Imagery is needed to convey messages to your market base with the advances of digital technological networking. Why is that, you may ask? Simply put, the user attention span continues to drop as instant gratification continues to grow. This applies to your website, your social media pages, and your print ads; this impacts YOUR BUSINESS directly and most business owners are blissfully unaware! It is now easier than ever to get your brand in front of your target market, but that goes for all of your competitors as well. Let's take a look at how you can adjust the way you appeal to your target audience using imagery and an understanding of their behavior and get ahead of your competitors.
Website Imagery - Website traffic is extremely important for conversions, which means your content must be relevant or you'll have the traffic numbers, but no results. This is a common mistake most business owners make when building and advertising their website. This is because it's not taken into consideration that most users only spend about 15 seconds on any given website. The clock is ticking! So how can you use imagery to set yourself apart from your competitors?
Background Imagery or Video: With only 15 seconds you have to emotionally connect with your audience. It has been proven that colors and images evoke a different part of the brain psychologically; therefore, you can easily appeal by using imagery to convey your business' purpose and story as its relevant and complementary to the given text on the page. Utilize text for information, imagery for an overall feel that connects the two and immerses the prospective client.
Landing Page Imagery: The most important page on your site is your landing page, that's where you set your hook. Do this by utilizing your website's available screen real estate to your advantage! What is screen real estate? Well, it's the area of the screen that's viewable to the user without scrolling or clicking. Your most relevant call to action or offer should be in this location and you can use imagery to introduce it, and make it appealing enough to create the wont to click!
Social Media Imagery: Ahhh the endless scroll of social media, if you thought 15 seconds was bad for your website, it's down to about 3-5 seconds on social media! This creates a tough environment for the average small business and needs a special approach. This is where you can bring some humanity to your business. Social media is not for advertising, in fact, businesses are penalized in the algorithm if they are too sales-y or seeking interaction with specific requests. As more and more people go to social media first to look into new businesses, this is where you can show your business' personality; again creating an emotional appeal instead of a sales appeal.
Post Imagery: With 3 seconds, eye-catching imagery content is a MUST! You need it to pause the scroll long enough to read the text content of the post or ad. While yes this article is about imagery, but with social media, the purpose of the imagery is to point to the text. As with all image content, it should be relevant and connect with the text content.
Text Imagery: Ah, the famous emoji! Use them 😁! They are of great importance for dynamic results to get people to read your social media posts and ads 👀. Why is that? You will find the answer in the word itself! It's imagery that conveys emotion, a key ingredient to any service or sales-based business - connecting the prospective customers' emotions with your content through complementary imagery 💯. Of course we can never underestimate the power of the #hashtag !
*Make sure to abide by all community standards for each social media medium.*
Print Imagery: Here's where the sales pitches should go, appealing to customers with coupons, deals, and specials as the call to action. As fewer and fewer people are going to print these days to find information on businesses standing out is key! This is where customer incentive comes into play and you can utilize imagery to create the need for the product even greater at a discounted rate. It's not necessarily the imagery or incentive that is chosen that's important in print work, believe it or not; it's the format and layout of the piece overall as you control where you want the eye to be focused.
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