ROI = Return On Infographics

Infographics about infographics are always fun.  Return on Infographics by Bit Rebels and NowSourcing takes a look at some of Bit Rebels’ own data from releasing infographics as part of their marketing.

The impact of an infographic can be measured on many levels, which makes it all just a little bit more complex and complicated to present. With the help of NowSourcing, we have been able to produce an infographic that will compare the traffic and social action impact of an infographic post with a traditional post that does not involve an infographic. It’s through social media analytics that a clear image slowly emerges to tell a story that for some has just been a question without an answer.

They’re pretty clear about this, but remember that this design is completely based on internal data from Bit Rebels.  It may be a good indicator of infographics in general, but we don’t know for sure.

Bit Rebels has shared some fantastic data from their internal tracking, which will be of interest to the you, the readers of Cool Infographics.  However, the design makes a few mistakes, and we’re all here to learn how to make infographics designs better.

• One of my pet peeves, the design messed up the size of the circles in the comparison table.  Based on the full-size infographic they released at 975 pixels wide, the smaller circle for 243 Actions is about 55 pixels in diameter.  Doing the match for the area of a circle, the diameter of the larger circle for 1,091 Actions should be about 117 pixels wide.  In the design, it’s actually about 256 pixels wide!  So instead of visually showing a shape roughly 4x larger, it’s actually showing a circle about 22x larger!  This is a “false visualization” and mis-represents the data.
• Are these comparison data points an average or a total of the 500 posts?
• How many infographic posts are compared to how many traditional posts?
• Love the use of the actual logos from the social networks in the comparison table, and they should have continued that with the rest of the design instead of just text later in the design.
• The blue bars behind the higher comparison value look like bar charts, but obviously don’t match the data.  They just fit the text, and have no visual relevance to the data.  An indicator icon or highlighting the entire column width would have been better than the bars.
• Are the Top 6 Social Networks in rank order?  LinkedIN is the top social network for infographics???
• The circles near the end of the design are also incorrect.  Instead of showing a 10x comparison to match the dollar values, the circles show an over 100x comparison!

Found on WebProNews, MediaBitro’s AllTwitter, and Visual.ly.  Thanks to everyone that also submitted it and tweeted links to it!

The Awesome Tower of Beer!

The High Life in a new infographic from RothIRA.com that visualizes the awesome tower of beer you could buy if you were to save just $1 per day starting at age 25.

Getting older has its benefits—how about all the beer you can drink? All it takes is a dollar a day (and a really, really large fridge).

Want to learn more about a Roth IRA?

Designed by InfoNewt (my company), this design follows the strategy of telling one story really well.  There are hundreds of charts online showing the power of compound interest and why people should invest early for retirement.  We took a different approach to put the power of those savings into terms that young adults are more likely to relate to…BEER!

Thanks to the team at RothIRA.com for being great to work with!

Update on Tuesday, August 28, 2012 at 7:44PM by Randy

Awesome!  The Tower of Beer infographic went viral and was picked up on…

Mashable: http://mashable.com/2012/08/21/retirement-planning-beer/

AARP: http://blog.aarp.org/2012/08/21/convince-your-kids-to-save-in-a-language-they-understand-beer/

HolyKaw: http://holykaw.alltop.com/the-high-life-explaining-retirement-savings-w

The Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/21/retirement-planning-expla_n_1817409.html

Betterment: https://www.betterment.com/blog/2012/08/20/have-your-beer-and-drink-it-too/

@GuyKawasaki on Twitter: http://twitter.com/GuyKawasaki/statuses/238656984864411649

The Jane Dough: http://www.thejanedough.com/retirement-planning-infographic/

…and many more!

Which Countries were Successful at the Olympics?

A personal infographic design project by Paulo Estriga, Which Countries were really the Most Successful in London 2012? compares the Top 10 medal winning countries with a normalized set of data showing the number of medals per one million people in the population of each country.

The official standings are reached by counting the number of gold medals obtained by each country, using silver and gold [bronze? - Randy] medals to break ties.  By this method, the USA was the most successful country, followed by China in second and Great Britain in third.

However, most of these countries have many millions of people to pick from, which naturally generates a large number of quality athletes making it to the Olympics.  What happens when we take population numbers into account?  Which are really the most successful countries in getting the most gold medals out of the fewest people?

This design is clear, easy-to-read, and does a great job of showing how normalizing the data with population gives you a very different result.  He clearly cited his sources, included a copyright statement and the URL to his site.  I would have preferred the URL to be directly to the infographic.

Paulo’s structure of the overall infographic is a great example of the 3-part story format!  The introduction visualizes the traditional way of measuring countries based on their gold medal counts, by showing medal icons.  The Main Event is the visualization of the new, normalized for population chart that shows something new and unexpected to the reader.  Finally, a conclusion wraps up the design describing where the traditional Top 10 countries fall in the new ranking.

Outstanding job Paulo!

The Lifespan of Storage Media

Crashplan has just released The Lifespan of Storage Media, a comprehensive guide to how long your data will last.  Designed by Mike Wirth with InfoNewt, this infographic compares the expected lifespans of popular media types used over the last 100 years to save different kinds of information: computer data, photos, videos and audio.  Do your 8-tracks still play?

As each new form of data storage comes on the scene, the market is at first enamored with its compactness, convenience and hoped-for data longevity. But invariably, the reality of physical vulnerability and a limited lifespan remains. Eventually, all media fails, but Cloud backup is forever.

This was a fantastic project to work on, and the data research was the most challenging piece.  We had to find data to support both an average expected life and an extended “with extreme care” life.  We certainly found some contradictory data sources, and ultimately used data we felt was the most commonly accepted in the industry.

Do you have old computer backups burned to CDs, tapes or even hard drives on your shelf?  Don’t count on being able to read the data from them too much longer!  The short lifespan for many of these types of media that people use everyday to archive their personal photos and videos was most surprising.

Thanks to the team at Crashplan for a great project!

Cellular Jerks: Where are your Mobile Manners?

So how in tune are you with your technology? Do you take calls on the toilet? Do you sleep with your phone on your bed? See what percent of the U.S. you fall into with the Cellular Jerks infographic from onlinecollege.org.

If you’re considering the pursuit on an online education, chances are you’re pretty plugged into the Internet and technology world.  Modern students everywhere are increasingly engaged with their tech devices, and with the rapid rise of mobile Internet access, many are even able to gain access to the materials and resources they need to study on the go.

 But this easy access might very well be both a blessing and a curse: The rise of mobile access has given rise to savvy, plugged-in individuals, but it may very well also have given rise to another being entirely, namely, the cellphone jerk.  Everyone seems to know someone or interact with a person who just doesn’t seem to have any mobile manners.  From loud conversations at inappropriate times to rude texting at an awkward moment, it seems like more and more people are getting lost in their own cell phone interactions. So attached are people to their cell phones that sometimes, those little devices end up in some interesting places.

 Don’t feel like you’re that addicted?  Check out the following infographic and see for yourself: You might be surprised to realize that you could be a cellular jerk, too.

I like this one because of the fun use of illustration to make the statistics more personal and can relate them to our everyday lives.

Many of the statistics are just shown in text instead of visualized, and most designers don’t understand that by not visualizing those values, it makes them visually “less important” to the readers.  This is especially true the further down the infographic you get, which also implies the project was rushed or the designer got lazy deeper into the design.

The clear Creative Commons license in the infographic is fantastic.  The URL directly to the original infographic landing page should have also been included.

Found on Online College.org 

The Greatest Human and Digital Viruses of All Time

 

Viruses. We all hate them. If they aren’t slowings us down physically, they are slowing down our computers. See the best of the worst on uniblue’s The Greatest Viruses of All Time infographic from Uniblue’s free resource libraries site liutilities.com.

“If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito.” ― Dalai Lama XIV

Viruses are inevitably small in nature, yet engineered to unleash intense and often terrifying devastation. They leave a costly aftermath whether it’s the irreparable loss of human life, or millions (sometimes billions) of dollars in lost revenue and property.

We have gone through history to find the worst viruses of them all; little creatures and scripts that have taken advantage of social and economic situations to propagate and amplify their prowess in mayhem and destruction.

Join us in this brief journey through time, spanning back as early as 1348 where we shall meet the darkest and most wicked viruses to ever afflict mankind.

This is a really elegant design that does a fantastic job of telling a story and walking the reader through the information.

Mostly text and illustrations, there aren’t many numerical data point to visualize.  The few numbers there are to work with, could have been visualized better to give them context and help the readers understand them better.  Why are 21 human icons shown to represent “75,000,000 to 200,000,000 dead” from the Black Death plague?

At the bottom should be some type of copyright (or Creative Commons) statement, and the URL for readers to find the original infographic landing page.

Designed by Derek Fenech, thanks for sending in the link!

New Feature: DataVis & Infographic Designer Job Openings

I recently added a new feature page here on the Cool Infographics blog called Cool Jobs.  The Jobs page is open for anyone to post freelance, part-time and full-time opportunities for data visualization and infographic designers.  Posting an opening on the Jobs page is FREE, and you should include a job description, a link to the opportunity, and contact information in the main body of your post.

Celebrating their First $1,000,000 of Custom Made Products

In its first six months CustomMade.com made their first million of custom products! They take their clients ideas and match them with professionals to get the job done.  Their Celebrating Our First $1,000,000 of Custom Made Products infographic shows their process and success. 

Over the first six months of 2012, we here at CustomMade have been thrilled to witness the growth of the first entirely custom online marketplace.  Our team has been constantly working to improve the site experience and our ability to match customer’s idea’s with the talented professional makers who can bring them to life.  Recently we paused for a moment and realized we were about to pass an important milestone for our marketplace – $1,000,000 worth of custom made products!

Along the way we’ve seen some amazing custom creations ranging from $32,000 custom kitchen cabinets to an $11 hand carved wooden pendant. We’ve seen rings made out of vinyl records, rings with amazing details from a family crest, and even an engagement ring in the shape of R2D2 (which any Star Wars fan would love).  Our makers have brought to life a children’s bed in the shape of a slipper, amazing custom humidors, and even a custom cat bunk bed!  You can browse all of our projects in progress on the site, or browse over 35,000 completed projects.

This work is being done by over 2,000 professional makers across the U.S. and Canada.  They include furniture makers, jewelers, ceramicists, glass blowers, metal workers, leather tanners, and much more.  These makers represent that true craftsmanship still exists today and that consumers are able to not just purchase an item off the shelf, but to create an heirloom that can be cherished for years to come.  We are proud to support these local makers and the products they create, and are looking forward to seeing what unique items they make next!

I love the classic, clothes-tailor style that dominates the overall design.

My biggest complaint with this design is the lack of data visualizations.  Big fonts are NOT data visualizations.  Visualization put the values into context for the reader by comparing them to another value so the reader can understand if a number really is big or small.

I love that the infographic itself was “Crafted by hand”, but in the spirit of the business, they should have given the designer credit by name.

Thanks to Zach for sending in the link!

Find the Best Airline Fees

Traveling is a pleasure that we don’t want to give up, but costs keep rising! Find the Best Airline For You infographic from Nerd Wallet lets you know which airline to travel on depending on your traveling habits to keep the costs down!

U.S. airlines continue to increase fees - more fees and higher fees.  However, there are no standards or regulations when it comes to airline fees so travelers don’t know what to expect.  Fee prices range widely by airline, and there is little transparency on the terms of each fee.  For example, some fees are charged based on how stops are made, while others are billed as flat fees.  Some fees have a base rate but increase from the time of booking to boarding the plane.  

As a result, cost comparison is extremely difficult, especially when travelers are evaluating multiple airlines.  To make matters worse, fees are not properly disclosed – they are hidden within multiple layers on airlines’ websites and shrouded by vague wording.  NerdWallet gathered the data and analyzed each fee across all major U.S. airlines.  To help travelers save money, we defined several traveler profiles and calculated fees on a comparable basis to determine which airline is best (and worst) for each type of traveler.

There are a handful of things I like about this one.  

• The main thing is that throughout all of the Lowest/Highest comparisons, the scale of the bar charts is kept consistent.  This allows the reader to easier understand how much money is related to each travel fee.
• The green-red (good-bad) color scheme is instantly understandable to the reader.
• The icons (all in blue) are easy to understand.  By keeping them all a consistent solid blue color, they are kept simple and don’t create a bunch of “visual noise” that would distract the reader.
• Sources are listed at the bottom
• The direct URL to the original infographic is included at the bottom so readers can find the high-resolution original no matter where they find it posted on the Internet.

I would suggest using the airline logos, even in a solid color, to make it easier for the readers to pick out the airlines they recognize.

Thanks to Annie for sending in the link!

VISA London Economic Outlook

VISA was smart and jumped on the London band wagon.  Designed by Bright Blue Day, the VISA London Economic Outlook infographic from Visa Europe shows a summary of the Olympics impact report.

The London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games will deliver an £804m consumer spending injection for the UK this summer and an economic legacy worth £5.33bn by 2015, according to Visa’s report, “Realising a Golden Opportunity: Visa Europe’s London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games Expenditure and Economic Impact Report”.

The report looks at the consumer expenditure and economic output related to the Games and its distribution across the country. It is based on Visa’s unique insight into consumer spending in the UK and spending data from previous Games and major sporting events.

We have also produced a unique infographic providing an easily-digested visual summary of the report’s findings.

This is a great use of an infographic as an executive summary of a much larger report.  This builds awareness, interest and traffic to a report that VISA Europe obviously spent a lot of money to sponsor.

A few thoughts about the infographic design:

• The call-out circles surrounding the map of the UK should be sized to match their values.
• The doughnut charts don’t work for the Distribution of Economic Activity.  The percentages are too close together, so all of the doughnuts look almost the same.  I think a pair of bars for each location, but keeping the scale consistent across all locations would have worked much better.
• I love the icons for the business sectors
• The color scheme is fantastic!  Simple, directly tied to VISA and makes the overall design bold without being gaudy.
• The monument silhouettes from London are easily recognizable, and work nicely in the background without drawing too much attention.
• The bottom should have a clear copyright, and the direct URL link to the original infographic landing page.

They also created a short infographic video based on the static infographic:

The infographic is available as a high-resolution JPG image file or a high-resolution PDF.

The designer at Bright Blue Day was Ollie Flippence.  Great job Ollie!  Thanks for sending in the link!