3 Deadly Mistakes of Infographic Creation These pieces of content can really bring in visitors and social shares, but make sure they don't fall into one of these errors.
By Eric Siu
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Google's search volume for infographics dramatically increased more than 800 percent in just a few years, according to Hubspot, and overall inforgraphic production has risen 1 percent daily. The rising trend may point back to our learning preference. The Social Science Research Network reported that 65 percent of people are visual learners, making infographics and other images a crucial part of your content marketing strategy.
Related: 7 Tips for Creating Awesome Infographics
Content marketers and businesses are taking notice of infographics' power and popularity. KISSmettics published 47 infographics in just two years, helping it generate 2,512,596 visitors and 41,142 backlinks from 3,741 unique domains in the same time period. They have also received 41,359 tweets and 20,859 likes. The site estimates that if it had spent just 5 cents per visitor, it would have amassed a $125,000 bill. Its infographic and content-marketing efforts only cost around $28,200.
Let's look at how visuals effect social media. Facebook photos command 53 percent more likes than the average post. Image-based social networks such as Pinterest boasts over 70 million users with 70 percent located in the U.S. With a skyrocketing trend towards visual information, businesses can benefit from creating infographics. Here's our round-up of three common mistakes made while creating infographics, and why you should avoid them at all costs.
1. Too wordy. As referenced above, 65 percent of people are visual learners. Of course, text can play an important role by giving context and explaining the corresponding infographic wherever necessary, but should be short in comparison to graphs and illustrations. Go in order of importance and use graphs first. If you can't describe your point with a graph, find an illustration to use, with text serving to give more context to the piece.
Spend some time on your infographic's design to make them more visually commanding. Make your infographics stand out with big, bold numbers and statistics to support your messaging. Check out the infographic The Most Popular Books of All Time, from Love Reading as a compelling use of mixing graphs and illustration.
2. No branding. Consider the three main purposes of infographics: expertise, driving referral traffic and SEO. Brand your content to ensure your infographics help achieve all three purposes. The simplest way to brand an infographic is by adding your company name, logo and website address at the bottom to show ownership. Anyone planning to share it by social media or repost it to their own site will know who to link to without hunting down the information.
Related: Your Sneak Peak at the Future of Infographic Marketing
Remember to add your details to the top of the infographic as well. If you are an expert in your industry or niche, adding your logo and company name makes it easy for people to find you and recognize your brand. New and emerging companies need every opportunity to brand themselves to build recognition. Aside from making sure everyone knows who you and your company are, branding an infographic can help protect it from unscrupulous marketers passing off the infographic as their own.
Check out the infographic, The High Cost of Multitasking, by Fuze, to see the ideal way to brand an infographic. Notice their logo, business name and website address all displayed attractively at the bottom.
3. Too long. According to Neil Patel of KISSmetrics, an infographic shouldn't have more than 6 main points. Otherwise, you risk giving the reader too much information to digest.
Patel discovered infographics with six main data points get more tweets than those with five or seven. If it's necessary to include more than six main data points, divide it into several parts instead. Remember to let the reader know the infographic is part of a series by adding serial numbers so they can follow along accordingly. Or add a line at the bottom of your infographic asking your audience to read the rest of the series.
Infographics can be short and still serve a powerful punch, but also shouldn't be rushed. They require care and time before your business will benefit from SEO and social-media recognition. Get started by making your infographics easily shareable by adding social-media widgets on your site or blog posts, and asking your audience to spread the word.
