Tell clients you've moved gallery platforms

This page covers the other half of switching. It isn’t about moving your galleries across. It’s about telling the handful of clients who’ll notice. It goes with the practical plan for switching to Tellisto and covers the client side. By the end you’ll know who needs a note, what to put in it and when to send it, with a short template you can adapt.

Who needs to hear from you

It’s tempting to treat a platform change as an announcement to your whole list. It isn’t one. The only clients who need to know are the ones with a live gallery right now or a job still under way. That means a shoot delivered but not yet downloaded, a booking partway through, or an open proofing round. Those clients have a reason to open a link, so they get the new one.

Past clients whose galleries finished long ago mostly don’t need anything. Nothing broke for them and nothing is waiting. The exception is if you’re closing the old tool completely. You might then want to give everyone a last chance to download their photos before that account closes. That’s a kind thing to do, but it’s a separate, softer message. It isn’t the same as telling active clients where their gallery is now.

To clients, it’s still your gallery

This is the part that makes the whole thing easy, so remind yourself of it before you write to anyone. To your clients, the new gallery is just your gallery. It carries your studio’s name and your colours. There’s no Tellisto badge on it, no third-party logo, and no “tellisto” anywhere in the web address, on any plan, free included. They don’t install an app or create an account. It’s a web page with your name on it.

That’s why the switch doesn’t feel like a switch to clients. If the note is calm and the link works, all they notice is that their photographer sent them their photos. You control the gallery presentation, so the new gallery can look as considered as the old one did. The less it looks like a migration, the less anyone treats it as one.

What to say, and a note you can borrow

Keep it short and human. You’re not launching anything. The client needs to hear this: here are your photos, same as ever, at a new link, and there’s nothing you need to do. Include the PIN if the gallery has one. Don’t apologise for moving and don’t explain your business reasons, because none of that is the client’s concern.

Something like this, with the square brackets swapped for your details:

Hi [name], your [shoot type] gallery has a new home. You can view and download everything here: [link]. [If there’s a PIN: The access code is [PIN].] Same photos, just a fresh link, so this is the one to keep. Anything you need, reply straight to this email.

For a fuller version, the guidance on what to write when you send a gallery works here too. A re-send is a delivery email with one extra line saying the link is new.

Send the link once the gallery is live

One rule keeps this smooth: send the new link only after the gallery is live in Tellisto and you’ve clicked it yourself. Open it the way a client will, check the photos are there and the PIN works, then send. Never announce a move before there’s something to open. A promised link, or a link that isn’t ready, is what turns a calm change into a support thread. Nothing forces you to rush, so there’s no reason to send anything before the gallery is ready.

One improvement you can mention

There’s one improvement you can mention while you’re writing, and clients tend to appreciate it. Galleries on Tellisto don’t expire on their own. There’s no inactivity countdown and no automatic archiving. Clients who’ve had galleries vanish elsewhere learned to rush to save every gallery within a week, and they don’t need to here. You don’t have to make a big deal of it. If a client asks how long they’ve got, the gallery stays up for as long as you keep it there. If you want to give them a way to keep their photos long-term, that’s what the Client Vault is for. For most re-send notes, though, it’s best to say nothing about deadlines at all. Having no deadline is the reassurance.