18 THE POWER OF VISUAL STORYTELLING Brian Solis, an author of What’s the Future of Business, says: “The most effective visual storytelling affects one’s being . . . changing perspective and ultimately behavior upon impact.” Creating the right image to convey your message relies on understand- ing whom you are communicating with and how they will react to it. Communication is a two-way process, and marketers have to be as sure of their audience as they are of the images they are crafting to reach them. The right graphics can persuade, relate, and influence decisions on an emotional and subconscious level. Images are powerful tools, and we are becoming an ever-more visual culture. This data is precisely why visual storytelling allows companies a strong opportunity to take these existing behaviors and cultivate content focused on harnessing consumer engagement versus broadcasting mes- sages. Visuals draw immediate attention to a post about a topic and can generate shares, traffic, lead generation, thought leadership, and exper- tise. Visual storytelling can also help companies achieve earned media at scale. By striving to be shareworthy with Graphics are used as a shortcut to all visual content, companies like Coca-Cola are reaching an idea that causes the audience to the valued friends-of-friends audience. This allows Coca- respond in a certain way. An image Cola to better leverage word-of-mouth endorsements, becomes a symbol of something which are incredibly valuable. According to Bazaar Voice, bigger and more complex: this is 51% of Americans trust user-generated content over other what lies behind the psychology of information on a company website.22 logos and advertising imagery. For B2C companies, this sentiment is especially prev- alent in the fashion industry where there’s a trend of trusting the opinions of bloggers and customer reviews. Why? People like seeing how the garments are styled and fit by people they can relate to. In spring 2013, Coach launched a campaign asking its customers to admire the view from above—of their shoes! Using the #coachfromabove hashtag, fans were asked to share “selfie” photos of their Coach shoes on Instagram or Twitter for a chance to be featured in a gallery on the compa- ny’s website. A “selfie” is a photo you take of yourself. Over an eight-week