Blog ‘n’ Roll

Usage of infographic in your blog

Infographic is a visual representation of data, concept, or a process. You’ve probably seen a lot of them online. They are used in blog posts, articles, presentations, and website landing pages. The wide use of infographics is quite understandable – it is a sure way to make your writing more engaging. 

Photo by Touann Gatouillat Vergos on Unsplash

It is a great tool that has multiple benefits, no matter what your writing niche is. Let’s discuss why and when to use it and how to do it right in your blog. 

Why Use Infographics? 

First of all, it is a very effective communication medium. People are mostly visual creatures, 65% of us are visual learners. It means that commonly readers comprehend visuals much easier and quicker than simple text. 

According to statistics, the human brain can process images 60,000 faster than text! That’s what I call a difference. But it is not the only reason to use blog infographics, here are several significant advantages. 

It makes data comprehensive

Maybe you need to explain the production cycle or brain processes – it can be quite challenging. But when you use illustration, it is much more understandable for the audience. 

And the information given in such a way is easier to remember. If you want to make your post more engaging and clear to the audience – an infographic will help tremendously. 

Illustrated infographics are sharable

It is not a secret that images are much more shared than texts. Even if your writing is outstanding, people are more likely to share illustrations.

Photo by Carlos Muza on Unsplash

Usage of infographics can boost your shares and attract a new audience as a result. You can add a share button and endorse people to use your illustration. Just make sure you put your brand name on it. 

Brand Awareness

This is also a perfect way to increase brand awareness. It doesn’t matter whether you are an individual entrepreneur and blogger or a company’s representative. Usage of the brand colors, style, and logo will do the trick. 

Brand awareness is crucial for growing a business or personal blog and its further monetization, especially if you are interested in brand deals and sponsorships. 

SEO

An infographic blog post has more SEO potential. It is more engaging and interesting for the audience. It also can be shared and used by other creators, which leads to more exposure.

And images are an excellent choice to promote your blog on platforms like Pinterest. And each picture has its SEO factors like a file name and meta description. 

When it is hard to get a higher ranking with the text, you can increase your chances with an infographic. Google, for example, shows results for texts, images, and short answers on the first page. 

 When to Use Infographics?

Now, when the benefits of an infographic blog post are obvious, let’s talk about when to use it. Of course, one wouldn’t do it for every post simply because it takes a lot of time and effort. And also because when anything is overused it loses its power. 

Here are several good reasons to use blog illustrations in a particular post. Use it if you: 

  • Need to explain something difficult to an audience; 
  • Want to present statistics, case studies, survey results, or lots of numbers – they always look better as graphs; 
  • Need to do a summary of a long and informative post; 
  • Want to make a comparison of two subjects or concepts; 
  • Want to highlight particular achievements, factors, or make an engaging presentation of the topic. 

Let me be clear – if there is nothing important to put on the infographic, do not do it. Just use an image for illustration. There is nothing more boring than infographics that does nothing for a post. 

Overall, infographics can be divided into several types according to their usage, such as:

  • Statistical; 
  • Timeline; 
  • Process; 
  • Informational; 
  • Comparison; 
  • List, etc. 

Here is another cool thing to remember when you create infographics – they can be used multiple times. You can post them in your blog posts, on other services, on social media, in guest posts, and whenever you feel stuck with writing.

And it won’t get flagged by Google as plagiarism or copypaste. So be cautious of what data you want to illustrate – make it relevant for more than just one text. 

How to Create It? 

When you decide on how to use infographics, the next question is how to make it? 

Well, there are three ways to approach it. 

  1. Hire a designer. Professionals can always do it better, it is a fact. If you have an opportunity, you can invest in graphic design and get outstanding results. And order all formats for social media too. But it is, obviously, an option not available for everyone. 
  2. Use other people’s infographics. If there is something created on the topic you are covering, you can use it. Just make sure you credit the author and have a link to the source. It will add visuals to the post and make it more exciting. Of course, it is rather a quick fix, but sometimes it is necessary. 
  3. Create it yourself. You do not need to be a graphic designer to do it. There are lots of online and desktop tools that allow creating graphs and all types of visuals. And many of them are intuitive, user-friendly, and, most importantly, free. 

I have 3 top picks to create your original infographics for you:

Canva

It is free to use and there are several cool free templates. And it allows downloading the file in high-resolution. It is pretty easy to use; there are lots of features and designs to choose from. And you can learn it quickly and create slick, stylish, and simple images. 

Piktochart

This tool is also user-friendly and easy to learn. Many great features allow the creation of unique images. One can create something simple, use ready templates, or even craft something advanced.

And one can also upload their own images to use. The free version lets you download the result in PNG or JPEG. But if you want to download it in PDF, you’ll need to get a premium subscription.  

Venngage

This one is great, but has one downside – it is not free. You can try it for free, but if you want to download your design, you’ll have to pay for a subscription. But there are nice tutorials on how to use it and an extremely helpful blog on all things infographics. 

5 Cool Examples of Infographics Usage

To sum everything up, check out these incredible posts with infographics from other creators.

Good Writing Habits of Famous Writers

Making time for creative activities, Statistics Canada

The Ultimate Guide To Note Taking In Class

The Ultimate Guide to Creating Visually Appealing Content

The most Googled artist in every country in the world

Maybe these examples will inspire you to get your hands dirty and create a stunning visual for your next blog post!

Share links to your favorite infographics in the comments section, I’ll be happy to check them out 😉

Vasy Kafidoff
Vasy Kafidoff

Vasyl Kafidoff is a founder and mastermind of KAFIDOFF.COM. He has a strong interest in education, modern technology, marketing, and business management.

If Vasy is not working, you can find him somewhere in the world attending a Rock Concert with his mates.

Personal website
  • Usage of infographic in your blog
    Infographic is a visual representation of data, concept, or a process. You’ve probably seen a lot of them online. They are used in blog posts, articles, presentations, and website landing pages. The wide use of infographics is quite understandable – it is a sure way to make your writing more engaging.  It is a great […]
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Blog content plan and how it helps for your blogging needs

You shouldn’t underestimate a blog content plan and its benefits! For beginners, it might sound boring, but it a necessary tool if you are serious about blogging. It is a must-have step to be more productive, consistent, and provide quality content. And it will make your life so much easier, as everything is already planned. 

blog content plan
Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash

So how can a blog plan help you out? Well, the main benefits are:

  • It increases efficiency. According to the studies completed by Joe Pulizzi from the Content marketing institute, 60% of companies with written content strategy are more effective than those who have it just in words. And the same goes for individuals. Blog planning is crucial when it comes to efficiency. 
  • It helps to define your goals and objectives for a period. Blogging should never be aimless, especially if you want to monetize your blog and find a decent following. 
  • A plan helps to always know what to write. When you have it all drafted for at least six months in advance, you won’t get stuck with writing because of the lack of ideas. There will be no writer’s blocks and nerves about what topic to cover. 

A content plan for a blog is as important as a business plan for a company. After all, the competition is enormous, only in the years 2014-2020, the number of bloggers grew by 10 million!

How can one beat that? Well, with a smart strategy and planning beforehand, of course. 

How to make a plan for your blog? 

Now, let’s get into practical details of how to plan a blog and draft content for 6 months ahead. We’ll go through all the steps, starting from the goal and audience. 

Set the goals

Having clear goals is important because you’ll shape your content according to them. I divide the year into 4 parts 3 months each. And set goals for each period. Do not worry; you can change them in case something new arrives. The goals should be smart:

S – Specific

M – Measurable

A – Attainable

R – Relevant

T – Timeframe

The more specific you get, the easier it will be to achieve. For example, in the first 3 months, you want to boost your email list by 20% or increase conversion rates by 15%.

Another good example is increasing blog’s traffic by 10% in a particular period. 

Define the audience

How to plan a blog without paying attention to the readers? It is impossible! Whether you are a comedy writer, product reviewer, or lifestyle blogger, you need to know who you are writing for. 

target audience
Photo by CHUTTERSNAP on Unsplash

Create a target audience persona – approximate demographics (age, location, employment) and their motivations. It will help to find topics to cover and choose the particular formats. 

Create calendar

Now it is time for a content calendar. I like to use Excel spreadsheets but there are many other ways to do it. What do you need to add? 

Posting schedule – consistency is the key.

Vasy Kafidoff

If you are only starting it is easy to think that you’ll write every day. But in reality, it is extremely hard. The average blog post is 1,236 words and if you add proofreading, finding visuals, and other tasks – it takes a decent amount of time.

A lot of bloggers choose to post once or twice a week, which is fine. Quality goes before quantity. 

Create sheets for each month. For example, in May you need to produce 5 posts. Create lines with deadlines. 

Also, add lines for topics and keywords for each post. We’ll fill them in later. 

Important! Add specific dates and events to the calendar. For example, holidays or industry-specific dates. You can craft the content according to them to attract more visitors.

If you have sponsorships, add them too and create pieces around the same subject. 

Outline the content

Now it is time to brainstorm ideas for the next period. First of all, decide what content forms you can do, such as:

  • How-to guides; 
  • Product reviews; 
  • Opinion pieces; 
  • Listicles; 
  • Case studies; 
  • Researches; 
  • Videos or podcasts; 
  • Interviews; 
  • Guest posts, etc;

Another great idea is to reuse your old content. For example, rewrite and update old blogs or social media posts.

To make the blog more entertaining, diversify them in the calendar. For example:

1 post – how-to guide; 

2 post – product review; 

3 post – old content updated; 

4 post – listicle; 

5 post – your podcast on the subject. 

Brainstorm ideas

There are many ways to find ideas to plan a blog. You can do market and keyword research, look at what is trending, find ideas in comments and questions, make an audience survey, or look at what is in the news. 

Any decrease or disruption in the amount of content you are producing and using can have a negative impact on your rankings. However with a full plan in place, you will have a steady flow of content to use throughout your campaigns.

John Waghorn

The fun part is to brainstorm all of them according to categories. If you need 5 pieces per month, it means that for 6 months you’ll need 30 pieces, 6 topics for each category. 

So draft 6 how-to guide ideas, then 6 product reviews, find 6 pieces of old content you can update, think of listicles, and podcast topics. It is a manageable amount of topics to think of and you’ll have your content strategy drafted for half a year! 

plan a content
Photo by Matt Ridley on Unsplash

After you are done, put them on the calendar month by month. And add keywords that you’ve found during the research. 

As an example, a travel blog schedule for May can look like this:

1 post – how-to travel this summer and stay responsible with COVID-19;

2 post – 10 hiking boots for your trip: choosing the best ones;

3 post –tips for traveling alone in 2021;

4 post – 20 things you’ll need to pack for a trip in Mexico;

5 post – podcast about finding the best international flight deals.

Here you go – the content plan is ready all you need to do is to bring it to reality!

Ready to plan your blog content? 

Blog content plan is a great organizational tool. It helps to be professional, stay on top of the industry, and be more successful in what you do. And it also perfect for managing your time better.

You’ll draft the strategy for a year or 6 months once and then you’ll get to do only fun things – actually create content. Do not forget to review it before the new period in case some updates are needed.

One of the most important aspects – you should always aim for quality and consistency in posting. Remember that and your blog will rock the world! 

Vasy Kafidoff
Vasy Kafidoff

Vasyl Kafidoff is a founder and mastermind of KAFIDOFF.COM. He has a strong interest in education, modern technology, marketing, and business management.

If Vasy is not working, you can find him somewhere in the world attending a Rock Concert with his mates.

Personal website
  • Usage of infographic in your blog
    Infographic is a visual representation of data, concept, or a process. You’ve probably seen a lot of them online. They are used in blog posts, articles, presentations, and website landing pages. The wide use of infographics is quite understandable – it is a sure way to make your writing more engaging.  It is a great […]
  • Blog content plan and how it helps for your blogging needs
    You shouldn’t underestimate a blog content plan and its benefits! For beginners, it might sound boring, but it a necessary tool if you are serious about blogging. It is a must-have step to be more productive, consistent, and provide quality content. And it will make your life so much easier, as everything is already planned.  […]
  • I can’t write anymore! Stuck with your writing?
    Can’t write anymore! What should I do? Every writer fears this day but eventually, we all find ourselves there. Am I stuck forever? Am I even a good writer?  Stop. The answer is YES, you are a good writer. And NO, this block won’t last forever. Writer’s block is a common occurrence among all authors, […]
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    Comedy is an art that can become a full source of income. And you do not have to be a standup comedian for that. After all, not everyone is comfortable in front of the crowd. But what about comedy writing? What if you love humor? There are still many career options on comedy that do […]
  • Entry level writing jobs (Where to write as a beginner?)
    Starting your freelance writing career is arguable the most challenging part. Before you get that desirable first order, it might seem like a hopeless case. Where do you find clients? How easy is it to fulfill the requirements? Are there enough gigs for everyone?  The truth is, there is plenty of entry level writing jobs […]

I can’t write anymore! Stuck with your writing?

Can’t write anymore! What should I do? Every writer fears this day but eventually, we all find ourselves there.

Am I stuck forever? Am I even a good writer? 

Stop. The answer is YES, you are a good writer. And NO, this block won’t last forever.

Photo by Moritz Mentges on Unsplash

Writer’s block is a common occurrence among all authors, whether you create fiction, comedy texts, or blog posts. It is completely natural to be tired and feel like you can’t write anymore. It happens to the best of us. 

What to do if you stuck in a rut?

Here are some things that I find helpful. 

Do Not Panic

First of all, do not make a huge deal out of it. When it happens the first time with an author, one might think of it as the end of the world. OH NO, my friend. Believe me, it is not. 

The writer’s block is closely connected to anxiety, self-criticism, and perfectionism. So the more you’ll focus on what you cannot do, the harder it seems. Panic can lead to frustration and fixation. 

Do not be harsh on yourself; do not discredit any of your skills and accomplishments. Think of it as a learning moment. 

Find the Root

Why can’t I write anymore? I’ve been working on this novel/article for two weeks and everything was fine! Of course, there is no one reason behind all blocks, but there is a psychology of creative writing to help. Think of why you are stuck in a rut, for example: 

  • You do not know what happens next; 
  • You’ve lost interest in the story; 
  • You lack information and need additional research; 
  • Maybe you are simply tired; 
  • You are too critical of yourself. 

Finding the root of the problem can be the best way to overcome it. 

Write Something Else

What I like to do personally when I’m stuck and can’t write is to get busy with a side job. For example, you do not know what to do with your novel – ok, let it rest.

Go and write a blog post, an article, a poem, or just do some trash writing. 

Of course, you need to stay on schedule, whether you are working to monetize your blog or finish a story by the publisher’s deadline. But the secret is to keep your creativity running. Do not stop writing. 

Try Free Writing and Other Prompts

If there is no side gig or you simply cannot do it either, it is time to try some writing prompts. 

One of my favorite ones is a technique by Julia Cameron called Morning Pages. In this exercise, you need to free-write three pages each morning.

Source: https://sayingimages.com/good-morning-meme/

Do not edit, do not reread, do not care about what you are writing, and what is it for. Just scribble anything that comes to your mind for three pages. 

It helps to release all negative thoughts and boost one’s mood. And look, you’ve finished 3 pages! You definitely can write!

You can find lots of other prompts and exercises online. They help to get out of the comfort zone, try something new, and boost creativity. 

Try New Setting

Here’s an easy way to approach this problem – switch up your routine. Maybe it’ll help you to be more inspired to work. 

Photo by Brooke Cagle on Unsplash

For example, choose a new place, go outside to a café or stay at home on the contrary. Try software that helps to write without distractions instead of the usual text editor, for example, Ommwriter. 

Set new music as it helps to reduce stress and be more productive. Change it up a bit and see how it goes. 

Start from the Middle

You may be stuck because you cannot deal with this particular part or scene at the moment. It is ok, some of them take much more effort and labor to complete. What is the solution? Just go to the next section. 

This one will not go anywhere, you can finish it later. 

And the same works for any type of text, whether it is an article, blog post, or a fiction story. Create a plan of what you’ll address or what happens with characters. And if you cannot do one part, start with the middle one or even with the last one.

No rule says you need to write in chronological order. 

You’ll feel better as you go along and be more confident to come back and do the complicated part. 

Do Something Different

There is another reason why you might be stuck – you are just tired. It is that easy. In such a case, try to do something else. 

I mean not watching Netflix for the whole day, no matter how tempting it sounds. I mean something active but different.

Go for a walk and pay attention to people and surroundings. Maybe there is something cool you can spot for inspiration. 

Try exercising. They endorse cognitive function and give us a better mood. You can do it at home, go to the gym, or try jogging – whatever works for you. 

Another great option is to read. There is nothing that inspires a writer more than other author’s excellence. 

Now you are ready to return writing, dear friend

Writer’s block happens to every author out there. It is a completely normal part of the process and there is no need to be extremely disappointed about it. 

Try to change your routine, use some writing prompts, and exercises. Preferably do not stop writing, just switch it up a bit. 

Wish you a good luck with your writings 😉

Share your thoughts and tips on how you are relieving the stress. I will be happy to find other ideas.

Vasy Kafidoff
Vasy Kafidoff

Vasyl Kafidoff is a founder and mastermind of KAFIDOFF.COM. He has a strong interest in education, modern technology, marketing, and business management.

If Vasy is not working, you can find him somewhere in the world attending a Rock Concert with his mates.

Personal website
  • Usage of infographic in your blog
    Infographic is a visual representation of data, concept, or a process. You’ve probably seen a lot of them online. They are used in blog posts, articles, presentations, and website landing pages. The wide use of infographics is quite understandable – it is a sure way to make your writing more engaging.  It is a great […]
  • Blog content plan and how it helps for your blogging needs
    You shouldn’t underestimate a blog content plan and its benefits! For beginners, it might sound boring, but it a necessary tool if you are serious about blogging. It is a must-have step to be more productive, consistent, and provide quality content. And it will make your life so much easier, as everything is already planned.  […]
  • I can’t write anymore! Stuck with your writing?
    Can’t write anymore! What should I do? Every writer fears this day but eventually, we all find ourselves there. Am I stuck forever? Am I even a good writer?  Stop. The answer is YES, you are a good writer. And NO, this block won’t last forever. Writer’s block is a common occurrence among all authors, […]
  • How to earn money being a comedy writer? Awesome comedy writing jobs
    Comedy is an art that can become a full source of income. And you do not have to be a standup comedian for that. After all, not everyone is comfortable in front of the crowd. But what about comedy writing? What if you love humor? There are still many career options on comedy that do […]
  • Entry level writing jobs (Where to write as a beginner?)
    Starting your freelance writing career is arguable the most challenging part. Before you get that desirable first order, it might seem like a hopeless case. Where do you find clients? How easy is it to fulfill the requirements? Are there enough gigs for everyone?  The truth is, there is plenty of entry level writing jobs […]