14 Jul 10 reasons to use infographics

If you’re not exactly familiar with what an infographic is, you’d be easily forgiven as the term is thrown around a lot without much explanation and it’s sometimes also disguised as other more jargony words like “data visualization” and “information design”. But what people don’t realise is that our world has always been saturated with visual information and we’ve only just in recent years discovered how important and effective a tool this may be for our business.

If you find yourself asking what exactly does an infographic look like?, well wonder no more –  infographics are essentially any data that is organised and make visual. It can be as simple and common as a graph, chart or map or it can be a beautifully designed work of art that reads like a story. The beauty of infographics lies in the fact that you can easily process complex information in an engaging way without reading large blocks of text.

10 reasons infographics are awesome

1. They’re memorable

More than 90% of the information that is processed by the brain is visual so infographics are more effective than blocks of text that resembles a novel.

2. They’re attention-grabbing

People are visual creatures, we’re hard-wired to connect with and recall visual data. We’re able to recognise a symbol in 0.15 seconds and a further 0.1 seconds to attach a meaning to it.

3. They’re simple

Infographics are an effective tool to use globally as they’re based in visuals which translate across culture and language. They’re also a powerful tool for conveying complex information into easier to understand chunks of information.

4. They’re quick to read

Our brains process visual data like infographics approximately 60,000 times faster than written text.

5. They’re short

The recommended length of time it should take to read an infographic is 3 minutes and under so they’re great for shorter attention spans.

6. They’re in demand

Businesses that feature well designed infographics grow traffic to their site an average of 12% faster than those who don’t.

7. They’re effective

It’s a documented statistic that an average visit to a web page lasts less than 60 seconds so ensuring you have compelling content helps keep people on your page longer. An infographic based article is 40% more likely, on average, to be read than a text based one.

8. They’re informative

People using illustration based instructions get a 323% better result than people using purely text based instructions.

9. They’re persuasive & show expertise

Creating an infographic takes skill. It shows your knowledge and understanding on your subject and establishes you as an expert in your field. As your credibility as an expert in your field grows it allows you to persuade your audience to your way of thinking.

10. They’re viral

Infographics are extremely shareable! They’re colorful, interesting and easily digestible so your audience can pretty much pick up on all of the knowledge an infographic has to drop in a few minutes or less which makes them the perfect kind of content to share.