Design Meets Technology with Pixpa’s Founder Gurpreet Singh [INTERVIEW]

We’re a society of roving photographers and online creators. Everyone equipped with a camera tied to their smartphone or tablet. My iPhone is just shy of 10,000 photos and my portfolio continues to expand. We’ve been running a series of photo essays here at Luxe Beat Magazine and it got me thinking about my own digital stockpile. In a quest to simplify, organize and showcase my visual stories, I discovered Pixpa.com. The Pixpa all-in-one platform was founded in 2013 by creative innovator, Gurpreet Singh. The website portfolio solution is designed with the photographer or creative artist in mind. The technology is simple to use, visually driven and cost-effective. They offer a free 15-day trial and monthly pricing ranges from $6 to $25 per month, on the annual plan and a few bucks more if you go month to month. They also offer a money-back guarantee.

Curiosity got the best of me and I had to find out the story behind the software platform that is bringing artists and end users together, in all corners of the world. Pixpa Founder, Gurpreet Singh, generously made himself available to share his story in this exclusive interview.

Architecture Grad Turned Creative Director

Gurpreet Singh studied architecture, and right after completing his college education in 1999, he formed a multi-disciplinary creative agency that he led for 15 years. In his role as the Creative Director of IdeazInc, Gurpreet worked on branding and communication design projects for global clients. His work involved collaborating with designers, photographers and artists around the world. The insights and experience he gained during this time led to the creation of Pixpa. With an understanding of both sides of the business, Gurpreet envisioned Pixpa is an all-in-one platform for creatives to showcase, sell and share their work online. 

What sparked the idea for Pixpa?

Gurpreet Singh (GS): Before Pixpa, I was running a full-service creative agency for over 15 years. In this role, I worked with scores of photographers and designers on one hand and clients around the world on the other. In my discussions with fellow creatives, I realized that there were a need and space for a platform that specifically caters to creative professionals and helps them showcase, share and sell their work online easily. It was this insight that gave me the idea to kick-start Pixpa. Since the launch, Pixpa has grown into a product that empowers thousands of creative professionals around the world to create and manage their online presence.

How did your architectural background influence the Pixpa platform?

(GS): Architecture is about bringing together design and technology to create spaces that are both functional and aesthetic. Building a website builder like Pixpa also involves bringing together the elements of design, technology, functionality, and aesthetics together.

Also, architecture teaches you a lot about project management. Years into building a SAAS product, I have worked with a highly skilled team of developers, marketers and content creators. But the thread that joins the business and technical side of the product is crucial. One needs to be able to translate customer feedback into actionable team requirements.

This is where I feel my years of architectural education help me gauge what the customer really needs and how can I work with my development team to define a clear task-oriented roadmap of Pixpa’s features and capabilities to meet those expectations.

How is Pixpa different from other portfolio publishing tools?

(GS): Our vision has always been to develop Pixpa into an all-in-one platform for creatives that enables and empowers them to manage their complete online presence in one place. Publishing a portfolio is just one part of this process, and Pixpa lets you go beyond with integrated blogs, eCommerce, and client galleries. We are the only platform out there that lets you sell products, services, digital downloads and images as prints or downloads, together. Plus, we have a full-featured Client Galleries platform that lets creatives manage the end-to-end workflows of sharing, proofing, delivering and selling their work to clients.

Compared to other solutions such as Wix and Squarespace, Pixpa is singularly focussed on photographers, artists, designers, and other creators. That focus reflects on our entire product and offers a seamless, tailored experience for creatives that is unique to Pixpa.

All of this available at best-in-industry, cost-effective pricing plans with 24×7 customer support.

How do Pixpa creators sell their work?

(GS): Pixpa is a tool not only to showcase work but also to sell physical products, digital products and services online. Pixpa enable creative pros to grow their busines and take orders online easily. The platform has a powerful integrated eCommerce engine. Pixpa e-commerce also provides tools for selling services like classes, assignments, and projects.

Creatives can also sell images as prints and downloads through their website by adding beautiful e-commerce enabled galleries.

Pixpa does not charge any commissions on your sales – you take home all the revenue. Transaction charges from your payment processor will apply. You can connect your PayPal or Stripe account to collect payments directly to your account. You can read more on Pixpa’s eCommerce features here: https://www.pixpa.com/ecommerce/stores

What’s behind the company name?

(GS): We just wanted a simple, short and memorable name with a .com domain available. The word Pixpa just clicked. The name is derived from Pics or Pix, which is a reference to images or pictures, that form the core of our visual platform. 

What’s next for Pixpa?

(GS): We are committed to our vision of making Pixpa an all-in-one platform for photographers and creatives.  We are continually looking towards the future and figuring out ways to further improve and enhance the user experience for our customers. This includes making sure that our support remains as personal and directly connected with our customers and the feedback channels remain as strong. We also continue our focus on the business workflow tools that creatives need such as enhancing our eCommerce capabilities and client galleries platform.

How do you define luxury?

(GS): To me having control over one’s time is the absolute luxury. The ability to spend my time doing the things I love (especially travel!) is luxury.

What books are you reading now?

(GS): My current reading list includes Atomic Habits and Radical Candor.

Savoury or sweet?

(GS): Savoury, it is for me.

What are your favorite series to binge-watch?

(GS): Homeland and Master of None.

Thank you Gurpreet for sharing the history behind Pixpa and for all that you’re doing for digital artists and image creators! To check out this creative solution go to pixpa.com.

Attention Pixpa Creators

Luxe Beat is looking for interesting photo essays. To pitch your idea and have your photo essay featured with us please contact us here and include “Photo Essay” in the subject line. To view our Photo Essays Series click here.

 

Feature image of Gurpreet Singh courtesy of pixpa.com