How to Use Infographics to Drive Traffic and Improve Your SEO
Date: April 2, 2014Category: Author: Jennifer
What is an infographic?
What makes it different from any other image? To answer that question, I want you to think back to grade school. Remember all those word problems you were given throughout the years? The other night, I was helping my daughter with just such a word problem – something about fish, ducks, and feathers. She was struggling understanding the concept presented so I encouraged her to draw out little representations of the information she was given. Almost instantly, her face lit up and she waived me away, “I got it, Mom.”
Our brains process images faster and more easily than text. It processes pictures all at once whereas text requires it to process the information in a linear, sequential manner. This makes images easier to remember and connect with facts.
So back to my first question – what is an infographic? As defined by Wikipedia, infographics, or information graphics, are “graphic visual representations of information, data or knowledge intended to present complex information quickly and clearly.” Simply put, any data-rich image that conveys information can be considered an infographic.
With the information overload of the internet and our short attention spans, infographics aim to condense large amounts of information in an attractive, easy-to-digest format. An effective infographic will combine good design and storytelling to engage and educate the audience.
7 Ways infographics help SEO
Typically, text is preferred over images for SEO. (Images provide little SEO value.) Search engines can more easily crawl the text to determine its relevance and value. So why are infographics an exception to the rule?
1. People are searching for infographics. In fact, one study found infographic search increased over 800% between 2010 and 2012.
2. They’re easy to embed and link back to your site. If you take the necessary step to provide embed code with a good image name and alt attribute and ensure it links the image back to your post, your infographic becomes a powerful tool to drive traffic back to your site.
3. Infographics have link building and social share value. They give your audience something they can repost and share with friends. A great example of this is the infographic by Customer Magnetism included below. This infographic alone has generated hundreds of social media signals, more than two thousand inbound links, and over 20,000 unique visitors to its page. More people linking to your site leads to better SEO results.
4. They build brand awareness. An infographic can and should be branded. Including your company logo and website on your infographic helps to build your brand reputation.
5. Infographics boost your subject authority. A well-researched and unique infographic is a showcase of your knowledge and expert in your subject. It can build your credibility among larger sites and therefore search engines, such as Google. Together with Google Authorship Coding, it could have a positive impact on your rankings.
So if a picture is worth a thousand words, how much is an infographic worth? Turns out to your SEO, it may be worth a great deal. Check out the great infographic below to see more evidence of the benefits of this powerful SEO tool. And be sure to stay tuned to our blog as we begin to roll out our own infographics!
Created by Customer Magnetism.