Visuals are changing the landscape of content marketing. Back in the early days, most content was text-heavy, with little emphasis being put into visuals. But now, that’s no longer the case – the market craves visuals.

And when it comes to visuals, there is one form of content that can significantly drive traffic and engage readers – infographics.

Infographics have exploded in use in recent years. They are a fantastic method for displaying pertinent data in an easily digestible format – and they feed prospects’ visual addictions. However, according to Brafton’s Director of Digital Marketing Strategy, many marketers aren’t using infographics to their full potential, and that there are crucial steps they should take to get the most ROI out of them.

“Many people don’t know how to set up an infographic and track its ROI,” he says “They’ll get an infographic, publish it on their blogs, but then there will be no plans for future use of it.”

He explains that one of the solutions to solving this ROI puzzle is for marketers to learn more about what kinds of metrics they should be tracking. Infographics, while not at the tippy top of the content funnel, are just below blogs, and their main purpose is not to generate leads, but to drive traffic.

“Infographics aren’t a gated form of content,” Jeff says. “They’re top of the funnel, and they don’t really do anything for lead generation. They are more for getting people to a site – more ‘foot in the door’ kind of content.”

For this reason, you shouldn’t bank on infographics for increasing their leads. Instead, they should focus on looking at metrics such as search visibility, traffic, engagement and time on page to see where the true ROI comes from.

Another important metric is backlinks. As Jeff explains, infographics are highly effective at growing backlinks and help companies with domain authority and ranking. For example, Brafton recently produced an infographic that garnered us all sorts of backlinks from other brands. Because they are easily shareable, infographics can boost any backlinking efforts.

There are several other ways in which you can use infographics to their full potential. Here, we cover five of the best ways to repurpose an infographic and bring in that sweet ROI:

1. Create a landing page

It’s important to have a landing page for your infographic, and it’s best to do it right after the infographic has been made. This gives you a place to direct readers back to when they come across your infographic in search results, on other sites or from social media.

Be sure you’re also including web copy on the landing page that goes further into your infographic topic. Expand upon each point and give prospects more data that can help move them to the next stage in the buyer’s journey. By providing this additional information for readers, you’ll go a long way toward building trust and authority with your audience.

2. Use a snippet in a blog

Should you write a blog post entirely about your infographic? Yes. Should you also use small snippets from your infographic to use in blog posts down the road? Heck yes.

Chances are the topic or data from your infographic aren’t going out of style anytime soon, so be sure you’re including information that’s relevant in your future blogs. For example, if you’re writing about a subject that is somewhat related to the overall theme from your infographic, cut an image from the infographic to a smaller size, place it in your blog, and link to the landing page. Let readers know they can find more information by checking out your infographic. This keeps the graphic relevant and keeps prospects on your site.

5 steps to get the most ROI out of your infographic

3. Make emails more engaging

Emails are one of the best methods for engaging your prospects, so why not boost that engagement factor even more by adding blurbs about your infographic?

Just like with your blogs, include snippets from your infographic to entice readers. Write a short summary about the infographic, and direct readers back to your site to see the whole feature. You can even encourage your email recipients to socially share your infographic – people who receive emails are three times more likely to do so than prospects through other marketing channels.

Here’s an example of one of our recent emails in which we included an image:

Make emails more engaging with snippets of your infographic.

4. Share it socially

Your email readers shouldn’t be the only ones sharing your infographic via social media. If you aren’t posting it on your social platforms, then you’re severely missing out – infographics are three times more liked and shared on social channels than any other content type.

In your post featuring your infographic, write up a short blurb about the topic and link back to your site. Make use of hashtags and other social features to add more engagement. And of course, encourage your followers to share the infographic to increase its visibility.

Here’s another Brafton example of a Tweet we sent out that includes part of our infographic:

5. Track results

After you’ve repurposed and distributed your infographic, you’ve got to track the results. After all, you want to see the ROI that resulted from your efforts, right?

Again, as Jeff suggests, be sure to track search visibility, time on page, traffic, engagement and other important metrics. Remember, your infographic isn’t all about lead generation – it’s about getting people to your site and introducing your brand. Once they’ve viewed your infographic, you’ve got more chances to wow them with the rest of your content and start working at turning them into leads.

Tressa Sloane is the Sr. Manager of Editorial Development in Boston. Born a Southern belle, she now resides in the chilly (but wicked awesome) Northeast, and when she's not learning everything she can about content marketing, she's obsessing over Elvis, Auburn football and France.