Boost your communications results with these 5 creative tools

By Matthew Collis | matthewdcollis@gmail.com

Matthew Collis has compiled his top five creative tools to help you inform and engage your audiences in a meaningful and effective way.

There are a wealth of tools to help marketing and communications professionals with their work, from those that help with videos and graphics, to quizzes, surveys, presentations and more. But which tools set themselves apart? It can be overwhelming to sort through the options and narrow down ones to invest your time in. That’s why in this article I’ve compiled my top five creative tools to help you inform and engage your audiences in a meaningful and effective way.

1. VideoScribe

VideoScribe is an easy to use software that lets you create custom, professional looking and engaging whiteboard videos in-house. It’s inexpensive and the videos are relatively quick to produce. Whiteboard videos are a great storytelling tool and have been shown to lead to increased viewer interest and retention than other video types. As well, in a study that compared those who watched whiteboard videos to those who watched talking head ones, it was found that the whiteboard viewers were “three times more likely to share the video on social media and were twice as likely to both recommend and buy the service, as well as to recall the facts and message being delivered.” In addition, Hubspot found that 54% of consumers wanted to see more video from businesses they support.

2. Stencil

Stencil is a graphic design tool to develop compelling and engaging graphics for social media, ads, blog posts, articles and more, quickly and easily. Check out these 15 visual content marketing statistics to learn why visuals are so important in breaking through the clutter and helping your content stand out. The tool comes with editable templates and can be added as an extension to your Chrome or Firefox browser for convenience. I like that Stencil automatically sizes your canvas based on how the image you’re creating will be used, and gives you the ability to view previews on desktop and mobile and share and send image mockups before finalizing. It’s also integrated with Buffer so you can schedule your image in a social post right from the tool itself.

3. Typeform

Surveys and quizzes, if done right, can be an excellent tactic to make the content you are creating more engaging. The average human attention span is now eight seconds, which is less than that of a goldfish. This is why producing engaging, interactive types of content is more important than ever. Typeform is my go-to tool for eye-catching and interactive surveys, quizzes and forms. You’re able to bring questions to life with animated images and custom layouts. You can get as creative as you wish or draw some inspiration from a template library of quizzes, questionnaires, polls and more.

4. Piktochart

Infographics grab attention and can be effective in helping your audience understand and retain information. And infographics get three times more likes and shares on social media than any other type of content. Piktochart is ideal for developing infographics, reports and flyers yourself with no design experience. You can import data, add customizable, interactive charts and maps, and choose from a library of templates, icons and images. You can also easily change the colour scheme of existing templates to suit your brand or the look and feel you’re going for. The user experience is also great, eliminating potential frustration and saving you time.

5. Prezi

If you find that you’re developing presentations on a regular basis, with Prezi you can create visually compelling slides to tell a story in an impactful, persuasive and engaging way that look like they were produced by a professional designer. And great presentation visuals are key when you consider that 90% of information sent to the brain is visual and visuals are processed by our brain 60,000 times faster than text. I like that you can create eye-catching charts and graphs and then help your audience understand the data by zooming in with supporting text, images or videos. This “zoom reveal” feature is also useful to use throughout the presentation, allowing you to tell your story by focusing on important points as it unfolds.

You may discover one or more of the tools above to be a perfect fit for you and your team. You’ll likely find these tools to be user friendly and come with a short learning curve. Try one out and see how it works for you. Good luck!