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New liveBooks client and Philadelphia photographer Michael Confer specializes in Lifestyle and Landscape photography – with a distinctly elegant and classic style. We were so impressed with how he put together his website that we just had to feature it this week.

Read on for more on his site’s creation – and don’t forget to head over to www.mconferphoto.com to see it all!

Q: Did you use a pre-designed template or was your site custom-built?

MC: I used a Professional pre-designed website by liveBooks for photographers called “Landscape.” One Monday morning I downloaded four different pre-designed liveBooks templates so I could experiment and interact with the different strengths and design features of each template. While I liked many of the different aspects of each design, the “Landscape” template fit my personality the best. It features a professional, yet simplistic design that showcases my images and videos without additional fancy designs that can potentially distract the user. Once the “Landscape” template was chosen, I resized and uploaded my images, experimented with galleries and image order, wrote some background info and highlights, did a few tests, optimized the mobile aspect, spoke to customer service twice, and linked my Vimeo videos. I submitted the request to go live Thursday evening and was live Friday morning!

Q: How long did it take you to create your site?

MC: I experimented with templates for one day and learned all the features of the editSuite. The other three days were experimenting with design, image order, and background information. In the end it took me about three hours a day for four days. If I had all decisions made about my website, except for template choice, I could have done everything in one day. I had already owned my domain name with one of the major providers and called them for some confirmations; I was all set in 10 minutes.

Q: What’s your favorite aspect of your site thus far?

MC: A favorite aspect of my new liveBooks site is the simplicity, professionalism, and the showcasing of my work first and foremost. I hope everyone visiting my site feels the same!

Have a website you’d like us to feature? Email us at social@livebooks.com!

Guest blogger Manuela Marin Salcedo is a research and development team leader at Momenta Workshops. Her expertise is in visual communications and social media. In addition to her work for Momenta, Manuela is working on long-term, independent multimedia projects.

Unless you are a social media manager with experience engaging virtual audiences, social media as a promotional tool for your photography business can be intimidating and exhausting to manage. While it can also be a social and fun experience, keeping up with all your feeds takes maintenance. Therefore, the team at Momenta Workshops has put together a short list of tips and tricks to help you re-evaluate and invigorate your social media feeds to further your photo business strategy.

Develop Social Media Goals

Whether you are new to social media pages or a seasoned pro in need of a social media boost in creativity, it is important to plan and evaluate your social media outreach. If social media success by way of increased follower engagement is your destination, you’re going to need a road map to success. Consider the following as you create your goals:

• How is social media important to your company?
• How does social media relate to your goals?
• How are you using social media as a voice of your brand?
• Are more followers the goal or better dialogue with current followers?
• Do you use all your feeds equally? If you’re neglecting one, do you need it?

The answers to these important questions will give you direction, and that will be essential in creating a new strategy or refreshing an old one.

Add to the Story

Taking the above tips into consideration, with every post you put your valuable time into, ask yourself:

• What am I saying?
• Did I just say the same thing with a previous post?
• Am I adding to my brand’s story?
• Is this post encouraging people to follow me or just adding content?
• Would *I* want to follow posts like the ones I’m sending?

If you are bombarding your audience with the same perspective or information multiple times in a short span of time, you could become irritating.

Live-Post From Events

Are you attending a film festival this weekend? Did you recently attend a gallery opening? What about a lecture? Were they interesting, exciting, mind-blowing? Talk about it! Share content from it, such as favorite quotes or photos. Chances are, others who attended these events have social media accounts and will be talking about it too and your posts can add to the dialogue and give you lots of exposure to new people. If the event has a specific hashtag, make sure to use it. This will make your posts visible on a grander scale and allow you to interact with brands and individuals.

Interact With Your Followers

Think of your social media as an invitation for followers to interact and engage with you and your portfolio. Your posts initiate a dialogue. When followers respond, don’t leave them hanging. Turn those replies into a conversation; your followers will be more likely to chime in with their two cents in the future.

Get Visual!

As visual creators, you’re in luck. Research and analytics show adding images to your social media posts can increase click-through rates anywhere from 18%-27%. What does this mean exactly? People love pretty pictures! So let it rip and share your greatest asset: your beautiful images!

What are some other tips that you’ve employed to invigorate your social media channels? Let us know in the comments!

Photographer and stylist Steven Menendez has one of the most vibrant, colorful, and beautifully styled websites we’ve ever seen. He says that his work has been greatly inspired by his travels – seeing exotic people and landscapes has influenced his creative perspective – and we can definitely see that same unique perspective in his website design.

We are so thrilled to have him as our featured website this week and we know you’ll love his site – www.stevenmenendez.com.

Q: How would you describe the aesthetic of your website in three words?

SM: I would describe the aesthetic of my website as uplifting, chic, and clean.

Q: How do you choose the photos that you display on your homepage?

SM: The way I choose my images is finding the ones that speak to my aesthetic of classic, chic, and timeless.

Q: How often do you update your website?

SM: I update my website whenever I have new work.

Q: What is your favorite feature that liveBooks offers?

SM: My favorite feature on liveBooks is the ease in uploading images and updating portfolios to keep the website fresh.

Q: What’s one piece of advice you’d offer to someone designing their website?

SM: The advice I would give others when designing a website is to keep in mind that the images should speak first and the website should be a beautiful canvas to display your work and not distract the viewer. For the most part I usually feel less is more when it comes to displaying your art. Research other websites and find out what looks good and what features you are drawn to. My motto is to keep it simple and let the work speak for itself.

Have a website you’d like us to feature? Email us at social@livebooks.com!

Things are continually changing in the digital age that we’re living in, and now that we’re mid-way through 2015, it’s time to do a round-up of photography website trends for the rest of the year – and beyond.

Mobile-Friendly Design

With an increasing number of people browsing the web on mobile devices such as phones and tablets, designing a website with mobile in mind is going to be even more important in the coming months. Think of a mobile-friendly site as a much simpler version of your full website; the amount of text is limited to be as concise as possible, the site menu has shorter titles, and the focus really falls on your beautiful images. It will also be extremely important to ensure that your site loads quickly on mobile devices, as user experience is even more apparent on mobile.

Interactive Storytelling

Your website and images should essentially tell the user a story: what your brand is about, your journey as a photographer, the past work you’ve done, and ultimately the type of work you hope to do in the future. Ideally, your images will also evoke a strong emotional response from the viewer – and interactive storytelling can help achieve this. Techniques such as scrolling images, unique page transition effects, and interesting layouts allows you to create a truly original and engaging experience for your viewers – hopefully triggering an emotional response that will make them remember you long after they’ve left your site.

Image-Centered Design

A couple of years ago, the theme of prominently displayed images across the full screen became very popular in web design. This is incredibly fortunate for photographers, and it’s a trend that’s not going anywhere any time soon. In fact, it is only going to get more sophisticated as techniques emerge to optimize images for better responsiveness and faster load time. Plus, the ability to add information on top of photos without compromising the resolution or user-experience will prove extremely valuable.

Customized Image Portfolios

The way you display your images on your website is highly personal; only you know the story you have to tell and the way you want your audience to hear it. The trend of creating unique ways for users to view your portfolios is gaining a lot of traction. From displaying your images in a grid layout, photo strips, slideshows, and automatic scrolling, you now have more control over the experience your user has.

Focus on Video

Video has become increasingly popular over the past couple of years, and that trend will only continue. Many websites are now utilizing full-screen videos in the background to create a more engaging experience for the user, and because many sites have become more advanced to facilitate faster media streaming, Internet users tend to read less and watch more. Even if you do not typically offer video services, creating a reel of “behind-the-scenes” shots would be a great way to present your brand so that it leaves a lasting impact on your audience and allows you to have interactive media.

Minimalist Design

The minimalist design has been trendy for a few years now and it basically follows the “less is more” philosophy. Large, full-screen imagery, bold typography, simpler navigation bars, and linear shapes are all going to continue to be design elements in the future. The good news is that this type of design will be a great way to practice honing your marketing message in fewer words and/or photos.

What trends do you hope to see (or not see!) the rest of this year and next?

Resources:

8 Photography Website Trends

Top 7 Website Trends for Photographers