Employer Branding Is Booming. But Most Companies Are Still Using Stock Photos.

By Serge Bejjani, co-founder and CEO of Shootday, delivering global photography and video production for businesses across 150+ cities.

Employer branding has become one of the fastest-growing areas of corporate marketing. With talent shortages, remote competition, and changing employee expectations, it has become increasingly clear that companies are no longer just selling products; they need to sell themselves. And yet, when you look at most careers pages, you’ll see the same thing: smiling team stock photos and soulless generic office shots. There’s no authenticity, no personality, just plenty of empty hype. Which is a real shame, because most employers have plenty of opportunities to create the candid, fully reflective imagery they need to attract attention.

Why events could be your best employer brand asset

Every year, companies invest heavily in team offsites, leadership summits, client gatherings, and training days. These are the occasions when a company shines, where culture and relationships are built and reinforced, and real human interaction takes place. And that makes them the perfect source of authentic employer brand content. But most companies are ignoring it.

Whether it’s focused collaboration, spontaneous laughter over coffee, or the camaraderie of a team-building exercise, these are the moments that capture a company’s culture. And no stock photos can ever replicate that. But few businesses take advantage of the potential that events open to them. There may be a group or audience photo, or a few snapshots taken by the team, but there’s no strategic effort being made to capture the experience and use it to represent the company. And at a time when candidates research employers just as thoroughly as employers research them, that seems like a massive oversight.

Why candid photography matters

While polished corporate headshots and professional imagery still have an important role to play, particularly for leadership profiles, executive decks, and company websites,  they alone are no longer enough. Today’s candidates expect more than a curated front. Inauthenticity is off-putting. If a potential employee can’t gain a sense of the genuine work environment of a business they’re considering joining, they might not apply for the role despite being a great fit. There are several reasons why this is happening.

Social media

Employees share their own workplace experiences publicly. Highly curated employer branding clashes with what people see on personal LinkedIn, Instagram, or TikTok posts. When the two don’t align, credibility suffers.

Generational expectations

Millennials and Gen Z candidates focus on culture, flexibility, and lived experience. They want to see what it actually feels like to work somewhere; not what the marketing department says it feels like.

AI content fatigue

As AI-generated imagery becomes more common, people are increasingly craving the genuine. Candid photography with real expressions and unfiltered interactions show what a company is really like.

So, while there’s still a place for the polished perfection of brochure imagery, candid photos and believable storytelling will do far more for employee branding.

How HR and marketing teams can align on event content

One of the reasons so many employers miss the potential of events is lack of communication. HR and marketing rarely meet; there’s no need for one to speak to the other, so opportunities are missed. But when HR and marketing collaborate, events can be structured to maximise their potential on all fronts – including recruitment. And that begins with storytelling.

When you know what story you want to tell to prospective employees – innovation, collaboration, community impact – and who you want to attract, you can begin to create scenarios that will naturally deliver the opportunity for that content to be created. If you also know where you want that content to be used before the event, you’re in a better position to choose the right format.

What “good” employer brand photography looks like in 2026

For employer brand photography to work in the current environment, it needs to deliver context, credibility, emotional range, and energy. It should also be created with distribution in mind: short-form vertical clips for social platforms, content adapted across multiple channels, real-time publishing during or immediately after events, and assets that serve both internal communications and external recruitment. It needs to take place in real environments, with real people.

The goal isn’t to catalogue hundreds of random photos, but rather to create a curated library of moments – including consistent, professional corporate headshots for key team members – that can be used to authentically tell your company’s story. Working with a professional event photographer who understands employer branding can help you to achieve that. Capturing a dynamic rather than a guestlist.

Maintaining a consistent visual identity across multiple offices and countries presents its own challenge. When a company operates globally, it’s easy for employer brand imagery to become fragmented, different styles, different tones, different standards. The most effective organisations treat this as a strategic priority, establishing clear visual guidelines and working with photography partners who can deliver consistent, on-brand headshots and event coverage across every location. Whether your team is in London, Singapore, or São Paulo, the visual story you tell about your culture should feel coherent and recognisably yours.

Companies are already investing in events and culture-building experiences, and they’re using them well to further internal relationships and embed the values that they want to stand for. But they’re still failing to unleash the full potential of events by overlooking their capacity for employer brand content creation. The opportunity is there. The moments are endless and authentic. The opportunity is clear. What’s often missing is a structured approach to capturing and reusing these moments.