Monthly Tracking Sheet Set-Up

Congrats, and welcome to the Monthly Tracking Sheet! I hope this tool does wonderful things for your business and helps you expand and grow intelligently. 

You should receive an email confirming your purchase within one business day. After that, please allow up to 3 business days to receive an email with access to the tracking sheet itself, as described in Step 1 below!

Please use the instructions below for getting set up and learning how to use the tracking sheet!

Video-Based Instructions

I did this recording as part of an interview for a photography group so the first few minutes may not apply!

1. Access The Sheet

To get set up, you’ll need to open the email you received from mike@mikeglatzerphotos.com. It may take a day or two after you’ve paid to receive the email, so please be patient and keep an eye out! 

Client “Open” to be taken to the Tracking Sheet. You may need to sign into Google to access the sheet. 

Note: Make sure you use the email address you submitted when purchasing the file!

The email will look like this:

2. Make A Copy

Once you’re signed in to Google and have clicked the link, you should see the Monthly Tracking Sheet. It should look like the screenshot below:

Next, you’ll need to make a copy and save it to your personal Google Drive account. This is VERY important – if you don’t make a copy, you’ll be editing the template file itself. That means anyone who purchases the template WILL SEE YOUR DATA.

And I’ll delete it as soon as I notice it.

So – MAKE A COPY FOR YOURSELF BEFORE ENTERING DATA!

To make a copy, go to “File” in the top left of the menu and then select “Make a copy”.

You should then see a pop-up that says “Copy Document”. Rename the Monthly Tracking Template to whatever you would like.

I personally save it as “20XX Monthly Tracking Template” so I can copy it again later. That later copies will be the current year, such as 2023.

There’s a method to this madness to save you time overall, so bear with me!

3. Setting Up Your Personal Template

Once you’ve made your own template copy, it’s time to set up your photography niches or “Types” and your Lead Sources. Don’t worry about the other tabs in the sheet just yet – we’ll get to those!

For the Types of photography, you want to break out, enter each one starting with cell B18 on the 20XX Year tab.

See an example of mine below. The sheet will work if you have 1 type of photography, but it may be great for data collection to break it out. If you’re a headshot-only photographer, you could break your Types into actors, individual corporate, and team corporate. If you’re a wedding photographer, you could break out the Types by venue or package you offer! 

Lead sources are standard and should be entered starting at cell B30. Swap out one of my examples below for Pinterest if you do a lot there.

The tracking sheet will automatically update the fields in all other sheets based on what you put here!

4. How to Organize Your Tracking Sheets

Now that you have your template sheet created, I recommend copying your personalized template for the year you want to track.

Do this to have a working copy for the current year without messing up your template. 

When next year rolls around, copy the 20XX template version and rename it for the new year. This method allows you to keep the previous year’s data without deleting or rewriting it. The Type and Source fields will already be filled, so you don’t have to re-enter that information. You should also change the name of the 20XX Year tab to match the year of the tracking sheet.

The whole point is to track across multiple years to see how you’re growing, trending, and developing!

You could also just make a copy of the previous year and then delete all the data on the new sheet, but that takes extra time, and I’m lazy! You can see an example below of how mine are organized if that will help you visualize the instructions better.

5. How to Use the Tracking Sheet

With your current working year tracking sheet created, you can now start entering data as leads come in and you work with them as clients.

Month to Month

Click on the Jan tab of the sheet to get started.

Each of the Month tabs are the same (minus the name of the Tab and the header in the top left). The goal is to enter leads based on what month they inquire with you and track the data from there.

Lead Name

Start by entering the lead’s name in the “Inquiry” section.

Lead Source

After that, I recommend selecting where the lead came from under “Source”. The dropdown options will be populated by the Sources you entered on the 20XX Year tab (and you can see them at the top of each Month tab in yellow).

Note: If the lead came from a Referral or Other source, I recommend writing where they came from in the “Comments” section.

Booked the Consult

Next, you can use the dropdown under “Consult (Y/N/DNS) to select “Yes,” the lead attended the consult meeting, “No,” they canceled before the meeting happened, or select “DNS” for “Did Not Show” to the meeting.

Contract Signed?

Next, you can select “Yes” or “No” from the “Booked (Y/N)” section if they did or did not sign the contract and pay the session fee or retainer.

Type of Client

I recommend entering the “Type” of client when they inquire, but you can do this after they book. The dropdown options will be populated by the Types you entered on the 20XX tab (they’re also present at the top of each Month’s tab in purple for reference).

Session Numbers, Sales, & COGs

Now that your lead is booked, you can enter the remaining data fields (Session Fee, Sales, and COG or Cost of Goods) as everything happens!

You’ll notice that the fields at the top of each Monthly tab update their data as you enter it.

Not only there, but also the 20XX Year tab – which gathers the data from ALL the Month tabs and crunches the data.

Use all of this information to help determine where your best leads are coming from, your various averages per lead and type of photography, and so much more!

Last Updated

One last field to keep updated is the “Last Updated” D4 cell on the 20XX Year tab. I always enter the date when I last changed the sheet here. When things are crazy, this is a really helpful way to know if that sales session three days ago has been included or not. 

6. Enjoy Your Data!

Once you’ve made it through a chunk of or the entire year, you can start seeing trends in your leads!

Feedback & Bug Fix Requests

If you find something doesn’t work (math doesn’t calculate properly, a field isn’t updating, etc) or if you have suggestions for how to improve the sheet, please use the link in cell K4 on the 20XX Year tab (or HERE). From there, you’ll be taken to a Google Form where you can submit your request.

Please keep in mind:

• Some bugs are because of Google and your system. You may get a response that states, “This is a Google error that you need to solve yourself.”
• If you edit the Excel Code logic yourself, then I will not debug it for you.
• Not all suggested improvements will be integrated. Google Sheets may not have the capability, or it may be a feature that is niche and not widely helpful/needed.
• It may take a few days to get a response and a few days more to see something changed. I will do my best to respond within 3 business days to all submissions.

Release Notes

Major Update 20230428.1

• Initial Release

Minor Updates for 20230428.1

20230801.1

• Expanded entries per month from 30 to 100 leads