A picture is worth a thousand words. If you are successful at communicating the values of your brand through product photography, then descriptions and long worded feature lists become obsolete. Show don't tell, is one of the first things students are told in art school. This is something all retailers should be doing with their product photography. Don't overlook the power of great product presentation, because no matter how incredible everything else you have is, your customers came to your site to see those products and to buy them from you. Don't let them down. 

It's very common to want to spend a ton of budget on big, beautiful lifestyle images. These are integral to create an aura of the lifestyle, but are in the end, only reinforcers to the products themselves. They show someone wearing your clothing walking down a beautiful beach, or sitting at a luxury table sporting that elegant wrist watch. This is all great stuff, but it's important to remember that your brand exists to have these products go out into the world. It is an injustice to your brand to focus so much effort on lifestyle assets to get people to visit your site, but then overlook such a critical aspect. The products themselves. Your products are what people will eventually take with them, share with their friends, and be proud of. In online shopping we don't have the luxury of allowing someone to directly interact with a product. They can't feel it's weight, they can't touch the material's texture, and thus its difficult to create that inner connection of discovery that gives you the feeling that, "I cannot live another day without this.".

This is a nice product shot, but it doesn't do much to show off the true character of the product, or the ideals of the brand.

Allow your product photography to embody a concept and to touch the heart of your customers. Let it pair with all those amazing lifestyle images you shot. This is crucial. It holds everything together and defines your products as beautiful brand assets and marketing tools. Showing what matters most to the customers, in the most efficient way possible is a no brainer to get those conversion rates up and increase brand following. This is incredibly valuable to retailers hitting social media. A beautiful product image that carries brand concepts effortlessly is a powerful tool when it's getting shared around Facebook.

Pairing the product photography to your brand assets in a simple way creates an elegant and unique presence. 

When we designed AnyiLu.com, the client knew from the start that they had to be differentiated. It was such a pleasure to work with a very forward thinking client team who was open to new ideas, and this led us to some amazing results. It was very important to the Anyi Lu team that their shoes be portrayed in a very elegant and clean manner while showing the quality of materials used, the amazing craftsmanship, that they are light weight, and that you can be active in them. Now we can go through inspiration folders and look at different lighting techniques, but the fact of the matter is that the shoe will be shot on a table and will be grounded. So we may have solved 2 issues of showing material and craftsmanship, but light weight and comfortable while in action, now that's a challenge. 

"What if the shoes were just floating? And we had some different views showing all parts of the shoe, like it was moving in 3D space a bit?"

This idea was a home run. The products themselves, without any other design on the page, look beautiful and intriguing. They show a concept and it is instantly understood with a guttural feeling what these shoes are all about. By letting this decision come before any set-in-stone designs, we allowed ourselves to work product photography directly into the concept and architecture of the site, using creative tactics to reinforce this idea of floating, weightlessness and 3D space. This created a unified and unique shopping experience that people just love. They love to share it with their friends, but most importantly, they feel comfortable buying from it. 

If you want your customers to trust you, fall in love with your products, and share them with everyone they know, don't skimp out when it comes to product photography. It is one of the strongest tools you can have when selling online.