Visual Psychology
How can you use the psychology of images and visuals to increase your impact?
We have previously discussed how getting your audience to “imagine” something is a potent lever of persuasion. For example, some of the benefits are:
- Thinking Past the Sale — People gravitate towards scenarios they imagine; you can increase the odds they make a decision you want by getting them to imagine your desired outcome.
- Availability Bias — The easier it is for someone to imagine a scenario, the more probable and important they think that outcome is. The more detailed and effortful an imagined scenario is, the more powerful this effect will be.
- Repetition — The more you repeat something, the more likely your audience will believe it. So by getting someone to repeatedly imagine a scenario, you can increase the odds that that scenario comes into reality.
And, as you know, visual persuasion is far more effect than non-visual persuasion.
But there’s another reason why getting people to “imagine” is a powerful lever of persuasion. As Susan Weinschenk writes in 100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People:
“The visual cortex is more active when you are imagining something than when you are actually perceiving it. Activity occurs in the same location in the visual cortex, but there is more activity when we imagine. The theory is that the visual cortex has to work harder since the stimulus is not actually present.”
So if you can’t show someone an image, make them visually imagine your desired course of action or outcome. And, as noted above, the more vivid and effortful an imagined scenario is, the more persuasive it will be.
Visuals and Memory
Making your desired choice or outcome more visual also contributes to your persuasiveness because visual information is more memorable for humans than other kinds. This is why mnemonists (aka, expert memorizers) use Cicero’s “method of loci” to recall super-human amounts of information.
In Moonwalking with Einstein, Joshua Foer writes:
“The principle underlying all memory techniques is that our brains don’t remember all types of information equally well. As exceptional as we are at remembering visual imagery . . . , we’re terrible at remember other kinds of information, like lists of words or numbers.”
He goes on to explain “elaborating encoding”:
“The general idea with most memory techniques is to change whatever boring thing is being inputted into your memory into something that is so colorful, so exciting, and so different from anything you’ve seen before that you can’t possibly forget it.”
TL;DR: if you want to make something more memorable, make it visually detailed. And, as you know from reading this blog, the more something sticks in someone’s mind, the more they will believe it to be true.
How You Can Use Visuals
Some food for thought:
- When creating an ad, do you want to show the audience a picture (which will be more effective than words), or get them to imagine that picture? A key trade-off is how intricate that picture is; the more complicated and detailed it is, the less likely your audience will stick with you and fully imagine it (because our brains are lazy).
- Consider combining the command to “imagine” with simpler visuals. For example, if you want to get someone to imagine owning camping equipment you sell, you can show them an image of a simple tent set up in the woods, but then ask them to imagine how tired they’ll be after a day of backpacking and how having your light-weight camping stove would make their backs hurt less.
- If you want an audience to remember your key point, build an association with a strong and related image.
- Make your own ideas “sticky” for yourself — Use the method of loci to remember things by creating images in your mind based in an actual physical place you have visited. In simple contexts, creating a “memory palace” can help memorize for a test. But it can also be used to memorize questions for networking events, grocery lists, or processes at work.
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