When you’re scrolling through social media, what catches your eye the most? For me personally, it’s the images. Striking, exciting, adventurous photos catch my eye – no matter what the topic is. In fact, a post that includes an image has a 650% higher engagement rate than a post that’s made up of only text. So clearly, it’s crucial to include images – but how?
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Make it Appealing
Stock photos can be boring – we’ve all seen the two coworkers shaking hands, a group of people chatting & pointing at a computer, or fake doctors wearing stethoscopes around their necks with their arms crossed. They’ve been used hundreds of times and won’t necessarily catch the attention of a social media scroller. Instead of using basic stock images from anywhere on the internet, I recommend using websites such as Unsplash or Pixabay. On these sites, you can find stunning, high-quality images for free – and if you want to give a shout-out to the photographer, their information is included! But these images can be used free of charge with no worries of penalties or copyright infringement.
Adding Accents
Programs such as Canva or Lunapic have excellent programs that can help you edit photos. From filters to shapes & lines, these programs help create an eye-grabbing image for websites & social media. The best part – you definitely don’t need to be a designer to use them! These programs are free to use and have a very simple user experience.
When adding accents though, don’t overdo it. A few simple lines or shapes, and 1-2 fonts are all you need to make an image pop. Also, be sure to use high contrast to your benefit. Overlaying a darker filter over an image opens the door to use light text – and vice versa.
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Brand Consistency
Once you start determining the style of images that match your brand & feel correctly, stick with it! By no means do they need to be boring templates every time you create one. But there should be some sort of brand consistency. Accent colors should correlate with your logo, prominence of your logo should be consistent & overall feel of the photos should match. When a person sees your images week after week, your brand should resonate with them.
Sizing is Key
I’ve seen so many images on the internet where the words are falling off the pages, and the image is cut in an odd spot, or there’s extra white space. I find there’s nothing more off-putting to the naked eye than an image that isn’t correctly sized. Be sure to research what size is needed before publishing – and then check yet again once live! For example, Facebook has a different size requirement than Instagram, and yet another size is used for every website on WordPress. Just be sure to double check your work so you aren’t kicking yourself after it’s been live for 3 days.
As you can see, adding an eye-catching image to your blog can make an impactful difference to the engagement of your blog posts.
Are you having issues coming up with images to match your brand? Talk to the Parqa team today to help make your content with imagery speak directly to your audience!
