In this article, we’ll explore how you can apply SEO practices to your graphics intensive website. Goggle, like many other search engines, is unable to actually “read” the images on your pages. Search engines are designed to search and index related text content.
For example, if you have an image of a Ferrari car on your web page, this does not actually mean anything to a search engine, until you begin to place related text content onto your page to indicate that your image is indeed about a Ferrari.
In order to increase your search engine rankings, it is extremely important to put text that directly relates to the content of your page. So for example, if you are promoting a particular smart phone model, all of your text and images should relate directly to that specific item.
This method of optimizing your webpage “convinces” the search engine that the content is exactly what it claims to be. Focusing your pages for specific content is simply known as Search Engine Optimization (SEO). But how does SEO work for sites that are graphics-intensive – like “desktop wallpaper” sites and “art gallery” sites for example?
These types of sites get the viewer’s attention by the images presented – not by any text shown. Also, if you try to “hide” your text, that’s an easy way to get your entire website de-indexed from all search engines – so doing that would be a bad idea. With that said, let’s explore some ways in which we can apply SEO to a graphics-intensive website.
Using SEO On Your Graphics Intensive Website
- Put some descriptive text both above and below your images. Ensure that your text is focused around the content in your images. For example, if your images make up a gallery of Nokia smart phones – don’t suddenly start writing about Nike shoes.
- Ensure that the headings on your page relate directly to the images and text content of your page.
- Google and other search engines focus allot on text, so ensure that your pages ALWAYS begin with text – and not images. Placing an opening heading / paragraph at the top of your pages will not hurt.
- Create separate text-intensive pages (like articles) that can be used for SEO. Ensure that these pages also relate to the content of your site – and insert links to your graphics-intensive pages. The search engines will index these pages along with the links to the graphics intensive pages.
- Be descriptive with the HTML code that directly relates to your images. Here’s an example shown below:
<img src=”nokia-lumia-520-3G-phone.jpg” title=”Nokia Lumia 520 3G Phone” alt=”Nokia Lumia 520 3G Phone” width=”400” height=”200”>
<figcaption>Nokia Lumia 520 3G Phone</figcaption>
In the example shown above, everything points to the fact that the image is about the Nokia Lumia 520 3G Phone. There’s also a caption placed below the image (using the figcaption tag) to emphasize this point. Even the JPG file also uses the name of the phone. You can be sure that search engines will properly “read” your images when using this method.
Using External SEO For Your Graphics Intensive Website
- Use Off-Site SEO to point to your graphics-intensive pages. This involves building links with other websites to improve your overall “link reputation”. When doing this, ensure that your linked text contains your important keyword phrase.
- When doing external linking, always try to get links from sites that relate in some way to your niche. If the site that links to you is considered an “authority site” by the search engines, this is even better. External SEO and link building is more about quality than quantity.
Conclusion
Depending on the type of graphics-intensive website that you are creating, it may seem hard to include lots of text just to satisfy the search engines – but it must be done, since search engines cannot “read” images.
By including “targeted” text that relates to your graphics, you are giving your website the best chance to acquire high search engine rankings while at the same time giving your visitors the content that they came for. Ensure to use these SEO tactics for best results.