May 29th, 2010 by Nick

Anybody offering search engine optimisation services will tell you how important keywords are and how vital content is. This is of course very true, however sometimes it can benefit a company and their website if we all stop looking at the hard data and facts and think about more creative, innovative or light-hearted ways in which we can get our messages across. There is on easy way to do this and that is via images.

Before dismissing the idea of images as part of your link building strategies or increase of online traffic, consider web user trends, including your own. Chances are there is not a person out there who does not love Google images, whatever the reason. Perhaps it is for a quick joke to mock a friend, or it could be for a presentation at work and you do not have any suitable images on your system. From a personal perspective, most people are attracted by images and want to look at them, so with this in mind, including them within your search engine optimization does not seem like such a silly idea after all.

Images are also a lot more user friendly. For example, if a person is browsing the web for various pieces of information, then they are more likely to stop and look at an image than they are to stop and read a full web page crammed with content. Research in website readers has shown that people are more likely to skim online text as opposed to thoroughly read it, but it is highly unlikely that they will not stop to view an intriguing or interesting image. Images can also be controversial and amusing, which not only makes them great for grabbing attention, it also makes them more likely to be shared amongst web users.

Clever images which are mocking current situations or giving a controversial opinion in a more funny or jovial way are usually very well received. Get as much input as possible from web developers and design teams to come up with the most imaginative images. Always ensure the images have clear title tags so that they will show up in searches and entice users to click through to your website. Images can become very famous indeed if done correctly, so take a bit of time and effort into deciding what image content to display to get the most out of them.

One of the best things about images over any other form of SEO content is the speed in which it will be distributed to other people. Most images are easy to download or save, enabling people to re-distribute them to people for either personal or business reasons. There is not much else that spreads as quickly as an online image; videos do get some exposure, but not as much as images. For this reason, it is a very good idea to put your company name or logo, or at least a website, onto the actual image. That way, wherever in the world the image goes, it can always be linked back to you.

Link to us

If you want to link to this blog, copy and paste the following HTML code to your website.