How to Write Gallery Instructions for Clients

Write instructions from what the client will actually see, not from memory.

On clientgallery.io a gallery opens in one of two layouts. Galleries created before 25 September 2026 open as one scrolling page of photos. Galleries created since then open by default in a review room: a large photo in the centre, thumbnails on one side and comments on the other.

The two layouts name their controls differently, so the instructions differ too. Open the client link in a private browser window, type the password if the gallery has one, and note which layout you get. Then use the matching wording below.

Check one more thing while you are there. Comments, colour labels and Face Search are switched on per gallery, and on the one-page layout comments and colour labels are off until you turn them on. Never tell a client to use a control that is not on their page.

Use the words on the buttons. A client told to "heart" a photo looks for a heart, and gives up if the button says something else.

Face Search is off until you switch it on for a gallery. When it is on, the selfie is matched inside the client's own browser and is never uploaded, which is worth one sentence in the instructions for a family gallery.

One sentence, with the button names. Nothing about the software beyond that.

On the one-page layout, the two pick levels need a meaning. Star and love are just two marks until you tell the client what each is for. A common split is star for "I would be happy with this one" and love for "this has to be in the album". The reasoning behind two levels is in star and love pick levels.

In the review room there is one level, so the sentence is simpler: select the photos you want.

If comments are on, say what they are for. Retouch requests on a specific frame, yes. A general question about the invoice, no, that goes to your email.

A number, not a feeling. "Choose your favourites" produces either eight photos or three hundred.

If the package includes 40 retouched images, say 40. If the album holds up to 60, say up to 60. If there is no limit, say that too, because a client who suspects a limit will stop early.

Say what happens past the number. If extras cost something, give the price per image now, so the conversation after the picks arrive is arithmetic rather than a negotiation.

Both layouts show a running count, so the client can check themselves against the number. On the one-page layout the bottom bar counts stars and loves separately. In the review room the top line and the send button show the number selected.

A weekday and a date. "Within two weeks" asks the client to do arithmetic on a Monday night, and most will not.

Tie the date to something the client cares about. "By Friday 16 October, so the album reaches the printer before the holidays" gets a faster answer than a bare deadline.

If two people are choosing, name the one who sends. Both can mark photos on the same link, but one person should press send. A request addressed to a couple is often answered by neither.

If the date passes anyway, the escalation is covered in getting clients to choose their photos faster.

This is the line most instructions leave out, and it is the one that causes the longest silences. Clients mark their favourites, close the page, and assume you can see them.

Tell them plainly that nothing reaches you until they send. On the one-page layout, that is Send my picks. In the review room it is SEND MY SELECTIONS, and the final button has to be held down for 2 seconds, which surprises people who tap and move on. Put that detail in the instructions.

On the one-page layout, also say that sending locks the picks. The confirmation screen says so, but a client reads it after deciding, not before. If a client locks too early, you can reopen their picks from the studio. Their earlier picks stay in place, and the product does not tell them it happened, so send them a line yourself.

One sentence that turns the send button into a step with an outcome. "Once your picks arrive, I retouch them and put the finished photos in this same gallery within three weeks."

If you retouch into the same gallery, say so, because the client then knows to keep the link. On the one-page layout, retouched photos show a small green tick, and the bottom bar shows how many of the client's picks are done.

If the final delivery includes a full-resolution ZIP, say it will appear as its own button and has a clock on it. The ZIP stays live for 3 days per handoff, and you can upload it again any time. On the one-page layout the button shows how many days are left.

Paste this into the gallery's welcome note, or into the message that carries the link, and replace the brackets. It is written to be read once, on a phone.

If you switched on comments, add: "To ask for a change on one photo, open it and press Draw · Comment. You can circle the spot right on the photo." If you switched on colour labels, add one sentence saying what each colour means to you, because a colour with no meaning gets used at random.

In the review room the welcome note opens as a window the first time the client visits, and stays one tap away under the Welcome button in the top bar. That makes it the right home for these instructions.

In both places, but not in the same length.

The gallery's welcome note is where the client is when they need the instructions. On the one-page layout it sits under the gallery title. In the review room it opens on the first visit. Put the full five lines there.

The message that carries the link needs only the number, the date and the send step. Anything longer gets skimmed in an inbox and forgotten by the time the gallery is open.

You send that message yourself, by email or text, from your own address. Clients answer a person faster than a system.

Instructions get longer every time a client asks a question. Resist it. A page of steps is a page the client does not read.

• No tour of features the client will not use this round.
• No controls that are switched off on this gallery.
• No screenshots in the email; the buttons move and the screenshots go stale.
• No "let me know what you think" without a number and a date.

If a client needs an account to see your gallery, your instructions have to explain it. On clientgallery.io they do not: the link, plus the password if you set one, is the whole of it. That is one less line to write.

If your studio runs its selection round inside a print store or an in-person sales appointment, these instructions are the wrong shape. Keep the process you have. This page is for the studio that sends a link and waits for a list.

This page cites no external figure, price or policy, so there is no outside source to list.

Every clientgallery.io product fact on it was checked in the product code on 30 September 2026: galleries created since 25 September 2026 open in the review room by default while older galleries keep the one-page layout; on the one-page layout, a single tap or the star button stars a photo and a double tap or the heart button loves it, Send my picks asks for a name and an email and locks the picks, and a reopened round keeps earlier picks without notifying the client; comments and colour labels are off by default per gallery on that layout; the jump-to bar appears when a gallery has sections and shows each section's photo count; in the review room, SELECT PHOTO marks a photo, SEND MY SELECTIONS needs a name and a 2-second hold, the email is optional and EDIT SELECTIONS re-sends; the review room has comments with drawing tools, no colour labels and no jump-to bar, and shows the welcome note on the first visit; Face Search is off by default per gallery and matches the selfie in the guest's browser without uploading it; the full-resolution ZIP stays live for 3 days per handoff and can be uploaded again at any time; access needs no client account.

The wording advice and the templates are editorial recommendations.