Congratulations! You just made an awesome infographic.
Since you took the time to create an infographic, I’m sure you already know the impact that it can have on your content marketing efforts. Infographics, just like all images, stand out in the vastly overpopulated world known as the Internet. The image you created will pop out in people’s social media feeds, and the wealth of useful, interesting, and surprising information packed into the infographic will prompt people to share it.
The process after you create the infographic becomes the challenging part. Getting as many eyes as possible on it is the only way to bring the maximum traffic to your website.
Let’s look at some ways to get people to see your infographic and how you can reap the benefits of your hard work!
Publish Your Infographic
You now have access to this amazing infographic. How will you make it spread online? Do you tweet it? Do you post it on Facebook or Instagram? Do you print it out and hang it on your fridge?
The first thing you should do is publish it on your blog. People will be able to share the image from your blog, and this will allow them to link back to your website. Now everyone who clicks on the infographic will be sent directly to your website, increasing your traffic and giving you the opportunity to capture leads from the people visiting to see the graphic. The blog post will be the central hub of your promotion for the infographic.
When you post it on your website, it is a good idea to publish it under a Creative Commons CC By 4.0 license. This license allows others to freely distribute and share the graphic, including on their own website, as long as they credit you for creating it, usually by linking back. To give your infographic this license, all you have to do is add a CC button to the blog post.
You should also make sure there are a lot of options for people to share your infographic. If you are using WordPress, there are some great plugins that create sharing options on the image, such as this image hover sharing plugin. This simple call-to-action will definitely have a positive impact on your social shares.
Create Social Traction
It can be difficult to get people to share your content if you don’t have a large following. Social shares are a tricky beast – it’s hard to encourage people to share an infographic with no social proof, but it can be exceedingly easy to get someone to share an infographic that already has a proven track record of shares. So how do you get there?
It’s important to match the topic of your infographic to the social network you focus on. Is your infographic focused on business? LinkedIn would probably be a great place to focus. Interior design? Pinterest would be a good idea. Facebook and Reddit can cater to all kinds of audiences, but whatever topic your infographic covers, it should have wide appeal.
Many social networks offer sponsored post options in order to give your infographic that initial spark of interest. I personally have had success sharing infographics on Pinterest, StumbleUpon, and through Facebook Ads. Depending on the topic, other sites could work, too.
Reddit is a tough network to make a splash because of Redditor’s staunch anti-self-promotion stance. There is a subreddit for infographics, but you are more likely to gain traction if you share to a relevant, but more popular subreddit. Here’s a list of the biggest subreddits – does your topic suit any of them? Even a few dozen upvotes can mean hundreds or even thousands of visitors depending on the subreddit.
Pitch It to the Right People
Chances are there are people or publications in your niche that have a larger audience than you do. These people are essential to the success of your infographic and fully reaching its potential.
Try to find people you can actually get in touch with. If you are pitching your infographic to The New York Times, don’t send an email to the CEO. Don’t pitch it to the “tips@” email address, either – it is likely that that address is a bit of a black hole. Try to find a writer who is an expert in your industry and send them a personalized pitch about why your infographic is a great fit for their readers. If you’re planning ahead, you can even pitch it to them as an exclusive.
There are many bloggers who have thousands of people reading their content every day. Try to get in touch with them, but only if you feel like their audience would benefit from your infographic.
The key component of pitching your infographic is not to beg for coverage. Instead, just try to get your infographic in front of them and offer some reasons for why it is timely, would be useful to their readers, or would be successful. It is not bad to ask them to share the piece, but make sure you do so in a tasteful way.
Here Is an Example of an Email Pitch You Could Write:
“Hey [Reporter’s name]!
I loved the article you wrote last week about [Topic of article]. [Several sentences of commentary on article]. I just made an infographic about this topic, which you can check out here: [Link to infographic]. I thought you would really appreciate the part about [Some detail about topic present in the infographic].
Considering [Some recent news event that makes this piece timely], is this something you would be interested in sharing with your readers?
Just let me know if you need any more info.”
If you succeed in pitching it to the right people, your infographic will likely reach a far broader audience than its initial publication.
Submit to Directories
A number of infographic directories exist, which serve to catalog infographics around certain topics and showcase great data visualizations. When you submit your infographic to a directory, you can get more eyes on it and boost your search engine rankings by getting more backlinks to the post on your website.
Although there are low-quality directories that won’t help you gain traffic, there are some high-quality inspiration galleries where your infographic will be valued by a thriving audience.
For example, Visual.ly is a well-known and respected infographic community. You can even rank the submissions by popularity. A typical submission to this infographic directory looks like this one by CJ Pony Parts.
Some directories charge a small fee for your submission, and in some cases it is worth it. These directories enjoy higher-quality content, and people who read and share infographics will be looking on these websites. Some directories don’t charge anything, and it’s a great way to get a backlink to your website. Be sure to carefully evaluate any infographic directory before submitting to determine if they are worth your time and money.
Some tip-offs that an infographic directory is probably not worth your time are low domain authority or a submission page that specifically talks about buying links.
There are submission services to automate this process, but I would not recommend any I have tried. You are better off selecting and submitting to the directories of your choice, even if it takes more time to do so.
Learn From Successes and Failures
Marketers are always trying new things to see how they can maximize the number of people who see their brand. Success and failure will come with different strategies, and it’s important to note what works for you.
Most people are afraid of failure, but failure is necessary to grow your business. Everybody fails, and it’s the only way to learn what your audience wants to see from you.
If an infographic fails, try to find out why. Was the timing wrong? Was the quality of your infographic poor? Was the content not interesting enough?
The best way to do this is to ask your audience what they liked and didn’t like about it. If an influencer doesn’t share your infographic, ask them why and what you could improve on. Marketing is all about learning from mistakes and improving them for later.
Take the Next Step
Now that you have created your infographic, it is time to take the next step! What strategies will you implement to promote your infographic? Share your promotion tips and tricks in the comments below.
