Social Media Design: Five Steps for a Winning Visual Strategy in 2021

Social Media Design: Five Steps for a Winning Visual Strategy in 2021

Being human, we are psychologically embedded to perceive and remember visuals more quickly than textual information. Reading a magazine, passing a billboard while driving, surfing the internet, or watching TV, content is always in front of our eyes. But how much likely you remember them? No, for the greater chances. Not because your memory is weak, but the content was not aesthetically strong enough to grab your attention. As the business owner, this situation rings the bell in the head to develop something that can attract the audience towards the brand. One best way to do that is to use graphical elements that are memorable and create a long-lasting impact. An effective way to do this is to follow the sequential approach, which we have defined below.

5-Steps Design Process

If you are wondering what the process of graphic designing is, it is nothing but the steps to make a compelling design from plan to execution.

Designing may sound easy, but it is the field only imaginative and creative people pursue. Anyone can become a designer, but not everyone best the best designer.

Coming to the point, here are five steps a designer should follow or incorporate in their existing work process to attain progress efficiently.

1: Create a Thorough Plan

Putting your hands in work to be fast may sound good, but defining some guidelines first is always the best way to make a start.

If you are a professional designer and working with graphics for many years, maybe a thought can come into your mind that why you need a plan? You know everything, or you have the experience. Well, every requirement is different, and planning accordingly with the available resources always comes in fit.

You may ask yourself questions and settle things like the required time for each task, Available experience for design work, number of people or resources required, what platform you have to cover, the budget for the designing work, or many similar things.

If you or your team lack the expertise required for work or below the belt, don’t panic. There are always alternatives to the problems. Here, one solution is to get a graphic design subscription service that can save your neck. Alternatively, you can use online designing tools like Canva, which is intuitive that even a non-designer can perform some basic job. It is not necessary that you can do everything. Sometimes, getting help from others does not compromise your credibility.

2: Create a Style Guide to Follow on the Social Media

After the planning of resources, now it is time to take visuals into account. It happens by defining a style guide. A style guide provides the guidelines to keep social media posts consistent, making them according to the platform.

A style guide consists of the color palettes and font faces that a designer will use in work and design templates, references, and images.

It does not need to be strictly formal but should be understandable to everyone in teamwork. A piece of information like how and when you will use the logo in the posts. E.g., Does every image need a logo? Which logo version is best? Or can a profile picture be a logo?

3: Ruminate the Ideas

Before diving into the designing work, brainstorm the ideas to develop the crystal-clear image of the outcome you and the client are expecting. It will reduce the hurdles and issues that occur in mid of the process.

If the creative brief is handed you over by the client itself, it is better to analyze it thoroughly and ask for the references from which they had drawn the inspiration or idea. At this point, once you have 3-5 concepts in hand, you can make a decision on which design you want to go with. It will allow you to function smoothly with your work and will bring the best results with efficiency.

4: Spend Time Making the Custom Graphics

Not every company likes to invest a massive budget in photography. Some prefer to use stock images as an alternative. But keep in mind not to use such stock images which dozens of companies are already using. The work will not gain a unique identity with that.

Take time to build some custom graphics in harmony with the images required for sharing on social platforms. Besides, random candid office or product picture also works well. You do not need to put professional photos every time.

Again, when using the stock photos, conduct research, and ensure that they are not used in abundant quantity. You can also perform some tweaks and adjustments to make them unique or combine them with templates and collages to bring some originality. Even a simple orientation change can make a significant difference and make it stand apart. However, using various online graphic maker tool can help you to simplify your work.

5: Rearrange Designs for Multiple Social Platforms

Every social platform has its distinct user base and demographics, operates on a different level. The working style is also very diverse, clearly stating that the same graphic design approach will not work the same across every medium. For every platform, you have to alter the work a little bit. Adding to that, the picture size also varies from platform to platform, which you must consider to make the most perfectly aligned. The image type also plays a crucial role and affects content promotion.

If you consider Facebook pay-per-click (PPC), which consists of lengthy text, the cost per click will increase. An innovative AI-based Facebook algorithm does this very intelligently by scanning images that include text.

First, understand the working mechanism of the platform you are going to use for the marketing, then putting things into action can make a process more enjoyable.

To Summarize

It is observed that the audience prefers textual information with images or graphics. It provides them relevancy for promoting the posts to the audience. But the goal is to design these posts in the best way to attain the users’ attention.

Multiple things need to be considered when designing and promoting the content. Determine the social media medium you want to use, audience preference of that platform, how others are promoting, the trends, and other relevant things.

However, do not consider these steps fix. You can always amend and apply changes to them as per the project requirement.

Lastly, if you cannot achieve high or expected engagement with your designs, do not hesitate to outsource the professional graphic design service. Some services work on the Flat Rate Graphic Design model in which you can avail unlimited graphic design work on a monthly subscription basis. It is another alternative to take the progressive shift.

Remember, you are always on the right track if you successfully represent your brand’s image with graphics.

 

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