The Social Media Takeaway - Louise McDonnell

Profile Pictures: Tips from a Top Headshot Photographer

• Louise McDonnell • Season 1 • Episode 46

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In this week’s episode of The Social Media Takeaway, I’m delighted to be joined by John Murray, a professional headshot photographer and personal branding expert. We discuss the importance of authentic profile pictures in building trust and connection online, diving into the psychology behind genuine smiles and how they impact first impressions. John shares practical tips on preparing for a headshot, avoiding common mistakes like forced smiles and poor lighting, and why investing in professional photography can elevate your personal brand. If your profile picture doesn’t reflect the real you, this episode is filled with actionable advice to help you make a stronger, more authentic impression.

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Louise McDonnell:

Welcome to the social media takeaway. I'm your host, Louise McDonnell, and this is the show for business people who want to learn how to use social media as a sales and lead generation tool. So if you like the show, please make sure you subscribe. And if there's anyone at all that you feel would benefit from what we're going to chat about here today. Please make sure you share this episode with them. Today I'm delighted to be joined by John Murray. John is a personal brand expert. He has been trained by the world's leading headshot photographer Peter Hurley in 2014 and has gone on to be named one of the top 100 headshot photographers in the world. John merges behavioral sciences with world class photography, teaching people to unconditionally love themselves and their faces. Wow, I love that nobody likes how they look in a photo, do they?

John Murray:

But I do have to leave here. I have to say that.

Louise McDonnell:

Good answer.

John Murray:

Yeah, yeah. Now people hate themselves in photographs because when we see ourselves in the mirror we think we look like that and then we don't. So it's back to front and we're the only person in the world who sees us. So when we see a photograph of ourselves it's the wrong way around and your brain is trying to figure out why you don't look like you. So we all pick one thing on our face we don't like and we blame it on making us feel uncomfortable even though it's not that at all. It's empathy because the person in the photograph is uncomfortable and you're just being socially appropriate to them. It's empathy. God help them. Brain thinks it's an actual person standing in front of you and it's not.

Louise McDonnell:

It's so true actually, because even I know when you're on the zoom, I think when you started using zoom and I was like, geez, I look weird in that. And then you mirror it and you're like, it can be weird to everybody else.

John Murray:

It's a whole thing. It's best to not think about it. Just come in here. Exactly. Exactly. Let John shoot you in the face and look all nice.

Louise McDonnell:

So tell us, tell us a little bit about your journey. So this, it sounds really intriguing, like personal brand. it's what's on the inside that counts. So tell us how you came to be doing what you do.

John Murray:

I took up photography as a hobby and my next girlfriend bought me a camera. She bought me tickets for Larry, the cable guy. he's a comedian, American comedian. He does the voice of the tow truck in, or the pickup truck in cars. The movie made her the kind of hillbilly guy. and. Comedy's not very child friendly, but I like him and the next girlfriend bought me tickets to a show of his and then he cancelled and she got the money back but felt bad because it was a birthday present. So I was always messing around with her camera so she bought me a camera and I kind of sat in a drawer for a while, I was terrified to photograph people and a neighbor of mine was a photographer and he kind of showed me how to use Photoshop and gave me some pointers and tips and things. And it just kind of, the hobby grew. And then my mom kept volunteering me to photograph all the neighbors, kids and pets and weddings and stuff. My mom volunteered me to shoot a wedding. Um, and it kind of, I knew if I was good crack and I just had a bit of fun with people, then the photographs were great and they liked the photographs. And then that kind of grew into me photographing behind the scenes of music videos and different things. And it just slowly developed into, like, I was an ambassador for Canon. I got to train with Peter Hurley down in 2014, and since 2014, he's been telling me your shadow transitions are terrible and other different insults like that, that only makes sense to photographers. but. Yeah, that started down in 2014. My word for photographer, my focus shifted. So how I was taking photographs of people changed. I'd shot an image of an old man. I have it on the cover of my phone. Da, da, da, brain old man with a hat and I'd taken that and had a big conversation with Peter around that. And then it's kind of just, everything just switched. And then Peter was putting a business together with a corporate psychologist named Anna and they were going to do this thing where they merged photography and psychology together and then it all be done on zoom now, but you know, he's on the American sailing team. She's all over the place and they couldn't kind of stick together. They couldn't keep it together. Because. You know, COVID hadn't happened and nobody figured out what zoom was yet or instant messaging and calling. So they separated, but I was left holding the ball in the middle, you know, going, this is kind of cool. So then start doing courses and distance learning and stuff like that. So I had classes when I was in college and psychology and it already had an interest in it then pre hospital medicine. As well beforehand in my previous life and then into this. So it all kind of comes together. So it's pretty much everything I've ever learned in my whole life, all whacked together in one big thing. And now I'm really, really interested in what's going on inside people's heads and how we wear it on the outside. It's

Louise McDonnell:

true. Like, and, you know, having a really good headshot for your profile picture, it's so incredibly important, you know? So I know when I was at social media fest, we were at the same event about a week or two ago. And You know, the people that you meet online on zoom like this, you've no problem recognizing them and connecting with them when you meet in person and the people that you connect with, maybe just on social and if their profile picture doesn't look like them or isn't up to date. And then they come up and they're like, hi, blah, blah, blah. And you're like, oh my goodness, who is this person? You know, it's

John Murray:

That happened to me at the social media fest. So, the night before. So I'd arrived down from, I'd been in Killaloe in Clare on the Clare Tipperary border the night, the day before, and I got to the hotel at like one o'clock in the morning. And if you set my gear up for me going on first, And I came out and I connected this guy on Twitter and the whole lot and I was able to figure out who he was really quickly, but I'd never met him before face to face. He's a chef and he He has his head down in his profile picture on Twitter. She's all right. It's Twitter. It's not like your LinkedIn. And. I came out of the function room after setting the thing up, the gear up, and I walked out and he's in the reception standing there and he said, John, who are you? Oh, how's it going? You know, I had to pretend I knew who he was straight away and I didn't. I said, oh, how's it going? You know, how are you, pal? we're laughing and joking. And then, He was like, it's Chad. And I was like, oh, thank God. He said who he was. It's literally like him looking down cooking on his picture on Twitter. So I didn't put two or two together because I hadn't seen his face, not that you click into people's faces on Twitter.

Louise McDonnell:

No, you don't. But like, it's still how you, you associate the name with a person that you think that they look like. Yeah. I remember being at another social media event, this going back a good few years now. And like that it was a girl I connected with on Twitter. And she's like, let's have a coffee together when we meet because we had never met in person. And there I was at the coffee, like doc. Looking around, I was like, where is she? And she came and like, her profile picture was probably 15 years old and I got such a shock. I was trying, I was trying to not let it show. I alright, okay.

John Murray:

The other side of the coin as well is when you recognize people from online. I remember being at, I was talking about a thing last year, the Fingal Enterprise and Women's Network event. And. I went and there was a lady sitting at a table that I recognized and I went over and I kneeled down beside her at the table, start talking to her and then realize, I don't know you like we've never been in the same room together. This is weird. I just kneeled down beside you as if we were best pals because sometimes we interact on Twitter or on LinkedIn and because we follow each other and stuff, you know, I think we're in a messaging group together and it was really weird. When I realized that I was quite inappropriate in the fact that I was like on top of her, like right in kneeling next to her, having a good old chin wag and I didn't know her. I was like, Oh, I kind of just know your picture.

Louise McDonnell:

but doesn't that, that's actually what it's all about. I suppose that's the power of social media is that you can connect with somebody and interact with them and never have met them and feel like, you know, then when you meet them, but I suppose the other side about it is, and that's what we're here to chat about today is that. If your profile picture looks like you, it certainly helps if they make that connection. A

John Murray:

hundred percent. Yeah.

Louise McDonnell:

Okay. John, I want you to give advice to everyone tuning in here today. So for you to get the perfect headshot like if they can't make their way to your studio, okay. What advice do you give them when they're preparing or when they're taking that shot? Cause I know everybody gets nervous and everybody as a result, probably all does the same. I'll make the same mistakes.

John Murray:

Very obvious at the moment with all the campaign posters everywhere, politicians and the photographs, a lot of them are terrible. Like they're terrible. So never fake your smile in a photograph get to know the photographer beforehand, have a phone call with them, have a bit of a chat with them. When you go into a studio, it should be you having a conversation with them before you go anywhere near the lights. You shouldn't be 10 minutes to talk to them, get comfortable with them, kind of figure out who they are and have a chat with. Before you go anywhere near the studio as well, make sure you talk to them and you get a sense of who they are. Because like some of the sessions in here are an hour and a half, you know, if you are not on my wavelength, this is gonna be an awful hour and a half, you know? And that's important because the expressions have to be genuine, have to be, there's just no alternative. The alternative is you go. And you look like you sniff the seats on buses when strangers get up and it's weird. Don't fake your smile. If you fake it, it's disingenuous and it feels weird. All the campaign posters for politicians. A lot of them are absolutely dire.

Louise McDonnell:

Let's go through them. Micheál Martins.

John Murray:

Yeah, he's sneering. I know who took the photograph, and I had texted the pictures up onto Twitter and Instagram, slagging the politicians posters, going, Which ones are yours? Just so it can go easy because you're my pal. But Micheál Martins is a sneer. Like it's, it's a fake smile and he looks condescending in the photograph. You know, it's, he's smiling on the left side of his face as far as I can remember. And it's like a, I don't know, it's, it's like a narcissist smile. It's like,

Louise McDonnell:

I don't like it either. And that's why I brought it up. And I like, I actually. You know, as a politician, and this isn't a political thing, because I'm kind of anti party, I'm into people, so if I like them, it doesn't matter what party they're in, and I like Micheál Martin, but I think his poster is absolutely dreadful, the smile, I

John Murray:

looks like a Disney villain. Like, you know,

Louise McDonnell:

he doesn't look super intelligent. I think he makes him look like he's, it's like, you're going underestimate him in that photo. Yeah.

John Murray:

And that's the images that we use can be very damaging, like, and it's not just the politicians. It's like everybody, when you're using an image and it's showing you badly, like it's reflecting on you badly. It's just, it's not a good thing. It's not a positive thing, you know, and it's important. That's why people need to connect to you on an emotional level. What our headshots are is a way for us to connect to people on the far side of the world through a screen. But when we walk, like my studio is next to Grafton street. If I walk down Grafton street at one o'clock today, I'll pass 20, 000 people easy, won't pay attention to any of them. If I see a drunk person or a drug addict on Grafton Street at one o'clock this afternoon, I will see them. Their shape is different. So what we do is our brains are scanning the shapes of your shoulders and the position your head is in to make sure that the person is not a threat to you. Now, we've had eyeballs for 90 million years. And we've been looking at squishy things like us for 90 million years. So when we see it on screen, your brain believes that's an actual person standing in front of you and you interact with it as if it is. So if somebody has a genuine smile on their face, we connected that genuine smile. If they have an awkward smile on their face, it's like, why are they doing that to me? You know, why would you do that to me? Like, that's, that's uncomfortable. And when we see ourselves doing it, we do the same thing. We feel uncomfortable for ourselves, and that's why we feel bad. But when we see other people doing it in photographs, and it's a bad picture or it's an uncomfortable picture, we feel uncomfortable with them. So we reflect, or that's, that's what empathy is. It's us reflecting what we see in other people and mimicking it. So it's important that the headshot, even if it's tiny on the screen, it does the exact same thing. It makes us feel connected to the person who's standing in front of us, you know even if they are just on the screen. But the, like, there's so many different things that are in the images that we don't think about. Cause it's my job to think about it, but when you're walking into a studio, make sure you're connected to the photographer, make sure you kind of know them, make sure they have a sense of you, you have a sense of them, have a chat with them, you know, you should be talking to them the whole way through the session. I might have somebody in here for an hour and a half and I'll shoot 30, 40 photographs. Because I'm talking to them the whole time and I'm watching how they move and I'm taking photographs of them. Rather than firing the camera off and taking thousands of photographs and go pick the least offensive one, you know. So that's really, really important because that will come across in the photographs. What are tips? Don't get your hair cut the day of the thing. Just don't. You go in, you don't like the hairdresser, you're the commoner, or the barber, and you come out and you're not happy with the haircut, it's going to reflect in the photographs. And you're going to have bits of hair everywhere. so if you get your hair cut, If you get it done once a month or once every six weeks, get it done in the middle. Like, get your headshots done right bang in the middle because your hair is going to be that way for the longest period of time. Like when you get a cut fresh, it's fresh that day, but you're not going to be totally fresh every single time somebody sees you unless you're obsessed with getting your hair cut. And you don't want to get it done when you're walking around like Oscar Wilde, like you've arrived on top of the car and the hair is everywhere. Because you don't go around like that either. So it's the bit in the middle is good. So about halfway players are cool. Never wear anything fluorescent or look what mad patterns as well. Cause the lines are too close together. She were watching TV tree before it was virgin media and they start putting money into it and you're watching and everything seemed to be kind of. It was like doing it through a weird old webcam or something. It was like the quality looked off. There's a thing called moire. And when the lines are too close together, it looks like the patterns are moving on the screen, even if it's a photograph. So that's important. And you can overthink it. Drink plenty of water before the headshot session. You need to look hydrated. Don't have a hangover going in because like nobody needs to be seeing red glassy eyes. And most photographers won't even bother to tell the retoucher to fix that. Like. You know, you had a whopper hangover, but yeah, there's loads of different things, but it's, it's important again, that like, if you're getting a little professionally, even if you're going to use a selfie, selfies are perfectly fine on LinkedIn. Perfectly fine. You know, people think I'm mad for telling people that, but they are perfectly fine. As long as they're well lit, get the light behind the camera, get the light source, that side of the camera like stand near a window with nice light outside. not when the sun is. Like baking the stones and it's coming through the window and it's nuclear outside because you're going to be squinting and stuff. But make sure that the light is that side because you need to be seen. Like it would be terrible if the light source was totally behind me and I'm here now as a silhouette of myself. Can't connect to that.

Louise McDonnell:

No.

John Murray:

There's probably a thousand other tips. Don't do duck lips because it looks like a cat's bum. never do that. yeah, that's it.

Louise McDonnell:

but the psychology then behind it all. So what should you be thinking like when you're getting your photograph taken, you want people to be relaxed and

John Murray:

I know what they're going to be thinking like, Oh, I don't want to be here. basically what it is, is fight or flight. It's the acute stress response when people are standing in there with the lights on them like they're nervous and they're stressed and they pull their head back and we end up in Chinsville and then they're like holding their eyes open because they don't want to blink and then they think, oh, I need to smile. Smile is not under my mouth. That's creepy. So they just need to relax, but totally relax. And that's an important thing. That's see what the selfies because can see it. You know your side, you know, so what you're doing is you're holding the camera and you're putting it in a position to show off side that you favor, That's the thing you're in control, but if photographers in control is completely different. So you're going to have to relax and you're going to have to allow it to happen. But then again, you want to be having the chats with them and stuff like that. And if you go to a photographer and I said this to photographers all the time, if you don't like people and you have no business taking photographs of people. Go to a photographer who's going to talk to you, and who will connect with you on a human level, because it's going to relax you. It's going to make things so much easier. And if they're good crack as well, it just makes life so much easier. Like, I'm terrible crack. I'm an awful introvert, and I don't talk to people. You know, that's what people come in here for, is The and then they get the photographs, but their personalities are reflected in the photograph because they've allowed themselves. To allow me to see it make sense.

Louise McDonnell:

Yeah. I remember like during COVID I was bringing out one of my planners and like all of a sudden it was, we went into lockdown. So I had like a booking with the local photographer and then she said, sorry, Louise, you know, we have to cancel this. So I was like, what am I going to do? I've no photograph for my planner. at the time she was 12, my daughter was 12 and I said I took out the green screen. Like I had a clue, took out the green screen, put on all the lights, gave her my phone. I said, take as many, take as many photographs as you can. We'll pick the least offensive, just like what you said. But the thing was John, I was so much more relaxed because I was smiling at my daughter. I was completely relaxed and I remember thinking this is the most, you know, cause I was actually smiling at her. I mean, I know she can't come with the look. Into the lens, because I kept looking at her. Yeah, yeah. Look into the lens, you're looking in the wrong place. I was like, all right, okay. So we took the photos and then because I think I probably know a tiny bit more now. So I went on to Fiverr then, because I needed the photographs like, immediately, of course. Yeah. And I went on and I said I didn't even know what the. What, like they were going to do, I said, Oh, touch up photos. I had no idea what they were going to do. So I said, here, off with you, go and touch it up and give it back to me that it's on a clear background, whatever. So then they came back and they said, do you want us to, I don't know what they asked. Do you want us to touch it up? And I said, I didn't know what it meant. I was like, yeah, fire away. And when they came back, they had taken off all my moulds, all my moulds and all my freckles. And I laughed. I laughed so I have a

John Murray:

friend who's a wedding photographer and he'd given images, he normally edits his own stuff. I think he'd like five or six weddings on and they're all, everything's kind of going to end up backed up. send everything to a retoucher. Like everything that I have goes to retouchers. Like, you know, a couple of retouchers are used. Everything goes off to them, edit in house. It comes back to me within 48 hours. Perfect. Done. I don't have to worry about it. I said, send it all off. Right, grand. I think you went out to Fiverr or something to find somebody. Now I'd given them names, but I think the lads that I use are quite expensive. So it's like just for a wedding as well, you kind of need like a basic edit done, like a very basic edit on like a hundred images and stuff. So like, you know, a Euro or two here, there is fine. He went off to them and he sent somebody in one of the photographs had a mole on her face and our birthmark. That's what was a birthmark. It was one of the kids and the images came back and I said to him, just when you get them back, check them. And it came back and they'd removed the birthmark on the child's face. I feel like you don't do that. Like you don't do that. So he was like, I won't be using that again, may as well just edit my own pictures,

Louise McDonnell:

yeah. Yeah.

John Murray:

Yeah. It was just so funny. I

Louise McDonnell:

laughed so much. And I was like, Oh, I didn't, I didn't realize they were an issue, but anyhow, that's fine. I'll use the photo.

John Murray:

No, but that's, it's their perspective on what they should be doing. And it's not always right. So sometimes you have to give them instructions, but you have to give them specific instructions on certain things. Like, do not take this out. That line on her face is supposed to be there. It's a scar. I had a lady actually before, and she had a scar, a cleft palate scar on her lip. And she had a scar on her forehead that she'd been in an accident years ago. And I could see it, but you could barely see it because of the lights and stuff. It kind of evened out the tone across it. You couldn't really see it. And I gave it off to the editor. I came back and then I was kind of questioning myself. I was looking going, I can't see it. Jesus did it, remove it. Like, and he can't do that because it's something that's permanently on her face. Solicitor, and she's not far from here. And I was looking and looking and looking and I zoomed right in on the image and it was still there. It was just the lights. I had to go back to the original image and check. And you couldn't really see because of the lights that the definition of the scar. And I had to give it to her, and I had to explain, I didn't need to, but I felt like I needed to explain to her, by the way, here's the original image, and here's what the editor's done, like, the scar is still there, we weren't going to take it out, because it's something that's permanently there, but it is there, and she's like, yeah, that's fine. There's me like over panicking over, you know, oh Jesus, she's got to get all offended.

Louise McDonnell:

overthinking it. Yeah. any other pictures that stand out that people would be, aware of any, anything in the media, can pop up some picks when we're, when we're editing this.

John Murray:

Oh, and this I don't know. There's a lot of the politicians pictures are terrible. Mary Lou McDonald's is Awful, awful, awful. I put up my Instagram last week when I was putting them up with the song out of Sesame Street. One of these things is not like the other because it's completely over retouched. And when actually when the local elections were on, it was early this year or last year, she had posters up. And I was looking at them going, Oh, Jesus, like fair play to her. This time around, she hasn't got the one that has 55 filters over it, like where she's completely smoothed over. and she has wrinkles and lines on her face and stuff. And then all of a sudden the other ones are back up again for this time round and they're completely over retouched like completely over retouched, but there's loads of that. I like that. I think before Francis Fitzgerald's was kind of like that as well. If I remember correctly, it was like a red. She was wearing a red. Jacket or red top and that woman was in her late 60s or 70s or something. She looked like a 22 year old in the picture. stop doing that. Like if it doesn't look, if you can't show you in a poster, you can't be trusted to be voted for, you know, like it's, says deception. And then, oh, your man Malachy Steenson. I put this on my Instagram when I saw it. This is the last time around and this time as well. So was looking at his poster as I was driving past it. Near Sheriff Street. I'm going to the studio one day. I'm looking at the lights a bit odd in that like this It's not studio lighting and it's definitely not like in a room He's out on the street somewhere and somebody's taking I said, you know what? That looks like it looks like a photograph out of a newspaper or off the news of him coming out of somewhere So I didn't know who he was. So I googled him seemingly He was involved in all of the Antifa riots Riots and stuff up in East wall, all these kind of anti immigrant things and he got arrested and the picture that he's using as his politicians campaign pictures is him coming out of court and he's like in a suit and he has like his shirt is hanging out at the bottom of his thing. It's sloppy and awful looking. But yeah, that's what is on the poster when I googled it afterwards, I googled the image. And it came up and there he is walking out of court and it's the exact same picture and it's like, you know what, it takes a massive set of testicles to use a picture of you coming out of court for being a racist as your campaign politician's poster, like, you know.

Louise McDonnell:

There's a poster there, you won't have seen it, it's locally around here, it's a local candidate, Michael Clarke, and I have to say I love it. Every time I pass it I'm like, He hit the nail on the head because he looks, I don't know who took the photo. He's so relaxed. He's a real genuine smile. And all of his posters, actually the colors in the background are just really nice. So it really stands out it's funny how you do notice them. You notice pictures, you know, especially when you keep seeing them.

John Murray:

Yeah. So most of them are terrible and you don't look at them because they don't connect to you in any way. And then you see his, and then all of a sudden. That really does connect with you. There's a guy in Swords as well where I live, and his posters. Can't remember his name, his posters are up on the walls and they're in black and white. And it's just him with a genuine expression on his face and they look great. And then I was looking at that. That's really cool. Cause you notice them. And then the flyers come in the door and there's a completely different one of picture of him on a phone. It's like a selfie of him and his child or something on the poster on the little flyer thing. But the camera is, it's, It's completely blown out. So it's like his ears look massive and stuff like that. It's like a really weird shape. he's gonna drop the ball on that one, but his posters are great.

Louise McDonnell:

Yeah. I'm

John Murray:

gonna vote for him. Voting's today, isn't it?

Louise McDonnell:

Voting is today. Yeah. Yeah. This is

John Murray:

recorded on Friday. So whatever day you're watching this on.

Louise McDonnell:

Friday the 29th of November 2024. So we're going off to vote now in a few minutes time. But for, for all the people on the posters.

John Murray:

Yeah, for the people on the good posters. There's there's some that are really good and there's some that are terrible. I

Louise McDonnell:

think you made an interesting point though, John, and that it's really good for anyone tuning in. Like the guy on the poster that you thought was, that you liked. The black and white, I think sometimes stands out when everything else is color. But if you just use the same photo on the flyer, it would have helped you make that connection. Like it's just a simple thing, and no more than having the same profile picture on all across all your socials so that, you know, people go, Oh, it actually is the same person, you know? So it's not like years apart in terms of age on each, on each platform or on your website

John Murray:

I change mine regularly enough because I get free headshots and Selfie. No. But, you know, I was asked something for chartered accountants a couple of weeks ago was talking about an event and somebody else was a panel and one of the people on the panel was making jokes over my. Orange t shirts in my like in the posters. I have my headshots, my current I've seen pictures of me in this hoodie. I'm not sure if you can see the logo on the hoodie is a man. Pulling his boxers, pulling his jeans out of his boxers. This is part of the crack that you get when you come in the they were referencing kind of like that really, really don't wear fluorescent colors in your thing. And I'm wearing like, you know, road cone orange in it, in my profile picture at the moment, they were referencing that over the color and the whole lot. Everybody thinks you need to be wearing a suit or your shirt or whatever else you don't. Even if you're working, you're CEO of a bank, it doesn't matter. You can wear a t shirt, you know, it's fine. I

Louise McDonnell:

think as long as the colors that you wear suits you, that's the most important thing that they're not washing you out that, you know, that they go with your complexion and. All of those things,

John Murray:

that definitely does help. Like it definitely helps. Like I shot something the other day in Belfast and a lot of people were wearing, they were told to wear black or white and a lot of them are wearing white and shirt. I've loads of lights. I'm sure the lights were just reflecting off the white and then the images were all glowing up and stuff. And that doesn't help. And it does kind of wash them out as well. Like I remember the first girl I photographed, blonde hair. White shorts, you know, so I had to get creative with the lights to try and balance that out, to try and kind of take some of the impact off it. And other people come in and they were like scarves and things like that. And they were taking them off. Leave that on you. Layers are cool, you know? But yeah, if it helps and it definitely needs to have some sort of a complimentary. Factor when it kind of look at your skin tone and your hair and all that sort

Louise McDonnell:

of stuff. So anyone listening in, I did a great podcast episode with Aoife Donegan and she kind of goes through all of that. So if you were wondering about color for profile pics, that's a definitely a good show to check out after this, this one, because she gives some really good advice on it. So, so John, if people were looking to connect with you. Where do you hang out? You mentioned Instagram and LinkedIn. Where do you hang out the most?

John Murray:

All over the place. My LinkedIn mostly, you know, most videos, weird videos of me talking about stuff completely unrelated to what I do for a living. On LinkedIn a lot, I'm all over Instagram and stuff as well. Twitter. So I'm at jmphotodub on Twitter, John Murray Headshots on Instagram. And I'm also Oru Paddler, my kayaking page on Instagram. Facebook and all the usual places. You can get the links actually on my website, johnmurrayheadshots. com and you can click through the links. It's just easier. They're all in one place. Or you could just hang around outside the studio and wave at me in the street.

Louise McDonnell:

Well, I have to say, I saw some of the work that you did when you were speaking at the event and I can say to everyone tuning in, his are amazing. So give yourself a treat and get yourself a nice headshot for 2025.

John Murray:

Yes, come 2025 is the year of headshots. It's not the year of headshots.

Louise McDonnell:

Tis now. Tis

John Murray:

now. I don't even know what Chinese New Year is, but we'll have to look. Oh, I'll

Louise McDonnell:

tell you what it is. It's my planner.

John Murray:

It's on your planner, is it?

Louise McDonnell:

Yeah, That

John Murray:

was unintentional, but we'll go with it.

Louise McDonnell:

No, I'm going to go with it. Here we are. Da

John Murray:

da da. the snake. Nice. Cool. Wrong way around. Do you know how to say Happy New Year in Chinese? I do not. In Mandarin, it's Oh, go for it again. that's in Mandarin and in Cantonese, it's Wow,

Louise McDonnell:

that's great. Okay. Well, we're ahead of ourselves already.

John Murray:

So yeah,

Louise McDonnell:

that is my planner. It is out shortly. That's a little preview of it. So anyone tuning in stay tuned. We'll let you know when it's out. John, thank you so much for sharing all your advice. think when it comes to your profiles on social media, your profile picture, I think it's probably. the most important thing because it's the number one way that people can get that connection with you. So If it doesn't look like you, if people don't recognize you when they meet you in person, you need to do something about it. you know, if you really want to get a good head shot, tune into this advice. If you want to be a better one, connect with John and he will sort you out.

John Murray:

And no matter where you are, I do this on LinkedIn from time send me a message, no matter where you are in the world. And if you want me to connect you with a headshot photographer who has a decent portfolio and is really good, I connected with them anywhere in the world because I am part of a thing called headshot crew because of Peter Hurley and there is 40, 000 headshot photographers on it all around the world. And we can go and connect you with somebody who's in your city who is fantastic and you're guaranteed to get good headshots because I recommended it. And I'd stand on my own head for recommendation.

Louise McDonnell:

And if there's an election any time soon, maybe somebody might share this. It's not mine, I

John Murray:

was going

Louise McDonnell:

we have another election, maybe people might share this advice as well, because good headshots surely make the difference. Thanks a million, John. Really enjoyed it. See you later. Bye.