Image Resources to Create Your Social Media Shareables

The Big Question

When anyone starts talking about visual content, the big question that usually comes up is: Where can I find free, good quality images that I can use without any image credit problems?

Before I can give you my answer, let explain to you about how to legally use online images. First let’s start with something called Creative Commons.

Creative Commons is described in their about section as “a nonprofit organization that enables the sharing and use of creativity and knowledge through free legal tools.”

What does that mean to you? It simply means that when you’re looking for images to use for your blog or to create your social media shareables, make sure you look to see that the image is registered with Creative Commons.

When a photographer or artist registers their work with Creative Commons, you can freely and legally use their image.

The second thing you need to know is that there are different types of Creative Commons licenses. Some of the different licenses allow you just to share the image while other ones give you permission to make changes like add in a blog post title and your site address.

You can read more about the different licenses here at the Creative Commons website.

Don’t Make These Image Mistakes

I realize that most of you reading this post aren’t professional photographers or graphic artists. I get that.

I’m a bit on the techno-challenged side so you should have seen me the day I figured how to use Instagram. I was like a little kid with a new toy.

So for those of us who don’t fall under the professional photographer category, here are some tips about how to use images for your social posts.

1. The big thing I want you to remember is that most of the images you’ll find online are copyrighted. They may or may not be listed under the Creative Commons license so the photographer will give you the terms on how you can use their image.

Please take the time to read this important information.

And always always always credit the photographer with a link back to their site or a text credit on the image. They’ve worked as hard to create their images as you do on your products or services so if you’re going to use their photos, please take the time to give them the credit.

2. Images are like any other type content so you can’t just grab a photo from Google Images, a Facebook post or Pinterest pin. These images are owned by the photographer so check their terms of use.

{ And yes, I know that I repeated myself from the first tip above. This part of using images is so important that I needed to say it twice. }

Let me walk you through an example

I know that the Creative Commons site can be a bit on the legaleze side so let me show you how to determine which image you can share and which one you can customize for your images.

For my example, I ran a search for the word Fall in my favorite image search program, Photopin.

I love to use Photopin because I know that the images in the site are already listed under the Creative Commons license. Plus, they’re arranged in these cool categories which totally cuts my search time in half!

How to Check the Creative Commons license

I found a cool Fall image and when I clicked on it, the link takes me to the photographer’s page on Flickr. Now I want to check if I can make changes to this image and add in a blog post title.

When you’re viewing the image in Flickr, look for the link that says, “Some Rights Reserved.”

When you click the link, you’ll see the Creative Commons license come up. This page will detail the license the photographer has agreed to use with regards to people using their work.

Please read this section carefully to make sure that you’re using the image legally.

What I really want you to look for is the part that’s listed under “You are Free to” section.

As you can see in my example below, this photographer is only allowing people to SHARE his work. You do not have permission to make any changes to the image.

If I wanted to use the image on my site, I could share it and then post a Photo Credit link to their Flickr page at the bottom of my post.

But that’s not what I’m looking for. I want to find an image that I can add in some text copy and my blog site’s URL.

So I clicked around some more on Photopin until I found one with different terms in the Creative Commons sections.

I found this Fall image, went to the Flickr page and clicked on the ‘Some Rights Reserved’ link.

When I go to the Creative Commons license page, there are now two words listed under the “You are Free to” section. Not only can I share the image, I’m able to adapt the image.

This means you’re allowed to ‘remix, transform, and build upon the material’ of the image. Basically, now I can add in some text to customize the image to create my social media shareable.

Always look for the word ADAPT when you’re searching for images. This way you can be sure that you’re following the Creative Commons license to make changes to the image.

 

More Sites to Find Images

There’s quite a few photo search sites like Photopin where you can find images to use. Lots of them have registration signups or ask you to give them your email so they can send you the images to your inbox.

I sorted through some lists of image resources and found some good ones that let you download your image without any extra steps.

Free Images:

When you find your image, make sure that you click on the usage links before you download the image. You’ll find the license information in this section.

Free Photos Bank:

This is a site full of stock photos for free. I couldn’t find any license information so if you do have any concerns, they have a contact area where you can ask them any questions about the images.

Morgue File:

I love this site and I can’t wait to dig deeper into their image archives. It’s basically a site for photographers but they have graciously shared their photos with us for free and for that, let us all say “thank you.”

You’ll find the license information when you pull up an image to download.

Pixabay:

Great breakdown of categories and they even have some cool clip art type of images. You’ll see the license information when you click to download the image.

Another Image Option

One of the best ways to find images that you know are safe to use is to build your own stockpile of photos. It’s really easier than it sounds.

Just use your smartphone camera or if you have one, a digital camera. And then start taking pictures of things that you see around you.

Find things outside your house or in your office that grab your attention like watching your kids play or the steps you take to build your next order.

Don’t try to be perfect and pretend you’re in a photo studio. You’re not looking to create professional quality images. Instagram was built on images of everyday moments, so just take photos of things that move you and upload them to your computer.

You can figure out later how you’ll use them. These are your photos to use as you like and create whatever you want without worrying about anyone’s copyright terms.

The biggest thing I want you to know about this process is that finding and adding images to your social posts is as easy as running a search on the right sites using the right key words.

And when you take the time to add in a creative image to your social posts, it’ll help your marketing message stand out from all that online noise than just a post with text and a link.

Photo credit: Morgue File 

PS If you’re looking for time management tips to help you handle your social media marketing , download your FREE copy of my 10 Social Media Time Management Strategies ebook. You’ll learn some cool strategies to help you create a social media routine that works with your crazy busy world.