While many believe that SEO is strictly implementing keywords and incorporating healthy backlinks, there’s much more to it. Search engines are taking several factors into account when it comes to page rank, including page load time and domain authority. If you’d like to take your SEO knowledge to the next level, consider image optimization.
Google can read the following without the guidance of extra help:
- Color
- Shape & basic objects
- Image metadata
- Alt text
- EXIF data
You can make it easier for search engines to discover your image by providing some additional information.
Titles
While camera’s may opt for the manufacturers’ settings such as, “DCS_1122.jpg,” this will not impact SEO. Name your images with a relevant description. Make sure to keep it simple and seriously consider how people search.
Alt Tags
Alt Tags represent an HTML field which provides the search engines with additional information about the photo. Marketers have recently discovered that images improve the accessibility and maximize the SEO impact of images.
Captions
If there is no ALT Tag, the search engine will try to understand the photo by reading the surrounding copy. Captions are the first location that the search engine looks for to determine information about the image. However, captions are non-essential images and it is ALT Tags that really impact SEO.
Context
Some images may seem appealing, but they MUST be relevant to the content. Take note that not every image needs a caption, so pay close attention to the copy surrounding your image.