You know what they say about first impressions... the same goes for the images on your website. The first thing that users will see are imagery and large fonts, and according to social science research, about 65% of people are visual learners. Most - as much as 90% of the information we absorb is through visuals. So it's reasonable to assume that if the first thing a site visitor sees is a piece of media that is low quality and requires slightly more effort to process, they will assume the same of your product or service.
Your site's media serves to compliment and enhance the written content. It can even serve to clarify what you're talking about. For example, if you're trying to describe a novel and/or complex concept/product, an image can go a long way toward clarifying that explanation. Not many people are going to buy a product they can't compute.
That said, many amateur website builders have a difficult time understanding how to acquire a high-quality image. To start, look for an image that is 300 pixels per inch at least. This means that if you enlarge it, it will not look blurry (see the example above). Taking screen shots of images or downloading images from social media do not typically result in high-quality images. Same goes for selecting and copying images from documents or PDFs.
There are a number of good resources for high-quality royalty-free images on the internet, but your best bet for your website is to pay for personalized images that speak to your product or service exclusively. While the initial cost may be higher than desired, the payoff will be worth it.
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