Never underestimate the power of a good visual. For example, take the epidemic of obesity that’s plaguing the United States.
We recently had Duke University professor William Evans speak at several of our retirement communities on how weight training could be used by older adults to halt or even reverse the effects of aging. His studies showing that even seniors well into their 90s could dramatically improve their health and fitness through resistance training were compelling, but what really grabbed the audience’s attention was this slide series showing the progression of obesity in this country over the past couple of decades.
There are plenty of statistics out there you can use to educate people on the problem, or you can just show them this simple visual progression from 1985 to 2008. Click through the slides quickly to get the full effect. I could feel myself getting fatter just watching it.
Each of us processes information differently. Some prefer reading your story. Others are more susceptible to visual or audio storytelling. The next time you’re working on a white paper, brochure or annual report, consider straying from the well-beaten path and shaking things up with a more visual approach. You might just increase the impact of your messaging.
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How long do you reckon before this is the UK? RT @dhutson Does This Map Make Me Look Fat? http://bit.ly/9IvpvO
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On the other side of the coin, we have several people telling us to ditch PowerPoint this week….
I fully agree with your suggestion to shake things up with good visuals. The importance of using well-executed visuals to drive a point home was instilled in me long ago while attending a boot camp class led by Edward Tufte [ http://www.edwardtufte.com/ ], a Renaissance man and firm believer in the power of visuals in communications. Interestingly, he was asked by President Obama to join the Recovery Independent Advisory Panel — the group of people who will watch how stimulus money is disbursed. If you know how to tell a story visually, I guess you can even figure out how and where all that stimulus money is going.
Thanks Loren. Tufte really is one of the gods of visual information. I’d love to see him do something that illustrates the smoking crater that is the California state budget. Guess I’m not smart enough to understand how billions in tax dollars can’t sustain a decent level of service for residents who need help most (not to mention basic services for all of us).
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