Expert Interview Series: The importance of branding & professional photos

Sarah Giffrow is the Creative Director and Benevolent Overlord of Upswept Creative, a small-but-fierce branding and web studio that builds strong, smart, beautiful brands for independent businesses.

Sarah sat down with us to discuss the importance of branding in today's marketplace as well as the advantages of incorporating professionally-produced photos into a company's website.

Tell us a bit about your background. Why did you choose to start a branding design company?

Upswept Creative came about from my desire to help people do what they do best and grow and be fulfilled by their business dreams. I get pretty easily excited about the work people are passionate about doing and the care, knowledge, and craftsmanship that goes into it. It's honestly heartbreaking to find something that's beautifully made, or to experience a service that makes a real difference, and see how much that person or business isn't doing to communicate that.

Powerful branding is important, but it shouldn't stand between your viewers
and what they're searching for on your website. 

Effective branding has always been important for companies and organizations. But why is it even more essential today?

At Upswept, we spend a lot of our time on web design and online presence, and nothing has driven home the importance of branding more than seeing how the web has evolved. People can now get information on demand with smartphones, and we can find basically anything we're curious about with a quick web search. Attention spans are short, and we have so few seconds to make an impression, so it's super-important to have a good handle on your branding. An effective brand is only going to help you make that impression - and make it one that sticks with the customers.

When it comes to websites, how do you balance powerful and distinctive branding with user-friendly web design and an uncomplicated web experience?

I like to approach websites from a very goal-oriented mindset. Powerful branding is important, but it shouldn't stand between the viewer and what they're searching for. It's important to think about what you want that website visitor to do next once they've landed on your site. Having a goal in mind - such as getting more e-mail signups, or selling new products - keeps me focused on making sure the important stuff is accessible and approachable. And it also gives me some great opportunities to add variation and pop to a website design.

Is it possible to create a well-constructed brand that doesn't appeal to your customer base? How do you avoid this?

It's absolutely possible! I've definitely seen branding that's off-putting to me, even when the product is something I'd find useful or interesting. It's important to know who you're talking to when you're beginning to craft your brand, and I like to go beyond the demographics and the numbers. Your brand can flourish when you really try to get into the audience's head: How do they feel? What are they struggling with? How can this business or product help make their life better?

Narrowing it down to a specific niche can help you create a more powerful message, too. When you try to attract too many people, you can easily fail to attract anyone - or lose out on attracting the people you really want to connect with.

If someone were to say to you, "I don't need professional photography for my website. I can just rely on stock photos and images," how would you respond?

I'm an experienced photographer on top of being a design professional, so I can go on for hours (and I have) about stock photography and how uninspiring it is to any customer! I believe that stock photography weakens a lot of brands. They tend to look cheesy and lack authenticity, and you have no way of knowing how many other businesses are using the exact same photo. It's a one-way ticket to brand confusion.

Stock photography often has a very generic, inauthentic "look" to it, and that's for good reason: the stock photographer wants to create a photo that a lot of different people can use so they can sell it more often. But a generic photo can't tell your brand's story the way having your own professional photo session does. When you have your own professional photo shoot, you can tailor it to your story, your audience, and your message, and you're guaranteed that nobody else will have images like yours.

How can you utilize high-quality graphics and photography to help improve a brand and generate more sales leads?

You can communicate so much with a photo or with the right colors and graphics. A picture is worth 1000 words, right? High-quality design and photography give you the opportunity to create an experience that's welcoming and memorable and that doesn't feel sales-y. Using your photography and graphical style consistently across all of your marketing will help your brand stick in your customer's mind, so they'll think of you first when they're ready to buy.

Name one thing that a business or organization can do to their website this week to help them improve their inbound marketing.

Look at the home page of your website with a goal in mind: what does your business need? Think about where you want your business to go next, how you want to grow, and who you want to reach, and then ask yourself: is your website experience helping you get there?

How do you measure the success of a branding campaign?

It depends quite a bit on what the goal is. I like to go into a branding or web project with specific goals in mind, and those tend to vary from business to business. Having a measurable goal like increased web traffic, more e-mail list signups, or higher sales is incredibly useful. More than anything, though, if I've created a brand that is memorable, smart, and authentic, then I'm going to feel good about that.

Wondering how you can tie together your branding, content creation, advertising, social media and other marketing efforts into an effective campaign? Get your free copy of our B2B Guide to Inbound Marketing for more insight on developing your own comprehensive marketing plans.

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