When you login (yeah we are shocked too that people do log off of some platforms especially Facebook) into one of your accounts and usually some of the first posts you will see on the threads will be from companies or those being promoted by companies or individuals.
Honestly, the posts that catch any a reader’s eye will have a picture on and it is usually those interesting pictures, they might be metaphorical or just plain funny. Everyone (that reads or has ever read) knows that old saying of “Pictures are worth a thousand words,” in marketing this is or should be motto that guides any campaign.
The fact is, in all forms of marketing be it social media or your usual billboards, and everyone embraces imagery because as human beings we tend to be more inclined to what we can see.
When you bombard people with posts that are all full of nothing else but talk, people actually get bored because it becomes monotonous. Your posts might be interesting, funny, and quirky but visuals enhance their rich far more than when they are just plain words.
People like to be romanced (not literally) but when you are marketing a product or brand always appeal to their desires in a form that will build your brand’s hold in the market via whatever form of marketing you are using at that time, it doesn’t matter if it’s just a press release, visuals will help you. Pictures make people “feel some type of way” about what they read or what they are about to read, you see a great picture and it makes you read and share a post you did not even intend to read.
In Uganda, when you look at most of the social media campaigns of companies especially the major brands that are online, you see them embracing the use of imagery in their campaigns, the best example would be Airtel’s new ad where instead of having a bunch of people doing something, there is a hand holding a UGX note to the wildlife scenery in one of Uganda’s national parks, it is very appealing or the MTN ad of the little girl that finds an egg and has to use the internet to find out more. Those subtle ads that get people thinking and talking then shared, retweeted and in the end you have put your point across at the same time, marketed your brand. We are no longer in the days of very straight forward advertising, people will get the message but they will not find it as appealing as one that is creative with an interesting picture or video, why? Digital age, that is all!
And when we say pictures, we do not mean substandard photography or some little poor and very easy graphic designing work, we are talking about going all out but still bring out something simple and appealing to the consumer’s eye and wallet.
We advise companies to include picture apps like Instagram and Pinterest more in their social media marketing strategies and at least 8 out of every 10 posts on social media sites should have pictures or videos.
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