Create an Infographic for Free (Seriously)

Quality infographics lead to social shares, and social shares leads to increased brand awareness, and increased brand awareness leads to conversions. That’s why I laid out the 10 Commandments of Infographic Virality last month, noting that “high quality infographics are 30 times more likely to be read than text articles.”

How to Create an Infographic for Free

In response to that article, one reader left a comment asking how to create an infographic for free? This was a good question, indeed, as agencies can charge $1,000 or more to create an infographic. But a hefty price tag is no reason to miss out on the treasure trove of traffic that can come with an infographic — designing your own infographic is totally doable.

There are several sites that allow you to create your own infographic for free. The easiest site, in my opinion, is Piktochart, a site with 350,000 users. It is incredibly intuitive and user-friendly. With more than 700,000 infographics created to date, Piktochart has been praised by Forbes, TechCrunch, CMS Wire, and TechInAsia. The free version of Piktochart offers seven free themes. Users can:

• Upload photos
• Implement interactive charts and tabs
• Choose from an expansive library of customizable icons and shapes
• Link from any icon, image or text with ease
• Save creations as high-quality .jpg or .png

Piktochart also offers professional packages that offer additional themes and icons (beginning at $29 a month). Piktochart’s professional clients include: Cornell University, Harvard University, York, Red Bull and Marriott.

Here are some infographics that were created by individuals using Piktochart:

In addition to infographics, Piktochart is handy in making other promotional material, like a graphic (though not an infographic). I made the graphic on the right (touting Bruce Clay’s SMX East discount code) to share on social channels using Piktochart.

When you use Piktochart, you’re investing time rather than money. And if you want to increase your design-savvy, there’s no better way than to practice. Piktochart also has an awesome blog where they frequently share design tips, which you’ll definitely want to read. And if you’ve ever been designing and wondered how to optimize your color scheme, make sure to check out How do Colors Affect Purchases? from KISSmetrics.

Whether you set out to create an infographic on your own or hire someone else, one thing’s for sure: quality infographics can set your social media campaigns on fire. BitRebels.com conducted an experiment wherein they posted data, primarily using text. Then they took that same data and posted it via an infographic.

The results don’t lie: the text-based post garnered 62 tweets and retweets on Twitter, and the infographic earned 578, proving what we’ve long known about infographics: they engage users and drive traffic. BitRebels also saw a 120 percent increase in +1 votes in Google+ and a jump in LinkedIn shares from 7 to 51 when sharing an infographic in place of more traditional post.

“All told, the company’s traditional post enjoyed 243 ‘actions’ on various social media website, whether that’s Facebook likes, LinkedIn shares, or Twitter retweets. The same information, when presented in an infographic, enjoyed 1,091 “actions” on the same set of social networking websites. That improvement is enough to make a significant difference in sales figures and visitor numbers, and it’s one of the reasons that so many companies are choosing to go with engaging infographics over traditional, blog-style content.”

Inspired by BitRebels and each of the 350,000 Piktochart users that create an infographic with flair and facts? Join the party and create your own — and then make sure to follow the 10 Commandments of Infographic Virality.

If you enjoyed this content, then read our How to Make a Graphic-Text Mash-up to Promote Content post to see more great graphic design options!

What success have you seen creating and sharing infographics? Tell us in the comments.

Kristi Kellogg is a journalist, news hound, professional copywriter, and social (media) butterfly. Currently, she is a senior SEO content writer for Conde Nast. Her articles appear in newspapers, magazines, across the Internet and in books such as "Content Marketing Strategies for Professionals" and "The Media Relations Guidebook." Formerly, she was the social media editor at Bruce Clay Inc.

See Kristi's author page for links to connect on social media.