“Do you know how hard it is to get a great picture of an aquarium filter in action?” I was recently asked. The person asking the question wasn’t a photographer. He owns a pet store, specializing in tropical fish and all the things you need to keep tropical fish happy. Photography wasn’t something he really did, but in the effort to get great images for his social media and website, he’d devoted quite a few hours on one of his very rare days ‘off’ to taking pictures of his merchandise.

Now, he wasn’t terribly impressed with his results. The photos weren’t bad, necessarily, but they weren’t really good, either. “This wouldn’t convince me to buy anything!” he said.

It was at that point we took a little journey together to the filter manufacturer’s website. There, we found beautiful images of this company’s products: high resolution, well-composed, beautifully lighted. A quick email confirmed that these images were indeed available for use on the retailer’s site. Total time commitment? Less than 15 minutes.

Better than that? The manufacturer also had two videos available for the retailer to use for marketing purposes – great news, as the odds of this retailer making their own videos were just about the same as the odds of them opening a sushi bar!

The moral of the story is simple. Make sure you’re checking with your vendors regularly to determine what kind of digital assets they’re willing to provide to help you sell their products. Images, videos, informative articles and other sales collateral provided by your vendors can be mixed in with your own original content to create a more robust and appealing experience for your visitor.

Many vendors are more than willing to share these items, as they understand that the more you sell, the more money they make. It’s a balancing act: you want to make sure your website and social media presence retains your own distinct brand identity while using your vendor’s marketing materials. The pet owner in question does a great job getting pictures of his customers with their pets, both in the store and throughout the community. Mixing those with manufacturer’s images has proven to be a winning combination on social media.

Think about what type of images, video or content can only be created by you, and research what may be available to you from your vendors. You want great, eye-catching content, but you don’t have to create it all yourself: that’s one of the secrets of smart digital marketing!