Joy, Excitement, Companionship, and most importantly Trust. These are just some of the key emotional ties that come along with a simple bodily movement, a smile. Body language and facial expressions play a major role in the way we interact with others. In the past utilizing body language and facial expressions was an integral part of business. However, as time has progressed many businesses have now become digital and that sense of physical interaction with humans has been lost. Or has it? Just below we are going to be covering Understanding Image Psychology to Increase Ad Conversions.
What is Image Psychology?
Image Psychology is the study of images in terms of their elicited emotion. Understanding the emotional response that images evoke is a key factor to be aware of, especially as digital marketers. In our realm the only human interaction that we can bring to the table is through photos or videos. A picture is worth a thousand words make sure it’s saying the right ones.
Do Human Faces Increase Landing Page Conversions?
As any marketer knows babies, women and attractive people sell products. Just take a look at Gerber Baby Food their logo, website, and product packaging are covered with images of cute babies. These images evoke an innate emotional human response, especially if the leads are female.
Studies have shown that on average, women simply react differently than men do to infants. It has to do with primal instincts and the wiring of the human brain. However, as marketers we understand this effect and use it to our advantage. We utilize powerful imagery or video to create emotional impacts, that we can use to generate an action. This same methodology is applied when using attractive models to sell products to increase ad conversions.
Eye Contact
Eye contact is by far one of the most powerful non-verbal forms of communication. Think of having a conversation, when direct eye contact is utilized the conversation feels as if it is being transferred more efficiently and effectively. The direct eye contact simply confirms that there is direct attention, which is essential when trying to sell a product!
This image although seemingly simple is extraordinarily powerful. Let’s break it down. First off the setting is impeccable. This scenery engages the rural blue collar working class of society. It also reinforces the fact that their products are “organic” or “all natural” because it is inferred to be a locally owned farm.
Next, the family is a huge factor. The two children, mom and dad holding hands, and everyone smiling making direct eye contact. This image is screaming the “American Dream” all over it. Thus, pulling at the emotional heart strings of millions of individuals aspiring to be just like that man or women in the picture.
It is the culmination of all these factors that reinforce key characteristics of this company, Organic, Family Owned, and Trustworthy. Images like this drastically impact our decision making in milliseconds.
Look It’s a Bird, It’s a Plan, It’s a CTA!
It is a well known phenomenon that people follow each other’s gazes naturally. In an experiment done in Oxford in a busy market place, 5 actors stood around looking up at a roof top of a building. As time went on more random people began to do the same thing, the crowd grew larger as more people started to follow the behavior of the crowd. Without any need for intervention, it was simply an innate behavior to follow the crowd. In a similar fashion that this experiment was conducted, the same strategies could be applied to your ads.
For example, certain ads have seen an increase in conversion rates when models look at the call to action. This is because marketers are taking advantage of our innate response. The average individual would follow the trend and look right at your CTA and increasing ad conversions!
Strengthening the Relationship Between Customer and Business
Personality and transparency go along way in business. Take a look at some of the best current marketers, Gary Vaynerchuk, Russell Brunson and so many more. What are some of the powerful strategies they implement to earn our trust? It is with transparency and personality.
I believe that the best marketer to execute this is Gary Vaynerchuk. His daily vlog not only shows you the behind the scenes working of all his businesses. In addition, it gives you a look into who is Gary Vaynerchuk? What type of person is he? Can I trust him? Upon watching just a couple short minutes of any of his videos, one can understand the depth of value he provides. Through simple car selfie interviews, Gary’s personality comes to fruition. He is calm, cool and collected. A sense of wisdom and respect floats about his air, but he isn’t pompous. It this combination of consistent value he provides. In conjunction with the friendly nature that converts cold leads into dedicated followers.
This same type of strategy can be implemented to increase ad conversions. A great example of this is almost any of Russell Brunson’s Clickfunnels commercials. Typically, it starts with Russell being in his office and explaining to you how excited he is to share this new information with you. The same strengths that Gary Vee uses are apparent in all of Russell’s work too. You see his charisma, positivity and excitement. The energy is contagious and helps to get leads in the same exact mindset. Eager and wanting to know what’s next!
The Analysis
The next time your creating an ad campaign keep these factors in mind. Images and videos can drastically improve the performance of any landing page. But, don’t just use any image that is lying around. Break down the images as we have done throughout this post. Understand the emotional response it is trying to evoke. Utilize different angles or different directions of eye contact to direct the eye movements of leads. Think about using different facial expressions to mitigate different emotional responses. Are you trying to play into the leads soft side? Or is exciting them the goal? To create the most effective ad, you have to be willing to do in depth analysis of content. The smallest factors can create huge impacts. A picture is worth a thousand words, make sure your content is saying the right ones.