Do You Need Branding Before You Book Brand Photos?

Short answer: no.

In fact, quite a few of the women I photograph are at exactly this stage. They know they need to start showing up properly online, but their website isn’t finished yet, their brand colours aren’t final, and they’re still figuring out what everything will look like.

So they sit there thinking they have to wait to book brand photos.

But the problem is this: while you’re waiting for everything to be perfect, you’ve got nothing to share.

No photos for LinkedIn or for your website and definitely none that actually look like you.

Which means the easiest thing in the world is to keep putting off being visible.

The “in-between” stage of a new business

I had a discovery call recently with someone in exactly this position.

She’s starting a new business and wants to build a website and start posting on LinkedIn. The challenge is that she doesn’t have a finished brand yet.

Her main thought was essentially: do I need to wait until all of that is sorted before I get photos?

Not at all.

When it’s your first shoot, the goal isn’t to create a perfectly styled brand world. The goal is much simpler.

You need photos of you.

Your face is the most important thing

The first stage of brand photography is often about visibility rather than branding.

Good headshots.
Photos of you working.
Relaxed images that feel professional but natural.

These are the photos that let people recognise you when they land on your website or scroll past your posts. They’re the images that make your business feel like it belongs to a real person rather than a logo.

And once you start using them, something interesting happens.

You start to feel like your business is real.

Why neutral photos work best at the beginning

When someone doesn’t have branding yet, I usually recommend keeping the shoot fairly neutral.

Simple outfits.
Clean backgrounds.
Minimal props.

That way the photos can work across everything you’re building next. Your website, LinkedIn, presentations, launches, whatever direction the brand eventually takes.

It also means the photos won’t suddenly look out of place once your branding is finished.

Think of them as your foundation photos.

Content you can create even before your brand is finished

Even without branding, we can still create useful images during a shoot. Things like:

• working on a laptop
• using your phone
• sitting at a desk
• relaxed portraits and headshots
• images where text can be added later (for example on a laptop screen or whiteboard)

Those kinds of photos become incredibly useful for posts, announcements and launches later on.

You can even add graphics or text in Canva afterwards once your brand identity is finalised.

Your first shoot doesn’t have to be perfect

A lot of people imagine their first brand shoot has to be the ultimate version.

With Perfect outfits, props and a perfect brand identity.

But the truth is most businesses evolve quite quickly once they start showing up.

Your first shoot is simply about getting you out there. Getting a bank of professional images so that when you start talking about your business, people can actually see who you are.

The polished, highly styled shoots can always come later.

The important thing is that you don’t stay invisible while you’re waiting for everything else to fall into place.

Because a business with photos of a real person behind it will always feel more trustworthy than one hiding behind stock images.

And once you book brand photos, showing up online suddenly becomes a lot easier.