Starting SEO for Images: 5 Quick Tips
***Guest Post***
Getting your images to rank in search engines can be as effective in driving traffic as text can be, especially with the amount of queries done in image sites like Google images and Flickr. Even a non-technical user or beginning SEO-er can easily start getting images ranked by focusing on a couple of key image features when it comes to SEO. More on SEO for photographer websites and blogs in this ebook.
Alternate text
The most basic element of an image is the alt attribute that lives within its HTML code. The alt attribute allows a machine, like a search engine, to interpret the visual image that it normally would not be able to understand. For example, by looking at alternate text within the snippet of HTML code below, you know exactly what my image is about even though you can’t see it. A search engines works in the same way and can rank an image in the same way as a page if the right text and links are in place to promote your images.
<img src=”/racecar.jpg” alt=”Red Sports Car Driving on a Racetrack”>
Use a short complete sentence for your alt text and do not list a bunch of keywords.
Images as Links (Navigation)
Many websites use images as its main navigation links. For example instead of a text link that says Products, you have it as an image that a search engine cannot read. When you use the alt attribute as previously mentioned, not only do you tell Google that you image is about “Products” but you tell it that the page it links to is also about products (much more important). Google weighs links more heavily than text, especially in main navigation when the links are on all pages of your site. So remember to use alt text in all your images and not just photos, and especially the linked images, so that Google knows what the pages are about that the links point to.
Text on the Page
You can obviously fool Google by telling it the image is “Red Sports Car Driving on a Racetrack” when really it is a photo about something else. So Google takes into account the text that surrounds the image on the page. If you have a bunch of racecar photos on one page, don’t depend on just the alt text to get you ranked, you will need text on the page as well that talks about race-car stuff too.
Image Captions
Use captions for your images wherever possible. This goes back to text on the page helping your images rank. But also, in template systems (like blogs) captions are often used to generate the alt text as well.
Social Tools like Flickr
In addition to posting images to your website, you may more easily be able to rank in search engines by posting to social sites like Flickr or Picassa. Search engines index these photo sites often (look at these sites very frequently for updates) so you have a good chance of ranking quickly and they often have more search power than your own site. Flickr also has built in labeling that helps Google understand what your images are about. Bottom line: post images to multiple places, but remember to brand your social portals so that searchers can contact you if they like your photos.
Next Step in SEO
Nobody has more images than photographers, so if you’re looking for photographer google rank, then check out the Photographer’s SEO Book.
- Zach
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