how to pick blog images - Express Writers

10 Ways to Boost Your Copy With Engaging Visuals in Your Content

September 5, 2022March 20, 2017 by Adam Oakley

Quick: what’s black and white and sad all over? Online copy with no visuals! Today, great visuals are everything to engaging, readable online copy. In addition to making your material more exciting, they also help pull readers through your text, making it easier for them to engage with and connect to it. Without visuals, content is just a sad shell of text, and won’t make it far. Here’s everything you need to know about why visuals matter and how to use them in your online content. What the Numbers Say About Visuals in Your Content When you were a kid, you loved books with pictures, right? The illustrations just added something to the text, and you enjoyed learning about new worlds and people through colorful images. Today, it’s no different. While it might be true that we’re older and that the visuals in question now aren’t so much illustrations as they are graphics, screenshots, and infographics, visuals are just as important as they’ve always been, and adding them into your marketing copy can take it from “blah” to memorable. The reason is simple: visuals tell a story, and that story helps enhance your online content. Without visuals, the words must stand on their own, which makes your material less compelling and exciting for readers. Here are some visual marketing statistics on the power of visuals in your content: 37% of marketers report that visuals are their most valuable marketing asset, second only to their blogs 74% of social media marketers add visuals to their social updates While people only remember 10% of the information they hear, they remember an average of 65% of what they see, making visual information the way to go for companies that want to encourage brand recall. In 2016, 51% of B2B marketers were prioritizing the creation of visual assets. By the end of this year, experts are predicting that 74% of all web traffic will be dedicated to video content. Infographics earn 3x as many likes and shares on social media as any other type of content. Tweets that have images in them receive 150% more retweets than text-only updates. Facebook posts with images earn 2.3x the engagement of text-only posts. With these numbers in mind, it’s clear that visual marketing is here to stay, and that engaging in it can be the most productive thing you do this year. 10 Ways to Use Visuals in Your Online Copy New to the world of visual marketing? Don’t fear. Start by using these top ten visual tricks: 1. Add Images To Every 200-300 Words in Your Blogs & Create Social Shareworthy Inset Images This is one of the easiest and most straightforward ways to incorporate images into every blog you publish. But don’t just “add images.” Here are some rules of thumb: Add a screenshot per every 200-300 words. By nature, the brain responds more to visual stimulation than text, so you’ll want to break up your content with a lot of visuals. Screenshots work well to illustrate points. Design (or have designed) a beautiful blog topic image, sized for optimal social sharing. Things to consider: theme it to the color code of your logo, have a custom artist design it. Here’s an example of a couple creative blog headers our designer has put together that gained a good deal of traction on social media: Need custom image creations? We can help! 2. Create A Custom Infographic Check out this crazy stat about infographics: Source: MassPlanner One of the most valuable things you can do for your marketing is to create a custom infographic. It’s seriously worth the investment. We create one every quarter (sometimes more): and to date, this content type has been our most-shared. The header of one of our many infographics, 10 Blogging Resolutions. Unique because it’s designed specifically for your company and helpful because it addresses the concerns and interests of your target audience, this form of visual content will help to differentiate your brand online and help you stand out from the crowd. Infographics perform better on social media than other types of content, so you’ll earn a solid ROI from your infographic. If you’re looking for a team to create infographics for you, look no further than our creative infographic services! 3. Create Custom Blog Headers that are Themed In Your Colors Custom blog headers can give your content a unique look and help your blog feel more cohesive. This is the “featured image” section of your blog. Ideal for brands of all shapes and sizes, custom blog headers are some of the most useful things you can create for your brand. For best results, create headers that use your company’s colors, utilize your logo, and incorporate a streamlined and cohesive design. Check out how we do this for our content on The Write Blog. The end “blog roll” look is visually engaging: We’ve been experimenting with drawing “visual story steps,” too. As of late 2016, we added unique, storytelling imagery to our content shop, which is a new variation in our visual products. Here are a few examples from our Process Page, to give you an idea of what these look like. 4. Screenshot Everything that Has a Visual Explanation If you’re writing a tutorial, how-to, or instructive post, you need to be including screenshots. Visually explain what you’re talking about. Screenshots help your readers understand what you’re saying and synthesize your post accordingly. This, in turn, makes it easier for them to connect with your content and absorb the meaning of your posts. It also helps your content be more useful to your readers. Be sure that if you’re going to include a screenshot, to add one that’s in-depth and detailed, not a broad overview that won’t help your readers or that they could just as easily find on their own. One tool I love is the Full Page Screen Capture, in the Chrome app store (free). I use Chrome daily, and to get a full-length screenshot without zooming and messing up the focus, the Full Page Screen Capture … Read more

The Age of Visual Content: Your Guide To Placing Photos in Everything You Write

January 20, 2023December 18, 2015 by Adam Oakley

Imagery in blogs and web content: they vary from the sublime to the ridiculous (crash test dummies in love, anyone?) but they’re vitally important to your content. Research has shown that articles that feature images earn 94% more views than those that don’t. This makes sense given the fact that we live in what some have dubbed “The Visual Age.” There are currently more than 2.5 billion camera phones in existence (whoa!) and image-sharing sites like Instagram are exploding in popularity. With all of this in mind, it’s clear that images should be playing a large part in your content strategy. The Power of Visual Content According to an infographic created by Wyzowl, only 10% of people remember things that they have heard and only 20% of people remember the things they read. In contrast, though, 80% of people remember the things they do and see. This is why so many of us, myself included, categorize ourselves as “visual learners.” The human brain is wired for visuals. We process visual information 60,0000 times faster than we process textual information and 93% of all human communication is not verbal. For this reason, the addition of visual content into blogs and other content marketing materials has the power to boost views and strengthen your content. Get Your Free Copy of 13 Incredible Free Stock Photo Resources. In fact, Jeff Bullas states that the COO of Shuttlerock, Paul Bingham, has noted these changes firsthand. According to Bullas, when customers optimize visual content using Shuttlerock, their email lists grew by upwards of 44,000 subscribers and they earned 23 million new impressions via Facebook timelines. One user even experienced a 57% growth in sales and another gained over 33,000-page visits after running a photo competition. How’s that for proof? 5 Benefits of Visual Content Visual content, which includes images, videos, infographics, memes, and many others, has many benefits. These include the following: Visual content can promote sales Visual content can increase brand awareness and help consumers remember your company Visual content can promote sharing on social media networks like Facebook and Twitter Visual content can provide an SEO boost Visual content can increase reader engagement While many marketers steer away from visual content because they believe that the only option is cheesy stock photos or that they’re not qualified to create other types of visual content, like infographics, that provide marked traffic boosts, including visual content in your marketing is actually much simpler than it sounds. The 5 Main Types of Visual Content You Should Be Using There are many types of visual content, but some perform better than others. According to KISSmetrics, there are several types of visual content every marketer should be using. 1) Images You know what they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. But when you augment your high-quality blog posts with equally high-quality images, they can be worth a thousand views instead. Now more than ever, people don’t want to wade through dense, impenetrable content that offers no relief. For this reason, images are an important addition. There are many different types of images, varying from personal photos to high-quality stock photos and each has its own unique set of benefits. On one hand, images taken by you add a personal touch to your content and can help add value to deeply personal topics (it would be strange, for example, to purchase a stock photo for an article about your family). On the other hand, unless you’re a professional photographer it may be difficult for you to produce images that are as high-quality as they need to be in order to feature prominently in your content. In these cases, it may be a better idea to purchase images from a reputable stock photo company. You can even do something really cool and get a custom artist to illustrate for you. Like we did in the How to Tell Your Best Story post above. You can find decent $5 artists on Fiverr. To give your stock photos an extra boost, you can use a service like Canva to create unique photos via a drag-and-drop design interface. We’ve added a link in this post to a free resource we created giving you 20 awesome free stock photo resources. Just remember that if you are going to use images, you must be conscious to always purchase them from a reputable source rather than simply copying and pasting them from the web, as this can easily result in a lawsuit. 2) Videos According to Moz, posts that feature videos earn 300% more inbound links than their video-less counterparts. Videos are one of the most useful ways for marketers to present solutions, relay information, and introduce products. When done correctly, a high-quality video can boost a content campaign by providing a personal touch, giving readers an insider view of the company, or clearly showcasing a product. Videos can also be used to drive conversions. In fact, one study demonstrated that featuring a video on a landing page increases conversions by an average of 86%. There are many different types of videos, from how-to videos to interviews, to customer service and tutorial videos. What’s more, live-streaming apps like Periscope and Meerkat have ballooned recently and many marketers are using these platforms to offer behind-the-scenes footage or to promote secret sales and giveaways. 3) Infographics Infographics are the prom queen of images. By combining visual and textual content into an information-dense powerhouse, a great infographic can easily go miles in your content marketing strategy. In order for an infographic to be as effective as possible, though, there are some important things to remember. Here’s an infographic we did on the Ultimate State of Content Marketing. First of all, the layout of an infographic needs to be simple and impactful. This means using the right colors, images, and formats to convey data in a simple and easily digestible way. Additionally, the information included in an infographic must be accurate, authoritative, and relevant. Because infographics are boiled down to … Read more

How To Pick Awesome Images for Your Blog Posts

January 1, 2021June 25, 2014 by Adam Oakley

Whether it is a stock image or the writer’s own, photographs really make a blog pop. Photos will grab the attention of the casual passerby or may convince a doubtful person to read your post anyway when the photo is combined with a stellar headline. Images are crucial to increase your blog views, but sometimes it is difficult to find the right image for your post. Let’s take this opportunity to look at the importance of images and three things you should consider when using them. Are Images Really That Important? Short answer: yes, images are important. Copyblogger says the reason images are vital to blog posts is because one simple image can create an emotional tie with your audience. Images also bring in readers who might not have read your post initially, but that image sure did catch their attention. Whatever the image does, whether bringing in an emotional tie to current readers or bringing in a new reader, it should always sum up your blog post. It might seem weird that a photo can do that, but we all judge whether or not a blog topic is interesting to us by the image the blog uses. One of the best ways to learn is to have live examples. Several popular sites out there utilize images to gain the best results possible. Visit Buzzfeed, Mashable, MOZ, and Hubspot to see some great examples of using images in a powerful way. In addition, we utilize stock images for our blog posts and we have found some truly astounding images that relate with our content perfectly. This is attainable! Start looking through images and adding them to your blog posts to see incredible results from readers. What to Consider When Picking Images When choosing an image, there are many different things you will need to consider. Here are three things to think about as you use images on your site: 1. Do You Have The Rights? Rights to photos are crucial when you choose an image for your blog. If you steal someone’s photograph off Flickr or Google, you could be setting yourself up for some legal trouble in the future. Many artists will let you use their photos if you simply ask, but not asking is unethical, reflects badly on your company, and can cost more than a monthly subscription to BigStockPhoto.com. The best way to know if you are able to use an image is if it is listed under “Creative Commons.” You can use photos under CC as long as you properly attribute the photograph. If you are unsure, you should do some detailed research into the topic. You don’t want to be caught unaware and have legal problems regarding a simple image you pulled from Google. 2. Are the Photos Relevant to Your Topic? When choosing the right photo for your post, you must make sure it is relevant to your blog topic. You don’t want a photo of an adorable looking house cat if you are blogging about wild tiger and lion sanctuaries in the States. That would look very strange and wouldn’t give readers much confidence that you are a leader in your field if you can’t tell a regular house cat from a tiger or lion. Make sure the image you choose has an obvious tie-in with your blog content and attempt to make the photo a summary of your post. The best way to do this is to select the photo after writing your content. 3. Is It High Quality and Appropriately Sized? Another important element to consider is making sure your photo is high quality. You don’t want a low quality, pixelated image for your post because that will look sloppy and readers will click away quickly. Find images that are the highest quality possible to ensure that they are stunning and will grab your readers’ attention. We all love a good high quality image and we are more likely to click on a link that utilizes one for their post. Stock images are great for finding truly high quality images that will look great for your blog posts. Images Are Expensive, What Should You Do? A big concern for many people is how expensive the rights can be for one photo. A great idea to save money and budget appropriately is to set up a monthly or yearly subscription to a stock image site. This will help you allocate appropriate funding and will grant you access to hundreds of high quality stock images that will go with just about anything. This is what we do with our images and we are able to find some great ones our clients enjoy! Stock images are a great investment for copywriters and companies, and can provide you with many different photos from which to choose.