Every successful business owner is aware that buyers consider visuals first.
And they know that making a good first impression with product images is essential to boost sales.
To achieve so, they deploy photography techniques, technical optimizations, and eCommerce image retouching for the best results.
If you want to know how successful businesses do it for more sales.
Throughout the article, we discuss the 10 best practices you must include in your next to-do list.
1. Work out on perfect product photography
Planning and preparing before photo shooting your product picture can save you from many hassles.
It is important to decide what types of photography will suit your products for optimum results.
Your store may have multiple products. Different type of photography works best for different products.
For example, taking an individual shot is helpful if you sell a single product.
However, group photography can perfectly serve that purpose if you sell multiple items together in a combo.
And you can choose lifestyle photography that tells your customer how they can use that product in their life.
This type of photography easily attracts people and can motivate them to buy it.
2. Use high-quality product images
Before purchasing something, people want to see what this product looks like in real life.
If they cannot zoom in to see properly, it is a big turnoff for them.
Another important thing to note is that,
67% of consumers value clear, detailed images over product information, full descriptions, and customer ratings.
So using just high-resolution images is not good enough. It also has to be clear and detailed.
Even if your raw photo has excellent pixel density, it may still have many issues, including:
- Lack of sharpness and clarity.
- Issues with color and saturation.
- Brightness and contrast problem.
- Unwanted objects in the photo.
- Scratches, dust, spots.
Thus, you must ensure that your product picture is high resolution, clear, and detailed and looks crisp on any screen size.
Some business owners utilize free tools to correct these issues and optimize product pictures.
Which often results in unrealistic and unprofessional-looking photos.
In these cases, using professional eCommerce photo editing services is your best bet.
3. Choose a suitable backdrop
In most cases, the product image is the first thing customers see.
And you already know they prefer clear and realistic images. So, Using backdrop colors that help your product appear natural and distraction-free is important.
In general, Using plain white or colors like pink, yellow, and other light colors backdrop works well. These colors help to show consumers the actual color and don’t draw attention away from the product.
4. Use realistic product images
The reason for 22% of product returns is that products appear differently in person than they do in the images.
So it is crucial to use high-quality photos that accurately depict the product. This will help build trust in your buyer’s mind and reduce the return rate.
Your product picture should truly represent how it actually looks in real life.
So don’t apply filters on product images even if it makes your product look better. Since filters often alter the image to a great extent.
Also, avoid using raw photos as your product images. Because often, they don’t look realistic due to common issues mentioned earlier in the article.
5. Ensure appealing images
We all know that the eCommerce marketplace is highly competitive.
It is possible that what you are selling (or similar products) is being sold by other sellers.
In these scenarios, ensuring your product stands out from the crowd is crucial.
Therefore, try to create appealing images through different techniques.
For example, you can use shadows, reflections, highlighting essential features, close-ups of the item, and different angles to make your product images pop.
6. Guide your audiences
Before buying, customers prefer to see the product from multiple perspectives and contexts.
Thus, using a range of images of the same product that facilitates doing that is very important.
Utilize your product images to demonstrate where your product can be used and how to use it.
When possible, illustrate the situation or context in which your buyers will use the item.
Another useful thing you can do is, describe how to use your product in a series of steps using images.
This will help customers understand how they can use and benefit from it.
7. Opt for a 360-degree product showcase
Many people don’t want to buy from an eCommerce store just because they can’t touch/feel/view the product.
So if you want them to buy from you, then opting for 360-degree images will be a wise choice.
It will give your customers a real-life-like feel when buying your product.
And they will be able to see your product from different angles.
As a result, it can significantly boost sales.
8. Put GIFs on the checklist
If you think it is not convenient to use 360-degree images yet, then you may opt for GIFs!
The good thing about GIFs is that they will not cost you much money and are easy to make.
You can take multiple photos of your product from different angles and combine a few in a single GIF image.
Or you can use a high-quality video of your product and use a few seconds of it to make a great animated GIF.
9. Optimize for different platforms and devices
Although many people use different types of devices when ordering online.
More users are accessing the web from a tablet or smartphone than from a desktop.
And nowadays,
79% of customers order online through their mobile devices
So you have to use images that can render well not only on desktop but also on mobile devices.
However, if you want to showcase your products on a social media platform like Instagram/Pinterest, it is better to use lifestyle product photography.
10. Optimize images for SEO
It is necessary to ensure that your product photos are optimized for SEO.
To do that, here are a few things you can consider:
- Include your product title in the image file name.
- Use hyphens between words.
- Avoid using a shortened form of a word/phrase in the filename.
Another important thing to do is optimize the image’s alt tags for SEO.
To do that, The product title, keywords, and maybe the business name should be added here.
This way Google and search engines can easily understand the product images and possibilities are the images will get ranked for relevant search queries in Google and other search engines’ image searches.
However, avoid using hyphens there; use space instead.
Final thoughts
Consumers frequently rely on product images when purchasing online.
So you must plan and prepare before the product photo shoot, choose a proper backdrop, employ different photography techniques and formats, and correct image problems.
Also, Optimize your images for SEO, different devices, and platforms.
Applying these practical tips will eventually boost your sales and help you to take your business success to the next level.
If you need support to fix any issues with your images or want to retouch them.
In this case, consider trying our eCommerce image editing services for great results.
