1. Visualise this:
Concentration spans are short, competition for attention is fierce and the sheer volume of news (both factual and fake) continues to overwhelm us all. In a world of less long-form journalism and ever-more condensed, bite-sized bits of information and imagery, visual communication is increasingly taking centre stage.
In recognition of this radically changing landscape, major health organisations and leading journals, from the WHO to the BMJ and JAMA, have moved into creating and publishing infographics highlighting research findings, health data and public health information. Ideally we too can recognise this shift and share our evidence in visual formats, for which there’s clearly a growing global appetite.
2. Becoming the source:
We rely on the mainstream media to report on Cochrane evidence and help spread the word about our latest research findings. But looking ahead we’ll be less and less able to do so. Experienced, specialist health and science reporters are getting harder to find, clickbait journalism is on the rise and mainstream news outlets are no longer the primary source of information that they once were – especially among younger audiences.
People increasingly look to their own social media networks, google searches and assorted ‘wellness’ websites of varying credibility for their own health information needs. It’s a difficult world for many people to navigate. For Cochrane to have a place in this fragmented environment, we need to recognise the media landscape is shifting and respond accordingly.
As well as relying solely on traditional methods like issuing press releases that others can use, we can also offer a respected source of evidence ‘assets’ that can be shared – be that infographics, podcasts or news stories/web content that lead to people accessing, understanding and seeking out Cochrane evidence.
With this in mind, the infographics we are working on can be easily shared, promoted and provided to third parties (think websites, journals, media outlets, blogs) as a simple piece of code, which will enable them to be re-published on other platforms. And the best thing? Any changes or updates we make centrally will be reflected wherever they are published – ensuring infographics maintain their accuracy and value long after their initial production. A ready-made, eye-catching infographic is an enticing proposition for a lot of news and health websites out there…
3. Tailored to suit:
Interested in a quick summary of the key results or prefer a deep dive into the data? With interactive infographics you can do either; there are endless possibilities for linking to and highlighting important aspects of reviews – the plain language summary, Summary of Findings Table, key discussion points and other specific areas – enabling the evidence to assume whatever shape or level of detail users are after.
4. Sharability:
We all know the power of word of mouth, of likes, retweets and forwards to friends, family and colleagues. Our infographics are designed with sharing and reproducibility in mind.
5. Pole position:
Having high quality, frequently accessed and shared evidence assets like infographics leads to better Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). At the moment, many Cochrane reviews appear below third-party media reports (that may or may not represent the review findings accurately) or papers of varying quality. We’d like to improve the numbers. The more people share and click on our infographics, which in turn lead back to Cochrane reviews and our own evidence assets (podcasts, other infographics, news stories), the higher we will go.
