Infographics: An Informative Guide

We all love creative, visual images and what better than images that educate with informative topics and content. The ideal way to display this content is by using infographics that can be displayed on your website and easily shared.

What is an Infographic?

An Infographic is a way of taking complex and detailed information and presenting it in a visually pleasing way that is easy to assimilate and share online. Infographics are creative, colourful and fun and capture awareness of the salient points of a topic, creating an opportunity for increased traffic to your website.

Infographic Value

An infographic by Customer Magnetism showed that the utilisation of the visual eye has many benefits that include these observations:

• High quality infographics are 30 times more likely to be read than text articles
• 90% of information transmitted to the brain is visual
• 40% of people respond better to visual information than text
• Publishers that use infographics grow in traffic an average of 12% more than those who do not use infographics.

These statistics hold value and it is clear that the ease of share has the propensity to enable an infographic to go viral, however, an infographic is only as good as its content substance and, whilst great visuals will capture the eye at first glance, the content topic will keep the user reading and sharing.

Infographic Objective

So I’m addicted to Canva! There I’ve said it! And whilst I can create great images and visuals with Canva, I also subconsciously know that I can spend a LOT of time procrastinating in the creation of that image with the focus being on the visual and not the GOAL.

So what are the goals for Infographics?

Convey Information: You want the information within to portray your content message well.

Extend Reach: The infographic has a natural ability to be shared more online. This is content that gets seen so, used well, will also increase brand awareness and drive traffic back to your site.

Establish Authority in Industry: The content within an infographic should be content that has the ability to establish your brand as thought leaders within your industry. You know your topic well and have delivered it in a visually attractive way.

Make boring data less boring: Sometimes industry reports can deter reading as the wealth of statistical content within can be too much to assimilate in text form. The optimum way to get the salient points across is through statistical infographics that can portray the information in a more attractive way.

Infographic Preparation

It’s all very well to wake up and say ‘today I am going to create an infographic’ yet have no idea how or where to start.

Preparation is key here and the outcome will represent the thought process put in. The main preparation process should be mapped so by the time you start to create the infographic, the creation process should be straight forward. The factors involved in the mapping process are:

Topic

An Infographic can be used to display information in relation to any topic. The secret is to choose the salient and most interesting facts within a topic in order to attract attention. Statistics are the most popular choice when creating an Infographic.

• Highlight the most relevant and statistical information
• Choose a topic that will attract your audience to share the content and drive traffic to your website.
• Focus on specific keywords that will optimise SEO and also think of your potential audience and the terminology you will use.

Story

Once you have the content, you have to decide how much information you want to display in the Infographic. It is recommended that you have no more than 15 components within a visual so that the presentation is succinct.

As with blog creation, the most eye catching and relevant information is usually displayed first. This is the initial attraction to the reader and increases the chance of them reading the rest of the content.

The content has to flow so that:

• It reads like a story
• It makes sense
• The middle information enforces the introductory information
• The closing content summarises the topic and displays a call to action

Visual

Think creative! The visual choice is yours alone, however it must take into account:

The audience: Would they look at symbolic visuals that are fun or would they prefer to read information that is displayed in a statistical way? As a brand you will be able to decide whether a graph or a pictorial image better suits the information you wish to impart

The Company brand: Are you a brand that has a serious corporate image or are you a more informal brand? Again this relates to the type of audience you wish to attract in line with your brand image. Elegant formality or informal fun …. Decide which represents you best.

The message: Are you portraying a serious message that requires certain sensitivity in its presentation or are you defining your message with a humorous touch? The type of information displayed should be mirrored by the visual. Remember, it’s the visual that will tell the story first. The eyes will be drawn to the image and the text will follow.

Colour: So much choice, yet choose well! You may link the colours to your brand image and present a theme that is easily recognisable as your Company brand or you may want to match the colour to the content type.
Think about background colours and then the colours that will be displayed as a contrast. Do they stand out and read well?

Layout: The infographic layout incorporates the story as mentioned above. Up to now you have decided on the:

• Topic
• Content
• Visuals
• Colour

Now you have to design the layout of the Infographic so that it optimises your message.

• Sketch the layout on paper so you have an idea of how the different segments will piece together.
• Keep in mind the visual graphics and colours that you have decided to use.
• Make good use of all spaces within the framework so that all the information is displayed to the best.

Check out some infographic options here.

Logo: You must brand your infographic! Once it starts to be shared and maybe go viral, what a missed opportunity if your Company name isn’t on there! Plan where you want your logo to go and put it in your infographic.

Call to Action: In line with your content topic, you may have an offer that you want to promote and no better way than a call to action to a landing page on your site.

Example: If your infographic is highlighting the salient points of a recent Company Report; display a Call to Action that will enable the user to download the report in full.

The best way to display your infographic is within a blog post so make sure you have a relevant CTA to add to the post to generate increased business leads and potential sales.

Create your Infographic

I’ve mentioned Canva already however there are some great sites that concentrate purely on the creation of fantastic infographics. Creativebloq have included 10 Free Tools for Creating Infographics in this great blog here.

Infographic Placement

The best place to host your infographic is in a blog post on your Company site. The benefits of this are:

• You can create text around the infographic to enhance SEO to increase rankings in Search engines
• You can maximise the volume of backlinks to your site thereby resulting in an increase in traffic; potentially hitting your landing pages.
• You can place strategic Call to Actions within the Blog Post to guide the page traffic to landing pages specific to your services.

When you place the infographic on your site, ensure that it is resized to fit the blog yet a link is also provided to the full resolution graphic so that it can be optimally read through all eyes.

Note: There are options to promote links within the actual infographic that will lead to landing pages within your site. Thinglink allow you to share infographics that are clickable however the link they provide is directed back to your infographic on THEIR site which does not allow for great SEO opportunities. Hubspot wrote about it here.

Embed your Infographic

You want to maximise every opportunity for your infographic to be shared so, as well as the social share buttons on your blog, why not make it easy for the infographic to be embedded on other blogs!

A simple way to create an embed code is by using the Siege Media embed code generator which will allow others to share on their site whilst using an attribution back to your site.

Share and Engage!

Infographics can easily be implemented into your existing online strategy. You have applied SEO to the content and once hosted on your website platform this can drive traffic to your site.

Social Media share buttons, embedded where the Infographic is hosted, are vital.

Take relevant key words within the infographic and plan a sharing strategy that drip feeds each piece of information over time.

Make sure to have a Pin IT button for the infographic. Pinterest is ideal for infographic sharing as it is so visual.

Search for the key phrases on Twitter and engage with others who are talking about the topic online. Refer them to your Infographic.

Cut a segment of your Infographic that shows one piece of information. Share this on your Facebook page with a link back to the full Infographic on your website.

Engage with people who show an interest in your Infographic, highlight the page to relevant, online influencers with huge traffic sites that can showcase your work and tie it back to your site.

Remember: Infographics have a huge potential to go viral. It is a combination of planning the topic, key search terms, visualisation, layout and sharing strategy that optimises the virility of the information.

Plan carefully and execute well!

What infographic tips do you have? Let us know!