You’re an academic (or training to be one). You’re doing important research that could change lives. You deserve to be heard.
But academia has a communication problem. 7,000 research articles are published every day...but 50% of them are never read (Jago, 2018).
You were told to ‘publish or perish’, but no one is listening to you, and your research isn’t getting the attention it needs to drive change.
You’re flummoxed. Why is it so hard to do what you need to do?
The content isn’t the problem - your research is well conducted, interesting and has important recommendations. It deserves to be seen and acted upon.
The problem is how you’re delivering the content. It’s a process issue. You might be making it too complicated. Perhaps you’re using too many words or choking things up with jargon. You may be completely abandoning the use of visuals, unaware of their ability to do the heavy lifting for you.
So what can be done? Plenty, as it happens. We need to get visible or vanish, a phrase coined by Deakin University Associate Professor John Lamp.
Okay then. What’s one good way to make your research visible and accessible, and get it into the hands of the people who need it?
The most direct answer is an Infographic – a tool you can use to connect and communicate on many platforms with many people. Don’t know what one is? Don’t know how to make one? Just need a few tips? Read on.
Welcome to Infotopia!
What is an infographic?
It’s the name we give to the representation of information, data or knowledge in a visual format intended to communicate quickly and clearly.
This infographic organises material visually and concisely to take a reader from problem to solution.
Why use an infographic?
Infographics help us understand information quickly. We can process visuals in 13 milliseconds versus 6 seconds to process text.
Our brains LOVE visual information presented in a narrative fashion (22x more memorable than facts alone).
Infographics are proven to drive research impact – Springer Nature (2019) found that published research which included a visual summary received 88% more views, and researchers who posted a visual summary of their work on Twitter got 170% more engagement than those who didn’t.
Who reads infographics?
Anyone who needs to understand your research quickly and do something with it. For you that may include funders, or policy makers, or lay audiences, or all of the above. Infographics are brilliant for communicating information in actionable ways.
When should I use infographics?
Whenever you need your research to be understood quickly and acted upon.
How do I make an infographic?
Killer question. We explain the process step by step below, including suggestions for free support apps and further resources.
Step 1: Start with why. Why is your research important, why should audiences care?
Step 2: Define your audience. Who are they, what do they need help with, how is your research relevant to them, what do you want them to do as a result of receiving this information?
Step 3: Determine your content. The best sequence is problem–solution–result.
Step 4: Decide on your infographic structure. There are lots of examples of punchy structures. Linear, path, skyscrapers, comic strip, mind map, visual metaphor - it’s all explained below.
Left to right:
Linear, Path, Skyscraper
Comic Strip, Mind Map, Visual Metaphor
1. Linear – straight up and down, Point A at top, Point Z at bottom. Clear, simple, great for keeping things quick and punchy, but can be boring for something with more depth.
2. A path – shows more of a journey, different stopping points on the way, ending in bottom right corner with clear call to action. This one is great to show your research journey.
3. Skyscraper – 3 columns, each column representing a BIG overarching point, and sub points/visuals to explain underneath. Brill for breaking up complex topics.
4. Comic strip – wonderful for storytelling, each panel has a visual or stat to advance a narrative structure in chronological order. Visually great and very engaging. A word of caution: you’ll need to have a really well structured story for this approach to make sense.
5. Mind map – big central idea in centre, other supporting points around it – this one’s a boss for when ideas are distinct from one another.
6. Visual metaphor – storytelling on SPEED – using a graphic framework to demonstrate an unfamiliar concept in a familiar way. Are you plumbing depths? The image could be an iceberg. Working ever higher? A mountain does the trick. Maybe you need a conveyor belt, or cogs… anything that supports your narrative journey visually.
Step 5: Choose an accessible colour scheme - no more than three colours, good contrast, view accessibility guidelines here for reference
Step 6: Choose a font. Be consistent with it. Have a bolder point size for header, medium size for subheader, normal size for body text. If you go with more than one font, make sure they work together seamlessly, and be consistent with how you use them (for example, a serif font for all headers, a sans serif for all body text). Keeping them in the same visual family works well. Here’s a link to a great article on best font pairings: https://inkbotdesign.com/font-combinations/
Step 7: Choose icons to make your points visual and make sense. Icons are meaning makers, not decoration: choose them wisely and make sure they’re relevant. Just as when you choose a font, they need to be consistent throughout the infographic (so, for example, if you use a handrawn image, make sure they are all hand drawn). We’ve put together some cracking free image sites for you:
Free visual metaphor templates from Nifty Fox
Free hand drawn icon templates from Nifty Fox
Flat Icon - free vector icons
Freepik - free illustrations and images
Unsplash - free professional photography
Step 8: Want to include graphs? They’re great when handled with care. If you use them, make sure:
they tell the story
you explain them
you build them up gradually to prevent cognitive overload
You can grab a great free graph-maker like https://rawgraphs.io/ to make them look smart.
Step 9: Put it all together. Use PowerPoint, Canva or a design software like Adobe Illustrator. (Pssst, we’ll be running a e-training course on how to do this, launching in summer - sign up for our mailing list at the bottom of this page to be first to know.) Follow the three golden rules:
Clarity – does it have a clear structure so your audience will know how to read it? Does it end with a call to action so your audience will know what to do with it?
Content – what are your key messages? What key takeaways do your audience need to remember?
Consistency – have you kept to the same fonts and sizes, the same style of imagery, and the same colours throughout? Start with a bold title. End with a footer that states who you are, your institution, and contact information.
Step 10: SHARE IT. Want some tips for how? Take a look at our social media guide.