Maximize Your Event Photos for Future PR and Marketing Needs

We often talk to event planners who want quality photography for their events, but have trouble justifying the expense to their client or board.  Instead of investing in a professional photographer, they assume that assigning an associate to point-and-shoot will give them decent photos and save them money.  In some cases, this might be true.  But many planners haven’t recognized that professional event photos can serve more than one purpose, and can actually save the client money in the long run.

This point was proven yet again with an event we photographed recently for the National Foundation for Cancer Research (NFCR).   Their savvy Director of Marketing and Communications, Erin Chen, called me about photography for their event at the New York Hilton, saying she wanted more than the typical “stand and smile” photos they usually get.  She was looking for artistic, emotionally evocative images they’d be able to use for marketing.

Erin explained that they’d wanted to use last year’s event photos on their website and in their printed materials, but the photos they’d gotten “were just too boring.”  She was looking for something more: shots of the room décor and guests engaging with each other, but incorporating interesting angles, close-ups of faces and expressions.

I sent Erin to our website photo galleries and an online link to images from a recent event covered by one of our photographers who excels at this type of event photography, to show her how we can deliver the type of images she wanted.  Erin loved the photographer’s images, and confirmed the booking immediately.

The Progress In Cancer Research event was held last week, and the folks at NFCR are thrilled with their event photos.  The images are exactly what they wanted for their website postings, public relations efforts, brochures and other promotional materials.  Rather than hiring a separate photographer for brochure photos, or relying on stock photos that have no real relation to their organization, they were able to get fantastic marketing photos at a fraction of the cost.

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