Do you know what stock images are? They are professional photographs of common places, landmarks, nature, events or people that are bought and sold on a royalty-free basis and can be used and reused for commercial design purposes. In the automotive industry, stock photos might be of cars, people in front of cars, friendly customer service faces, or any number of other common automotive retail situations. They’re used all the time, but if your utilizing them for your automotive dealer SEO, you should really stop!

The problem with stock images is that they’re usually readily recognized as stock images. This is especially true if a customer is shopping around. If they visit the page of dealership A and then hit the page of dealership B and see the same images on both, there’s a good chance they’ll be turned off.

Instead, take your own photos as often as possible. Most dealerships already have something setup to take quality pictures of inventory, so use that same setup and get any other photos you need. Customer service? Pic the most congenial staff member and get a good shot. Service department? Get in there and get some action shots! Using your own photos means you never have to worry about ownership and you’ll always stand out from the crowd who uses stock or OEM photos.