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Monthly Archives: November 2015

How to Create Graphics Fast & Easy for Social Postings and Blogging!

Graphics That Rock Your Social Media and Blogs!

Just since 2007 visual content on the internet has increased over 9,900% . There is good reason for that.

Human brains like visual information. Our brains retain visual information better than other kinds of information.

Conversion rates go up to 300% by ONLY adding visuals to your content marketing!

[bctt tweet=”Adding images to your blog increases conversion rates by as much as 300%! “]

That is pretty amazing! I am not surprised. What I am surprised by is how few people marketing on the internet are actually using visuals in their best presentation if any at all.

Everything from the color you choose to the fonts you pick- it all tells a story. It speaks your brand.

It is time to throw out all those silly looking clipart graphics – so old school now that we have so many powerful free and almost free graphic creation and editing tools where you don't need a degree in design to create!

When I see the clipart it screams tacky and when I see stock photos that look like stock photos it feels like the content marketer did not take much thought and then it feels the rest of the content may also not be coming from a point of service or adding value.

There is simply no excuse to use such thoughtless imagery these days.

Remember the saying: “A picture speaks 1000 words”? Studies of the brain show it can process an image in about 13 milliseconds. Our brains will only remember about 10% of the information we absorb through text yet for visual information we can retain about 65%.

Human faces create emotional responses in other humans' brains. People remember images of people. Using people in your graphics is very effective.

Liven your blogs by adding color!

Color is another element that triggers emotional responses. Be intentional with your colors you use in your brand, your designs and in all your graphics that you use on your social postings and on your websites and blogs.

[bctt tweet=”Choose your colors wisely when posting visuals. It triggers emotional responses. “]

You also want to have consistency in your color choices. While it is fun to use an array of different colors every time you post- that will not necessarily increase brand awareness. What is the purpose of your using the color? What is the response you wish to achieve through your color choices? These must be taken into consideration.

There is a reason why doctors use blue and not red for their logos, colors and content.

When I first started blogging back in 2006 most people called them weblogs and it was all text. We evolved in 2007 to adding images to blog posts. It was a huge deal!

Fast forward through the internet evolution to where we now have Instagram and Pinterest, two of the most visual content platforms and those two companies are growing. We now have live streaming, heck, back in 2006 YouTube was such a small company and no one really used it then. Now it is not only the third largest search engine, it has billions of views and video. Now we add in live streaming with Periscope and Blab. We are really talking about life changing technologies.

If you have not embraced visual graphics in your content, now is the time to do so. After all, don't you want to have increased chances of people doing business with you?

I am teaching a webinar on December 9, 2015 at 8 p.m. Eastern time where I will show you how you can create effective and engaging graphics in 2 minutes or less. I will also be sharing the list of websites and tools I use to create my graphics fast and easy.

Click here to register for the webinar.

Tips to Create Graphics that will Rock your Social Media postings and blog posts:

  1. Take your own photos! Taking your own photos creates original content which of course is good for google spiders to crawl. Original photos that you take are your own creative genius. They don't have to be perfect. You can create your own backgrounds with the photos you take to add your text layers on top of.
  2. Break up your content by adding graphics in between your paragraphs to add visual appeal. This keeps the visitors on your page longer. It adds interest to your content. Nothing is more boring than a wall of words.
  3. Add text to at least one of your images on each blog post. For most of us, we are not just posting on our blog. After posting to our blog we are then sharing the content across our social media channels.  When you post to Facebook and Pinterest- you will get a lot more interaction if you had text to your images.
  4. Use Quotes. People love quotes. People read quotes. And when you have your quote over an image, you will get more interaction and engagement. I will show you a very fast way to do this on the Free Graphics webinar I am hosting on Wednesday December 9,2015.
  5. Use Typography to enhance  your textual overlays on your graphics. This adds interest and you can create focus points leading the eye where you want it to go. You don't want to overdo it, so watch your styles and sizes when employing this technique.

I asked permission from copyblogger to use some of their images to show you what effective and engaging graphics look like. Copyblogger gave me permission to exhibit their graphics on my blog.  They have an excellent article about creating graphics for your blog posts.

You will notice in this first image- how the text is set over a background that is not too busy. You don't want your text to compete with the images in your graphic. The man taking the photos is interesting and the detail is intriguing. You want to pay attention to details in your images. This image is watermarked very simply by copyblogger. I also like how the shoulder of the person is over into the red background just a bit. This makes the image flow. Otherwise it can look very amateur.

images-engage-readers-

When you are creating graphics for your blog posts- sometimes you just can't find a good image to match your content or sometimes the post should not have an image. In these cases, you can do some very interesting design on a canvas with text like this one below from copyblogger. Study this graphic to gain some tips into ways you can use typography to arouse interest in what you have to say.

ld-profitable-content-

Sometimes you don't want a bunch of people in your graphic but you do want it to be about people. This is a great graphic, again from copyblogger where the handshakes are just enough to get the message across about the importance of having your legal stuff all in order. Again, you see how the transparent overlay of color to hold the text grabs your attention but also looks like it belongs with the image. Taking your background and using your opacity slider in your editor works like magic!

website-legal-elements

If you are featuring yourself or a guest on your podcast or blog– here is a great way to feature them that is classy and respectful.  Chris Ducker looks great in this image. You want to make sure the image is wide enough for Twitter and Facebook and your blog – so a profile shot of Chris would not work well visually. Copyblogger used the right tonality of color and design to keep your eyes on the image. Human eyes are naturally drawn to other human eyes. You want to draw the audience into the eyes. This graphic does that perfectly.

yp-jadah-sellner-

Creating graphics is easy and fast. There are some very simple and free to low cost tools you can use. The more graphics you create, the faster you get. The best way to save time is to find all your background images first, then pull them all into your editor or software, and then edit them all, then add the text.

I use keynote on my mac to make the fastest images. The images at the top of this blog post- I created in less than 2 minutes each on my mac in keynote. I will be showing you how I do this and more on my webinar:  Create Graphics Fast & Easy to Boost Your Engagement & Rock Your Social Media Posts and Blog Posts. 

If you don't have a mac, don't worry. There are some editing tools you can use online that will also make the process faster.

 

7 years ago

Join Me on Blab.im – Interview with Real Estate Broker Stephanie Anson

Katerina Gasset SEO Consultant Branding Marketing Online

Listing Experts Academy- Thinking about joining but have questions? Hop on Blab.im with me and ask away!

I will be interviewing Broker Stephanie Anson about how she used the strategies in Listing Experts Academy to dominate her niche on the internet!

Find out more about Listing Experts Academy and take a peak into all that we are learning!

Join me on Blab.im  Wednesday November 18, 2015 at 11 a.m. eastern time. 

You can subscribe here on this link to the blab:

https://katerinagasset.com/BlabforLEA

If you have any issues with the link or finding the blab- you can just do a search for me, Katerina Gasset in blab and my blabs will show up.

You must have a Twitter account to subscribe to Blabs. So make sure you have your Twitter handle handy:).

If you want to hop on to ask questions, you have to be on your computer with a headset and a microphone.

If you are on your iPhone you can download the blab app but must use your iPhone ear buds with mic in order to get in the open seat.

I look forward to helping you learn more about Listing Experts Academy via live streaming on Blab!

How to Use Trello for Your Business and Personal Projects & More

Trello is by far my favorite free tool I use for  many business and personal tasks. If you are a visual person, you will be in heaven with Trello. 

For your learning pleasure... I added 4 Trello video tutorials I created to train my virtual assistants in using Trello and one of the tutorials was part of a course I teach.  I get a lot of comments on these videos from all over the world so I thought why not share them with all my awesome subscribers! ​

Try #Trello for Free- If you are a visual person- you will love Trello: https://goo.gl/mx7ys1

Click to Tweet

Here are just a few of the ways in which I use Trello: 

  • Business Project Management 
  • Training Guides and Systems 
  • CRM for Small Business 
  • Organizing Workspaces and Files 
  • Home Management and Projects 
  • Trip and Vacation Planning 
  • Gardening Planning  and Projects 
  • Healthy Living Recipes, Articles, Shopping Lists, Menus and more 

How you can use Trello is only limited by your imagination.  There is the free version which is what most people use. Trello also has a business version that is a small fee of $8.33 per user per month when paid annually. You can create teams inside of Trello for personal and for business. 

My favorite Trello features are anything that saves me time, Trello delivers on being a time saver! 

This video tutorial is about how to use Trello for Task Management. This is the system I use with our virtual assistants and really, any one who is connected to a task or project. In this tutorial I start you at the beginning of creating a board and then adding the cards. 

Do you like checklists? Well, then you will love Trello!  You can add checklists in any of the cards. But what is even better is you can click to duplicate the checklist across all your cards. This feature saves so much time. There are also check boxes in front of each item on your checklist. When you check off the box, a progress bar appears so you can see by percentages how much more of the list still needs to get done. 

In this Trello video tutorial I share with you ways in which you can use Trello for business and personal management: 

Another time saver for me is you can drag images, pdf files, documents, whatever it is you need to add to a card, right on the card and Trello uploads it for you. You can choose images to be "cover" image on a card. This is a great way to organize projects and not lose the images you want to keep. 

In this video tutorial I share with you how you can use Trello as a CRM. This obviously won't work if you are using something super robust like Infusionsoft.  Trello is great if you don't have hundreds and hundreds of leads. I use if for my consulting and marketing company,  Listing Experts Academy, Fast Track SEO and other niche markets. 

In this tutorial you will learn how to use Trello for Project Management. There are just too many awesome things you can do with Trello and there is no way I can list them all in a post.  Some of my tutorial videos on Trello have over 8,000 views which is a lot because I did not promote them.  I am happy to share what is working for me in my business and personal life. 

Another timesaver is you can send or forward emails to specific cards on your Trello boards. So when I get an inquiry from someone who wants to hire me to consult them on their branding, marketing, SEO, content marketing, website development and creating funnels for their online businesses- all I need to do is set up a quick rule in Trello, forward the email and it appears right on the card almost immediately. 

 

 

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