How to Determine a Shot List to Match Your Brand & Website
Branding photography is a powerful tool to help your business reach the next level of growth. Many people underestimate the power that it can have on your website. If done correctly, brand images will help you attract more of your ideal customers who NEED your products and/or services and therefore, make you more money!
However, not all brand images are alike! You need to have the right brand images on your website to see these results. The question that many business owners ask us before even signing up for a branding photo shoot is: “How do I know what images I need? I don’t even know where to start.”
Our answer: We need to come up with a shot list that matches your brand.
What is a shot list? A shot list is a list of images that will be captured during your branding photo shoot. For example, a shot list for a chiropractor may be the following:
Professional headshots in front of your entryway of practice.
“In action” of the chiropractor adjusting patient on their backside.
Lifestyle image of the chiropractor practicing breathe work in front of the water at the beach.
The chiropractor welcoming a patient into office through their front door.
Candid images of the chiropractor and patient chatting with each other in the consultation room.
Et cetera, et cetera!
Determining what your shot list will be depends on your answers to several different questions. How is your website laid out? What the headlines to each of your web site pages? How do you want your audience to feel when visiting your website? For the purposes of this blog post, we will go through the steps of how to determine a shot list specifically for your website, since this is the most common situation that our clients find themselves in!
How to determine a shot list to match your brand for your website:
Your first step is to set up a meeting with your web designer to chat about the website layout and where there will be placeholders for specific images. Let’s get specific with this step. For example, let’s start on the homepage. Do you need a horizontal/landscape image that is going to serve as the “cover” image at the top of the homepage? If so, what would you like it to be, and does it have to have negative space on one side to leave room for text? Photographers like to call this image the “hero image,” because it is the first and most important image that your website visitors will see. If you run a service-based business, it should probably be an image of you and what you’re all about. If you run a product-based business, it should show your product in a way that resembles what it represents. With the rest of your website, you would do the same thing. Go through each page, and determine what image you need in each spot, depending on the context of the page.
The second step is to clarify what your brand colors and overall brand “mood” are. Let’s give you another example, because we love those :)
Say you are a realtor who only works with military families. Your colors are red, white, and blue and your brand mood is very patriotic, powerful, and professional. With this example, we would suggest that you incorporate some of your brand colors in your photos (through your outfits, props, locations, etc.). We also suggest that your outfits and locations exude professionalism. In that case, it may mean wearing a business-casual outfit in some images and showing you in a professional setting working with a client (i.e. your office space). Taking these factors into consideration will also allow your website to look cohesive and flow smoothly together.
Third, gather ideas. Pin, save, screenshot - you name it - any images you see online that you really love and want to emulate in your photos. The internet is such a gift and allows us access to thousands of ideas on the daily. Find inspiration through others, and keep a running tab/list of images that you can come back to and send to your photographer. Of course we do not promote copying others (because your brand is unique, and what works for someone else will not work for you). However, gathering inspiration is really important because it helps you see what is possible and gets your creative juices flowing. We love Pinterest, Instagram, and the O.G. Google for searching for ideas!
Lastly, to help make the above process smoother and easier for you as the client, we always suggest that your photographer and web designer communicate with each other. If you haven’t already read about this, go check out our other blog post. That is why I partner with web designers like Samantha of Be Creatively You. Working with Samantha helps me understand what types of images you need to help build your shot list and gives you the best possible outcome of a website with beautiful images that help it flow.
If you’ve made it this far and what we’ve written makes sense, then let’s chat. You can find Samantha’s work & web design process here: Be Creatively You. You can also schedule a free phone consult with us to find out more about branding and product photography here.
Samantha of Be Creatively You.