A Guide to Creating Visually Appealing Content [Infographic]

Are you creating visually appealing content for your website? It's a trend that you just can't ignore anymore. Visual content has the stats to back up just how successful it is. Marketers should be paying attention to this content style and use it to their advantage to generate more backlinks, social shares and higher search rankings for their websites. It's no secret - if your content is highly visible online, you'll see a major boost in traffic, leads and sales. 

The Quick Sprout infographic below has some valuable information that proves why creating visually appealing content should be a main focus in your content marketing strategy. 

Why is Creating Visually Appealing Content so Important?

Here are some telling stats on just how big visual content has become as a resource for people in the beginning stages of the buyer's journey and how it's changing the way we all approach marketing:

• 63% of social media is made up of images.
• Nearly 66% of updates on social media are visual content.
• 50% of all Internet users have re-posted a photo or video they have found online.
• 54% of all Internet users have posted an original photo or video that they personally have created.

Visuals are Vital to Online Success

• Content with relevant images gets 94% more views than content without. 
• That 94% equates to almost double the views, and the boost is noticed across all topics and categories. 
• Tweets with images on Buffer receive 150% more retweets.
• Images are the #1 most important factor in optimal social media content.
• The brain processes visuals 60,000 times faster than it does text.
• 90% of the information sent to our brain is visual.

9 Major Types of Visual Content

1. Eye-catching, creative photography (think good stock photos or Instagram pics)
2. Video (YouTube, Vimeo, or Wistia embedded into a post or shared via social media)
3. Screenshots (helpful images of your product or workflow)
4. Infographics (various lengths depending on your subject and purpose)
5. Data visualization (standalone charts and graphs)
6. Comics (relevant comic strips or cartoons)
7. Memes (popular memes customized to fit the context of your post or update)
8. Visual note-taking (casually-designed layout of ideas, typically text-heavy)
9. Miscellaneous graphics (images that compliment the content you've written)

Images may be awesome content boosters, but don't just add one because you can. Avoid overused stock photos and don't use boring or irrelevant images. 

Tips to Make Visual Content that People Will Love

Tip 1: Design with grids.

• You can put a collage with many images in a grid or placing a frame around a photo.
• It will give order and professionalism to your images.
• Grid images are easier to overlay text.

Tip 2: Find a good photo filter and use it consistently.

• Filters can provide a sense of consistency across the visuals.
• It makes your posts more recognizable in social media (branding).

Tip 3: Set a colour palette and determine your brand fonts.

• Colours trigger different feelings for us.
• Use colours that fit the topic you're talking about.

Tip 4: Choose a striking stock photo.

• If you're searching for an image for Facebook, your should look for "lines" or "queues" rather than a search for the Facebook logo.
• Search for visceral reactions and go with bright, bold colours.