You’ve just hit your 14th tab in a desperate search for the perfect stock photo. Just two hours left until your deadline, and that elusive “perfect” hero image is buried somewhere among shots of business people smiling at salad for some reason. SaaS landing page gradients are all starting to merge into the singularity as you scroll. Good luck with that.
The sad reality is that you’re not just choosing a pretty photo. You’re deciding that changes click throughs, comprehension, confidence in your brand, and the time it will take for the rest of the work to be approved.
It gets really tricky when you need your asset to act as a visual for a landing page that has to leave room for a headline, or a social post that needs to fit exactly like your existing campaign… Or even an image for a deck in a pitch that needs to look like it was intentional to the content. All that means for you is that time is essential, because if you spend too much time looking, all you end up doing is doubting your selections and wasting a ton of hours. When you could be using Adobe Stock and its powerful filtering system.
Why Picking Visuals Feels Tough Even When You “Know What You Want.”
Lack of decision-making doesn’t usually get a team bogged down. Usually the usual culprit is the presence of too many reasonable options, making it harder to decide and easier to question your recent selection.
In real scenarios, the situation looks like this: you keep jumping from tab to tab with your final choices because it feels like all of them are “right,” but you don’t know which one is “the best.” Then there are stakeholders in the group chat who talk more about the type of image you chose rather than the messaging of the slide or page. Or, you go all-in and choose something quickly and have to redo everything because now it’s clashing with the brand or the layout.
Approvals take time, so design and copy remain in draft while the deadline slips. And with time, each new project starts from scratch, and you never quite discover a visual standard that works for you.
All of this comes down to a choice overload, documented in a famous study known as the Jam Study, and then in later meta-analyses that show up its effects. These studies explain how this overchoice is more likely to show up when the decisions are hard and you don’t know your exact preferences. When you think of it this way, large stock image libraries are prime estate for creating this. That’s why it’s important to rely on a resource where the search experience helps you filter and reduce choice overload, for example, with Adobe Stock.
Why Stock Image Searches Always End Up Feeling Like Torture and What to Do About It
Adobe Stock gives you the means to eliminate choice overload, but you need to use it correctly, so let’s start with some ways stock searches typically go wrong.
Many searching problems occur even before you click in the search field. The idea in your mind is likely pinpointable, but the search query you start with is far too general. “Business teamwork” returns a thousand handshake assets when you really need to search for something specific, such as “two people collaborating on a laptop, natural light, copy space left.”
Mismatched brand values come up quite often. If your brand is minimal and a search returns loud and a tad over-the-top results, you might feel it’s almost good enough to use because it at least hits the intent.
Or the mismatch could be in the layout. It’s even possible to find a beautiful photo that’s the incorrect orientation, or doesn’t have enough “safe area” for the text you need to insert, or perhaps the photo is just a touch “off.”
Keyword guessing games can lead to a lot of time loss as well. You’re constantly trying different variants without any real idea of how that library has its images tagged.
Finally, there’s anxiety about licensing. If the work ends up in ads, print, or for a client, then fears of legal rights risks can slow things down even more.
If you’re pressed for time, any of the above can make you tempted to opt for a solution that “will suffice,” even if that means you’ll actually have to change it down the road.
How to Make Faster Decisions in Adobe Stock About Which Asset to Go With
You can go faster with visuals once you decide what “right” means before starting out. Always use three easy to remember decision anchors that you want your asset to fulfill:
- Message: What should someone know instantly?
- Mood: What should the feel be: bossy, calm, fun, high-end, etc.?
- Format: Where is it used and in what size?
Thereafter, specify non-negotiables. This should help in excluding results that end up wasting time by being “almost right.” Non-negotiables can be orientation, copy space necessity, color direction (such as shades that match the brand), and people in the frame (if you want them). If you do want people, define them to fit the criteria that resonate with your audience in terms of age, ethnicity, or dress style.
Now, create a shortlist rule to help yourself decide. Reduce your options to 10, then 3, and finally just 1. Make your final choice by swapping your shortlisted candidates into the layout; don’t eye it based on the stock listing thumbnails. This should heavily influence your final decision.
Finally, keep in mind that photos that look great in the library can fail with a headline, mobile crop, or once you match them to other layout elements. Always choose an image that fits the context it’s meant to be part of.
Using Adobe Stock the Easier Way Than Your Current Stock Library… (Yes, There Is an “Easier Way”)
Adobe Stock is enormous, and while there’s no denying it’s a powerful tool to have at your fingertips, it’s also a rabbit hole for anyone browsing with a vague intention of what they need. Just to give you an idea of how big it is, Adobe claims to contain beyond 900 million assets. Speed here comes from its filtering capabilities with constraints that are genuinely in line with designers’ workflows. It cannot be overstated how valuable it is in this regard. Everyone using it needs to look at it as a feature to help in decision-making.
First, engage your filters to avoid future layout heartbreak. Orientation keeps you from falling in love with photos that will never fit. Copy space helps you locate photos where your headline isn’t jammed. And a really handy feature: Adobe Stock supports cropping previews in search, so you’re able to make a quick check before you even click on the image.
Color can be another early decision. Adobe Stock also includes a color filter and, best of all, will allow HEX, which is the biggest boon to those who are really keen on their color. “Color vividness” lets you flip from strong commercial to quiet editorial moods, and “depth of field” splits up busy and clear backgrounds.
When guessing keywords slows you down, use visual matching. The “Find similar” feature saves restarting when you want a similar concept but with more options. “Find similarities by color” helps with palette consistency. Reverse image search is useful when scoping options from a mood board.
For workflow, choose assets that don’t require too much editing. Items cut out from their background are great for quick drag-and-drop work, while scalable art is actually much better for print, UI, or brand system work (there is a filter for this).
The searching algorithm can also be filtered for people. For instance, Adobe has an ethnicity filter in their search, which is based on contributed model release data and not machine learning. It makes a lot more sense to use that feature when the casting or community will be just as important as the visual message.
The most basic way to use this big selection of tools is to tie every feature to a decision being made. “Room for copy,” “palette needed,” and the “same theme, less stocky” all become decisions in the search process.
Why Drop Previews in Your Assets? Faster Feedback, Faster Editing.
Even a great image will fail without full context. This is another case where Adobe Stock makes life easier, since watermarked previews can be dropped immediately into assets via Adobe Creative Cloud Libraries.
This feature makes a huge difference. Instead of being forced to picture a design from thumbnails, you make your choices having already judged things like spacing, typography, crop, etc. This can be shared for stakeholder feedback earlier too.
An efficient workflow is to drop previews, check on headline and focal legibility, test with stakeholders, and then, once everyone is certain, you can license the image that emerges as the final choice. After licensing, the high-resolution asset will seamlessly update the preview, with all your edits preserved.
Licensing Early Can Save the Hassle of Searching for a New Photo Right Before Going Live
Delay on licensing happens at the last moment. It’s actually the absolute worst time to make a visual change. A basic understanding can make it easier to vet a visual earlier.
Within the realm of stock photos, “royalty-free” normally means we pay once and can use the photo under certain terms without further payments. This does not imply the asset is free, unlimited, or without specific restrictions.
You can find the details in Adobe’s licensing guide, and you should consult it. In summary, the standard license is generally for print runs up to 500k copies, unlimited web views, and use in social media, email marketing, and mobile ads where expected viewers are below. 500k. The standard license is different from the extended license, with the latter being an upgrade for scale in items sold or print runs.
Teams tend to be more confident in simple use cases. Web, social, or internal decks tend to be simple. High print runs, items for resale or broadcast, and audio-based use cases tend to bring up questions in the process. Just always be sure to run a quick check if your asset is in scope.
There is also IP indemnification with Adobe Stock for select customers (under terms and conditions and with eligibility restrictions). That can give a little extra peace of mind on those commercial jobs.
Habits That Cut Stock Search Time and Improve the Final Pick
Faster searching comes from setting clearer criteria and rejecting sooner. Write your search out in concrete terms. Use subject, environment, emotion, and composition as a starting point. For example: “person working from home, relaxed, copy space above, muted”.
Eliminate unwanted results quickly by filtering based on layout requirements and color.
Remove images from search that don’t cut it to save more time, such as HDR that’s too bold, smiling models, or tight backgrounds that clutter a message.
If you’ve already got a reference image you like, save it with context by noting things like legibility, tone, on-brand. You can always use these references with the Find Similar feature to help standardize your campaigns. Once one piece fits, keep using it with variants.
Remember that basing your decisions on stock listing thumbnails can be misleading and may lead to you licensing a useless asset for your campaign. Always test in your layout, Adobe Stock empowers you to be able to do this, so don’t waste the opportunities.
Less Searching Through Salads, More Creating With Adobe Stock
Adobe Stock was never intended to be a massive wall of media assets to sift through. It’s a design tool that allows you to hone workflow by picking the assets that communicate what you want quickly.
If you want to put this into practice today, open Adobe Stock, run one real search for a project you’re already working on, and use those filters to get to a final shortlist. This will be easy to make feel like it was created for your workflow.
All of this means you get back to doing the actual creative work you do best: Not sifting through images of people laughing at salad ever again… Unless that’s your thing, of course
