Today we’re going to talk about visual media such as photo images, graphics, infographics, etc.
In the past, people used graphics on web pages mostly for accent. They might put little stars or spheres a bullet points, or use arrows or buttons to attract attention. But back then, internet connections were often so slow that no one could load larger images.
These days, loading images takes very little time on most internet connections, so there’s no excuse for leaving them out.
Why are images so important? There are several reasons:
1. Images help break up large blocks of text and give the eyes something else to focus on, which holds interest longer.
2. Images help illustrate points better than text can in many cases.
3. Images give Google something additional to index other than text.
4. Images are crucial for getting traffic from image based sites like Pinterest and Instagram, so having your own unique images instead of stock photos can really help, but even stock photos can have a big impact.
There are many different types of visual media you can use in your content marketing plan.
Just sprinkling appropriate stock photos around your articles can help, but using unique photos that really illustrate your post will make even more of a difference.
Don’t forget to add alt image information to your photos too. This will help you get some occasional traffic fro Google images.
Infographics aren’t quite as impactful as they were when they first became popular, but used correctly they can still be useful. Create infographics that are useful an convey specific information in a way that is easy to digest and you will still get a significant amount of traffic from Pinterest and other sites.
Pinterest is a very important traffic source these days, and it’s important to make images for every article you post that are specifically for Pinterest. These images should be taller than they are wide, an should have appropriate text on them to get people to click through to your article.
If you’re having trouble coming up with good images for Pinterest, you can use Canva. They have a lot of templates you can use that are appropriate for Pinterest and they even have an app you can use on your phone or tablet.