It is important that you choose the images carefully. An image that is not related to the content on the page will be confusing to the user, and an image that is blurred or poorly cropped will only make your page look bad and unprofessional. Make sure that each image you use has a clear relationship to what’s on the page and looks good.

Image optimization for web and SEO

Images are very important in an effort to make your content accessible and engaging to users, and therefore image optimization for the web is one of the very important factors in SEO. Image optimization is the process of creating and delivering high-quality images in the ideal format, size, and resolution to increase user engagement. It also includes precise labeling of images so that search engines can read them and understand the context of the page.

First, images provide search engines with important contextual information. Secondly, optimized images speed up page loading, which increases user engagement and search engine rankings.

You have to be careful not to use images that you don’t have the rights to, but you can find a lot of resources online that provide free images for companies to use. Freepik.com, Pixabay.com are just a few of the sites with high-quality free images.

Adjust the size of images

According to research, images make up an average of 21% of the total weight of web pages. Since images consume more bytes than any other part of the site, their size definitely affects performance. If you reduce the size of images without reducing their quality, page loading time improves, and therefore the experience of site visitors.

Large images slow down the site, which leads to a poor user experience. If we state that a one-second delay in loading a website leads to a 7% drop in conversions, and that about 40% of people abandon a site that takes more than three seconds to load, then it certainly becomes clearer why image optimization for the web is important.

Image size and file size are not the same thing. Image size refers to the dimensions of the image (e.g., 1024 to 680 pixels). File size is the amount of space required to store it on a server (e.g., 350 kilobytes).

Images with a higher resolution and larger dimensions significantly slow down page loading. Optimizing images for the web requires reducing the size of files so that they can work well on the web. It is also important to choose the appropriate photo format. PNG, JPEG, and GIF are popular formats, and each has its own advantages. Choose the appropriate format depending on your needs.

How to best adjust the size

There are numerous tools that allow us to get this job done. It is important to take into account the right compression ratio and preservation of image quality when optimizing images for the web. Ideally, you should experiment with file types and compression rates to see what works best for each image. Many image editing tools, most notably Adobe Photoshop, have a “save for the web” option, which automatically minimizes file size while optimizing image quality.

If you’re not familiar with using Photoshop or don’t have someone to do it for you, there are a number of good tools that can help with this job. Our recommendation is the photo compression tool tinypng.com.

Another option that helps with the problem of photos on the website is the use of CDN (content delivery network). A CDN is a network of servers located in different geographical locations, which allows for a shorter response period to requests, and therefore faster loading of the site. Google’s CDN is located at the following address. There are numerous CDN offers, and in addition to Google’s, some of the more well-known ones are Cloudfare, Cachefly, Keycdn …

Name the pictures carefully

Choosing the right file name is important for a website’s SEO and for ranking image search results. Before uploading any image, give the file a relevant name that will include the appropriate keywords. Filenames should make sense for both search engines and people.

Alt text, or alt tags, are used to describe the appearance and function of an image on a page. Their purpose is multifaceted. In the first place, people with visual impairments will use screen readers to hear what is in the picture. If, for some reason, the image cannot be uploaded to the site, this text describing what is in the image is removed instead. And last but not least, they point search engines to what exactly is in the image, thus helping the image to be properly indexed (allowing the image to be displayed during a specific search, i.e. a search for certain keywords).

Add images to Sitemap

Google It encourages site owners to send them a sitemap to help them better index your pages and add them to the index. They also allow you to include images in your sitemap or create a separate sitemap for the image to submit.

If you use WordPress, there are plugins that you can use to generate an image sitemap , such as Google XML Image Sitemaps . By providing Google with clear information about the images on your site, you increase the likelihood that they will appear in Google results when searching for images.

Digitizer is here to clear up all your doubts and guide you on what a good digital marketing is. Contact us today.