Visual Marketing with Stock Photos

A successful visual marketing incorporates images that sell and convert. The right kind of cheap stock photography is the difference between effective social media graphics and ads, and those with minimal to no effect. Images, depending on how you handle them, can attract or turn your customers away. They have become important elements of marketing. That’s why you need to learn a few tips and tricks to find the perfect cheap stock photos.

Here are some tips to help you turn your eyes to stock photo cheap pros:

  • Cheap stock images are a valuable investment. Do not compromise the quality of your images. Stay away from pixelated, low quality ones because users won’t click grainy images. Make sure that they are clean, crisp have good resolution, and in focus. Keep in mind that high quality images gives your message more power.
  • Your images should express the message of your ad. Choose an image that lends well to your message. It should possess enough power represent your message or act as an accent. Show a visual representation of your message so your readers will understand you – even without reading your message.
  • Your target audience should see themselves in your design. When choosing cheap stock photos (check some agencies here) for visual marketing, picture the people you want to reach. Put them in situations that they can relate to and try to make feel real.
  • Include people in your photos to evoke strong emotions. As you know, humans are emotional creatures. To connect with people, you need to portray emotion that they would feel for your brand. If people feel something for your brand, they will have a stronger connection.
  • Use hashtags and popular search terms. You also need to optimize your cheap stock images for search. When you optimize your images, you can create more traffic to your website. Think about the search terms you frequently use and determine how you can apply them to your optimization.
  • Make use of Instagram. Yes, the image-based website can be your marketing campaign best friend. You do not need to always post pictures of your products. You can also use cheap stock photos that fit with your overall theme.
  • Never use the image for the sake of using an image. When choosing cheap stock photos, always have a purpose – especially if you are using generic photos. People can smell them from miles away. However, if they are used with the right adjustment and imaging, they can be really useful.

There are many other useful tips in using stock photos cheap to creative an effective visual marketing. We are happy to share them with you. Watch out for our next blog to learn more about the use of images in enhancing your visual marketing.

“Indemnification” and Cheap Stock Photos

Investing in cheap stock photos is about more than just getting a great deal for high quality images to boost your marketing efforts.  For many users, cheap stock photos are a flexible tool to help reach advertising goals on a budget, help spruce up boring looking websites, and help add graphical “flair” to all elements of a business.  But they are also a tool in a legal sense, and understanding their full value means understanding some of the ways that cheap stock photography is about more than just a great price.  Read on, and we will explain the concept of “indemnification,” why you should care, and what it all means for your relationship with cheap stock imagery.

What is “Indemnification?”

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Indemnification is a long and daunting legal term.  But it isn’t one that you should leave to your legal team to figure out, as it has a lot to do with investing in your business and running your business the right way.  To “indemnify” something is to protect it against loss, or the future risk of loss.  When you purchase insurance for your business, you are making an investment based on indemnification.  You indemnify your business by paying out of pocket today to avoid suffering a bigger loss tomorrow.

And when you understand some of the legality of image use, purchasing stock photography is another great example of indemnification.  When you pay to use cheap stock images, you aren’t just paying to get some snazzy graphical content today; you are paying to protect your business from a potential huge loss in the future.  Here’s how come.

Image Licensing 101

Image Licensing

We talk about this here on stock photo secrets often, but it’s so important that it’s worth revisiting.  Every image that has ever been taken is actually the intellectual property of the artist who took it, and unless they explicitly sign away their right to that image, it means they own it as creative and intellectual property.  Those laws exist to protect artists, but they have a powerful effect on your business too.  If you just grab a photo off of the internet and hope to use it for your business needs, you are actually breaking the law by violating the intellectual property of the photographer who took that image, unless you can get their permission for your use.

And if you ignore that law completely and use all images pulled off of Google images or other places on the web you might get away with it for a while.  But if your business grows and you start getting more visibility, the chances of you getting caught go up and up.  Plus, there are a lot of digital technologies that exist to help professional photographers learn when people are using their work without permission.  And all it takes is one person finding out you are using their imagery without licensure for you to be in big trouble.

If a photographer does find out you are using your imagery, they can immediately take you to court and sue you for damages commensurate with their work.  Especially since you would be using their imagery for commercial purposes, meaning you in some way profit from another artist’s imagery, a court is almost guaranteed to find in favour of the artist.  Meaning you will have to pay them for using their imagery retroactively, as well as pay for legal fees and the time lost.  So what’s the solution?  Indemnification, and cheap stock photos.

Cheap Stock Photos are Legal Insurance

buy cheap stock photos

Every cheap stock photo in every library from every major stock photography vendor has been cleared for commercial use by the artist who took it.  When you pay for a cheap stock photo, that’s really what you are paying for.  Yes, you get the immediate value of high quality, high definition imagery.  You get a huge library of images you can search, and use as needed.  And you get great deals for just about any imagery you can find, which will save you thousands over hiring your own photographer.  But you also stay on the right side of the law. and indemnify yourself, insuring against future legal issues.

For these reasons, think of cheap stock photography as an investment.  Just like insurance, the money that you pay out of pocket today will be protecting you against losses in the future.  But in this case, you are making a purchase based on indemnification to protect yourself against future legal fees and fines.  Anyone who has been to court can tell you that those types of fees get out of hand quickly, and the fee you will have to pay an artist for using their image without permission will be a lot higher than what you could spend on a cheap stock photo.  So indemnify yourself, and pay now instead of later!