Last winter we hosted a webinar with the Conversion Scientist Brian Massey. In the webinar he talked about something he called ‘business porn.’
What is business porn?
Business porn is the stock photo. We’ve all seen stock photos all over the web.
In January we wrote an article about marketers’ apparently widespread addiction to business porn. Companies will lazily use stock photos in place of interesting images on their website.
These stock photos could be of a woman with a headset, a happy sales team, or some dudes sitting around a boardroom.
And even though Brian Massey, Tim Ash, and other marketing experts have repeatedly and consistently preached against using business porn images on websites, the practice, sadly, continues. Companies are using stock photos more every day.
Why is this horrific practice continuing?
Business porn is widely available. All it takes is a quick Google image search to find salacious business porn images. These images depict everything you could possibly imagine.
This is just easier than actually finding good images that would actually help your website.
The images are alluring. The women are beautiful. The men look like models. Everyone is smiling. The backgrounds are all white and clean.
Business porn is the fantasy of every office manager and every executive.
Real life is much different.
Most business porn can be gathered with just a simple Google Image search. More advanced business porn only costs a few cents per image.
Getting real images of your business costs money. And using more creative images you can find online, takes some thought.
Why Should You Say No To Business Porn?
Ultimately, saying ‘no’ to business porn is about conversion rates. Data shows, clearly, that sites with stock photos on them convert poorly. Pictures of your office, your employees, your town, and even other creative pictures you can find online, will ALWAYS make your site convert better than business porn.
