Photoshop Trainer
Joined: 23 Sep 2011
Posts: 1
Location: Brighton UK
|
 Posted: Fri Sep 23, 2011 10:05 am Post subject: Get your images to the top of Google |
 |
|
It is all very well taking fantastic photos but how do you get people to see them? This guide is all about how to appear in Google Image Search using SEO (search engine optimisation) specific to images.
Most photographers have spent time building an online presence via a personal website, a blog and social media platforms. How many of the photos have been optimised for search engines, especially Image search engines?
Social Networking Accounts are great ways to build a strong on-line brand for a photographer. Here you should make sure you use all the tags made available to you. Geo Tagging, image tagging, titles, filenames etc. Use the Keywords that you want people to find you for.
If you take the time to abide by the SEO guidelines you will see a great increase in traffic for your images.
Getting your photos to the top of Google Images means hugely increased exposure for your work as you won’t just receive hits from people familiar with you. While nobody seems to know the exact method Google uses for ranking images (they keep it close to their chest) there are some great tips to follow to ensure decent placement.
Although Google claims to sort images by actual content (photos with faces/vertical lines etc.) everyone seems to agree that the primary categorisation of an image is the text attributed to it. This includes the filename, title, alt title, description and even the text around the image so these must all be considered when posting an image.
Image Filename – this should be a clear description of the image and not the default camera image name. Think about which keywords you want to appear in the results for. Filenames should be as descriptive as possible for example - Brighton-Pride-2011.jpg
Image Title and Alt tag – these too should be descriptive. The title should be similar to the filename (ie. Brighton Pride 2011) You could expand a bit on the Alt tag although again be careful and don't just spam with keywords. I advise keeping the image name and the alt tags the same.
Image Caption - a short caption below the image is another way to increase search rankings.
Text Surrounding the image - Google reads the surrounding text of the image to determine relevancy. If the image is not wrapped to the text then make sure to use a caption.
Imagine you are writing a description of an image for someone who is blind. For all the attributed text imagine you are describing the image to somebody who can’t see it and make sure that they would know exactly what you are describing. For the caption or surrounding text add something to the image that can’t be gained from viewing it – extra description.
Once you've got yourself onto Google Image Search you need get people to actually click on your image so that they end up on your site. Most of this comes down to personal taste as people find different images attractive but here are some ways to help make your photo stand out:
Large image size – you want people to see the quality in your photos.
High quality images – make sure the photos are of a high standard, use some decent equipment!
Use photo editing software – although it is possible to produce some excellent photos without editing it can turn a good photo into a great one.
Using “Brighton Pride 2011” in Google Image Search as an example
Using the featured image as an example you can see the part tagging and social media sites have in promoting photos.
The above photo is currently 8th in Google Image Search for “Brighton Pride 2011”. It has been used on the site SoSoGay because the photographer uses the creative commons license, allowing anyone to publish images as long as they are credited, usually with a link to the photographer’s Flickr or website.
This is achieved by tagging titling and key-wording images on your own blog too - this can help Google Image Search ranking. It's worth noting
that if people looking for an image to use on their blog find you because your images rank well then they are more likely to use your images and give you lots of lovely links. Using creative commons is a really powerful way to add links to your website and Flickr account.
So, the photographer has used Image SEO to get her photos reasonably high on Google Image Search which has lead to more popular sites using her photos and linking back to her - this in turn raises the ranking of the photos. This combination of SEO and networking is an effective way to get people looking at your photography and increases your profile. |
|
