Optimise Your Social Media Images: Here Are Some Best Practices You Should Know
Social media is a visual platform. That's why visuals are one of the essential elements of a successful social media strategy.
Your brand images and photographs are a perfect opportunity to leave an impact on your audience and build trust between you and your potential customers. If well-executed, high-quality images will help attract people to follow your brand on social media channels. But if they're boring, uninteresting and visually unappealing, people won't want to follow you either. That's why it is essential to optimise your images so that they give the right first impression of your brand. To help you do just that, I've put together some tips for optimising your photos for maximum engagement on social media.
Plan your visual content in advance
You never know what type of content will resonate best with your audience consistently. There are no guarantees, of course, but if you plan, you will be able to adjust your strategy based on what's working best for you and your audience. If you're struggling with ideas for the images you need for your social media posts, here are a few things you can do:
- Brainstorm topics that your audience might be interested in.[nbsp_tc]
- Research your competitors and look for a way to be different and better. Don't copy them, as they are probably challenged too.
- Create a mood board with images that inspire you. Moodboards can help you to stay focused and give your brands visual identity.
- Look beyond your products and services; consider your staff and their stories; it's not all about selling, but showing behind the scenes too.[nbsp_tc]
Use the right tools
If you're looking to optimise the visuals of your social media posts, you should use the right tools and software. If you're not a photographer, you should consider hiring a professional. Or go on a photography course as knowing the basics can help immensely.
Stock images and an image editor can come in handy if you want to create visual content for social media but don't have the budget for a photographer. Stock images are useful because they're ready-made and come with different variations. Just be aware often, your community will spot a stock image a mile away.
An image editor is helpful when you're suggesting changes to your photographer or when you're editing your own photographs. You can use image editing software to edit the lighting and colour of your images, remove unwanted elements and add a filter to make your images pop.
Add a call-to-action and brand branding
You need to create a new and creative image for each post. But, keep the editing and style consistent. This helps to build your visual identity and theme.
Use the same branding for each of your posts by adding a call-to-action and your logo. This way, your posts will be consistent and look more professional. Your audience will also be more likely to click on your posts if they're visually appealing. However, we recommend that you don't have a call to action on every post as we are building communities first. To allow for a more sales focus, I will often use sales content with a call to action as an off-page (dark) post. This way, it keeps the feed about the community and the advertising, about adverting...
Provide context for your images
Whether you're sharing an image from your latest blog post or from your Instagram feed, your image needs to be relevant to your audience. If you add the image to a social media post without context, it will be difficult for your audience to make a connection between the content and the image. Visual content is a great way to engage with your audience, but only if you're doing it well. It's important to provide context for your visual content. This can be done by including a short caption with each image you share. But I'm sure that this is obvious… right?
Make sure they are in the correct ratio and resolution
Facebook: Historically, Facebook likes horizontal images. Now, however, the platform accommodates mobile users. As 80% of users access Facebook via mobile.
For Facebook, it is always best to aim for a square (1:1) or portrait (4:5) aspect ratio. You can upload landscape (16:9) images. But on mobile screens, square and portrait images occupy much more space than landscape images do, giving you a better opportunity to inspire engagement.
Facebook requires feed images to have a minimum width of 479 pixels, but I always shoot for a minimum width of 1200 pixels; this way, the pics look as good as possible. Note: Facebook caps feed images at 2048 pixels for the longest dimension, but you can still upload larger images.
For Facebook Stories, upload images with a vertical (9:16) aspect ratio for full-screen display on mobile devices.
Instagram: Instagram's optimal aspect ratio has changed and adapted over the years. In the beginning, the platform only allowed square images, but it later rolled out support for horizontal (1.91:1) and portrait aspect ratios. However, to make sure your profile feed is looking sharp, it is best to shoot pics that work horizontally or vertically, as well as in a square, as your profile feed is always made up of square images.
As the platform has increasingly focused on Reels, the algorithm has also begun to prioritise the display of portrait images. And in May 2022, Instagram announced that the platform has been testing 9:16 photo placements; good to see the platform is continuing to test and refine the display of content. But for now, to hit Instagram's current best practices, aim for a 4:5 aspect ratio.
For Instagram Stories, use the Facebook Stories aspect ratio below. To optimise for mobile, always publish full-screen vertical (9:16) images to Stories. If you include still images in your Instagram Reels, a 9:16 aspect ratio is your best bet. I've also found that stories on both Facebook and Instagram automatically crop on the device you are publishing from, so if you use an iPad, the ratio will differ. So always post from a phone for maximum coverage.[nbsp_tc]
LinkedIn: Optimising your LinkedIn images, aim for files with a minimum width of 1200 pixels. Then use the mobile app's built-in editing tools to adjust the height and crop as needed.
Unlike some other social media platforms, LinkedIn will allow you to upload full-screen vertical images to the feed. But, the published images won't cover the full screen. Instead, LinkedIn adds not-so-stylish vertical bars to full-screen vertical images in the feed.
As with all images online, don't forget to add the Alt Text to optimise them for search.
Visual content is more important than ever. From social media posts to blog imagery, it's the easiest way to attract attention and make an impact on your audience. That being said, it can be easy to get it wrong and create posts that don't resonate with your audience. It's important to follow best practices when creating visual content so that you can make the most of this opportunity and build trust with your audience. That means you need to get creative, use bright and bold colours, and make sure that your images are high-quality. But most importantly, have a plan, test and refine, and design it to look spontaneous, but plan as much as you possibly can.
