I have stressed over and over again the importance of having quality content, so naturally, the next topic should be about content marketing!

Content marketing is more than just posting quality content, it requires precise planning (through the use of tools such as content calendars). It is a strategy for the long-term – to make sure that what you want to say is conveyed in consistent messages. It is a strategy to “attract, convert and retain customers” according to Joe Pulizzi in his article called 3 Components of a Content Marketing Editorial Calendar that Works. At the end, you want this content to add value to your company and drive profit. In a Forbes article, Joshua Steimle advocates that the return on investment is extremely high – using his own company as an example, he says that with the use of content marketing, his company grew more than 1000%. He attributes the success to the fact that before salespeople needs to go out and make a sale, clients are already flooding in because they have been exposed to the value that the company can provide to them.

There are various ways to create content marketing. A few on the list may be blogs, videos, webpages, and infographics (as mentioned by Joshua Steimle), however, I want to dig in deeper about visual content, infographics in particular. We all know that it is usually easier to capture someone’s attention if a photo or video clip accompanies the post.

So what’s the big deal about why visual content is more appealing? Why are inforgraphics gaining so much popularity? Well, for one, “90% of information transmitted to brain is VISUAL” and “80% of people remember what they SEE and DO” as opposed to only “20% of people remember what they READ”. 67% of people are more easily convinced of what is presented if visuals are provided. Users of inforgraphics “grow traffic 12% faster” than those who don’t. Infographics are great. If that wasn’t compelling enough, try reading through this “The Power of Visual Content” infographic that provided me the information listed in this part. Be honest, didn’t you retain more facts from reading that than this plain text?

See, aren’t infographics awesome? Try to incorporate it into your content strategy!