First impressions are incredibly important and for most businesses product and commercial
photography should be the deciding factor when trying to convince consumers to buy from your brand, especially now that online sales are growing in popularity, up 20% from this time last year.
The power of professional product photography on your website is exceptional, it shows that you have taken that extra step into taking care on how your brand is perceived online. If you aren’t using professional images for your online presence then you could be losing out on converting sales.
Anybody with a phone these days can take product shots, but put yourself in the shoes of your potential buyer, they are more likely to buy from a brand that has taken the care and attention to hire a professional photographer over someone using their smartphone.
Taking exceptional product photos is a skill like any other, it requires patience and an attention to detail that has been honed over years of experience. Your website visitors will be drawn to images before reading any of the text on a page and they want to see themselves using the product before making a decision.
Here are the reasons why it’s important to go professional when taking product photography.
It Shows You Care
It’s all well and good spending hours crafting your homemade bird tables or perfecting the art of home brewing, but if you stop putting the effort in once you’ve created your product then nobody is going to believe that it’s worth buying. Having professional photos really shows that you’re prepared to go the extra mile.
It Reduces Return Rate
Almost a quarter of products sold online are sent back because the photo looked different to the product that arrived. It’s easier to sell products in person because the consumer can see and feel it before buying. By using professional product photography you are showing exactly what the product is and it sets the customers expectations on how they would use the product in everyday life.
You want to create a story using your photos and using high quality images helps you to convey the story you’re trying to get across that meets a customers expectations.
Good Product Photography Can be Used for Offline Purposes too.
High quality images can be blown up and shrunk down to pretty much any size you want, HERO shots are a great example of why it’s important to have professional photos taken as they can be used for any type of printed media. HERO shots are higher quality images that are produced using more care and attention to detail to lighting and set design, usually with some negative space where the design team can add a logo or a small blurb about your business.
Having these high quality images ready for print means that you won’t lose any quality like you would with a smartphone camera or a cheap DSLR, the visually pleasing photos will stand out when printed off and used for advertising in shops, magazines, billboards, packaging and leaflets.
Helps to Build Your Brand
Photographers will always help you to design a mood board that coincides with what your brand identity looks like, everyone’s brand has its own ‘personality’ and product photography is the main content that helps your online personality shine.
This online personality is incredibly important because you want consumers to recognise your products straight away, the photos can be ‘dark and moody’, often used (but not always) by coffee brands or men’s styling products or ‘bright and flamboyant’ (Ice cream companies, florists).
Putting up professionally branded photos consistently on your social media sites communicates to your audience that you are:
1. Professional
2. Innovative
3. High Quality
4. Attentive
5. Caring
Better Images Means More Shareability
If your product is to be featured in a magazine or an online shop then you want photos that stand out. Professional product photography helps to increase ‘likes’ on social media sites such as Instagram and Facebook meaning that you’re more likely to be received well by a wider audience.
It Keeps You Ahead of Your Competition
When eyeing up your competition look to see what you think they do well and what can be done differently, more often than not you will be able to see what makes people want to buy their product. What you find visually pleasing most likely your customers will too.
When putting two similar product photos side by side, one taken by a professional and one taken by a complete beginner, who do you think will be more likely to get sales? If you show you are producing content that’s a step ahead of your competitors then you’re bound to stand out from the crowd and the extra money you’ve spent on a photographer will be worth it in the long run when you’re the brand that’s getting all the sales.
Investing in photography now may seem like an unworthy expense, but in the long run it will save a lot of time and headaches, there are lots of way to increase sales but high quality product photography is proven to be the number one reason why customers buy a certain product.