Question: How can I help my products stand out online?  

Answer: There are lots of ways to help your products stand out, but a big one is working with a professional product photographer for your product images. It’ll make sure that you’re skipping the trial and error, and targeting your product images directly to your ideal clients from the start!

Standing out online isn’t optional as a product seller

In this day and age, if you’re trying to make sales online – or honestly sales of any product even in a physical shop – you’re going to have to have a stand-out online presence. Social media profiles have gotten more and more curated. Buyers have gotten more and more skeptical. And on top of all that, times are getting tougher and tougher, and customers are making all kinds of compromises between price, quality, and whether an item they don’t strictly NEED is a wise spending decision in the first place.

All that together? It means if you want to succeed in this climate, you’re going to have to stand out. It’s not optional. Your customers need to look at what you create, what you sell, and know instantly that you’re the company they want to work with, or order from.

Professional product photos help your business stand out online

And if you’re a product seller, that means having pristine product photos. Not “pristine” in the “perfection” way, though. I don’t mean overly curated, or lacking imperfection – because honestly? We want there to be authentic, human elements in your product photos! That’s what keeps you differentiated from AI slop. (Because we all know how that’s going right now… right?)

What we want, is for your branded product photos to be unique to your business, with an aesthetic that speaks directly to your ideal buyers, from the second you show up in their scroll. That single focus for your product photos is what will help them stand out from the crowd – because they’re speaking TO the right people SPECIFICALLY. Right now? That takes a lot.

Speaking directly to your ideal buyers is powerful

It’s easy to think that the most performant images for your business would be whatever is simplest, and would appeal to the most people. I mean, you want the MOST buyers, right? More appeal to more people, means more buyers, and more profit.

Except… actually, it doesn’t. What leads to the most profit, is attracting the RIGHT buyers, and making sure there’s the LEAST amount of friction between them seeing what you do, and paying you money for that thing. Why? Because like I said earlier, it’s CROWDED out there. And increasingly we’re living in a world where buyers don’t 100% know what they’re getting when they order from a new company, especially one they’ve found online. AI images exist, and they mean that the photos companies use to promote their products might not even be REAL. And we’ve all seen the “AI product reveal” videos online in the last year – we’ve seen the fails, and our money is too valuable to spend on something that won’t be what it says it is.

When you use professional product images, that are clearly real, and exactly what your ideal customer is looking for, it prevents all of that friction. Your buyer doesn’t have to ask themself whether what they’re buying is real, whether it’ll look like what the photos look like – that friction disappears. And because your professional product photos will be targeted to what your ideal customer is looking for in the first place, AKA making sure the “vibe” is what it needs to be… buying your product becomes a no-brainer.

What makes professional product photos different?

Why can’t this be done with AI, or with photos from your phone? That comes down to the team behind the photos, making cool things that work for your people. When you work with a professional photographer for the product photos that go on your website, or your marketplace shop, or your advertizing generally, you’re leveraging years of experience in what moves the needle, and what doesn’t.

It’s not a trial and error process – it’s expertise you can rely on from the moment you send your products out to be photographed, until the moment you receive your final images. No endless prompting of an AI system to get to a mockup of your products in a flat lay that kind-of-sort-of-maybe looks like your real products. No failed photoshoots because you didn’t consider how well your phone would take photos in the lighting conditions available to you. No purchasing of props and painstakingly laying out sets that highlight the unique features of your products. All you have to do, is tell us what to highlight, and who needs to love your photos – and we do the rest.

Can you still get away with DIY product photos?

I’m always the first person to tell you when something can be done without outsourcing, even if it technically doesn’t benefit me to say so. And if I’m being completely honest, yes, you CAN get away with DIY product photos, and you might even be able to move the needle with them, at least a little bit. Especially if you pay attention to making sure your images are fully branded, and targeted to your ideal audience.

But you didn’t start your business to be a photographer – you started it to make amazing things, that solve problems, and that people love. When you work with a professional for product photography, you don’t have to wear the “product photographer” hat, on top of the “amateur accountant” hat, and the “operations manager” hat, and the “product fulfilment” hat. You don’t have to keep up with every trend, or know what lighting is working in online shops right now.

So CAN you get away with DIY product images? Maybe. SHOULD you? Not if you want this to be EASY.

Looking for a pro to take your product photos to the next level?

So – is it time for you to invest in professional product photos for your product-based business? Are you ready to take the trial-and-error out of your current product photo process? Or… to make sure your products are highlighted effortlessly, while appealing to your target people?

If the answers to any of those are “yes,” it’s time for us to talk. Jessica Strobel Photography would love to create a package of product photos that do real work for your business, from the moment you click “post”! No matter where those images are going.

Bonus: Take a look at just a few results that my AMAZING team of collaborators and me have gotten for our social media management clients!