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At the end of every year, we like to read through some of the major reports on inbound marketing, content marketing, social media, and online behavior.

It’s amazing how fast things can change in 12 short months — and 2016 was certainly no exception.

This year, we’ve seen the importance of visual content emphasized by the changes that occurred across almost every major social network, including Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, and Twitter. At the same time, videos have become powerful tools for brands looking to communicate more easily with their readers.

To help you keep pace with these trends, let’s take a look at some marketing statistics that demonstrate the impact visual content has on reach, engagement, and sales. The stats are categorized by General Visual Content, Video, Emerging Visual Marketing, Infographics, and Social Media.

(Want to learn more about content creation, strategy, and promotion? Take our free Content Marketing Certification course.)

42 Stats You Should Know About Visual Content Marketing in 2017

General Visual Content Statistics

1) 37% of marketers said visual marketing was the most important form of content for their business, second only to blogging (38%). Tweet (Source)

2) 74% of social media marketers use visual assets in their social media marketing, ahead of blogs (68%) and videos (60%). Tweet (Source)

3) When people hear information, they’re likely to remember only 10% of that information three days later. However, if a relevant image is paired with that same information, people retained 65% of the information three days later. Tweet (Source)

4) B2C marketers place greater importance on visual content than B2B marketers. Tweet (Source)

5) 51% of B2B marketers prioritized creating visual content assets in 2016. Tweet (Source)

Source: Content Marketing Institute

Video Marketing Statistics

6) By 2017, video content will represent 74% of all internet traffic. Tweet  (Source)

7) Cisco projects that global internet traffic from videos will make up 80% of all internet traffic by 2019. Tweet  (Source)

8) 76.5% of marketers and small business owners in an Animoto survey who have used video marketing say it had a direct impact on their business. Tweet  (Source)

9) 34% of B2C marketers say pre-produced video will be critical to content marketing success in 2017. Tweet  (Source)

10) 4X as many consumers would prefer to watch a video about a product than to read about it. Tweet  (Source)

11) More than 60% of marketers and small business owners said they planned to increase investment in video marketing in 2017. Tweet  (Source)

12) 62% of B2B marketers rated videos as an effective content marketing tactic in 2016. Tweet  (Source)

13) Using the word “video” in an email subject line boosts open rates by 19% and clickthrough rates by 65%. Tweet  (Source)

14) In a 2016 HubSpot survey, 43% of consumers wanted to see more video content in 2016. Tweet  (Source)

Source: HubSpot Research

Emerging Visual Marketing Trends

15) In 2016, 14% of marketers used live video. Tweet  (Source)

16) Facebook users spend 3X more time watching live videos than traditional videos. Tweet  (Source)

17) 51% of all video plays are on mobile devices — this growth represents a 15% increase from 2015 and a 203% increase from 2014. Tweet  (Source)

Source: Ooyala

18) Videos under five minutes in length account for 55% of total video consumption time on smartphones. Tweet  (Source)

19) Magnifyre found that 29% more people viewed a 360-degree video than the same video in traditional format. Tweet  (Source)

20) 85% of adults consume content on multiple devices at the same time. Tweet  (Source)

Infographic Stats

21) Eye-tracking studies show internet readers pay close attention to information-carrying images. In fact, when the images are relevant, readers spend more time looking at the images than they do reading text on the page. Tweet  (Source)

22) Infographics are “liked” and shared on social media 3X more than other any other type of content. Tweet  (Source)

Source: MassPlanner

23) Infographics were the B2B content marketing tactic with the biggest increase in use, from 2015 to 2016, up from 50% to 58%. Tweet  (Source)

24) People following directions with text and illustrations do 323% better than people following directions without illustrations. Tweet  (Source)

Source: NeoMam

Social Media Stats

25) Tweets with images receive 150% more retweets than tweets without images. Tweet  (Source)

Source: Buffer

26) In an analysis of over 1 million articles, BuzzSumo found that articles with an image once every 75-100 words received double the social media shares as articles with fewer images. Tweet (Source)

27) Facebook posts with images see 2.3X more engagement than those without images. Tweet  (Source)

Source: BuzzSumo

28) The equivalent of 110 years of live video is watched on Periscope every day. Tweet  (Source)

Source: Periscope

29) There were more than 500 million Instagram users in June 2016. Tweet (Source)

30) 55% of marketers chose Facebook as their most important social media platform. Tweet (Source)

31) 85% of videos on Facebook are watched without sound. Tweet  (Source)

32) Facebook users watch 8 billion videos per day. Tweet  (Source)

33) Snapchat users watch 10 billion videos per day. Tweet  (Source)

34) Snapchat users share 9,000 photos per second. Tweet  (Source)

35) Organic engagement on Facebook more than doubled in 2015, while organic engagement on Instagram almost halved. Tweet  (Source)

Source: Forrester Research

36) Organic Facebook engagement is highest on posts with videos (13.9%) and photos (13.7%). Tweet  (Source)

37) Snapchat had 150 million daily active users in June 2016 — up from 110 million in December 2016. Tweet  (Source)

38) 44% of online women use Pinterest, compared to 16% of online men. Tweet  (Source)

Source: Pew Research Center

39) Shopify users referred by Pinterest spend an average of $80 compared to the Facebook referral average of $40. Tweet  (Source)

Source: Jeff Bullas

40) Over 80% of pins are re-pins compared to 1.4% of tweets retweeted. Tweet (Source)

41) YouTube reaches more 18+-year-olds during prime-time viewing hours than any cable TV network. Tweet  (Source)

42) Half of YouTube subscribers between the ages of 18 and 34 would drop whatever they were doing to watch a new video from their favorite channel. Tweet  (Source)

How do you plan to incorporate more visual and interactive content into your 2017 marketing strategy? Share with us in the comments.

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in January 2015 and has been updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.

 

Most people don’t relish the thought of receiving negative feedback about their work, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be highly beneficial.

In fact, in a survey of nearly 1,000 employees, Zenger/Folkman found that more than half preferred corrective feedback over praise, and 72% believed that their performance would improve with the help of constructive criticism.

Feedback can be beneficial to improving your work, but there are definitely right and wrong ways to deliver and receive that feedback.

To get to the root of it, the folks at Venngage conducted a survey of 57 INBOUND 2016 speakers from a variety of organizations and industries. They asked these experts how they handled negative feedback from their particular stakeholders, such as customers, readers, managers, and peers. 

Check out the infographic to see which strategies you can apply to your career.

How much time do you spend on email each week?

According to a recent survey from Adobe, the average American professional spends about six hours a day checking email — that’s 30 hours during the work week.

That’s a lot of time spent on unbillable tasks that could be spent focusing on work that meets the goals of your paying clients.

Getting bogged down by your inbox is especially problematic in agencies where account managers and other client-facing employees must deal with managing requests from a number of different clients who are all considered priorities.

When you communicate with your clients primarily over email, it’s easy for important messages and tasks to get lost in the seemingly constant shuffle. Your inbox can quickly become an unmanageable time sink.

You could use a project management tool to reduce the amount of email clutter created from projects. But you could also better optimize how you use email, prioritize requests, manage communication from your inbox.

Check out these 13 Gmail plugins and apps to start improving how you use email to communicate and collaborate with clients.

13 Tools to Improve Client Communication & Collaboration Through Email

1) SaneBox

SaneBox weeds out unimportant emails after examining your inbox content and history, surfacing only the communications you want to priortize. You can train the tool by moving miscategorized emails to your inbox to make it even smarter.

The tool also provides features for setting notifications for when people don’t reply to a message, unsubscribing from unwanted newsletters, and snoozing emails you want to deal with later. 

Price: Snack plan for $7/month for annual contract, Lunch plan for $12/month for annual contract, Dinner plan for $36/month for annual contract

2) Just Not Sorry

Communicating with clients in a direct, assertive manner is easier said than done. This plugin helps you write more confident emails by scanning your messages for extraneous words that undermine your tone, e.g., “Sorry,” “Just,” or “I think.”

When you use a word or phrase in an email that could potentially weaken your positioning, the app highlights it and explains specifically how it could make you seem less confident and proficient.

Price: Free

3) Mailburn

This iPhone app upgrades the user interface of your email client by displaying emails as chat dialogues. It also separates newsletters from emails from people in your inbox, and provides an option for you to unsubscribe to irrelevant communications with one swipe — perfect for decluttering your inbox. The app works with both Gmail and Outlook.

Price: Free

4) HubSpot Sales

HubSpot Sales is a free email tracking tool that allows you to see when a client or prospect has opened an email — basically, you’ll be able to tell if your email got lost in the client’s inbox or if she’s actually ignoring it.

The plugin also highlights key contact information about the person you are emailing, such as links to their social profiles, so you can gather intel on what the person is interested in or recent events in their professional life and personalize your messages. With HubSpot Sales pro, you can create up to 1,000 templates and track the performance of your sent emails and content. 

Price: Free, Sales Pro is $50/user/month

5) Yanado

You don’t want to be controlled by your inbox, but it’s also the place where many of your important task items and communication about these items are located.

This plugin brings your to-do list to your inbox to make prioritizing and organization more streamlined. There’s no need to hop from your email to your to-do list to your project management tool and back. It’s all there in one straightforward interface. 

Price: Free plan for one user, Startup plan $6/user/month for up to 100 users, Premium plan $15/user/month up to 1000 users, Enterprise plan pricing available upon request

6) Snapmail

Snapmail is perfect for when you need to send a vendor or a client password details and other sensitive information, but you don’t want it to sit in their inbox and potentially cause a security risk. You simply select the Snapmail button, and any text emails will be encrypted. Once your recipient opens the email, she will have 60 seconds to record the content before it’s gone for good.

Price: Free

7) Unroll.me

To focus only on the really important emails — like those from your clients — it’s a good practice to unsubscribe from the email newsletters that are no longer relevant or those that you’ve been mysteriously added to.

With Unroll.me, you can easily view your subscription lists and unsubscribe from them with one-click. You can also choose to “roll up” your subscriptions into a digest email to reduce email clutter and distractions throughout the day. 

Price: Free

8) Todoist

This app allows you to instantly convert messages in your Gmail or Outlook inbox into tasks for your to-do list, and automatically syncs across all of your devices. You can also assign tasks to other members of your team, collaborate on tasks, and set deadlines and reminders to stay on track.

When you install the plugin for Gmail, it creates a tab to access your to-do list within your inbox, so you don’t have to download another program to view your list.

Price: Basic is Free, Premium (for individuals) is $28.99/year, Business (for teams) is $28.99/year/per user

9) Batched

It takes 16 minutes to refocus after handling an email, and on average, employees check their email 36 times per hour. How can you get anything productive done with a tool that constantly distracts you? 

Batched lets you control when emails reach your inbox, which is especially useful when you need to focus and get a project out before a deadline. Basically, the tool filters emails under a specific label in your Gmail account. At times that you have selected (such as every hour or at 9 a.m., 2 p.m., and 4:30 p.m.), those emails are moved to your inbox. You always have access to any important incoming emails, but you can stem the habit of checking email out of curiousity that something important has arrived. 

Price: Free

10) Grammarly

You need your clients to trust you, and building trust is all about proving to your client that you’re an expert in your field. And experts don’t forget about grammar. They know the that only amateurs (not amatures) dash off an email without clicking spellcheck. 

Grammarly works wherever you’re writing online — email, in a project management system, or a blogging platform — and makes sure that your credibility remains in tact by double-checking your work. 

Price: Free basic plan, Premium plan available on monthly basis for $29.95/month, quarterly basis for $19.98/month, and annual basis for $11.66/month

11) Checker Plus

If you want to know when you’ve received an important email from a client or manager without constantly opening up Gmail, this app allows you to set up Chrome notifications for important conversations, ensuring you never miss an important message.

The app also allows you to go on “Do Not Disturb” mode when you’re trying to get work done, and lets you mark unimportant messages as “Read” without even opening up Gmail.

Price: Free

12) KeyRocket

This plugin teaches you how to use all of Gmail’s built-in hotkeys so you can more efficiently manage your inbox with fewer clicks.

When you take an action in Gmail that could have been accomplished via a hotkey action (e.g., composing a new message), KeyRocket triggers a simple notification that lets you know the hotkey option you could have used.

Price: Free

13) Google Dictionary

We all stumble across a word, phrase, or reference we don’t quite understand every once in a while. This plugin lets you double click on any word in an email and instantly look up the meaning or Wikipedia explanation — without having to leave the compose window.

Price: Free

What plugins, extensions, and apps make communicating with your clients easier? Let us know in the comments below.

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in April 2016 and has been updated for freshness, accuracy, and comprehensiveness.