If you’re looking for ways to increase the performance of your site and engagement from users on your site, pictures may be a great boost. Think about it, how much of a difference can a good picture make? The answer is a huge difference! 

According to research conducted by MDG Advertising, “67% of consumers say that the quality of a product image is ‘very important’ in selecting and purchasing the product.” So, if the pictures you take for your business have bad lighting, people cleaning in the background, or simply don’t capture the holistic view of the great work you do, your performance may suffer.

We strive to help our clients achieve high performance through SEO, content, and more. But, one thing that we can’t do is provide you with images. Of course, we can fill in the gaps with stock images, but it’s not the same! 

Stock photos are awesome for their convenience, but the sad truth is that they just don’t appeal to your clients as much as real photos do. Marketing Experiments tested this when they compared the performance of using their top-performing stock photo versus using a real photo. Guess what? Clients that saw the real photo were 35% more likely to sign up for that site’s services.

Don’t know how to make sure your real photos turn out amazing? You don’t have to be a professional photographer to take good pictures! We’ve got you covered with these 4 tips to help you capture the full essence of your services.

 1. Cleanliness Check

While it may be tempting to pull out your phone and take a picture of the brand new kitchen that you’ve just completed, don’t. Take a second and look around the area you plan to take a picture of. Make sure the counters are clean and free of any clutter, there is no trash in sight, cabinets are closed (unless you’re specifically showing off cabinets), and there is no one else in the picture.

After you make sure that everything is clean, pull out your phone again, open your camera, aim the camera towards the area that you want to take a picture of, and look at what you see.

 2. Just Look

Hold on – that’s not all. It’s not quite time to snap that picture yet. Hold the camera up and look at what’s in the frame. Ask yourself these questions: 

1. Is there anything or anyone in the frame other than the product that I want to take a picture of?
   

                If the answer is yes, make sure you remove the “anything or anyone”.

1. Can I see everything that I want to take a picture of well?

               If the answer is no, adjust your lighting. You can learn how to do this in step 3.

1. Is my finger in the way of the camera? 

               This may sound silly, but it happens and it’s an honest mistake. Make sure that your finger isn’t in the frame.

You’ve looked and made sure that you’re properly capturing the right things, now let’s talk a little more about lighting. 

3.Too Dark, Too Light, Just Right

It can be easy to snap a picture that’s either too dark or too light, but you want to avoid either one. Take a look at the example below.

The goal of taking a picture is to make it look as natural and as close to how you see it in-person as possible. If it looks like it’s nighttime in your picture when it’s not, it’s underexposed. If it looks really bright and like stuff is glowing, it’s overexposed. You want to achieve a happy medium between the two! 

If it’s too dark inside (which is the most common), you can turn on some more lights, open blinds, or even invest in a small ring light. If extra lights and opening the blinds don’t seem to be working, you can try adjusting the lighting on your phone. Here’s how to do it:

• iPhone: In the camera app, tap on the screen until you see a box and a line with a sun in the middle of it on the right side. To increase the lighting, slide the sun up; to decrease the lighting, slide the sun down. Do this until you get the correct lighting. 
• Android: In the camera app, tap on the screen until a line with a sun in the middle of it. To increase the lighting, slide the sun up; to decrease the lighting, slide the sun down. Do this until you get the correct lighting. 

The last resort is turning on your camera’s flash. Try your best to avoid this, but if you absolutely need to you can. Stand about a foot away from what you’re taking a picture of (unless it’s up close) and use the flash. If you’re too far, you won’t notice a difference in the lighting and the picture will probably still be dark. If you’re too close, the picture will be overexposed.

4. You’re Free to Snap

And now, for the moment you’ve been waiting for: time to take the picture! Once you’ve gone through steps 1-3, you’re ready to finally snap some pictures. At this stage, you are free to be as creative as you want. You can take photos of the same thing at different angles, place things such as decorative vases and towels in the picture to make it look a little nicer, or even do some up-close shots of the sink fixtures!

Hopefully, after these 4 tips, you feel more confident in your photography abilities and can capture some beautiful pictures. If you want even more guidance on taking pictures, we have some additional tips below. The more pictures you take, the more full, aesthetically pleasing, and successful your site will be. We can’t wait to see the photos of your next project!

Additional tips, tricks, & examples:

1. Always take more than 1 of each shot, just in case something goes wrong with the first one. 
   
2. Look at your pictures before you leave the place you’re taking pictures of.
3. Take multiple angles of the same subject (up high, down low, up close, far away).
4. If you really want to make your pictures aesthetically pleasing, use the 7 principles of art and design (especially symmetry, rhythm, and pattern). Check those out here.
5. Use depth of field (portrait mode) for those up-close shots!
6. Purchase some camera lenses for your phone and play around with those.
7. When you’re taking a picture with a mirror in it, make sure that you can’t see yourself in the mirror.
8. Have fun! The more you look at this as a fun addition to your services, the better your pictures will come out.