What You Must Know About Finding and Using Photos Online

When I peruse my Facebook news feed and the Web, I notice many things wrong with the use of photos on company pages.

Choosing the perfect photo can be time consuming and frustrating, but someone needs to lay down basic ground rules. Allow me to share those rules.

My hope is these four simple tips for finding and using photos online will save you and/or your company time, money and embarrassment.

Watermarked photos are not pretty. Dear ABC Company: Dreamstime wants its watermarked photo back. I don’t know how many times in the past six months I’ve seen company Facebook pages use photos with a watermark. Can you not see the watermark? Do you think it enhances the look of your photo? The watermark is there for a reason—you have to purchase the photo!

The only time it’s acceptable, in my mind, to use a photo with a watermark is when you’re designing marketing collateral for your client and need to show your client some potential images. iStock photo does a great job explaining a safer way to use your stock photos here.

No one will like your small or pixelated photo. Eye-catching photos generate 53% more likes than the average Facebook post, so it’s important to choose a photo that’s the correct size and viewable to your audience. The last thing you want to include is a pixelated or extra small photo that’s not appealing. When uploading a photo to your Facebook post, make sure it’s at least 403 pixels by 403 pixels because that’s the size it will show up as in your timeline. Any size less than that may appear pixelated or too small when clicking on the image.

Avoid the use of clip art. I remember when clip art was cool and cute in the early 90s. Those were the days I could find the perfect image for my middle school report right on Microsoft Works! Now, there is so much clip art all over the Internet. If you have to use clip art, be careful—most clip art is copyrighted and illegal to use without the proper permissions.

Be careful with Google Image Search. Using copyrighted images can cost you or your company money, so it’s important to follow these rules when finding and using images online. Just because you find the perfect image for your post doesn’t mean you have the rights to use it. At Identity, we use iStock photos and Thinkstock when we are purchasing and Creative Commons through Flickr.

Quality and free photos are hard to come by, and I know all too well how it’s a challenge to find the perfect photo for blog posts or Facebook posts. However, I guarantee the extra time is worth it, and you will be doing your company a favor.

If you have any other tips for finding and using photos online, leave them in the comments.