While Search Engine Optimization (SEO) does not provide overnight traffic to your website, it is a long-term strategy that can help brings in a steady stream of leads.
Many factors go into Search Engine Optimization, including quality content, page load times, and website authority. Today, we will focus on image optimization and why you should not overlook this seemingly simple SEO strategy.
What is Image Optimization?
Image optimization is one of the key strategies you can use for improving your SEO rankings and website performance. Image optimization is creating and delivering high-quality images in the ideal format, size, and resolution to increase user engagement and improve the user experience.
Not only do you want to create a visually appealing website that your customers will enjoy, but image optimization also helps search engine crawlers read and understand page context. Web crawlers gather information from billions of web pages and organize it in the search index. If you accurately label and tag the images, it improves how your site ranks in the search engines.
3 Tips for Image Optimization
There are three main priorities you need to be thinking about for image optimization:
Image Size
Find the middle ground when choosing the image sizes for your website. The bigger the images, the slower your website pages load – which means that you have a higher bounce rate because visitors leave the website quickly.
But if the images are too small, you will encounter issues with pixelation and poor-quality photos. So, if you are reducing the image sizes, then be careful not to compromise quality.
Follow these current industry guidelines for sizing website images:
- Large image sizes or full-screen background images should be no bigger than 1MB
- Smaller images should be 300KB or less
- The standard dimensions of your images should be 1024 by 680 pixels
Icon vs. Stock Photo
Using stock photos is fine, and stock photo websites are the most convenient for most small businesses. But these stock photos will not necessarily help your SEO strategy because other websites often use the same images.
Just like you need unique copywriting on your website, it is just as essential to upload amazing images whenever possible. One of the most straightforward solutions for optimizing your images is uploading your portfolio of before and after photos.
Additionally, make sure you always use alternative text (alt tags) with your target keywords, so it makes it easier for search engines to index your image content. Alt tags also help search engines rank your pages.
Hero images
Hero images can serve as a powerful communication tool when used correctly. Think of the hero image as an introduction. First, it gives users a sense of what to expect from the rest of your website. Then, when the hero image grabs the user’s attention, it prevents them from bouncing off the page.
Avoid large hero images. These oversized photos can lead to pixelation, which negatively impacts image optimization and makes ranking your website in search engines harder.
Make sure your image is sized appropriately to display correctly on a desktop, mobile, and tablet.
Lead Generation with SEO
The right SEO strategy is an invaluable investment because of the number of leads you can bring in through organic traffic. If you are looking for lead generation solutions, then Modernize is the team to call. We are here to help!
