Image Optimization Tips for Better SEO – The purpose of the search engine optimization is to enhance the visibility of the website and web contents. In this context, the internet marketers use different SEO strategies so that the rankings of the websites or web contents of different businesses are boosted. So far as search engine optimization techniques are concerned, these are constantly changing as the Internet is evolving with time.
When dial-up Internet was used, users had to wait for long to get images loaded on the websites. In contemporary times, individuals can experience fast web access in the mobile devices. Optimizing the images for the users as well as for the search engines is very important and there are a number of ways by which a user can optimize the images for the search engines.
Image Optimization Tips for Better SEO
Use The Right Image
To find and then use the right image for the website is important to be successful as a search engine optimizer. There are many websites that allow the SEO professionals to look for the right images. The Flickr.com is one such web portal, which has a wide selection of different photos. An SEO professional can choose from these photos, they can filter the content by the license.
It is easy to find pictures that can be used for commercial purposes. But, in this regard it is important to understand that one needs to have all necessary permissions to use or change the image according to the needs or requirements.
Apart from the Flikr.com, other websites that a search engine optimizer can visit to look for images include the following:- Freeimages, Unsplash, New Old Stock, Public Domain Archive
Choose The Right File Format
After having chosen the right image, it is important to decide upon the file format that suits the user’s needs, requirements. The search engine optimizers are most concerned with pictures, photorealistic complicated graphics. Therefore, in this context, there are three widely used image formats from where the SEO professional can make a choice.
- The JPEG is the commonly used image format. This format uses data compression implying that based on the PC user settings, the quality of the image can suffer a bit. When compared to other file formats like the PNG, GIF the JPEG does not support transparent background. The advantages of using this format is it keeps the size of the file small, the format is supported almost everywhere.
- The GIF is a bitmap image format, used in art as well as in animations. The format supports about 256 colors. It is recommended for photorealistic images, photographs. The attributes of the GIF includes its small file size, support for transparent backgrounds. Because of which the file format is apt for making company logos, website page elements.
- The other image format is the PNG and it is considered to be a modern alternative to the JPEG as well as the GIF formats. The PNG has a better range for color, supports transparency, and possess auto gamma correction features. The PNG stores a short description of the content of the image so that the search engine can categorise the images. It is understood that this file format is the most modern. The size of the file with the PNG extension is a bit larger.
Optimize Your Images for The Web
Page speed is too important for any site and image compression keep very important role to speed up any blog. For more about speedup wordpress blog read out another article “Reduce wordpress page load time and speed up wordpress”.
There are some tips that the SEO professional needs to adhere to while optimizing images for the web. It is important to reduce the size of the file to a certain degree but not at the cost of the image quality. This can be done using a number of ways but the smart way to accomplish this is to use an online compression technique, a tool like the Compress JPEG or the TinyPNG. Using the tool is simple. The user needs to upload the image in the web application and the latter takes care of the online compression.
Use Informative File Names
The file names should be informative. You can download images from the camera and in that case you need to give a name that is descriptive. By giving a descriptive name you are making it convenient for the search engines to find the images. It is advised to use your Keywords in the file name. For additional details on this you need to check online on the ways how nomenclature is practiced with respect to the image files.
Wrong file name – xyz123.jpg
Right file name – how-to-find-right-file-name.jpg
Focus on Alt Text
It is important to be attentive to be alternative text. What is the purpose of the alt or alternative texts? These texts are used to display the image identity when a user hovers over the text using the mouse cursor. The alternative texts are shown to the users when there are issues during image rendering. The alt texts are used by the screen readers so that the visually impaired individuals do not have any issues navigating the web.
The visually impaired individuals have limited information besides the file name, search engines to aid them figure out the about a web image. But the inclusion of an alt text helps the user describe the picture content precisely. It needs to be comprehended that a simple alt text is sufficient to make Google, other search engines tell all about the picture. This ultimately helps the search engine professionals, using the SEO skills, rank better in the search engine results pages.
Separate Your Thumbnails From Main Pictures
It is important to keep the thumbnails estranged from the main pictures. The thumbnails should be small so that the page load time is minimized. The SEO professionals require to resize the thumbnails, they need to use the appropriate compression level for that. It is important to keep the pictures quite small. How can the pictures be kept small in size? The use of suitable photo-editing software like the Photoshop, other free tools like the Pixlr, Fotor can be used for this purpose.
Create Image Sitemaps
Search engine like Google encourages the SEO professionals to use image sitemaps for image optimization. These help to find more and more images that are available in the website. Product images, slider gallery images are often used by the SEO professionals for creating image sitemaps. If you possess a website and have an image sitemap for your site, adding image information to it is simple. Alternatively, you can use a separate sitemap for the images.
In this context, it is important to understand that creating a sitemap is not that complex. For the various URLs that are listed in the sitemap, you need to add image information on that page. There are examples available online that you can check in this regard. Wordpress users can use wordpress plugins like Udinra OR Image Sitemap for Image sitemap.
Don’t Rely on Third-Party Image Hosting
There are many image hosting platforms like Imgur, Postimage etc and these offers the services to upload images onto their massive servers. The advantages of doing this is saving space, reducing the site bandwidth. The disadvantage of using these hosting services is that the images can get blocked or deleted when there is high amount of web traffic. It is therefore recommended to use personal servers to host images. The practice of hosting images in the personal servers is beneficial in the long run.
Integrate With The Social Media
Social media web portals are increasingly gaining importance in search engine optimization. The professionals in this field need to integrate the images with the social media platforms. This implies adding social media sharing buttons to website. In this context, there are some popular methods that one can use to increase the number of visitors hitting a website.
There are social media websites like Image sharer that allow visitors to share site images as well as links. The search engine optimizer needs to use effective strategies to customize the mode of Image Sharer icons and its appearance. For more information on this the SEO professional needs to search online suitable contents.
Consult Google’s Webmaster Guidelines When In Doubt
It happens that the SEO professionals are confronted with issues when they try to optimize the images. In this context, it needs to be said that search engines like Google has prepared a set guidelines for publishing image that allow the website owner optimize their websites for the search engines. Suitable online links help the user to clear any ambiguity in this regard.
Final words
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