Words + Pictures: Content Marketer’s Guide to Visual Storytelling | Annotated Version

@BuddyScalera • #CMWorld@BuddyScalera • #CMWorld

Words+Pictures:A Content Marketer’s Guide

to Visual Storytelling

Buddy ScaleraContent Strategist

BuddyScalera.comWordsPicturesWeb.com

The Annotated Version!

@BuddyScalera • #CMWorld

About The Annotated Version

• This presentation was delivered at the Content Marketing World 2015 by Buddy Scalera

• This Annotated Version included modifications to prepare it for Slideshare and ebooks

• Videos and decks are available at the official CMWorld website:http://www.contentmarketingworld.com/cmworld-2015-presentation-decks/ Buddy Scalera

Look for these callouts.

These too.


Just one more thing…

• The views shared here are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of my employer, my collaborators, or Content Marketing World

• I’ve made reasonable attempts to credit graphics and other contributions, but if I have missed something, please contact me directly at my website

Buddy Scalera Michelle KillebrewWebsite: BuddyScalera.com | Blog: WordsPicturesWeb.com

+Slideshare.net/buddyscaleraInstagram.com/buddyscalera/

Comic books are visual storytelling and we can learn a lot from sequential art narratives.

I’ve written a few comics. Some are better than others.


Educational books can be found at http://www.comicbookschool.com

And Educational Books…

http://www.comicbookschool.com


Words + Pictures


Thanks, good night!

Too many marketers think that an

infographic is all they need to have a visual

content strategy.


Wait!

We know that there’s more to it

than that.


Infographics:The Best and WorstThing to Happen to

Marketing


Infographics are to marketers what babies are to awwww….

Cute in small doses.


You can have too much of a good

thing.


Infographics CAN Be

Stories...But They

Aren’t Always Stories

Infographics designed by Ivan Ruiz. Find them at:

http://www.slideshare.net/IvanRuiz24


Because…

…that’s why.


Act 1: Storytelling for Marketers


Story is not an

autobiographyabout your brand


Your brand can be a plot point

but…

It’s their story.…as in your target

customer/user.


Your visual content strategy is like any other part of your digital strategy. Content marketing should always map to a user journey.

Your Customer’s Journey

User Journey

Your target user is on a journey called Life.


Conflict = Story

What they need

User Journey

Your target user meets an obstacle, which creates a conflict.


Conflict Resolution

What they need

What you have

User Journey

If your product/service/solutio

n helps solve this conflict…


The Story Continues

What they need

What you have

User Journey User Journey Continued…

…the user journey continues.


Why Visual Stories?

Because the web is a mostly visual medium.


Act 2: Evolution


Grok

During this part of the presentation, things get meta. I tell a story about

storytelling. Grok is my lead character and he is the first

health educator.

Grok and related characters are © 2012 Buddy Scalera & Pat Quinn. Do not use

without permission.

Pat Quinn:http://patquinn.blogspot.com/

Part of this story has been edited, so it doesn’t spoil

the experience for the people who haven’t seen

it presented live yet.


Grok had a problem –People kept eating the

wrong berries. Some would get sick, others

would die.


Grok could tell people which berries, but they

would forget


Grok had an idea. Draw it on the cave

wall. Good berry, bad

berry.


The strategy worked. Grok’s people learned the good berries from the bad berries. They stopped dying from this very preventable

mistake.


With this, Grok became the very first public health official.


The Gud Berries seal of approval.


Grok had a new challenge. How to spread his health

message to an increasingly large and spread out tribe?


How to share a message.


Content is King.


We have five senses, but we do not use them evenly. Content marketers must recognize the vision is the most utilized sense on the Internet.

Sight Sound Smell Touch Taste


For the most part, the Internet is a

visual experience.


A significant portion of the brain is

devoted to visual processing.


Act 3: Science


An MIT study revealed that our brains can identify visual information incredibly fast.

“The visual system is very good at processing meaning.

“It’s very good at learning to ignore things that are consistently irrelevant.”

- Dr. Brad Wyble(Interview 8/11/15)

In the blink of an eyeMIT neuroscientists find the brain can identify images seen for as little as 13 millisecondshttp://news.mit.edu/2014/in-the-blink-of-an-eye-0116

Dr. Wyble is super interesting:

http://wyblelab.com/research


Visual Language of The Web

One of the most popular websites

for consumer health information.

It features a clean, inviting interface.


Ignored.

Ignored.

As Dr. Wyble said, we’re really good at ignoring stuff that’s

consistently irrelevant.


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Most people would agree that WebMD is

a well-designed website for consumers.

But we’re asking the eye to make a lot of

decisions to find what is really important. In this “above the fold”

screenshot, there are 61 different things

you can click.


Symbols

Icons like this make sense. We can tell immediately what

they will do.


Huh?

Others are less obvious and require a text description. That

sort of defeats the purpose of an icon.

Most people would agree that WebMD is

a reasonably well-designed website.

And when certain icons are repeated, it

becomes more confusing.

Yes, social is important, but ask

yourself who is going to share your landing pages. Is it just visual

noise?


Choices

There are a lot of decisions to make here. This may be

overwhelming.

You probably ignored the clip art. More

visual noise.


Visual Design Sends a Message

Make sure you’re sending the right

message.


Layouts Have Personality

You can immediately identify

the consumer website…

…and the professional

website for doctors.Next slides: Speed test & word association.

@BuddyScalera • #CMWorldConsumer websites.

@BuddyScalera • #CMWorldProfessional websites.

@BuddyScalera • #CMWorldOld websites.


Logos Have Personality


Why do so many infographics have the samev i s u a l p e r s o n a l i t y ?

If your want to stand out, then why are you matching the same vector-based design style that’s so popular in

infographics?


It’s okay to use photographs in your infographics.





WORDS: UPPER VS LOWERCASE

It’s more than just shouty. It’s difficult to

read.


We don’t read the letters.We see the shape of the word.

We see words as pictures based on shapes we’ve

identified and saved in our memory.


WE DON’T READ THE LETTERS.WE SEE THE SHAPE OF THE WORD.

Users read all-caps text about 10% slower than mixed cases, because it is harder for the eye to recognize the shape of the words….Don’t do it.

- Jacob Nielsen“Designing Web Usability”

The uniform style of ALL CAPS forces us to pause on

certain words.


Visual content strategists must have a basic understanding of icons and other important

Semiotics

So why do we have ALL CAPS on road signs?

Because we know that this shape and color means

STOP.


All of these are arrows. They are contextually relevant depending on where they are seen.

In the context of your music player, this arrow now

means PLAY.


Used online and in traditional stereo icons.

Other Meanings

None HelloHi-Five

None CloseDeleteCross Out

BoxSquare

In this context, the square means STOP.

There are other ways to say STOP and the visual representation will depend on the

context.


Firefox

Chrome

Explorer

Certain icons have become so familiar that we know what they mean in the

context of online and offline situations.






Firefox

Chrome

Explorer

Online or offline, Batman is always

Batman.


Infographics Are a Tactic Websites are

constrained by width, but have infinite depth.

Gorgeous infographic that looks fantastic on

your Brand.com website.


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Seed this infographic on Facebook.


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Hmm, too big for the social network slot…


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1

…don’t worry, Facebook will crop it

for you.


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Social networks have mores and traditions.

Respect.

Consider a strategy for your infographic

tactic.


So do our friends at Content Marketing

Institute. With a tip of the hat to Joe Kalinowski.

Google Think does this really well.

Google Think does this really well.


Epilogue: Action Plan


Action Plan

What can we learn from Grok?


Solve Their Conflict


Consider Your Shared Language


Right Message & Channel

Your message may not need to last 600,000,000 years. But you should feel good to know that healthcare message are important now as they were at the dawn of time. And with a good message, a strong content strategy, and a determination to get the right message to the right person at the right time, we can just as effective as Grokwas 6000000 years go. Because if you really think about it, the reason we’re all here today is in some small part because Grok was able to share an effective health message.

Act 3• Tie Grok’s story back to pharmaceutical content strategy• Health messages are still important, even if the message is distributed through modern digital channels• It still must be appropriate to the audience, shared in a language they understand with a clear call to action• Story – even if it’s not a “once upon a time” fairytale -‐-‐is still a method that humans understand….why? Because Grok survived, thrived, and we are all in some way, descendants of his tribe (taking some literary license here, but…)

Epilogue• Grok and all storytellers recognize the power of communications and content strategy helps brand marketers to share an effective message• Health messages are essential stories that people need and will listen to if it is relevant to them• Your message may not need to last 600,000 years, but, hey, you never know….

We’re all descendants of Grok, the first health storyteller and content

marketer.

Visual storytelling is baked right into our

DNA.


The End.

Story & presentation by Buddy Scalera.http://BuddyScalera.com

Buddy ScaleraContent Strategist

BuddyScalera.comWordsPicturesWeb.com

Slide templates & infographic by Ivan Ruiz. http://ivanruizdesign.com/

Grok art by Pat Quinn.http://patquinn.blogspot.com/


Appendix

Appendix

Post-conference stuff.


Top Tweets

Buddy’s Note:After every presentation, I check Twitter and other social channels to see what people shared. This is one of the ways I can determine what people are taking away from the experience.

Sometimes I save key observations because they help me improve my presentations and slides.

The next couple of slides include some of the key tweets that I’ve saved. I hope they are as useful to you as they are to me.

Special thanks to the people who came to my session and shared their tweets.


Matt Osias @mattosias "Stories are defined by conflict. Conflict can be resolved by a brand." —@MarketingBuddy #CMWorld #ContentTipsy Brandmuscle @brandmuscle @MarketingBuddy No problem! Your energy was awesome and the user-focused design lessons are great takeaways from #CMWorld.Erika Heald @SFerika Excellent session on visual content this morning w/@marketingbuddy. Took SO MANY notes in #Evernote. #CMWorldMelissa Suzuno @trixiemaru .@MarketingBuddy thanks again for a wonderful, thought-provoking, very meta session on #visual #storytelling!Guilherme Conter @gconter Bons insights sobre comunicação visual com @MarketingBuddy #CMWorld

Top Tweets


Charles Cooper Cooper_42 You must modify your message/story for your users and the medium they're using @MarketingBuddy #CMWorldLiberty Tsighis @libertyt "Build your content to where people are in their user journey." @MarketingBuddy #CMWorldMelissa Ripp Lozoff @peapodmel Involve designers WAY earlier than you thought you needed to. They need to be in the room at the very beginning. @MarketingBuddy #CMWorldAndrea Fryrear @AndreaFryrear Your visual language needs to adapt to the channel it's on (but Batman is always Batman regardless of context). @MarketingBuddy #CMWorldAllison Erdman @allisonerdman "Were stuck in this weird rut where we think everything has to be a vector graphic." -@MarketingBuddy --THANK YOU! #CMWorld

Top Tweets


Chris Sledzik @csledzik Visual design + usability are paramount partners in digital #marketing. Make it easy for consumers. Focus on CTAs. @MarketingBuddy #CMWorldAllison Erdman @allisonerdman "If your icons need a tag and label, you don't have very good icons" - @MarketingBuddy #CMWorld #Visual StorytellingAndrea Fryrear @AndreaFryrear Our visual processors in our brains are very good at learning to ignore things that are consistently irrelevant. @MarketingBuddy #CMWorldMike Goldberg @HeavyMetalMG The evolution of content as king starts with cavemen; the original visual storytellers @MarketingBuddy #CMWorld

Top Tweets


Bridgette Klein @BridgetteBKlein Sep 10Story is defined by conflict. Otherwise it is just set up. @MarketingBuddy #CMWorldBarry Feldman @FeldmanCreative Sep 10"Most of the web is a silent experience. We rely on our vision." @MarketingBuddy riffing viz storytelling at #CMWorldWhitney Stephens @WMLStephens Sep 10Your brand can be a plot point, but it's your customers' story. @MarketingBuddy #CMWorldClarabridge @Clarabridge Sep 10Don't tell your brand's story. See how you can fit into your customer's story. @MarketingBuddy #CMWorld

Top Tweets


Janelle Witting @janelleforreal Sep 10Oh dang @verbality , presenter is a content marketer by day and COMIC BOOK WRITER by night! #CMWorld @MarketingBuddyAllison Erdman @allisonerdman Sep 10"#Infographics can be stories, but they're not always stories!"-@MarketingBuddy #CMWorldAmber Ooley @AmberOoley Sep 10From content marketing to comic books, let's get visual. #CMWorld @MarketingBuddyMelissa Ripp Lozoff @peapodmel Sep 10 Cleveland, OH"Your brand can be a plot point, but it's THEIR story." @MarketingBuddy #CMWorld

Top Tweets


Sketchnote artist Kelly Kingman.

See this sketchnote and Kelly’s amazing art at: http://kingmanink.com/


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