Why is it important to have professional photographs to market your school?
Pennie Withers • February 6, 2025
Pennie Withers - School marketing photography
As a professional photographer for over 15 years, I have worked with many schools and colleges to create beautiful photographs to be used in school prospectuses, on websites, social media posts and PR activities. During that time, I have often worked alongside the team at Maxx Design who are fantastic at working with many of the top Independent Schools in the UK and producing the most beautiful marketing collateral for them.
I recently had a chat with their Creative Director, Matt Barrett to ask him a few questions about his experience using professional photographs for his clients.
- What prompted you to use Pennie to take professional photos of your school clients? We work with some of the top Independent Schools in the UK and often find that they do not have professional images to use in the marketing materials (printed prospectuses, websites and social) we are producing for them. This leads us to often recommend using commissioned photography and taking Pennie along as part of the team... good imagery is vital in capturing the life and personality of the school.
- What are the benefits you find from having professional photos to market your client's schools ? You cannot underestimate the power of having stunning images to complement good design. In an image hungry world and with people having less and less time to read materials, great images bring the piece that we have worked on to life and sell the 'real' school.
- How did the photo session run on the day? When we work with Pennie, we always art direct the day to ensure we capture the images we are after for the specific project needs. But if needed and with a good briefing, we'd be confident in sending Pennie in solo to capture general imagery. Throughout the day, Pennie barely stops, and we often find, when reflecting at the end of the day, the fact it feels like two days because of the amount of images we capture and how many steps we've clocked up. For me, having worked with other photographers, one of Pennie's biggest USPs and why we keep using her is her approach to minimal disruption to what is happening in the school ... this helps capture 'real' shots that don't feel staged with heavy posing or lighting. It also helps that Pennie is quite small so can sneak about and has a very friendly way about her which helps the children feel relaxed.
- Were you pleased with the results? Yes, absolutely! Getting the preview link to view the shots taken is always an exciting moment.
- Any other comments? We've worked with Pennie for over 10 years and consistently get fantastic results. With her background in marketing, Pennie is very good at interpreting what the image needs to achieve and how it will be used. I would highly recommend working with Pennie to create a bank of beautiful images with which to enhance any marketing campaign.
So, if you are updating your school prospectus/website or bank of marketing images for social media etc... please do get in touch to discuss how I may be able to help. I look forward to hearing from you.
Pennie
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