Corporate & Business Headshots

Your business headshots are the cornerstone of your digital identity…

Demonstrate confidence, approachability, and competence. 

Headshots are an essential element of your branding, whether you're a business or an individual. It should be reflective of your capabilities, your achievements, your values - your excellence!

WHY UPDATE BUSINESS HEADSHOTS?

Just like clothing styles change, headshot photography styles change. A look that was popular years ago is likely no longer so. Today's higher end professional business photography headshots are "cleaner", with an emphasis on expression and lighting that guides the viewer's eye towards the primary areas of the eyes and mouth, where confidence and approachability respectively are conveyed. 

Whether your company is looking to update corporate headshots for a new website, needs to update their “team” information and profiles, or are just looking to improve your online presence, consistent professional headshots is a representation of your brand, and will send the right message to prospective clients and employees. Barry Braunstein Photography will work with your organization to create the best look that amplifies your brand, showing your team’s confidence and competence

CORPORATE HEADSHOTS FOR REMOTE EMPLOYEES

Achieving Consistent Headshots for Remote Employees

As businesses have embraced remote employees, it can be challenging to have a consistent look for those employee headshots. Some have created a set of specifications for the lighting, how they should be positioned, camera angle, type/color of background, etc.. Unfortunately, this approach can yield mixed results at best for many technical reasons, as well as the fact that different photographers have different processes/styles.

To address this problem, clients should specify their requirements for headshots for these remote employees as part of their requirements/RFQ’s when choosing their “home office” photographer (eg, where most of the employees reside). They can then evaluate the photographer’s responses to determine which solution best suits their needs. 

For example, I have a world-wide network of top tier headshot photographers who have implemented a very similar process of lighting, composition, etc.. – I’ve used this network along with my process to create consistent headshots with several photographers contributing to the effort. The image below used 4 different photographers, including me. Other approaches can utilize live remote collaboration tools, allowing for instantaneous review, feedback and adjustments during a headshot session.

Identifying your needs up front and choosing your headshot photographer that has the best solution for your needs will yield better results that are more easily scalable and consistent.

IS YOUR BUSINESS ON LINKEDIN?

Businesses that post articles often encourage employees to share those articles with their networks, increasing the exposure of the article to a broader audience. Many businesses also encourage employees to publish their own content that supports the overall narrative, and brand, of your business. They often identify a handful of subject matter experts who will commit to posting content several times a month, whether it be original content or content curated from third-parties.

When an employee posts an article, their profile picture is visible at the top of the post, along with their title. Readers, when seeing an article of interest, often click through to the personal profile or LinkedIn Page to learn about the sender. The content published is attached to and becomes a part of the employee’s LinkedIn profile, positioning them as an expert and thought leader. As these posts have the potential to be distributed to a wide audience, the entire project should be treated as an advertising campaign, with particular attention paid to the quality and substance of the content, and the overall look, messaging, and branding.

This is why many companies who have employees posting articles ensure that those employees’ LinkedIn profile is professionally written and include a professionally done headshot, the latter that is consistent with the look of headshots posted on the company’s website. The overall look should be reflective of your brand, and be designed to send the right message to prospective viewers. Providing those employees with a professionally done headshot for their LinkedIn profile is also used as a perk by many employers.

Read more about LinkedIn Headshots & Brand Amplification thru Employee Posts on LinkedIn

CORPORATE/BUSINESS PORTRAIT OR HEADSHOT?

Not sure if you are looking for business portrait photography or business headshots? If so, let's first start with some definitions:

Headshots:

 A headshot is a particular type of portrait – the crop shows the head and shoulders, with the bottom crop at chest level. The focus is the person – and the expression/lighting is key. Used for websites, LinkedIn profiles, bios, headshots work well in most situations, and particularly well where the size of the image is relatively small, such as a LinkedIn profile.

Portraits: 

Portraits show more of the body, with crops ranging from full body to a crop at the torso. Additional consideration is often given to the background, pose, placement of hands, potential props, etc. as those are now part of the frame. The size of the image should be large enough so the viewer can still see the details of the subject’s face and expression.

So which should you use? No rules – both can convey/elicit emotion, but portraits can tell more of a story. Headshots are often used in the about section of a website, and while portraits might be used in social media, blog posts, brochures, or other website pages. You would also use portraits if you had multiple people in the photo.

For portraits, body language, pose, expression, and lighting should play well together and are consistent with your branding. To convey power, arms folded with a bit of a serious expression would work well. Similarly, to convey an open, energetic, friendly brand, a more casual pose, clothing, and energetic/friendly expression would work well.

An Approach for Achieving High Quality, Consistent Headshots That You/Your Staff Will Love!

Creating consistent, high quality headshots for your staff can be challenging – many have never liked the way they look in photographs or are uncomfortable having their picture taken, coordinating schedules can be challenging, particularly if you have employees who are out of state. And often you don’t have an opportunity to review the images until well after they are taken.

To address these issues, I’ve developed a process/approach for both on-location and in-studio sessions that simply works. Key elements include:

• Pre-session consultation to define the overall look that will be consistent with your branding

• Preparing all participants for the session

• Expert lighting that is specifically designed to help everyone look their best and support the overall branding

• Live review of images with each participant as each session progresses – we know at the end of each session we have some images we like!

• Optional live remote viewing of images - you can see the results LIVE as the session progresses

• Expression coaching – helping each person look their best and capturing the best look for them

• Expert retouching

• Unlimited usage rights for final images

• Files delivered in multiple crops (including LinkedIn optimized)

• Flexible scheduling options - on location or in-studio

• Process for remote employees that yields consistent results

HEADSHOTS & BRANDING