Graphics in Copy?

Does the graphic forward the sale? If it does, keep it. If it exists merely to look pretty, delete it.

--- Ross

There's one sure way to find out. Test your copy with and without.
You can use a graphic to paint a vivid picture of the desired outcome or effect.

I think a good graphic helps, but it seems that most look so awful I can only imagine they drive away sales. If someone uses graphics then great, they just better be damn great

Graphic doesn't sell, your copy sells..

BUT graphic sells the copy

At the same time, its really important to see how well your graphics are and how well it compliments the copy.


Naveed
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Graphics tend to go one of two routes:

1. Distract from the selling process. Rather than focusing on the copy, the reader focuses on the graphics that don't have much meaning.

2. Enhance the selling process. The graphics suck the eye in...get your copy read and understood faster... hammering your point home.

A great case-in point of graphics and text working together are tabloids. Here's a headline from a recent magazine cover, "Angelina Threatens Brad." There's then a picture of an angry Angelina Jolie and a separate picture of Brad Pitt with Jenifer Aniston. Together, both elements work together to tell a tantalizing tale of love, deceit, and jealously... you know, the good stuff. The pictures alone or simply a headline don't have nearly the same power as they do together.

The words tell the story (reveal the meaning)... and the graphics hammer it home so hard you can't ignore the story... even if you have little desire to find out all the details inside the mag.

It all depends on the situation. You have to split test and find out because sometimes graphics outpull no graphics. Sometimes it's the other way around.

Either way you should get very different results, so it's worth testing.

Oh yeah, and sometimes when you split test 2 different graphic minisites, one outpulls the other bigtime. I've had a $200 minisite beat out a $1000 minisite.

There is a book titled "Which Ad Pulled Best?" Copywriting lore has it that, given to a group of the top people in direct response, the best of the best guessed correctly 50% of the time.

My guess is with graphics that percentage would come in around 20%. People don't pick the graphics that work. It flat out doesn't happen -- A/B split runs back this up.

Like the water cooler talk about the 'great' Superbowl ads, people pick what's pretty. What they don't do is assess, with a critical eye, message-to-market match.

There is no conceptualization that, for instance, a nicely done retro style could be better for a USP stressing, say, craftsmanship. It just doesn't occur to many folks to do anything other than mindless, Web 2.0 cliche.

...With stock photo models pretending to be employees. No where -- I mean NO and WHERE is there the keen insight of creating a "Wendy the Snapple Lady" that makes employees the spokespeople for delivering a credible message, rather than Mega Headline PhotoShop Overdose clinics.

Finally, the conceptualization isn't there you could, for instance, use information graphics (Infographics) to visually explain your value proposition to a potential customer. Heck, the web can't even figure out the huge percentage of people who are visual thinkers, meaning visual deciders. All they can come up with is the slick ebook cover -- the seeming pinnacle of design thinking and visual merchandising.

It comes as a practically alien concept that you're better off showing a before-and-after graphic for your remodeling firm or collision repair shop. I can have people slapping their heads for hours, just stating one obvious thing after another, when it comes to practical, pragmatic, obvious use of graphics.

Folks, we are in the buggy whip days with graphics on the web. There's not a lick of sense applied, anywhere. The Betty Ford Senter should have a Photoshop wing for the addicts and their rainbows and unicorns hallucinations about what works in graphics.

And the FDA should regulate Photoshop like a mind altering substance.

Read Why Your Website Doesn't Need To Be Pretty. Looks matter ...just not in any way graphic artists and the Photoshop addicted can conceive of.

Yeah, the question of "graphics or no graphics" is not nearly as difficult to wade through as the question of humor in copy.

Clearly, they need to be sparce. Like the woman who dresses and accessorizes for the evening, and then knows to remove two accessories.

You have to apply the right graphics for the right purpose.

If your copy is about surfing you don't slap a graphic of a polar bear up there unless he's on a surfboard.

I'll be ramping up the use of graphics for the IM community by implementing some cartooning and comic book art and storytelling. I'm 110% sure it will increase sales and retention and add the kind of branding that far too many cookie cutter WSOs and IM sites seem to have. It's so you can't tell one from the other.

Graphics impinge on the surfer's mind. They mean reliability and makes it easier for the surfer to recognize and recall and navigate.

Watch out, I'm gonna re-invent IMming.

there is a HUGE difference between designing a pretty site and designing to sell.

HUGE.

I just took a friends squeeze page he's done many 1000+ combination multivariate tests with.... and almost doubled conversions just by adding a slicker design to it.

and yes, we tested the hell out of the page with COLD traffic.

he already had a page that was converting well on cold traffic, but when you add high end design, thats designed to convert, it enhances already good copy.

I've been preaching this since 2000 and proven it works.

Well said Davemiz.

Too many examples of WSOs and other products from the marketing community look so bland no wonder people struggle to make money. Invest the time in getting some efficient and entertaining graphics. If it didn't work you wouldn't have major media using them.

Hiring someone might be too expensive for the newbie and too many pros are too arrogant to think that it would boost their presence and sales. Believe you me, I've seen it all.

I think graphics are important, a picture tells a thousand words right? Nice graphics will draw your visitors in and make your site more appealing. No one wants to read boring plain sales copy that isnt formatted and looking good. Graphics are good in my opinion

You completely missed the point.

Are graphics going to produce a response increase? If so, how? That is good for this venue as it requires nobody's opinion, but cold hard numbers.

They're either put into a test, or it's your opinion.

Have you seen the Adtoons site?

People SEE before they READ, so to that extent design is
important to your message--it's called "first impression".

-Ray Edwards

It's all about painting pictures. You are either putting those pictures up graphically on the web page, or your great copy is painting that vivid picture in their "minds eye". It just depends on what kind of painter you are.

George

brian, lol yes you are correct. in this case, sorry dude. no can do. :-)

I'm stock photo slut. I probably spend a couple hundred a month on buying pictures.

When I write, I always have the visual in my mind's eye.

It can really make the difference between capturing someone's attention or losing immediate interest.

WARNING: This is not a shameless plug!

The site (top9trader.com) I just finished has images on the homepage and the blogs to accentuate my points. And it's performing much better than its image-free, video-less predecessor.

I wholeheartedly recommend taking the time to find the right visuals to drive home your point...

And yes, I do believe that's why many of the video sales letters are quickly moving the industry in that generally direction.

I mean, it's so easy to hire someone to make a fairly well-produced video for hardly anything...