Infographics are one of the most powerful marketing tools available today. We all love them. Marketers love them. Consumers love them. We pin the heck out of them on Pinterest. Infographics, when properly used, are an amazing asset to enhance your content marketing strategy.
34% of marketers said visual assets are their most important content, according to a recent Hubspot survey. This makes sense when you consider that a picture is worth a thousand words. Furthermore, 65% of the population classify themselves as visual learners (myself included), according to the Social Science Research Network. Eye-tracking studies have shown that internet readers pay closer attention to information-carrying images. Fundamentally, consumers respond to the combination of visual and text in a concise, informative way.
The key to an infographic, besides being visually appealing, is to also convey useful information. That component is crucial. One thing we’ve noticed with our clients is that infographics are a great way to turn “boring” topics into a captivating visual. A great infographic can turn something that, in blog format, would just be a long list, into an amazing visual depiction of information that is both informative and aesthetically pleasing.
For example, Smart Car used their Twitter feed to share an infographic that has gone from being informative to being nearly legendary in the marketing world. One marketing pro tweeted “Saw a bird crapped on a Smart Car. Totaled it.” That in itself is pretty funny, but even more amusing was Smart Car’s response. They measured the relative weight of an average bird crap and used the power of math to determine how many bird craps it would actually take to total a Smart Car’s Tridion safety cell. Then, just to add to the cleverness, they calculated it from different types of birds (pigeons vs. emus makes for amusing statistics). This translated to an incredible amount of brand equity — all from a simple infographic response to a tweet. Learn more about Smart Car’s bird poop infographic.
If you want to add infographics into your marketing plan, but are having a hard time explaining why it’s important or seeing the value in it, we have three crucial reasons you should be investing in infographics.
1. They’re great for social media
Infographics are liked and shared three times more than other content in social media. It’s a great way to attract more likes and followers. Also, Pinterest is great for sharing infographics that link to your website.
2. They drive traffic to your website
Sharing infographics on social media drives traffic to your website, and good content — while visitors are on your site — makes them stay on the website longer. Infographics are a great way to drive new users to your “sticky” content (i.e. content that makes visitors stay on a captivating page that they either naturally react to or can interact with) and get them to stay longer (and hopefully convert).
3. They help with SEO
Infographics are a great way to approach link building (but I reinforce the quality content caveat here). Infographics are completely shareable and likable — like a more informative version of a puppy gif. They also send people directly to your site and are easy to brand with your own colors and styling.
There are tools available to you, from Canva to Piktochart and more, to make infographics a reality in your content marketing portfolio, so take a look at what’s out there to help you start building your first one. Humans are visual creatures and naturally respond well to images. Furthermore, it’s a great way to build on existing resources. That case study you spent hours pulling data on? It would look awesome visually depicted in an infographic as an addendum to your report. That dry white paper you spent hours editing? I bet you could cull information from it to build an amazing infographic. Those months of social posts you spent writing, curating, and scheduling? All that work may not be as transient as you think if you can link it into a cohesive infographic strategy.
If you know you want to tackle infographics or content marketing in 2017, contact our team and we would be glad to help you develop a strong strategy for the next year — plus, we can even help you build your first infographic!
