Infographics - how to present the content in an attractive way?

Infographics have become an inseparable element of an attractive message of content. The pictorial culture is extremely popular because graphics can express much more than words, and the human brain reacts much faster - thus it assimilates the pictured content more easily.

The dynamically developing technology makes organizing information almost a requirement. In this way, the fashion for infographics was born, i.e. visual forms of presenting difficult information and numerical data. They are often used to show all kinds of expert knowledge, and thanks to their interesting and interesting form, they are easily remembered by Internet users.

Infographics - where to start?

Before starting design work, you should think about what information you want to convey and to whom the message should go. It is worth looking for answers to some fundamental questions related to:

• the addressee of the message,

• Main reason,

• the theme of graphics,

• the place where the infographics were published,

• the data you need and the places where you can find them,

• the nature of the infographics: entertaining, educational, informative or inspiring,

• the language to be used in the message.

This information will become crucial both at the level of text and image creation. Thanks to them, you can start creating an initial outline of the infographic - plan the skeleton of arrows and words, grouping related information and visualizing the flow of the message with the help of a diagram.

Free infographic - tools overview

A properly prepared infographic does not always require the involvement of both a graphic designer and a copywriter and a lot of time. By preparing simple graphics, you can use easy-to-use and, above all, free tools, thanks to which data visualization can take on a new meaning.

Piktochart

It is one of the simplest and most intuitive tools for creating infographics. Piktochart users also have the option to create a report, banner or presentation, thanks to icons, vectors, charts and pictures, to which you can easily match a given template by category or keywords. This tool also allows you to import Excel sheets and CSV files, which has a positive effect on the time of creating a presentation. The finished infographic can be saved on disk in JPEG or PNG format, but also embedded on a website or published on social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, Google + or Pinterest.

The downside of this tool is that the saved file has a watermark, in addition, the quality of the added images is poor, and their number in one infographic is limited.

Visual.ly

Visual.ly is another social platform that connects visualization makers.The infographic created with this tool should primarily cover the subject of social media and be addressed to social communication channels. Visual.ly will be perfect for presenting Facebook statistics or comparing Instagram accounts.

Easel.ly

This tool has definitely more themes than Piktochart mentioned at the beginning. To create an infographic in Easel.ly, you first need to select a background and then embed various objects, shapes and text into it. The creators also took care of the users' comfort, so the added objects can also be duplicated, colors, graphics and texts can be edited. The great advantage of this tool is the fact that the infographic saved on the disk does not have a watermark. However, the possibility of creating charts is definitely missing, as well as the correct variety of Polish characters.

Infogr.am

The Infogr.am tool offers templates to which you can add text, diagrams, maps, videos and graphic files. It will be great for creating statistical infographics, but the free version does not allow you to download the file, but only online publication.

Vizualize.me

Vizualize.me is a tool that is perfect for resume imaging, as it is used to create a visual resume. In the free version, you can choose from several themes and color palettes that can be edited at your own discretion. The finished project can be downloaded to disk and used freely.

Users who have a LinkedIn account have a much simplified graphic design process as Vizualize.me automatically downloads the most important profile data and creates a graphical version of the CV based on it.

Wordle

With Wordle you can create something like clouds of words. The infographic created with this application is interesting, and the process of its creation - extremely simple. We choose the words ourselves and set their size, distribution, colors, and the shape of the cloud itself. The old-fashioned look of the website can be quite a downside for many people.

Venngage

The tool is extremely flexible as it offers a wide range of free templates that can also be freely edited to get the look of the infographic you want. Venngage is very intuitive and easy to use, and also allows you to save your finished infographics to disk in PNG format and export to a PDF file.

Infographics - common mistakes

Often, while browsing the Internet, you can come across more or less unsuccessful infographic designs. In order to avoid a number of mistakes when creating even a simple visualization, one should first of all avoid what is pointless, chaotic, too complex and boring. It is also a bad idea to be excessively inspired by ready-made infographics - the reproductive nature of the image may have a negative impact on the final result, and the recipients may consider the topic treated superficially.

If you want to create a nice-looking and neat infographic, you can safely use free programs that help to organize information and at the same time give you a lot of room to show off. Aesthetically, visualization does not have to mean a large loss in your portfolio, you should approach the task reasonably, organize your knowledge, determine the most important issues, choose the right tool for you and create at will.