Whether your content is being consumed via social channels or on a website, visual content remains a powerful tool in marketing – but only if done and used correctly.
November's challenges look closely at developing content for marketing, particularly how visual content can enhance your message.
Day 1: What is visual marketing and why is it important now?
You've heard the old saying about a picture being worth a thousand words?
Sure it's a cliché but this cliché is just as true in marketing as anywhere else. Harnessing the power of images and visuals will make your marketing more powerful and memorable. Images can turn concepts and intangible things into something concrete. Pick some key images that you can use to tell your story and make sure your marketing packs a punch!
Day 2: Getting Visual on a Budget
As a start-up or small business, it can be important to create and share visual content without having to outsource. Never before have we had such an amazing range of DIY design tools at our disposal. Go online today and search for design and editing tools that you can use to create and enhance your own marketing visuals – take a look at Canva (https://www.canva.com/)
Day 3: Engaging the Audience
People engage with visual content because it's easier to understand, can tell a story and evoke emotions more easily than written posts. Think about how you might utilise your channels better when pushing your visual marketing – hashtag campaigns and communicating directly with your followers is a great way to boost engagement.
Day 4: Show Off Your Brand Culture
A great way to connect to your audience is by using compelling visuals that humanise your brand and gives your followers a reason to interact with it regularly. Consider how you might incorporate a human element into your marketing – a great way is by showing what happens behind the scenes of your brand. Can you take photos of your office space, your staff or even the manufacturing of your products and use them in your marketing?
Day 5: Build an Image
Library It seems so simple but so many businesses don't do it. It can be as easy as whenever you design an image or have photographs taken, save the images in two formats (one as a final and another to edit or add to later) and take as many photographs as you can (from different angles and perspectives). If you don't have one already, today's the day you start building your image library. Write up a list of images you want and organise to have them taken.
Day 6: Create a Series
Using a visual series of graphics creates a sense of familiarity and encourages engagement. It's a great way to create multiple images quickly while carrying the message through. Today, come up with a design for a visual series (this is particularly helpful when running a campaign for a new product). A word of advice; make sure you use your brand elements consistently but change the content of your images.
Day 7: Curating Visual Content
Developing visual content includes two core components; content creation and content curation. Once you have the content you want to share, using a scheduling tool to plan when and where to share the content is the best way to be consistent particularly on social media. Curating content doesn't have to be time consuming, as long as you plan in advance.
Review all of your visual content today – develop a social media calendar that includes all of your online channels and start plotting how and when you will share your content.
Day 8: The Power of Visuals and Text
By using both visuals and text, the communication of your message is taken to another level. For example, good design dictates that whenever you use a photo, there should be a caption with it. Moreover research shows that most people will read the caption after looking at the photo. Take a look at your visual content and start drafting captions for them – make sure your image is eye catching and then write a caption that builds on the message of the image.
Day 9: Put Your Content to the Test!
Good content ultimately does several things for your potential and current customers. Does your content (1) educate, (2) entertain, (3) persuade, (4) tell a story, (5) easy to share, (6) easy to find? Does your content pass this test? You only have so long to catch the eye of your customer, so make sure your content captures who you want it to.
Day 10: Trial Your Visuals
Even if you don't have the time to evaluate new visuals, you can easily look at the images you already have. Will the image support the message, does it need supportive text or can it stand on its own? People can read all sorts of information from images. Don't just use it because it's pretty. Test your images by asking friends and family what it means to them in relation to your product.
Day 11: Print is still very much alive!
Although marketing is dominated by online platforms, printed material is instead taking new forms. More and more brands are integrating both online and print elements into their campaigns. As you create a design element for your marketing, consider how you can use it with slight variations both online and in print.
Day 12: Aim for the Inbox
Using both text and graphics together is the most powerful way of communicating with your customers. An email newsletter is a great vehicle for doing this. Not only is it a personal approach to your marketing, you are delivering your message straight to the customer. Do you have a newsletter? Does it need improvement? There are plenty of online tools that you can experiment with in developing a newsletter – check out http://www.flashissue.com/
Day 13: Why we love Infographics
Infographics have taken off in the last few years mainly due to their simplicity – anyone can design and make them! Marketers without design skills can use online applications to create good-looking graphics, which can then be embedded into blogs or websites for customers to view. Perhaps the most important part of creating an infographic is the message – you want to create a story that conveys your message, entertains and persuades customers to buy. So what's your infographic story?
Day 14: Visual Identity
Your visual identity will be what the customer sees in their mind when thinking about your brand. By pairing your visual identity with the right messages, you can have a powerful marketing tool. What is your visual identity – is it your logo, an icon or avatar, colour or font? How can you better incorporate your visual identity into your marketing?
Day 15: Know Your Community
Your community reflects the value of your brand – it consists not only of your customers, but your influencers, relationships, and authority. Think about each of these groups within your brand community and consider how you might strengthen your connections with each. Do you nurture your community with exceptional customer service? Your brand will gain more recognition and praise from all of these groups if you do. This is particularly important if you are a 'For Purpose' organisation.
Day 16: So what's your story?
Establishing a great brand using social media doesn't take deep pockets! It takes an understanding of all the elements of making a brand; story, community, channel, and visual identity. We've looked at what makes a community, the number of channels available, and what is visual identity and lastly it's time to consider story. If you haven't developed brand stories that successfully demonstrate your values, today's the day!
Day 17: Keeping it fresh on social media!
If you wonder whether social media channels have changed our visual expectations, remember that most weren't even around five years ago! It can be hard to keep everything consistent and up to date – even big brands have struggled to keep up. A great way to stay relevant on social media is by using something called a visual hammer.
To keep up with today's marketplace brands need to use a visual hammer in order to nail an idea into the customer's mind. It used to take the form of a tag line, but as discussed, visuals are now the most effective way to take a verbal message and make it memorable. Update your profile pictures and page banners today with your visual hammer.
Day 18: Facebook gets visual
According to HubSpot, Facebook photos received 53% more likes than posts without. Clearly this means visual content is frequently seen. The cover photo is the largest real estate you get for an image, as well as the first thing a user sees when viewing your page so you want to give some real though to what your cover photo says about your brand. Think about how you can engage your customers and use that as the inspiration for your image.
Day 19: And Twitter gets visual too!
To match their competitors, Twitter has become more visual in recent years. Over 36% of content shared on Twitter is photos and 9% is videos. Review your visual content (whether used on other social channels or not) and test out what works best on Twitter – just don't forget the hashtag!
Day 20: Repetition is key – no really repetition is key!
It has been proven that people need to see something at least seven times before they remember it. Small businesses can achieve brand recognition by showing their brand as often as they can, on as many channels as they can. Think about how you can build on the narrative of your brand and what will support it – then post and share it as much as you can!
Day 21: Let's Review!
This month has given you a whole other element of marketing and selling your brand – visuals can be a huge asset to your marketing campaigns! Take a look back at all of the challenges and review your progress. If you would like to further your understanding of using visuals or marketing your business in general, feel free to get in contact with us via enquiries@lighthouseinnovation.com.au or give us a call to find out about our Marketing Mentoring program.
For some helpful advice, visit the Lighthouse Facebook page for online articles and resources to help you complete the daily challenges.
About Lighthouse Business Innovation Centre
Lighthouse has a strong track record of supporting entrepreneurs, researchers and inventers on the path from concept to commercialisation. Since July 2008, Lighthouse has worked with over 990 distinct enterprises and provided group and peer based services to over 3400 enterprises and individuals. For over five years Lighthouse has successfully delivered business advice, education, mentorship and networking opportunities to help these businesses commercialise their ideas and grow their companies. Lighthouse also delivers programs such as the ACT Microcredit Program for the ACT Government. Visit www.lighthouseinnovation.com.au for more information.
