Photos and videos get more clicks than links and text in social media. Businesses have come up with a diversity of strategies to amplify this preference for visual content and turn it to their benefit in the form of higher brand awareness and bigger sales.

In the near future, instead of reading an article we may be watching it. Rapid growth of visual content predominance in social media is confirmed by all statistics. And it’s happening at such an accelerated pace because of people’s pressing need to satisfy their information and entertainment “craves”.

The advantages of visual content stand out to any marketer:

• Visuals convey meaning more quickly.
• They decrease the dominance of info-heavy articles.
• The user gets as much valuable information as possible within a very short time interval.
• Brand awareness becomes easier to achieve.
• Clear, detailed images convey superior product information.
• Quality business pictures/videos are easy to achieve thanks to the numerous editing tools available.

Convincing data on current trends!

• Videos are shared 12 times more often on Facebook than texts and links, and photos get twice as many likes as text updates.
• More traffic is referred to outside websites by Pinterest than by Twitter.
• Instagram’s growth speed has left behind Facebook’s.

Thanks to videos on social media channels, companies live in their brand. Talking about the brand is one thing, but showing how things happen is a lot more engaging and appealing to customers and prospects. This is where the big revolution of visuals lies within the evolution of social media.

Increase viewers’ time on site!

People are naturally attracted to images and videos than to text. In fact, the brain’s absorption rate is much higher when exposed to visual stimuli. Thus, good video marketing strategies could make a huge difference in sales if properly used in social media.

A well done video goes viral and no other form of content can help you achieve the massive exposure that videos can. Videos are shareable; if you engage viewers they will spend more time on your website, and eventually share the video material with others. Moreover, this gives companies the huge benefit of encouraging viewers to interact with their brand.

Viewers have the freedom to decide!

Advertisements could be a real nuisance on social networks, on mobile apps and even in online searches. By visual means, businesses can lower the spammy, negative look of their ads. You promote your business by using inspirational videos and pictures, without pushing the prospect. The web user can thus decide on whether to act or not. This is promoting and persuading without pushing anything down the throat of the audience.

To sum it up, the preponderance of visual content on social media is a rising trend. Small and large businesses have learned what it means to go video-viral, and marketing efforts converge in this direction. The evolution from text to visuals is clear in social media marketing, however, the ‘show’ will continue to unfold in its complexity over the years to come. The potential of visual content for social media marketing has been widely acknowledged but we are still far from grasping its true extent and potential.