Infographics are very popular these days, getting a lot of interest on social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and Google+. They are being used more frequently on sites because they are one of THE most popular ways of SEO linkbaiting for your site, which is where people link to your great content themselves.

What Is An Infographic?

An infographic is simply a visual representation of information. These infographics present complex information or data visualisation quickly and clearly to the viewer.

Many good infographics present information clearly, that would normally be very complicated or hidden within excessive amounts of data.

Not every infographic will be a hit though! Some infographics can receive hundreds of retweets, likes, +1’s, etc. while others only may only get a few.

Getting Started With Infographics

With any content that you are producing for your site, the concept is the most important part. Think about all the information that is relevant to your niche? Have you had to research any sort of data for your site’s niche? There is no point spending time producing an infographic on different types of car fuel consumption, when your site focuses on healthy food! Make sure you pick the right concept.

Once you have a concept, you need to find the information. Now, you can’t just take any old data at random to create an infographic and then expect your visitors to share it all over the web. Your infographic has to catch the attention with many people and spark their interest.

The infographics that tend to work the best are the ones that are able to present huge numbers or complex processes that nobody can really understand or that present data in a really interesting way. The example above illustrates American Presidents inaugural speeches, how many terms they served and how they ended their time in office. All of this information is displayed clearly and easily for people to view and make sense of.

An infographic doesn’t necessarily have to feature fancy graphics. Often a combination of maps, diagrams and a few images reduced to their symbolic character are enough. Remember that the information is the key element, graphics are used to present this data more clearly.

Here are some ways that you can use infographics to promote your site:

1. Focus On Your Niche

Don’t invest the time in creating an extravagant infographic on a topic that isn’t related to your site. Spend time researching beforehand to make sure that you are covering something related to your niche.

2. Consider Outsourcing

If you aren’t sure how to design an infographic for your site, you could consider outsourcing the process. Infographics can cost anything from a few hundred dollars to thousands of dollars depending on the quality. Like anything, you generally get what you pay for!

3. Be Controversial

Infographics that are about controversial topics can work well and attract traffic to your website. Always know how far to push it though, you could inadvertently alienate large numbers of your regular readers by trying to be too controversial.

4. Promote Your Infographics!

When your infographic is fully made and ready to go, you want people to view it. Make sure you put a coordinated effort into promoting it the best way possible. You should use your blog and other sites you have to promote your work. Don’t forget to link to your infographic on all the major social networking and bookmarking sites, like Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Stumbleupon, Digg, etc.

5. Submit To Directories

Many bloggers make a living from promoting other people’s works, including infographics. Submitting your infographics to niche directory sites can make sure that your infographic gets the attention it deserves. Top publishers may be willing to republish your visual on their sites. It never hurts to ask them if they are interested.

6. Make It Easy For People To Share Your Work

You shouldn’t just assume that people will link to your infographic on their own. Always try to make it as easy as possible for your visitors to share your work around the web. A code snippet that they can copy and paste on their site to promote your work is one good way to do this. Integrating things like AddThis, ShareThis, etc. on your site also makes it really easy for people to tweet, like, +1, etc. your content.

7. Do Follow Ups

You’ll find that some infographics just take off very quickly, while others can take a bit of time to do so. Don’t just assume your infographic is a failure because no one is linking to it or tweeting about it. You should put a sustained effort forward to get more eyeballs to visit your visual.

Do you use infographics on your website?  If so, have you also found them to be good ways to attract traffic?  Let us know your views & opinions by leaving a comment below!