Almost every home small business online marketer needs graphics. Many graphics are available pre-made. You don’t necessarily need to have every single graphic customized for your use only. Some graphics should always be custom made, but others can easily be stock material.
If you’re making sales pages of any kind, there are a few types of graphics you should almost always have. You don’t necessarily need a header and footer, but sometimes you can’t get away with having no graphics at all.
The most important thing you need if you’re selling an eBook, software package, membership site, or other digital products is a good eCover. This will have to be customized with your product name.
A good eCover graphic lends credibility to your product. If your eCover is poorly done, a lot of people will think the product itself is sub-par. If your eCover is especially attractive, it will make it seem like your product has a higher value. A good eCover is essential, especially if you’re selling to other marketers!
A guarantee graphic is also important. Guarantee graphics help draw attention to your money back guarantee. A guarantee graphic can increase your conversions. If you don’t have a clear-cut guarantee policy on your sales page, or if visitors don’t see it, you could be throwing sales out the window.
An attractive order button that draws attention is almost as important as your eCover. The order button is what people need to click in order to purchase your product. If they somehow miss the button, or if it’s difficult to see, people might get frustrated and leave.
Also, some people specifically look for the order button on your site first. The price of a product is usually near the order button, so some people will instinctively scroll down to the order button before they even read the sales letter.
If your order button is especially tempting, your price is good, and your eCover is exceptional, they may hit the order button and buy without even reading the whole sales letter. This is especially true if they’ve already heard a lot about your product before they make it to your sales page.
Bullets or accent graphics can also be important. They help draw attention to essential benefits and features. They should be used sparingly. Using bullets to accent everything on a page takes away from their usefulness, because they should only be used to draw attention to your most important benefits.
If you’re running an affiliate program, you should have a selection of banners for affiliates to use to advertise your site. Although some affiliates will only promote you through text links or emails, a lot of affiliates will still need banners for websites and blogs.
Remember, pre-made graphics can really save you time and money, but it can also pay to have part of your graphics custom made. Great custom graphics can really help skyrocket increase sales.
When using pre-made graphics, always check the usage licence to make sure you will not be violating copyright if you use the graphics on your website. Most sites which sell royalty-free stock images will grant you such a licence automatically.
Here are some of the resources I use when purchasing stock images or creating my own graphics:
Royalty-Free Stock Images:
http://www.istockphoto.com
Full-featured Graphics Editor (Free)
http://www.gimp.org/downloads/
Flickr Creative Commons
http://www.flickr.com/creativecommons/
Stay tuned for another marketing tip real soon, and good luck with your online marketing efforts!
To your online success,
Bill Brine
Home Small Business Development And Coaching
And here’s another great resource I created to help you build your business: