Using pictures on blogs (based on scientific research and psychology)

To picture or not to picture

According to Neuro-linguistic programming people are divided into major groups which are auditory, visual and kinesthetic. The first group learns best by hearing sounds, the second group learns best by seeing pictures and the third group learns best by touching.

For example, when buying a car the visuals will become attracted to good looking cars, the auditory people will become attracted to cars with great engine sounds and the kinesthetic people will become attracted to cars they feel comfortable driving.

So what does this has to do with your Blog?
Simply its believed that around 40% of the people are visuals which means that if your post doesn’t have pictures then 4 out of 10 persons won’t like it or at least they won't like it the way they would have liked it otherwise.

Pictures and emotional connection

Contrary to common beliefs, high resolution pictures, quality picture or high definition pictures aren’t enough to attract users but it’s the emotional connection that people develop while visiting the website that brings the users back it and not the quality of the picture.

Users keep visiting websites that make them feel good and avoid websites that makes them feel bad. Try making a post about insects in your blog and put some very high quality images for some insects and see the visitors’ response. Most probably no one will come back to this page again if not to your website simply because if people associated being on your website with negative emotions then you won’t see them coming again.

Lots of bloggers mistakenly add pictures to their blog posts without assessing the emotional effect they have on their visitors then wonder later why their blogs aren’t getting any visits.

How to choose the right image for your blog posts?

Choose an image that looks good, that makes people feel good and that allows visitors to have good emotional experience while reading your post.