Image optimization can mean different things to different people. If you’ve ever tested your site speed on Google’s PageSpeed Insights, you’ve probably seen a recommendation to optimize your images like so:
In this example, image optimization refers to decreasing the size of your images. Image optimization also means optimizing your images for search. This article will cover both forms of image optimization.
Why is Optimizing Your Images for Search Important?
Searchers may discover your blog, and a new article and could become new followers because they found your image.
In the example below, a tired mother or father may want to get away, bring their toddler with them, and still have a vacation… this said searcher may search for ‘toddler-friendly resorts’ (this keyword actually has 110 monthly searches in the US). Google Images may give the following result:
After a quick glance, the multiple photos collage catches my eye and even tells me what resorts they are at. It turns out the same blogger added the photo collage to her blog, ‘Have Baby Will Travel’. I now have found a new blogger I’d like to follow because this blog addresses my need of traveling with a toddler, and probably has some tips I could learn.
When Optimizing Images for Search, you want to Fill Out Image Meta Data
Image metadata is the information about the image for crawlers such as Google-Bot to understand what your image is about. Let’s walk through the different fields and where to find them.
Here are a few tips on optimizing your images for search:
Do keyword research and include the keyword in your image alt tag and in the image file name. Example: If you are showing an image of a baby-friendly resort in the Maldives then your file name would be baby-friendly-resort-maldives.jpg. Your alt tag would be ‘XXX Resort Baby Friendly Resort In the Maldives’.
Keep your alt tags 16 words or under and don’t spam the alt tag.
Add a caption to your image, if an explanation would help the reader.
Use original images if you have them. I know stock images are easy and they’re everywhere, but if you have an original image that can capture the searcher, use it!
Have the image on the page tell the story your article is conveying.
Don’t have your image be a separate attachment page, many times this shows as duplicate content which is not an SEO best practice.
Interesting Read: Beginner's Guide to Image SEO - Optimize Images for Search Engines
Optimizing Your Images for Speed
You want your blog to load very fast as speed is a ranking factor. By optimizing your images and helping them load quicker, you are actually helping your SEO. Many times I will go to sites and the images may take 5 seconds to load, which makes the page very heavy and not very fast, and you can quickly lose your reader.
Before uploading your images into WordPress, first, lose weight and compress your images. There are many different tools you can use, some of my favorite tools that don’t sacrifice quality are:
JPEGmini - Great for one-off photos and free
Kraken IO - One-off and Bulk upload option - free version and paid version
Optimizilla - Allows bulk upload, free version, and paid version
Alternatively, you can use a Wordpress Plugin, such as reSmush.it, to optimize your images.
We recommend that images be resized using an offline application by the blogger before uploading to 2000px on the longest side. Using online plugins can tax the server as the server has to do the image work. Multiply that by x100 blogs and BoardingArea might have some potential issues with our bloggers uploading 100+ photo posts for Trip Reports. One blogger is currently uploading nearly 500 images at one time to the system.
Interesting Read: 7 Best WordPress Image Compression Plugins Compared (2022)