How Much Does Visual Matter?

How Much Does Visual Matter?

We know that visual matters.

If your brand doesn’t engage with the eyes, any words you use to tell your story will likely fall short. But just how much do brand visuals matter?

A new infographic from HubSpot, an inbound marketing and sales platform, suggests people remember 80% of what they see and only 20% of what they read.

A few more compelling stats from the infographic:
  • 65% of people are visual learners
  • 93% of all human communication is nonverbal
  • 55% of website visitors spend less than 15 seconds actively reading content on a page

Tweets and Facebook posts with images get more than double the social shares as the same tweets and post without images. Here at Rottman Creative, we can attest to this personally. Switching from cartoon-style line drawings to compelling photography for our social media updates led to a major boost in post and page likes and an exponential increase in clicks. Our revamp of rottmancreative.com was motivated by this same need for a greater visual presence to engage and inspire our audience.

The evidence is pretty compelling that if you’re not including a strong visual component in your branding, you’re missing out on reaching a lot of people. But simply having visuals isn’t enough. You need the right visuals.


Color

Color impression can account for 60% of the acceptance or rejection of a product or service. Red, for example, can suggest excitement and passion, while black implies luxury and sophistication. Choose colors that reflect your brand’s mission, personality, and services.


Format

Also consider the format of your visuals. HubSpot found that Twitter users tweet images 361% more often than videos, and the images get more than double the retweets of videos. While this trend might be a symptom of our limited attention spans, videos still hold the power to increase conversions on landing pages by 86% and boost visitor understanding of your product or service by 75%, so don’t count them out just yet.


The Bigger Picture

The big idea is to make sure your visuals make sense. Choose compelling visuals that represent your brand, your mission, and the audience you want to attract. Then provide greater context with polished, descriptive copy. Even the best visuals will fail at inspiring your audience if they aren’t a part of your larger, authentic brand story.

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