The Ultimate Guide To Social Media Graphic Design
Table of Contents
What is social media design?
In simple terms, social media design refers to the use of visual content for marketing strategies via social media platforms. Visual content includes posts, memes, GIFs, animation, videos, or any other form of graphics that can easily be posted on social media platforms.
Social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, etc. are powerful marketing tools that help in generating traffic and increasing brand awareness. Creating a good, relevant social media design will help in promoting and increasing engagement with the audience.
A relatable, well-designed visual will strengthen your brand identity while compelling users to engage with your content. Social media designs also help establish your brand image and help you reach a wider audience, all at once.
What makes social media design so popular?
Social media design is popular amongst marketers from every corner of the world. Every industry has used social media design to inform, please, and eventually persuade consumers to take the desired action. It acts as an effective bridge between the brand and its audience.
From typography, and graphics to illustrations and motion graphics, social media design puts together various elements to create eye-catching visuals. It captures the target audience’s attention, opens new markets, and efficiently sells products/services.
It comes as no surprise that every marketing strategy revolves around creating graphic designs for social media, and here’s why:
Creativity
Graphic designing is a weapon used by marketers to slay their competition by creating aesthetically pleasing, original content. Their creativity helps them in creating engaging visual content that has a positive impact on their audience.
Efficiency
Graphic designers use the fact – that humans are heavily influenced by visuals – to their benefit. Creating infographics and or visuals to summarize lengthy content is an efficient way to communicate with your audiences.
Create an impression
Your latest social media post acts as a platform for your potential customers to interact with your brand. Designing creative and authentic graphics/visuals gives you an edge over your competitors and creates a lasting impression.
Consistency
The more content you provide that helps solve a problem or gives easy-to-understand information, the more audiences will start thinking of you as an expert on the subject. This helps in building credibility for your brand and shows consistency in your work.
The purpose of social media design remains the same, that is, effectively communicating information through aesthetically pleasing visuals and minimalistic content.
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4 Social media platforms and their specs
Social media platforms are excellent tools for marketers to generate new leads and reach a broader audience. Every industry in this day and age uses social media to create brand awareness, generate leads, share information, and build relationships and credibility.
Every platform is different, and each of these platforms has specifications with regard to designing the graphic. Here, we have listed 4 of the top social media platforms along with their features and specifications:
With more than 1.45 billion daily active users and 2.20 billion monthly active users, Facebook is used by brands worldwide to engage with the audience, promote their products/services, collect reviews, and sometimes even for customer service.
Specs:
- Profile image: 180 x 180 px
- Cover image 820 x 312 px
- Content image: 1200 x 630 px
- Event image: 1920 x 1080 px
- Story image (aspect ratio 9:16): 1080 x 1920 px
It is a platform that offers various features like IGTV, Instagram Reels, Instagram Stories, Instagram Live, etc. and has over 1 billion monthly active users.
Specs:
- Profile image: 110 x 110 px
- Post image: 1080 x 1080 px
- Portrait image: 1080 x 1350 px
- Landscape image: 1080 x 566
- Instagram Stories: 1080 x 1920 px
- Instagram Reel (length): 15 secs
Twitter is a fast-paced platform with over 320 million active users that focuses majorly on real-time information and is the ideal platform for brands that publish original content regularly.
Specs:
- Profile image: 400 x 400 px
- Cover image: 1500 x 500 px
- Post image: 1024 x 512 px
With over 562 million registered users and 294 monthly active users, it offers brands opportunities to communicate B2B and grow their network effectively.
Specs:
- Profile image: 200 x 200 px
- Cover image: 1584 x 396 px
- Post image: 1104 x 736 px
- Company profile image: 300 x 300 px
- Company cover image: 1192 x 220 px
Planning ahead and knowing what works best for your visuals will help you go a long way. Designing a graphic according to various social media platforms’ dimensions is crucial to prevent your image or video from getting cropped in unnatural ways.
5 rules to follow while designing content for social media
Content is what wins on social media platforms. And even though your content’s nature and design will vary depending on your brand, certain rules remain the same throughout. Check the original size for all social media images.
Here are 5 general rules that will help you create social media content to keep your audience engaged:
Useful
Try designing content that your audience came for. Give them content that they are seeking for and can use.
Variations
Try using different fonts and elements in your design. Make sure that your content covers a wide array of topics while also incorporating different design styles.
Balance
Make sure that there is a balance between your individual post and the collective feed. Design varied content that is in line with your previous content.
Themes and templates
Having the same theme/template for a particular type of post will help the audience easily recollect where the post originates. This helps in creating content in a scalable and speedy way.
Adjust
Testing whether your content does well or not, is very crucial. Depending on the feedback and stats you get, you might have to make a few adjustments to your designs.
Social media platforms are a very competitive place. Following these rules will ensure that you achieve your marketing goals and get the desired results. It also helps in making your content digestible and appealing to the audience.
7 Tips for Designing Graphics for Social Media
Designing a graphic is not about putting all the elements together and calling it a day. It requires attention to detail and knowledge of designing, colors, fonts, etc. With regard to social media, this requires even more attention so that your graphic design or visual not only grabs the attention but also makes them stop browsing through and focus on your post.
To help you out, we have put together 7 tips for designing graphics for social media:
Clarity
Keeping the balance between being informative and being simple is necessary. Having too many elements in your graphic design can suppress the message you want to convey, and so, having a clear, simple visual is a must.
Style
Trying different approaches and techniques will make your content look different than what your viewers are used to. Diverse and original graphic design solutions never have and will go out of style.
Contrast
Ranging from color, sizes, layouts to texture, type, shapes, etc. use contrast to highlight information. It can further prove beneficial for aligning graphical elements and focusing on a particular visual element for graphic design.
Color
Choosing the right color for your image, avoid using monotone color combinations, and focus on picking up the right hue that conveys your brand’s tone. Be bold and give bright colors a shot while inserting new tints in a balanced manner.
Call-to-Action
Having an eye-catching design is great, but having caught their attention is not enough. So don’t forget to add encouraging, interactive, or call to action elements to your design, which will add purpose to your design.
Branding
Creating a graphic design with your brand’s name or logo is essential. With visuals getting shared a lot on social media platforms, make sure that your image doesn’t get lost, and people are able to identify your company/organization.
Typography
Getting people to read text on a picture is even more difficult than making them notice the image. Use easy-to-read fonts for your image and prioritize sizes, weights, and colors to emphasize important information.
Visuals play an integral role in planning a social media campaign. By ensuring that each design reflects the message you’re trying to convey on social media platforms, you promote your brand’s tone and marketing goals.
Social media offers an opportunity to experiment with new, original content, and as a brand, grab those opportunities!
