Need images for your business webpage or press release but don’t have a web designer? We did a study which concluded that people spend more time on releases that contain multimedia, by an average of about 30 seconds (that’s a lot of time!). But if you don’t have a high quality cam, the funds for a stock photo account or a web designer, how do you incorporate images in your campaign? These tools may be for you:  Search Engine Journal recently blogged about free infographic creating tools so we decided to put them to the test.  Here are a few of our favorites–

Tagxedo

Here’s a neat play on a tag cloud of words found on bloggingprweb.com. You could say these are our “key” words used on the site, since the cloud is in the shape of a key. The coolest part about it? You can put your tag cloud into tons of other shapes for free, or if you upgrade, the words can be arranged in the shape of your company logo! Properly implemented, tag clouds make a website appear more interlinked when crawled by a search engine. This can improve the site’s search engine rank. Who knew you could use tag clouds for SEO?

Gliffy

Here is a nifty flow chart we created on the life of a press release on PRWeb.com. You can add as many bubbles and connections as you like, with customizable shapes, colors and fonts. It’s a great way for clients to visualize and simplify a process or service your business offers.

Gliffy can also make custom Venn diagrams. Venn diagrams show a common relationship between a number of things. The only downside: making a set of more than 5 circles connect without information becoming jumbled can be difficult, as seen above. Got under five pieces of info? Go for it!

Wordle

Another word cloud creating feature, similar to Tagxedo. Aesthetically pleasing and fun to make, works great as a header for a blog or an “about us” page.

Make Sweet

Another venn diagram creation program, but only with two circles. The difference? This image is 3D and the circles can be filled in with any image you possess.

Infographics offer a new way of looking at concepts, processes and data sets—it’s an efficient method for repackaing, repurposing and giving greater meaning to old content as well. Now go forth and create—the possibilities are endless! What do you think about these infographic creation tools? Will you be using infographics as multimedia on your webpage or press release? For more tools, visit the full blog on Search Engine Journal.

Want some more sophisticated tools to make graphics for stats and data sets? Makeuseof.com also has a list of free infographic creation tools.

Filed under: Multimedia, Tips and Tricks by Stacey Acevero