Creating striking content for your marketing is no longer an option but a mandate. Naturally, human beings tend to grasp concepts better when they are presented to them visually. It is no wonder 90 percent of the information that your brain processes is usually visual with 40 percent of people finding it easier to learn better through visual stimulation rather than using plain text.
This article is going to help you explore the best five types of visual content marketing for your business in the form of images, videos, infographics, memes, and presentations.
Eye-catching Images
Every content creator will tell you that images/photos play a very significant role in marketing for good reasons. For instance, images allow your target audiences to lay their focus on a brand thus making that particular brand more relatable. In addition to that, images come in handy to show the behind the scenes’ of your brand in a bid to help your audience understand better and develop more interest in your brand.
Also, images are used to showcase your products and services in a manner that will attract customers and clients to them. This is a strategic way of applying visual content knowing that imagery has a great impact on how human beings perceive everything. In this case, the use of images becomes important especially when you are looking forward to showing your goods in action. Most photographers and videographers are fully aware of this trick and in the real sense, this is one of the contributing factors that explain better why 90 percent of the public are of the opinion that images are influential in their purchase and buy-in decisions.
It is not just the use of any photos or images that will create an impact on your products and services. There’s more to that and the best way to go about with the use of imagery is to ensure that you reflect your brand’s unique selling point in the best way possible. At the same time, be pretty sure to capture your brand’s values through the use of color imagery or any enhancement that will make it eye-catching.
According to Marketer Jeff Bullas, the use of relevant images is likely to drive a staggering 94 percent more views as compared to not using any images or photos in your content. On top of that, experts say that 65 percent of the information in the form of images is likely to be retained by viewers after three days.
Videos
Even though photos or images take the lion’s share when it comes to the creation of the content, videos too are equally important. As a matter of fact, it is always a sound idea to mix up your content and give it both the sound and voice as a way of influencing your target audience. The following YouTube video contains some vital information that tells you how content marketing plays a major role in growing your business:
Using videos to grow your content marketing is increasingly becoming popular today. But before you go that way, there are important statistics that you need to have at your fingertips:
- It has been established that 64 percent of buyers are more motivated to settle for a given product after watching its video.
- There is a 19 percent chance that your email will be opened and be read by your target audience when you use the term “Video” in it. In addition to that, there will be an increased click-through rate of 65 percent on your email while there will be a reduction of 26 percent for those unsubscribing to your email list.
- In one survey regarding Video Marketing Statistics and Trends, the prediction was that 74 percent of the total internet traffic will likely be video in the near future.
Apparently, there are a thousand and one reasons as to why videos should be at the forefront of the content marketing plan. A few of the reasons that came up include:
- Customer retention
- Improved search engine optimization (SEO)
- Higher engagement
- Stronger emotional attachment/connections
Much of the emphasis is placed on learning more about Video SEO as an essential tool in tackling video content effectively.
Infographics
Infographics are the epitome of visual content marketing for your business. In fact, this should be the right place to start your marketing campaign. Content creators are fully conversant with infographics because it crystallizes a lot of important information into a single and easily viewable visual content. This way, the content becomes less intimidating and easy to understand and apply its concept by every viewer or reader.
Take a perfect example of the use of infographics in social media today. In its realms, social media provides a good platform where infographics get more likes and shares at least three times in comparison to the other types of visual content. This trend explains clearly why a whopping 60 percent of all content marketers used infographics in the year 2016 unlike in the previous year.
But why is this the case?
The best explanation for the increase in the use of infographics by content marketers in 2016 is probably based on a few simple reasons. One of the major reasons for that emerging trend is attributed to the fact that infographic as a content marketing tool is well known to cause an increase in profits by a larger margin of about 12 percent. Essentially, all these are valid reasons as to why content marketers are turning to infographics. Other reasons besides the ones highlighted above include the following:
- Infographics make the information more appealing and eye-catching
- It comes with valuable ideas
- Grabs the attention of the viewers
- Easy to understand
- Less boredom
- It awakens the viewers’ interests
- Easily accessible
- Infographics are more persuasive
- Quite memorable
- It is capable of relaying information so easily.
Infographics are suitable to use for visual content marketing for your business when there is a lot of statistical data to present to your audience. Alternatively, it is essential when you want a breakdown of the hard-to-understand visual content into a more understandable and viewable format.
Memes
The word meme can trace its roots back to 1976 when it was used by Richard Dawkins for the first time as a way of ascribing an idea the ability to replicate itself into a number of different meanings from one person to the other. With the advancement in technology and increased use of social media, memes (in the form of photos and text) have found their way in various platforms and are always used as pictures or images accompanied by one or more humorous captions. At the moment memes have taken a center stage in content marketing contrary to what many people believed some years back. Their use in visual content creation started when they first gained popularity online as more and more people shared them for entertainment reasons. Currently, they are part and parcel of visual content marketing representing easy-to-create but quirky forms of visual content.
Memes are created every now and then for different reasons. As a visual content creator, you may come up with your own memes as a great way of evoking positive emotions that can help set yourself a mile away from your immediate competitors. Before you get there, you must start by determining if all memes are appropriate for your niche. Apart from that, you will need to find out if your memes will appeal to your target audience.
For you to emerge as a successful visual content creator, your memes should target a certain group of individuals. This means that if the brand you are marketing resonates with young individuals, then you are on the right path. Another unique aspect of your memes is their ability to let you create various in-jokes that are directed to your industry. This is a good way of making your audience laugh while helping you build strong communities around your brands.
Presentations
Presentations were only reserved for the boardrooms but now things have taken another direction. The improvement in technology has made it convenient for you to share your presentation with the entire world thanks to sites such as SlideShare. Through presentation, you can create your visual content using photos with text and dramatically expand the outreach of your brand. However, you will, first of all, need an effective SlideShare presentation in order to reach out and inform your audience about your business through their devices at the press of a button.
Just like infographics, the presentation focuses mainly on eye-catching colors and attractive design with the aim of drawing the reader’s attention to the text. The only difference comes about in their scope but they are a great way of reaching out and engaging your audience with your visual content. This visual content can be in the form of photos or videos accompanied with some text to clearly highlight your brand in a manner that will draw the attention of your audience to your products or services.
Even though the presentation is meant to display some serious content, preparing and presenting complex information in a digestible and humorous manner can be an added advantage to your content. This makes your presentation to be entertaining as well as offers a piece of actionable advice to the users on how they can improve their content strategically.
However, there are guidelines you need to follow when making your presentations. First of all, you need to be consistent with your fonts, colors, and borders. And don’t forget that proofreading to correct grammatical mistakes and checking spells is equally important.
In conclusion, content marketing for your business has become the best tool to reach and engage your audience while informing them about your brand. Therefore, you may choose the most appropriate way of creating your content starting from images, videos, infographics, and memes as well as presentations among others.