Images are key

I've noticed in the 4 years I've been running The Sewing Directory that images are becoming more and more important on the internet.  Gone are the days where you get pages of text with possibly one small image at the top.  Now blogs, websites, social media are all geared towards great eye catching images.

Facebook gives more importance to images and shows them to more of your followers, Pinterest have built a whole network around sharing images and most of us get turned off pretty quick nowadays if we visit a site that is very text heavy.

My new advert

At the start of this year I did a big overhaul of the site and replaced a lot of text with images, so you can navigate the site visually (by clicking on projects/tutorials you like the look of) rather than by text.  However I've known for a while that I needed to do more than just this.

Fortunately one of my favourite business sites to follow, Build a Little Biz, opened a new intake for their visual marketing course in July so I jumped at the chance to take part.  I've only  managed 1/3 of the modules so far because of the school holidays but it is all online and you get lifelong access so I've been taking it at my own pace. You get e-mailed a pdf twice a week with the module information to work through, plus you get 2 bonus videos which show you how to use a particular piece of software to produce a particular type of image.  The best thing is you can do it all with free programs!

The new Sewing Directory Motto

Already I've managed to design myself a new advert.  The first time I've ever done it myself, previously I have used a graphic designer to do it.  I've also come up with a motto for The Sewing Directory and added it to my About Us page which I've just updated.  I've also designed a few graphics for a new post I've just added to the site called The Most Useful Sewing Tutorials Ever.  

Once the school holidays are over I plan to work through the rest of the modules and create a lot more images for the site.  I already have a huge list of things I want to make image wise so now I need to make time to start working through that list.

I hope you will all like the visual makeover of the site and if you are looking to make more images for your business I highly recommend the visual marketing course.  If you aren't ready to jump straight into a course they have some useful posts about visual marketing here: http://buildalittlebiz.com/visual-marketing