Personal Branding Session: How Emma Built Her Brand Visuals

Personal Branding Session: How Emma Built Her Brand Visuals

Emma runs a business coaching practice from Cambridge. When she launched three years ago, she built her website using stock photography. Two years later, she had clients, a waitlist, and a website that looked like it belonged to someone else entirely — a generic businesswoman in a generic office who bore no resemblance to Emma, her specific approach, or what it was actually like to work with her.

The rebrand required photographs. Not headshots — something more: a set of images across multiple situations and contexts that could be used across a new website, social media, a speaking reel, and a book proposal she was developing.

Planning the Session

Personal branding photography sessions require significantly more pre-session planning than a standard headshot or portrait session. Before we met, Emma and I had two planning conversations in which we mapped out: the specific types of images she needed (working at laptop, in conversation, speaking, walking outside, relaxed at home), the locations that made sense for her brand (her home office, a café she uses for client meetings, an outdoor space that read as accessible and warm), and the outfits for each context.

The session was planned as a full day across four locations. We shot from 10am to 4pm with breaks for outfit changes and travel.

What the Photographs Show

The working-at-laptop photographs were shot in Emma's home office — bookshelves visible, natural light from the window, a plant she genuinely owns on the desk. Not staged; just her actual working environment, tidied and lit. The conversation photographs were shot in the café she uses with a client she knows well, who agreed to appear. The speaking photographs were shot in the meeting room she rents for group workshops.

The outdoor shots — which Emma uses as her main website header — were from Parker's Piece on a September afternoon, warm light, relaxed expression, the city visible faintly behind her.

Six Months Later

Emma relaunched her website with the new photographs. "Everything feels like me now," she told me. "I actually want to send people to my website." The book proposal was submitted. She got a publisher.