But coming up with fresh photo ideas or perfecting your visual strategy isn’t always easy.

That’s why we rounded up 50 ecommerce websites with standout product photography—organized by industry. These examples highlight how top brands use composition, lighting, styling, and editing techniques to elevate their imagery and move more product.

30,000 sales and marketing pros get our insights, tips, and best practices delivered weekly.

Browse for inspiration. Steal a few ideas. And if you need help turning your own shots into polished product images, we can lend a hand there, too.

Clothing/apparel and footwear

1. Girlfriend Collective

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This set of images features clean, high-resolution portraits of models in active poses, styled against a neutral, seamless background. The garments are front and center, with no distractions from props, textures, or harsh lighting.

This style of photography strikes the right balance between editorial polish and ecommerce clarity—a smart direction for any brand focused on performance, comfort, or versatility.

2. Quince

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Quince uses warm, natural light and textured backdrops like stone, sand, and wood) to create a sun-soaked, lifestyle-driven aesthetic. The product photography feels candid and cinematic, blending fashion with storytelling. Clothing is styled casually and captured in movement or relaxed poses, helping customers imagine how pieces feel and function in real life.

3. Victoria’s Secret

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Victoria’s Secret has secured its spot on the top of the list for product photography for years. It knows how to present their products in a way that speaks to its target audience, and even makes more than 20 million people tune into its annual televised fashion show. 

4. ModCloth

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ModCloth shows its products on models of different shapes and sizes, showing the versatility of various items and allowing its customers to better predict how it would look on them. It does the same with color variations, too.

5. Thirdlove

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Instead of using image editing to create color variants for its products, Third Love shoots custom photography for most of the variants. This creates a more lifelike effect that appeals to shoppers.

6. SSENSE

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This split-screen from SSENSE showcases the brand’s signature editorial-meets-ecommerce photography style—bold, artistic, and culturally tuned-in.

A street-style inspired shot featuring a flowing, pastel-toned skirt, structured black bag, and plush accessory charm. The blurred background and candid motion capture personality, movement, and context—showing the product in the wild.

The flat lay shows a green bikini submerged just below the surface of a rippling pool. The water distortion and sun reflections turn a simple product shot into an abstract composition. It’s aspirational, seasonal, and emotionally evocative—perfectly suited for a trend-forward audience.

7. Coterie

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These product photos from Coterie offer a clean, clinical, and elevated aesthetic that aligns with the brand’s premium baby care positioning. Shot against a soft, gradient blue background, the diapers are perfectly centered and isolated—creating a sterile but comforting environment that enhances product trust.

What works well:

• Perfect symmetry and clarity: Both the front and back views are shot with precision and balance, emphasizing shape, texture, and material. This symmetry helps customers understand fit and structure at a glance.
• Soft, diffused lighting: Gentle lighting minimizes harsh shadows and ensures every detail of the diaper—such as the elastic bands, fabric texture, and wetness indicator—is clearly visible.
• No distractions: The minimalist backdrop and absence of props keep the focus entirely on the product, reinforcing a sense of hygiene and quality.

Symmetry sells—especially in fashion. Learn how perfectly mirrored product photos boost conversions and trust.

Learn more

Jewelry 

8. Deliqa Gems

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Each ring is photographed against a seamless white background, allowing the viewer to focus solely on the craftsmanship, color, and cut. This is essential for high-conversion jewelry ecommerce.

The lighting is soft but directional—eliminating harsh shadows while enhancing gemstone brilliance and gold luster. It’s especially effective for faceted stones, making them pop with fire and depth.

Deliqa shows different angles—front, top-down, and profile views, giving online shoppers a true-to-life sense of scale and form, mimicking an in-store experience.

Retouching is used judiciously: reflections are polished, shadows are uniform, and every gem is color-corrected for maximum vibrancy.

9. Electric Picks

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Electric Picks’s jewelry product photography strikes a perfect balance between lifestyle and studio shots—an ideal approach for modern ecommerce. The left image shows the necklace worn on a model, adding context, warmth, and emotional appeal. The other two are clean studio shots that focus on detail and form. This blend helps shoppers envision the item both in real life and up close.

All three images use natural-looking, diffused light that avoids harsh reflections (a must for shiny metals like gold). The earrings in particular benefit from soft-edged shadows that give them dimension without distraction.

10. ROEN

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ROEN’s jewelry photography example delivers a premium, high-end aesthetic that aligns with luxury engagement ring shopping—balancing emotion, clarity, and craftsmanship.

The leftmost image shows the product on a hand in warm, soft lighting, immediately evoking romance, elegance, and aspiration. It adds emotional weight to the otherwise clinical product lineup.

The remaining three images showcase the rings against clean, light-gray backdrops with subtle shadows that lift the products off the page. Each shot is expertly lit to maximize sparkle, metal luster, and form—especially in the center stone.

Side views, angled shots, and direct front views all help customers evaluate details like band thickness, setting style, and stone cut. 

11. Susan Alexandra

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This playful product photo brilliantly blends creativity and humor to showcase a beaded dog leash set. The real dachshund and its beaded twin—linked by matching rainbow leashes—instantly grab attention and make the image unforgettable.

This image is a strong example of how injecting personality and playfulness into product photography can make a brand stand out—especially for fun accessories.

12. OUTOFOFFICE

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This set of product photos uses clean styling and close-up detail to showcase modern jewelry in a minimal, elevated way. Each frame focuses on a different piece—earrings, rings, bracelets, and necklaces—while keeping the background simple and distraction-free.

This style is ideal for luxury, designer, or minimalist brands that want to convey sophistication and clarity in their product presentation.

13. Jewels & Aces

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This series of close-up earring shots exemplifies how subtle styling and soft lighting can elevate small, intricate jewelry. Each image highlights a layered ear stack featuring dainty gold chains and diamonds, worn in unique yet coordinated pairings.

Here’s what we like: 

• Warm, natural light: The lighting enhances the gold tones and gemstone sparkle without harsh shadows.
• Tight framing: Zoomed-in ear shots keep the focus on detail, allowing customers to see how each piece fits and drapes.
• Consistent tone: The cohesive color palette and similar poses across models create a polished, trustworthy brand image.

Want your jewelry shots to sparkle like ROEN or Electric Picks? Learn the secret techniques for high-converting images in our expert guide: How to Edit Jewelry Product Photos Like a Pro

Learn more

Footwear and accessories

14. Glasses Direct

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While Glasses Direct has straightforward yet beautiful white background product photos, supporting visuals round out the impact for potential customers. Illustrations that outline dimensions help shoppers estimate how the frames would fit on their own faces.

15. hardgraft

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With a muted, desaturated palette and soft directional lighting, each item is photographed with studio precision against a neutral background. hardgraft’s deliberate use of shadows adds depth and dimension without distraction, allowing the tactile richness of suede, leather, and wool to take center stage. 

The styling is minimal but intentional—products are cleanly isolated yet carry subtle lifestyle cues, like an unzipped kit or a pencil-stuffed wrap. This clean and cohesive look highlights craftsmanship and quality, appealing to discerning customers who appreciate quiet sophistication.

16. Mulberry

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This campaign showcases handbags in vibrant, outdoor settings that feel both editorial and approachable. Rather than sterile studio shots, these lifestyle images embed the bags into real-world fashion moments—making them feel aspirational yet accessible.

Each look is styled to suggest a narrative—countryside strolls, spring fashion—adding depth and relatability to the product. Shooting outdoors brings out texture and color in the bags, while the blooming florals and tree-lined road evoke seasonal charm. Bold outfits and confident poses draw attention, but the handbags remain the focal point, always held prominently and clearly lit.

17. Birkenstock

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Birkenstock’s product photography strikes a balance between lifestyle and studio visuals. From sun-drenched sidewalk shots to clean, floating product images, each photo highlights the brand’s signature comfort and craftsmanship. The use of natural textures—brick, stone, and foliage—adds warmth and tactility, making the sandals feel at home in any setting. 

Meanwhile, crisp lighting and soft shadows emphasize material quality, like nubuck leather and contoured cork soles. Their floating product shot, set against a cool gradient background, draws the eye to every strap and buckle with sculptural clarity. Birkenstock’s visuals are proof that even casual footwear can look iconic with the right photography.

18. Chalo

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This image series presents handcrafted leather boots through a rich visual narrative that blends craftsmanship, product detail, and styling. From top-down flat lays to styled shots and macro textures, it balances artistic flair with product clarity.

Warm, earthy hues echo the natural materials and craftsmanship, making the entire set feel cohesive and tactile. Including the artisan’s hands working on the leather gives authenticity and emphasizes the handmade quality—connecting product to maker.

Technology

19. Bang & Olufsen

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This photo is a stellar example of minimal, lifestyle-oriented product photography that speaks volumes without clutter—a highly effective way to market portable tech like Bluetooth speakers.

Shooting the speaker partially buried in sand immediately communicates durability, portability, and outdoor utility—perfect for beach days or travel. Plus, the fine mesh texture of the speaker contrasts beautifully with the rough, grainy sand, drawing the eye directly to the product.

The subtle motion blur of sand being brushed aside adds energy and realism, reinforcing the “on-the-go” lifestyle. And the soft pinkish-gold tone of the speaker and tan leather strap blend seamlessly with the neutral sandy palette, creating a warm, aspirational tone.

20. Apple

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The iconic tech brand has made smartphones, computers and other tech devices look sexier than ever. The brand has such a strong visual aesthetic, and all product photos support that image—including photos on its distributors’ sites.

21. Sonos

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This image from Sonos showcases a Bluetooth speaker and a pair of over-ear headphones in a highly polished, product-centric style that’s ideal for ecommerce and tech retail. The clean, white background removes all distractions, keeping the focus entirely on the product design—perfect for a high-end tech brand.

Subtle drop shadows under both products add depth and dimension, helping them stand out while maintaining a crisp, modern aesthetic. The matte black finishes are lit specifically to highlight contours without losing the rich, dark texture—key for showcasing premium materials.

Plus, including the TIME Best Inventions 2024 badge for the headphones subtly reinforces credibility and innovation without overwhelming the visual.

Beauty, cosmetics, and skincare

22. Max Factor

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The bright white backdrop keeps all the focus on the products and makes the colors pop. It’s also super consistent, which is great for brand identity and gives everything a polished, high-end vibe. 

Each product is facing forward in a clear, easy-to-identify way. No weird tilts or artsy shadows—just straightforward, scroll-stopping clarity. You immediately know what’s what: foundation, mascara, lip color, and an eyeshadow palette.

Max Factor doesn’t just show product containers:

• The lip color shows the wand and box.
• The mascara is open, showing the brush (which is a key selling feature).
• The eyeshadow palette is open to show the actual shades.

Basically, the photos answer the unspoken “But what does it look like inside?” question before you even have to ask.

23. Essie

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This photo nails the vibe. The mix of bright turquoise, fiery red, and cheery yellow nail art really pops against the warm-toned background. It draws your eye to the nails without needing a spotlight. Each nail tells a mini story—smiley face, abstract flames, a playful “X”—making it feel custom, not cookie-cutter. This is less “salon menu,” more “expression in progress.”

And you get more than just the nails. The texture of the fabric, the paintbrushes, the speckles—it adds a sense of realness and movement, like we just walked in on an artist mid-project.

24. Wiselands

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Wiselands uses rich, moody lighting to elevate its product photography, giving skincare essentials a luxe, tactile presence. The close-up shots highlight the amber glass packaging and gold typography, with warm shadows that enhance the sense of calm and care. Subtle skin contact and soft textures create an intimate, grounded feel—perfectly suited for a brand focused on clean, conscious ingredients. 

The lighting is deliberately imperfect, mimicking golden-hour warmth that flatters both the product and the skin it’s meant for. It’s a masterclass in using tone and minimalism to communicate trust and quality.

25. Crown Affair

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The minimalist layout and monochrome color palette for Crown Affair’s product photos ooze luxury. It’s giving calm confidence without shouting for attention. 

Each product is centered, evenly lit, and spaced the same—perfect for a sleek grid or product catalog. Cohesion like this builds brand trust fast. And the soft shadows and contrast between black and white bottles add just enough depth to keep things visually interesting without losing the clean aesthetic.

26. Vacation Inc.

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Sunscreen brand Vacation Inc. uses bold, retro-inspired design. The packaging and photo styling lean heavily into a nostalgic ’80s/’90s vacation aesthetic, reinforcing the brand’s identity. Everything from the fonts to the saturated colors supports this.

Despite the vibrant branding, the layout is clean. Products are isolated against a pale gradient background, keeping attention on the packaging.

Outdoors and sporting goods

27. Linus 

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This example from bike brand Linus takes a lifestyle over product approach. We’re sold on the vibe before the bike. It’s aspirational but also relatable—perfect for parents and cool kids alike.

The mid-movement shot adds energy and makes the product feel fun and adventurous. The text placement is smart: bold, centered, and readable without overpowering the image.

28. Pow Gloves

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Pow Gloves delivers high-impact product photography that leans into performance, texture, and environment. Shot in snowy alpine conditions, its imagery captures real-world functionality while keeping the product in crisp focus. 

Frosted lenses, fleecy knits, and matte leathers pop against blurred white backdrops, highlighting both material quality and cold-weather capability. The models are active but cropped, letting the gloves and headwear shine without distraction.

29. Beestinger

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Beestinger’s product photography balances precision and action, capturing the high-performance world of archery stabilizers. Each image speaks directly to its audience—whether it’s competitive target shooters or camo-clad hunters—by showing the gear in realistic, high-stakes contexts. 

Sharp detail on textures like carbon fiber, metal finishes, and compound bows communicates quality and durability. Meanwhile, the use of tight crops and dynamic angles keeps the focus on function, not fluff. By pairing lifestyle imagery with close-up product visuals, Beestinger hits the bullseye on authenticity and trust—two essentials in any performance-driven category.

30. CamelBak

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The top-down flat lay showcases CamelBak’s water bottles in a scattered, playful arrangement. Each bottle is angled differently, giving the scene energy and allowing each product to stand out while still feeling part of a cohesive set.

The smooth teal gradient adds visual interest without stealing the spotlight. It complements the product colors and adds depth, helping the matte finishes of the bottles pop.

The lighting is soft but directional enough to highlight the textures—especially the powder-coated surfaces and engraved designs. This gives a tactile sense of quality without relying on close-ups.

The photo manages to feel unified while showing a range of products: mugs, tumblers, bottles—each in a different color and size. It’s a great way to communicate customization options without crowding the frame.

31. Lift Foils

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Lift Foils captures the thrill and elegance of hydrofoil surfing through cinematic, lifestyle-driven photography. Their imagery effortlessly blends action and atmosphere—highlighting both product performance and the aspirational lifestyle that surrounds it. 

From crisp shots of foil boards slicing through tropical waves to grounded moments of riders gearing up at the shoreline, every frame conveys motion, freedom, and connection to nature. The gear is presented in real use, allowing water, sunlight, and setting to act as natural visual enhancers. This approach not only showcases the quality of the product but also sells the lifestyle it unlocks. It’s adventure marketing at its finest.

32. Landyachtz

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Landyachtz uses clean, minimal product photography to make bold skateboard designs pop. Set against bright white backgrounds, each board is perfectly centered and evenly lit, allowing the intricate deck artwork—from hand-illustrated mountains to surreal portraits—to shine without distraction. 

This studio-style approach highlights every detail of shape, texture, and color, making the craftsmanship unmistakable. The consistency across the images also creates a seamless browsing experience, while the sharp, high-resolution shots invite zoom-level inspection. It’s a textbook example of how white-background photography can still feel expressive and brand-forward.

33. Ethnotek

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Ethnotek’s product photography perfectly reflects the brand’s vibrant, adventure-ready identity. Shot in natural, wild settings, their bags are photographed in real-world use—slung over shoulders, perched on rocks, or trekking through fields. 

This lifestyle-forward approach puts the product in context, emphasizing durability and design for travel and outdoor enthusiasts. The saturated colors of the bags stand out beautifully against the natural backdrops, and each shot is carefully composed to showcase both form and function. The result is photography that feels aspirational, authentic, and deeply connected to the brand’s do-good, go-anywhere ethos.

Furniture and home goods

34. MADE

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MADE’s product photography captures the harmony of modern living with a refined, editorial edge. Each image is carefully styled to showcase not just the product—sofas, lighting, or beds—but the ambiance they create. The lighting is soft and consistent, emphasizing texture, shape, and color in a natural way. Warm, muted tones pair with clean architectural lines, drawing the eye through the space and highlighting each design detail without distraction. 

The result is an inviting, aspirational scene that feels livable yet elevated. MADE’s photography doubles as interior inspiration, turning every product into part of a cohesive lifestyle story.

35. LOEHR

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LOEHR’s product photography is a prime example of modern minimalism. With sharp, architectural compositions and pristine lighting, each image distills furniture design down to its purest form. 

Materials and textures are foregrounded—brushed metals, matte lacquers, and soft upholstery—without unnecessary staging or visual clutter. The crisp shadows and natural gradients from ambient light add depth while preserving the clarity of shape and line. 

The result is bold, geometric forms. LOEHR’s photography doesn’t just display a product—it reflects the brand’s design philosophy: functional, thoughtful, and quietly radical.

36. Simon Pearce

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Set against airy, sun-drenched environments, Simon Pearce’s imagery brings out the artisanal quality of each glass and ceramic piece. The clear sparkle of handblown glassware, the creamy textures of stoneware, and the golden tones of sunlight on surfaces are all captured with refined precision. Lifestyle compositions feel warm and inviting—perfectly styled without feeling staged. 

Whether it’s a mimosa brunch or champagne on the patio, the photography captures the brand’s essence: craftsmanship, comfort, and understated luxury. This is storytelling through light, texture, and good taste.

37. Motel a Miio

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Motel a Miio’s product photography bursts with color, warmth, and Mediterranean charm. The brand highlights the artisanal quality of its handmade ceramics through rich textures, sunlit surfaces, and thoughtful arrangements. 

Each image showcases the uniqueness of glazing and form—from the dreamy aqua blues of bowls to the peachy-pink blush of plates. Natural shadows and earthy backdrops give the shots a tactile, sun-kissed feel, inviting viewers to imagine relaxed outdoor dining or cozy kitchen moments. The photography is not just beautiful—it’s transportive, evoking a laid-back, design-forward lifestyle rooted in craftsmanship.

38. Studio Neat

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Studio Neat uses minimalist product photography. In this example, each item is suspended against a clean, white backdrop with gentle shadows, emphasizing their streamlined form and material finish. The floating composition gives the products a modern, weightless feel, aligning with their functional and design-forward ethos. 

Every visual choice—neutral lighting, soft gradients, centered framing—supports a sleek and utilitarian aesthetic. 

Cars and automotive

39. Carvana

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Carvana takes a clean, uniform approach to product photography by displaying each vehicle category in profile against a pure white background. The consistency in angle, lighting, and car color (white) helps customers compare models quickly while reinforcing trust through visual clarity. 

For ecommerce brands managing large SKUs or configurable product categories, this style benefits from clipping path, retouching, and shadow effects to ensure clean, scalable presentation across all digital platforms.

40. CarBahn

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CarBahn’s product photography leans into a high-performance, gearhead aesthetic with bold contrast, sharp lighting, and industrial backdrops. Each category image emphasizes material texture and mechanical precision. There’s a tactile, real-world feel, with shots that oscillate between clean studio setups and gritty workshop environments. 

This style is ideal for performance auto brands. Related edits might include color correction, reflection and glare removal, and precision shadow work to enhance contrast and depth without over-editing the hardware’s raw appeal.

41. Mercedes-Benz

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Mercedes-Benz’s product photography captures futuristic elegance with cinematic precision. This concept vehicle is shot under ambient, gradient lighting that complements the sleek contours and metallic finish, making it feel like a luxury object from the future. The low angle and subtle reflections emphasize design innovation—fluid lines, illuminated details, and aerodynamic form—while keeping the focus on craftsmanship and vision.

Lifestyle and miscellaneous

42. StickerBrand

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StickerBrand’s product photography transforms wall decals into immersive, real-life design statements. Each wall is staged in context—whether it’s a moody café corner or a leafy bedroom escape—so shoppers can picture the product in their own space. The lighting is soft and natural, allowing the decals to blend seamlessly with furniture, textiles, and finishes while still standing out with crisp lines and vibrant color.

43. Bambi Baby

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Bambi Baby’s product photography blends lifestyle and catalog styles to showcase both the function and feeling behind its premium baby gear. 

The left side of this example shows a warm, everyday moment—a family on a walk at golden hour. This emotional lifestyle shot balances beautifully with the crisp, isolated product shots on the right, which highlight detail, color variations, and pricing. This dual approach supports both storytelling and conversion. 

44. Bentley

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Bentley’s luggage line embraces bold, clean, and ultra-modern product photography that celebrates color as a core brand identity. The suitcases are displayed in a tight lineup with seamless lighting and minimal shadows, highlighting each hue without distraction. The gradient floor and backdrop also complement the tones of each suitcase.

45. Walmart

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Walmart uses bright, consistent, and brand-forward product photography to energize its promotional graphics. Each product—from beauty tools and smart tech to outdoor gear—is presented against soft, uniform color backdrops that create an airy and cheerful visual experience. Items are expertly isolated, often enhanced with clipping paths, drop shadows, and vibrant retouching to make them pop while maintaining a cohesive brand aesthetic.

Food and drink

46. Candy Club

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Vibrant gummies, chocolates, and sour belts spill playfully from jars across a crisp white background, letting the intense colors and textures take center stage. The overhead layout creates a sense of abundance, while the neatly styled candy piles maintain a polished, crave-worthy aesthetic. Candy Club’s photos are a visual sugar rush that makes every sweet treat look like a party.

47. Rauch

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Rauch brings a playful, shelf-ready polish to its product photography. Against a smooth gradient backdrop that shifts from citrus yellow to cream, each beverage line is given equal spotlight with symmetrical placement and minimal distractions.

Each product floats with a subtle shadow, allowing vibrant packaging to take center stage. The lighting is soft yet evenly distributed, enhancing the saturated colors and fruity visual cues without harsh glare. 

48. Backyard Butchers

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Backyard Butchers nails a clean, trust-building presentation that’s perfect for high-value food subscriptions. Its product photography highlights premium meat packs in pristine kitchen settings with natural light, fresh produce, and minimal props—immediately reinforcing freshness, quality, and home delivery convenience.

49. Tony’s Chocolonely

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Tony’s Chocolonely brings the same bold, joyful energy of its packaging into its product photography. Vibrant, solid-color backgrounds create instant visual impact while keeping the focus squarely on the products. Items are shot straight-on with clean clipping paths and slight shadows to create a floating effect, lending a sense of playfulness and modernity. Every shot is bright, color-blocked, and punchy enough to pop in any feed or grid.

50. Ghia

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Set against a creamy, sunlit backdrop, Ghia combines perfect product symmetry with unexpected moments—like a pour shot mid-air or cans balancing precariously on glassware. The lighting is soft yet directional, giving glass and liquid a gentle glow while letting label colors pop with vintage flair.

Create your perfect product photos

Great product photography doesn’t just capture what you’re selling—it captures why someone should care. Across industries, from fashion to food to tech, the most successful ecommerce brands use thoughtful visuals to build trust, spark desire, and drive conversions.

If you need help making your own photos stand out, we’re here to help. From background removal and retouching to full-on image enhancements, our team can take your product photos from functional to phenomenal.

Ready to elevate your product visuals? See how our photo editing services work and get started transforming your images today.

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The post Product Photography: 50 Ecommerce Websites With Inspiring Photos appeared first on Path Edits.

Luckily, resizing images without losing quality is easy once you know how. This guide walks you through how to resize an image in Photoshop without losing quality and all the other best methods—starting with what to consider before you begin.

30,000 sales and marketing pros get our insights, tips, and best practices delivered weekly.

Preparing for image resizing

Before you resize an image, consider the following: 

• Aspect ratio: Make sure the image keeps its proportions so it doesn’t look stretched. Common ratios include 1:1 (square) for profile pics, 16:9 for banners, and 3:2 for product shots.
• Required dimensions: Every platform has its own size recommendations—Instagram Stories need 1080x1920px, while blog images usually fall between 1200px and 1600px wide.
• Resolution: Web images should be 72 DPI for fast loading, while print needs at least 300 DPI for high-quality results.
• Use case: Think about where the photo will be used. This helps avoid distortion and keeps your visuals looking sharp. Websites and online stores need smaller file sizes for speed, while social media platforms have specific size guidelines to keep images looking their best.

It’s also a good idea to make sure you start with a high-quality image. No amount of editing or resizing can make a poor-quality photo look great. 

How to reduce image size in Photoshop: shortcut

If you want a quick and easy way to resize images in Photoshop, follow these steps:

If you’re already using Photoshop, open your image by going to File > Open from the menu at the top of the application window. If you have just opened Photoshop, you can still open the image directly from the opening screen. You can also use the shortcut CTRL + O (COMMAND + O on a Mac) to open an image at any time.

Navigate through your documents until you find your image, and open it. Then, go to Image > Image Size in the top menu. You can quickly access the Image Size window by typing CTRL + ALT + I (COMMAND + ALT + I on a Mac).

In the Image Size dialog box, enter the new dimensions you want to resize your image to. Make sure the chain link icon (to keep proportions) is enabled.

If you are sizing an image for your ecommerce website, you will want the dimensions to be as small as possible without losing quality. A good rule of thumb? Keep images around 1000px wide (2000px wide if they are to fill the screen from side to side). You can keep an eye on the final file size with the “Image Size:” text at the top of the dialog box. In general, try to keep ecommerce images under 200K to ensure fast load times.

Next to Resampling, choose a method that works best for the type of image you are working with:

• Bicubic Sharper (reduction) is best for reducing the size while still showing a lot of detail
• Bicubic (smooth gradients) will produce the best images for showcasing flawless skin by smoothing edges
• Nearest Neighbor produces very harsh edges and emphasizes artifacts. Only use this if you want a grainy, pixelated look.

All other resampling options are for enlarging images, not reducing them. If you’re not sure which resampling to choose, stick with “Automatic.”

Click OK, then save your resized image (File > Export > Export As…).

For more control over file size and compression, Photoshop’s Export As… tool is a great option—covered in the next section.

How to reduce image size in Photoshop: Export As…

The Export tool in Photoshop is one of the best ways to shrink image file sizes without sacrificing too much quality. Whether you’re optimizing a product image, a thumbnail, or a homepage banner, it can balance image clarity with fast loading speeds.

Using the Export function in Photoshop is often comparable to the compression you’ll get from other tools, without the extra steps (or extra cost) of needing to access additional software.

Before using the Export function, set your ideal image aspect ratio in the top, left hand corner after selecting the Crop tool.

Once your image is cropped (if needed), resize and compress it using the Export function.

Go to: File > Export > Export As…. You can also use the Export As… keyboard shortcut CTRL + SHIFT + ALT + W (ALT + SHIFT + COMMAND + W on a Mac)

This opens the Export As… window, where you can fine-tune file size and quality.

Photoshop image resizing settings

Here are some of the image resize file size and other settings you can choose from:

• Preview section: See what your image will look like after export. Clicking on 2-Up allows you to see different options side-by-side 
• File format: On the right-hand side of the screen, you can choose what file type your exported image will be. JPEG is best for compression while keeping quality. PNG is great for transparency but results in larger files. If you have a simple vector-style graphic with no transparency, PNG-8 will give you a great-looking file at a fraction of the size of a PNG-24 (see below). If your graphic is animated, save as an animated GIF.
• Quality (for JPEG): When the JPEG file format is selected, you can use the slider to move between low quality and high quality. A compression level around 5 or 6 is usually adequate. 
• Quality (for PNG): When PNG is selected, you have the choice to choose “Transparency” and “Smaller File (8-bit)” If you want a high quality, transparent image (known as a PNG-24), check Transparency and leave Smaller File unchecked. However, if you need to compress an image heavily and transparency isn’t that important, choose Smaller File. This will allow you to export your file as a lower-quality, smaller-sized PNG-8.
• Image size: The dimensions of your image. If you know the exact dimensions you need, you can enter them here. Or, if you want to reduce the size by a percentage, you can use the Percent scaler as well. 
• Resample: This is how Photoshop “rebuilds” parts of the image’s data that are altered during compression. Any time you enlarge or reduce an image’s size, you’re going to affect the original proportion that the image had in relation to pixels per inch and dimensions. Bicubic creates smoother gradients, but does not allow for the most compression. Explore other options such as Nearest Neighbor (most basic and worst preservation of detail), Bilinear (usually better for upsampling), Bicubic Smoother (designed for upsampling) or Bicubic Sharper (better for downsampling/preserves detail).
• File size: On the lefthand side of the Export As… window, you can see the file size of the optimized image.

There’s no one-size-fits-all option here. When reducing an image in Photoshop, each image generally takes an individualized amount of tweaking to find the best image quality with the best compression.

Image resizing tools

Web tools to edit images and reduce file size

• Bulk Web Resizer: This site allows you to upload a batch of images and then resize according to your desired dimensions. You can also adjust the image quality to your needs (choose 100 if you want to preserve the original quality), as well as sharpen images.
• Canva: Canva’s free photo editor allows you to crop and resize images on its site. Additional free editing tools include flipping and rotating images, adjusting the color, and adding filters.
• ImageOptim: ImageOptim can be used in your web browser or via a Mac application. To shrink files, ImageOptim gets rid of EXIF meta­data, such as GPS position and the camera’s serial number — however, you can choose to keep specified metadata intact (which is essential to optimizing your product photos for SEO). There’s also a Lossy minification option, which ImageOptim says will result in the smallest file size possible, while preserving image quality. ImageOptim has pricing plans, starting at $9/month for 1,000 image optimizations.
• Kraken: Kraken has a web application and a developer API that can handle bulk image optimization and resizing. The simple web interface is free, and you can drag and drop photos or upload by entering the image URL. There are also different pricing options depending on how many images you work with and how frequently you need to reduce their size. Pricing is based on the total number of GB.
• Pixlr: Resize and also edit photos as needed. The image-editing site also has a free vector-editing tool, as well as free fonts and graphics you can use.
• pngquant: This tool will compress .png files to reduce the file size. 
• TinyJPG/TinyPNG: This site allows you to reduce the file size of your images. There are no editing features; instead, TinyJPG/TinyPNG focuses on compressing files to ultimately reduce the file size, stripping unnecessary data from your image.

AI resizing and compression tools

• Let’s Enhance: great for resizing photos for print and digital use.
• Squoosh: web-based, Google-backed compressor with advanced controls.
• Upscale.media: AI-powered upscaler for improving resolution.

Plugins that reduce image size within your CMS

There are tons of plugins on the market that make the image resizing process easier and more automated, all from within your CMS. Here are just a few:

WordPress

• EWWW Image Optimizer
• Imagify
• Optimole
• ShortPixel
• WP Smush PRO

Shopify

• Avada SEO & Image Optimizer
• Crush.pics – Image Compression and Optimization
• LoyaltyHarbour Image Optimizer
• SpurIT SEO Image Optimizer
• Tiny SEO Speed Image Optimizer

Tips for resizing ecommerce photos

For ecommerce product photography, maintaining high quality while optimizing file size is key. Here are some best practices:

• Recommended dimensions: Most platforms work well with 1000×1000 px for product images. If zoom functionality is needed, go for 2000×2000 px or higher.
• Aspect ratio: Stick to 1:1 (square) for product photos and 16:9 or 4:3 for banners and hero images.
• Compression: Keep file sizes under 200 KB for fast loading. JPEGs with a “High” setting in Save for Web are a good choice.
• Background: Use a clean white or transparent background to keep the focus on the product.
• Resampling: Use Bicubic Sharper for downsizing to preserve details.

Tips for resizing headshots

Headshots should look sharp and professional across platforms without being too large. Here are some tips to keep in mind: 

• Recommended dimensions: For LinkedIn, company websites, or professional use, 400×400 px works well. For print or high-res needs, go for 1200×1200 px or more.
• Aspect ratio: Stick with 1:1 (square) for profile pictures or 4:5 / 2:3 for portraits.
• File type: Use JPEG for web (compressed but sharp) and PNG for transparent backgrounds.
• Compression: Aim for a file size under 100 KB for web use to prevent slow loading.
• Resampling: Use Bicubic Sharper when reducing size to keep facial features crisp.

Outsource your image resizing needs

Resizing images properly takes time, especially if you’re working with a large volume of product photos, headshots, or marketing assets. Instead of spending hours tweaking dimensions and compression settings, consider outsourcing to a professional image-editing service.

At Path, we specialize in high-quality image resizing, background removal, drop shadow, and more—all done by expert editors with precision and speed. Whether you need bulk resizing for an ecommerce store or perfectly optimized headshots, you’re in good hands with Path.

Need bulk image resizing done right? Try Path free—fast, flawless, and optimized for web.

Learn more

Image resizing and compression FAQs

Does resizing affect SEO?

Yes, large images slow websites, hurting rankings.

What’s the ideal file size for web images?

The ideal file size for web images is under 100KB for optimal performance.

The post How to Resize Images Without Losing Quality in Photoshop (+ Other Tools) appeared first on Path Edits.

When it comes to optimizing your product photos, you’ll need to think about the context in which they’re viewed. Not only do Amazon product images display on your main product page, but they also show up in search results, as thumbnails.

Get the complete guide to Amazon image size requirements for 2024.

30,000 sales and marketing pros get our insights, tips, and best practices delivered weekly.

Amazon image size requirements for 2024

When setting up new product pages or updating existing listings, you’ll need to meet the Amazon image guidelines and related technical requirements. If you don’t, Amazon won’t accept your listings and images, even if you have the best product images.

Technical requirements

Check out the technical Amazon product image requirements at a glance below, but remember it’s always best to check its site for the most up-to-date information and Amazon policy.

Other requirements to note for main product images include:

• Image size: Your Amazon picture sizes need to be at least 1000 pixels wide or tall, and 1600 pixels on the longest side. You can’t make your images bigger than 10,000 pixels on the longest side.
• Image frame: The product should fill 85% or more of the frame and not be cut off anywhere.
• Background color: ALL product photos should have a pure white background (RGB color values: 255, 255, 255).
• File format: You can upload JPEG, PNG, non-animated GIF or TIFF files. Amazon prefers JPEG.
• Color mode: Both sRGB and CMYK are accepted.
• File name: The file name must include the product identifier (this is your Amazon ASIN, JAN, EAN, 13-digit ISBN or UPC). After that, a period and a file extension (see accepted file types listed above). For example, 1234567890123.tif or A987654321.jpg. You may not include dashes, spaces or other characters in the file name.

You can also include up to eight additional photos to support your main photo.

Offer level images

If you’re selling used or refurbished products, an “Offer Level” or “Listing Photo” is also allowed on your product pages. This image displays on Amazon’s offer listing page, which helps customers differentiate your offer. To add your image, access your Amazon Common Template. Map the field termed as “Main Offer Image” and “Offer Images.”

Creative guidelines

Beyond adhering to Amazon product photography requirements, high-quality imagery will also make your products come to life for shoppers who can only view them through a screen. Some companies may opt to shoot their own product photos but there’s value in hiring a professional product photographer.

Using high-quality images for the main and child SKU images are particularly important for converting sales and receiving more clicks, but they’re also part of Amazon’s non-technical standards. These Amazon product images requirements are:

• Use real photos: The image must be an actual photo (or the cover art, in the case of music or books for example). Drawings, vectors and illustrations won’t be accepted as well as additional inset images, animated GIFs, graphics or text overlays. (Non-animated GIFs are acceptable.)
• Keep it simple: Anything in the frame that’s not directly related to the product risks becoming distracting to the potential buyer. Remove these from your Amazon product images.
• Aim for quality: Your Amazon product picture resolution should be high-resolution. Use sharp and well-lit product photos that look realistic. Pay special attention to how the colors look after they’re shot, as you don’t want any unpleasantly surprised customers.
• Be appropriate: Pornographic or offensive messages are prohibited from Amazon, so you’ll want to remove anything potentially risque from your shots. Check this tutorial to help you get rid of unwanted elements in Photoshop, Photomerge, or GIMP.

For shoes in particular, you’ll need to show only a single shoe, facing left at a 45-degree angle. No room for creativity here! Additionally, childrens’ clothing should be photographed flat without models, while apparel for adults should be worn and photographed on models.

Editing your Amazon product photos

If your photos require editing, you might consider hiring a professional photo editor, which can mean the difference between beautifully-detailed photos and Photoshop fails (which no business owner can afford).

Not sure if it’s time to outsource your photo edits or if you should keep doing them yourself? These are the 13 signs it’s time to get some outside help.

Here’s what can happen if you use an unreliable editing service, for example:

Source 1, 2, 3

Compare the images above to this professionally shot and edited image:

Source

It’s important for your images to be honest. In other words, don’t change the vibrance or saturation, because once your product gets to the customers, they’ll know you misrepresented the photos and description. Setting realistic expectations is very important, even critical, when selling online so your customers know what to expect.

Similarly, if you need to represent scale in your photos, make sure everything is realistic when photoshopping your images. It’s best, whenever possible, to put a ruler next to the item or simply put in the actual dimensions. Don’t enlarge any elements for products with multiple pieces.

What to avoid in Amazon images

Amazon requires all sellers avoid the following elements in the product images:

• Text, logos, borders, color blocks, watermarks, or other graphics covering the product or in the background for main product images
• Accessories that aren’t included with purchase
• Confusing props
• Mannequins

Here are additional resources from Amazon:

• Product Image Requirements
• Seller Central: Prepare product images
• Stores creative guidelines

Assigning image priority on the product page

It’s up to you to prioritize the images in the order in which you want them displayed. It’s a good idea to use all of the available image slots, rather than just two or three pictures. Doing so helps overcome one disadvantage that every online retailer faces: not being able to put the product in the hands of the customer.

Once you’ve uploaded your photos, you’ll want to prioritize and assign how each image appears on the page. This process determines the order of your images, so they show up in the correct sequence within the Amazon product search results as well as on your product pages. Consider arranging the images so customers experience the product (through photos) in a logical way.

Check out the example below from Loisa, which sells Latin-flavored spices and seasonings on its own ecommerce store and through Amazon. In addition to the straightforward white background shots, it angles the bottle of seasoning so customers can see the part of the label that lists the ingredients. It also showcases the product outside of its packaging so shoppers can better imagine cooking with it in real life.

Image source

Tips and best practices for Amazon product photos

Use lots of images

Use supplemental images to your advantage (and to help the customer make an informed decision). Give customers a detailed view of the item(s) from all perspectives. Not showing aspects of the product in detail can cost you a potential customer.

For example, this matcha powder from Golde is photographed in a few different ways. The main image gives you an idea of how it’s packaged, which sets expectations for when the product arrives. 

Image source

The supplemental images show how customers can use the product in drinks. It also gives you a glimpse into what the matcha powder actually looks like, which you can’t see when it’s in the packaging.

Show different angles

Try to imagine which angles the buyers would examine in person and then replicate that. You might also want to shoot your product from different angles.

If you’re not sure which angles your customers want to see regarding your particular product, go to a physical retail store and observe how shoppers interact with merchandise (if you can) or look around at objects in your home and pick them up as if they were displayed in a store. What would you look at or look for? The interior of handbags and wallets, for instance, are often photographed as there are important features customers would be interested in.

Incorporate models and people

Use a mix of images with people too. This can give products scale and help potential buyers imagine themselves in the model’s place.

Mind the lighting

You’ll also want to pay attention to the lighting of your photoshoot and how that affects the colors of your photos, especially because they need to look the same way in the photos as they do to the naked eye. Use an extra light source, and edit the photo afterward to really make it pop. A little bit of post-processing can go a long way.

Hire a pro

If your budget allows, consider hiring a product photographer. An experienced professional who specializes in your industry and type of products should know which angles to capture. Ask your network for recommendations and peruse directories like Shopify Experts, Guru, or Thumbtack.

A picture is worth 1,000 words—and sales

Never underestimate the value of optimized product images. Even though the search algorithm places some weight behind brand name, product title and description, optimizing your photos can certainly help boost your views.

Because a picture is truly worth a thousand words, ensure that your product photos help your customers see themselves with your product while also helping them make informed decisions.

Amazon image size FAQs

What size should images be for Amazon?

Your Amazon image size should be at least 1000 pixels tall or wide by at least 1600 pixels tall or wide. You can’t exceed 10,000 pixels. If your images are too big, you can resize them without sacrificing the quality.

How many listing images can you upload to Amazon?

You can upload one main product image and up to eight supporting product images on Amazon listings.

What are Amazon photo requirements for images other than the main first image?

Amazon has the same requirements for main images as it does for supplemental images. However, you should use these spots to showcase your product from different angles, contextually, and in different ways than it appears in the main image. Be sure to follow the Amazon product image size guidelines for all your photos.

The post Amazon Product Image Size Guidelines (Updated for 2024) appeared first on Path Edits.

Color can take an otherwise ordinary-looking product and make it pop off the page. Not only that, you can create a cohesive brand your shoppers will become familiar with.

Understanding color’s role in ecommerce allows you to make the right decisions for your shoot, but how can you choose the right background for your product photos? That depends on a variety of factors.

30,000 sales and marketing pros get our insights, tips, and best practices delivered weekly.

How to choose the best background color for product photography

1. Figure out where you’re using the photos
2. Consider the color of your product
3. Think about other subjects in the photo
4. Use color to evoke specific emotions
5. Complement your brand colors
6. Review your photos on different devices

1. Figure out where you’re using the photos

Your product photos need to look great on your own website, but you also need to consider the context of your photos for other placements, such as online marketplaces, social media, and brochures. Let’s look at the best background colors for each channel.

Your ecommerce store

White, transparent, slightly off-white, and light gray are popular background colors for most ecommerce websites. These clean backgrounds make it easy for shoppers to browse through your products. Instead of being distracted by too much color, they can focus on and compare the products, like on Agood Company’s online store. 

If you want to use a touch of color, make sure the tones work well across your website. For example, children’s product retailer Kidly opts for different neutrals that fit well together and suit the brand’s light color scheme. 

If your brand calls for bright colors and you want a unique ecommerce shop front, get inspired by Life Supplies, which uses different tones to separate its various product ranges visually. One quick glance and shoppers instantly know which products are from the same line. 

Social media

When people look at your social media channels, you want them to see some visual connection between your images and your overall brand identity.

For example, Vielö sells premium skincare focused on organic and sustainable ingredients. The brand’s Instagram page shows photos featuring neutral colors and tactile materials, such as wood, paper, stone, and others. No photo is the same, but they all work together in a collection. 

You can also experiment with more colorful backgrounds, cropping, and filters for social media. It all depends on your brand and audience.

Amazon

Amazon requires sellers to use a pure white background for product photos. Even if you didn’t use a white background at the time of shooting, you can add it during post-processing. 

Here are other requirements to keep in mind for Amazon: 

Etsy, eBay, and other marketplaces

While other platforms aren’t as strict on having a white background, it’s still recommended for marketplaces like Etsy and eBay. It brings uniformity to the product browsing experience and makes your products look professional.

However, Etsy, for example, also allows you to use brighter colors and lifestyle settings as product backdrops. Browsing the different Etsy gift collections shows how sellers use various backgrounds. 

Print

Print signage, catalogs, and brochures haven’t gone anywhere. They’re still essential parts of marketing campaigns for many brands.

Clean white background is the perfect canvas for showing your product’s features and colors, while contextual lifestyle shots will allow shoppers to envision how they may use your product. For example, DIY and home improvement retailer B&Q uses both across its brochures. 

If you need to use product photos for in-store displays and signage, contextual lifestyle backgrounds tend to reign supreme. 

2. Consider the color of your product

Product color is another consideration when deciding your background color. The main thing to remember is you need contrast between your product and the background color. This means your product should always be lighter or darker than the background, regardless of your chosen tones.

Bright, colorful products

If you’re not limited to specific background colors, like white for an Amazon listing, and want to add color to your products, why not experiment with vibrant hues?

Once you know which products you need to photograph, review your shot list and look at the main product colors. Then, using the color wheel, review the opposite colors on the spectrum—these shades will let your products stand out. 

For example, if you have a green-colored product like this cleansing bar by Ambi, you’ll find reds, pinks, and violets on the opposite side of the color wheel. Using one of those as a background color for your product is a simple trick to create instantly eye-catching and attractive visuals. 

You’re not limited to just indoor studio shots, either. Take this purple wine bottle and tumbler from Partner in Wine as an example. While the overall shot features similar lilac tones, the product is displayed against the contrasting green grass, leading the eye straight to the product. 

Similarly, if your product has warm tones, opt for a cool color as the background—and the opposite for products with cool tones.

If your product only features a hint of color, try that as a background option. But, instead of going for the exact same shade, tone it down and opt for a lighter one, like Mio’s body butter photo. 

One trick is to use an online color tool like HTML Color Codes first to find your product accent color and then move the slider to the left for a lighter shade you can use as the background.

Neutral products

If your products are in the neutral tone range, why not stay there? Gray, nude, beige, and other neutral shades lend themselves equally as calm background colors for a sophisticated look. That’s not to say you can’t add a splash of color if it fits your brand, but neutrals work particularly well with equally neutral background colors and organic backdrops like stone, sand, wood, linen, and other materials.

Ethical and eco-friendly lifestyle brand Nkuku shows how adding similar neutral colors in the background can create an earthy but elegant look. The trick is to add enough color contrast to let the product take center stage. 

White objects

If you sell white products and need a white background to fit the requirements of a marketplace like Amazon, ensure your lighting and editing emphasize any shadows or texture the product might have. Doing so will help the product stand out even on a white or off-white background, like the Amazon listings for white gloves. 

If your white background shots need a touch of luxury, add a reflection shadow, just like Lily & Roo’s pearl necklace shot. It gives the illusion of a glossy surface, often used in higher-end jewelry, accessories, and tech stores. 

However, If you have the creative freedom to pick a background, any darker colors will help your white product pop. There is no one-size-fits-all, and instead, consider your brand’s color palette to help you choose a few different tones to find the best color background for your product, like this rich, maroon fabric showcasing high-end jewelry from Prestons. 

Transparent products

What if your products have no color and are made of a transparent material like glass? Whether you choose a white or dark background, lighting your product to bring out its edges is key. Adding shadows will help separate your products from the background, just like Waterdrop’s shots of clear glasses on a white backdrop. 

Another option is to add a subtle gradient. Nkuku’s glass bottles demonstrate it well—the lighter shade on the left highlights both bottles on one side, while the darker side contrasts the bottles’ contour on the right. 

Black products

Photographing black products brings its own challenges, similar to white and transparent. You want the product to be distinguishable from the background without losing any of its unique features.

Generally, this means you’ll want to go for a lighter color background. But you don’t have to always stick with white. Try more powerful colors, like Ethique did with its charcoal soap bar against a bright pink backdrop. 

On the other hand, dark backgrounds can create a luxurious, opulent feel, so if your brand calls for a dark design, go for it. You’ll just have to pay attention to your lighting during the photoshoot to illuminate your product and its shape, like in this bracelet product shot by Seekers. 

Whatever background color you choose, you want shoppers to see your products clearly. If the background overshadows the product or makes it difficult to see, that’s a clear sign to try something different.

Finding the right balance comes down to experimentation. Remember, you can always change the background color in post-production or use a color change service if the photo doesn’t turn out how you envisioned.

3. Think about other subjects in the photo

While product color has perhaps the largest impact on which color background you should use, you might also have other subjects in the frame to consider.

Props

If you create lifestyle or styled product shots, you’ll need props. Same as picking a background color or pattern, choose props that will complement your product rather than distract from it.

You might want to decorate the shot with props highlighting your brand’s message. For example, independent organic skincare brand Harvest included cozy wool socks, a towel, and a rustic wood backdrop in its foot salve product shot. The brand focuses on natural ingredients, hand-crafted products, and simple packaging, which shows in its prop choice. 

Another method is including natural ingredients as your props if you sell health, beauty, food, or drink products. Ethique does this playfully with bright colors and unique prop placement for its body care collection. Each photo features the main product ingredients, such as a slice of lime with ginger or a spoonful of matcha. 

Models

Showing your products in use with the help of models is a great way to give shoppers more context about your product. For clothing, footwear, accessories and jewelry, it’s a traditional way of showing how the product looks when worn, like on the Wild Fawn Jewelry online store. But you can use models for other types of products, too. 

Spend time with your team and photographer, and consider how your model’s hairstyle, clothing, and skin tone work with your background color to make your products shine. Establish who your models are in advance and which background colors you hope to use. Working with a stylist can also help ensure your models and products complement one another.

Remember, models play an important role in highlighting your products. But in most cases, they shouldn’t be the main focus. For example, WILD SAGE + Co included a model for its beeswax candle shot, but the model’s pose and clothing don’t detract from the main focus of the image—the product. 

4. Use color to evoke specific emotions

When you want to add some color to the background, consider how those colors may affect online shoppers. Are they complementary to the colors of your product and brand? Will they persuade shoppers to buy? Do they resonate with your brand?

Emotions associated with colors will vary across cultures, so it’s not a universal method. But you might still get inspired by traditional color associations as a starting point. For example, blue can invoke feelings of serenity and logic, while green—freshness, health, and nature.

While color is important, the truth is, there’s no best color for background. The colors you choose depend on your goal and what you’re trying to convey.

5. Complement your brand colors

To get the most from your product photos, don’t forget that they need to go well with your brand colors. The last thing you want is to have a handful of quality photos that don’t match your website or brand color theme. This is why planning your shoot beforehand is so important.

6. Review your photos on different devices

With 54% of shoppers choosing online shopping for better value, there are many different types of devices accessing your online store. Even if shoppers are in a physical store, as many as 92% still check out products on their phones first. From computers and tablets to various smartphones—that’s a long list of differently sized gadgets.

First, review how your images look on different screens—are they sized appropriately and visible even on smaller phones? As many as 44% of shoppers are expected to use smartphones in 2025, so ensure quality photos with cropped unnecessary details. Most browsers have built-in emulators to check sites on different screen dimensions.

Second, consider varying screen brightness and contrast levels. This means products need to stand out against busy backgrounds—or those that are too similar to your product tones—without colors blending together.

Product photography background ideas: colors to try

If you’re looking for quick recommendations on picking the right color for your product shots, here are some tips and creative background ideas:

White

White is the most common background color for online listings by default, and for a good reason. It works well with most color combinations and doesn’t require heavy edits. 

White is a safe bet and works for many scenarios:

• Fits online marketplaces: Ecommerce platforms like Amazon require at least one product photo to have a white background. Even if not a requirement, white is the perfect, distraction-free backdrop to show products on any online marketplace.
• Creates a cohesive look: A white background is a great choice if you want a simple, clean look for your online store. With white background, there’s no room for error because all your product backgrounds will work together.
• Makes editing easier: Even if your background looks slightly off-white after photographing it or the backdrop has some wrinkles, it’s easier to edit it to pure white compared to colorful backgrounds.
• Brings attention to the product: Most products will instantly stand out against a white background.
• Gives space for text: If you need to add any words alongside your product, such as for an infographic, a website banner, or an email, white background makes it easy to create a clean design.
• Can decrease page load speed: Adding color to images can increase your file size. White background images, on the other hand, can help your site load faster, but make sure you still compress your photos.

Neutrals

The closest to a standard white background, neutrals like off-white, gray—from light to dark— beige or brown can highlight your products online. 

Neutral works well for different product ranges and scenarios because it:

• Fits most products: Neutrals play well with jewelry, clothing, homeware, skincare, beauty products, and even tech.
• Don’t distract from your product: Similar to white, neutral tones will keep the attention on your product.
• Adds subtle warmth or coolness: Beiges and browns will infuse a warm feel to your shots, while cooler neutrals, such as gray or subtle blues, will tone it down.
• Perfect for social media: White might lack personality for branded social media product images. This is where neutrals shine and can help you create aesthetically pleasing social media shots.

Black

If you’re going for a more dramatic, elegant look—look no further than black for the background color. 

A black background:

• Creates a luxurious, timeless feel: It’s not very often you’ll find product shots with a solid black background, but it can work well if you’re going for a classic, bold look. The depth of an all-black backdrop gives an air of sophistication, perfect for showcasing jewelry, leather goods, technology gadgets, or rich textiles.
• Brings out product details: Lighter products with interesting textures can benefit from being shown against a black background to focus attention on their details, shape, or other unique characteristics that might otherwise not show on a white background.
• Works well with metallic products: A black background helps show off the shiny, reflective surfaces of metallic products as the light bends around them and creates a mix of highlights and shadows.

Colors

Whether you want high-impact pops of color or soft pastel tones, strategic use of color backdrops can take your photos to the next level. 

Here are some ideas on how to use colorful product photo backgrounds:

• Contrasting colors: Use the color wheel to find opposite colors that’ll make your products pop.
• Complementary colors: Layering colors in complementary or similar shades to your product will create a harmonious look. It’s a great way to mix and match your brand palette colors to add something unique to every photo.
• Bright colors: If your brand is all about energy, vibrancy or capturing attention, bright color backgrounds will help you set that tone in your product shots. Just take care not to let the colors detract too much from the product itself.
• Pastels: For a softer, more relaxed aesthetic, try using muted pastels. Shades like powder blue, pale peach, lavender, and subtle mint green can help express warmth and nostalgia. Pastels also tend to work well with floral, feminine, or vintage-style products.

Natural materials

Want something more unique than just a solid background color? Natural materials can help you create eye-catching product shots. From warmer materials like wood, terracotta, and cork to cooler, sophisticated ones like slate, stone, marble, and sand, there’s plenty of room for choice.

If your brand sells products that invoke themes like nature, coziness, and the outdoors, consider wood, moss, leaves, pinecones, or feathers. For minimalist, modern aesthetics, try marble, stone or concrete backdrops. Rustic, artisan goods pop against tiles, burlap, or linen, like this wooden soap dish from Jungle Culture. 

Changing color backgrounds after the shoot

One of the most powerful aspects of post-production is the ability to change the background color you used during your shoot. Sometimes you just won’t have the perfect colored material when shooting—that’s okay!

If you can’t find the colors you need, you can always add the color afterwards by following our Photoshop tutorial. But for next-level results, our experienced photo editors are ready to help whether you want a simple, white background or a colorful one. 

Best product background color FAQs

How do I choose a background color for my product?

1. Figure out where you’re using the photos
2. Consider the color of your product
3. Think about other subjects in the photo
4. Use color to evoke specific emotions
5. Complement your brand colors
6. Review your photos on different devices

What color background sells the most?

White backgrounds tend to sell the most. A white background allows you to showcase products without distracting buyers. It creates a clean, minimalist look that works for most products and marketplaces.

What is the best color for your product background?

White is a versatile background for most ecommerce websites, but the best background color will depend on factors, such as your product type, colors, and brand identity. Strategically using color will help draw attention, set the mood, and make details pop.

Should you use a white background?

White backgrounds showcase products without being distracting, creating a clean, minimalist look that works for most products and marketplaces. However, colored or textured backdrops can also highlight products uniquely.

What background should you use for food photography?

For appetizing food photography, complementary or clean, solid color backgrounds like white, black, and gray work best to avoid taking attention away from the food. Natural elements like wood boards or tablecloths also help enhance the photo. 

The post Best Background Color for Product Photography: How to Use Color to Drive Sales appeared first on Path Edits.

For ecommerce brands wanting to stand out in crowded product searches, an opportunity lies in focusing on visual search optimization. As image searches gain momentum, shoppers are looking beyond keywords to find products.

30,000 sales and marketing pros get our insights, tips, and best practices delivered weekly.

Let’s take a look at how you can optimize your content for visual search and get your products in front of customers.

What is visual search optimization?

Visual search optimization is the process of optimizing digital content to enhance its visibility and relevance in visual search results. Visual search involves using images or videos as queries instead of text. Users can upload an image or take a photo to search for similar or related visual content.

A visual search is a query that is made with or about images. You might take a picture or screenshot of a product and use it to search for similar products online. When you use visual search, technology analyzes visual patterns to find similar images and return them to you.

In contrast, image search helps users find information using text, like typing in a Google Search “black boots for women” or using voice search to find relevant results.

How to optimize your ecommerce site and product photos for visual search

• Understand how consumers use visual search
• Use multiple images for each product
• Make sure your images are high-quality
• Put images in your sitemap
• Add Google image badges
• Learn how to optimize your images for visual search
• Go beyond just images
• Create your own visual search
• Remember Google Snippets

Understand how consumers use visual search

Before you can understand how to optimize your site, you need to know how consumers use visual search. This starts with putting yourself in the consumers’ shoes and considering the context and intent of their visual search.

For example, are your customers searching for gift ideas, solving a problem, or looking to buy? How do they like to shop online? Understanding these motivations allows you to meet their needs better with visuals and photo descriptions that align with their intent.

To learn more about your customer behavior, you can study your site’s and social channels’ analytics to see how your audience interacts with visuals and what they click on. Pay attention to any effective competitor visuals, too. What aesthetics and multimedia do users respond to? Reverse engineer what resonates.

You can also send post-purchase surveys, monitor social conversations about your brand and products, use focus groups if resources allow, and keep up with visual search trends from Pinterest, for example. Using Pinterest Trends, you can change the region and the search period, select interests for trends within specific niches, add demographics filters and keywords, and more.

Although these trends constantly change, the top Pinterest searches and categories at the start of 2024 were:

• Dinner party
• Nails
• Fashion
• Valentine’s Day
• Winter outfits
• Prom dresses
• Tattoos
• Braids

Use multiple images for each product

Using more than one product photo to represent your merchandise isn’t just good for the user experience, it’s also good for visual SEO. Google has repeatedly said it prioritizes the user experience when determining rankings. Plus, you can use different keyword variations for each of your image files.

Check out Maik in the example below. The ethical sock brand shows a mix of white background images with contextual settings and people photos. The variety of images lets the brand target unique visual search terms that can appear in varying Google searches and visual browsing queries, like “colorful socks with jeans” and “animal-themed socks.” 

Make sure your images are high-quality

High-quality product photography benefits more than just on-site users. It also gives you an edge in visual search results. When images are crisp and detailed, shoppers are more likely to click on them over low-quality competitor images.

For example, when users browse visual search results or image-based platforms like Google image search, clear, appealing photos stand out. You only have a small space alongside other brands in those results.

As seen in the example search below for children’s bedroom ornaments, top-ranking images allow shoppers to clearly see each product. With multiple thumbnail options competing for attention, ensure your product images are high-quality and clearly show the product to entice clicks. 

Be aware that low-quality images can be as bad as having no images at all because it can lead to disappointment and show a lack of care.

Put images in your sitemap

Your sitemap is essentially a “map” of your website—it houses information about the content on your site and the relation between those elements, such as text and images. Search engines use this file to crawl your website and learn more information about it. It helps search engines understand what is on your site.

If you create an image sitemap, you’ll give crawlers more information about the photos—and make them more primed to appear in searches. You can learn more about sitemaps and how to submit them on Google Search Central.

Add Google image badges

Google released an Image Search update back in 2017 to include small badges on search results thumbnails. These badges let users know what they’ll see when they click on the image, such as a recipe, a product in an online store, or a video.

To this day, you can see these badges in search results, and Google Images and Google Lens also use them. Follow Google’s guide to add this structured data to your product pages. 

Learn how to optimize your images for visual search

Size and format your images appropriately

Google’s image optimization guidelines include recommended file formats. They say PNG and JPEG files are best for still images, and WebP and AVIF files are best for animation. 

Reduce your image file size

A big part of SEO is having a quick-loading site—and large images can slow load speeds. Compress your images so the file size is smaller, without using image quality

You might also consider lazy loading to reduce the page load time, but it requires some technical knowledge to set up.

Use keywords in file names and alt tags

Uploading a product image titled “Photo_123” will make it difficult for search engines to understand what’s in the photo and when it’s relevant to people’s search queries. Instead, be descriptive about the subject matter.

For example, if you’re selling a red women’s coat, you could give it a file name, “Red-women-winter-coat,” and also include your brand name.

When it comes to alt tags, remember that they help visually impaired users with screen readers understand what’s in the image. Alt tags also display when your images fail to load on the site, which could happen when the user has a bad internet connection.

Using the example above, you could add an alt tag, “A dark-haired woman in a long, red coat and black boots, sat on a park bench.” Think how you would describe the image to someone who can’t see it. And make sure not to add too many keywords in your alt tags because Google may consider it spam.

Go beyond images

A multimedia approach is best, especially if you’re optimizing for visual search. Think product videos and 360-degree photos that bring static images to life. This will not only help you stand out in search, but also in the eyes of the customer.

Matches has high-quality videos and close-up shots to enhance the visual search and user experience. The different media options help shoppers see the product from several angles. 

Create your own visual search

Even though it’s not mainstream yet, creating your own visual search experience can help get ahead of the curve. Implementing it now gives you time to work out the issues before it becomes widely adopted. This way, your competitors will deal with technical issues while you’ve already hit your groove.

How do you build your own custom application with visual search features? You’ll find numerous visual search providers offer this service, such as Snap Vision, Intelistyle, Clarifai, and Syte among others.

Your own visual search can help shoppers find relevant results faster. It may even inspire them to add complementing products to finish the full look. As a bonus, you’ll also get even more data and insights on your customer behavior, adding to marketing opportunities.

Some brands are taking visual search into their own hands now, too. ASOS Style Match, for example, lets its app users upload or take a photo of an outfit, and the store will find similar product recommendations. It’s a great cross-sell and bundling opportunity. 

Remember Google Snippets

Ever notice how some Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) have a “People also ask” box with dropdown questions related to your query? It looks like this: 

Sometimes, they include images. You can use images to optimize for those highly coveted Google Snippets. Start by researching what type of images currently appear for your search query and add or replace them with a high-quality image that better captures the query.

Opt for photos with your product centered and move the image to the top of your page. Don’t forget to also add appropriate image titles and alt text.

Visual search platforms to know

For customers, visual search is a simple, interactive way of browsing products that closely match what they’re looking for. For ecommerce brands, it’s an untapped opportunity to have their product images appear in the searches.

But that’s just the basics. Visual search tools continue to get more advanced as technology improves. Social media platforms, especially image-driven ones like Pinterest and Snapchat, have also launched their own versions of visual search. The list of visual search platforms only continues to grow—here are a few popular ones you might want to note:

Google Lens

The Google Lens app, for example, is a seriously improved version of a basic image search. You can find recipes or directions, add events to your calendar, and translate words from a photo. Google Lens also allows users to find where to buy products online. They snap or upload a shot of the coveted piece, and Google will tell them where to get it. 

Over 12 billion monthly searches encompass a wide range of information, from identifying plants to translating signs. In 2022, Google launched Multisearch, which combines text and image search, making it easier to find variations of similar products.

Bing Visual Search

Microsoft’s search engine hit 100 million active users in 2023, so while not in the same league as Google, it’s still notable for its visual search feature. It works in a similar way—users can upload or take photos or paste image URLs to find similar search results.

Pinterest Lens

Users can take photos of an object or select parts of pins to find other related pins with Pinterest Lens. For example, by highlighting just the shoes of an outfit image, you can find pins related to the selected footwear. With more than 465 million monthly users going on Pinterest to find products, it’s definitely one to watch. 

This platform is all about inspiring its users. So, if your product images can be the source of a new home project or outfit idea, you can gain their attention before they go to a competitor.

Pinterest also publishes yearly predictions for which searches will trend. The predictions are based on their user searches, so it’s a good resource for ecommerce brands planning in advance.

Amazon Lens

Unsurprisingly, the world’s largest marketplace has also capitalized on visual search. Using the Amazon app, users have different ways to shop. They can use the Shop the Look feature to upload their own photo or browse public images by other users to find products, take a photo of an object, or scan a barcode. 

Find It On eBay

Launched back in 2017, eBay’s visual search feature lets mobile users snap a photo of a product, upload an image or screenshot, or scan a barcode to find similar listings. eBay had 135 million active users in 2022, so any ecommerce brands selling there shouldn’t sleep on optimizing images for the app’s visual search. 

Scan by Snapchat

Similar to Google Lens, Scan by Snapchat users can interact with almost anything using visual search. One of the features includes finding related products in partnership with Amazon so users can shop while using their favorite social media app.

Why visual SEO is important

Visual SEO isn’t just a marketing buzzword we’ll forget about when the next one comes along. It’s important to incorporate it into your SEO strategy alongside text-based searches so you can start creating a better customer experience.. As Google, social networks, Amazon, and other online platforms continue to bolster their visual search experience, the tech isn’t going anywhere soon.

A good search function is essential for 9 out of 10 U.S. consumers. That means if your store website or product images aren’t updated with SEO in mind, shoppers may soon abandon their carts. This is because it’ll take them too long to find exactly what they’re looking for. Or they may not find your product in search results at all.

With 43% of consumers aged 16 to 64 using the Internet regularly for researching products and brands, it’s even more important for smaller or lesser-known ecommerce brands to make sure their visual SEO strategy is on point or, at the very least, gets regularly updated.

For example, Australian furniture retailer King Living saw a 15% increase in clicks and overall revenue after it updated its site and replaced previously text-heavy content with product images. The brand found visuals more effectively communicating product information than just text descriptions. 

Besides helping users find products, SEO-optimized images improve website usability, also making it more mobile-friendly and load faster. Smartphones account for 74% of online purchases, so paying attention to the mobile experience is well worth it.

The benefits of visual searches go beyond hitting marketing goals. Those who may face a language barrier or can’t put what they’re looking for into words can use visual search technology to help find good quality information and answers in their daily life.

Implementing visual SEO into your ecommerce strategy

Setting up an effective visual SEO strategy takes time and effort, but the payoff for your ecommerce business can be huge. By optimizing your product images and site for visual search, you make it easier for interested customers to find you and explore your product range.

But visual SEO is just one part of a solid marketing plan. Together with a strategy for text-based searches, faster website speed, and a great mobile experience, you’ll be well on your way to more sales and customer engagement. 

Visual search optimization FAQ

What is visual search?

Visual search uses photos or screenshots instead of text to find relevant information or products. Users can upload or share an image using technologies like Google Lens, which will look for matching visual attributes instead of keywords.

How do I optimize an image for search?

Optimize your images for visual search using descriptive filenames and relevant alt text. Ensure the image is high-quality, shows the product in focus, and the file is compressed to avoid exceeding recommended file sizes based on platform requirements.

How do you optimize visual content?

Optimize visual site content with high-quality, high-resolution product photos and videos. If appropriate, include multiple angles, supporting lifestyle imagery, zoom functionality, and other multimedia elements like 360-spin images.

What is an example of visual search?

Examples of visual search include taking a photo of a plant on your phone and searching Google Lens to find information about it, using Pinterest Lens on a part of a pin to find matching objects, or snapping an outfit with Amazon’s app to find buying options.

What are ways to optimize your search?

Use a combination of visual and text-based search improvements. For example, use relevant keywords in metadata, text and image content, and URLs. Regularly create fresh, high-quality content to target search content, and refresh existing content.

What is the best image size for SEO?

The best image size for SEO depends on how you intend to use the image and any marketplace requirements. For a standard website, use a hero image with 1280×720 pixels, a blog image with 1200×630 pixels, and a thumbnail image with 150×150 pixels. Try to ensure file sizes are below 100 kB.

The post Visual Search Engine Optimization: How to Use Visual SEO to Boost Visibility and Sales appeared first on Path Edits.

When consumers browse your online store, the only way they can experience products is through images and descriptive copy. As such, your product photos are a powerful way for customers to experience your wares.

After all, people retain 80% of what they see while only remembering 20% of what they read. If the photos on your ecommerce site aren’t up to par, you’re likely missing out on sales.

30,000 sales and marketing pros get our insights, tips, and best practices delivered weekly.

But if the power to invest in high-quality product photography isn’t in your hands, you may need to make the case to your boss or superiors. Don’t worry—we’ve done the legwork for you. Just share these insights to make a compelling argument to your boss.

The benefits of product photography

There are a dozen reasons your product photography matters. But ultimately, the pros of high-quality product photos boil down to a few basic benefits.

Reduced returns

Accurate product photos are critical to reducing returns rates. You want to ensure photos depict how the items will appear in real life. This includes size, material, color, and more. Product photos with improper coloring, for example, can lead to increased returns. As many as 66% of online shoppers say color rendering in photos is important to them when browsing pants online.

Returns are costly for online businesses. The industry average hovers around 16%, and businesses lose about $165 million for every $1 billion in sales.

Lower bounce rates

According to one survey, the product photo is often the first or second thing online shoppers look at—along with the price. The last thing you want someone to do when they hit your product page is bounce. Poor quality photos will surely lead to high bounce rates because of a bad first impression.

Improved shopping experience

Online shoppers only have product images and a brief description to convince them to make a purchase. So, it’s no surprise that consumers have strong opinions about good product photos. In fact, 57% of shoppers say the number of product photos impacts their purchase decision when shopping for pants.

Quality also matters. According to Etsy, image quality is actually the most important consideration—90% of shoppers say it’s “extremely important” or “very important” when they make a purchase decision. 

Therefore, it stands to reason that customers want clear, concise copy paired with high-quality product photos.

Clarified value proposition

Customers can’t touch or try out your product when they’re browsing your ecommerce store. They have to immediately understand the value proposition of the product and why they should purchase it.

One way to build that kind of trust with customers is to provide crisp, clear product photos. High-quality images allow shoppers to see a product’s details, check out a product from multiple angles, and get a deeper sense that they understand exactly what they’re purchasing.

Images illustrate what your brand and products are about—which is precisely why you should ensure every photo is a solid representation of the brand. They help people understand what the brand is about. Telling someone your business cares about the community is one thing, showing them photos of you actually helping the community is much more powerful.

Poor quality images not only can leave potential sales on the table, but they can also degrade trust between the brand and customers. Blurry images prevent them from examining a product’s details and bad lighting means the product’s actual color or dimensions may be different from how it appears in photos. That can mean more returns or exchanges and a loss of customer loyalty.

Competitive advantage

Many small business owners struggle to get quality product photos. In fact, as many as 40% of new shop owners on Etsy list this as a “very difficult” or “somewhat difficult” challenge. And many online retailers are failing to meet consumers’ needs. Consider these insights from one study of people shopping online for pants:

• 67% want to see the front of pants and 66% want to see the back—so most shoppers want to see both the front view and the back view. While nearly 99% of stores show the front view, only 83% show the back.
• Approximately half of shoppers want to see detailed photos of the side seams of pants, and about 78% of stores do this. Just under 60% want to see photos of the “side faces”—which 71% of stores offer.
• 51% want to see detailed shots of the zippers on pants, while only 1.3% of stores have them.
• 42% want to see detailed shots of the rivet, 29% of the inside of the pants, and 25% of the inside of the pants pockets. The study didn’t find any merchants providing these types of photos.

Online stores selling pants show an average of 4.11 photos for each product. But it’s clear shoppers want more. If you can provide more than your competitors, you’re more likely to win the sale.

More shareability

Want your product to go viral? That’s less likely to happen with dark, blurry photos. Consumers are 40x more likely to share content that features an image across their social channels.

For example, research showed that Facebook posts with photos saw the most engagement over any other type of post — they accounted for 87% of total interactions. Another study showed tweets with images receive 18% more clicks, 89% more favorites, and 150% more retweets than tweets without images.

One solid example of this is Oreo, which created a 100-day, image-driven campaign to celebrate the cookie’s 100th anniversary. The results speak for themselves: In just 100 days, the brand gained more than a million Facebook fans and boosted interactions by 195%. 

Image: Storybox

3 arguments to make in favor of high-quality product photos

To add to the list of benefits above, you can further sway your superior with a handful of compelling arguments in favor of product photography. These reasons will help you make a solid case as well as respond to any potential objections your boss may have.

1. Product photography is an investment with an immediate and high ROI.

Potential objection: “Photography is expensive and has a high upfront cost.”

Your visual presentation counts with customers. From the design to your ecommerce site to the way you present your wares in images, these are visual factors shoppers note when considering a purchase. As a matter of fact, in one recent study, 93% of consumers cited images as a major consideration when making a purchasing decision online and more than half of consumers will leave a website if they don’t like how it looks.

As a result, upgrading your product photography game can an immediate impact on sales. To help you get it right the first time, consider these stats:

• A Splashlight survey showed that half want to see at least three to five product photos that shows the product at different angles
• In the same survey, more than half also wanted to see apparel in product photos on models
• Our analysis of the top fashion and apparel sites found that brands show an average of eight product photos per page

So, although product photography is undoubtedly an investment, it can help turn more of those browsers on your ecommerce site into buyers.

2. High-quality product photos is an industry best practice (and can help you beat out competitors).

Potential objection: “There are plenty of other ecommerce sites that don’t have professional product photos.”

One way to pique your boss’s attention is to bring up a potential competitive advantage. Because not all ecommerce sites have adopted professional-quality photography to showcase their products, this is one way to differentiate your brand from competitors in your niche.

 

 

 

 

 

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Make the case that using poor quality images is not only causing you to lose sales, but also leaves a gap for competitors to use to get a leg up on your brand.

That being said, more and more ecommerce brands are seeing the light and investing in professional photos. To drive home your point, ask your boss to put themselves in the mindset of a shopper. Show them a side-by-side comparison of two ecommerce sites; one with poor quality images and another selling similar products with professional photos. Which one would they personally buy from? 

3. Product photography doesn’t have to be prohibitively expensive.

Potential objection: “Building a photography department would be too expensive right now.”

Yes, the sky can be the limit when it comes to building your own photo department. Good photographers require good salaries and the necessary equipment can cause a serious case of sticker shock.

But you don’t have to go from nothing to an entire department. You can work with a freelance photographer to take product photos on an as-needed basis (which is far less expensive than shelling out for a full-time salary plus benefits).

 

 

 

 

 

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Depending on your needs, the photographer’s experience, and your location, a professional photographer will typically charge $75–$300 per hour or around $75–$375 per image. That’s far less expensive than paying the average salary of $38,901 per year plus benefits for a full-time photographer in the U.S.

If your boss prefers to keep your efforts in-house, then you can DIY your way to great product photos. By buying the right props and equipment, you can save a little cash without seriously sacrificing on quality. 

Make your case for quality product photos

Now that you can make a compelling argument to your boss convincing them to invest in product photography, here are some additional resources to help you navigate the process of creating high-quality images for your ecommerce biz:

• Martha Stewart Photo Stylist Shares Her Best Tips for Your Product Shots
• How to Build an Internal Product Photography Department
• Get Inspired: 50 Ecommerce Sites With Beautiful Product Photography 

The post How to Convince Your Team It’s Time to Invest in High-Quality Product Photography appeared first on Path Edits.

In this article we’re going to give you ideas on how to edit your product shots so they’re optimized to produce the most sales.

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1. Get rid of distractions and imperfections

Effective product photos make it quick and easy for shoppers to see what you’re selling. Too many distractions take away from the product itself.

Distractions can take many forms: maybe you have too many props, there might be background noise on a lifestyle shoot, the light might have created a glare, or you could have the unavoidable speck of dust or odd stain.

You can remove these distractions with photo retouching in Adobe Photoshop or a similar photo-editing software. You can find out how to remove unwanted objects with this tutorial, for example, or outsource it to a virtual photo editing studio that can handle it for you.

2. Crop to fill the frame

Your product should fill a majority of the frame. This is an Amazon requirement as well as an ecommerce best practice.

Filling the frame allows shoppers to have a better view of the product without having to zoom, squint, or click through—regardless of the device they’re using.

Oral care brand Keeko uses white background main images that zoom in on the product so it fills the frame. While the toothpaste product on the far left is larger in actual size than the floss on the far right, shoppers don’t necessarily need to see scale at this stage in the journey—they’ll get that through the secondary images on the actual product page.

3. Cull the appropriate number of product photos to edit

Not enough product photos won’t give shoppers enough information. But too many may cause information overwhelm. The key is to get it just right.

According to our analysis of 25 top brands, three to five product images is the sweet spot. For most brands and products, you’ll want at least three images:

1. Front of the product
2. Back of the product
3. A detail shot

Remember, best practices are guidelines, so it’s all about what works for your product and customers. You can also do a quick search on a popular ecommerce marketplace such as Amazon to see how many product images best-selling items have.

If you’re selling makeup, type “best makeup brands” on Amazon. Find one or two best sellers, click on the item, and take note of how many types of product photos that brand has.

You can also look on brands’ websites instead of just their Amazon listings, especially if you plan to sell direct to consumers via your own online store. Deodorant and wellness brand Native uses five product photos for its facial cleanser, for example—several of just the product on its own, as well as a few that include models.

4. Use white backgrounds

White backgrounds should be the standard for your main product photos, even if you can’t create a white background on set for whatever reason. They make it easy for shoppers to see products, compare items, and click through to the ones they’re interested in.

Generally, you’ll want to default to white backgrounds for online hero and main images.

Hero Cosmetics uses simple product-focused photos with a white background that really highlight its products and makes it easy to understand what options are right for you.

You don’t have to use stark white for your own website. Instead, you can opt for a hue or shade of white. Hylo Athletics, for example, uses an off-white background to showcase its vegan shoe line.

If you can’t create a white background for your photoshoot, you can always remove the background later. Once you remove the background, you can change the color to white or create a transparent background for more universal digital use.

5. Change the background color

While white backgrounds should be the standard for your main product photos, that doesn’t mean you should shy away from getting creative—especially for your own website or social media. You can change the background color using Photoshop or a similar tool.

Experiment with various colored backgrounds to see what resonates most with your audience. Be sure to follow these tips on how to choose the best color.

See how Nguyen Coffee Supply makes its coffee products stand out further using a blue background. Working to find one or two additional colors for your backgrounds can really help spice up your entire product page with very little additional effort.

6. Create lifestyle composites

Lifestyle photography typically involves more work—set design, props, styling, assistants, possibly even models. But it’s important to include both white background and lifestyle photography to appeal to a wider range of customers.

Essentially, you want to incorporate your products in as many “real-world” use cases as you can to give more context to the prospective buyers. If you don’t have the extra budget for models, props, photographer, and locations for your lifestyle shoot, you can outsource it.

You can send your white background images and chosen stock photos to a studio to create for you. Or, you can hire a professional photography studio like Products On White Photography to shoot and edit the composites for you.

7. Fix lighting errors

Proper and effective lighting always starts at the photo shoot. It’s always best, but not always possible, to get the lighting right during the shoot. But sometimes you’ll need to fix it afterwards—maybe the weather wasn’t working, there was a glare, or you had unwanted reflections.

So if you’re unable to get the lighting right for your shoot, you can use a few simple lighting effects in post processing.

Here’s an example shared by Mandi Johnson, a fashion photographer and blogger. As you can clearly see, just a small change in lighting can dramatically change the look and feel of the same photo. Depending on your specific brand identity and positioning you can use lighting tweaks to really hone in on the exact feel your audience resonates with.

8. Use shadows

Just as it’s important to pay attention to lighting during your shoot, you’ll also want to keep an eye on the shadows in your product photos. Shadows give dimension to lifeless, flat white background photos. They’re challenging but can make a dramatic difference.

Add a drop shadow

If your shadows weren’t working at the time of the shoot, you can add a realistic drop shadow in Photoshop afterwards.

Here’s a great example of shadows that complement the product with Farmacy. The usage of shadows here make the product feel more life-like as opposed to a standard boring stock photo.

Add a reflection shadow

While natural shadows are often manipulated during the shoot, reflection shadows are typically added during post production. It’s a great way to add drama to your product images.

Luxury products, jewelry, perfume, and cosmetics often get reflection shadows. That’s because these items are often sold in department store environments with bright fluorescent lighting and reflective glass cases—so the shadow mimics that in-person experience.

Revision Skincare uses reflection shadows effectively for its product line. In this specific case, the shadow is what’s known as a reflection shadow, helping the image feel more three dimensional.

9. Fix colors to appear realistic and lifelike

Product photos need to accurately represent what you’re selling. It’s one thing to make your photos look good, but it’s another to over-edit or exaggerate your product to the point of being unrealistic.

From a color perspective, this means no filters or saturation. It’s important the colors in your images appear the same as they do in real life.

Be especially mindful when selling clothing, given it has the highest return rates. While the wrong size and fit are often the biggest reasons for returns, differences between a color on your site and how it looks in real life can impact returns significantly.

10. Use color change edits instead of reshooting

Using color change edits can maximize your investment. Instead of taking multiple photos of the same product just with a different color, you can use color change edits. Simply take one photo and create the rest through post processing.

Many top ecommerce brands, for example, use color variants to quickly show what the product would look like with a different color without taking a new photo entirely. Same models, style, look, just an edit to change the color in post production. For example, True Classic shows off its product bundle of nine of the same t-shirt, just different colors.

Instead of taking photos of nine individual shirts, it could take a photo of just one shirt and then change the color through editing. This can not only save time, it helps keep your product photos consistent as well.

11. Remove wrinkles from clothing

Wrinkles on apparel products look sloppy and unprofessional, plus it may make shoppers question the quality of not only your products but your service.

While you may iron and steam thoroughly before (and during) shooting, wrinkles are often inevitable. Removing wrinkles from your product photos helps show you care about the details and fortunately doesn’t take too much additional time on your part.

Here’s an example from Motif Concept Store:

12. Repurpose photos into videos and animated GIFs

Product photos don’t have to be limited to stills. In fact, many of the most successful ecommerce brands use other media types, including animated GIFs and product videos to provide a more dynamic shopping experience with context, ultimately driving more sales.

Fortunately you can often repurpose and reuse your photos, videos, and GIFs on a variety of channels and make your efforts go all that much farther.

For example, video is the top media format marketers use, with many taking advantage of short-form videos (videos that last less than a minute) due to how well-suited they are for social media engagement.

Incorporating video, even at a small scale, can help your products stand out, especially as consumers continue to consume more short-form content, and that content continues to drive return on investment (ROI).

Here’s how Graza uses video and GIFs for its olive oil products. It incorporates both stills and video to showcase its olive oil in action.

With editing tools such as Adobe Premiere and Apple Final Cut Pro, you can create videos in just a few minutes. For animated GIFs, try EZGIF or Make A GIF.

13. Reduce image file size

Image file size impacts page load time—bigger files take longer to load. A slow-loading website or page leads to a poor user experience (reducing conversion rates) while also hurting your SEO (reducing traffic). That’s why it’s important to reduce the file size of your photos before uploading them to your site.

Luckily, there are many ways to do so without affecting the quality of your product photos. And you can use tons of free tools like TinyPNG and Kraken.io.

14. Add alt text to increase visibility in search 

Optimizing product photos for SEO is also incredibly important. Over one-third of ecommerce traffic comes directly from search, and this figure continues to grow.

One way to optimize for SEO is to include alt text for all of your product photos. Not just for SEO, alt text is also essential to help those who may be visually impaired navigate your site. Alt text is a hidden data field you can add in Photoshop, on your computer, or when you upload the photos to your website or marketplace channel.

Provide as much context as you can while describing the image in a neutral and non-subjective way. Here’s a great example by Semrush:

Use targeted and descriptive keywords relevant to your products. Do basic keyword research around your products to see which terms are being searched around your specific products. 

15. Test your way to optimized product photos

We’ve covered a lot of ground on how to optimize your product photos so far, and while implementing the suggestions above will put you ahead of the competition, it’s very important you take a “testing” mindset into the process of improving your product photos.

You won’t know what works best for your business or brand simply by reading about what should work, you need to test things out for yourself. Of course, knowing the latest research on how consumers behave is a good place to start.

Ecommerce consumer research tool PickFu surveyed 100 consumers and found that roughly 50% of consumers look at price first and half of them would then look at the photos. Product titles and descriptions, while still important, weren’t as critical to those who were surveyed.

They recommend using tools such as Google Optimize and AB Tasty to A/B test your product photography.

When it comes to testing your product photos to see what works best, you’ll first want to have a baseline. Use a baseline when testing different product photo variations.

Below is an example. On the left, is the standard baseline. On the right is where different categories and product offerings are introduced.

Here are some ideas to test for your own product photos:

• Big vs. small product photos: Once you have your baseline, experiment with different sized images on your product pages. An easy test to run is smaller photos vs larger photos. While testing different sized images, it’s important to always make sure the images look good on mobile and tablet devices, otherwise your test will be wasted.
• Number of images: Try listing only a few products per page, or add your entire collection. Consider running each test for a few days and take note of any significant change of purchases, add to carts etc. Choose a few parameters to test, and stick with it for a few weeks before making any additional changes or running more experiments.
• Lifestyle vs. white background photos: Experiment with different backgrounds and contexts with your product photos across social, product collection pages, ads through post-production and editing. Measure Click Through Rate to establish a baseline. Social media is great for getting a “gut reaction” to any test you might run. Experiment with “quick view” to help keep potential customers on the same product without having to open a new page

Invest in high-quality photos and edits in the first place

Ultimately, there’s no shortage of tactics and strategies to improve your product photos and in the process improve your conversions. But investing in high-quality photos and editing is one of the most effective ways to take your product photos to the next level and drive more sales.

The post 15 Ways to Edit Product Photos to Boost Sales appeared first on Path Edits.

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But shadows can be effective at making your product pop and appear more appealing. Let’s step out of the dark and into the light and see a few ways you can use shadow edits to elevate your product images and drive more sales. 

What is a shadow edit?

A shadow edit is when you create, edit, add, remove, or otherwise manipulate shadows or reflections in an image. You can create shadows with the help of editing software like Photoshop and Lightroom. Common shadow effects include drop shadow, floating shadow, and reflection shadow.

Many of our clients send drop shadow edits along with clipping path edits. That’s because the two editing techniques together can take a flat, lifeless image and give it dimension, depth, and visual interest.

You can also use shadow edits to create different creative visual effects, or edit out mistakes.

Types of shadow edits

There are five types of shadow edits, each with its own visual effect and level of editing effort.

1. Drop shadow

A drop shadow is when you create a silhouette of a product very close to its edges. This shadow gives definition to the product by creating a light gray layer of varying opacity, angle, and saturation to one or more of its sides, making an otherwise flat image look more 3D and helping the product stand out from the background. 

2. Floating shadow

A floating shadow is placed below the product as if the ray of light is hitting it on the top, creating a shadow beneath. This adds dimension to the shot by making the product appear as though it’s floating above an imaginary and invisible surface. 

Floating shadows are fun, creative, and playful—they work especially well for marketing product images. See how the floating shadow makes this sneaker appear as though it’s flying:

3. Reflection shadow

A reflection shadow makes it appear as though the product is resting on a reflective surface. This type of shadow edit is often used for cosmetics, electronics, sunglasses, jewelry, perfume, and other luxury and glam shots. 

4. Natural shadow

A natural shadow edit is when you create a realistic shadow for images without any due to on-set lighting limitations or complex, uneven edges. The natural shadow makes it appear as though the object is resting on a non-reflective surface. 

A natural shadow makes items on a white background look more realistic and less artificial and flat—thus more appealing to a potential buyer. Plus, the shadow mimics the actual size and shape of the product, so it looks like a naturally cast shadow—not an effect added after the fact.

To add a natural shadow, we first create a clipping path to isolate the product and then use several Photoshop tools to create, place, and color the shadow to look like a natural one.

5. Existing shadow

An existing shadow edit is when you fine tune or enhance an existing, natural shadow that was created during the shoot by exposing one side of the object to a source of light. 

If the photographer did their job well, you can use the existing shadow in the final shot. It may still require minor tweaking to be featured on a different background, for example, but overall it’s all about keeping it natural. 

Ways to use shadow edits to improve product photos

Here are some ways to use shadow edits in your product photos to make the most of your investment.

Add dimension to your white background photos

Product images on plain white backgrounds can look flat. If you only apply clipping path or image masking, your results will be equally flat. But if you add floating shadow or drop shadow, the products come to life, bringing dimension to the frame and differentiating the product from the background. Suddenly your images don’t look flat anymore and thus your products are more appealing. 

Make jewelry shine

Reflection shadows are common for luxury products, and it works well for jewelry in particular. The reflection adds dimension to the frame, making it appear as though the jewelry is sitting on a reflective surface, and reiterates the details in the jewelry. 

This shadow effect mimics the in-store environment of most jewelry stores—think fluorescent lighting, lots of mirrors, and reflective glass display cases. 

Put your image on a new background

Not all product images have to have white backgrounds. In fact, there are many instances where you’ll want to get creative and use an alternative to white background ecommerce photos. 

But when you remove the original background to replace it with a new one, the output isn’t always seamless. The lighting and composition are likely different for both shots, so it likely requires some small touches and finesse to turn a composited photo into a natural-looking one. 

In this case, you’ll likely retain the original shadow and use an existing shadow edit to make it look natural in its new context. 

Fix distracting shadows or soften the harsh ones

One of the popular reasons to order shadow-making services is to fix the existing shadows. Sometimes you may want to make them less pronounced, as they take too much focus off the object.

In the below example with the red toy car, the shadow is rather complex, harsh and unnecessarily long. Whatever shadow is left in the “after” example only provides some depth and natural look to the product without overpowering it or taking away the focus from it. 

You may also want to fix lighting in post-production by retouching harsh lines coming from direct sources of light used without diffusers. Remember, shadows in your product shots should be much like shadows in real life—unnoticeably in the background, not competing with your product.

Remove shadows of unwanted elements

It happens quite often that some element is gone from the original image due to the reshuffling of objects in composition and whatnot. But the shadow might still be left in. That’s when you need to consider retouching helps too.

For example, this T-shirt has the shadow of the hanger and the rail in the original shot, while the resulting image has had it all removed: the objects as well as their shadows. 

Add unrealistic and creative shadows

This shadow edit is more creative than it is technical—it requires some outside the box thinking. Adding a creative shadow could result in stunning creative for ads or print photos.

Here’s an example from former tennis champion Stakhovskiy who turned into a wine producer. His creative social media shots use references to the championship period of the now-wine-maker quite a bit. This is how it used a shadow to tell a story. 

Outsource your shadow edits to a team of experts

Shadows are subtle but impactful elements to your photos that can take an ordinary product image and turn it into a major sales tool. Shadows bring products to life, add dimension to white background shots, and even lend themselves to creative ideas.

But not everyone has time to create the perfect shadows for every image. And when you can’t manipulate the lighting source on set, it’s difficult to get a consistent look and feel. That’s where drop shadow editing services come into play. You can send all your shadow needs to our virtual photo editing studio, starting at just 25¢ per image.

The post Step Into the Light: 6 Ways to Use Shadow Edits to Get Better Product Photos appeared first on Path Edits.

Outsourcing doesn’t need to be some forbidden word. Many of the most successful entrepreneurs outsource to help them focus on what they do best.

In this article, we’re going to cover everything you need to know about how to outsource your ecommerce business tasks and which areas are best to hand off to a qualified third-party professional.

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What is ecommerce outsourcing?

Ecommerce outsourcing is when an ecommerce business pays a third-party vendor to manage various aspects of the business. Many ecommerce businesses outsource tasks to increase bandwidth, move more quickly, or get expertise in an area they lack resources. As many businesses look to be more efficient and keep costs low, more are turning to ecommerce outsourcing given the many benefits outsourcing provides.

Deloitte reports global spending on outsourcing could reach upwards of $731 billion in 2023. And a 2022 survey found that over one-third of businesses are actually increasing the amount of work they outsource. Nearly half of businesses were already in the process of outsourcing or looking to improve their outsourcing strategy at the time the survey was taken.

Editor’s note: Outsourcing isn’t to be confused with automation. Automation is when you use tools to automatically fire off specific actions, according to established variables or prerequisites.

Outsourcing is less of a “set it and forget it” deal. Instead, it requires more trust due to a hand-off of certain business functions to an external resource to handle independently. Just like with hiring the right employees, the vendors you choose will have a direct impact on what you’re able to accomplish.

Of course, outsourcing isn’t a one-size-fits-all strategy, there are different types of outsourcing each of which may be best suited for your specific needs.

Types of ecommerce outsourcing

Here are the types of outsourcing you’ll need to be aware of to make the best decision for your business.

Local ecommerce outsourcing

Local outsourcing is when you work with vendors at a local level. For example, you could hire an advertising agency in your town to help drive traffic to your ecommerce business, an especially strategic move if you’re targeting people who live in the area. You could also hire a local social media firm to help assist in getting the word out about your products.

Benefits of local outsourcing

• Close proximity to your vendor: While businesses have benefited massively from a global economy, being able to meet with your vendors in person can bring peace of mind and create more rapport.
• Localized expertise: Your vendor will deeply understand the challenges and pain points of your local market. They can even advise you with insights about your target audience.

Nearshore ecommerce outsourcing

Nearshore outsourcing is when you work with a vendor located in your greater surrounding area. For example, if you’re in the United States and work with an outsourcing vendor in Canada, that would fall under the nearshore outsourcing umbrella.

Benefits of nearshore outsourcing

• Similar time zones: When working with a nearshore vendor, you can communicate during your regular business hours. While this can be convenient, it does have the downside in that you don’t get the added benefit of having work done overnight.
• Similar culture and working environments: Working with a vendor who shares similar culture and work environments can help save time on communication and outsourcing processes. That said, as the world has become more globalized, this benefit can often be overstated. Many outsourcing firms from all over the world have capable and talented employees who can work with you on your every need.
• Predictable costs: Working with a nearshore outsourcing firm can be helpful when budgeting because you’re more likely to be familiar with how much a particular service is supposed to cost.

Offshore ecommerce outsourcing

Offshore outsourcing is when you work with a vendor located in a different country, typically overseas—hence the term “offshore.” As business becomes more globally connected, offshore outsourcing is becoming increasingly common. According to data shared by Microsourcing, some of the most common offshore outsourcing tasks include IT, finance, and payroll, with many businesses using offshore outsourcing to assist.

Benefits of offshore outsourcing

• Cost effective: Working with an offshore vendor is one way to keep your costs low. That isn’t to suggest you should take advantage of your vendors to get the absolute lowest quote—you still need quality work, after all. But there can be some pretty significant cost benefits to using offshore outsourcing.
• 24/7 coverage: Having someone work on your tasks overnight can give you a serious advantage. If you need a design request fulfilled overnight for an important presentation in the morning, waking up to it can be a game changer. 

Why should you outsource? 3 major benefits of ecommerce outsourcing

Businesses turn to outsourcing for many reasons. For some, it’s a purely cost decision. For others, being able to outsource an important component of business can help a business scale. As a business owner, knowing certain tasks are completed like clock-work can help keep you focused on your biggest-win opportunities.

Here are some of the major benefits of ecommerce outsourcing.

1. Outsourcing can save you money

According to Deloitte, 88% of businesses said they were able to save money by outsourcing. Outsourcing can help you control costs by allowing you to strategically invest in the services you need, rather than having to spend money on hiring new full-time employees as well as additional equipment, software, and tools.

Many businesses find themselves in the place of needing help, but not quite ready to make an additional in-house hire. Because outsourcing vendors handle all the logistics of the given tasks, you can get quality expertise at a fraction of the cost.

2. Ecommerce outsourcing allows you to focus on your strengths

Instead of spending time on tedious and time-consuming tasks, ecommerce outsourcing allows you to focus on your strengths. For example, if you’re good at marketing, but it takes two hours to create and edit a product image to use on social media, you could use our clipping path photo editing service to take the cut-outs completely off your plate.

You can then use those extra hours to drive awareness to your business, a much better use of your time. Growing a business is difficult, outsourcing can help you stay on track and avoid burnout.

3. Outsourcing helps you scale your business more quickly

Perhaps the biggest and most obvious benefit of ecommerce outsourcing is how it allows you to grow your business quickly. According to a survey conducted by Clutch, over 90% of small businesses have plans to use outsourcing in 2022 to help them grow.

You can focus on the revenue-generating aspects of your business rather than being bogged down by the necessary—but not big picture—needs of your business.

Which tasks to outsource in your ecommerce business

The benefits of outsourcing are clear, but what should you outsource? Let’s take a look at some of the specific tasks you can outsource.

Photo editing

Photo editing is one of those tasks that can be incredibly time-consuming but also essential to virtually any product-based business. The last thing you want is to use low-quality and poorly edited images, which ultimately reflects the quality of your brand.

If your images aren’t high-quality, will your products be?

Editing photos can take anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour per shot. This time adds up, especially if you’re not a photo editing expert. Photo editing can often take away valuable hours that can be used to focus on the essential—which is why it often makes so much sense to outsource.

Here are some of the photo editing tasks you can consider outsourcing:

• Clipping paths and image masking for background removal
• Color variants to launch new prints or add more color to your photos instead of holding a whole new photoshoot
• Ghost mannequin to bring your apparel product photos to life
• Photo retouching to remove wrinkles from fabric, smudges on your product, glares, and other imperfections

We handle your tedious and time-consuming edits so you can focus on more important tasks or your advanced edits done in-house.

Product photography

Photo editing isn’t the only photo-related task you should consider outsourcing. Using ecommerce outsourcing for product photography can save you even more time and money.

Product photography is essential to your ecommerce business because your product photos are how your potential customers get to know about your product—product images replace that in-store product experience. In fact, one Weebly survey found that more than three-quarters of people find quality product images to be “very influential” to their purchase decision.

White background product photos are perfect for outsourcing. If you plan on using white backgrounds for your product photos, it’s not as simple as just taking a product photo and removing the background. For the highest quality images, you have to customize the lighting for every shot and angle if you want to get your photos right. Let the product photography experts handle it. 

Silk dress brand VAUGHAN outsources simple photo retouching jobs. It was a no-brainer, as the brand didn’t need to waste money on an in-house graphic designer when a basic knowledge of Photoshop will do the trick. VAUGHAN outsources tasks like background removal and change so it can sell on Amazon.

If you want the highest quality product photos, it almost always makes sense to hire outside professional photographers to help you with your shoot. Here are some places to start your search for expert product photographers:

• Products on White Photography
• Squareshot
• Slack’s professional photographer channel
• Fstoppers, The LawTog, or Ladies Behind The Lens Facebook groups

Marketing and social media

Marketers are feeling more spread thin than ever. According to Semrush, nearly 64% of marketers said they wish they had more time and resources to focus on their core tasks in marketing. Ecommerce outsourcing can not only help support your marketing team, but it can help keep costs low by not having to hire additional full-time employees.

Here are a few of the things you can outsource within marketing:

• Social media: While social media can be an incredibly powerful tool, keeping up to date with the latest trends, best practices, not to mention time spent posting can get time consuming, quickly. Working with an ecommerce outsourcing vendor to tackle social media is one of the easiest ways to free up time. From editing images to the right dimensions for a specific social media platform or even the actual posting itself, there’s no shortage of tasks you can outsource for social media.

Motif Concept Store, an apparel brand for women, uses outsourcing to help with both its product photography and social media marketing.

• Content creation: Not only does posting on social media take time, but so does creating the actual content itself, not to mention your other content marketing tasks. Whether you need help with blog posts optimized for SEO or strategic marketing campaigns that require specific images or assets, outsourcing your content creation can, again, help save you significant amounts of time and money.
• Community management: You can use an ecommerce outsourcing vendor to help you stay on top of questions and inquiries across social media and your standard support channels. Having a team available to answer support-related inquiries around the clock can help you provide a world-class customer experience.

When outsourcing marketing and social media tasks, consider vendors who have experience in multiple social media platforms as well as experience with community management.

Web development and IT

Website maintenance is a never-ending process. Using a vendor specializing in web development can be invaluable in helping keep your site secure, technically optimized, and help take basic web development tasks off your plate.

Here are a few things you can outsource to a web development firm.

• Maintaining your ecommerce store: You can outsource the maintenance of your ecommerce store including, updating plugins, security patches, resolving server downtime and more.
• Running site speed and technical SEO audits: Your site speed is incredibly important when it comes to conversions. A slow site is detrimental to your bottom line. Additionally, having an outsourcing vendor audit your site for SEO improvements can go a long way in ensuring your site ranks well in search.
• Uploading images and product photos: Send over your images and product photos to your outsourced web development and IT team and let them handle the rest.
• Publishing blog content: Creating content is time consuming no matter how you slice it. Use an outsourcing partner to take that final draft and upload it to your website. A 2020 report by the Content Marketing Institute found that 84% of businesses have outsourced at least one aspect of their content marketing efforts.
• Building landing pages for new product launches: Stop wasting time building the perfect landing page and instead outsource the task to a vendor that has marketing chops.
• Setting up new email accounts: Have a systemized process for creating new email accounts and other important software you use to run your business.

Be sure to check out review sites like Clutch, GoodFirms, and G2 which each have detailed reviews of hundreds of web development and IT vendors.

Manufacturing

What’s great about outsourcing your manufacturing is you can focus more on brainstorming new product ideas and then letting your vendor take care of the rest. “We put the entire operation on our 3PL partner and now I don’t even think about it. It ended up costing less than paying for everything we need to keep doing self fulfillment,” says Allen Walton, founder of surveillance gear company, SpyGuy.

Outsourcing vendors that specialize in manufacturing have the systems, tools, and resources to help you create your products at scale. Manufacturing and fulfillment vendors can help with:

• Product development: You can hire a partner to help develop your product concept and bring it to life. 
• Holding raw materials: Your outsourced manufacturer can hold all the raw materials needed for production so you don’t have to invest in renting additional space.
• Manufacturing expertise: A strategic vendor can help provide improvements on the overall production process and introduce ways to decrease costs and improve your bottom line.

Virtual assistance

There are some truly incredible virtual assistant companies that operate all over the world that can help take those mundane tasks off your todo list. Using virtual assistants you can have them:

• Manage email: Keep track of important emails and stop being overwhelmed with your inbox.
• Answer and make calls: A dedicated virtual assistant can help screen your calls and answer any incoming calls related to your business.
• Customer service: Use a VA to respond to basic customer service inquiries or requests.
• Data entry: With a virtual assistant vendor you no longer need to spend hours of your time entering basic data into a spreadsheet.
• Slide decks: A VA can also help put together a deck for an important presentation as well.
• Research: Your VA can be a great resource to help you do research on potential product ideas, competitors, and best practices to grow your business.

Pro tip: When choosing a VA vendor, remember to account for timezones, so you know exactly what to expect for your outsourcing workflow.

VAs are often available at an affordable rate. Wise Advise virtual assistants, for example, have VA services available for just $25/hour.

Business operations

As your company grows, don’t let the increase of admin tasks bog you down. Outsourcing some of the operational aspects of your business can help you focus on your core strengths.

Here are some related tasks you can outsource:

• HR documentation: You can outsource everything from standard employee contracts to creating onboarding documentation for new hires as well as standard operating procedures (SOPS) for your company to follow.
• Shipping: Stop wasting your time going to and from the post office. Find a third-party logistics (3PL) vendor to take care of shipping and fulfillment.
• Data analysis: Your vendor can help you with data analysis regarding your business’s performance and more.

Accounting

If finances and accounting isn’t your strong suit, you should definitely consider outsourcing this critical part of your business. Even if you enjoy accounting, it may not be the best use of your time.

Keeping track of your sales, customers, and metrics can get pretty chaotic, pretty quick. An outside vendor can help you with your accounting to ensure you have an accurate and up to date picture of your finances.

Vendors here can be especially helpful in saving you money on taxes and other other accounting best practices.

3 tips for successful ecommerce outsourcing

Now that we’ve covered all the things you can outsource, here are some extra tips to help you get the most from your outsourcing.

1. Get clear on your goals

Know from the start what you’re hoping to accomplish through outsourcing. Having a clear goal in mind will help ensure you’re getting the best bang for your buck. If you can’t clearly articulate your outsourcing goals, chances are an outsourcing vendor won’t be able to either.

Are you looking to improve your customer service? Are you wanting to optimize your manufacturing and product development process?

Being able to communicate your challenges and goals clearly with your potential vendor will help set you up for long term success.

2. Communication is everything

Open and strong communication with your vendors is a must. Setting communication guidelines and expectations up front is critical for getting the most out of your working relationship. Get in the habit of over communicating across the board to ensure you and your vendors are on the same page.

You should also negotiate with your vendors before signing anything. Make sure the terms are something both you and the vendor are happy with.

In addition, while working with your vendor (and even before you start) get everything in writing. Not only can this help you legally in a worst case scenario, it can also help keep everyone aligned.

3. Choose a flexible outsourcing partner

Businesses are complex and always evolving. Sometimes you may only want an outsourcing partner for a short time. Other times, it makes sense to find a partner long term.

Choose a vendor that is flexible to your needs, both now in the future. For example, if you’re outsourcing manufacturing, can they handle a 10x increase in volume as you expect in Q4? Can your vendor assist in other areas of your business as well?

At Path we have 300+ designers and has been in business for nearly 15 years so you know we’ll be here for a while. Whatever your photo editing needs, there’s a good chance we can handle it.

Looking to outsource your photo editing?

While there’s no shortage of tasks you can outsource, photo editing is the perfect place to start and it can truly be one of the best investments you ever make.

Your talent and creative energy are best spent doing what you love—not fiddling in Photoshop for hours. With Path, you can have professionally edited photos in under 6 hours.

FAQs about ecommerce outsourcing

What is ecommerce outsourcing?

Ecommerce outsourcing is when you choose to work with outside vendors to take care of a specific set of tasks related to your ecommerce business. You can use ecommerce outsourcing for anything from marketing, to finance, to project management.

What are the benefits of outsourcing in ecommerce?

Keeping costs low as you scale. Freeing up time to focus on more strategic initiatives for your business. Utilizing expertise outside of your domain.

The post Ecommerce Outsourcing: Get Back to What’s Important in Your Business appeared first on Path Edits.

If you just started selling online, you might be wondering how to edit product photos white backgrounds on a budget. We get that. And we’ll show you how below.

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If you’ve been in business long enough to know the power of good product imagery, you might be looking for ways to optimize the entire process—so you get the most crisp images against a really white background. At reasonable rates. On time, every time.

Why put photos on pure white backgrounds

Before getting into the technicalities of achieving a pure white background for your product images in post production, let’s understand why most products are shot against white to start with.

To support just how important image quality is for your online sales, research from Deloitte found that customers perceive content quality as a key pillar to brand building—this includes your product images. 

There are at least five reasons why ecommerce marketers want to have a product white background for their imagery:

Put white backgrounds to spotlight your product

You want to sell the product, not the background—so that’s what you want people to pay attention to. Avoid busy backgrounds and other distractions. Any colored, textured or patterned setting around your item will steal some of the spotlight from the product, making it less pronounced, competing for attention.

Marketplaces require pure white backgrounds

Amazon and many other third-party ecommerce marketplaces require your product photos to have a pure white background. Take a look at Amazon and you’ll see every pixel on the page is crowded with visual information and cues.

Marketplaces are there to make money, so they use intricate user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) design to guide their users to purchase.Streamlining the visuals from their millions of vendors reduces additional distractions and creates a cohesive, on-brand look for the marketplace itself.

In the below thread called White Background Pics on Amazon’s Seller Central forum, merchants confirm that any non-white background is detrimental to product search rankings, as the algorithm suppresses those listings. 

Another seller points out, addressing such photography mistakes gives a boost in sales: 

Long story short: When on Amazon, follow Amazon’s guidelines for product photos—and whatever other marketplace you’re selling on.

Pure white background photos are easy to edit

If you want to replace an existing background with a transparent or colored one, the easiest starting point is a product image with a white background. Many photo-editing platforms like Photoshop provide a few tools in their rich arsenal designed specifically for whitening a selection or making white pop, for example.

Create a universal starting point for every channel

If you need to repurpose your product photos for other channels, white background images are an excellent base. For example, you might promote an image on Instagram, use it on your website’s product page, and list the item on eBay or Etsy—you can start with your white background images and manipulate them accordingly.

Pure white backgrounds are universal, unobtrusive and adaptable for multiple uses and channels. Ambiance-rich hues, like neon or RGB-range backgrounds, are only good in certain marketing contexts—for example on social media or in commercials. Just like textured backdrops, they are rather limiting this way.

There is a time and place to get creative though. Check out these ideas for product photo backgrounds that aren’t white.

Cultivate visual consistency

Maintaining consistency in your visual approach and branding is more complex than you might think. There’s so much nuance and detail—every pixel, font, and hue can impact consistency and brand recognition.

Plus, consistent product photos make it easy for people to comparison shop. It’s easier to compare two items when their images are similar, as opposed to products that have two different photographic approaches. Showing your product against a really white background helps consumers clearly see the object’s details, improves the professionalism of your brand, and ensures consistency.

But removing a product image from its background takes time, money, and energy. And while you can find cheap background removal services and apps, the quality and reliability of these tools may not always be up to your standards. After all, the last thing you want is for your beautiful product to look inferior after a subpar editing job.

Save a ton of time with pro background removal from 39¢ per image

7 ways to put a product on a white background on a budget

In the best-case scenario, you won’t even have to remove background from product photography in post-production, as you invested the time, effort, and skills to shoot the object against the white background to start with. However, this isn’t always possible with limited resources, as white background product photography involves quite a bit of experience in handling multiple lighting sources, reflectors, and diffusers.

Below we review the pros and cons of all available options for every budget and skillset.

1. Create a white background for your shoot

Estimated startup cost: $750+

Fixed upfront cost can include either daily studio and equipment rental or a monthly studio rental + purchasing of photo equipment. Both variants also include the services of a photographer whose per day rate or monthly salary depend widely on the skills and geography. Let’s consider daily hire for example’s sake.

• Studio rent per day: starting at $200 per day
• Equipment rental per day [camera, tripod, lighting, reflectors]: starting at $250 per day
• Photographer: starting from $300 per day
• Total per day minimum without an assistant and transportation: $750

Estimated cost per image: $2.50+

Taking perfectly white background product photos from the get-go will dramatically reduce the amount of time and money you need to spend editing them. Typically all you have to do is to touch up color contrast and retouch any minor imperfections.

While you get the best results this way, it comes with a lot of caveats and upfront investment in equipment and skill-building.

These are some considerations to account for when setting up a white background photoshoot:

1. The choice of the backdrop itself. You can use a roll of paper on a stand, a piece of acrylic as the basis, or a white seamless wall in a studio. Backdrops come in glossy and matte variants, they each have their limitations and advantages in terms of portability, reflection, and durability.
2. The distance between the object, the camera, and the background also play a role in how the lighting will reflect from your item. Improper setup could result in overexposure and flares in your photos.
3. The entire lighting equipment setup is mission-critical for any type of photography, let alone for product images against a white setting. The power of lights, angle, direction, and height all play a role into how your background will be lit, and whether it has glares or unwanted shadows. The size of the item, the studio setup, and the products reflective and transparent qualities add further complexity to this style of photography.
4. Hire a photographer who specializes in white background. A skilled photographer is needed to manage the entire arsenal of lighting equipment in the studio, and some experimentation is required to arrange all reflective elements and sources of light for a perfect shot. A few test shots will allow you to see if the light spread is even or if you need to make some final tweaks to your lighting setup.
5. Find natural light. If you need to DIY your product shoot on a budget, you may also consider a natural light source. However, there are other limitations, like time restraints, inconsistency as the sun moves relative to the object, and inability to control intensity of light overall.

While it’s best to take a high quality image with proper lighting against the white backdrop to start with, this method comes at a cost. There are hefty upfront expenses, like studio and equipment rental, as well as hiring a professional photographer to deal with the intricacies of setting up the location.

The anti-example below exhibits an unevenly creased and partially patterned background in an inconsistent natural light with shadows—everything that can and should be avoided in the above-described scenario. So this was ultimately a case for an advanced photo editing team that knows how to edit the background of a photo by hand. Needless to say, that natural hair is a bit of a challenge to edit and a variety of techniques can be used to achieve a true-to-life result, for example clipping paths and image masking. 

Polish up your product shots with pro retouching from 79¢ per image

Pros

• Results in clean, crisp, high-quality product photos—arguably the best on this list
• Only minor edits are required in post production

Cons

• Comparatively expensive, specifically for smaller batches of editing jobs in per image rates
• Time-consuming and labor-intensive
• Requires a proven photo professional to set up lighting, do test shots, and conduct the shoot

2. Choose an online automation tool

Estimated startup cost: $0

Estimated cost per image: 88¢

Remove.bg pricing plans 2022

Problem is, automated product photo editing tools rely on AI and algorithms instead of human skill. Many times, you’ll find part of your product gets removed when you didn’t want it to, or a portion of your background remains visible even after you’ve tried to get rid of it. You certainly don’t want to be the victim of a Photoshop fail.

Even when the AI photo editors do get it right, you have to spend time carefully checking each and every image for errors—a painstakingly tedious and time-consuming ($$) process.

You’ll likely need to make some detailed edits yourself. Most of these automation tools offer ways to tweak your image after the initial background removal, but trying to fight against the algorithm to fix the image can become such a hassle that the program is no longer quick—nor easy—to use.

Related: 5 Jobs That AI Can Never Replace in Your Ecommerce Business 

If you don’t take the time to finesse product images after the initial background removal, you could end up with an inferior image. But you may not get the results you desire with these limited tools. 

Apowersoft: background eraser reviews on App Store

Remember, consumers have a ton of options when shopping online, so showcasing your product with high-quality, professional images is key to standing out from the competition.

Pros

• Very inexpensive and affordable to edit white background product photos on a budget
• Easy to learn how to use, though imperfections may be difficult to fix
• Generally efficient and fast photo editing
• Can be done with a mobile phone app

Cons

• Difficult to produce a high-quality image
• Limitations in terms of maximum allowed image resolution
• Could end up costing you more in time and money to fix errors
• Unable to get perfectly crisp, detail-oriented edits

3. Learn how to remove backgrounds in Photoshop

Estimated startup cost: $9.99 per month

Photoshop pricing plans are now rather affordable, with its most affordable Photography plan starting at $9.99 per month. This plan grants you access to Lightroom and Photoshop and includes 20GB of storage. You can also test out the free trial before you subscribe. The biggest cost here is your time and effort investment into mastering this complex tool, which takes hundreds of hours of learning curve just to grasp the basics.

Estimated cost per image: varies—mostly costs you time

The above point makes per image cost rather cumbersome to calculate, as some people have plenty of free time to learn another tool and some are more strapped for time. Additionally, everyone learns at a different pace.

Adobe Photoshop CC is the professional, industry standard software for image editing and manipulation. Once upon a time, Photoshop was a very expensive piece of software. Today, however, Adobe offers a monthly plan that gives you access to just Photoshop CC and Lightroom for only $9.99/month.

Photoshop allows you to remove a background in many different ways, depending on what type of product you are working with. The wide menu of techniques including clipping paths, masks, selections, and layers gives you maximum flexibility and the ability to tweak your image’s tiniest details, pixel by pixel.

With all that power, however, comes a steep learning curve. Photoshop can take years to master, and if you have other things to worry about besides editing your product images (which you probably do), this might be the last thing you want to add to your plate. And, removing images from their backgrounds still can be very time-consuming, even for skilled Photoshop professionals.

Here are a few helpful tutorials to get started with:

• How to Remove the Background from an Image With Hair
• How to Use the Magic Wand Tool to Remove/Replace the Background
• How to Create a Transparent Background
• How to Change the Color of the Background

Pros

• Save money by DIYing your image editing
• Potential for high-quality images
• Consistency in brand visuals

Cons

• Huge time investment to learn software (you can browse more Photoshop tutorials here)
• Huge time investment to edit each individual photo
• Requires specific mindset, like attention to detail, pedantry, and spatial thinking

Get product photos that pop with background removal services

4. Assign image editing to an employee

Estimated startup cost: $4,000+

• $16 per hour rate for an assistant job in the US + benefits, tax, sick days,
• cost of hiring [$4,425 in the USA],
• office rental [varies widely, from $200 per coworking spot monthly],
• equipment [laptop from $500],
• software licensing [varies widely from $20 per user per month]

Estimated cost per image: $1.60

Let’s say you already have a junior team member looking to diversify their skills with photo editing. With an average hourly rate of $16 and productivity of 7–10 images per hour at the top capacity for a non-professional, your per image price is going to start from $1.60 per image. Once again, we didn’t accrue hiring cost, office rental, taxes, and sick days, which could easily double the pre image pricing eventually.

If you have a team working for you, you might consider assigning photo editing responsibilities to one of your employees. This is often ideal because an internal employee knows your brand inside and out, and can make edits accordingly.

Carla Kabbabe, owner and founder of Claurete jewelry, built a three-person team who collaborates on product photography for the brand. “I understand if someone is earlier in their career, but talented and going to excel in the future,” she says.

If you have someone who has expressed an interest in learning Photoshop, this could be a great opportunity for them to learn a new skill. If you already have skilled graphic designers on staff, they probably know how to produce perfect product photos on white background in Photoshop.

But if you have a large quantity of product images that need to be adjusted, asking one person to take on all photo editing responsibilities—in addition to their regular duties—is a huge time burden.

As mentioned above, even skilled Photoshop users might need a lot of time—up to an hour per image—to remove the background from a product photo. If you have to add the time (and cost) of training a new employee on Photoshop, you could be looking at a significant net productivity loss for that employee while they learn the software.

Learn how to build an in-house product photography team

And while spending all day cutting out product images might sound like a lot of fun, it isn’t. It’s tedious, boring, and often stressful. Make sure your employee really wants to take on this responsibility before you try adding this to their plate. And check in regularly to see if they’re still happy with the work. You might consider additional incentives (such as bonus pay based on number of edited images) to ensure they don’t become disgruntled.

Pros

• Save money by bringing photo editing in-house
• Give employees an opportunity to learn new skills

Cons

• Huge time investment for both skilled and new Photoshop users
• Tedious; can cause employees to become disgruntled
• Takes creative energy and time away from other business tasks
• Can create excess costs if employee needs extra incentive

5. Hire a full-time, in-house production assistant

Estimated startup cost: $4,000+

• $41,000 salary for a production assistant in the US + benefits, tax, sick days,
• cost of hiring [$4,425 in the USA],
• office rental [varies widely, from $200 per coworking spot monthly],
• equipment [laptop from $500], and
• software licensing [varies widely from $20 per user per month].

Estimated cost per image: $3.15

At the rate of 50 images per day—which is a considerably fast pace for a background editing job and other basic post production manipulations—260 working days, the annual productivity of one internal staff member is 13,000 images per year. When an average salary of $41,167 is divided by the annual output of 13,000 images the per image pricing for the editing job only is $3.15. Mind you, this calculation doesn’t take into account any of the above-mentioned fixed variables, like cost of hiring, office rental, and equipment cost. Plus, it assumes this person is only doing photo edits and not performing any other duties or administrative tasks related to their job.

Because background removal is such a mundane and unexciting task, it can quickly become a full-time job. Companies often opt to hire individuals called production assistants to take on these roles.

Whereas graphic designers tend to spend most of their time creating layouts, choosing colors and fonts, and helping design your overall branding, production assistants spend the majority of their time importing content into design templates, making edits to existing designs, or editing photos.

Production assistants are often in the beginning of their career—in many companies this role is considered a stepping stone towards becoming a graphic designer. As such, an entry-level production assistant (with two years of experience or less) can command an average salary of about $17/hour, or about $41 thousand per year in the US, according to Indeed. However, this calculation doesn’t account for additional employee-related expenses such as benefits, etc. 

If you hire a full-time production assistant, you might also have to provide benefits and paid time off. You can choose to go with a creative staffing agency where the agency takes on the burden of benefits, but you may pay more per hour for the employee, and you risk employee turnover because you are, after all, hiring a temporary worker.

Also, production assistants often take positions with the hope of moving into a design role, so they have the expectation they won’t be removing backgrounds from photos forever. Keep that in mind when you select your candidate.

Pros

• You have one person dedicated to editing all of your images
• No training required

Cons

• Significant, additional costs of an employee or temporary staff member
• Time cost of recruiting (and keeping) employee
• Risk of turnover

6. Contract an individual freelancer for background removal

Estimated startup cost: $0

There are no explicit upfront costs in this case.

Estimated cost per image: $5+

Prices range from $5–$50 per image for basic photo editing depending on the location, experience, profile strength, and rankings.

There are plenty of skilled individuals out there hungry for work, and they will happily edit your photos for you. The great thing about outsourcing to a freelancer is you pay per image or per hour—no salary or benefits—and you pay only for what you need.

Freelancers charge a bit more per hour than an in-house employee to compensate for the lack of benefits. According to Payscale, a median salary for a US-based photo editor is just over $57,000 per year or $15.95 per hour. Freelance editors based outside of the US offer their services on freelance marketplaces from $4.95 for basic edits to quadruple of that for premium service per image. This is the per image pricing by one of Fiverr’s top sellers. 

Even with higher rates, paying a freelancer could work in your favor as you pay only when you need the work done, without having to keep someone on payroll during lull times.

However, freelancers have limited capacity. If you only have a handful of images per week, a freelancer will likely have the bandwidth to handle your request. But one person can’t edit hundreds of images in a short timeframe. At least, not edit them well. So if you have a backlog of images that need backgrounds removed, a freelancer likely won’t have the bandwidth.

Also, you aren’t that freelancer’s only client. When you request work, you’ll likely end up in a queue with other clients, and your photos will be edited in turn. This might mean several weeks before you receive your edited shots. Some freelancers offer quicker turnarounds but this usually comes with a rush fee.

Furthermore, freelancers are human beings. They get sick. They go on vacation. They move. They switch careers. All of these factors can affect how quickly you get your images edited, and whether that same freelancer will still be serving you five years from now.

Pros

• Pay as needed
• Can hire someone who specializes in background removal
• No need to provide benefits, workstation, or software
• No need to provide training
• Can easily fire freelancer if it doesn’t work out

Cons

• More cost per hour than in-house employee
• Freelancer can only accommodate what her bandwidth will allow
• Slower turnaround
• May not be able to serve you through entire company’s lifetime

7. Outsource background removal to a photo editing company

Estimated startup cost: $0

There’s no upfront investment whatsoever in this scenario. However, note some services require a monthly subscription with minimum contract fees, even if you don’t use all your subscription credits within that month. Path doesn’t require a subscription or signup fee, and Path credits never expire, so you don’t have to worry about that with us.

Estimated cost per image: 39¢+

Starts at 39¢ per image with Path.

Companies such as Path specialize in removing backgrounds from product photography. When you use a service, you pay for image editing as you need it, as you would with a freelancer.

The difference: A company has more resources. So a company like Path can accommodate more images at a time than an individual freelancer would. Plus, these companies usually have very quick turnaround times. At Path, you can get your edits back in as little as six hours. And having been in business for almost 15 years, you can rest assured we’ll be here when you need us, through every stage of business growth.

Photo-editing companies employ many skilled designers and production assistants, so there’s always someone on staff who can get your image right. And because these people have the same training as an in-house designer or freelancer, edited images are high quality and professional.

Companies also typically have more longevity than an individual, so once you find one you like you know you can continue to use them as long as you need.

When choosing a company for photo-editing outsourcing, look at several factors to help you make your decision:

• How much does the company charge per image? Price is important, but keep in mind that it shouldn’t be the only factor. Remember that poor quality images can hurt your sales. Path pricing starts from 39¢ per image, so you get all of the peace of mind for a professionally executed job at that modest rate.
• What is the guaranteed image turnaround? How quickly do you need your images? Make sure that the company you choose can deliver according to your schedule.
• Which photo editing services are offered? If a company doesn’t focus on photo editing alone, they may not be the best fit as they likely have more expensive offerings they want to focus on. However, if a company only creates white backgrounds for product images, they may be too limiting for what you need. Look for companies that offer background removal (either with a clipping path or with an image mask) and can do other specialty tasks such as adding drop shadows and optimizing images for ecommerce sites.
• How long has the company been in business? Longevity says a lot about the quality of a company. A company that offers poor quality service and value-for-money will not stay in business for long. Path for instance, has been in business since 2002.
• How many people work at the company? High-quality, fast turnaround can only be achieved with a large workforce. Does the company employ a handful of people, or are there many skilled associates on staff that can handle your request as soon as it comes in? We hand-picked over 300 proficient Photoshop users to process our clients’ images in a seamless and nimble manner. Combined with the rigorous work management processes and easy client onboarding procedure, this ample talent pool allows Path to stay atop in terms of highest value-for-money ratio for our clients.

Pros

• Pay-as-you-go service, there’s no pressure to match a retainer or keep an employee busy
• No HR costs associated with in-house employment: taxes, training, equipment, office rental, recruitment cost, benefits, etc.
• No need for micro-management, as an agency is experienced enough to lead the client to the optimal mix of services in each case
• Great value-for-money with access to the best talent pool at reasonable rates
• Visual consistency across portfolio if you’re working on a long-term basis, a devoted designer with brand knowledge could be assigned to a client
• Quick turnaround due to the smooth workflow and expansive talent pool
• Possibility to negotiate a partnership contract with rates based on regular volumes

Cons

• Finding a photo editing studio may take some time as you may need to try a few vendors to find your perfect match—you can get your first two photos edited for free with Path
• Higher cost per hour than in-house employee depending on volume
• Possibility of change of executor for a new client

Give our photo editing services a shot with two free edits

Choose how to edit product photos on a white background

Depending on your needs, you have a variety of options when choosing how to edit your product photography. Remember, the cheapest option may not be the best option, because poor quality images can actually harm your business growth. Also, just because it won’t cost you extra dollars to do it yourself, it will cost you time and ability to grow your business in other areas.

Outsourcing your background removal to a photo-editing company can give you the flexibility to receive high quality, edited images in a short time. If you choose to go this route, make sure you research the company thoroughly to make sure they can accommodate your needs to your satisfaction.

CTA Let us look after your white background edits, so you can get back to the fun stuff. Try Path free.

FAQs: how to edit product photos white background

What’s the cheapest way to put a product on a white background?

• Outsource white background photo edits to a photo editing company
• Contract an individual freelancer for the edits
• Assign image editing to an existing employee
• Hire a full-time, in-house employee
• And more ideas in this post

Should product photos be white?

Yes, product photos should have a white background. The overwhelming majority of product photos have white backgrounds, as this is a requirement on ecommerce giants like Amazon and eBay. Colored backdrop images are popular in marketing and advertising, as they help grab users’ attention and add emotional coloring.

What is the best background color for product photography?

White is the best background color for product photography. White background is the most popular, universal, and versatile backdrop for product images. It puts the product and its details into the spotlight, makes images easy to edit, and allows for website design consistency. Marketplaces like Walmart, Amazon, and eBay require ecommerce images with white backdrop. 

The post How to Edit Product Photos for White Background on a Budget appeared first on Path Edits.