Lead generation is one of the vital objectives of every marketer. And the reason is because more leads mean more sales – in most cases.

That’s why we use content marketing to reach our audience and draw them into the sales funnel.

However, the world is longer interested in super-stretched, text-only copies that do only talking without showing.

Your audience now wants you to show instead of telling all the time. They want to hear you speak less and see what you’re seeing.

That’s where graphics come in.

Graphic content marketing involves using visuals like pictures, memes, GIFs, icons, and many others to pass your message.

And there are steps to implementing this strategy, all of which we will discuss in this article.

Why Are Graphics Important For Lead Generation?

More and more businesses are beginning to embrace graphic content marketing, and here’s why:

Attracts Attention And Increases Engagement

You can’t convert your leads for sales if you don’t attract their attention first.

While attracting attention, you must also engage and entertain your audience as much as possible. And that’s exactly what graphics do.

Take a look at the image below.

The contrast between the blue and red colors creates an eye-catching distinction between the main headlines.

And that makes it very easy to get your lead’s attention.

You can even go more realistic with your graphics by using brushes like watercolor from brushgalaxy.com.

Suitable For Passing Complex Messages

Creating content that is difficult to read and understand will earn you a red flag from your audience faster than not creating any content at all.

That’s one big headache that can’t be solved entirely, even after you have professionally articulated your words.

On the flip side, graphics-led content, especially with infographics, are pretty useful for expressing complex stats and info in the simplest way possible.

You can literally compile tons of mathematical figures into bars and circles while segmenting the vital sections with different colors.              

More Informative And Aids Retention

A study by Brainrules shows that your audience can remember about 65% of what they saw even after 72 hours or three days.

That’s a lot and keeps you in the heads of your potential leads. This is especially important for brand recognition. 

Additionally, graphics often provide more information while showing less.

That makes graphic-led content very effective when creating copies for lead conversion or social media promotional posts. 

Time And Cost Efficient

It can take your readers up to ten minutes to read through a thousand-word article.

Relatively, an infographic containing the same information will take less.

In fact, the human brain processes visuals 60,000x faster than texts. So reading through a graphic faster shouldn’t be a surprise.

Moreso, graphics are cost-efficient since they help with generating more leads and sales than fully textual content. 

Easily Shared

Infographics are 3x shared more than other content types and are the fourth most used type of content marketing. 

Other graphic content, including images, memes, illustrations, GIFs, and even standalone data visualizations, can also help you reach more audience than textual content.

7 Ways To Generate More Leads Through Graphic Content Marketing

In 2021, close to 51.4% of content creators and marketers used visuals in their content.

And now, a few more have caught up to the trend. But if you are among those who haven’t, here’s how you can.

1. Figure Out And Understand Your Audience

Before creating any type of content, you must discover your audience.

Are they middle-aged? Or perhaps the low-income earners?

B2B or B2C customers?

For example, memes appeal more to the younger ages and B2C audiences.

However, it won’t fit well for B2B thought leaders and decision-makers.

To find out who your audience is, you need to start by finding out what needs your product solves or what services you offer.

A company selling “beauty products” will want to target more of the female gender, preferably in their early peaks of life.

And their graphics might have a tinge of pink colors, which largely appeals to the female gender – although not in all cases.

If you’re targeting hegemons of large SaaS companies on social media, let’s say LinkedIn, you will need more than pink colors.

We are talking about illustrations showing actual value-led facts and established infographics.

2. Convert Your Survey Results Into Infographics

Infographics are graphics containing figures or texts, illustrations, and representations.

And its primary purpose is to pass complex messages in a simple-to-understand way.

Also, this type of visual aid the cognitive ability of readers through repetitive patterns.

On the other hand, surveys are tools for collecting important information from your target audience.

These stats can then be converted into infographics and published as a standalone piece on your website. You can also integrate it with a textual blog post to draw your reader’s attention.

Combining surveys and infographics is a step towards creating bottom-of-the-funnel (BOFU) pieces for converting your leads.

But beyond that, these infographics can turn into a lead magnet.

A typical case study is Bookafy, a company offering online scheduling software.

And they are a niche expert in matters relating to bookings and appointments.

By running a quick survey, Bookafy can collate the percentage of respondents who prefer using automated booking tools and those who do not. 

Once the stats are published as a shareable infographic, other websites will download it for use and refer back to Bookafy.

As a result, Bookafy gains more backlinks which will automatically increase their website rank on SERPs.

The higher this infographic content ranks on search engines, the more visitors it gets. And more visitors mean more leads.

3. Use Illustrations Inside Blog Posts And Your Website

Apart from social media, content marketing finds more expression on your website and blog page.

When people are looking for solutions to their queries, they are more likely to visit your resource page to see if you have a related solution.

Of course, that’s if search engines pop up your website in response to their queries.

However, it’s not a good idea to bombard your visitors with several blocks of text.

They will definitely appreciate more illustrative graphics that will not only attract their attention but also supply them with the needed answer as fast as possible.

Consider using illustrations and other graphic types to create a compelling story on your homepage.

One common way to do that is by visualizing the total number of clients, successful past projects, and reviews with appealing pie charts.

4. Let Visuals Do The Talking On Social Media

If you’re looking for another place to generate an awesome amount of leads with graphics, that’s social media.

According to Forbes, there are about 4.9 billion people using social media in 2023, and this figure is expected to reach 5.85 billion by 2027.

One of the best social media to prioritize graphic-led content marketing for B2B SaaS brands is LinkedIn.

This platform is filled with hundreds of thousands of decision makers and top stakeholders who seek solutions daily. 

For B2C brands, Instagram and Facebook are better options.

On Fb, you can use graphic carousels to convey tons of information at the same time. The reason is because graphic carousels generally attract more attention than single image ads.

Moreover, they have 72% more CTR than other types of ad.

The idea is to use appealing visuals to do the talking on your social media account. 

5. Integrate Graphics In Your Email Strategy

Email marketing is more useful for leads management and conversion than leads generation.

However, it can still bring in a good number of hot leads for your business, especially if visuals are used.

Just so you know, there were about 4 billion email users in 2021, and the percentage will likely climb up to 4.6 billion by 2025.

Instead of sending long copies of duplicated and cumbersome texts to your email list, you can convey your message with infographics or standalone illustrations.

A perfect case study is Grammarly’s monthly email report.

The image above combines illustrations and a few texts. And that makes Grammarly’s report easy to understand.

As a result, Grammarly is more likely to receive more CTR than other competitors using only textual content.

6. Image Seo

Image SEO involves optimizing your images and other types of visuals for search engines.

For example, Google has an image page that displays thousands of linked images in response to a particular query.

So if a lead searches for “how to use CRM”, and you have well optimized graphics in one of your articles addressing this query, one of your images will likely pop up.

When people click any of your images, they will be taken directly to the source link – which is usually a blog post. 

However, you need to ensure your meta tag, description, and image title is properly placed.

That increases the likelihood of your graphics appearing in the image page.

7. Use Memes And Gif

Memes are images or visually-represented texts that carry a certain sense of humor and are widely shared on social media.

GIFs, on the hand, means Graphics Interchange Format. And they are often animated.

These two powerful visual elements can enhance the engagement rate of your leads with the content you produce. 

So you should occasionally slide them into your email newsletters and blog posts to create an intriguing ambiance.

When people find your content interesting, it becomes effortless to make them sign up or take action.

Conclusion

Marketing has always been challenging.

And the competition to attract quality leads is even more intense than before, especially with the advent of sophisticated innovations and AI.

However, using the graphic-led content marketing strategy will give you an edge over your competitors and help you gain potential prospects. 

First, understand your audience and tailor your graphic type to their needs.

Afterward, add these visuals in strategic places like your blog posts, sales page, and homepage. And lastly, optimize each graphic for SEO.