Headshots - A vital Career tool!

Actors, Singers, Business, Artist, Authors, Public Speakers, Models - one word...HEADSHOTS! Your professional headshot is your most important marketing tool for work no matter what industry you are in. Whether it's your LinkedIn profile, your Casting Workbook profile, your personally branded Facebook page, or even your OkCupid profile, you need an image that conveys exactly who you are on first glance.

You only get one chance to make a good first impression.

As an actor all you have is your headshots to represent you to casting agents as nowadays most casting is done online so you dont get a opportunity to stand before them and dazzle! It is the most important tool and the first thing you should consider investing in when starting in the industry.

Many business owners mistakenly believe that headshots aren’t an essential element for their business. But, the truth is that a corporate headshot can help to advance your career and improve relationships with customers and clients. Your headshot for business is a great way to create the right first impression, and those corporate headshots literally help you to shape the image that you want to build for yourself. Especially when starting a career, many people are tempted to save their money instead of paying for professional headshots. They don’t realize the importance of conveying the right message to the people in their industry - having the wrong image may be detrimental to your progression. The wrong image could say that you don’t take your position seriously, or perhaps that you are not contemporary in your thinking, or that you’re not too concerned about projecting your professionalism.

Once you have one professional headshot you are happy with you can use it on a multitude of avenues - Websites, LinkedIn, FB Business page, Business cards, press releases, newspaper articles etc. In this day and age, not having a headshot to help build that connection with clients and industry professionals is almost like not having a business card at a networking event. Faces help people remember, and your headshot is how you can get yourself out there!

Keep in mind that hiring a professional photographer doesn’t mean that you are simply paying for their time during the professional headshot session, because there are hundreds of hours of training and practice that went into developing their talent. Also, additional work is done by the photographer after the session is over in order to edit the photos to prepare them for printing.

There is no question about it: even if Uncle Bob has a nice camera, it is better to work with a true professional who can create a portfolio of headshots that will help you shape the right impression for your industry no matter which industry that is.

I will be writing a lot more blogs on this area including 'How to dress for your Headshot session' and also 'How to get the best results out of your Headshot session'......coming soon :)

Thanks for reading :)

Nat xx