Visual micro content (VMC) is driving forces of engagement these days. Clips and GIFs in the social web are as popular as never before. And I am not talking about the creation of memes.
More and more brands are discovering GIFs, clips and cinemagraphs as fine art and a new way of storytelling. Movable imagery recently became a popular marketing format, which is easy to digest and really stands out in social media feeds.
“Yay” for being a photographer or visual engineer with tons of material on hand. Shame on you if you aren’t involved on social networks yet. Visual content marketing is the way to advertise your photo business, create leads and drive sales in 2016. Why? Gen Y! On a global scale, 64% of the web traffic are videos.
For the young audience, VMC is the digital answer to TV spots; small bites of information and entertainment. Instead of producing a 30 seconds spot try creating 30 spots lasting a few seconds to appeal to a number of buyer personas in your target market.
But beware of producing VMC just because you read it’s trendy and Facebook, Twitter or Google provide the technology. Each cinemagraph, clip or GIF needs to fit into your overall social media strategy: What is your communication goal? Whom do you want to reach? What can they learn from you?
Once you have the answers to all these questions, start planning VMC in your content calendar and make sure you optimize your visual material for each social network. Facebook’s algorithm will reward you with reach if you upload a video there instead of posting it as (YouTube) link. Twitter content has an ideal size of 506x253px.
For details, check out this always up-to-date social media image sizes cheat sheet (Google spreadsheet).
Useful resources — DIY:
- 10 Cool Photoshop Tutorials For Creating Your Own Cinemagraph
- 7 Apps To Create Cinemagraphs On Your Smartphone
(Your smartphone camera might come with a GIF/cinemagraph mode already. I have a Samsung Galaxy S4 and my device cam offers me the mode “animated photo” to capture a scene for 5 seconds and choose afterwards the image parts I want to animate or freeze.) - Instagram releases Boomerang because GIFs are taking over the world
Useful resources — Libraries:
- Use cinemagraphs from Giphy, or create your own
- Use GIFs from Riffsy
- Make use of the GIF library / search on Twitter
Useful resources — Inspiration:
- Jeffrey Lewis Bennett creating GIFs of wedding couples
- Animated urban, nature, travel photography by Julien Douvier
- 10 Emerging GIF Artists Who Prove Motion Photography Has No Limits
I gave it a try myself with GifMaker and a series of photos I took in Auckland a few years ago. You might want to go through your archive too to see if you can leverage some old photo series today.
If you like this post you might also like Adobe Post: Create Beautiful Free Social Media Images In Minutes…