Agri-Insights Issue 14 | Page 6

Visual Storyte “For the NASCAR fan, it’s all about the experience. American ethanol fuels that fan experience.” Think of the most beloved books from your childhood. Or the stories you hoped your kids would ask for because, secretly, you liked them just as much as your child. Certainly, you remember the titles. You probably recall a few memorable phrases, like “I’ll eat you up I love you so.” What are unforgettable, however, are the images. That doesn’t change as we grow. Research shows that roughly 65% of people are visual learners1, and that the human brain processes visualization 60,000 times faster than text 2 . Visuals help us tell our stories quickly with impact and emotion. But they have to be the right visuals, used in the right way, to complement the written word. Perhaps the most common mistake made, in terms of content creation, is viewing images as placeholders. “Well, that story is a bit short. Let’s slap a stock photo in there to take up the space.” While it’s true that just about any photo is better than a gaping hole, a far better technique is a strategic approach that identifies which images need to be captured in order to multiply the impact of a given message. PAGE 6 FEWER WORDS, GREATER IMPACT In some cases, words need Ѽ