The Importance of Brand Imagery

Brand imagery can often be overlooked when you start your business. You're often too busy focussing on what you're doing and how you can get the sales in at the beginning. Then slowly overtime, well for me anyway, you start to realise you want more. You want a brand that is from the heart, that tells your story, that feels wonderful and that resonates with your dream clients. And that can not only be done through the written communication, but through the imagery you are sharing on your website, social media, brochures, and so much more.

As you build your business, wanting to raise your prices and offer something really beautiful as a creative business, everything has to to be inline. And everything needs to be of a certain level. iPhone photos of your products on your website won't cut it. You need imagery that is professional, is clean, in the photography style that is relevant for your brand and that showcases you as a person and what you do.

Think about some of the most beautiful brands you know - is their imagery substandard? No, it is considered, refined and reflective of them. I don't want you to start comparing yourself to others, but looking at other brands gives you a great insight into knowing all of the assets needed for a beautifully aesthetic-led creative business.

So let's delve a little deeper.

When I was two years into my business, I knew something had to change. I was working all the hours and earning very little. My dream clients were nowhere to be found. So I explored what I really wanted for my business - how I wanted it to feel and look and who I wanted to work with. So I went back to the drawing board, thinking about my mission, my story and all of my passions. And since then these have become such a large focus in all that I do.

In fact, just thinking about my story made me realise the importance of representing that for my brand, plus how much I loved it. So from then on, storytelling became a huge focus in my business, both for me and for my clients.

And storytelling is a vital tool to think about when creating brand imagery. What story can you tell in your images? What is the story of you as a person and how can you portray that in brand photos of you? How will the images you create tell a story through your website and tell the stories of the messages you are portraying on social media?

So we've chatted about why brand imagery is so important and what we can utilise in our imagery - storytelling - to get those beautiful brand-aligned and unique images. But let's talk a little more about what kind of images you need.

If you are product based, the first thing I would invest in would be a product shoot with an established photographer. Consider getting clean and crisp images of all your products, both in situ and plain images of just the product. Use the same background for all of the latter, and build some context into the ones in situ.

If you are service based, a brand shoot is an essential for you. Hire a brand photographer, and stylist - hello me - if you need to. Consider working shots, head shots, lifestyle shots and so much more. Show your personality, your values, your nature and your working environment.

And a really important thing to consider is where are these photos going. If they're predominantly for your website, think about the ratio, the size, any blank space needed and how they are going to tell the story of the placement of what they're communicating. Look across your whole website and think thoroughly about the photography needed, planning it with your team.

Lastly, never ever forget the importance of the photographer and the work that they produce. Their style must be aligned with your brand and ideally they will have experience in shooting businesses like yours. Plan a design brief and a shot list for the day, and communicate this with them. You want to get the very most out of this investment that you are making, so don't underestimate the importance of the planning and design stage, and really researching who you want to work with and how you are going to work with them.

As a creative business, your clients will look at how your imagery showcases you and your work. They want to see how you work and they want to see an element of professionalism and alignment across all of your touch points. If you consider this and all of the points I have made, you are onto a great start for your shoot or shoots.

And don't forget your images need regularly updating. Consider additional shoots such as content days and the like. Be that beautiful brand you've always dreamed of being, with an aligned and clear aesthetic to pull those dream clients in.