Infographics are a fairly new concept, right? Wrong. The concept of displaying information visually has been around for a long time; from Egyptian hieroglyphics to presenting data in the bar charts and line graphs we know today. We are visual creatures by nature – and so are your potential customers.
Back in 2014, Toni wrote a piece on the ‘lynx effect’ of infographics, and 2 years on it appears this effect is what continues to make infographics so popular on the web.
But should you jump on the infographic hype? Take a look at the benefits and potential drawbacks of infographics, how they affect SEO and how you can make one yourself.
As you can see from the above graph , search term popularity for ‘infographics’ has been on a steady rise since 2010.
Advantages Of Using Infographics
Text articles are the most popular form of content online, allowing the author to go into extensive detail about their chosen subject – however, with the surge of popularity in recent years, take a look at a few benefits infographics have over text articles:
- Infographics are great content to share and have a tendency to go viral. Receiving numerous shares on your content can create strong backlinks to your website
- Around 65% of people are visual learners, thus, infographics are recalled and remembered better than text articles
- Infographics work as great branding products, creating a truly unique piece of content for your business to distribute
- People are impatient – many users will be looking for answers to their questions If they have to read large amounts of text to find their answer, they will likely go elsewhere
- Because infographics are generally data-based with small amounts of text, there is less chance of any bias from the author being presented
Potential Drawbacks Of Using Infographics
Like all good things, infographics are not without their potential drawbacks – and as their popularity has risen, so has the number of poor quality infographics found on the web today. Take a look at a few of the drawbacks of infographics:
- There may be a cost involved to create a truly unique infographic – with design companies charging in excess of £2000 for a professional graphic
- Infographics can slow down the loading time of a webpage – not only is this a big drawback in terms of user experience but can also negatively affect your sites rankings
- Infographics can easily be screenshotted, meaning your content can easily be replicated and used elsewhere with no benefit to your business – this is why you should always add branding
- Infographics cannot be read by search engines, meaning they are less likely to be discovered through organic search
Infographics In Action
Take a look at the data below, in the first instance, it’s presented in text form, in the second case, it’s presented in an infographic. Which one stands out more to you, which are you more likely to recall?
- Example A
Why Are Infographics So Successful?
93% of all human communication is non-verbal
Visual information is processed by the brain up to 60,000 times quicker than information in text form
The average attention span of a human is now 8 seconds, this is lower than a goldfish’ at 9 seconds
People remember 80% of what they see and do, 20% of what they read and 10% of what they hear
90% of information transmitted to the brain is visual
An infographic is 30 times more likely to be read than a text article
- Example B
Tips For Creating The Perfect Infographic
The best infographics deliver a large amount of information in a much smaller amount of space than it would take to convey information using a text article. Here are some tips on creating the perfect infographic:
- Choose your data carefully, make sure it’s relevant, credible and commands attention
- Plan the structure of your information before composing your infographic
- If you use images in your infographic ensure they are high quality and available for use without breaching copyright
- Avoid using too many different styles of font
- Use a consistent uniformed colour scheme throughout the infographic
- Use the text in your infographic to explain the figures presented, keep it short but informative
- Avoid using industry jargon
- If you use data from external sources, be sure to reference them
- Use the right tool. There are several high quality infographic makers out there with free plans – some popular ones include Piktochart, ly and Canva
Do Infographics Benefit SEO?
Yes, if they are used correctly. An infographic is essentially an image on a web page, therefore, search engines can’t ‘read’ the content within them – an infographics success is largely dependent on it’s reach through shares, social media channels and users embedding onto their own web pages.
Infographics generally have an easy sharing link that allows users to post onto social media or other platforms. In doing so, inbound links are created signalling to search engines that your site’s content is good quality and this will improve your rankings.
Note that infographics should be incorporated alongside your other content and not become your only source of new content online.
Need Help With Your Content Marketing?
If you’re considering incorporating infographics into your digital marketing strategy or need any further help with any aspect of your content marketing, give us a call on 01285 50 55 50 to speak to one of our team or fill out a contact form and we will get back to you.