Let’s say you’re looking at a house online. Sure, knowing the dimensions, numbers of rooms, and statistics are all vital factors to learning about the property. But what you really want is a large album of photos to check out. Even though they were angled and staged by a professional photographer, we prefer to have a visual of the real deal. It’s the photos that make you want to contact the realtor. Without great pictures, you would never even consider visiting the home.
Your social media marketing should abide by the same laws.
Take a look at some of the most recent updates your brand has published on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other platforms. What do the images look like? Is it the content you want to represent your brand? Are your proud of it? The truth is, social media is quickly becoming the first piece of content many consumers see when experiencing a brand for the first time. The last thing you want is to present your brand with shoddy images.
Since it’s spring time, you might want to consider some spring cleaning on your social media images. These five techniques are used by professional content marketers when they are creating quality work. Are you ready to get creative?
1. Crisp, clean, and quality photos. Photos that capture certain elements of your company are effective on social media due to their originality and human nature. However, you want to make sure that these photos are high-quality. If a quality camera isn’t in the budget, most smartphones come with a decent camera of at least 12 megapixels. This will allow you to take a clear photo and minimize blurriness. When deciding on your subject manner, make sure it is in the center of the photo and is self-explanatory. No one wants to try and decipher what the subject of your photo is. Photos can be action shots of your employees helping customers, snapshots of your latest products, or even pictures of your organization’s location. All of these are great ways to add a bit of originality to your strategy.
2. Stock photos. If you’re not ready for the camera, you might want to consider high-resolution stock photos. These files should be large in size and as clear as day. One thing worth noting– if you’re going the stock photo route, keep in mind that because of the number of people that use these purchased images, they may come off as inorganic. Some of these photos have cheesy actors or props in obviously fake scenarios. Weed through the stock photo sites such as iStock and find ones that don’t look staged. Another good rule of thumb is to avoid clear cut face shots of the actors. It’s all about capturing a certain element of your business, not identifying a person to represent your business specifically.
3. Logos. For some businesses, this one is fairly simple. Others may have to go back to the drawing board. When creating a social media page for your business, you should have your logo as your profile image. This should be the latest version of your logo and be as high-quality as possible. If you have this logo in vector form (.AI, .EPS, and smart .PDFs), that would be best since you will need multiple different files with dimensions that meet platform image specifications. In other words, the image you use for Facebook may be cut off on Twitter, or vice versa, depending on the platform’s current standards (which often change).
4. Branded images. Combine steps 1-3 for this step. Harness the power of graphic design and create images with your branding superimposed upon relevant images. Whether you just add your logo or further graphics that match your tone, colors, and style, this is an important part of a your content rollout. One of the best ways to create this is through Canva. The team at Canva has created a world-class platform in which you can generate and share truly original designs that are sized to each platform’s specifications.
5. Videos. Ask any professional in the social media marketing world what the most crucial part of an image strategy is, and they will say video. This medium must be incorporated into your monthly content calendar because of its effectiveness but also because of how it takes priority in the current platform algorithms. Incorporate production-quality videos showing demonstrations of your products or services, Q&As, behind the scenes, announcements, interviews, and much more. Camera shy? No worries. A collection of pictures can be morphed into a slideshow that matches your branding.
It’s time to jazz up your imagery. With the above 5 techniques in mind, how does your current content stack up? If you’re starting to see room for improvement, that’s a good thing. You’re taking your first steps into a better understanding of quality content. But here’s the issue many face– each one of the above requires a team with both skilled creatives and analytical managers. That’s where The Go! Agency can step in. Every day, we create a variety of quality imagery for our clients so they look their very best online!
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