The Importance of Visuals in Attorney Social Media Marketing
One of the most common mistakes attorneys make on social media is not using visual content. Photos, videos, and graphics can expand your outreach and boost brand visibility.
Here’s why every attorney should incorporate visuals into their social media presence.
1. Standing Out from the Crowd
The internet is a busy place. The most prominent social media platforms boast billions of active users. Every day:
- Over 300 billion emails are sent
- 7.5 million blog posts are published
- 500 million tweets appear on Twitter
- 95 million posts are made on Instagram
That’s a lot of content—all fighting for attention. With so much online activity, how can you keep from getting lost in the noise?
For law firms, the key to standing out from the crowd is to employ plenty of visuals. People prefer pictures and videos to plain text. In fact, Cisco expects consumer internet traffic will be 82% videos by 2022.
By adding pictures and videos to your profiles and posts, you can attract your target audience and increase your visibility online.
2. Increased Engagement
Social media isn’t a monologue—it’s a conversation. When other users engage with you, you can form meaningful connections and learn more about prospects. Increased engagement also helps your search engine optimization (SEO) rankings.
Numerous studies have shown that visual content receives far more engagement than text-only posts. For example:
- Social media posts that include images get 650% more engagement than text-only posts
- Visual content is 40x more likely to be shared on social media
- Approximately 65% of people are visual learners
Simply put, photos and videos will entice more likes, favorites, reposts, and comments across your social media channels.
3. Brand Voice
Developing a brand voice is one of the most critical aspects of building a robust online presence. Your brand voice is determined by how you communicate with the world. It’s the “personality” you present for your audience.
It’s inescapable, too. Like it or not, with every post, comment, and direct message, you’re creating a brand voice. If you aren’t intentional about your law firm’s voice, you may be representing yourself poorly.
Visual content is a great way to take control of your brand voice. The colors you choose, the font in your infographics, the expressions of attorneys and staff in photos—all of these “statements” and more can shape how the world perceives you.
Remember: first impressions are everything, and images will likely jump out at users before they read a word of text. What first impression do you want to give potential clients and referrers?
4. Educating and Informing
Social media gives attorneys a golden opportunity to educate prospects, demonstrate expertise, and establish themselves as a go-to source of information in their legal niche.
But as attention spans grow shorter by the minute, how are you supposed to hold your audience’s interest long enough to tell them anything?
Once again, images are the key. By presenting information in an appealing, easy-to-digest visual format, you can help potential clients truly absorb useful insights. After all, who wouldn’t rather skim an infographic or diagram than study a tedious wall of text?
Use your images to share:
- Handy tips
- FAQs
- Statistics and studies
- Memorable quotes
- Summaries of longer blog posts (which you can then link to, driving traffic to your website)
- Client reviews
Better yet, consider producing short videos. Not only will this garner the interest of more social media users, but it will make you more “human” in their eyes.
5. Lasting Impressions
Not only are people able to process visual content easier than plain text, but they retain it better, too.
According to education consultant Dr. Lynell Burmark:
“…unless our words, concepts, ideas are hooked onto an image, they will go in one ear, sail through the brain, and go out the other ear. Words are processed by our short-term memory, where we can only retain about seven bits of information (plus or minus two) […]. Images, on the other hand, go directly into long-term memory where they are indelibly etched.”
This is as true for attorneys as it is for teachers.
The effect only increases over time, too. One study showed that participants only retained 10% of written information after three days, but nearly 65% of the information presented with a visual aid.
Using images and graphics will help make your content stick in your audience’s memories, keeping you top-of-mind with potential clients and referrers.
Kick Your Social Media Marketing into Overdrive with Visual Content
No matter what platforms you use, visuals can make all the difference for your practice’s social media presence.
Of course, an effective internet marketing campaign takes time and effort. How about a little help?
At Let America Know, we give lawyers across the nation the social media support they need to promote their brand online, reach their target audience, and grow their business.
Check out our done-for-you social media marketing program designed exclusively for trial attorneys.