Develop your Story through ‘Personal Brand’ Photography
The value of visual communication has grown exponentially with the advent of digital marketing on social media. As a result, photography has become more crucial than ever before to the promotion of entrepreneurs, their products and services, and their brands.
Images capture the attention, imagination, and curiosity of the viewers. The goal of posting a great image on social media is to have a viewer linger on it, which dramatically increases the likelihood that they will read the information that accompanies it. Text accompanied by images on social media has been shown to generate more engagement than text without images. Example: When accompanied by a photograph, Facebook campaigns have 65% more engagement, and tweets, an average of 35% more retweets.
Images contribute visual creativity and style to a business venture. When carefully tailored to you and your professional world, they show the authentic you, you as you are going about the business of running your company. In addition, images, still today worth a thousand words, tell your story: they help your audience come to understand what drives you, what kind of person you are, what you stand for, and what you offer to the world.
Let’s say you’ve decided to set up a small business. You got in touch with your ‘why,’ you’ve settled on your product or service, crafted a mission statement to guide you, identified your target market, and are preparing to launch. You know that images provide a great marketing tool, but are not sure what to photograph or where to begin.
Here are a few recommendations about possible content for Instagram, a social media platform designed for photo (and video) sharing. Of course, you can use your images on other social platforms such as FB, Twitter, and LinkedIn, and on marketing materials such as brochures, flyers, newsletters, book covers, etc. but, for the purposes of this article, I will focus on Instagram.
What to post?
- An attractive, professional headshot of yourself which shows you at your natural, confident and relaxed best
- Images that show you in action, doing whatever it is you do
- Images that show some ‘behind the scenes’ glimpses of your business, thereby humanizing and giving life to your brand
- Images which show individuals or, better, customers using your products or services
- Images which speak to personal aspects of yourself that you’re comfortable sharing with your audience: think interests and values, hobbies and other activities you engage in. Among other things, you want to show that you are living your brand values
- Images that communicate an emotion
- Images that (when coupled with the appropriate text) inspire or educate, entertain or engage
- Images that show you are looking out for the best interests of your customers and employees, that you care
Vary the nature of your posts to keep your account interesting, and engage with those who respond to them in order to nurture a conversation and connection with those who are following you. Finally, celebrate your accomplishments as you review your images, select your favourite and most effective ones, and enjoy using them as you see fit to promote yourself, your business, and your brand.
Marion Voysey is a photographer specializing in portrait, headshot and personal brand photography. She works collaboratively with entrepreneurs to plan photo shoots that generate a collection of meaningful, engaging, story-telling images they can use to promote themselves and their brand.
We are thrilled to have Marion as a sponsor for our spring conference, Business Bootcamp on Sat. April 27th, and will be capturing images of our mamas in action on the big day!