You Don’t Need an Image with Each Blog Post

Why are you adding an image/ graphic/ photo to your blog post? Because someone said to do it that way? Because people are visual and need the extra stimulus? Because the print magazines (or some popular blog you read) does it that way?

Rethink that plan. The images added to blog posts for the sake of adding images to blog posts are over done. Unless they really add something, like instructions, or some other practical purpose, they just add to the general clutter. Blog readers are becoming both ad blind and image blind due to the overload of useless stuff thrown at them.

• Your words can (should be able to) stand on their own. If not, rewrite, rather than illustrating something that isn’t there.
• Your blog does not need an image just for the sake of having an image.  Is adding an image worth a slower load time, a cluttered layout? How many times do you read a blog and see images that fail to load?
• What does the image really add to your post? What does a random image stuck into your post say about you? Does it say you are creative, crafting a well thought out post, or just another blogger following the pack mentality?
• If you are not creating your own images you are giving a lot of time and space to promoting the work of someone else. You also risk having the original artist objecting to the use of the image, or the way it has been used.

So, what do you do to keep your blog visually orientated and appealing? Don’t be afraid to get creative, it doesn’t have to be a great work of art, it just needs to be something meaningful, interesting and relevant to the post you are making.

• Use your own work. Make your photos, graphics or images a feature, worthy of having their own post.
• Start your own weekly/ monthly web comic. Stick to a schedule that suits you.
• Doodle something. Use your own hand drawn illustration, it will always be uniquely you.
• Take a look at text art. Use your keywords in a new way. Just don’t go crazy with it. Moderation in all things.
• ASCII art is a retro text art and takes time to work on. Don’t steal the ASCII art you find online any more than you would another image.
• Add an image of yourself, the real person behing the blog to illustrate the posts you write. This is, at least, sincere content and gives readers a real connection to you.
• Go back to basics, give the odd post it’s own unique background. Don’t over use this either. Think of it as a highlighter pen for your best post of the week/ month.
• Use subheaders to break up the text. Bold a sentence that sums up your post. You don’t have to stick to basic black.
• If your blog looks bland to you and you want to add colour change your font colours, try out some jewel tones in blue, green, or red.
• Add a graphic file with your signature to the bottom of your posts instead of using an image at the top of the post.
• Skip images. Christmas is special because it comes once a year. Why not use that theory for images you add as well. Make them something unusual by not using them everyday.