Are you in a funny business? Many companies use cartoon picture images to sell their products and/or services, thinking that cute artwork can tickle customers into a buying mood. And it’s true, cartoon images are very accessible for most people and they have the added advantage of appealing to a customer’s humorous side without bringing a lot of baggage that can be a problem for photographic artwork. But glamour images have their place, too. Glamour doesn’t have to mean sexy. Stock glamour shots can refer to any photography that uses attractive models. It can be a provocative shot of a model getting a massage for selling spa services, or a relatively benign image of a model wearing a headset to illustrate customer service. The secret to glamour images? People like seeing pictures of other, attractive people when they’re in the middle of making a buying decision. Glamour sells.
Whether you’re choosing a cartoon or a glamour shot for your marketing materials or your website, you should think about using one of the many online stock photography sites for your images. Stock images are available as either “rights-managed” shots where you pay for how much you intend to use the it: many times, often, or just once. With rights-managed shots, you’re also paying for exclusivity: once you purchase an image, it can’t be sold to someone else (at least not one of your competitors) for the life of the contract. “Royalty-free” images are purchased for a single, usually cheaper, price and offer unlimited use as long as you like. The downside is that they’re not exclusive.
You can find stock images, cartoon or photographic, on several sites open to the public. Gettyimages.com, istockphoto.com, corbisimages.com, and others offer literally millions of images. You can choose an image by selecting keywords that describe the shot you’re looking for. The images you purchase are e-mailed to you for your website or printed pieces.
