The Ultimate Guide to Choosing Images for Your Website
Photos (and videos… blog for another day!) have a massive impact on your website – for good or bad. People often ask us for tips on choosing images for their website. They’re wondering: What kind of images should I have? How many photos should I have? What or who should be in the photos? Do I need to hire someone or are there other ways to get good photos? You get the idea.
That’s why we wrote this – The Ultimate Guide to Choosing Images for Your Website! It’s chock full of helpful info, so read on.
Why is choosing the right images for your website so important?
The goal of your website is to help your business grow. It’s a place to tell people what you do, show them your work or products and drive them to take action and buy. All marketing efforts should point people back to your website to help you sell. It’s your online home base. It is the face of your brand.
When people land on your website, it’s essential that they feel you’re trustworthy.
People buy from businesses they trust.
Therefore, one of the main goals of your website should be to build trust with your customers. One way you can do this is by choosing the right images for your website.
Blurry, dark, generic, or just plain lousy images can damage your credibility. If you want to show up as a legit, trustworthy brand online, you have to look like one!
Next, we will dive into where to get images for your website, what kind of images you need, tips for choosing the right images, and a few technical best practices for when it’s time to add them to your website.
Where do I get photos for my website?
So, it’s time to pick out photos for your website. Maybe you’re working with an agency or designer like us, and they’re asking you to send them all your images.
The problem? You don’t have any(or the ones you do have aren’t great). What do you do?
You have three main options: (1) hire a professional, (2) take photos yourself, or (3) use stock photography.
1) Hire a Professional
Hiring a professional photographer to do a brand shoot is going to be your best choice. You can meet with them to discuss your photo goals, create a photoshoot shot list to make sure you get all the images you need and collaborate with them so the coloring in the edited images fit well with your brand’s overall style. It’s worth the investment to get professional photos so you don’t have to worry about if you have the variety, quantity, or quality of images your website needs.
2) Take Photos Yourself
Are you savvy with a camera? Do you have an eye for snapping good photos, then plan a photoshoot day for your business and make it happen. When taking your shots, make sure you have adequate lighting so your photos appear bright and crisp. They can always be edited later, but even the best filters can’t save an image that is too dark!
If hiring a professional isn’t in the cards for you right now and you’re a decent photographer, then this can be a good option because you’ll build more trust with your customers by having unique images, rather than stock photography.
But if you aren’t comfortable behind the camera and aren’t ready to hire a professional, then do yourself a favor and save yourself the time and find some good stock photos (hint: this isn’t a last resort option, keep reading).
Types of photos to include in your photoshoot shot list
Whether you’re working with a professional or doing a photoshoot yourself, don’t skip the step of planning out your photoshoot shot list ahead of time! A good photographer will often help you with this step, but don’t just rely on their recommendations. No matter who is taking your photos, do your part and make a list of important photos to be sure to capture during your photo shoot so you don’t miss any.
To get you started, here are a few ideas for shots you’ll want to get:
1) Photos of happy customers enjoying your product or service.
The importance of these types of photos cannot be emphasized enough. By showing happy customers’ or clients’ faces on your website, potential new customers or clients are able to see that “people like them” buy your product or service.
This isn’t just fluff, it’s backed by psychology. Having visuals of happy customers experiencing, using, or interacting with you and your business makes a huge difference on your website.
Depending on the nature of your business, this may take a bit more effort and planning, but do what you need to do to get these photos for your website. These images go a long way in helping you establish trust with people. So, are you a florist? Snap some photos of a customer enjoying their new arrangement. If you’re a contractor, take some photos of a family enjoying their new space. If you own a boutique, get some photos of a customer checking out with their new items and a smile on their face. Even getting headshots of people who’ve given you positive reviews to include next to their written testimonial on your website is tremendously impactful.
2) Headshots of yourself and your team!
These are some of the most important images you can have on your website.
People want to know exactly who they’ll be working with or buying from. Showing your face on your website is crucial for establishing trust and credibility.
By showing your face, people will feel more of a sense of connection and relatability to you.
3) Photos of you and your team “in action”.
You don’t want your whole website to be posed, headshot-style photos of you and your team.
Be sure to get some “in action” shots. Do you stage homes? Get photos of yourself arranging pillows on a couch and hanging art on the wall. If you’re a bookkeeper, shoot some photos of yourself at your desk working on a spreadsheet or using your calculator.
4) Images pertaining to your business without people in them.
We love showing people in photos, but there’s a time and place for photos with no people.
Having a variety of images without people in them can be super helpful for different design elements on your website. Are you an interior designer? Show off some of your favorite rooms. Do you own an event venue? You’ll want to get some images of the spaces you have for rent.
5) Images of your brick-and-mortar location (if applicable).
Do you have a store or an office? Make sure you get some exterior and interior photos of your location.
This will help customers find you easier and know what to expect when they enter your office or shop.
3) Stock Photography
Before you jump to the assumption – I’ll stop you right now – stock photography is NOT (all) bad and using stock photos is NOT something to be embarrassed by. No doubt, there are some awful stock photos out there that are so incredibly cheesy they make you cringe to look at them. But there are actually a ton of great stock photo options out there too, and there are plenty of reasons and ways to use stock photos successfully.
Stock photography can be an affordable option for small businesses that are just getting started with their websites or who need temporary photo options while coordinating a photo shoot for an updated site. They’re taken by professional photographers, so they’re sure to be crystal-clear quality and edited to perfection.
As you’ve gathered by now, we’ll generally first recommend you get professional photos taken because they’ll feel more authentic and personal to your brand. Customers can typically point out when you’re using stock photography vs. your own photos. So if you’re going the stock photo route, we recommend having at least a headshot of yourself or a team photo on your website at the very minimum.
BUT DO NOT MISS THIS: If you don’t have custom images for your website, DO NOT let that keep you from moving forward and getting your website live. This is often such a hold-up for people because they convince themselves they have to have all these “perfect” photos before they can get their new website up. This is one of the biggest mistakes a business can make because they’re letting perfect get in the way of great. A website launched with good stock photos (that can easily be updated at any time) is 100% better than no website live (or an outdated one that is likely harming you rather than helping you).
Where to find the best stock photos
There are many websites that sell high-quality stock photos (and some are even free!).
Here are some of our favorite sources for stock photography:
Adobe Stock. These photos are not free, but they have a very extensive selection. You can even search by color so that your photos can match your brand style.
Unsplash. Unsplash is a great option for free stock photos. You won’t find any cheesy, staged photos here. The selection on Unsplash is artistic and elevated.
Pexels. Like Unsplash, Pexels is an awesome resource for more artistic stock photography. Bonus: You’ll often see multiple photos from the same shoot on Pexels, allowing you to get a cohesive photography style for your website. Bonus: They also have a selection of FREE stock videos!
HauteStock. Looking for more “aesthetic” photos? Try HauteStock. You pay a monthly membership fee to get access to thousands of beautiful stock photos. You can even filter by your brand colors!
How do I choose the best images for my website?
Whether you’re taking photos yourself, browsing stock photography websites, or looking through the photos you already have, here are some best practices when selecting photos for your website.
Get a good mix of horizontal and vertical photos.
Horizontal and vertical (a.k.a. portrait and landscape) images will be used for different purposes on your website.
For example, banner images should always be horizontal (landscape). Banner images refer to images that are used as section backgrounds on a webpage and are wider than they are tall. A vertical (portrait) photo wouldn’t work because part of the image would be cut off.
DO use a horizontal (landscape) photo for section backgrounds.
DON’T use a vertical (portrait) image for section backgrounds. The photo will be more zoomed in and may cut off important parts of the photo.
However, there are other instances when vertical images come in handy. Take the below section, for example: we’ve got an image on the left and a substantial body of text on the right. We’d want the image to line up with the text, so we’d need a vertical one here.
DO use a vertical image next to a large body of text for a symmetrical layout.
DON’T use a horizontal image next to a large body of text.
Make sure the quality is crystal clear.
Blurry, pixelated images undermine the credibility of you and your website.
If you’ve worked with a photographer in the past and somehow have a folder full of blurry images, reach out to them and ask for high-resolution photos from your shoot.
If you’re taking your own photos, be sure that your camera is crisp and your lighting is bright enough.
If you’re using stock photography, this won’t be as much of an issue for you, but you should still make sure you’re downloading the highest-quality version of each photo.
If your image isn’t crystal clear, go for no image or a stock photo instead. (We’ll usually make an exception for headshots and team photos if it’s all you’ve got – use them in a smaller image block on your website, even if they aren’t perfect!).
Choose a few photos with blank space.
When we say “blank space”, we mean an image where the subject isn’t in the very center of the photo or where there is “blank space” to the left, right or even in the middle of the image for text.
Images with blank space are really nice to have if you’re planning on overlaying text or other content on the image without worrying about covering something up.
DO choose a photo with the subject to the right or left side when overlaying text.
DON’T choose a photo with the subject in the middle if you’ll be overlaying text that covers up the subject.
Choose images that feature your target audience demographic.
If you’re using photos with people, you’ll want to make sure they match the demographic of your ideal customer. For example, if your business caters to retirees, you wouldn’t want to feature college kids on your website.
You want your ideal customers to be able to visualize themselves using your service or product, so feature images of people that are similar to them.
What are some best practices for adding images to my website?
Once you’ve gathered all the images you want to use on your website – examples of your work, headshots of yourself and your team members, photos of happy customers, maybe some beautiful stock photos, and a good mix of vertical and horizontal images – it’s time to get them added to your website!
Here are some important things to keep in mind.
Note: If you’re working with an agency or professional designer on your website (like us), they’ll likely take care of these things for you. (We include all of the following things in every website we build!) But if you’re DIY-ing, make sure you do these two things.
Ensure all your images are below 500KB in file size.
Large image files will slow down your website. You want a site that loads fast so people don’t click away, so be sure to compress them to 500KB or below.
We have a few tricks for compressing images without sacrificing quality:
First, you’ll resize the image a little bit to prepare for compressing. If you’re on a Mac, open up your photo in the Preview app. Click “Tools” and then “Adjust Size”. Play around with the dimensions until you get it to around 1.5MB (give or take).
Then, you’ll want to use an online image compression tool. We like Tinyjpg.com. You’ll simply drag and drop your photos into the tool, and it will compress your images for you. Ensure all images are 500KB and below, and then download!
The reason why we use this tool instead of simply sizing down to 500KB on our computer (as outlined in the first step) is so we can preserve the quality of the image. If you only use your computer to resize, you risk coming out with blurry images.
Name your images with your SEO keyword(s) so Google can “see” them.
Your website should be all the things at once: beautiful, functional, purposeful, fast, and findable.
If you’re putting time and effort into building a website, you want it to be discoverable on Google. This is why SEO (or search engine optimization) is such a crucial piece of your website build.
Why are we talking about SEO and images in the same blog post? Well, you can actually use your images strategically to help your website get found in search engines.
If your image file name is something like IMG_34893428.jpg, Google can see that, and it tells Google absolutely nothing about what the image is. You’re missing out on SEO opportunities.
Before you upload your images to your website, rename them to include (1) your business name, and (2) your focus SEO keyword for that page.
For example, the SEO keyword we chose for our homepage is “Small Business Consultants”. So, we’d want to rename all the images on our homepage to include “Small Business Consultants | Hoffbeck + Co.”
Choosing images for your website is an important step to showing up as a trustworthy brand online.
You have one chance to make the right first impression online. You can have the most beautifully-designed website with the fastest load speeds and copywriting that drives action (all important things, might we add), but if your photos aren’t up to par, you’re undermining your credibility.
That’s why being strategic and selective about which photos make the cut on your website is so important.
We hope these tips and tricks help you feel confident choosing images for your website so you can put your best foot forward and build trust with your ideal customers!
Feeling inspired to learn more about website design and strategy? Dig into some of our other blogs about improving your website! 👇🏼
More soon,
Mara
WEBSITE DESIGNER + SEO SPECIALIST
P.S.
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