Do’s and Don’ts of Watermarking Photos of your Handmade Items

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I’m sure you’ve seen one of those pictures on social media that asks you to share the image to see how far it goes, and it has hundreds of thousands of shares. This illustrates how fast one image can move around online. So what does that have to with your Silhouette or Cricut business? It shows that once you post an image online, it doesn’t matter where you post it, your image can potentially be seen by millions of people quickly. Clearly, it’s pretty important to protect your images.

Watermarks are a great ‘first line of defense’ against theft of your images. But, there are a few rules to follow when watermarking images.

What is a Watermark?

A watermark is an image or text that is placed somewhere on your product pictures to claim ownership. Watermarks often detract other crafters from stealing your pictures and using them as their own.

4 Watermarking Do’s and Don’ts

1. Don’t let your watermark detract from your item. If your buyer cannot clearly see your item, they are likely to pass it up. This watermark is too distracting.
2. Do make your watermark overlap a small portion of your item. It is easy to crop out a watermark that is in the “background” of your photo. To prevent people from doing this, simply overlap your watermark onto the edge of your item.
   
   
3. Don’t make your watermark too light to read.
4. Do use your business name or name in your watermark. Phrases like ‘Do Not Copy’ or ‘Not Your Picture’ don’t claim ownership. Read more about this here. (Let’s pretend my business name is ‘handmade’.)

How Can You Create Watermarks?

You can watermark your photo using a basic Paint program, PicMonkey, Photoshop, and more. There are also several phone and tablet apps available, check your app store.

Alternatives to Watermarks

I know that not everyone is a fan of watermarking. Sometimes, watermarks prevent you from being featured. For example, Etsy will not feature any product listing with watermarks. No worries! I’ve got an alternative way for you to protect photos in this post.

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Psst! All the images are above are things I’ve made with my Glowforge. Click here to read more.