How To Make Your Article Pleasing To The Eye and Shareable

By Heather Hart

When crafting articles, writing and SEO are only part of the equation. Creating quality graphics that are the correct size for sharing to various platforms is a must. These are also known as visual media.

Aspects of Visual Media

1. The Featured Image

The first image you want to make sure you have is the featured image. This image is the image Facebook, Twitter, Google, and other places will pull when sharing the article online. For this reason, it’s imperative to make sure it is sized correctly.

You’ll need to check your website or blog theme to see what their suggested featured image size is. For Facebook, the link share image size is currently 1200 X 630.

If your website had a featured image size that was 980 X 760, you’d want to make all your featured images 1280 x 760 pixels. Then, you could use guidelines to keep your text within a rectangle that was 985 x 670 pixels. That way if it was cropped for Facebook or a recommended post on another page, the text would always show, and the image would always be the correct size. Even if it was cropped at the top or sides as Facebook needs a shorter, wider graphic and your blog required a taller, thinner graphic.

This is easier to do with Photoshop than it is with Canva, but you can eyeball it with Canva if you know what you are looking for. Or, if you don’t add any text to your featured image, you don’t have to worry about getting the spacing right.

2. Breaking Up Space With Vhttps://www.canva.com/isual Media

In most cases, it’s a good idea to add a photo every 400-600 words. Including photos throughout your article can help break up your writing. This makes it easier to read and sometimes understand.

Here are some examples of how to use photos in your articles:

📷 Use screenshots to illustrate instructions

📷 Insert photos to show the progression

📷 Add a quote photo to share

3. Branding Your Visual Media

As with anything online, building your brand is important. When adding photos to your post, branding them for your website can keep other people from stealing your photos. It can also help refer readers back to your website when your photos are shared online.

Before even choosing graphics to work with, you should decide if your website has a graphics theme you want to follow. Do you want all your photos to have people in them? Do you want only illustrated graphics and no photos? Do you want graphics that follow a specific color scheme? These are all branding choices that can make a difference.

You can easily do some research by checking out some of your favorite websites to see how they brand their photos. You shouldn’t brand yours the same way, but it can give you an idea. You could also do a search on Pinterest for ideas of how to brand graphics.

Once you have your graphics decisions made, you’re ready to start branding the photos themselves.

Simple steps for branding your photos are:

📷 Pick two fonts. — When branding your website, you should have one or two fonts that you use for almost everything. These should be the fonts you use on the graphics you design for your articles as well.

📷 Use your logo. — Every graphic you embed in a post should include your logo on it somewhere.

📷 Add your URL. — Depending on your logo, you may also need (or want) to add your URL to your graphics. You can add your main website URL, or the direct URL to the article of the post the graphic was made for. Either way, this is so that when the graphic is shared online, people will know to visit your website for more information if (for some reason) it gets unlinked from your post.

4. Using Alt Image Keywords for SEO

When you embed images in your post, you can add descriptions, captions, and alt text (or alternative text). This “is a word or phrase that can be inserted as an attribute in an HTML document to tell Web site viewers the nature or contents of an image...”

These should be descriptive and specific. Think less than 125 characters. Alt image attributes are important for SEO. Thus, using keywords or phrases are important.

An example of a good alt image attribute would be: “Adding visual media to online articles at a workstation with an open laptop, camera, and notebook.”

There is no reason to include “a picture of” or “an image of.” Always use complete sentences and relevant, descriptive, keywords, or phrases where possible.

5. Creating Pinnable Images

While there are several reasons to add visual media to your post, adding pinnable images is important for sharing. Depending on your niche, Pinterest could be a major traffic source for your website. There are 250 million people who use Pinterest every month. And it drives 33% more traffic than Facebook.

The best size for pinnable images is 600 X 900. In other words, vertical is better. Not square. Not horizontal. Vertical. Taking the time to make at least one vertical image per article can make a huge difference to the shareability of your post.

The graphics that do best on Pinterest, in addition to being vertical, include one of the following:

📷 A Quote

📷 How to _______

📷 A List (5 ways to _________)

📷 Article Title (short, catchy, and easy to read)

Adding Graphics To Your Post

When adding graphics to your post, it’s important to use graphics you have the legal right to share. You can’t simply search for images related to your topic and add the graphics that come up. This practice can get you sued.

There are two ways you can legally add photos to your post.

1. Take Your Own Photos

When taking your own photos, you need to make sure your photos are 72 dpi, have good lighting, and are good quality.

Or, if you’re writing how-to articles, screenshots may be appropriate. There are multiple screen capture programs available to take photos of what is on your screen. Most of these will work great, just make sure when you are editing them, you stick to your brand and keep it classy.

Some editing programs can reduce the photo quality, so keep an eye on that as well.

2. Use Royalty-Free Images

Using royalty-free images (also known as stock photos) is the most common and recommended way to add graphics to your post.

Royalty-free, “refers to the right to use copyright material or intellectual property without the need to pay royalties or license fees for each use, per each copy or volume sold or some period of use or sales.”

How To Find Royalty-Free Graphics

You can find free royalty-free images on sites like:

📷 Pixabay

📷 Pexels

📷 Unsplash

Or you can purchase royalty-free graphics or subscriptions to stock photo sites like the following:

📷 Adobe Stock

📷 Shutter Stock

📷 Megapixl

When using stock photos, it is always important to check the license information. Some licenses require you to credit the photographer, while others don’t. And some images aren’t available for commercial use.

Photo Editing

Once you have found the graphics you want to use in your post, you are ready to start editing them.

You can easily edit photos with a free tool like Canva. Or you can use a more robust tool like Photoshop. Both will get the job done.

When editing your images, you will want to:

📷 Resize your graphics

📷 Add text

📷 Include your logo / URL

📷 Add the photo copyright information if needed

Recap

Just to recap, visual media is important when publishing your articles online. It helps with readability and SEO. You’ll want to make sure your graphics are the correct size for sharing, branded for your website, licensed for your use, and tagged for SEO. Now, you’re ready to start adding graphics to your articles.

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Heather Hart — Author Coach

Heather has a passion for helping other writers make their dreams come true. With well over a dozen books in print, she has been working as an author coach for close to a decade.

https://www.facebook.com/authorheatherhart/

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