, , , , , ,

Creating Perfect Flat Lays with 8 Easy Tips

A perfect flat lay with photos, hat, and sunglasses on a white furry background

Flat lay photography has become a versatile visual form for any small business. These minimalist photos of products taken from above and arranged with props use minimalism to create visual emphasis. That simple presentation style makes items pop, perfect for promoting products on a website or grabbing the attention of those browsing social media. Whether you’re getting started making your own flat lays or looking to master the technique, here are 8 easy tips for creating perfect flat lays. 

1. A Fully Clean and Flat Surface is Essential

Flat lays are named for everything being laid on the same, flat level. A completely flat and clean surface creates the blank canvas necessary to make perfect flat lays. Everything sits on an equal level and receives full lighting, leaving nothing obscured. That flat surface will also lack shadows, making it the perfect canvas to edit in texts or graphics when editing.

2. Perfect Flat Lays Need Proper Lighting

Bright lighting is what makes flat lays so eye-catching. To accomplish this, you need a soft, broad light. Natural light in a bright space can work but is out of your control. Artificial lighting will give you full control but can come with a cost. We recommend starting with a lightbox or ring light. These are relatively cheap in the world of photography equipment. If you’re interested in more professional grade equipment, a strobe light with a soft box provides a perfect mimicry of that soft, natural light of a sunny day. Of course, if you aren’t looking to get this equipment, you can always hire a professional photographer for truly perfect flat lays.

3. Props Bring a Flat Lay to Life

A flat lay isn’t just merely a photo of a product or something your company makes. It should also invoke a certain emotion or theme. Props help bring that life and character to a perfect flat lay by creating a lifestyle context that viewers can imagine. For example, a flat lay of cosmetic products can be brought to life with some related props such as makeup brushes.

4. Flat Lays are for More Than Just Products

Flat lays are great for showing off a business’ products, but they can also evoke a certain moment or emotion that’s associated with your brand. This is particularly great for businesses that focus on services. For example, a catering company can create a flat lay of an ornate table setting. An interior designer can have a flat lay of an idealized work surface that includes a blueprint, furniture catalog, laptop, and a cup of coffee. A salon might create a flat lay with the various hair cutting and styling tools they use.

5. Create a Colour Palette

Part of the effective and eye-catching minimalism of flat lays is accomplished with a limited set of colours that unite the image. Determine a colour palette that works well both with the featured product(s) or props while keeping the background neutral. This will help tie the entire picture together, giving it a cohesive look for a perfect flat lay.

6. Your Flat Lay Background Doesn’t Need to Be White

Part of designing your flat lay and its colour will mean choosing a proper background. Marble, tile, and wood can be great options depending on the content, but flat lays work best with solid colours. That doesn’t mean the background needs to be white, especially if the products you’re showing off are. Instead, a solid background of colour can help the items pop. A large roll of paper can create a perfect background. 

7. Don’t Underestimate Negative Space

Flat lays are defined by minimalism. If they become cluttered with objects, they become too visually busy and important objects blend into others. Keep a healthy amount of negative space in the flat lay and around each object. This keeps them distinguishable and visually prominent. A simple rule: if you think there might be too many things, remove one.

8. Take Multiple Shots

Like any photography, one photo usually won’t suffice. Take many photos of your flat lay at different angles and orientations from above. Then, rearrange items and take even more shots. It’s always much easier to take as many photos as possible when you have already collected and arranged the materials than realizing you need to collect and arrange everything again because you didn’t capture that perfect shot. Taking all these various photos will provide you with a rich library of shots to choose from, ensuring you have at least a few you will want to use.

Flat Lays are All About the Pop

They might be called flat lays, but visually they are anything but flat. These 8 easy tips are sure to help you start perfecting your flat lay photography. If you’re interested in professional flat lays, contact Rosewood about our brand photography services. We’ll be happy to help you create flat lays that truly pop.

/0 Comments/by
, , , , , , , , ,

The Rise of Social Commerce: How Brands Can Leverage Social Media to Drive Sales

Person holding a phone, engaging in social commerce as it drives sales

Social media has become an essential marketing tool for growing your business’ reach and reputation. However, another one of social media’s goals, like other marketing, is to convert that attention into sales. One of the best tools for accomplishing that is ‘Social Commerce’, where products are sold directly on social media. We’ll explain what social commerce is and how you can leverage social media to drive sales.

What is Social Commerce?

Social commerce is selling products directly through a social media platform. Product discovery, selection, and checkout all occur on the platform rather than redirecting individuals to your own store. It’s a service that is now available on most major social media platforms, including Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok. For all three, you create product listings that appear in a shop on your account. Users can then browse and order products directly through the app. In exchange for offering the service, the platform takes a percentage of the sale as a fee. 

The Benefits of Social Commerce

Social commerce is different from eCommerce which happens on a business’ own dedicated website or online store. As a result, you have slightly less control over the presentation, and it requires creating a store dedicated to the platform. However, there are clear benefits to using social commerce to drive sales. 

People Use Social Media to Shop

Over 80% of users research products using social media and nearly half of both Millennials and Gen Z are already making purchases on social media. Social commerce immediately drives sales because you provide a shopping experience for these many users precisely when they are actively searching for or considering products. 

A Seamless Shopping Experience

That immediacy and convenience also translate into an effective shopping experience that helps further drive sales. Social commerce provides the opportunity for a potential customer to immediately purchase upon discovering a product they like. This creates a more streamlined shopping experience. Rather than leaving the app, navigating to the product on your digital store, adding it to their cart, and filling in their information to complete their purchase, the user can immediately checkout and continue their browsing. The eCommerce checkout can be a moment where carts are abandoned and sales lost. The speedy and seamless shopping experience of social commerce means there are fewer chances to lose the customer’s attention and that purchase.

A More Thorough Representation of Your Business on Social

Another benefit of social commerce is that you can better showcase the products that your company provides on social media. You could make posts for every product you sell, and you should highlight new items, but these inherently move down the feed as time progresses. Those ever-drifting posts aren’t an effective way to continuously show off your entire catalogue. Instead, the dedicated storefront of a social commerce space on your profile allows social media users to conveniently get a better sense of your products and services without needing to leave the app. 

Shopping That Reaches Your Audience

Social media platforms have an incredible amount of user data at their disposal. With social commerce, you can use that data to promote specific products to those whom the platform knows to have certain interests. Because of the wealth of data available, these product suggestions can be highly specific. For example, one product might suit a certain demographic like men in their 40s, while another suits young adult women. Each can be selectively targeted on social commerce to users in those demographics. Specific product suggestions of this specificity on your own eCommerce store need a shopping history and will take time to generate. Social commerce allows you to specifically tailor such suggestions and promotions from the start.

Social Commerce Isn’t the End of eCommerce

Social commerce has clear benefits for driving sales, but it doesn’t replace eCommerce and having a dedicated digital store and website. It’s an addition and effective supplement to your eCommerce strategy. Ultimately, the goal is to drive sales away from social media platforms, which take a 2-5% cut, to shopping and browsing on your own digital storefront. There customers can browse and better familiarize themselves with your products in a space that is exclusively dedicated to them. Social commerce’s strength is in getting new customers as they are generally browsing and securing that initial sale. That sale then converts someone into a dedicated customer when they understand the quality of your products. 

Making the Most of Social Commerce

Social commerce’s ability to convert and drive sales lies in the shopping convenience it creates for those actively browsing. It’s a valuable tool for attracting and recapturing dedicated customers. If you think social commerce is part of your next social media strategy, contact us at Rosewood. We’ll be happy to help you expand your eCommerce horizons. 

/0 Comments/by
, , ,

The Role of Video Marketing in 2023: Trends and Best Practices

Someone working on a laptop beside a cup of coffee

Video is becoming a dominant tool in marketing. More people are consuming video content each day, and all the major social media apps, including Facebook and Instagram are pivoting to emphasize video to compete with the continued interest in YouTube and the rise of TikTok. To help you create great video advertising and social media, we discuss the role of video marketing for your business and the biggest trends and best practices to follow for 2023.

The Impressive Results of Video Marketing

Video marketing’s role has only grown this past decade as online video has become more and more widespread and easy to share. In 2018, already 78% of marketers found video marketing produced great ROI. This year, that’s grown to 92%. A study from Wyzowl also found that 79% of customers say a video has convinced them to purchase a service or product, while 91% want to see more video content from the brands they follow. Those numbers reflect not only the efficacy of video marketing, but also how its role as a marketing asset is growing.

Standing Out – The Role of Video Marketing

Video marketing plays a vital role by allowing your brand to show off more of its personality and character. Video ads and social media are great for showing off products, services, and your business in action. However, with video marketing also becoming a standard and a common part of most marketing strategies, you need to ensure your video gets attention by following leading trends and best practices. 

The Best Trends and Practices for 2023

To help your videos stand out, we’ve assembled some of the trends and best practices for 2023 to help your videos get those views they deserve.

Short Videos

As the rapid growth of TikTok shows, short videos get a lot of attention and are extremely effective for getting views. In fact, two-thirds of consumers found short videos more engaging, impactful, and memorable than longer videos. Although TikTok’s future in Canada might be a little unclear, since it has been banned on government employee phones, even Ottawa still recognizes the power of short videos for marketing. Other social media platforms have as well. Instagram launched Reels and YouTube launched Shorts in 2020. These short videos are an effective way to market parts of your business, especially since all three platforms prioritize these shorter videos for their users.

The Perfect, Endless Loop Keeps Them Watching

Along with short videos, the endless loop has become a best practice for increasing views and engagement. Together, looping and brevity cooperate to create snappy videos that your audience watches multiple times. Those multiple views will also give your video preference in the platform’s algorithm, so loops are great for growing your video’s reach. An easy way to create a seamless loop is to have the final moments of the video be the same shot or a few seconds earlier in the clip that starts the video. 

SEO

Short length and multiple views from seamless loops will optimize your videos for the suggestion algorithms. There are also methods to boost your videos’ SEO, especially any longer videos that won’t have these benefits. Properly title your videos to match search terms and include keywords in the descriptions. Focus videos on addressing questions and educating your audience; people are often looking for answers. Your videos will also receive SEO preference if you post consistently. 

Faces in Thumbnails

Another tactic is including human faces in thumbnails. You have surely noticed that a lot of video thumbnails on YouTube and other platforms often include people with emotive facial expressions. The simple reason is that those videos get more attention and views. People are naturally drawn to human faces, and expressive faces attract our interest. As a result, at least 72% of popular videos on YouTube include a human face.

Silent Videos with Captions

Besides what will help your video get immediate attention and clicks, you need to create videos that people want to watch and engage with. One of the best practices that has developed in the last couple years is ensuring your video can be watched silently. Many of your audience will watch your videos in a setting where they can’t or prefer not to have audio on. As a result, you need to add accurate captions so that anyone can watch the video without sound. Otherwise, they will simply move on. All platforms include automatic tools to help you generate those captions, but you need to edit them thoroughly for accuracy. This will make your videos both watchable in complete silence as well as more accessible to those with hearing difficulties.

Creating Real Moments – Live Video and Stories

Another great way to generate engagement and attention in your video marketing is creating momentary content with live video and short-lived videos like Instagram Stories. Since these are time limited or specific to the moment, they create FOMO (a fear of missing out). Thus, live videos and interactive Stories are fantastic ways to directly engage with your audience, as they want to become a part of the moment themselves by participating in the chat, reacting, or providing their own input. This, in turn, forms real connections with your audience. 

Being “Real” – Raw Video, Behind the Scenes, and User-Generated Content

Since live content and stories are typically more “raw” and often show behind-the-scenes (BTS) footage, they capitalize on a trend that emphasizes your brand’s authenticity. Less edited videos that show your business’ operations provide your audience with a more sincere presentation. Similarly, reposting and sharing user-generated video content is a great way to show your brand’s authenticity and its engagement with its audience. 

Video Marketing 

Thanks to the ubiquity of smart phones, it has only become easier to start creating video content, and its growing popularity means it’s essential for your marketing. If you want to ensure your video marketing is following the latest trends and best practices, contact our advertising team to create attention-grabbing video ads. Our social media team will help ensure your video content is engaging. Plus, if you’re looking for some more professionally shot and edited content, be sure to look at our video packages.

/0 Comments/by