What is Personal Brand Photography?

Personal brand photography is quite a new concept but it is distinctly different from other styles of photography and is ideal for the web entrepreneur to promote their brand image

WHAT IS PERSONAL BRAND PHOTOGRAPHY?

Personal brand photography is a service designed to produce photographs of you and photographs representing your brand, which you can use on your website and on social media such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. These will be styled, coordinated and shot to specifically represent your brand. This is much more than a portraiture service, or which a headshot or commercial photographer is aiming to produce, as it is specifically geared to reflect your brand and your brand image. These photos, and personalised graphics, will far better represent you than the rather random collection of images, or completely generic stock images, which most businesses have on their website and social media feeds which makes them all look the same. The world is now full of photographers, everyone has a camera on their phone, however, understanding how to take and use photographs to portray your personal brand is a special skill that requires an understanding of photography, social media and personal branding all combined together.

WHY WOULD I WANT A PERSONAL BRAND PHOTOGRAPHER?

Hiring a personal brand photographer can free you from the constraint of not having good on-brand photographs to use on your social media posts, such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Having a stock of personal brand photos you can use to illustrate your posts makes posting so much easier, more professional and less of a chore. Your posts also convey your brand identity in a way that you have under your own control. You can hire a personal brand photographer for a single shoot, but the real power lies in having them on a retainer so that you have someone to work with to produce a constant supply of fresh images for you to use. Someone you know and who knows and understands your business and can keep you up to date with social media trends.

WHO IS PERSONAL BRAND PHOTOGRAPHY FOR?

Personal brand photography is for entrepreneurs and influencers who do not have the time or expertise to shoot their own brand images or prepare them in the correct format to use on their social media and website. One danger for entrepreneurs like this is that they muddle through and use random images from different sources so that their brand image suffers, and ends up looking like so many other businesses, rather than having a distinct brand identity to reflect the owner's personality.

Even entrepreneurs who are skilled at photography will need personal brand images of themselves as selfies can not express the full personality of the entrepreneur as well as carefully taken images can.

RESOURCES

• Personal Branding. The What, Why, How and Who by Dr Natalia Wiechowski (LinkedIn)

• 5 Pictures You Need for Your Social Media Channels by Dr Natalia Wiechowski (LinkedIn)

• What is a Brand Portrait? by Jemima Willcox