What is personal branding photography?

AND WHY IS IT DIFFERENT FROM A HEADSHOT?

For a small business owner, an online presence is a necessity. For many business owners who offer a personalised service, that online presence needs to reflect the brand values of the business.

It might be being seen as an inspiring leader, a thoughtful advisor or teacher, a creative artist or a dynamic coach. It might include outstanding customer service & care along with expert status.

The brand shows what someone stands for and is known for, rather than just their commercial intent or their local celebrity status. The brand then helps immensely with marketing, because the core values are clear, attracting ideal clients while helping to filter out prospective clients who aren’t a good match.

But how to best to communicate a brand?

A bespoke collection of on-brand images that portray the whole ethos, values and personality of the person is one way. This is personal brand photography, and it’s very different to a few headshots. It might be a portfolio of over 100 professional images that includes the person in a variety of roles and locations, reflecting who they are, their message, the service or products that they sell, together with personal and business items that have stories behind them.

Combined with text that clearly communicates, these can be used to reveal the values and journey of the person, making them much more credible and relatable. Marketers will recognise this “high quality collateral”.

With the need to give websites and social media more & more content, a collection of images like this can be invaluable, providing many months worth of content. It can be tempting to use stock images, but they are generic and not unique to a brand. Plus there’s no consistency. To create your own brand photography library, a good starting point is to take photos of the things that have been important to your business journey. Anything from your diary, your first business card, the little things that inspire you, images that match your mood, people that helped, where you work, etc. All this helps build the know, like and trust that is so important to attract ideal clients.

To create the best photos of small items in good light, put them close to a window, but out of direct sunlight, and take a series of photos while you have everything setup. Layflat shots, taken from directly above, are popular.

Perhaps get a friend or two to act as your clients and create some photos of you providing your service. Planning of clothes and location are key. Getting photos of real (and happy!) clients is a fantastic way to accompany glowing testimonials. There are lots of good reasons to start building a library of images about your business.

The author, Laurence Jones, is a personal branding photographer based in Warwickshire.If you are in need of some personal branding images, please get in touch: www.ljonesphotography.co.uk