The Power of Visual Storytelling for Non-Profits

There’s something to be said regarding the sheer power of an image, it can communicate simple, vital information with a viewer or tug on their heartstrings, resonating with them for days afterward.

From captivating your audience’s attention to the point of conversion, persuasive imagery can provide your non-profit organization with a louder and clearer voice, allowing it to stand out amongst all the visual noise viewers are bombarded within their daily lives. Not only is it an extremely effective marketing strategy (both online and offline), it also increases and strengthens your connection with your audience and builds your brand.

Visual Storytelling in Marketing

Does visual storytelling in marketing really work?

In short, yes!

Vision trumps all our other senses; our brains do an amazing job at remembering pictures. According to Brain Rules, if you “hear a piece of information…three days later you’ll remember 10% of it. Add a picture and you’ll remember 65%”.

Not only do studies show our brains process visuals faster, but they also save the information more effectively when it’s delivered visually. But let’s keep building the case for why visuals (like infographics, illustrations, videos, charts, and even memes) are so critical for your organization.

To keep things short and sweet, we’ve put together a handful of ten fascinating statistics that will (hopefully) convince you to spend more time thinking about your visual storytelling tactics:

10 Statistics That Prove the Power of Visual Storytelling

1. 90% of information transmitted to the brain is visual, and visuals are processed 60,000x faster in the brain than text.
2. People following directions paired with text and illustrations do 323% better than people following without illustrations.
3. Visual information helps us combat information overload. We receive five times as much information today as we did in 1986.
4. Online content with relevant visuals attracts 94% more views than text-only.

6. We are visually wired: it only takes us 150 milliseconds for a symbol to be processed and just 100 milliseconds to attach a meaning to it.
7. People remember 10% of what they hear, 20% of what they read, and 80% of what they see and do.
8. Color visuals increase the willingness to read by 80%.

8. Social media posts with visuals have 120% more engagement than posts without.

9. Emotions and visual information are processed in the same part of the human brain. Visual stimuli and emotional response are linked in a simple way and these two together generate memories.

10. The average human attention span is now shorter than a goldfish‘s (we’re hoping you’ve made it to this point in our article!).

Visual Storytelling Rules Your Organization Should Follow

Now that we’ve got you thinking about the story your organization is telling the world, we’ll dive into our five high-level ‘rules’ surrounding visual storytelling marketing efforts for your non-profit:

1. Remain authentic to your mission and purpose at all times (when is the last time you read your organization’s mission statement?).
2. Always read the room – understand the context of where your visuals will live so you tailor them appropriately.
3. Make sure the visuals your organization uses amplifies your brand’s ethos, aim to create meaningful visuals, and avoid adding to the visual ‘noise’ viewers deal with on a daily basis.
4. Know your audience and understand their behavior so you can choose appropriate visuals that will positively resonate with them.
5. Be genuine, especially when it comes to non-profit organizations it’s critical to always show real people, real environments, and real-life situations in your visuals.
6. Remember, not every visual medium is right for every brand! Make sure you are cognizant of this with any story your organization is trying to tell.

Leveraging impactful visual storytelling, whether it be in the form of enticing infographics, relevant memes, or catchy animated videos can help your organization unlock its true brand potential, meet its mission, and best of all remain relevant with your audience.

A Quick Recap

Storytelling is something humans have always done and will continue to do – stories allow us to share our experience, retain knowledge, and pass down important information easily. Life has taught us that the depths of human emotion can truly be conveyed with a single, powerful image.

Always Remember To:

• Include visual storytelling tactics in your content marketing strategy
• Remain genuine and authentic
• Express your brands’ ethos with contextually appropriate visual content
• Know your audience and understand what will resonate with them

How Are You Telling Your Brand’s Story?

Storytelling, in the marketing sense, is vital to organizations that push for meaningful social change and disseminate important information – but don’t forget there are quite a few other factors at play beyond sharing memorable visuals with your audience. Reaching your audience effectively requires a strong, insightful brand ecosystem (we like to call it an ecosystem because a brand is so much more than a logo!).

As a non-profit, you know your brand ecosystem is one of your greatest assets – it propels your organization forward and is the first touchpoint with your donors, members, potential volunteers, and the general public. But, is your story being told in the best way possible?