In today’s post, we’re going to talk about a strategy that’s an oldie but a goody. Infographics can not just add interesting dynamics to your content, but they can also help your content rank in the SERPs. If you came here wanting to know why infographics are important for SEO, you’re in the right spot.
Search engine optimization continues to become more complex as the years go by and Google continues to hone its algorithm to make it more useful to their audience.
As marketers, we spend a ton of time racking our brains looking for new strategies in an online landscape that’s constantly bombarded with ads. How can you make your content stand out in a crowd?
What is an Infographic?
In the spirit of this post, here is an infographic:
Well, this isn’t an infographic so much as it is a piece of one. You can click on the link below the screenshot to view it in its entirety.
An infographic is exactly what it says that it is. It’s a content method that combines graphics as well as data to provide something a little different to your audience.
This content time should be easy to read with easily digestible content. It’s best to focus more on images and less on the text. Infographics are often used when there is a ton of data involved paired with content that may be filled with jargon or simply outright verbose.
Sometimes you need to tame the lion. And infographics are a great way to do that.
Keeping your audience engaged when discussing complex content is hard, no matter what industry you’re in.
However, once you throw in some graphs and charts and make the language minimalist and simple, you now have a way to communicate that won’t make people’s eyes glaze over.
Why are Infographics Important for SEO? – Our Top 6 Reasons
Search engine optimization, or SEO, should be one of your top priorities. This includes all forms of business, but it’s especially important for online companies and businesses that want or need to do tons of online sales.
There are several reasons you want to spend time and marketing dollars on your SEO strategies. Below is a list of our top 6 reasons why infographics are important for helping you to build your brand and increase traffic to your website.
1. Increased Shareability
There are plenty of businesses out there that struggle to get people to share their content, even by people within their own industry.
If you run a business installing windows or pouring concrete, it can be really tough to get people to visit your website. You know you need content. You know you need Google to help you out to show up.
Online businesses are in a similar boat. However, they don’t have the luxury of local SEO to help them across the finish line.
So how can infographics help out with SEO?
Let’s look at the online business model. You want to tap into the growing CBD market. But a lot of the informational content is all the same. This product will help you relax, help with neuropathy pain, etc…
What can you do to help set your website apart to make some money from CBD affiliate programs?
The first thing you want to do is create content with legitimate data, facts, and figures. Next, create an infographic. It’s a good idea to keep them together. More on that further in the post.
Infographics work best in informational content. These are the people who want to know why they should purchase a product and what they’re going to get out of it. Make this information easy to digest, even if the blog post or other content contained in it is not.
The last part of this strategy is the most important. Hit up social media, or find a social media manager or expert to do it for you, to visit the social channels where infographics are the most powerful.
Twitter and Pinterest come to mind. These platforms are chock full of professionals, marketers, and individuals that are looking to constantly share content with their audience. You’ll get a ton of eyes on the posts and great, free traffic going to your website.
2. Raise Brand Awareness
Every day, hundreds, if not thousands, of brands go unnoticed or forgotten on the web. We live in an age where the lifespan of social posts and the attention span of the people seeing them are constantly shrinking.
This bombardment of content makes your posts easy to forget. If the blog post isn’t skimmable, no one will read it. And even if it’s perfect, a lot of people won’t read it because they’re either not interested in reading or they don’t have the time.
Make their lives easier with an infographic. You can help people find your business with this type of content. What makes us so sure? Science!
The human brain processes visual information 60,000 times faster than it does text. But why does this happen? The answer is in evolution. Language is a human construct that has sped up this evolution.
But our sight is what helped us survive long enough to learn to develop language, along with being able to read and write these languages. Technology, in a way, is evolving faster than we are. Marketers are now using this science to promote brands more efficiently than ever.
When you’re trying to increase your brand’s awareness, consider infographics and other forms of visual content such as video to help get the word out faster.
3. Assist with Link Building Efforts
You need links. You want links. In the marketing world, they’re currency. They’re more valuable to your website than dollars, pounds, or bitcoin.
Ok. Better than bitcoin is a bit of a stretch but you get the idea.
For years, we’ve all been trying to get the best links while putting in the smallest amount of effort. We’ve bought them. We’ve guest posted. We’ve skyscraped.
It’s a crazy amount of work for anyone.
Have you ever seen an infographic in a piece of content? If you have, you may have noticed an embed box just beneath it. This is a piece of code that allows you to share the infographic for your own uses, with a link included that sends a user back to the “source”.
Sure. You could create awesome content and just use other people’s infographics. And that works, but it doesn’t give you one of those cheap, beautiful links that we all need to help our websites rank.
Make infographics. Have the link back to your website in the code. People can and will use it. More importantly, you should promote the fact you want people to use the infographic.
You made it to be shareable. You made it for that sweet, easy link juice. For example by submitting your infographic to websites, blogs and fora. And if you didn’t, then change it so you can. Link building is not going to get any easier than this.
Disclaimer: This doesn’t mean you should stop working on your other link-building methods. Infographics are just another great SEO strategy to help diversify your link profile.
4. They Show Up in Google Image Search
Google image search is one of the most underrated SEO strategies around. Most websites and small business owners use something like a stock photo for a featured image in their content. This is fine. It’s not going to help but it probably won’t hurt either.
Using our CBD example, how can we rank a sweet, shareable infographic that’s included in a great piece of informational content?
Coast through the Google SERPs for content that is ranking for your targeted keyword. Check out these posts to see which ones have the best information and make note if they are using an infographic within this content.
Pay special attention to the size, placements, and other aspects that could negatively affect SEO.
Then go to Images for this keyword and see what comes up. You’re more than likely going to find a bunch of stock photos and not much else.
If your blog posts are better but you’re struggling to rank for your keyword in the SERPs, then it’s possible that a high-quality infographic could show up if none of your competition is using them as part of their strategy.
Take the blog post title “Ten Reasons You Should Try CBD Oil”. Go find yourself some data that backs up your claims and build an infographic. You still want to try and beat the competition with content quality.
However, people love data and it can help push them towards a sale if you have the infographic set up well with quality information that the audience can research themselves if they decide to. Include links within your content throughout your article or provide a list of sources underneath the infographic itself.
Once complete, get the word out about this content as your normally would and track your traffic as well as how the infographic is rising through the image rankings.
You will likely see an increased amount of traffic as the popularity of your content rises. As more and more people click on your image, the actual blog post will follow in the rankings.
5. Establish Yourself as an Expert
Every day thousands of freelance writers and marketing teams crank out content. They’re all vying for the same tiny piece of the pie, hoping against hope that their projects can help the companies they represent stand out in a crowd.
Do you know what stands out more than anything? Research. It’s a dying art form but the need to back up claims and statements with numbers and data is growing.
Google wants to see it as well. They’re constantly punishing content creators that refuse to do their homework.
We saw this with both the medic update, creators who did not have credentials to make the claims they were making paid the price, and most recently with their reviews update. Now, people can no longer steal review content, slap some Amazon links into it, and then get an easy paycheck.
Infographics are a great way for you to prove to customers, search engines, and other professionals in your industry that you’re an expert. You know how to research and you know how to use it to create easily digestible content.
This is no easy feat but becoming a research master can take you and your website to new heights.
6. Combine Infographics with Blog Content
The single best way to rise up through Google rankings is still to create and promote the best content in your space. Infographics will make your content better. But your focus should be on creating the best, even without it.
When you combine these two strategies, not only will you get traffic and eyes on your content through social media, but climbing up the Google rankings can be substantially easier.
Will they make it easier to rank? Probably. Do they make it easier to explain complex ideas? Absolutely.
However, it’s not just infographics that you should be using. You should be going after any and all marketing strategies to help get people to your website and to drive sales.
The Takeaway – Why are Infographics Important for SEO?
Infographics can absolutely help with SEO. They can help you change up the whole game.
What matters the most is creating excellent content, doing super in-depth research, creating an eye-catching infographic to help explain this content, and then promoting properly to people so they can share it and help drive traffic to your websites and landing pages.
Thanks for stopping by. If you enjoyed this post, then you should check out this one on 12 design blogs to inspire your next project.
