Stock images can be very useful - especially for start up businesses. But if you're using stock images - beware.
Stock images are available at a wide variety of prices. Your design company will probably have a large collection that are available for your use at no charge. There are also some very inexpensive stock images available from many websites, with prices starting as low as $5 per low-resolution image.
From there on, the sky's the limit and you can spend tens of thousands of dollars on rights-managed images for your project.
Stock images are a way to avoid the cost of employing a professional photographer to shoot your premises and your food. In addition, stock images come with signed model releases.
But there are drawbacks.
1. We recently created an ad for a wine and food festival using a stock image. Of course, there is a finite number of images available and we found that another event had used the same image. Yes, coincidence, but it will happen. Remember, no-one has exclusive right to stock images; you will see them elsewhere.
2. Beware of showing food stock images, such as the one above. Show a grilled salmon stock image in your ads or on your website and your patrons will expect to be served exactly that dish.
3. Many years ago, a client chose a medium-priced stock image for the masthead of their website. A few days after launch, I was in Office Depot and saw that same image on box after box of printer paper.
4. If you choose a stock image of a person, you'd better hope that he or she is never involved in any kind of scandal! Imagine that you chose an attractive blonde as a signature image and that she is suddenly plastered all over the National Inquirer. This is not the image you want to project!
5. Because stock images are available to all, there's nothing to stop a rival establishment using the same images as you.
Beware - and ask your design company for their advice.
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