The Importance Of Professional Photography In Marketing: Why Your Business Should Invest
Working with a professional photography studio can make a significant improvement to how your business is perceived by customers. Ecommerce brands will understand this requirement, and it's true that most businesses will generate value from launching projects with photography agencies.
Create Impactful, Attention Grabbing Content That Engages
High-quality images create a strong first impression. They convey professionalism and trustworthiness, which can be crucial in attracting and retaining customers.
Visual content is more engaging than text alone. Professional photos can capture attention and encourage interaction on social media, websites, and other marketing platforms.
Attention spans are decreasing when it comes to consuming online content, and users are bombarded by content from every angle. This means it’s more difficult for marketing professionals than ever to make a strong first impression. However, more engaging creative decisions can help content stand out, and commercial photography is one method.
Marketers can get creative, with new production techniques from professional photography studios that push boundaries and make an impact. CGI is a great addition to a marketers' toolkit here, along with virtual production and AI being more recently added to the mix.
Showcase Your Products In Their Best Light
High-quality images can lead to higher conversion rates. This is important for ecommerce brands in the fashion, FMCG, and homeware sectors.
Expert photographers can make products look more appealing, which will prompt customers to take action whilst browsing ecommerce websites.
In a crowded market, across websites and on marketplaces such as Amazon and Ebay, professional photography can give you a competitive edge. It shows that you are an established brand that is trusted.
Be Authentic By Avoiding Stock Imagery
To make the best impression with your customers, avoid using stock imagery. Although it is a quick and easy solution, your brand won’t come across as authentic to your customers and won’t be memorable.
Corporate photographs will allow you to have greater control over your brand, and you’ll be safe in the knowledge that your competitors aren’t using the same photos on their websites – this can be a problem with free stock images, or photos from popular sites such as Adobe or Getty Images.
You also won’t have to worry about licence requirements, which you should be wary of if you are using Google Images to fill your website – it can be difficult to find good royalty free images.
Develop A Consistent Brand Identity Across All Platforms
Professional photography helps to establish and maintain a consistent brand identity. Unique, high-quality images can set your brand apart from competitors and make it more recognisable.
Why is brand identity important? Because your customers will be able to recognise your company, products, and services more easily. Brands can also strengthen their engagement by appealing to their customers' lifestyle, beliefs and values.
Consistent brand messaging across all platforms you appear on will help your customers understand your company. Mixed messaging can disrupt understanding and harm sales.
Visual Storytelling And Brand Stories
Great photos can tell a story about your brand, products, or services. This digital storytelling can evoke emotions and create a connection with your audience, making your marketing more effective.
Storytelling in business is used by the top brands and can be used to appeal to customers. This style of marketing can work well on social media, allowing companies to weave a narrative that increases engagement.
A professional photography studio will be able to collaborate with you on your story, recreating this with photos or video. You could consider using models in your photography, as well as still life compositions, or create some fun with stop motion animation videos.
If your brand is using image based advertising, investing in high quality photography will help you reap the benefits making the costs worthwhile.
SEO Visibility For Your Website
Search Engine Optimisation, or SEO, is vital for website visibility when customers are searching on Google or Bing. Professional photographers can provide images that are not only visually appealing, but can be beneficial for search engines, helping your site rank higher in search results. Remember to tag your images when adding them to your website (look for a box named Alt tag or Alt text in your CMS).
Alt tags help search engines understand your website’s content, as well as increase the chance that your images will appear in any image searches by customers. Good image SEO will positively impact most businesses, but ecommerce websites will see greater benefits due to the direct correlation between traffic and sales performance.
