Image optimization is essential when it comes to SEO for movers. Believe it or not, you may be losing potential visitors, readers, and customers because your image optimization is subpar. This is because Google considers over 200 factors when deciding where to place a website in the search results for a user’s query. One of these elements is the images on your website. Well-optimized photos won’t boost mediocre content to the top of search results, but they will set your site apart from those that don’t take the time to do so. That being said, improving the quality of an image doesn’t take much work. You may attract more visitors, generate more leads, and ultimately increase your sales by adjusting your existing image approach. Therefore, without further ado, here are some tips on using images to improve SEO.
What exactly is image optimization?
Creating and providing high-quality images is a crucial part of image optimization. Labeling photos with descriptive information helps search engine crawlers comprehend their context on a webpage. Additionally, a page’s image weight has grown increasingly significant as image use on the web has expanded. HTTP Archive reports that images now account for 21% of the typical page’s importance and that this percentage has likely increased over the years.
As a result, picture quality and size are essential elements of responsive web design and SEO. Furthermore, the website load speed and user experience benefit from picture size reduction without losing quality. Therefore, image optimization may increase your site’s visibility in search results, boosting your traffic and, ultimately, your sales and customer loyalty. That being said, if you want to optimize your images, you need to do the following.
1. Understand your keywords and keyword phrases
Using relevant keywords with your images is just as important as your website content. Therefore, you need to make sure you do your keyword research. However, you most likely know the most popular keywords people use to find you online. If you’re unsure what keywords to use, you should look into it. Find out what people are looking for using Google’s Keyword Planner or another keyword research tool. Once you have the ideal keywords, you can optimize your photos for search engines.
2. Use the appropriate format
Numerous image formats are available, and it can be challenging to determine which is best for what. However, what makes matters worse is that if you do not select the proper format, you may encounter problems when you try to display the image on your website. For this reason, you need to be sure you’re using the correct file type for your photos before uploading them to your site. The most common formats you will find on the internet are:
- PNG: Produces higher-quality photos but has a larger file size.
- JPEG: Image quality may suffer, but you may modify the quality level to strike a decent balance.
- WebP: This format is the only one that works in Chrome and Firefox, and you can choose between lossless and lossy compression.
Choosing the suitable image format is going to help with your movers website design, and will also improve the overall user experience.
3. Don’t forget captions and alt tags when using images to improve SEO
Although people can interpret images, search engine crawlers need more context. This is why alt tags are necessary. Without them, search engines cannot properly index your images. Furthermore, a reasonable alt tag can assist those with visual impairments understand the larger picture. But not only that, search engines crawl the alt tags if an image does not load for whatever reason. Therefore, you must ensure that your alt tag has more information than the file name. Use between 10 and 15 words to convey the essence of the image.
Additionally, it would be best if you thought about the captions of your images. In contrast, to file names and alt text, captions are viewable and may improve a user’s time on your website. In fact, including captions may have a positive impact on search engine optimization by increasing user satisfaction and engagement rates.
4. Make sure the images are mobile friendly
Google’s search algorithm prioritizes mobile-friendly content by primarily indexing the mobile version of a site. Therefore, the images you are using must be compatible with mobile devices. How? The solution is to make sure your images are scalable. Confident website builders and designs allow you to scale images based on the viewing device’s width. You may do this by including some specialized CSS code in your website. Making your images mobile-friendly is also necessary if you take digital marketing for movers seriously.
5. Image compression will improve page load times
Image compression plays a crucial role in any comprehensive approach to website optimization. Why? Because, in a nutshell, a quicker page load time improves the user experience and raises your site’s visibility in search engine results. There are numerous excellent online tools for compressing your images. File sizes of fewer than 100 KB are generally considered high quality. However, remember that Google doesn’t analyze each image’s dimensions individually. The full page size is what it explores instead. For this reason, you may attempt to reduce your picture to 30–50 KB if the quality variations are not too noticeable.
6. Give your image files appropriate names
And the last of the tips on using images to improve SEO that we will mention is file naming. If you want search engine crawlers to quickly understand your picture, you should rename it before posting it to your website. Don’t just call the file “IMG 0451,” include descriptive keywords that relate to the content of the picture, just as you would in the alt text. This will increase the probability that your image will appear in Google’s image search results.
