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Introduction
Surfing is fun, isn’t it?
Don’t worry, here surfing doesn’t mean in the waves. It means surfing the web!
While searching for anything on a particular, have you noticed how we always find a few popular websites on top? These web pages are usually helpful with great content and proper illustrations too. Also, since they top the list, we tend to visit them more frequently. Doesn’t the whole thing seem a bit magical?
Well, the magic behind this is search engine optimization (SEO).
SEO is a method of making and modifying web pages so that they have increased traffic. It ranks a website and displays it accordingly when searched on Google or any other search engine.
Now, when reading a book, do you love a book with illustrations or one with a lot of text? You must be choosing a book with illustrations. Similarly, with web pages, people tend to like web pages with pictures in the content.
Now, a web page with pictures may seem appealing to us, but a search engine does not see the images. Instead, it considers the alt-text provided for each picture. But then, what is alt-text? Don’t worry. We’ve got you covered. This article teaches about the SEO of images and alt-text and how to increase the page with suitable alt-texts.
Image SEO and its Importance
Before we start with image optimization, you’re probably wondering why we need to add pictures to a web page.
Previously we mentioned that people find web pages with pictures more attractive. Also, an image breaks large blocks of text. This makes an article interesting to read. Both are a part of on page optimization, but that’s not the only reason we should add pictures to a web page. When we add images to a web page and a related topic is searched in Google Images, the image on the web page also appears. Thus, optimized images increase the chance of ranking a web page in Google Images.
Now, we have mentioned image SEO a couple of times, but what is it? In short, image SEO is the optimization of images to increase traffic to a web page. This increases the page rank in a standard Google search and Google Images. Other than this, image SEO also makes a web page more accessible, which also increases a web page’s ranking and is a legal requirement in some countries.
Now that we realize how important it is to optimize images let’s see how to do it in the next section.
Optimization Tips for Images
Adding images to a page, indeed, is a good on page SEO technique. We must optimize these images themselves, too, to enhance the page. Let us see how we can do that.
Naming Image Files
Images are generally saved with a random name, but we shouldn’t upload them to a site like that. A proper name for an image file also tells a search engine what it is. Also, Google recommends using hyphens instead of underscores while separating the words in the name.
Resizing or Compressing Images
The number of pixels an image contains controls how long it takes to load. Site speed plays a vital role in on page SEO. So, we must make sure that we resize images before uploading them. Another alternative is to compress an image. This reduces the file size, enhancing site speed and page ranking.
Format of an Image
We all know there are different formats of an image. The different formats are used based on how it is to be used. So the proper usage of image formats also helps improve the page rank. The basic formats and their uses have been summarized below.
Format
Use
JPEG
Online photos, artwork, emails
PNG
Images with a transparent background
WebP
Images and animations that need compression more than JPEG and PNG
SVG
Icons and logos
Image Sitemap
This means adding a uniform resource locator (URL) to the images on a web page. In doing so, the image has a URL of its own, which helps a search engine fetch that image during an image search.
Content Delivery Network
A content delivery network is a group of servers that quickly load images and other content. They are located worldwide for quicker distribution of content to separate places. For example, since we are in Asia, downloading an image from a server in Asia will load faster than downloading from a server in North America. So on using it, the site speed of a web page increases, increasing the page rank.
Lazy Loading
Images usually take more time to load than normal content. So in this method, images and JavaScript elements are loaded only when that section of the page is viewed. Thus, the main contents of a page are loaded for the viewer, but the images are only when needed, increasing the site speed.
Browser Caching
When we open a web page for the first time, all its content, including images, is loaded and stored in the browser cache. The next time we open the same web page, they are fetched from the browser cache instead of loading the images again, thereby increasing the site speed and page rank.
Open Graph Images
Have you noticed that sometimes when you share a link, say a YouTube link, the shared link goes with an image and description added to it? This image is called an open graph and is used as a social media strategy. For example, if someone shares a link with an OG image on social media, it may catch your eye because of which you open the link. The same may happen to many other people, increasing the traffic on the web page.
Now, do you remember the part where we read that a search engine cannot see images? There we said that a search engine views an image as its alt-text. So let’s learn what alt-text is next.
Alt-Text
Alt-text is short for alternative text. It is often called alt attributes or alt tags. I guess its name is self-explanatory, indicating that the alt-text is a text alternative for images.
Now you may be wondering how alt-texts help in SEO. Since a search engine cannot recognize images, it identifies them as content through the alt-text. Thus, the alt-text helps determine what the image shows and uses it in on page SEO and image SEO.
Now, although you may consider the above points as advantages of images and alt-text, there are more. Let’s see what they are in the next section.
Advantages of Adding Alt-Text
We already know that alt-texts are helpful in SEO, but adding them has other advantages.
Alternative to Images
Images and alt-text represent the same thing. So, if an image does not load for some reason, its alt-text describes the image.
For Search Engines
From the beginning of this article, we have read that search engines use alt-texts to understand the content of an image.
Page Ranking
Including the keyword in the alt-text of an image improves the web page’s page rank. This is because a search engine scans the alt-text as content and uses keywords for page ranking.
For Visually Impaired Users
Visually impaired users usually use screen readers to go through a web page. Screen readers cannot read images, but they can read alt-texts. Thus, the user will know that there is an image and what it is showing.
After learning about alt-texts and all their advantages, I’m pretty sure you can comprehend their importance. Now the question arises, how are we supposed to write good alt-text that enhances page ranking? Let’s learn that in the next section.
Tips to Write Good Alt-Text
Knowing about images and alt-text is essential, but the ability to write good alt-text plays a more significant role. Let’s learn how to!
Descriptive
Alt-texts act as alternatives to images, so they should describe the image adequately, keeping the relevancy intact.
Short in Length
Alt-texts should be concise and within 125 characters. This is because screen readers usually cut off alt-text if it exceeds that limit. In that case, the user will not even know an image exists.
Usage of Keywords
Including the keyword in alt-texts without stuffing helps in SEO. It lets search engines know that the web page contains images that are relevant to the topic. This increases the page rank.
Images Should Not Replace Text
The images should complement the text and not substitute since search engines cannot read pictures even if it contains the text.
Phrases to Omit
The alt-text need not contain phrases like “image of”, “picture of”, etc. Alt-text itself defines that it describes the image.
Use Tags for Long Descriptions
The tag <img longdesc=""> can be used for images with long descriptions.
Form Buttons
Form buttons containing an image saying “submit”, “sign up”, “search”, etc., should also be provided with an alt-text.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is search engine optimization?
SEO is a method of making and modifying web pages so that they have increased traffic. It ranks a website and displays it accordingly when searched on Google or any other search engine.
What is image SEO?
Image SEO is the optimization of images so that it increases the traffic to a web page. This increases the page rank in a typical Google search and Google Images.
Name some optimization techniques for images.
Some optimization techniques for images include naming image files, resizing or compressing images, adding open graph images, using image sitemaps, content delivery networks, lazy loading, and browser caching.
What is alt-text?
Alt-text is short for alternative text. It is often called alt attributes or alt tags. It is a text alternative for images.
Why should we add images and alt-text?
We should use alt-text because they provide an alternative to images for humans and search engines and help enhance the page rank of a website.
What are some tips for writing good alt-text?
While writing alt-text for images, try to make them descriptive and short. In case of long alt-text, use the “longdesc” tag. Use the keyword in the alt-text, but ensure the text does not replace the images. Do not use phrases like “image of” and add alt-texts for form buttons.
Conclusion
SEO images and alt-text are essential parts of a web page, especially regarding search engine optimization. Images make a web page more appealing to viewers. Search engines cannot read these images, so alt-texts are used. Apart from search engines, alt-texts are helpful to visually impaired humans. So, in this article, we learned how to optimize images and alt-text, but optimization isn’t only for images and alt-text.
Apart from this, you may read other articles on SEO like
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