How Professional Photographs Can Grow and Transform Your Business


Professional photography is an incredible tool for any business, even the most successful businesses need them regularly updated. Photographs of your products, portraits of yourself and your team, and your studio/equipment are the most important images for your website and social media. Your clients want to see your workplace, they want to see the face behind the brand and they also want to know you have the equipment. Think of yourself as a consumer looking for something to buy, you want to see high quality images that show the product at all angles. Equally, you are interested in the seller, in the society we live in today where we have instant access to people's social media, we have learned to be interested in peoples stories and we want photos to depict that without having to read paragraphs. You can find out a lot of information from just a single image.

'Investing in professional photography is something that gets often overlooked by many businesses when re-branding. Whether you’re a newly launched company or an established organisation with a rich history, it’s important to connect with your customers. One way of doing that is by letting pictures tell your story. Photography is just as important as a logo or packaging when it comes to branding a product or service.' - Why professional photos can revolutionise your business - Hillsgreen | Agricultural Marketing, Anna Tomlinson.

As Anna Tomlinson stated in her blog, photography is an essential element to your business. There are many types of photography avenues to explore and finding the right photographer for you will be the tricky part, but it's best to start with finding a photographer that specialises in business branding photography, because they will recommend ideas from a marketing perspective. You also need your photographer to understand your business and vision because that will communicate through your images too, i.e. they need to know your branding colours to use throughout your images.


So what are the must have photos for any business?

The Essential Photos


  • Environmental Portraits
  • 'Meet the team' or 'About Me' Headshots
  • E-commerce Product Images for Websites
  • Lifestyle images for Socials
  • Details for Website/Socials/Banners

Catherine Dunstan Glass

Why Do I Need A Professional Photographer?


You may be thinking this exact question because it's a common thought among people to try and keep costs down. You can easily take your own photos, especially with the quality of phones these days, or the quality of cheap cameras, but you won't have the knowledge or craft that a professional photographer has. Professional photographers have the experience and skill with lighting that you may not be able to apply to your images. This does not mean that you can't take photos and share them on your website, using them for blogs will be perfect. Not every image that you share on your social media platforms need to be perfect. It's the opposite nowadays, we want to see real stories, raw and authentic photographs that tell a story.


With that being said, professional and styled photographs are a vital part of your business. Your website is your portfolio, your showpiece. You want it to make a perfect first impression and lasting impact to your clients. This will reflect the professionalism of your brand to your customers and it will give them a memorable experience that they will not forget!


Professional photographers will give you supply you a range of content for you to use and share on multiple platforms, and these images can last you weeks, sometimes months. So be sure to tell your photographer what content you want, what it will be used for and they can best help you.


So is a professional photographer worth it? Well... I am biased, so I am of course going to say yes but I am sure you agree too!

'It goes without saying that words are essential to help users learn about your product or services, as well as increasing the chances of your web pages ranking well in search engines. However, as your website has only a few seconds to make the right first impression, it’s the images that users will tend to look at first, thereby being a key factor as to whether they stay on your website or leave.' - Why good website imagery is essential to its success (fellowship.agency), Darren Hickey.

The Benefits


There are many benefits to using professional photography on your website and socials, but the significant ones to note are:

  • High quality images that build brand confidence
  • Consistency and professionalism throughout your website
  • Story telling images that help to support your website copy
  • Uniqueness to make you stand out from the same stock images used on other websites

What About Stock Images?


Stock Images are a great (sometimes) inexpensive way to find photos for your website but it does come with it's limitations. Of course anyone can purchase the same photo to use on their website which makes the photo become familiar to customers and they may not appreciate it the same after seeing it many times before. This will affect your brand trust because your clients will want to see real photos of your company, and it is sometimes obvious that it isn't your images. Trying to find photographs that are consistent can be tricky too and it will make your website become inconsistent and confusing to your clients. However, stock images can be useful in certain situations and it is definitely better to have access to high quality images than to have none at all, so if that's all you can afford then I definitely recommend that for the time being.

'Another problem with using stock photography on your website is that it’s widely available and the same images could pop up on the competition’s website. Furthermore, stock photography often looks generic and won’t do much to contribute to the brand story you’re trying to tell. Hiring a professional photographer for your website images will result in a seamless visual expression of your brand story that complements the messaging on your new website.' - Six Reasons Why Your Website Needs Professional Photography | Top Web Design, Branding, & Digital Marketing - Chambersburg, PA | Top Web Design, Branding, & Digital Marketing - Chambersburg, PA (cacpro.com)

Catherine Dunstan Glass

Summary


It is recommended to a professional photographer to create engaging content for your website because of the many benefits that it brings to your SEO and marketing. Professional photographs help to break up the copy on your website whilst also making your website viewers stay on your website for that much longer. In addition to the brand consistency and trust that it creates for your customers. We make our mind up in seconds if we like or don't like something, so it is vital that we make a great first impression on our websites. It's okay if you aren't quite there yet with your website, just like all of us, we are constantly learning and evolving, and our websites are always the last thing on our list to update and improve. If you don't have the time and money to pay for a professional photographer, then don't forget there is always stock images like iStockPhoto.


As you can see throughout my blog I have used my professional photographs to add context to my text and to break up all the paragraphs that I have included in my blog. It draws your attention and it helps you understand what I am saying too. It is very effective.

'Adding photos and videos to your website is a great way to increase user’s time on your site. Increasing user’s time on your site is a great signal to search engines such as Google. If users only stay on a site for a few seconds before leaving, that is an indication that the content on that website is bad or not relevant. However, short videos or images can increase users’ time spent on a page which can help your website’s ranking on a search engine results page.' - Benefits of Using Images on Your Website - Boston Web Marketing (getfoundquick.com)

What are your thoughts?


Let me know your thoughts in the comments below and if you have any questions or would like to book myself as your professional photographer, please do not hesitate to get in touch here. Also if you are interested in reading more about business branding, check out my page here for more information. I look forward to hearing from you and I hope you have found this blog useful. I am new to this but I thoroughly enjoy writing these blogs and sharing what I know. If there is anything else you would like to know drop your suggestions in the comments I will do my best to write a blog post on it :)


Nicky x