on Insights: BookBub:

Whether you’re promoting a specific book or trying to drive exposure to boost an author’s brand, posting eye-catching images is imperative to capturing readers’ attention on social media.

Some social platforms revolve around sharing visual content, including Instagram, where photos still generate 36% more engagement than videos. And on platforms where images are optional, including them dramatically increases engagement. For example, Facebook posts with images see 2.3x more engagement than those without images.

You don’t have to be a professional photographer or have an expensive DSLR camera to take original high-quality photos for your social media marketing campaigns. Your smartphone can take excellent pictures, and there are great articles with tips and tricks for easily shooting and editing pictures, including guides specifically from book bloggers. And you can use free tools like Canva or RelayThat to easily create custom graphics.

So what kinds of images should you share on social media to engage with readers? Here are some creative ways we’ve seen authors use images on their channels. We hope this helps you brainstorm some new types of images to post, so you can test which works best for reaching your unique audience.