6 Infographic Elements that Successful Infographics Have

We online marketers have all seen the impact of infographics over the past 5 or 6 years. The fact is that a colorful infographic provides data visualization to viewers which allow them to understand the data more fully.

Whenever we come across an infographics design that conveys a strong message, tells its story by blending stats with design elements, web elements and graphic elements, it is quite compelling. They just seem to have all the required infographic elements that make them unforgettable – especially when they are shared on social media.

This is the power of using effective graphics design regardless of our infographic steps or any canned infographic maker we happen to use.

But there are also thousands of infographics out there that fall way short of the mark. And it is painfully obvious that they were simply thrown together in order to participate in the infographic banner medium. They end up just becoming a mish mosh of web elements that make no sense.

Good Reasons to Start Using Infographics in Your Marketing Campaigns

There are several great reasons why marketers create their own infographics. LucidPress reports these following facts about using them:

Blog posts containing visuals and imagery get 650% more engagement that those without them.
Content that has relevant visuals get 94% more clicks and views that those use images which are not relevant.
Infographics will increase web traffic by at least 12%.
When content is curated, the original images are used 30% of the time.
A nice colorful infographic is 3 times more likely to get liked and shared on social media channels.

Can the power of using beautifully designed infographics not be more obvious?

Here is what we will be addressing in this article:

Table of Contents

6 Effective Infographic Elements

When learning how to make an infographic, it is critical to understand the design elements that the great ones contain. The good news is that those effective elements for infographics can now be identified. The bad news is learning to use them effectively is pretty much an art – or a craft.

The good thing about learning a craft is that practice will just about always make you much better and more skilled at performing that craft. The key is getting skilled enough at this new craft to attract a sizeable audience to your blog or website.

We first have to identify the proper ingredients to mix into our infographic batter before we begin baking our new cake. So let’s get started!

Find the Visuals that Match your Readers

If you have been involved in online marketing for even just a few months, then you probably already understand the importance of using images in your content. And what visual is better than using some stunning vector art or vector graphics in a striking new infographics design?

All online marketers pretty much know that any content containing images will draw about 3 times more engagement than content without images – this rule is even more prominent on a social network. So we don’t need to be sold on the power of using images within our blog posts.

The key here is first understanding our target audience and then finding the graphic elements that will interest them and attract their attention. This is the perfect starting point for creating an infographic and the first of several infographic steps that you will take.

Too many times, we see marketers that are so eager to get a new infographics design posted on their blog that they fail to realize that the topic does not interest their target audience. This may seem like common sense, but there are lots of intelligent marketers out there that are guilty of committing this costly mistake.

Having a good design inspiration for an unforgettable colorful infographic is so important because humans are visual creatures. Science tells us that we observe and recognize images within a few hundred milliseconds. This is why we need to use both images and design graphics that relate to our target audience – if we don’t, they will instantly click to the next website or blog.

Remember that you can always test a new piece of vector art or a vector graphic that you plan to use on your social media channels. Ask your social network which design infographic they would choose between two or more of them.

Pick Issues that are Pressing

When we have sufficiently researched our target audience, we understand their needs, their goals, and most importantly, their problems. I say “most importantly” in regards to their problems because this is what will dominate their thoughts in most cases.

We humans tend to think more about the things we want to move away from instead of the things we want to move toward. In other words, we stress more about our problems than we do in thinking about our goals.

Thus, whenever we start planning an infographic and begin reviewing infographic elements templates, it is wise and prudent to start listing the biggest problems that our target audience faces most often.

By choosing from among a current list of problems that your target audience suffers from, you are more likely to pick a winning infographic banner. This is simply because most people think more about their problems than their blessings. Don’t believe me? What do you think about the most?

Write an Infographic Headline that Beckons Others to Look

It is amazing to me how many marketers overlook the value of the headlines they slap on their blog posts. Most people will spend lots of time crafting a great article and then spend just a minute or two crafting the headline.

To give you some perspective, the most successful copywriters in the world will often say that, at a minimum, writers should spend at least as much time writing the headline of an article as they did writing the article itself.

Consider these marketing facts:

There is intense competition for the attention of new readers. Every single day, there are over 2 million new blog posts published online, there are 300 billion emails sent, and there are over 864 hours of new video uploaded. Let us not forget the 400 million Tweets that are sent out. And these numbers come from the year 2013 – it’s even worse now!
80% of all people who view your headline will never read the article. This is why it is so important to know your audience.
Traffic to your blog can increase as much as 500% strictly because of your headlines. Who wouldn’t love to get 5 times more blog traffic than they are presently getting?

If you were paying attention, then it should be dawning on you that your headline is actually the most important part of your article.

Here are two (2) great suggestions for improving your headlines:

1) Look for great headlines around you. Here’s a way to actually take advantage of the explosion of content around you. Start paying attention to headlines.

Pay attention to those headlines that keep appearing over and over again – it means they are winners. Also, pay attention to those headlines to inspire you to action. Try to figure out why those headlines stand out from the others.

2) Write five headlines for every piece of content you create. This rule will force you to spend more time on your headline. You will discover that in many cases, your first headline will not be your final choice – whereas before, it was always your final choice.

So every time you create an infographic, remember that its success will also depend on the headline you write for the blog post you place it on.

This is another example of where you can ask your social network for their opinion.

Find Powerful Facts that Support Your Message

Today we are blessed with more stats and facts than we know what to do with. This is great news for those of us who create content for our readers. One good thing about living in a busy world is that our environment will often times provide the design inspiration. How cool is that?

So as you are building a vector infographic, you should have the primary message and perhaps the main outline points already in your mind. If you want readers to be persuaded to take action after viewing your infographic, then you must find powerful facts to show them.

Copywriters tell us that emotions are what will sell others, and our facts are what confirm the decisions they made out of those emotions.

Why not have the best of both worlds?

If your facts are powerful enough, they will induce the emotions of your readers all by themselves.

If you are truly dedicated to creating an amazing infographics design that will move the needle, then you must find the most compelling facts available about your infographic ideas. Should you fail to find those powerful facts you need, then you should forget about that infographic and move on to the next one.

Remember that you are not writing text, you are creating an image. And your data is going to be most persuasive aspect of that image. Therefore, your facts are ultra-important.

Put Your Own Spin on the Visuals You Use

A huge mistake that we often see online marketers make is that they use stock images in their content. This is a rookie move and everyone knows it. The fact is that all of us have seen those stock images because they are all over the Internet.

One of the more important infographic elements you can use is putting unique images and graphic designs into your final infographic. This is actually very critical. Most people choose to focus on other elements for infographic at this stage.

If you are like me, I am very quickly turned off by the use of stock images. To be honest, I pretty much expect to see poorly written spun content in blog posts or articles that contain these rehashed images. This is a conditioned response because quite frankly, too many times that has been the case.

But I do understand that many of us can only use stock images because we have a small budget. This is a legitimate reason for using them, but there are countless things you can still do to make them unique.

I suggest you crank up Photoshop or some other image editor to put your own spin on the images you have. Creativity is always welcome in the world of creating infographics, or even if you like simply using infographics templates.

There are lots of people who like to download editable infographic templates – and many of them make very nice infographics that way. The important thing here is your own creativity will make your infographic design stand out among all the others in the end.

There is absolutely no excuse for using stock images. There are just too many free image editing resources available online for marketers not to be using unique images whenever they create infographics.

Below are some sites that allow people to edit images online for free:

Picmonkey – This is a very popular online editor that offers a lot of customization. It is quite easy to use.

Canva – This online editor is similar to Picmonkey. It is very popular and simple to use – many people use this editor.

Lunapic – This image editing website offers a host of advanced photo enhancements and adjustments. It is remarkably intuitive which allows even beginners to perform advanced edits on their images.

Fotor – Not as powerful and as comprehensive as other editors, but is easier to use than most. It has a nice photo collage tool.

Pixlr – This image editor is a favorite among e-commerce marketers because of its advanced editing tools. Several one click and automatic tools are available.

Below is a list of image editing software packages that can be downloaded for free:

Gimp – Considered the best overall choice. Many believe it is quite similar to Photoshop.

InPixio – This software is very easy to use and navigate around. It has a before and after feature that users really like.

Paint – Most personal computers come equipped with an image editing software called Paint already installed. Do not take this software for granted. It is more powerful than people think.

And here are several attributes that you can change in virtually any image to make it unique:

Change colors
Alter the shape
Add filters and shades
Flip the image horizontally
Change the image size
Add a texture
Cut out parts of an image and paste it on another image
Add frames or borders
Add text
Alter the fonts of text
Add drop shadows to text and pasted images
And many more!

Simplify the Layout of Your Infographic

One of the most overlooked of all the elements for infographics is making the graphics design simple enough for others to easily process the information.

Many of us like to think we are sophisticated when it comes to our niche or market. And to be fair, there are lots of people who really do have a high level of knowledge and skill in their chosen market. Their knowledge and experience make them a wonderful resource for others in their field.

But when we operate at this level, we must get in the habit of simplifying our messages to others.

Here are three (3) things we can do to simplify our infographic design:

1) One Clear Message. Our infographic must have one and only one message for our readers. Often times, we try to convey too many thoughts to our readers in a single piece of content. This is very counter-productive and will result in readers not understanding the primary message of the content.

Ensure that every infographic that you create has one message that is painfully clear to anyone who sees it.

2) Logical Flow. This must be a nice logical flow in how our infographics conveys information to others. The more intuitive the flow, the better your infographic will perform.

Remember that the most beautiful images in the world will not rescue an infographic that does not have a good flow of information.

3) Add White Space. White space is a term that professional editors use to describe blank space. The fact is that most successful infographics have lots of white space. They are too many infographics out there that are cluttered with way too many images. Readers cannot mentally sort them out to consume its primary message.

Ensure that each primary element in your infographic is surrounded by plenty of white space. This will greatly simplify your layout and make it easier to digest.

Your Infographics Can Greatly Improve

Starting today, you now have access to tools and knowledge that will greatly enhance the construction of your future infographics.

How About Using your Own Affordable Infographics Software?

For one payment, you can have access to hundreds of premium infographic templates. And these templates are fully editable.

In addition to that, you will have access to over 10,000 icons and several vast libraries of high quality images. These libraries contain images from every niche imaginable.

You can create your own unique infographic in less than an hour!

And since this software is installed on your personal computer or laptop, you do not need an Internet connection to create awesome infographics that your readers will adore.

Try this software for free!