You may not realize it yet, but if you haven’t been optimizing the images on your website, you might be losing out on a huge chunk of traffic. Furthermore, if you’re not using these images appropriately, you might lose the attention of your visitors. After all, visuals are often the most eye-catching element in any site so to stay above the clutter is a challenge that once mastered, it will propel your content to greater heights!
When you optimize images, they will be indexed properly to provide the relevant information to Google. In this article, we’ll go over some of the best ways to optimize these images for the World Wide Web. Firstly…
What is Image Optimization?
Think of it this way, when you engage in Search Engine Optimization (SEO), you’re helping Google index the pages of your website accurately. Since the search engine can’t read the images, you need to optimize your images to help the engine understand better.
By naming and tagging the image, you will help the overall optimization strategy of the page. That being said, we’re really not trying to get people through image searches on Google as that’s generally not a good source of traffic. Most people who conduct image searches are usually looking to copy an image or search images concerning a certain topic instead of actually wanting to read the content. But optimizing your images will enhance your whole strategy, so it shouldn’t be ignored.
So how should you go about this? Read on:
1. Give your Image a Good Title
When you upload an image onto your web page, give the image a good title. Your visitors will be able to view it whenever they move the mouse over, so try to be short but descriptive – enough to communicate the intended message concerning the image.For example, if you’re a smoothie shop or you’re blogging about healthy fruit drinks, you can have a title like this:
“Mixed Berry Smoothie”
When you come up with a title, try to include relevant keywords that you’re trying to optimize. Although Google algorithms aren’t looking at titles now, they’re expected to do so in near future.
2. Give Your Image An Alt Tag
When Google goes over your image to try and index it, it will read the “Alt Tag” or ‘Alt Text” to make sense of it. This will also play a part in the overall indexing of the web page and website.
Try to make your alt tag follow the theme of the website and keywords so that you rank higher in Google’s search results.
Alt Tag Example:
“Delicious mixed berry smoothie with fresh fruits.”
3. Compress The Image
The size of the image will impact the loading time of the page, so make sure that it’s compressed to a reasonable size to help the page load faster. Especially with mobile devices starting to become the preferred mode to browse the web, “size really matters.”
Just remember, the minimum file size should be 200px x 200px. If your image is too big and your website takes too long to load, visitors will lose their attention span and leave. Google will notice that they didn’t spend much time on the page and it will affect your search ranking.
Tip: You can use Photoshop to compress your images before you upload them to your website. And check it out! We even have a short tutorial to show you how to reduce your file sizes!
4. Create a Great Caption & Filename
Images on your page need to be captioned. Sometimes it may also require an attribution.
When people are looking at the text below the image, make sure that it describes the image appropriately.
Caption Example:
“A healthy berry smoothie that’s perfect for the summer!”
You can do this within content management platforms that will enable to you enter the title, Alt Tag, caption, and description – wordpress being one of the most used platforms for bloggers and web builders alike. One thing to take note though, the text in the description box will not be used by Google, so only type in information that you might find relevant. And while you’re at it, change the file name from the “.img” to something that incorporates your keywords for better optimization.
Incorrect Format – 40549455_m.jpg
Acceptable Format – strawberries_and_smoothie.jpg”
Correct Format – mixed-berry-smoothie.jpg
Although this doesn’t directly impact your SEO, it does have an effect when users are searching for images.
5. Make Your Images Easily Shareable
Depending on the context, shareable images can help magnify your business or blog. If you want to drive traffic to your site from social platforms like Instagram or Pinterest, it might be a good idea to add text to it. This, in turn, can lead to more clicks back to your site if the image goes viral.
Whenever possible, try to link your images with appropriate anchor texts. Plus, it can be even more useful if you embed the images in guest posts (if you’re in the habit of contributing to other sites).
So there you go, these 5 points should help you when you’re adding images to your content. Content is king but visuals are the queen! Any other points to share? Do let us know in the comments below.
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