What is an Infographic? And why is it getting so popular in the last couple of years? Why should you also start using it for your SEO or as a viral marketing tool? Let’s try to answer on these and many other questions in this article.
What is an Infographic?
Let’s start from the very beginning and define what an Infographic is. Information graphics or shortly Infographics are graphical representations of complex data, in a visually stimulating manner. Today Infographics surround us practically everywhere: in the media, in science and entertainment publications, in road signs and manuals and what not. The major aim of a good Infographic is to present complicated information with illustrative visuals, so that the user can assimilate the matter easily and quickly.
How old is the idea of Infographic?
5 years? 10 years? Nope, it is much-much older. If we look in history books of ancient times we will find the first examples of Infographics there – they are cave paintings and maps. It means that Infographics were invented several millennia before writing!!! Ancient Infographics served as a supportive element to memory and storytelling. Starting from the Renaissance (14th-17th centuries) Infographics were used in forms of statistical graphs in scientific books and atlases. Probably, the most famous Infographics of that time were those from Leonardo da Vinci.
Drawings of Water Lifting Devices. Leonardo da Vinci (1481), Technique – ink.[/caption]
Nowadays there is a much broader range of visual devices that are used in Infographics. They include charts, icons, diagrams, graphs, tables, maps, lists and some other forms of illustrations. Currently, the new type of Infographics – interactive – is gaining more and more popularity.
Why is Infographic so popular?
Now when you know the basics of Infographics let’s talk about the most common reasons why Infographics are used so often.
The reason for it is that text and graphics on their own are not perfect methods for communication. Long informative texts rely heavily on the reader’s ability to process information, in contrary, graphics are less advantageous while communicating abstract and complicated concepts.
And since your audience is both people who are very good in processing text and those who have a much better perception of images, you should not cut half of your audience by using only one of these two mediums. However, combining text and graphics allows communicators to use advantages of each medium’s strengths and diminish their weaknesses.
Not surprisingly, we can observe a very fast boost of Infographics in the last couple of years. For example, since 2007, statistics from the social network Digg reveals that the use of Infographics have increased by 250 times! And Infographic search volume have increased by over 800% in just over 2 years (2010-2012) and it continues to grow.
Where is Infographic used?
Nowadays you can find dozens of forums, blogs, Facebook groups or magazines talking about Infographics and their latest trends. There are numerous conferences and forums on the topic of information design that take place in different countries all over the world and often attract very famous graphic designers.
What are the benefits of Infographic?
This huge popularity of Infographics is due to their numerous benefits. And since we are talking about information graphics let’s also present their benefits in a visually stimulating manner:
Now you also want to use Infographics, right? However, you may be stuck with the following questions: Who can create Infographics for me? And how is it done?
Well, you can create Infographics on your own by using different programs that will help you with it (for example, Stat Planet, Creately, Many Eyes, Google Public Data, Wordle, Inkscape and many others). Or you can order this service to any Infographic design companies.However, please note that, if designed incorrectly, an Infographic may ruin all your efforts and damage your business.
What are the typical mistakes people making while creating Infographics? What makes the content bad? And what harm can a bad Infographic do to your business? Let’s use the following Infographic that will briefly answer on these questions.
Now you know main advantages of good Infographics and the danger you can faced if your Infographic is incorrectly designed. Many companies and bloggers who have already tried Infographics have noticed a significant increase in their website traffic. So why don’t you try and check out the results yourself? The investment will be worth it and you will be very much positively surprised by its output.
Or do you have any other reasons to stick yourself in the cave age marketing methods?
