Social media is dead. We're back in 1911

The expression "Use a picture. It's worth a thousand words" appeared for the first time in a 1911 newspaper article discussing journalism and publicity. A similar phrase, "One Look Is Worth A Thousand Words", appeared in a 1913 newspaper advertisement.

If we look at some online stats we can see that every minute people share/upload/retweet/etc. the following number of images:

• Facebook: 136,000
• Twitter: 1,475
• Flickr: 3,500
• Instagram: 1,350

According to other stats I found 64% of people says they are more likely to engage with brands if they post pictures rather than any other media. Focusing on the visual element has become more and more important to grab people’s attention, no doubts about that.

The evolution is pretty simple; it all started with blogs, where bloggers would write a 500 words post, then Facebook made it shorter, and Twitter made even shorter with its 140 characters. Nowadays Pinterest, the image based network, is the fastest growing, and so far 1 billion+ photos have been uploaded on Instagram. Another very good example is the growth of infographics (graphic visual representations of information, data or knowledge).

This trend toward the visual is very much influenced by technology. More people engage with social media via smartphones; taking a picture “on the go” is easier and faster than typing a status update on a tiny keyboard.

The conclusion is that visuals lead to increased engagement and generate more referral traffic. So, especially for brands, it’s a wise decision to invest in visuals which can show the brand’s “personality” as well as giving “power to the people” who can share their visual content.

A few years ago marketers were saying that “content is king,” but now, it seems we're back in 1911 where “a picture really is worth a thousand words.”