Visual elements of your brand are key to engaging your ideal reader and customer, but for many of us graphic design or handling a DSLR camera don’t come naturally!
Have you ever scrolled through Instagram and felt that little pang of jealousy when you find a perfectly coordinated feed with images and graphics that blend beautifully?
If you said yes then you are most definitely not alone! And that’s where stock photography subscription sites step in to help you to concentrate on other areas of your blog or business, safe in the knowledge that every month you will receive a set of curated images that you can use to promote your brand.
I love photography and believe it’s important to use my own images as much as possible to represent my brand, but stock photography has been essential for use in my online courses, workshops, eBooks, on my website and on social media to fill gaps where I didn’t have the type of office or flatlay photography I needed.
And stock photography is not just for office photo shoots, there are options for almost every niche of blog or business – you just need to find the one that’s right for you!
That’s where this article comes in, I am rounding up my favourite stock photo subscription services, photo bundles and stock image sites that you can use for your blog or business.
Paid Stock Photo Subscription
Haute Stock
My absolute favourite stock photo service is Haute Stock. I have been a member of their subscription service for a couple of years now and if you have downloaded any of my eBooks or browsed around this blog you will have seen a lot of their images.
In my opinion Haute Stock is leading the way in stock photography, keeping up with branding and design trends and reflecting this in the weekly stock photo packs they release. When you sign up you will get instant access to over 5,000 stock photos, receive monthly pre-made design assets you can customise in Canva and monthly social media calendars with caption ideas.
Side note – If you are not using Canva yet I highly recommend signing up (it’s free!) to creating social media graphics, digital products, logos, and other branded elements for your blog.
Haute Stock Pricing:
- Monthly Plan $29 per month | 25 downloads per month
- Quarterly Plan $99 every 3 months | Unlimited downloads
- Annual Plan $299 per year | Unlimited downloads – This is the best value and this is how I subscribe
Her Creative Studio
Her Creative Studio was the first stock photo site that I signed up for. I absolutely loved the styling for office stock photography which was perfect when I was getting started with this blog. If you are looking for gorgeous flat lays, seasonal assets and mock-up photography you will find lots of options here.
You can buy individual images from Her Creative Studio on Creative Market or sign up for Membership on the site.
Her Creative Studio Pricing:
- Bi-Annual Plan $127 every 6 months | Unlimited downloads
- Annual Plan $227 per year | Unlimited downloads
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Styled Stock Society
I recently sign up for Styled Stock Society via a bundle of other products I purchased which gave me a year of access to the membership. The membership offers three different pricing plans, quarterly, annual and a lifetime plan – this is an amazing option if you are ready to invest upfront to get life long access to the new images and templates created.
The stock photo library is packed with a variety of image collections, from interiors, to travel, to wellness and fitness – there is something for every type of creator!
Styled Stock Society Pricing:
- Quarterly Plan $75
- Annual Plan $250 per year
- Lifetime Plan $495
Paid Stock Photo Bundles
Jana Bishop
I recently discovered Jana Bishop via Creative Market and love her light and airy photo aesthetic. There are several bundles of images available for as little as $12! Again you can find a wide variety of images from interiors, to office and flat lay images all beautifully coordinated so that you create a consistent theme to your brand.
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Moyo Studio
Moyo Studio is brought to you by husband and wife team, offers beautiful stock photography to create design mock-ups, a branded aesthetic and customisable design kits. Their curated collections offer premium images that are perfect for the creative entrepreneur!
Individual Photos
If you are looking for a one specific image for your blog, your business or a campaign you are running then a simple way to search for individual images to buy is through Creative Market where you will find thousands of images to suit every type of blog, business or brand.
Adobe Stock also offer individual images, as well as monthly and annual plans for accessing their premium images, videos and templates.
Getty Images and iStock by Getty Images offers some of the widest variety of stock images available and is perfect when you require a specific image.
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Free Stock Photos
There are some free stock photography websites that can be tempting to use. The most well known ones are Unsplash, Pixabay and Pexels. On these sites the photographer uploads the image and you can download these to use for free with no limits on how many you can download.
However, in my experience you cannot be certain that the image you are downloading and using is actually copyright free and was uploaded by the original owner. On my travel blog we published a guest post with an image that had been downloaded from Pixabay, we were quickly contacted by the original owner of the photography requesting compensation for use without permission.
Despite us downloading this in good faith from Pixabay we still have to pay a $500 fee in compensation to the owner for the use of one image. When you download from a free stock photo site there is no guarantee the image was uploaded by the original owner, and could be someone who did not have the rights to the image who put it there.
Be warned – we were lucky this was only a $500 fee, I have heard others be fined tens of thousands for improper use of images so I generally avoid using these websites now and use the stock photo subscription sites I mentioned.
Wrap Up
To wrap up, using a stock photo subscription is a great way to get beautifully styled images that you can use on your blog, social media and business with confidence!
Thank you for reading! I hope that you found this article useful to select a stock photography option that works best for you!
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