10 Website Brand Photo Shoot Tips to Share With Your Photographer for a Service-Based Business (+ Free Photographer Checklist)
- Emily Brown
- 2 days ago
- 4 min read
If you’re a small business owner with a website, there’s a good chance you started with stock photos when you launched and there’s nothing wrong with that. But there comes a point when your business outgrows them.
You can have great copy, a polished design, and a strong offer, but if the photos on your website could belong to any business in your industry, you’re missing an opportunity to show people what makes yours different.
Once your business has gained some momentum, investing in a professional branding photo shoot can give you a library of high-quality images to use across all of your marketing:
Your website — headers, service pages, about page, testimonials
Social media — posts, stories, reels covers, profile and banner images
Email marketing — newsletters, welcome sequences, promotional campaigns
Google Business Profile — the photos that show up when people search your business
Printed materials — brochures, business cards, signage
This guide was created from the lens of a website designer to help you plan your brand shoot so that you and your photographer know what types of images will work best across your website.
What to share with your photographer
Shoot mostly horizontal (landscape) images
This is the number one recommendation from a website design perspective. Website headers, banners, and larger image sections are what makes a website feel sleek, clean and modern and this requires the need for a large selection of horizontal photos. We are naturally used to taking vertical photos because of our phones and social media, but horizontal images will give your website designer more flexibility to crop, position, and use your photos across different areas of your site.
Shoot wide, not tight
Ask your photographer to keep the subject to roughly a third of the frame rather than filling the image edge to edge. The extra space around the subject gives your website designer more flexibility to add text, adjust the crop for different sections, and optimize the image for desktop and mobile.
Images can always be cropped tighter within the website design software, but space that was cropped out during the photo shoot cannot be added back in. Starting with a wider shot gives your designer more options.
Keep things natural
Aim for natural, candid photos with a limited number of traditional posed shots. For group photos, avoid stiff lineups with everyone standing shoulder-to-shoulder and facing the camera. Instead, have your photographer capture people mid-conversation, walking together, working, or genuinely interacting. These images tend to feel more authentic and give your website a more approachable, modern look.
Individual Headshots
Get a clean, individual headshot for you and everyone on your team, using a consistent background and lighting setup. Consistency matters because then you can easily add, swap, or update team photos later without a whole new shoot, and your "meet the team" page will look cohesive even if it's updated over time. Headshots can be used on a website in a variety of ways whether they are on an About page or the author photo for your blog.
Include a handful of close-ups for variety.
It is good to have a few detail shots, hands at work, a genuine expression, a product close-up add warmth and texture to a website. These type of shots can work well as backgrounds or when layering other images and text to add depth to your website.
Action / In-Service Shots
Capture your team actually doing the work you do, consultations, sessions, hands-on services, whatever represents your day-to-day. These "in action" images are some of the most valuable on your entire site because they show, rather than tell, what it's like to work with you. It is recommended to have signed model releases for anyone photographed, especially clients or patients.
Environment and Space Shots
Capture both the interior and exterior of your space, including the details that make it distinctly yours signage, artwork, plants, textures, workspaces, and other recognizable features. These photos help give potential customers a sense of your business and make your website feel more personal and connected to the actual experience of working with or visiting you.
Capture photos with negative space
Ask your photographer to take a few photos with open, uncluttered space around or beside the subject. This gives your website designer room to place headlines, buttons, or other text directly over the image without covering the most important parts of the photo.
Share your website, social media, and existing branding
Give your photographer links to your website and social media accounts, along with your brand colors, logo, and other marketing materials. Seeing how your brand already looks and feels helps them make decisions about settings, backgrounds, props, and compositions that will complement your existing marketing and give you photos you can use across different platforms.
Create a mood board
Give your photographer a visual reference for the direction you have in mind. Create a Pinterest board, put together a mood board in Canva, or simply share a collection of images you like. Include examples of lighting, poses, settings, colors, and overall style to help communicate the look and feel you want more clearly than words alone.
Make It Easy on Shoot Day
The best branding photo shoots happen when everyone you, your team, and your photographer walks in already on the same page. That means sharing your shot list, your composition preferences, your branding and preferences before the camera comes out.
Get the Free Photographer Website Checklist for Service Based Business
These tips have been consolidated into a simple, printable checklist you can hand off (or email) to your photographer before your branding shoot with bonus recommendations on how you can best prepare.
Print it, email it to your photographer, or bring it with you on shoot day.
Interested in learning more about how professional brand photos can be incorporated into your website? New clients can schedule a complimentary 15-minute consultation, while existing clients can book an individual session or use time from a support plan to review their website and plan how to make the most of their brand photography.
