No Comment Jan 11, 2021
Visual content in social media is undoubtedly effective for various campaigns. People digest visuals in high speed and the engagements and returns are high. Just take the success that Instagram is enjoying today. Taking advantage of these benefits is only natural for a smart social media marketer, but like any other strategy there are things you need to be cautious about or risk losing the effectiveness of your approach.
With visual social media being the current trend proving high effectiveness, tips and guidelines on what to do are all around, creating clichés within the topic. But if there are “do’s”, there should also be “don’ts”. And here are some of them:
Bottom line: Blindly using Google images is scary.
Google is not a library of stock photos. It is not designed to provide your blog or content with appropriate images. Using Google images should be an ultimate no-no. You don’t know who owns the photo, the source, the copyright and everything else legal about it. It may look pretty good today, but you will never know when it will haunt you back. So, NO TO GOOGLE IMAGES!
Bottom line: Branding overkill is not eye-friendly!
So you’ve created and image of your own, it’s only right to put your URL, name, business and logo in it, correct? NO! Too much branding on a single image just makes it look like a hard-sell, which immediately turns off the audience. Go easy on branding, decide to use one and consistently use it on your other lines of visual content.
Bottom line: Don’t make it look like you own the image, when you really don’t.
Use the Share feature in Facebook instead of downloading the image. Play fair and just! It’s not enough to credit the owner or source along the caption. The share button is there for a reason. Don’t be greedy, you will never know when it will come back to you.
Bottom line: Too much is not enough, so go easy on posting.
Just because visual social media is effective, doesn’t mean it’s a good idea to flood timelines and dashboards with it at one time. Go easy on posting. Learn to create and follow a schedule. Also, make sure that your visuals fit the platform appropriately- that means size, shape and style. Be smart about it and don’t just go rouge on visual marketing.
Bottom line: Approach platforms one at a time to test the waters. Don’t just spit out visual content like a malfunctioning robot.
Avoid being burned out and overwhelmed in your campaigns or you’ll lose sight of the bigger picture and the longer run. Visual social media marketing is not a marathon. Take it easy by trying one platform first and see how it works. Post consistently in one platform until you get the hang of it, before jumping into another one. The goal is consistency and quality, not frequency and quantity.
So, there you have it, the basic things to avoid in visual social media. If you more ideas, share it with us!
