What’s Image Search Optimization?

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Image search optimization targets specific keywords for image searches to increase page rank and attract new visitors. This involves relevant image file names, high-resolution images, appropriate captions and descriptions, and surrounding text that complements the image. Image naming, quality, alt attributes, captions, and surrounding text are all factors to consider for effective optimization.

Image search optimization is a form of search engine optimization (SEO) that focuses on targeting specific keywords for image searches. This strategy helps different web pages rank higher in the search engine result pages (SERPs) for images, helping to increase the page rank for the main site. Many websites will also target keywords via image searches in addition to standard searches to attract new visitors who may click on ads, buy products, or grow revenue in other ways. Websites that use image search optimization often include relevant image file names, high-resolution images, appropriate captions and descriptions, and surrounding text that complements the image.

One of the components of this form of SEO is image naming. Websites interested in moving up in search results often strategically name their images to match searchable keywords. This often involves removing the letters and numbers commonly assigned to images from cameras or imaging software and replacing them with relevant words and phrases.

Search engines cannot distinguish individual words if they are placed together without spaces or dividers. Since spaces cannot exist in online filenames, words must be separated by dashes or underscores to allow for proper SEO. The words you choose should fit the picture and try to match targeted keywords that are commonly searched for or that apply to the rest of the website. Image quality and resolution is also a factor to consider, and higher quality images and different image resolutions get more influence on search engines.

Descriptions and captions are also useful for inserting an image into search results. The alt attribute, which displays a description to readers who hover over the image, should contain your targeted keyword or related keywords. This space is another opportunity to use image search optimization, but it should remain consistent, useful to website visitors, and relevant to the website as a whole. Captions can also provide more information to readers by including relevant keywords.

Another opportunity for image search optimization lies in the text surrounding the image. Some keywords in the text that match the image denomination and alternative description could help lift an image in the SERPs. As with other forms of SEO, targeted keyword phrases only need to appear a few times in the image name, description, and body text. Not only will this reduce the chance of search engines marking your page as spam due to too many keywords, but it will also increase your relevance to readers, making them more likely to visit your page again.




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