Find Beautiful Images for Your Blog and Social Media

Find Beautiful Images for Your Blog and Social Media

Images are an important element of your blog: they can differentiate content, offer a much better user experience, and can also help you connect with your readers.

Simply adding a few visuals can nearly double your blog’s views and greatly increase the number of reactions a post gets.

But where do you find the right images to use on your blog?

As a blogger, there are four ways you can use to add visual content to your site:

1. Take your own photographs.

This is by far my favorite way to create images for blog posts. You don’t need a professional camera (although it doesn’t hurt). Taking photos with your smartphone can be quite good if you’re just starting out. By using your own images, you can stand out.

This is especially true if you blog about food, fashion, or travel.

But I understand that not everyone has the time or the skills to do so. If you’re looking for an easier way to improve your content, skip to # 2.

2. Make use of free stock photos

These days, there are many high-quality sites offering incredible photography that are completely free to use for your blog.

Free stock images are free from copyright restrictions or licensed under the Creative Commons Public Use Terms. This means that you can copy, modify, and distribute them, even for commercial purposes, without asking permission.

In some cases, some photos may require attribution. It is very important that you triple check if you can use them, especially if you are doing it commercially.

Here are some of my favorite sites with great free stock images:

Important note: Even if you use an image that you think is free, you can still be held liable for its illegal use.

Anyone can upload images to these sites. There were cases when the work of photographers was used illegally. If they find out that their image has been used without permission (and you are using it too), you may be held liable.

If you’re planning to use a free image, make sure you’re allowed to do so and, if necessary, provide the correct credit.

3. Make use of images created by other bloggers.

Yes, you can use photos or pictures of other bloggers on your blog, but you should always ask their permission. And when I say always, I mean always.

If you read somewhere that you can just upload an image to your blog, as long as you link to the original blog, because you are doing a favor to another blogger, you know that this is not normal.

If you violate another blogger’s copyright, you can be sued. It only takes 5 minutes to send an email and ask for permission. And if you don’t get a response, find another image and move on.

Some bloggers even indicate in their Terms of Use, Privacy Policy, or FAQ if you can use one of their images. Check it out before writing to them.

4. Purchase licensed photographs

Royalty-free is a type of license used by stock photography agencies to sell stock images. You pay for the license once and can use it forever, within the accepted terms, without any further payment obligations.

This gives you the assurance that no one will come after you and file a lawsuit because of the image you used.

If I can’t take a photo for a blog post myself or don’t get permission from a blogger, I usually pay for all the other images.

I use three sites where I buy all my images:

  1. Depositphotos. One of my favorite stock photography sites, mainly because I get a great deal a couple of times a year (you can get 100 images for $49, for example).
  1. Shutterstock Possibly the most complete collection of images in the world, but not cheap. I use the service when I need to buy something very specific. But what I love is that you can get 10 free images if you sign up.
  1. Adobe Stock. Another great site with a great selection of photos and a good search tool. As in the previous case, you can sign up for a trial and get 10 images for free.

You are now ready to start blogging!

Now you are at the beginning of a very extraordinary journey. It will take time, hard work, and patience, but by following the steps I have outlined in this guide, you will succeed!

I did it, and you can too!

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