Images Capture Attention and Leave an Impression
In my experience as a web-developer, when I ask for feedback and impressions of a design, 98% of the time people comment on the photographs. People see the photographs and forget about the design! That first impression is important! A professional photograph communicates to customers: this is a high quality business.
Amateur Photos = Amateur Business
The converse is also true, an amateur photograph implies a JV business. That’s a pretty unfair reality: all of your small business’ hard work and talent will go unnoticed if a lame photograph causes a customer to navigate away from your website.
Don’t mess it up. Get good images and don’t settle for amateur results.
Here’s how you do it.
Use Your Own Photographs?
Well, do you shoot professional quality photographs? Honestly, most people have an over inflated opinion of their photography skills. Which is fine! Photography is fun, it’s an easy artform to access and a great way to save memories. People should love and enjoy the photographs they take!
But your business’ website needs professional quality images, not family album quality images.
People Ask About Your Camera
How can you know if your photographs are good enough? Well, when people see your photos do they ever ask you what camera you use? If yes, then that’s a good sign you’re producing some high quality stuff regardless of how expensive your camera is.
Since people have such high self esteem when it comes to their skills, when they see a friend producing great shots they think: “It’s gotta be the camera, I could do that!” Maybe you’ve even asked that of a friend, if so please don’t be offended, but the truth is, the best photographers don’t rely on their equipment to produce great images, they could use a “point and shoot camera” and still make a great photograph.
You Are Asked to Do Photoshoots
Do people ask you to do photoshoots of their family? I’m not talking about people asking you to take a picture when you are with a group of friends. I am talking about friends trying to book you to do a proper photoshoot.
If yes, then that’s also a great sign your photographs are good enough.
If not, then find another way to get high quality images. People might just like your photographs because of your cute kid, or the awesome memories behind the photograph. And that’s great, your kids are cute, and that family reunion was magical, but don’t try to shoot for your business’ website.
Unsplash.com for Royalty Free Images
Don’t waste your time on google images or flickr. Those images may or may not be royalty free. Save yourself time and go to the best collection, BY A LONGSHOT, of free photos, Unsplash.com. It’s filled with images from professional quality photographers who donate their images and just ask for credit when they are used.
Hire a Photographer
Images from Unsplash might not suit your needs, because you’re not going to find a gorgeous photo that is specific to your business, like a kick butt photo of your restaurant, worksite, or employees. Look on Yelp, or on Craigslist and you’ll find plenty of affordable local photographers. Just make sure to look critically at their portfolio and make sure their style matches your own.
Hire Madrona Web
At Madrona Web, we don’t make sites with bad images. We make portfolio worthy sites in every project and we take care of our clients by doing on site photoshoots. We love providing this service: taking photos helps us connect with our clients and understand what their businesses are all about. We also have a large stock photo collection that we use as necessary.
I hope this article has adequately explained the importance of good images on your site and given you some good leads on how to acquire those images. If you have more questions about web content, images, or web design in general, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us. Whether you hire us or not, we love to geek out over web development and photography and would be happy to chat about your web design project.