Photos are a vital ingrediant in most websites because they act as a visual foil to all that text that tells visitors what you do. Getting your website images the right  size, resolution and style will give your website a professional look. Here is the Create Design Studio guide to using photographs on your website.

The techy part
The web doesn’t need the same resolution for your photographs as you need in order to get good printed photographs. Using some photo editing software change the resolution of your photos to 72dpi and save a copy of them so your original file remains untouched.

The web also uses RGB colour, not CMYK as printers do, check your photograph is in RGB colour using your photo software.

Size your photos to fit the space available on the webpage, big photos take longer to download (worth considering if your customers are unlikely to have broadband, work on a shared connection in an office or are viewing the site on a mobile device) and getting your photos to fit snugly alongside your text makes the page look more considered and professional in design. You’ll use pixels rather than centimetres or inches to size photos for your web pages. as a rough guide most web pages will be from 900-1200 pixels across and considering you’ll want to have text to fit in then you may want to aim for  300-600 pixels in width for your photos.

Representing yourself and your business in photographs
Whether you want to have a picture of yourself on the site or not depends on how useful you think it will be to be recognised by customers or site visitors. If you are self-employed and have a personalised business it might be part of your branding to feature your photo on your website and on your other marketing materials.

Feature your office or premises on your website to help customers recognise it when they visit. If you work in a prestigious building or character office showing it on your website can help give visitors an idea of the personality of your business.

If you have company branded vehicles these may also feature on your website and will help customers recognise your employees when they are out delivering or providing services. Your vans can also feature your website address so they can help new customers to find you online.

Product photographs
If you sell products then photographs of what you stock are vital to help sell them online. Make sure these photographs are on a white or black background to isolate them where possible and make sure they are clear and sharp. Include thumbnail sized versions as well as larger ones so that visitors can see details of each product. If it isn’t clear from the photograph what size the item is try including a scale to help visitors see the size of their product. Some products may also need to have more than one image to show different aspects of the item or how it is used. The more information the better where selling online is concerned because visitors cannot handle and explore the item as they would in a shop.

Creating a mood with photographs
It can be useful to use photographs a part of your website to illustrate what kind of company you are, what kind of customers you have or to visually explain an idea central to your business. These ‘mood and style’ photographs may form part of your corporate branding and reflect the personality of your business. It can be worth taking time to choose them carefully and try running them past a neutral third party to see if they spot anything that you don’t. These photographs can be sourced from online photography websites, although prices can vary widely, and consider buying a higher-resolution version just in case you want to use the image later on printed marketing materials.

Choosing a photographer
A professional photographer will give you great results and images that are sharp, well lit and well composed but they may cost more than using stock phtography or taking the photographs yourself. If you choose to take photographs yourself think about not just your subject but what appears in the background of each photo: plug sockets, piles of paperwork, rubbish, unattractive views and so on. Take some test photos and look at the light on your subject, is it flattering? It is possible to get useful photographs by taking them yourself but always be aware that without care you could be giving your business ‘amateur’ looking photographs that do it no favours.

Create Design Studio can help to source and implement photographs into your website and design them into printed marketing materials too.

Like this? Try this:

Create Design Studio’s Guide to the Essential Features for Any Website

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Making your website as effective as possible at helping visitors to find what they want  isn’t difficult, here are some points to consider. If they can find what they want then they are more likely to get in touch with you. Take a look at your website and see how many of our tips you have already implemented and if there are some others you could add to your pages.

Visible contact details
You can make life easier for visitors to your website by including your contact details on every page. This doesn’t take up much space and it makes certain that whatever page they land on (if they have found you via a search engine they may not necessarily land on your homepage) they can call or email you when they see the product or service they are interested in, or if they want to ask you a question. Contact details can be included at the top of each page, perhaps close to your logo to reinforce who they are calling. Also place your details at the bottom of the page in the footer so it doesn’t matter if your page scrolls when customers browse your website.

Place links to any social networking accounts that you control to allow customers to contact you in a way that suits them. Your customers may want to find out more about you than what appears on your website and making it easy for them to follow your day-to-day activities on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn can help to build their trust in your brand.

Where are you located?
Having a map and address listed for your office reassures web visitors because it shows them you have a real presence, not just a virtual one. It can also be highly relevant if they want to visit you or make a purchase that would need to be collected or courier dispatched as distance from your office could make or break their decision to buy. Your map could be quite a simple drawing representing local main roads and any significant landmarks or you could choose to use a mapping service like the one Google provides.

Your image
Having photographs of you, your staff and your premises helps people to recognise you, making you more ‘real’, and assists customers to find your premises. The photographs you use should be taken with care. Consider if you can see other company premises or signs, rubbish, dilapidated cars and vans that block the view of your building.  Take the photo on a day with reasonable weather and bear in mind a photo taken in sunshine creates a positive image. When taking photographs of people make sure that they appear professional and well-groomed and try to make sure the lighting used is flattering, natural daylight is often better than fluorescent strip lights. Also, what background will appear behind these people? Try to avoid also photographing plug sockets, untidy office interiors and mountains of unfiled paperwork.

Tips for finding stock photographs online.

When they do decide to make contact
Make sure you have a method for collecting contact requests that come in from your website and put someone in charge of responding. If there is a form on the website when customers part with their contact details in order to ask you a question or to request information they will expect a response in return for disclosing their contact information. The opportunity to make contact with a new customer and to make a good forst impression should not be missed.

Your company newsletter
Concentrate on writing your newsletter with the interests of your customers at the front of your mind if you want them to actually read it and recommend it to others. A newsletter full of sales messages and company news that is only of interest to your staff will not encourage customers to eagerly open the next edition when it arrives. It should also be well written and checked for spelling and grammatical errors before being sent. Don’t neglect to include you logo and contact details with your newsletter so customers can use it as a way to contact you if they want to.

Feedback and testimonials
Genuine testimonials on your website are helpful because they build up a useful picture of your services for other customers. Build up a collection of testimonials so that you can regularly change them on the website, have a process in place and put someone in charge of asking every customer if they would provide feedback.

Blog about your business
Like your newsletter, blog about issues that will interest your customers about your products and services and the hot topics in your industry sector. Show your customers that you are an expert in what you do by writing about it and help to build up customer confidence in your ability. A blog can also help your search engine rankings by providing updated content on a regular basis.

Read our Top 10 Blogging Tips

Review your website
Spend time reviewing the pages on your website and check that there are no unfinished pages or pages that could benefit from expanded information or better images to illustrate your products or services. Your customers may need more information before making a purchase and incomplete information and unfinished pages will not help you to win their business.

If you need help to review your website we offer a website MOT

Like this? Try these:

Top ten tips for your e-commerce website
Forget the technology, it’s all about sales and marketing
The unofficial ‘rules’ that make great web pages visitors want to read

Looking for new web design ideas?

Visit our web design gallery.

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