Product photography is crucial for all eCommerce stores regardless of what product you are selling. The fact that you are reading this proves you are aware of the significant role product photographs play in eCommerce marketplaces.
As the saying goes, product photography can either make or break your eCommerce sales. You risk losing customers if your product listing consists of poor product photography, like blurry images, lack of proper lighting, having cluttered or busy backgrounds.
Think about this - when did you last purchase a product online that had only the product description and no image? Or a blurry image you could hardly make out the product?
You want to make sure your audience makes an informed decision before buying from you, regardless of which marketplace you sell your product. Today, we dive deep into understanding how to make your product listing stand out on eBay through product photography and get more eyeballs to your listing.
Your product photography guides customers to purchase, builds trust, and strengthens brand identity. It can be overwhelming to ensure you are taking good product images while simultaneously meeting eBay’s image guidelines.
eBay, unlike most marketplaces, has stricter rules for product photographs on its platform. However, to simplify this for you, we have summed up everything you need to take care of during eBay’s production and post-production stages.
Following are the general eBay product photography rules.
The above are general eBay product photography rules to abide by. Besides this, eBay allows using stock images for new products listed, and if you are selling a pre-loved product, you need to photograph the product in its present condition. You can use a model here or photograph yourself in the outfit.
Since eBay allows you to add up to 12 images to your product listing. Ensure you make the most out of it. Take pictures of your product from different angles, and add close-up shots to get a better look at the product’s design and material.
If you are selling a product with a slight issue, capture that on camera. Keep your customers well-informed about the product. In the end, nothing should come as a surprise to your customers after they purchase from you.
You don’t need to be a professional photographer to take the best shots. Product photography for eBay requires you to know only a few tips and tricks up your sleeve. Let’s dive into learning how to photograph clothing for eBay!
Are you wondering which best DSLR brand you should invest in for your product photography? You should know that you can easily photograph clothing with an iPhone or a smartphone camera.
Product photography can be overwhelming, especially if you are new to it. However, as long as you have the basic photography equipment, you are good to go.
Following are the prerequisites you must have before beginning your shoot.
Regardless of your budget for the lighting setup, natural light will always give good product shots (the trick is to choose only the golden hours). For artificial lighting, invest in primary lighting gears before investing in the more expensive ones.
Without any further ado, let’s dive into the three best practices for taking product photos that will make you stand out from competitors on eBay.
If product photography were a piece of cake, big brands wouldn’t invest significant money in professional photography every year. This shows the demand there is for good product photography.
However, you don’t need a hefty budget to get started. A few simple tips can help you make the best of what you have.
First things first, you want to ensure your apparel looks presentable. An essential thing to do here is to dry clean your clothes and steam iron them to eliminate any folds, creases, etc. Your camera can capture minute details, especially if you are using a professional DSLR.
How you present your apparel is crucial in determining how your audience perceives the product. Your customers picture themselves wearing these clothes before making a purchase. Use a mannequin, a model, or a hanger to style and present your product well. Let’s dive into each of these options.
You will easily find mannequins on Amazon within the price range of $50 to $200. Mannequins help show the exact fit of the apparel. You can use mannequins to photograph blouses, dresses, and other clothing items.
Styling up your apparel on a mannequin helps your customers picture how it would look on them. It also helps highlight different details of the product.
If you feel using a mannequin is too much for your product photography and want your customer’s attention to go entirely to your product, you can use the ghost mannequin technique.
A ghost mannequin involves dressing up a model or a mannequin in the apparel and then editing out the model/mannequin during post-production. This leaves only the 3D result of the clothing in the image.
Pro tip: Use a white mannequin to make it easier to edit out the mannequin later.
If you decide to use a model instead of a mannequin, make sure they don’t have any other accessories on them and that they tie their hair up.
Take shots from different angles. You’ll get the best pictures when the camera is at the chest level of the model.
Finally, edit the mannequin or the model out of the picture to get the 3D effect of the clothing.
If you are in a budget crunch, we’ve got you a solution!
Place your hanger in front of a white wall or backdrop, and keep your camera at eye level. Like the ghost mannequin technique, you can first hang your clothes on a hanger and then edit out the hanger leaving only the apparel in your image. You can use a hanger to photograph jackets, dresses, shirts, etc.
Another budget-friendly way of styling your product is by getting a model onboarded - provided the model is a close friend or a family member. Or, depending on your budget, you can set up a shoot with a professional model.
Once done photographing the clothing, you can use DoMyShoot to edit the image background.
Simply put, a flat lay photograph is the top shot of your product. That’s it— just one angle.
Although this shot is simple, it is the one angle that product photographers and brands widely use. This shot is best for beginners just getting started with product photography.
Flat lay is one of the easiest and most commonly used styling techniques across most marketplaces. This shot is used primarily to photograph shirts, pajamas, pants, dresses, etc.
You can use a white sheet for the background and tripod to avoid taking shaky images.
For flat lay photography, it can be tempting to add a few props to enhance the look of your image. However, avoid too much clutter. Experiment with different backgrounds, arrange for a good natural or artificial lighting source, and finally, edit here flat lay images well during the post-production.
This goes without saying. Having good lighting is a prerequisite. Use natural lighting whenever you can. You can shoot your model a mannequin close to a window.
If you plan on having a complete outdoor shoot instead, you can remove the background in the post-production using DoMyShoot.
One hack to make the most of the image slots provided by eBay is to upload pictures of your product taken from different angles.
Not only will different shots of your product help fill up your image slots, but your customers, too, will get a better understanding of your product by simply looking at it.
There are, in general, six main photography angles -
To understand which shot works best for your industry, look at what’s working for your competitors.
For a more professional-looking photograph, DoMyShoot guides users with the help of angle scales to take the best shots of apparel from different angles. We have gone deep into understanding how each angle benefits your product. Read more about the top 6 Product Photography angles here.
The main image, also known as the ‘Hero Image’ of your product, is the first image your audience sees before anything else. So how to ensure your hero image steals the show?
Avoid using props in your hero image, as this can confuse the buyer about what is included in the price quoted for the product. However, if you want to show your customers the exact size of the product, you can keep a scale next to it to help your audience determine your product’s actual size. You can use this technique for almost any product.
As mentioned earlier in this article, you can use stock images for new products on eBay. However, it is advisable that you photograph your product image yourself. Shoot high-resolution images (we recommend 300 dpi or higher).
Let’s have a quick recap of eBay’s product requirements -
If you are wondering how many images is the best number of images, here is what a research paper published by eBay says -
“Listings with one image had twice the conversion rates compared to listings with zero images. Conversion rates doubled again for listings with two images versus only one.”
Lastly, optimize your product listing on eBay for the best results. Optimizing your product listing and images will help your customers easily find your products in the search results. To ensure your product image is high-optimized for your listing, upload only high-quality photos, have a clear SEO-friendly product description, and optimize your image titles for SEO. Use Google’s Keyword Planner to find high-volume, low-competition keywords.
The two tips above show you how to photograph your product for eBay and most marketplaces. However, there is one underrated step left before you hit publish.
Sellers using high-quality images on eBay get up to 5% more sales than those sellers who use average or low-quality photos.
Here are six tips to make the most of your post-production.
An excellent product photograph helps increase your customer’s attention, trust, and conversion rate. Hence, optimize your product image to get more eyeballs to your product listing and let your customers know what to expect from you.
Now that you’ve understood how to photograph apparel for eBay and a few tips to keep up your sleeves, you can go and make the most out of your product listing on eBay and stand out from your competition.
Keeping track of eBay’s guidelines can be too much to keep up with. To simplify producing high-quality product photographs, use DoMyShoot to create photos optimized for eBay. Request DoMyShoot for a demo today!
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