Social media marketing is one of, if not the most essential part of an effective sales and marketing funnel. Businesses do social media marketing in many ways based on their current digital presence and desired audience.

However, oftentimes companies do not understand why their social media posts are trending or getting a lot of attention. Likely, if you want to improve your social media marketing strategy or keep up current social media growth, you should start developing visual-driven content.

What is visual content?

Visual content primarily focuses on image-based content in the form of photos, illustrations, charts, statistics, phrases, and quotes. Information on visual posts can be deciphered much more quickly than text-based content and should be streamlined to fit the visual format, especially if the image has text.

Video content is also technically visual content; however, it should be looked at differently than image-based content because consumers spend more time watching videos than looking at images, and video content can be much denser than image-based content.

Why is visual content important in social media marketing?

Companies and brands are vying for attention when people are online, especially on social media. There is an information surplus in the current social media landscape, and companies are competing to get their content noticed by the right audiences. Social media managers and marketers can take advantage of this by creating visual-centric content.

Naturally, our eyes are drawn to images and videos more easily than words. Someone looking at a social media post with lots of text will take a lot of time to understand the message and likely scroll away before finishing the post.

Images are also 60,000 times faster to process in the brain than large blocks of text.

Visual-heavy posts with few sentences, words, and phrases rely on the image to tell a story or give meaning.

Strong visual posts will make impressions on the viewers and likely lead to more direct action, such as sharing the content or making a purchase.

Businesses do this in different ways based on their customer knowledge, key marketing objectives, and desired outcome. Color psychology, logo design, and advertising layouts also play important roles in creating captivating, fresh, visual-driven social media posts.

Tips for incorporating visual content into your social media strategy

  • Maintain your brand’s identity while keeping your visual content purposeful by using the same color palette and including your logo in your visuals.
  • Repurpose your existing content. It can be as easy as taking a piece of information from your recent blog post or webinar and turning it into a visual post.
  • Take advantage of free resources and design tools to create graphics, illustrations, templates, and more.
  • Pay close attention to image copyright. Make sure to read all the fine print before using stock photos or illustrations to avoid copyright infringement.
  • Keep in mind the specific image resolution for each social media platform and try to keep the visuals in high resolution.
  • Keep videos short and uncluttered for mobile platforms and add subtitles or transcriptions.
  • Be mindful and sensible of your audience. It is important to look at your audience demographics, understand who you are representing, and be the voice for them through your visuals while also respecting others.

Read also: 7 Social Media Marketing Tips for Local Businesses

Understanding the value of visual content in your social media marketing strategy is the only first step to creating an effective social media campaign.

If your business needs assistance in creating enticing visual content for your online platforms or even developing a social media marketing strategy that will work for your business, contact Klout 9.

Our social media marketing consultant in Lafayette, LA, will be more than happy to work with you to create effective, visually engaging, and informative visual content for a successful social media marketing campaign. Contact us to get started!