Guide to Creating Visually Appealing Content
Marketers know that the more visual their content is, the better. The push for visual content – and storytelling through pictures – seems only to be getting stronger. So what are you to do with this growing focus on visuals?
Why is visual content so important?
Our brains understand visual information better than text. We are hard-wired to process visual information better and faster than we process text. A whopping 90% of information transmitted to the brain is visual. Maybe because of this astonishing amount of information that we’re consuming, we process visual info 60,000 times faster than text! Part of what helps us process visuals so fast and well is that we can process multiple images at the same time, rather than one word at a time.
Want more telling stats on the importance of visual content and how it’s changing they way we approach marketing?
- Visual content is more than 40 times more likely to get shared on social media than other types of content.
- Over 91% of Instagram posts are photos. (More than 40 billion photos and videos have been shared on the platform since its conception.)
- Tweets with images are 150% more likely to get Retweets than text-only Tweets.
- LinkedIn posts with images receive 200% more engagement than text-only posts.
- 98% of LinkedIn posts with images earn more comments than text-only posts.
- 100 million hours of video is viewed daily on Facebook.
That’s all well and good but where do we marketers go to get visual content and how is it best presented? We’re not designers by trade, after all. There are many tools and tips out there for making good visuals faster and easier. Here are a few to start you off:
Tips for the Best Visual Content
- Choose striking stock photos. You know those stock photos that look like stock photos? The cheesy, staged photos? Don’t use those. They’re not impactful. Take a gander at a few of my go-to sites for stunning and engaging images: Death to the Stock Photo, Picography, Pixabay.
- Brand your visual content to, well, your brand. Make your posts recognizable. Choose and use the same fonts, photo filters, and color palette across visual content. Keep it consistent!
- Keep in mind the rule of thirds. Foundation to photography, this is a method for composing an image’s elements to be visually pleasing. Take an image, divide it into an grid of thirds both horizontally and vertically (a tic-tac-toe board). The intersections of lines are where the eye is most likely to be drawn so place your key elements along these intersections.
- As a general rule of thumb, avoid using overused stock images. And don’t add an image just to have an image. Make sure it’s relevant and complements the content.
Types of visual content to inspire your next campaign:
- Eye-catching photography – Search the above tools for creative stock photos.
- Video – Share video directly to social media or try out Facebook or Instagram Live.
- Data visualization – Try turning your data and presentations into charts, graphs, and images instead of boring spreadsheets and bulleted lists.
- Infographics – Infographics are still really useful for displaying lengthy information. They also offer the added bonus of being able to be shared on platforms besides your blog. They can be shared on Pinterest and uploaded to SlideShare. If your infographics has multiple components, crop parts of it to create bite-size pieces of content for Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram.
~ ~ ~
Visuals are more persuasive. They makes complex data and ideas more accessible, understandable, and usable. Visuals and good design will increase your credibility. And building trust in your brand is important, right?
If you’re looking for a bit of help with your visuals we may or may not know a team of awesome designers. (It’s us. Give us a call!)
