Sarah from Hannibal-White Photography talks to us about representing our businesses online with the right imagery. The way in which you represent yourself visually can have an incredible impact on the way you are perceived as a business.

Consideration

If you started your business over 15 years ago you probably didn’t have ‘set up a Facebook page’ on your to do list. Neither was it at the forefront of your mind to ‘secure an Instagram handle’, or schedule ‘daily tweets’. It is also highly improbable that you spent your day snapping away photographing everything from what you had for breakfast, to setting up behind the scenes for the day or that you went to bed dreaming up your 30 hashtags….

Anyone taking the leap to start their own business will quickly learn how much time you have to pour into aspects of the job you didn’t even know existed. The dedication and commitment to it arises from your inner passion and feeds into all aspects of your brand.

Whether you love it, hate it, or are yet to embrace it, social media has quickly evolved and platforms such as Facebook and Instagram are now responsible for a large percentage of your marketing and advertising and can be a fabulous, free way to promote your business.

Facebook boasts 2 billion monthly users while Instagram has the highest audience engagement rates with 500 million monthly users.

So why is this important? What do you need to know about successful social media accounts?

Competition

While some larger companies are lucky enough to outsource their social media, some of us just aren’t that fortunate! So we spend time taking pictures on our phones, wondering what interesting content we should post, agonising over forgetting to take pictures, not knowing what our audience might find ‘interesting’, wondering if any of your posts will be of interest to anyone, all while juggling the actual business you are trying to run!

The recommendation for posting to ensure engagement, shares and traffic can be as many as 1 post a day for Facebook and 1-2 posts a day for Instagram… that’s a lot of images and a lot of time that we don’t necessarily have so it can be easy to convince ourselves that our social media channels don’t matter all that much, but they most definitely do and they need to be nurtured and embraced each day.

The dream would be to grow your business so that you can afford to outsource the work to a freelance social media manager. If you are already in this position, we highly recommend Sociable Suzy!

In the meantime, have you thought about a way in which you could take the pressure off of an element of your social media, namely your photography! Having a bank of professional images you can use on social media can make an incredible difference to your brand, and they may be easier to gather than you think.

The way in which you represent yourself visually can have an incredible impact on the way you are perceived as a business and since Facebook and Instagram could be the primary way in which your customers are finding you, it’s important to stand out, be up there with the best, and show yourself as the professional you are.

Through thoughtful relationships, Hannibal-White Photography has worked towards collaborations with local small businesses to provide an opportunity for sole traders, new businesses start-ups and established franchises to provide this photography opportunity as well as a unique selling point for their customers and clients.

As an action and event photographer for families, the service I provide to leaders of baby classes, toddler groups, parent and child sessions, local children’s services and infant classes allows moments to be captured which demonstrates the true essence of the brand and all aspects of it’s intended goals.

Whether 1 image is used on a flyer, or 4 images are used on a banner, or perhaps a series of images are used to build an Instagram grid, they are investments in your hard work and an opportunity to show yourself at your very best.

One of our original and existing partnerships is with Catherine from Tactile Tots, who has had first hand experience of the impact of advertising the addition of a professional photographer in her classes, and the use of photography on her social media pages. Catherine now shares with us the impact of professional photography on her business.

Sarah Hannibal-White – Hannibal-White Photography

Collaboration

Social media has been absolutely key to my business and it has proved to be the greatest investment I needed to make in order to get word out about my baby massage business.

At the beginning of my Tactile Tots journey I contacted Sarah to ask her to share my website on her very active Facebook page and so started a journey of partnership and collaboration which has proven to be very positive for us both.

Whilst, I admit at first, I only wanted Sarah to come to my classes in order to populate my website with a range of photos and replace the stock images I had started out with, I quickly began to realise how valuable having fresh images for your social media accounts is. People are far more likely to engage with visual content and 75% more likely to remember you.

The engagement I have noted from the professional images used proves the impact these images have had on my classes and I am so grateful that I have the option to drive my business forward in this way through our collaboration – plus it takes the pressure off of me having to be teacher and photographer at the same time!

I also quickly realised having Sarah come to my classes gave me a USP, as far as I’m aware no other local, baby massage courses have this opportunity. Sarah attends the final session of each of my five week courses and photographs the full infant massage interactions between parent and baby. I am able to advertise this and make the community aware of the opportunity through my marketing, allowing the uniqueness to be an great attraction for my clients.

When I began teaching I noticed how many gorgeous interactions I was privileged to observe from my viewpoint and how parents would never get the chance to see this, so Sarah’s work became even more precious in both my eyes and theirs.

Infant massage is intimate, calm and parents need to be ‘in the moment’ to appreciate and enjoy it. Sarah moves silently around the class and her non-intrusive manner allows the session to continue without interruption, with most parents admitting to forgetting she is there!

So, our partnership has grown and it benefits everyone involved. The parents attending my courses get beautiful photos of their babies, I get photos to use in promotion and Sarah gets to showcase her talents and secure future business. What’s not to love?

Catherine Defty – Tactile Tots

If you are interested in Sarah’s services for your business, please contact her directly on hannibalwhitephotography@gmail.com

With thanks to: ABC Concerts, Jiggy Wrigglers Winchester, Baby Sensory Winchester, Busylizzy Winchester and Tactile Tots

Using the right images to represent your business sucessfully

Sarah from Hannibal-White Photography talks to us about representing our businesses online with the right imagery. The way in which you represent yourself visually can have an incredible impact on the way you are perceived as a business.