I remember flipping the pages of a science textbook many years ago, studying the procedures for run-of-the-mill lab experiments. Behind me, my daughter’s voice piped up: “Have you ever noticed that the illustrations all show only white men’s hands?” she asked. I had not. The oversight might have been too subtle for me to miss, but not for my Gen-Z daughter, who’s part of a generation that’s keenly aware of how representation, no matter what form it takes, plays out—everywhere.

The United States is becoming more ethnically and racially diverse, especially in the 18-39 age bracket. And Gen Z is not only the most diverse generation yet but also one that values diversity and inclusivity in all its forms. Indeed, a whopping 81 percent of Gen Zers and 72 percent of Millennials say that multicultural and diverse consumers have a big impact on their brand choices.

Given that a picture speaks a thousand words, marketers need to pay especially close attention to the ones they pick for their ongoing branding campaigns. Not factoring in diverse stock photos might lead to campaigns missing the boat at best or seriously damaging their reputation at worst. Eighty-eight percent of U.S. marketers believe that “using more diverse images helps a brand’s reputation,” according to Censuswide research.

How to choose diverse stock photos

If the argument for using diverse stock photography is a no-brainer, exactly how does one go about finding the best stock photography images for their brands?

For best results when using mainstream sites such as Adobe, iStock, or Shutterstock, filter the images using detailed prompts with keywords and related terms, advises Crystal Kendrick, president of marketing firm The Voice of Your Customer.

Instead of only looking for “X” demographic, search by lifestyle, location, or activity, advises Maria Lobo, founder and CEO of Planet Lobo, a brand design studio. When targeting a younger audience, for example, Lobo might use the search term “skateboarding” rather than “diverse young fit models in the city.” Such searches will surface diversity in action instead of awkwardly posed shots. “The approach helps narrow down the search to images that naturally fit the desired aesthetic,” Lobo says.

Laying some groundwork before going fishing in image repositories helps. “Doing concept and strategy work for the image collection before browsing stock libraries helps you get a clear idea of the style and content you want, allowing you to stay discerning,” Lobo says.

What to avoid when picking from the best stock photography images

Dodge the most downloaded

Niche sites might make a better fit for content creators, but mainstream ones will do in a pinch. In such a case, make sure to avoid diverse stock photos with many downloads. “The last thing I want is to design a killer ad and then see the same image used by another company,” Lobo says.

Make intersectionality intentional

Remember that diversity includes gender, race, ethnicity, neurodiversity, people with disabilities and a diversity of ideas, experiences and backgrounds. Intersectionality matters. “Many brands concentrate on a single dimension of diversity like race or gender, forgetting about intersections within identities. Ensure your visuals depict real people’s lives from various angles, considering aspects such as age, disability and socioeconomic status, among others,” says Gordon Hwa, founder of Khepri Digital, a digital marketing group.

Baggu, a manufacturer of reusable bags and accessories, for example, features inclusive images and a really diverse age range that resonates. “It’s a brand that feels like it’s for everyone, no matter where you come from or where you’re headed,” Lobo says.

Avoid tokenism

When I was pursuing graduate studies, a university photographer wanted me and the one other woman in our large engineering school to participate in a photo shoot for the bulletin. “Isn’t it amazing how it seems like the whole school is full of women?” my friend asked, tongue firmly in cheek, when we later saw the end result. Focusing on diversity is a good idea, but avoid tokenism.

Steer clear of stereotypes or cultural appropriation

“When using culture-specific images, it’s important to understand the cultural symbols and practices represented by such images and provide adequate context so as not to misrepresent them,” Hwa says.

While the list of don’ts might make you feel like you’re treading on eggshells, getting it right is about being inclusive of everyone equally and of every aspect of true diversity. And the results are memorable.

Lobo, for example, remembers the Savage X by Fenty brand from Rihanna. “It’s one of the first places I saw ‘normal’ bodies—plus-size, non-traditionally model-looking, models with mobility and accessibility differences,” she says.

When content is done well with diverse stock images or user-generated content, it sticks. And attention-grabbing, knock-your-socks-off branding can be yours for the taking.

Ask the Content Strategist: FAQs about diverse stock photos

How can brands ensure that their efforts to use diverse stock photos resonate authentically with their audience?

Brands can ensure authenticity by conducting thorough research on the cultures, communities, and identities they want to represent, involving individuals from those backgrounds in the creative process to source inclusive images. They could also hire a freelance photographer to capture their own diverse branded marketing stock photography. Brands should also prioritize storytelling and contextual relevance to avoid superficial depictions.

What are some of the specific visual cues that indicate tokenism in branding campaigns?

Tokenism often appears in the form of a single minority individual being prominently featured but without any real context or meaningful representation of their community. It also manifests when diverse stock photos seem forced or they exist only in surface-level portrayals without acknowledging deeper layers of culture or identity.

What role does user-generated content play in helping brands achieve diversity in their visuals?

User-generated content allows brands to showcase real customers from diverse backgrounds, providing an organic and authentic reflection of their audience. By encouraging their community to share their own experiences, brands can foster inclusivity in a more genuine and engaging way.

For more tips on choosing the best creative talent and approaches to your marketing strategy, subscribe to The Content Strategist.

The post Diverse Stock Photos Done Right appeared first on Contently.

In our visually-driven digital age, where your audience’s attention span is fleeting at best, the importance of visual content cannot be overstated. Before we dive into ways you can use visual content and how Contently can help elevate your visual storytelling, let’s begin by exploring the fundamentals.

Importance of Visual Content and the Psychology Behind Visual Perception

Visual content—from graphics to videos—plays a vital role in storytelling and emotion. Our brains are wired to process these visuals quickly, with research suggesting images take as little as 13 milliseconds to be understood. This fast processing power highlights the importance of integrating visual elements effectively in our communications. Here are a few key psychological principles behind visual perception:

• Visual Memory: People tend to identify and remember visuals better than text. It’s estimated that after three days, a person can recall about 65% of visual content compared to just 10% of text.
• Emotional Impact: Visuals have a unique ability to evoke emotions. They can make us laugh, cry, or feel inspired, often more effectively than words alone.
• Storytelling: Visuals can tell a story instantly. A single image can convey a message without the need for lengthy explanations.
• Attention-Grabbing: Visuals naturally draw our attention. They’re the first thing we notice when we visit a website or scroll through social media.

Understanding these psychological aspects of visual content is crucial for content marketers. It provides the foundation upon which compelling visual storytelling is built.

Visual Content Creation Examples

Exploring the various forms of visual content can reveal powerful ways to engage your audience. Here, we’ll cover the most common types of visuals used by content marketers, plus visual storytelling examples.

Photos: Capturing Moments in Time

Photos are like windows into the past. They freeze moments, allowing your audience to connect with the emotions and experiences captured in the frame. Whether it’s a candid shot of your team in action or a stunning product photo, images have the power to convey authenticity and build trust.

Dove often uses photos to illustrate campaign concepts and drive its mission to redefine beauty standards. For its #TurnYourBack campaign, the company raised awareness of the damage that popular social media filters can cause, specifically targeting TikTok’s Bold Glamour filter. Although the images are simple, they are powerful examples of how brands can drive deeper connections while championing a cause.

Graphics: Simplifying Complexity

Graphics often include charts, graphs, and data visualizations. They transform data into visual stories that are easy for your audience to interact with. Graphics are excellent for simplifying complex information and making it more digestible, cutting through the noise and providing clarity.

Every year, Spotify releases a personalized recap for customers with its Spotify Wrapped campaign. They use bright colors and eye-catching graphics to convey each user’s music journey into a fun—and highly shareable—data story.

Videos: Practicing Dynamic Storytelling

Videos are perhaps the most dynamic form of visual content. They combine moving images with sound, creating a multisensory experience for your audience. From short, impactful social media clips to in-depth documentaries, videos are versatile tools for storytelling.

Italian energy company, Eni, relied on Contently’s versatile platform to bring their vision to life with the Powering Mozambique documentary. Through Contently, Eni seamlessly managed the entire creative process, from ideation to distribution, ensuring their narrative resonated with precision. This captivating documentary not only captured the hearts of viewers but also exemplified the potential of visual storytelling to inspire change and foster a deeper connection with audiences.

Illustrations: Adding Artistry to Your Brand

Illustrations are hand-drawn or digitally created images that can add a unique and artistic touch to your content. They’re versatile and can be tailored to your brand’s style.

Illustrations bring a touch of artistry to your content. They can be whimsical, serious, or anywhere in between, depending on your brand’s personality. Custom illustrations also offer the advantage of being unique to your brand, making your content instantly recognizable.

Salesforce has developed a distinctive illustration style that makes its branding instantly recognizable. Whether used in combination with photography or as stand-alone elements, their illustrations also include a cast of characters and mascots that represent different aspects of the brand.

Memes: Injecting Humor and Virality

Memes are a unique breed of visual content. They’re often humorous and have the potential to go viral, spreading your message far and wide. While not suitable for every brand, memes can be a playful addition to your content strategy.

Brands that have mastered meme use tend to do so sparingly, which can add to the humor if it’s unexpected. This HubSpot post on LinkedIn showed the benefit of their courses in a fun way that likely yielded higher engagement than a straightforward promotional post.

Infographics: Breaking Down Complexity

Infographics combine text and visuals to present information in a visually appealing and easily understandable format. They’re excellent for breaking down complex concepts and are particularly useful for step-by-step guides, data-driven stories, and educational content.

Contently helped the American Kennel Club (AKC) incorporate infographics into its content strategy. The company leaned on Contently’s expert creative network to design an infographic to help debunk the age-old myth equating one dog year to seven human years.

The impact was immediate and impressive. After adding the visual to their content, the original article swiftly skyrocketed to become one of AKC’s most-viewed pieces of content. This success story underscores how Contently’s platform empowers brands like AKC to not only enhance the educational value of their content but also drive remarkable engagement through visually compelling infographics.

Why Brands Need to Embrace Visual Storytelling

While visual content is not limited to these categories, they are some of the most prevalent forms you’ll encounter in the digital landscape. Understanding the strengths and characteristics of each type of visual content is essential for crafting a well-rounded content strategy. Your choice of visual content should align with your brand’s personality, your message, and your target audience.

A masterfully crafted visual story possesses the transformative power to not only seize attention but also to awaken emotions, foster trust, and inspire action. So, embrace the art of visual storytelling as a potent means to not just convey your message but to etch it into the hearts and minds of your audience, leaving an indelible mark in a fast-paced and ever-evolving digital world.

Subscribe to The Content Strategist newsletter to stay updated on the latest trends and strategies in crafting compelling visual stories for your brand.

The post Visual Storytelling Examples To Captivate Your Audience appeared first on Contently.

He created “Breaking the Chain of Infection,” designed with the help of Carol Navarro, a registered nurse, and spoke with multiple doctors to vet the information. To maximize impact across the globe, the infographic was translated in Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Malayalam, Portuguese, and Spanish.

You may not have seen Gude’s infographic before now, but you’ve definitely seen story after story about COVID-19 over the last few months. Turn the television to your preferred news outlet, stream a press briefing, read the latest article online, and you’re likely to be bombarded with an overwhelming amount of facts, figures, statistics, scientific data, and medical advice sprawled across the screen.

When done right, infographics and other types of visual content can be an antidote of sorts during the news cycle. There are many different types of visuals proving successful in relaying important content to audiences: infographics, data visualizations, charts, maps, cartoons, animations, illustrations, simulations, even GIFs.

Best of all, they simplify complex details and give learners a chance to process a lot of information.

More than just eye candy

Today, we’re seeing the most reputable sources relying on visuals to spread their messages—The Center for Disease Control, the World Health Organization, local hospitals, city municipalities. These visuals aren’t just eye-catching, but studies have shown that they actually increase the audience’s ability to retain important information.

“Editors have always said that graphics make great entry points for stories,” Gude said. “They’re great at attracting interest to more information about that topic.”

According to Wiley Education Services, it takes far less time to process symbols than text alone. “In fractions of a second, the brain can process symbols and attach meaning to them (Thorpe, Fize, & Marlot, 1996). Because infographics associate concepts and ideas with iconography, they naturally tap into this processing power and can help students engage more deeply with your content.”

Hundreds of studies and experiments have shown that pairing visuals with text helps people comprehend and remember information more effectively than just reading or listening. The brain processes visuals 60,000 times faster than text, and a lit review published in Educational Technology Research and Development found that including illustrations with text instructions helps people perform a task 323 percent better than those who read the instructions without visuals.

“The human brain evolved to be sort of like a visual processing machine,” said Alberto Cairo, Knight Chair in Visual Journalism at University of Miami and director of the visualization program of the Center for Computational Science. “A huge part of our brain is devoted to processing information that is gathered through our eyes.”

Cairo cited a Washington Post story from March about why outbreaks spread exponentially, which is full of interactive graphics and quickly became one of the site’s most popular stories of the year. “It’s a model of how an epidemic changes and expands. That visual simulation [was] the most viewed story…. That says something about the popularity of these images.”

Digging through the data

As the senior program manager for the 21st Century Cities Initiative at Johns Hopkins University, Mac McComas works with large data sets every day. Some of that big data gathered from public sets, or through various data use agreements, ends up being displayed through visuals.

“A lot of the research we do is on everything from housing, economic development issues, transportation, small business development, education and health outcomes—and how public policy and the private sector shape that,” McComas said.

Naturally, that research turned to COVID-19, specifically observational analysis of trends in Baltimore.

The 21st Century Cities Initiative has started by comparing data points from the first four months of 2020 to the same time period in 2019. The goal is to examine how COVID became a “shock to the city,” as McComas put it. That means examining behaviors like how often people go to grocery stores, purchase plane tickets, and even commit violent crimes.

“Visuals serve as a great entryway to get people thinking about some of these deeper research questions, but they’re never intended as the end point,” McComas said. “We always hope that they generate discussion and get people to think.”

That’s a key point stressed by everyone I interview. In a hurried society, audiences are spending less and less time with your message. Understanding the limitations of that can be helpful when communicating through a visual medium.

“Really try to do some detective work, and make sure you’re understanding the full limitations of what the graph or visual is actually saying,” McComas said.

In some cases, that abstraction can get away from the creator. Take this tornado of a graphic posted by an Oxford professor, which was later mentioned in a Financial Times article titled “When data viz goes psychotic.”

Not exactly easy to read. In other COVID-19 coverage, I’ve seen charts are comparing the number of virus deaths in April 2019 to April 2020, which obviously isn’t the whole story.

“The challenge is not just to show the numbers to people…. but it is important to add, what we call the annotation layer,” Cairo said. “The annotation layer is the words (either written or spoken) that you put on top of your charts to emphasize, explain, and highlight what they mean, why they matter, [and] what it is they are measuring.”

Creating credible infographics

Making appealing and trustworthy infographics doesn’t require an art degree, but understanding basic design concepts is key.

“Designing with the end-user in mind informs your graphic, and focuses your research,” Gude said, of his eight-step process for making infographics.

For example, handwashing graphics for children might use bright colors and cartoon illustrations. Graphics showing the scientific effectiveness of handwashing in healthcare facilities might provide more detailed instructions, stats, and text.

As far as getting started, there are some free or freemium options like Canva, Visme, and Infogram worth checking out. (Canva touts itself as the “non-designer’s secret weapon.”)

In addition to knowing your audience, another important step is minimizing the amount of info you include. Not all of your extensive research has a home in that particular graphic. Many artists make the mistake of drawing visuals first before they have all pertinent information, which is working backwards.

No matter what type of visual content you decide to use for your message, one thing is for certain: Infographics and other data visualizations are excellent tools in delivering information. In the midst of a global pandemic, media outlets of all kinds have learned on visual content to reach the public with vital information. It’s not an exaggeration to say they’re saving lives as we deal with COVID-19.

As a final piece of advice, Gude always returns to a helpful quotation from painter Hans Hoffman when encouraging new infographic creators: “Eliminate the unnecessary so the necessary can speak.”

The post Why Infographics and Other Visual Content Are Saving Lives From COVID-19 appeared first on Contently.

Though many marketers and publishers still lean heavily on stock photography to illustrate their work online, that reliance may eventually change. This year, Getty Images partnered with AI platform Cortex to determine which colors, framing, imagery, and keywords work best with different demographics. According to early results, marketers who use AI to find imagery “outperform their industry benchmarks by up to 300 percent.” Many agree that the stock photos we often see adorning corporate hand-outs and Powerpoint presentations aren’t the most dynamic. Technology could help find better alternatives.

Bad stock photography is so immediately recognizable in its bland, stiff-looking lack of context that it inspired its own subreddit. All of that stilted imagery seems to be set in a world where every wall is stark white and every team of coworkers uses a single laptop to get things done simultaneously. Oh, and that one woman is there—you know the one—the model who looks absolutely psyched out of her mind about Curves gym, Costco, salads, adding Spanish to her resume, and boxing during the holidays.

Because they’re often categorized by a basic emotion or environment when they’re collected, stock photos often end up in the uncanny valley, a place where human-looking figures do inhuman-looking things. They can look as though an alien or an algorithm mixed up a bunch of random facts about humanity and spat out a strange combination like “too happy businessman.”

“The images look divorced from the average person’s daily life,” Dubler said. “They can’t really convey a brand’s message to consumers, and we live in a world where most consumers want to experience a brand’s personality.”

The data backs him up, at least in the sense that visual content is rapidly becoming more important to brands and consumers. Contently’s 2018 report on visual content, created in partnership with Libris by PhotoShetler, demonstrated an increasing demand for better photography and video. Seventy-five percent of respondents said they always use a visual in their content, and 70 percent said they noticed an improvement in their marketing’s ROI after adding visuals. But where are small companies supposed to find images if stock photography has become so cliché?

A curated collection

Part of the reason stock photography lives on is the fact that it’s readily available online, and it’s often comparatively cheap (and sometimes free). Using stock photos is easy for small brands whose content strategies are in their infancy, and it looks feasible enough for companies that still underestimate the importance of unique design. Contently, full disclosure, uses some stock photography, but also incorporates custom graphics and original photography.

When we choose stock images, we typically use Unsplash, a photo service with curated collections. After some time spent testing out our options, Contently’s team concluded that Unsplash offered more artistic and editorial style than the standard stock schlock.

Annie Spratt, a curator at Unsplash, told me that her team searches for visuals in their database which “feature more creative and soulful imagery” than stock photos. “The biggest clichés have to be the accentuated over-expressions and the lack of creativity,” Spratt said. “There’s a real lack in imagination when you search for a stock photo of ‘happy’ only to find hundreds of photos of grinning people who always look pretty unnatural and slightly creepy.”

Readers on the internet know within a few nanoseconds whether they find an image effective or not. As Unsplash contributor Andrew Neel wrote recently, “Our brains process images 60,000 times faster than text.”

Photo by Roberto Nickson / Unsplash

In order to parse through images quickly and choose appropriate visuals, Spratt pointed to Unsplash’s unique collections. “Warm & Muted [comprises] over 500 warm-toned images that are more muted and moody,” she explained. “Just Add Type [allows for a] blank space, and the images are perfect for typographers, calligraphers, and hand lettering specialists. One Color collects striking imagery that features one main color.”

Freelance collaboration

If you want to ensure your content has the brightest and most engaging photography adorning it, going right to the source isn’t a bad idea.

Contently’s talent network doesn’t just include reporters and bloggers; we foster connections between brands and visual artists who can customize and elevate their content. Working directly with a photographer who can study a brand and express its mission through their lens offers an advantage, especially when you consider most companies are drawing from the same pool of stock images.

Photo by Nick Karvounis / Unsplash

“Avoiding stock imagery leads to better returns on investment and cost effectiveness,” Dubler added. “It helps set your brand apart from the countless others using stock images.” For example, financial services company Deluxe sends photographers to showcase exemplary customers for a content hub they call Small Business Revolution. Amtrak’s branded magazine, The National, features original photography, and in some cases, original art from cartoonists. Red Bull’s Red Bulletin features original travel and lifestyle photos in almost every piece of content.

When you’re choosing a great photographer, the freelance hire ought to be an artist who can think on their feet. ” Nothing too fancy or overproduced,” Dubler said,”and their images have to feel like they came out by chance or were found through intuition. Someone who enjoys telling stories will produce the right photos, whether that story is branded or not.”

The post How to Be Better Than Bad Stock Photography appeared first on Contently.

Visualized information as a whole has increased over 9,000 percent since 2007. It makes sense: The visuals help cut through the information overload we get from carrying humanity’s collected knowledge (and a ton of cat pictures) in our pockets. In fact, as the chart shows, we’re receiving about five times as much information now as we did in 1986. Images help us drill past this noise since it takes minimal time to understand a visual—only 1/10th of a second to be exact.

Visuals are also a great way to communicate with your readers, since they increase the willingness to read in the first place. That information will also have staying power, since they’ve been shown to help with reader comprehension.

There are a lot of reasons to be crazy about infographics, so treat yourself to a scroll through this one—you’ll even learn why exactly you couldn’t resist clicking on this story.

The post Infographic: Why Your Brain Loves Infographics (And Your Readers Do Too) appeared first on Contently.

It’s easy to see why. Content marketers are constantly trying to sell clients and colleagues on why they should become publishers, even though it’s often a stark departure from the way they’re used to doing things. And since content marketing is such a new and rapidly changing discipline, quick-hitting stats help them feel like they’re riding this wave of change.

So let’s take a look at 35 stats you need to know:

State of content marketing:

1. 72% of B2C marketers are producing more content than they were one year ago. —Content Marketing Institute (Tweet this.)

2. 58% of marketers said “original written content” is the most important type of content, outdoing visuals and videos. —Social Media Examiner (Tweet this.)

3. 90% of B2C marketers leverage content marketing. —Content Marketing Institute (Tweet this.)

4. On average, content marketers shoot for this division of content: 61% created, 27% curated, 12% syndicated. —Curata (Tweet this.)

5. A significant 92% of marketers said that social media was important to their businesses. —Social Media Examiner (Tweet this.)

6. 60% of the most effective B2C marketers have a documented content strategy. —Content Marketing Institute (Tweet this.)

Trends:

7. Most respondents, or 71%, will increase their 2014 content marketing investment “without a doubt.” —Curata (Tweet this.)

8. Almost 60% of marketers reuse content two to five times. They generate “snackable” content based on assets. —LookBookHQ (Tweet this.)

9. 50% of respondents expressed a desire to be able to measure how much real attention people are paying to their content. —Contently (Tweet this.)

10. Nearly half, or 49%, of marketers are learning to drive content to align with the buyer’s journey. —LookBookHQ (Tweet this.)

11. The lion’s share of marketers, 81%, plan to increase their use of original written content. —Social Media Examiner (Tweet this.)

12. Last year, infographic usage grew from 9% to 52%. —Demand Gen (Tweet this.)

13. 28% of marketers want to learn more about the art of podcasting. —Social Media Examiner (Tweet this.)

14. LinkedIn usage jumped 20% this year among B2C marketers. —Content Marketing Institute (Tweet this.)

15. 33% of marketers average 2 to 5 blogs a month. —LookBookHQ (Tweet this.)

16. Content reading on mobile phones increased over 10% in 2014. —Demand Gen (Tweet this.)

17. 29% of marketers generate multiple assets a week. —LookBookHQ (Tweet this.)

18. 73% of marketers identified brand awareness as a goal of their content. —Contently (Tweet this.)

Challenges:

19. 54% of readers don’t trust sponsored content. —Contently (Tweet this.)

20. Identifying content production is the biggest challenge for 44% of marketers. —LookBookHQ (Tweet this.)

21. Two-thirds have felt deceived upon realizing that an article or video was sponsored by a brand. —Contently (Tweet this.)

22. 57% of readers said that they’d prefer that their favorite blogs and news sites run banner ads instead of sponsored articles. —Contently (Tweet this.)

23. Only about a third of B2C marketers consider themselves effective at content marketing. —Content Marketing Institute (Tweet this.)

24. Only 24% of readers scroll down on native content, compared to 71% who scroll down on original content. —Contently (Tweet this.)

How marketers are measuring their content:

25. 56% of marketers are leveraging software to “manage their content workflow and distribution.” —Curata (Tweet this.)

26. 69% of marketers are using pageviews or unique visitors to measure the success of their content, while less than half are examining time on site. —Contently (Tweet this.)

27. A majority of marketers, 68%, evaluate their social media activities. —Social Media Examiner (Tweet this.)

28. 90% of marketers expressed some level of uncertainty “that their key content metrics are effective in measuring business results.” —Contently (Tweet this.)

29. B2C marketers use an average of 12 content marketing tactics at once. —Content Marketing Institute (Tweet this.)

30. Only 7% of respondents are not measuring the success of their content at all. —Contently (Tweet this.)

Loose ends to keep in mind:

31. The average human attention span is shorter than a goldfish’s: 8 seconds. —Static Brain (Tweet this.)

32. 74% of adults use social network sites. —PewResearch (Tweet this.)

33. Photo posts make up 87% of Facebook page interactions. —eMarketer (Tweet this.)

34. Only 4% of pageviews hold readers for 10 minutes or more. —Static Brain (Tweet this.)

35. 53% of consumers who tweet to brands expect a response within an hour. —Lithium (Tweet this.)

The post 35 Content Marketing Stats You Need to Know appeared first on Contently.

Here are a few of the easiest (and sexiest) tools that should be in your arsenal:

For making GIFs:

1. Gifmaker

With the web program Gifmaker, you can upload your own photos, choose an animation speed and GIF size, and then download the result. It’s that simple. And awesome.

2. Jiffy

Chrome users, rejoice: Jiffy is a Chrome extension that lets you make GIFs up to 15 seconds long directly from YouTube videos. It also gives you an Imgur link so you can post and share your new reaction GIF wherever you please.

3. Giffer

If you have $2.99 to spare, Giffer is an easy and clean iOS app that allows you to make GIFs from your iPhone videos and photos, and then email or share them.

For screen capture:

4. Framegrabber

Want an individual photo from a video you took? This helpful app for Android separates your video into frames for easy saving and sharing. Even though it’s not free at $2.99, the app can save a lot of time if all you want is a snapshot. Time is money, people.

5. Screencast-o-Matic

If you’re looking to capture an entire webpage or record yourself giving a tutorial, Screencast-o-Matic will record a video of your computer screen within the box you drag and select for it. Neat!

For photo editing:

6. VSCO Cam

VSCO Cam is probably the best photo editor for both iOS and Android. It’s very simple to use and offers a wider variety of professional-looking editing options than Instagram, putting you just a couple of taps away from producing the perfect photo.

7. GIMP

The interface might look a little scary, but don’t despair: GIMP is essentially the free version of Photoshop, with a platform that Windows and Mac OS X users can easily navigate.

8. Inkscape

As Gimp is to Photoshop, Inkscape is the free Windows and Mac OS X alternative to Illustrator, enabling you to create vector files quickly without having to shell out money for Adobe Creative Cloud. If you need quick graphics, Inkscape is your program.

For video editing:

9. HandBrake

This free tool lets you to change video formats in a pinch—just locate one video file and select which codec you’d prefer the video to be. Then, presto! Another copy of the video will shoot out in your requested file format.

10. Magisto

Once you register for a Magisto account, you can use the app to edit videos for free on desktop or on your iOS or Android phone. You can also add text and a cheesy video theme to your project.

For audio editing:

11. Fission

This freeware for Mac OS X lets you cut, trim, and join audio clips together smoothly. You can also convert audio into different formats, like WAV to MP3.

12. Audio Memos

If you don’t feel like using Apple’s proprietary Voice Memos app, there’s always the great $0.99 alternative, Audio Memos. Unlike with Apple’s Voice Memos, you can trim and edit whatever you’ve recorded with your iPhone.

13. Wavepad

Wavepad is effectively the Android version of Audio Memos—just record, trim, and select your audio format of choice.

For slideshows:

14. WOW Slider

Have you ever wanted to add a slideshow to your website kept getting hung up on all the extra code it’d take to create it? Then WOW Slider is for you. You can arrange your slideshow like a PowerPoint and then grab and embed the code into your post.

Bonus: Parallax Scrolling Animator

Webydo offers the first code-free parallax animator for adding beautiful illusions of depth and motion to your visual content. The program is currently in closed beta, so you have to sign up for it, but getting in on the ground floor of experimenting with the app seems worth it. Who knows? Maybe Sky Fall will be the next “Snow Fall.”

Contently arms brands with the tools and talent to become great content creators. Learn more.

The post 15 Sexy, Easy-to-Use Multimedia Tools to Up Your Visual Content Game appeared first on Contently.

When it comes to advertising and marketing, there’s nothing quite as good as a lively brand war, and one has been brewing lately between Lyft and Uber. Their weapon of choice? Visual content.

The two companies vying for the top spot in the instant ride business have been battling back and forth, trying to recruit troops for their growing armies of drivers who will pick you up at a given location just with the tap of an app button on your smartphone.

Uber launched the first salvo in the battle with a promoted Facebook post aimed at recruiting Lyft’s drivers, offering $500 up front and $45/hour to drivers currently working for Lyft who switch sides.

This prompted an intense counter-offensive from Lyft that saw the company park a huge billboard truck right in front of Uber’s San Francisco office, inviting their drivers to “be more than a number” with Lyft.

Aggressive tactics by like this are not new for Uber, as the company launched another visual campaign against Lyft around this time last year by driving a giant billboard around San Francisco telling drivers to “Shave the Stache,” and leave Lyft, which is widely recognized by its iconic pink moustache logo.

According to TechCrunch, Uber has even admitted that its tactics can be “too aggressive” after it launched a DDoS-style campaign January against its New York competitor, Gett.

Brand wars are nothing new

While the methods of delivery and technology may have changed over the years, brand wars like this have been waged since the beginning of the 20th Century, and there have been some lively ones over the years.

Coke vs. Pepsi

The world’s two largest soft drink brands have been battling it out against each other since the mid-20th Century, with the conflict largely coming to a head in 1975 when Pepsi was victorious over Coca-Cola in the Pepsi Challenge, something Pepsi used as ammo against Coke throughout the Cola Wars of the ‘80s and ‘90s and continues to hold over their head to this day.

In an era that predated social media and the internet, the companies used “real-life” visuals – T-shirts, buttons and posters – to spread the word.

Apple vs. Microsoft

You’re either a Mac person or a PC person; never the twain shall meet. And that’s exactly the way these two foes would have it, based on the intense rivalry the two have maintained since Apple first poked its head onto the tech scene in 1984 with a jab in the ribs to Microsoft via its innovative and now infamous 1984-themed commercial. Since its initial attack, Apple has continued to fire on Microsoft for decades – perhaps most famously with its “I’m a Mac; I’m a PC” video ad campaign.

Avis vs. Hertz

In the early 1960s, Hertz was the top car rental agency in the U.S., while Avis was in decline. The only way to for Avis to save the company was to launch an all-out war on Hertz and they did so in an innovative way – by embracing their second-place position and turning disadvantage into advantage through a series of ads featuring little more than a simple image and a classic serif font text. Avis painted itself as a company that tried harder to please its customers, while Hertz was so big it didn’t have time for customer care anymore.

These days, brand wars are more likely to be carried out on in visual format on Facebook or Twitter, but the concept is the same and just as bold: tell the public directly why they should choose you over your competitor. And the end result is the same: each drives the other to improve their products or services in the constant struggle for market supremacy.

Image via Town Talk Northampton

Colin Payne is a professional writer, photographer and visual journalist.

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These days, statements that SEO is dead are common, along with predictions that content marketing and social media are poised to replace it entirely. The truth is, SEO isn’t what it used to be—but it’s not going to disappear altogether.

In the early days of digital marketing, those who understood and implemented SEO techniques based on how search engines ranked websites were ahead of the curve. Today, search engine optimization is the standard, not the exception.

And with the increasing attention to visual content—from infographics to video, photos, and presentations—as a part of a successful content strategy, it’s ever more important that content marketers embrace SEO as a means of supplementing their visual content strategy. Here are several simple techniques to consider:

Using Search Data to Position Your Visual Content

It’s often difficult to come up with new ideas for your visual content, especially after agonizing brainstorming sessions yield few results. Content marketing is a large investment in relation to traditional marketing techniques, so it’s important your efforts don’t go to waste with half-baked ideas and poor execution. A good place to start finding ideas for engaging content is Google’s AdWords Keyword tool. Despite the fact that their tool is tailored for AdWords keyword bidding, it can give you meaningful insights into what topics people are interested in and help you find new ideas for content creation. This will help you ‘kill two birds with one stone,’ as you’re not only finding a general topic to cover but you’ve already found a keyword to optimize your webpage towards.

After you’ve narrowed down a keyword, do a quick search in Google and review some of the current listings to further ensure you position your content in the correct manner.

On-Site Search Engine Optimizations

After determining the topic for your next piece of visual content, it’s important to ensure you check off the list of standard search engine optimization best practices. There are thousands of sources on the web to find out what those are, but let’s consider a few techniques that fall outside the scope of traditional SEO and are tailored specifically for visual content.

1. Text transcripts

Search engine spiders (the robots that scan the web and index webpages) can’t crawl (read) text embedded in an image, or any rich media content for that matter. Search engines use textual data on the page to form an idea of what that page is about. Pages that feature visual content usually don’t have much text on the page that search engines can use to effectively formulate judgments of the page’s content. In order to allow the search engines to better (and more accurately) analyze your page, place a transcript of your visual content on the page.

You probably already have the transcript readily available in the form of the copy you sent to the designer. If you don’t and you can’t find the time to manually transcribe the content yourself, consider outsourcing the job. oDesk and Elance are good services to use if you have a couple of assets to transcribe, but if you’re dealing with high volume, consider setting up a HIT (Human Intelligence Task) on Amazon Mechanical Turk. It’s a great crowdsourcing platform designed to handle high volume tasks.

Hopefully, in the near future search engines’ OCR (optical character recognition) capabilities will be sophisticated enough to directly read text from an image. Until then, it’s important to assist search engines with this task.

2. Embed code strategy

Matt Cutts, the head of Google’s Webspam Team, has publicly stated that links included within embed codes may in the future be “discounted to a degree.”

The rationale is this: when someone wishes to repost your visual content on their website, they grab the embed code and place it into the HTML of their page. When a link is added into the embed code—often an optimized anchor text link—they may not realize it’s there, according to Cutts. Their goal was to repost your infographic, not necessarily endorse it.

The best solution is to simply to ask for a backlink. Most reputable site owners will include one anyway; asking for one will remind them to link back and help you get a more natural link. If you insist on including a backlink in your embed code, be sure to add a rel=”nofollow” attribute to the link tag.

3. Source transparency

Visual content, infographics in particular, have a bad rap in regards to presenting factual information. This is mainly due to the obfuscation of their sources. Some infographics include a list of source URLs in the footer of the image itself. This isn’t helpful to anyone. Place those links on your actual webpage—there is no reason to be stingy with links, especially if the content of those links is directly related to your content. This will allow skeptical readers to easily factcheck on their own terms and will provide some relevance flags in the eyes of search engines.

David Kohreidze is a digital marketing specialist at Visually. He is currently pursuing a computer science degree at Georgia State University in Atlanta.

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The post How to Hack Your Visual Content for SEO appeared first on Contently.

Pinterest co-founder Ben Silbermann once compared his social sharing website to the bug collection he kept as a child. Lucky for him, today’s Internet users share his love of collecting things: as of June 2013, Pinterest had 70 million users, according to Paris-based social media research firm Semiocast, its latest $225 million funding round in October 2013 bumping its valuation up to a whopping $3.8 billion.

Businesses have a lot to gain from Pinterest (and social media in general): new customers, more engaged customers, sales. According to a June 2013 report by market intelligence firm Visioncritical, four in 10 social media users have purchased an item online or in store after “favoriting” or sharing it on Pinterest, Twitter, or Facebook. Nearly half — 47 percent — of Pinterest purchasers say they pinned and purchased something after simply stumbling across it on the site, not because of a focused search for the item.

Clearly, Pinterest is winning the hearts and pocketbooks of today’s consumer. Are you taking full advantage of it? Here are five out-of-the-box ways to entice followers and pinners on one of the most popular – and visual – social networking channels in use today.

1. Create unusual pinboards

Don’t limit yourself to the standard buzzwords for your industry when coming up with new pinboards. A bakery naturally needs pinboards for cupcakes, wedding cakes and other baked goods. But more unusual topics, like the world’s oldest pastry recipes, campground baking, or ways to dress up products your customers purchase help you stand out from the crowd.

2. Develop visuals in languages other than English

Recreate your most popular visual content in Spanish, German or another predominant foreign language to embrace non-US or UK-based customers. Inspiring quotes, brief tutorials and advertising taglines all make great pins that let your international customers know you care. Before pinning anything, run it past a native speaker of the language to make sure the wording is accurate. Online translation technology is still too buggy to be trusted with something as important as your branding.

3. Ask people to show you things

People love to talk about themselves, so ask customers to pin images of something related to your industry. A fitness club may ask followers to post pictures of favorite workout gear, while an office supply company might invite followers to share photos of their workspaces. Don’t forget to cross-post your picture requests across other social media channels to entice looky-loos and new followers.

4. Tell a story

Use a dedicated storyboard to unfold a tale over several days or weeks. Send your mascot on a journey around the major landmarks of your town or share a series of pins that demonstrate how a customer used your product to solve a problem.

UNICEF captivated over 1,600 followers by creating a pinboard for an underprivileged young girl in Sierra Leone and pinning pictures of things she might wish she had access to, like running water and shoes. In this example, it’s unclear if the teen is fictional or real, so be sure to make the distinction before developing a story that tugs at heart strings or encourages viewers to donate to a cause.

5. Tell your story

Is your whole office is helping build a Habitat for Humanity home? Are your developers engaged in a weekend hackathon ahead of your next software version release? Take and pin pictures along the way so customers can follow your progress and get a peek behind the curtain. Pinterest is a perfect format for telling captivating stories that keep followers coming back to see how those stories turns out.

Lisa Hoover McGreevy is a seasoned professional writer specializing in corporate messaging, a data journalist on the Visually Marketplace, and a regular contributor to the Visually blog.

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