Hey everyone, let’s talk about images in content marketing. You’re using them, right? Please tell me you are! It’s surprising how many blog posts I come across without a single image. It’s baffling that anyone would publish content that way, but it happens all the time. Sigh

Why Images are a Must-Have for Your Content Marketing

If you haven’t already made images a staple in your content, here’s why you should:

• Articles with images get 94% more total views

• Content with images gets shared more, and those shares are more likely to be shared again if they include images from your content (Facebook posts with images receive 87% more engagement, while tweets with images enjoy 18% more clicks, 89% more favorites, and a whopping 150% more retweets).
• Images inject personality into your content, giving you a chance to make your brand “voice” stronger (even though images don’t speak literally, you get the idea).
• Images break up walls of text, making your content easier to scan (people may enjoy long-form content, but that doesn’t mean they want to read every single word!).

Well-optimized images are a secret weapon in content marketing—underutilized yet incredibly powerful. Even if you’re already using images, there’s always room for improvement. Here are five simple tips to optimize your content marketing images for maximum engagement and results.

Tip #1: Aim for an Image Every 100 Words

Your content craves more images than you might think – Buzzsumo discovered that posts incorporating an image every 75-100 words received the most shares on various platforms:

While this image lacks axis labels, the X-axis represents the word count between images, and the Y-axis represents the number of shares. This means a 1000-word article ideally has around 10 images. If counting words isn’t your thing, follow these general guidelines:

• Start with an image at the top of your post – either before any text or after the initial sentence or paragraph. This is a prime spot for your featured image that people can use when sharing your post on social media.
• Strive to include an image every couple of paragraphs unless you’re working with very short paragraphs.
• Add an image to each section if you’re using subheadings to break up your content (which you should be!). Sections without images appear dull, insignificant, and easy to skip. (Your readers might think: Why bother with this section if it didn’t even warrant an image?!)

Tip #2: Embrace the Power of Color

Our experience shows that tweets with vibrant, colorful, and saturated images get significantly more engagement. Apply this same color psychology to your content marketing images. Here are a few examples of effective color use in our own content marketing images:

To really step up your game, try incorporating your brand colors into your images whenever possible. Moz does a great job of using consistent color schemes (and a house font) across many of their images to reinforce their branding (the example below is from this post).

Tip #3: Strike a Balance Between Fun and Informative Images

Readers love visual data: graphs, charts—you name it. Whenever you can, incorporate data visualizations into your content marketing.

The best-case scenario? You create your own data ("making the news," as we call it) and then visualize it:

• If you have a designer or the budget to outsource, transform your data into eye-catching infographics (like these ones created by our partner specialist, Behak Wheeler).
• If not, use Excel! Something is better than nothing.
• Make sure to add your logo to the image so you get brand exposure if people reuse it. Struggling to find relevant data? Check out these seven fantastic sources for marketing data that you can cite to strengthen your content.

But don’t stop there! Our top-performing content blends informative, data-driven images (like the one above) with images purely for entertainment (think funny or inspiring visuals). Aim for a healthy mix of both.

Tip #4: Ditch the Clichéd Stock Images

I’m so over seeing images like this in marketing technology posts. A PERSON ON A PHONE. GROUNDBREAKING. Ironically, this one’s from a company called “Death to the Stock Photo.” You’d think they’d offer less generic stock photos, wouldn’t you? Even if your post is about mobile marketing, you can be more creative than showing someone staring at a phone. Instead, opt for an image that evokes an emotion. For example, here’s the leading image from a post about effortless PPC wins:

Instead of an obvious PPC connection (like a picture of an ad, how dull!), it plays on the feeling associated with “easy.” It’s lighthearted, humorous, something anyone could do. Much more memorable. Here’s another example from a post about client retention for agencies. The predictable choice would be a stock photo of people in an office setting. This image, however, connects with the “long haul” theme in the title, capturing the feeling of reaching the end of a challenging journey. We did it! Pure exhilaration! My arms are killing me!

(Big shout-out to Erin Sagin, the creative genius behind both these images.)

Tip #5: Don’t Forget to Keyword-Optimize Your Images

Did you really think I’d let you off without mentioning SEO?

Optimizing your images for search engines isn’t optional; it’s a must. You only have so many on-page tools at your disposal to boost your content’s ranking, and images are one of them. Don’t neglect them! Here’s how to do it right:

• Use your target keyword (and its variations) in your image file names. For instance, if you’re targeting “mattress pads,” your image file names could be “mattress-pads.jpg,” “best-mattress-pads.png,” “how-to-choose-a-mattress-pad.gif,” and so on.
• Apply the same principle to the alt text field for your images. Both file names and alt text should describe the image whenever possible. However, even if it’s a silly picture added for humor, try to incorporate keywords in the file name. Avoid keyword stuffing (like “mattress-pads-mattress-pad-all-about-mattress-pads-i-freaking-love-mattress-pads-did-i-mention-mattress-pads.jpg”); keep it natural and reasonable. For bonus points, ensure your content images load quickly and are mobile-responsive (meaning they automatically adjust their size based on the screen or device). This small step can significantly impact your content’s ranking for your target keywords – not just in image searches, but in regular web searches too. Just do it!

In Conclusion…

Remember, incorporating powerful imagery isn’t solely about aesthetics – it’s about boosting your content marketing performance across the board.