connected Operations Hub Across Tools
I built an operations hub using Airtable as the core source of truth. Using Make, it is connected it to our tool set:
Notion for team task tracking and SOPs
Studio Ninja as our customer portal
Koalendar + Google Calendar for scheduling and availability
Xero for accounting
The hub enables cross-tool automations like: sending reminders, updating job statuses, and triggering internal workflows. This dramatically reduced admin time and improved consistency across the customer journey.
Turning Conflict Into Loyalty
Most clients were delighted with their galleries, but we occasionally had a disappointed customer. We valued this feedback, and saw an opportunity to improve our processes and to make things right with the customer.
One good example was a couple who were unhappy with their final edits. After some email back-and-forth, I suggested a video call to better understand the issue. This helped me understand the issue was that sky looked washed out.
I re-edited key images, boosting colour and contrast in a way that stayed true to our style but met their expectations. We were also able to tweak our editing process to handle similar situations better.
The couple were thrilled and have referred new customers to us. It showed how human-centred communication that can transform upset couples into fans.
On-Brand Content with AI Support
To help our admin contractor write in our brand voice, I built a custom GPT, Patina Writer, trained on our past blog posts, emails, and guides. This tool was especially valuable during busy seasons when we needed quick, on-brand communication without bottlenecking through us.
We also used programmatic SEO to target long-tail keywords. Using Airtable + Make + templating scripts, we generated hundreds of local guides and supplier review pages. As a result, we saw a 100% increase (averaged over 12 months) for New Zealand based organic traffic to our website.
